Chapter 22
This would be a hell of a lot easier if I could see.
Seb moved slowly through the dark, one hand carefully keeping the power cable in a known position that was as far from his body as he could manage it without losing control of it.
The drones had been easy targets, their dimensional shifting left a warping that could be seen even in the dark.
He wasn’t sure if that was due to some sort of distortion effect, or if they naturally had…
indicator lights of some sort or something similar.
Either way, it didn’t matter, the two biggest threats in the cave were the easiest to deal with in the surprise of the moment.
That just left the rest… whatever the hell they were.
Human form infiltrators? Body jackers from the way they were speaking, I suppose, but now I don’t know if the people they jacked are still in there or not?
Honestly he was starting to count off all the tropes he was encountering, like some sort of check list.
My life has turned into someone’s shitty novel. Great. I swear, if my characters have had to deal with this because of me, I’m sorry, guys. I did not know.
Regardless, Seb now had a serious decision to make, and he knew damn well that he didn’t have enough information to make it.
Killing the drones was… easy, mentally speaking. Turned out to be easy physically speaking as well, but that wasn’t the issue. Morally, he could slaughter those all day without a pang of guilt haunting his dreams.
The Mengele labcoats, normally he’d count as even less of a moral quandary.
Anyone willing to do what they were speaking of, well, his only concern would be ensuring that he hadn’t made a mistake in identification…
theoretically at least. Seb supposed that he wouldn’t know for sure until he put one down, but he certainly didn’t think he’d be crying any tears over their bodies.
Enslaved victims being puppetted around, though, was a different matter.
Logically, he thought he could do it… if he had to. The tears would come… later… but he hoped he could do what had to be done.
But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t look for options.
Besides, killing them wouldn’t have much of an impact, I suspect. These idiots are mooks, not leadership, that much I’d bet on… and I don’t bet. Ok, new plan… murder’s off the table, but I can live with some good old fashioned psychological warfare. Let’s see if they can.
*****
“What the hell was that?”
The edge of panic was just barely kept out his voice as the speaker flailed in the darkness, trying vainly to locate a reference point from which he could orient himself.
“One of the children must have woken up and gotten loose. Human children are Refrakiota.”
The last word reverberated in ways that didn’t sound like it could come from a human throat, and for good reason.
“Use english when im a human’s body, idiot. You’ll damage it, and you’re not here on your power allotment.”
“There’s no good word in English,” the speaker complained, “but fine. They’re gremlins. Happy?”
“Ecstatic.” The leader said dryly. “Now shut up and find the little gremlin.”
A scraping sound set them all on edge as another high pitched giggling sound echoed off the walls.
“Aren’t human children supposed to be scared of the dark?” Another voice complained. “I’m sure that was part of the briefing!”
Before anyone could respond to that whining complaint, a loud bang caused them all to jump in place and look pointlessly into the pitch surrounding them.
What was that?
*****
Oops.
Seb rubbed at his shoulder where he’d slammed it into a crate containing… something… the noise it made had managed to startle him there, in the dark, despite being the one to set it in motion in the first place.
Feeling around in the dark, moving mostly on his hands and knees, while controlling the power lead so he didn’t do very nasty things to his body’s cellular structure, well it wasn’t something he wanted to ever repeat.
Frankly, doing all that the once was one time more than he wanted in his memories.
This would be a lot easier if my heart wasn’t beating so damned loud, though… How the hell can no one else hear that?
Bravery wasn’t his strength. He knew that about himself, he wouldn’t quake in terror, but he would freeze in indecision in the face of danger. Now, though, Seb was pushing through that and just… making a decision.
Probably a stupid one, but better that than none at all.
As he crawled through the dark, though, Seb inevitably brushed against something he shouldn’t have.
*****
“What the hell was that?”
The panicked voice sounded sharper in the blackness, causing everyone to jump.
“What are you screaming about?”
“Something touched me!”
“Calm down, you probably just brushed against something.”
“I can tell the difference between me moving and something else moving!”
The angry comments shooting back and forth would likely have continued if not for a quiet, yet surprisingly clear voice speaking up.
“I’m sorry. Didn’t see you there.”
There was a long silence.
“Who the hell was that!?”
*****
Seb listened carefully as he fumbled around as quietly as he could, keeping the position of the person he’d touched carefully in mind as they continued panicking about the quiet voice in the dark.
He found what he needed near the edge of the cave, a nice sized rock that he could hold easily in one hand as he crawled back.
“Everyone, it’s just one of the kids! Calm down, we’ll get the lights back on and call in more breknari to deal with it.”
That voice was loud and clear, guiding him right to its source with no issue.
Seb paused, listening to the ranting but for the sound of shuffling in the dark. He inched closed, one hand filled with a power cable he didn’t trust to let go of, and the other with a rock he could just barely grasp.
It didn’t take long to isolate his prey, though, and Seb carefully set aside every instinct he had that told him he didn’t want to cause pain.
He didn’t, but his wants had nothing to do with the situation.
When he had the location pinpointed, he eased in close and found his target with a feathery touch…
only then did he strike, bringing the rock down as hard as he could.
The crunch of bone twisted his guts up, but Seb was already moving away when the screaming started.
“Something hit me! I think my foot is broken!”
More shuffling in the dark, masked by the screaming, told Seb that some of the others were moving. Getting closer.
Perfect.
He waited, silent and hidden in the darkness as the panic spread. It was a strange feeling, being the cause of fear. Seb could admit that there was something in it that he found… thrilling.
He’d never desired to provoke fear in anyone he’d ever known, never wanted to cause pain. Most of his previous life had been guided by that one light in the darkness.
Less it harm others, do as ye will.
And he took that seriously, to his core. It wasn’t a decision he made, it was who he was. Don’t cause pain, at least not intentionally.
Seb now put that aside.
As the shuffling moved through the darkness, the complete lack of light in the deep cave something he couldn’t get used to, Seb waited for them to get close. When they did…
He swung.
Another crack of bone breaking, this time a shin if the height was any way to judge, and another scream of pain. The body hit the ground as Seb moved away, ignoring the pained screaming that was grating against his very soul.
More panic was spreading now, in the dark, and he forced a childish laugh before he moved to his next position, feeding the fear that stank up the darkness.
*****
“Someone, find that little monster!”
The researchers were yelling, screaming, and generally making no sense as the chaos refused to die.
Those not in total panic mode were flailing around, trying to find anything that they could use to cast light in the cave, most of them stumbling and tripping over equipment, beds, and each other in their rush.
No one could say what was happening with any clarity, but they all knew that things had gone inexplicably badly, and not one of them had any idea why or how.
Without power to call for support, there was nothing they could do to change their fortunes in any direct way, for that matter.
The childish giggles coming from the darkness were not helping.
*****
Seb was sweating buckets, and only part of that was from the heat in the caverns.
Honestly, he wasn’t sure if it was the intensity of the situation, the heat, or the physical exertion that was causing the worst of it, but he was pretty sure he’d already lost some significant weight just from sweating it out.
If I don’t get those kids out of here soon, I’ll probably be in a bad way.
He couldn’t remember how long someone could deal with this sort of exertion and heat, but Seb was pretty sure that it wasn’t as long as he’d prefer, especially with limited conditioning backing him up.
With that sobering thought in mind, Seb allowed the panic and chaos he’d started to continue on its way while he focused on the problem at hand.
Found it.
His hand felt the cool steel of the medical style table he’d been feeling around for, and Seb followed it up to the table-top, where his hand closed around the ankle of one of the victims.
He quickly tagged the location for a rift, ducking back down to check the base of the table.
Bingo. It’s on wheels. Good, He thought as he disabled the wheel locks. The rough floor of the cavern would make using them a little tougher, but anything was better than trying to pick people up and lug them around in the dark.
He crawled around behind it, then closed his eyes and opened the rift before putting his weight into the table and pushing.
*****
The blinding light that seared everyone’s eyes somehow only made the darkness all the worse as everyone instinctively looked in its direction and instantly covered their pained eyes as they saw nothing but blobs against their retina no matter where they looked.
“I can’t see!”
“What was that light?”
The sound of something scraping against stone rose above the general din of panic, the researchers stumbling around as they shielded their eyes against the light only to have it suddenly vanish and leave them all staring at spots fading to black once more.
“What the hell was that!?”
“I think it was a bridge fracture?”
There was silence after that.
“Did… did someone send backup?”
There was no response in the darkness.
*****
One down. The kid will hold, I hope. But this is going to take longer than I thought.
Seb was sweating through his clothing, his right arm was sore now from lugging the heavy power cable around, but he didn’t dare leave it lying around, if only because he might trip over the damn thing and the human form wasn’t really suited to tanking the full output of a reactor.
Pushing the gurney across the stone floor had taken both more time and energy than he’d thought it would, and he honestly didn’t know if he could get the rest out the same way before the invaders stumbled on something to flip the script on him.
He knew too well that, sooner or later… most probably sooner than later… at least one of them was going to finish fumbling around and figure out that the reactor was perfectly fine, and the trunk line had just been disconnected.
Once that happened, well it was pretty easy to follow the thick line back to the kid who was lugging it around for fear of leaving it to be tripped over in the dark.
How the hell do I speed this up? There’s another, what, nine people here? Something like that, not counting the Mengele wannabes.
He needed a way to get everyone out in a hurry, but what way that was…
I need a moving rift… wait…
Moving rifts were a thing, he knew well. He’d used them himself, after all, to get to Toronto, and would use them again to spread his network across the world. However, Seb had never heard of any experiments on using a moving rift outside a stable reference frame.
Would that work? Someone must have tried it… what don’t I remember any reports about it?
In fairness, he hadn’t studied most of those he had to admit. With Al available, he had been free to focus on other tasks and let the VI handle the minutia with reasonable confidence that he’d be able to refer back at will.
Seb knew that he could risk ducking out of the cave to consult Al, but every second that passed was a clock ticking down. Once they had the reactor reconnected, there was no chance he’d be able to get anyone else out… likely not even himself.
Screw it. I’ll gamble.
This was wholly unlike him, and Seb was intimately aware of that. Normally he wouldn’t make a call like this, he’d look for other ways until someone else handled the problem. He didn’t like risk.
Sometimes, though, you just had to throw the dice.
Seb felt around, orienting himself as he located the closest gurney and felt around it for where the edges were.
I’ll have to link the rift to the gurney, but keep it outside the frame… tricky. I usually use four points to secure the edges. I think I can do it with two, but it’ll affect the size.
Seb thought fast and realized that he was basically standing in the center of a makeshift hospital room.
That’ll work.
He quickly located the IV shoved into the kid’s arm and pulled it clear, following the tube back to the pole holding the drugged bag up.
In a flash he had that torn apart, the pieces breaking easily into two with a fast twist. Seb then jabbed them into the gurney at both ends before he moved around to find a second.
*****