Two days after Sophia and I had placed the bugs, I was putting the finishing touches on the backpack first-aid station and relaxing myself into my work. Today, Sophia had other obligations, allowing me to get quite a bit of work done. The models used to display the Omega-activity were getting better and better as we gathered more data and Galatea was able to incorporate it.
In addition, the excavation-work for Pandora’s Box, the gene-lab was done, now the robots sealed the interior with a thick shell of concrete, making it fully air-tight. The final placement was even more secure than I had originally planned, as Galatea had added a long corridor with blast-doors and a second airlock to make sure that no matter what happened inside, without my explicit knowledge nothing could leave the room.
The final specs included enough propane and liquid oxygen in insulated tanks to thoroughly purge the room, including the equipment inside, by turning it into a burning hell, hot enough to melt iron. In addition, the placement of the tanks in the four corners of the room should induce a spinning motion in the air, creating a flaming cyclone. Similarly, in the outer airlock was a similar system, aimed at the corridor between the lab and the lock, set to trigger if the inner airlock was breached while the inner door of the outer airlock was open. No biological agent could survive conditions like that, at least nothing I was aware of. There might be a Powered or dedicated equipment that could survive, but that was beside the point, if the system ever triggered, the only thing they would find inside would be metal slack and concrete, scoured clean by fire.
The inner airlock had a decontamination shower, bathing the inside in a sanitizing mist, followed by a strong dose of ultraviolet radiation and heat of roughly sixty degrees celsius. While there were microbes that might be able to survive one of those measures, I doubted that there were any that survived all three.
So, with lower pressure in the lab and the corridor between the airlocks, an inert atmosphere of nitrogen, forcing me to work in a sealed suit with its own air-supply and no unsealed, physical link between the inside and the outside, safe for the airlocks, I was confident that nothing could escape.
Part of me was amused by the paranoia both I and Galatea showed in regards to biological agents, compared to other, dangerous objects. I had no problem running around in an armour, powered by a self-designed energy crystal that would explode like a decently sized nuke if exposed to conditions I was not certain of, I had no problem living in a bunker powered by an experimental, self-designed fusion-generator, but a virus I created by starting of with a common cold-virus? That scared me to the point that I was willing to work inside a crematorium, just to make sure that nothing went wrong. It was an interesting disconnect, not driven by logic, but irrational emotions and Galatea had ‘learned’ those emotions from me, making her just as scared of the viruses I would be working with, even if they could not affect her, no matter what they claimed in an old movie one should watch on fourth of July.
I was happily looking at the finished piece of equipment, when Galatea spoke up.
“Catherine, you were looking for a good public relations opportunity and muttered something about rescuing kittens, were you not? I think I have something, it is not about kittens, but should work just as well.”
“Oh? What do you have for me, daughter?”
From the speakers came a voice, slightly distorted but clearly understandable.
“You heard it folks, the New Brunsburg Police Department asks for your help in locating five year old Eliana Mathis. She was last seen on the upper hiking trail, wearing a blue t-shirt. For more information or if you want to actively search an area of forest, seek out the gathering point at the intersection Old Harbour Road and Tollhouse Road.
You heard it here first, Channel 8 Radio, thi…” The voice broke off and silence ruled.
“The call for assistance went out a few minutes ago, why don’t you go to the gathering place and offer your help, I’m sure no hero would be stupid enough to attack someone who volunteers to search for a lost child. My drones should be able to find her quickly and you can rescue her, as the hero you want to display.”
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The idea was sound, nothing stirred the hearts of people like children in danger, there was a reason why people rushed back into burning buildings to rescue them, even if I had a hard time understanding the sentiment. And if one of the League’s Heroes attacked me in public, when I just wanted to help, it would erode trust in the League to an extreme degree.
I quickly donned my armour and got ready to go when I realised that it might be a good idea to use the new Backpack First-Aid station, in case the child was hurt. The alternative was the Plasma-Cannon, which I rejected as the wrong message or nothing, which would be a waste of potential. If nothing else, I could test the balance of the new backpack.
It was strange, being out in armour while it was still clearly bright out, not even dusk. I had to take extra care when leaving, to make sure nobody was in sight, but I had become very good at entering and leaving the bunker unseen since I had found it.
Surfing down the road was a surreal experience, a lot of people pointed and gawked and, in total opposition to my normal attempt at stealth, I was happily surfing down the bicycle lane, even if I was not riding one. I even stopped at a red light, next to a cyclist who looked at me as if the aliens had landed and were about to fit him with a rectal probe.
Luckily, my strange appearance and mode of transportation did not cause a vehicular accident on my way, that would cause a different kind of news, something I wanted to avoid, and I got to the gathering spot in record time.
As I walked up, two police officers, standing next to a table at which a distressed looking woman sat, spotted me and freaked out a little. Both stared at me with open mouthed for a second, before realising what was walking up to them and they started to draw their weapons. Part of me was exasperated, the idea that standard police handguns would even mar the finish of my armour was utterly ridiculous but neither of them was aware of that.
Raising my hands in a placating, if useless, gesture I signaled my non-aggression. On the corner of my screen, I saw a camera-team of a small, local news station filming away.
“Please, officers, lower your weapons. I mean no harm and am just here to help.” I said, using one of the ‘friendly’ sounding voice distortion filters. My words had no effect, the policemen just started to shout contradictory things, ranging from ‘on your knees’ to ‘hand up’, to ‘drop your weapon’, even if I had no weapon in hand.
Just as I thought things would go bad because the officers had no idea how to handle a situation like this, a blue-red figure landed close to them with an audible thump. One of the two officers, whirled around and almost fired a shot at Skylar, who had literally dropped in from the sky.
“Good evening, Skylar. Are you here to aid the search efforts?” I asked, still in my friendly voice. At the same time, I turned my hands so my palms were pointed at him, less as a placating gesture and more because it brought the air-tasers in my balm in line, allowing me to stun him, if he attacked, but nobody had to know about that. Looking on from the side, it had to look quite amiable and de-escalating of me.
“Metis. Good evening.” he said to me, before turning to the policemen, “Officers, stand down, I doubt you could even put a scratch into that armour, you would only endanger civilians.”
“Thank you. Can someone show me a map of the already assigned search-areas and maybe a picture of the lost child? It is why we are here after all.” I asked, making my purpose here obvious.
The woman at the table perked up, for the first time realising that I was there, judging by her shocked look. She had to have been deep in thought to miss the spectacle before.
“Wha…? Yes, sure, here.” She started to stir, looking through papers on the table and I walked closer. The two policemen looked at me as if I was a poisonous snake or something similar and Skylar seemed to remain completely neutral.
On the table, the frantic woman had located a large map with various markings on it, showing where people were already looking and at which place the child had been seen last, and when. In addition, I was shown a picture of a little, brown-haired girl, without any outstanding features but enough to recognise her. In addition, I learned that the mother’s name was Kira Mathis, just in case I needed to put the girl at ease.
Making a show out of it, I extended a display-screen out of the first-aid backpack and looked at it, softly tapping with my gauntlets, as if I was entering data. It was, of course, just for show, I did not want to give away too much of my capabilities and using a prop seemed appropriate. Galatea sent out my drones and I turned, walking off.
As I did so, the camera-team approached me, holding a microphone under my nose.
“Good evening, I’m Miley Coles with Channel 4, Local News. Can I ask who you are and why you are here?” A young reporterette asked me.
“Good evening. I go by Metis, and why I am here should be obvious. To help. If you would excuse me, there is a lost child out there that needs to be found.”
With those words, I engaged my hover-mode, surfing off into the distance, aiming at an area roughly centered to the search area. The drones would do the searching, but getting the child would be my job.