Awakened: The Story of Maxwell Cain

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

The Tinkerer

They got out on the side of the highway, to the strange looks of the cab driver.  Max knew the routine by now and gave the driver three hundred dollars to stay where he was for a few hours.  After seeing the cash in his hand, the driver, like the others before him, enthusiastically agreed to take a break there.

They headed into the woods and started hiking in the direction of the Tinkerer’s home, one mile north of them.  All three were silent along the way.  Though they agreed the woods would be empty of patrols, they did not feel comfortable speaking.  Max could hear the strange calls from the birds in the trees, communicating to each other.  It was an eerie chirping sound that would start where they were, and one by one, be repeated by other birds in the distance in front of them until they could not hear it any longer.  Max looked up and saw the source of the sounds staring straight down at him.  The looks from the birds watching them made the forest seem even scarier.

Each of them could feel the haunting of the forest and quickened their steps until they were nearly at a jog.  Within minutes, they had arrived at the chain link fence on the outskirts of the complex.  It was a fifteen foot fence with razor sharp barbed wire wrapped around the top, ready to shred anyone who dared to attempt climbing it.

They did not have time to dig, and they knew the fence stretched around the entire lawn.  They had not brought any tools for cutting the chain links in the fence.  Luckily, they had Max, a walking, talking utility belt of abilities.  He went to work quickly on the fence, snapping each metal strand, one by one, until there was an opening large enough for them to crawl through.

They went through the opening and crouched low to run across the gravel road surrounding the lawn.  They hid behind a cluster of bushes, as they caught their breaths and decided their next course of action.  Before them was the fifty yard gap of open, manicured lawn.  They would have no cover and would be easily spotted by any patrols.  They decided it would be smartest to wait forty-five minutes to see if any troops came out.

The lawn itself appeared to have been daily manicured and had one single sprinkler head sitting in the middle.  The only flaws in the yard he could see were a few small holes scattered near the edge of the grass close to the road.  After they waited, they saw that no guards were patrolling the outside of the house.  They decided to make their run for it.

“Wait!”  Chloe cried out as they stood up to start running.

Max whispered back, “Chloe, what is it?  We have to go.”

Chloe responded worriedly, “I’ve been looking at that device in the center of the field and it just looks out of place.”  She pointed to the sprinkler head in the middle of the yard.

“What about it?”  Max asked, “It’s just a sprinkler.”

Chloe thought for a moment.  “I don’t think so.  Max, grab that rock over there and throw it into the grass.”  She indicated a ten pound rock at the edge of the road.

Max picked up the rock with his mind, feeling foolish, and easily threw it a few yards into the grass.  After he heard the thump of the rock hitting the soft dirt, he also heard a strange sound coming from the center of the yard.  It sounded like the hydraulic air compressor drills you hear at mechanic shops when they changed your tires.

Suddenly, the so-called “sprinkler head” rose out of the ground and turned in their direction.  A loud bang sounded from the machine, and the rock was blown into little pieces, leaving a crater in the earth similar to the ones he had seen before.

They all fell to the ground and hid in case anyone had heard the noise and came to investigate.  After a few minutes, nothing had happened, and Chloe spoke.  “He has an HG-3200 security system.  I’ve only studied them in robotics class and never actually seen one in action.  This entire lawn must be covered in pressure sensors to activate the weapon.”