TINA guided Mod’s group through the rest of sublevel 29 and to the connecting stairwell to sublevel 30. The deeper they went, the more the halls reminded Mod of a prison—even more so than the cell block they’d passed through. There was nothing but concrete and metal for the final stretch.
They didn’t meet any more resistance. No more guards. No more test subjects.
Not a single soul.
Mod wasn’t sure how that boded for the bottom level of Gnosis.
Mod stalked forward with inhuman silence, never relaxing his rifle. Arsenal continued helping Athena. The pair walked a healthy distance behind. Mod didn’t complain. He was quieter, and he felt confident in his abilities now against pretty much everything that Gnosis could throw at him.
Besides, Arsenal and Athena had done enough already. This was his mission. Lock was his friend. His responsibility.
The connecting stairwell was a wide sweeping thing without rails, without piping. The group walked in silence under the red emergency lighting and soon they made it to the bottom. A set of blast doors marked the entrance to Sublevel 30.
Power had been cut to these doors too, and they didn’t have time to force their way through.
Mod stared at the door a moment and formed the question to TINA. He didn’t hear her voice or see text in his HUD, but the solution came to him.
He pressed a hand to the door’s control panel. Nanites slithered into the seams of the metal. After a moment, he concentrated. Power surged from his battery, through the nanites, and into the door’s mechanisms.
The locks turned with a series of thunks, and the blast doors slid apart enough for them to slip through.
There was a single straight hallway, large enough to drive a bus through. Red emergency lights stretched off into the gloom, but Mod could see clear across it. Every two hundred feet or so, there was another set of blast doors.
Mod stalked forward, scrutinizing the hall as he walked. His HUD highlighted near-invisible wear paths on the ground. Three rooms had been used extensively.
Lock was behind one of those rooms—the one at the end of the hall.
Arsenal and Athena’s footsteps echoed quietly behind him. By now, the nanites had stabilized Athena enough that she could walk on her own.
Mod pressed on until they stood in front of Lock’s door. Then he pressed his hand against the door’s control panel. Mod swapped to his pistol, then the three of them fanned out around the door in a breach position. When the nanites were ready, he sent power through them.
The door slid open. Shouts came from within.
Arsenal slid her pocket camera around and Mod saw the room through its lens.
The room beyond was a large biomedical lab, but right now, Mod was concerned about the four guards taking cover behind an instrument panel.
Athena looked over at Mod, silently asking if he wanted cover. Mod shook his head.
Mod raised his pistol and his impact shield, then stepped through the blast doors. Shots rang out.
The guards barely had a chance to fire back. Two shots clanged off of Mod’s shield. By then, all four guards were writhing on the ground as nanites wrapped around their faces.
Frightened scientists huddled on the other side of the room. All five of them were vampires.
One of them took a tentative step forward with her hands raised. Her name tag read Dr. Evelyn Carter.
“We’re unarmed,” she said, glancing nervously at the writhing guards.
Another muttered, “Please don’t hurt us!”
Mod stared at both of them. “Don’t get in my way.”
Arsenal and Athena walked in behind Mod.
“I guess this is it,” Arsenal said.
Athena leaned on a nearby control panel and stayed silent. She kept her eyes on the scientists.
The enormous room reminded Mod of Venture’s lab if Venture had specialized in biology instead of machinery. Control panels and wiring all lead to a platform in the center of the room where a giant holding tank stood. It almost gave the impression of an offering sitting on a giant altar, except that Mod knew it wasn’t gold or jewels being offered. There was a shadow of a person through the tank’s small viewing window. Long robot arms hung from the ceiling, each one ending in a serrated or pointed instrument.
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Mod had been in a tank like that several times, except he hadn’t been a sacrificial lamb. The longer Mod stared at the scene, the more certain that coming down here had been the right thing to do.
It was time to get his friend out of there.
He waved to Dr. Carter. “How do we open the tank?”
Dr. Carter’s jaw fell open. “That’s—No. We can’t do that. The subject isn’t stable.”
Mod waved to the door. “You’re free to leave if you’re worried about getting hurt.”
She stammered, “Are you with Cabal of Michael or… Are you with the Binary Brotherhood? What are you going to do with him?”
“We’re taking him away from here.”
“No—please. You can’t. He’s too valuable. There’s so much we can learn. He’s not a weapon, despite what you might think. He could be the key to—”
“In a few more minutes, Lachlan Harris won’t be your problem anymore.”
Mod’s question and TINA’s answer flowed silently. He instantly knew how to open the tank.
Dr. Carter hesitated. “You knew him.”
Mod reached out and put a hand on her shoulder. “Dr. Carter, my patience is gone.”
Nanites slithered up her shoulder and around her neck. Dr. Carter’s eyes went wide and she pawed ineffectively at the coating. Mod let the nanites stop just below her chin.
Arsenal shuffled behind him. Mod ignored her.
“Please be quiet. I need to concentrate.”
Mod walked up onto the platform and stood in front of the holding tank. Seeing it up close made it apparent just how different it was from the tank Mod had been in. The walls of this one were some kind of steel alloy and the walls were almost as thick as a blast door. Mod peered up at the viewing window and could just make out his friend’s face through the thick glass. His friend’s face was covered in bone-like growths and a breathing mask—so much that he could barely recognize Lock beneath it all.
Mod slammed a palm into the tank’s control panel. Nanites slid between the seams and into the circuit board. More streamed off of his arm and into the tank’s locking mechanisms.
“We should wake him up first,” Mod whispered.
“I agree. We’ll disengage chemical restraints first.”
Several thin tubes ran from chemical storage to the holding tank. Mod sent a command, along with a small electrical signal through his nanites. Snaps echoed through the room as the tubes disconnected. Chemicals leaked out onto the floor.
Mod called back to Dr. Carter. “How long will it take—”
Lock’s eyes flared open—intense beads of white in the murky water of the tank. It took a moment for him to focus. His gaze settled on Mod and his eyes narrowed.
Without warning, Lock reeled back and headbutted the tank. A dull clang sounded. The structure rattled, the platform quaked, and even the metal arms overhead quivered. A mix of gasps and shouts came from the scientists.
Arsenal said, “Are we sure this is a good idea?”
Lock stared through the window again, expectantly.
Mod commanded his nanite disguise to change, showing his real face for a moment. He held up a hand and hoped his friend still understood the gesture for ‘wait.’
Lock just stared. If he recognized Emmett, he didn’t react.
Mod touched the control panel again. Hisses and thunks sounded as restraints and locks disengaged. Freezing liquid spilled out of the tank, causing steam to rise as it spread across the platform. Mod sent more power through the controls, causing the door to open.
Then he stepped back and looked at his friend.
With the liquid drained, Lock stood on the bottom of the tank. Restraints and the breathing mask hung behind him. All his hair was gone, and his dark skin was covered in bony growths, like pieces of pale armor had been grafted to his body. Other swathes of his body looked like they were covered in scales or completely without skin and showing his muscle fibers. Steam poured off of his skin as the freezing liquid evaporated. Lock leaned against the metal and looked down at his body. He seemed relieved that Gnosis had left him a small pair of briefs.
Lock stumbled out of the tank and caught himself on the platform. It looked like it took him a millisecond to get his bearings and shake off the rest of the anesthesia. Then he stood up to his full height. Now he was easily seven feet tall and towered over Mod.
It was hard to ignore the unease bubbling up inside him. Mod didn’t know whether it was Lock’s newfound strength or just remnants of fear that he’d felt during their prior meetings. Not that it mattered.
“Are you alright?” Mod asked.
“No thanks to you.”
Mod ignored him. “Do you know where you are right now?”
Lock scoffed. “I’m at the bottom of Gnosis—sublevel 30.”
“Good. We’re here to break you out.”
Lock ran a hand over his bony scalp. “...You think that’s a good idea? They put me down here for a reason.”
“We know. We hacked their systems. Read the files. ‘Subject shows signs of severe psychological stress and confusion.’”
“It’s bullshit. They just wanted an excuse to keep me here.” Lock’s gaze swept across the room and landed on the scientists. His eyes narrowed.
Arsenal stepped in front of the scientists. “Don’t worry about them. They can’t do anything else to you.” Meanwhile, Athena had her hands up, ready to conjure barriers.
Mod turned back to his old roommate and raised his voice. “We’re getting you out of here. Unless you’d rather get back in the tank.”
Lock smirked. “Big talk. You must’ve got some upgrades.”
In the last three months, Mod had gotten a list of upgrades as long as his arm. He wasn’t the Class 2 super that nearly died in his college apartment.
Mod stared back. “Enough upgrades to fight my way down here without breaking a sweat. Now, are you coming with us or what?”
“You didn’t bring enough friends to tell me what to do.”
Lock stepped forward, his footsteps shaking the platform.
Mod stepped in front of him. Lock stopped and glared down at him.
“What’s the matter?” Lock asked. “Didn’t learn your lesson last time you got in my way?”
“Guess not.”
~ ~ ~