The rolling hills parted aside to give space to a four-lane industrial road that led up to a single one-storey brick building. The deep greens of the crops were muted by the fog that slowly rose back up to the sky, reducing visibility to a few dozen meters. The place looked like an abandoned maintenance building. Perhaps someone had wanted to build a water treatment plant out in these fields, or an electrical substation, but had never quite got to finish it. They’d done the legwork of casting cement tiles, deep enough for the grass to abandon its fight to break through. They cut down the trees, and cut into the hills, using those rocks and gravel to cover the adjacent fields. They erected this square brick building, with windows too small to let any significant amount of natural light in, but just about big enough to turn the place into a greenhouse during summer and make it colder than the outside in winter.
And then they left. Took their tools, their heavy machinery, and drove away into the fog, leaving only one once-blue small urban 4-seat car behind.
“Do you think this thing still works?” Dan asked, as he veered off the cement walkway, and rubbed the window of the car to look inside.
“Don’t try opening it,” Farrah replied. “We don’t want an alarm ringing.”
Scan
- Directional
- Targeted
Cost: Free.
She frowned, as she slid her labret ring between her teeth, somehow hoping that each little spin of the silver thing would add a yellow – or really any colour – dot to the grey square in front of her.
“What’s wrong?” Vega asked, stopping right next to Farrah. Her question sounded more like a ‘what’s the holdup’ although her tone held no actual excitement at the prospect of entering this building.
“I don’t have the inside mapped out, and I can’t see any zombies inside either,” Farrah spoke.
She looked at Vega who was nervously staring into one of the windows. She doubted the woman could make out anything through the white blinds covering it on the inside. But Farrah reckoned it wasn’t impossible that whatever was hiding Vega from her scans was also hiding the insides of this building. What Dan said next only further confirmed that theory:
“They would be able to cloak the place. Lines 150-something, to 170-ish separate the UDR into agglomerations. It’s all coordinate-based, so it doesn’t line up with the county borders, but they’re all directed network polygons with these bunkers at their epicentre.”
Farrah understood very little of that. Noticing her expression, Dan proceeded to explain what basically summed up to this place being at the centre of one of over a hundred arbitrary areas throughout the island. While he talked, she went up to the car and looked inside. She didn’t see any keys or cigs, and she didn’t want to waste any Power on scanning for those. Not when she didn’t know what awaited her on the inside of this building.
She approached a window, and pressed a hand between her forehead and the glass, as she peeked inside. An office room that’d been furnished at least three decades prior didn’t react to her intrusion. Papers were left on the desks and monitors the size of a microwave oven gathered dust. Their white casing hadn’t turned yellow despite the years, as no sun reached that far inside the building.
Farrah reported what she saw, before approaching the door, and cautiously pressing on the door handle. It didn’t give.
“I, umm, don’t think this is the right place…” Vega mumbled, as she walked around the makeshift parking lot – which was defined only by a denser layer of gravel, and examined the lateral side of the building.
“Anything?” Farrah called out, as she did the same in the other direction.
“I think this is the point where we break down the door,” Dan spoke, unsheathing his crowbar. He approached the small metal door, that could only be defined as ‘front’ due to the road leading up to it and two keypads and doorbell on its left side. He didn’t act on that though, as he called out again to the two women.
“What bothers me is the fact that we haven’t seen any traces of zombies. No blood, no scratches, that car is fine,” Farrah gestured as she joined him by the front door. “No movement, or corpses, inside.”
“This place doesn’t seem familiar,” Vega added, joining them.
“Why would it be? This is a -” Dan cut himself off before uttering the word ‘bunker’ which this very obviously wasn’t, out loud. “It’s not an archive, it would look different. Plus, you said the archives were using factories as a front. This is the same. Looks like an old building from the outside, is a secret bunker on the inside.”
“Dan, what we call ‘nests’ are found in cities and tunnels. Warren and Derelict. Not this,” Farrah tried to explain.
“Which are both so much more dangerous than an old building, come on,” he cut her off, taking a few steps forward and jamming his crowbar right over the lock, in between a thin slit that separated the door from its frame.
Farrah put a hand over his shoulder, tugging him gently for him to look at her.
“Half my strength comes from the knowledge shared by us Collectors. And I have no information on what this thing is. I want you to know that.” Farrah had full confidence in her skills and her ability to manage whatever was on the inside, be it old dust bunnies, or indeed a nest. But she needed Dan to understand what risk he was about to take. It seemed her warning had come off as a threat instead, as Dan nodded, twisting his shoulder from under her hand. “On my mark,” Farrah said, unholstering her pistol, and turning on the camping flashlight attached under her bag, “I’ll go first, then Vega, then you.”
“Sir,” Vega put down the bag of miscellaneous supplies she’d been carrying and threw her raincoat over it.
“I… sure,” Dan agreed tightening his grip over his crowbar.
“Then go,” Farrah ordered.
----------------------------------------
Domain Entered: Warren
Pinned notes available. Display notes?
Yes
No
“Bip,” Farrah whispered.
Vega promptly echoed her word.
They advanced, as much back-to-back as the layout of a straight hallway would allow. There was nothing but dry potted plants, sets of metal drawers, and a single water fountain lining the walls. The place smelled of drying paint and cleaning chemicals. If not for the dust trying to get deeper and deeper down Farrah’s nose and throat, and the darkness of the hallway, the place could have been mistaken for brand new.
“Fuck, I get why you say ‘bip’ like an idiot now,” Dan’s voice came from the entryway. He took a step forward, shutting the door behind him, and enveloping the corridor in a darkness that Farrah’s flashlight barely managed to fence off. “I have like 5 notifications, give me a second,” Dan continued.
“What from?” Farrah called out, as they reached the end of the hallway.
A good portion of caution had gone out the window the second Dan started talking too loudly from the entryway. But that didn’t mean the women weren’t on high alert.
Scans still displayed nothing, and they were faced with two corridors, and a double set of metal doors.
“Let’s clear this first,” Farrah nodded towards the metal doors which she presumed held a conference room. Even without ‘Scan’, she still had enough common sense to know that those were the places with loads of nooks and crannies where zombies could hide.
Vaga whispered a ‘sir’, and glanced back at Dan who was frantically reading over something in front of him.
“Oi,” Farrah hissed.
“Fuck off,” He hissed back, “I’m hacking this for you, missus ‘I need to scan shit’.”
The annoyance in his voice wasn’t directed at Farrah, but it could have easily been mistaken as such.
“Go, I’ll cover you,” Farrah told Vega.
The shorter woman didn’t waste a second. She pushed down the metal bar that ran horizontally across the door. Fresh air came from the other side, but Farrah didn’t turn around to look, as her gaze mutinously travelled between the three hallways before her. The door shut, taking with it what little natural light it’s let in. Just as it did so, a ray of fog-filtered sun reflected off something small on the ground of the left hallway.
“Dan, do whatever you’re doing here,” Farrah hissed again.
“Yeah, yeah, umm,” He started walking towards her, “There’s an active ‘Signal Jamming’ coming from somewhere. Expert vs Expert, it’s anyone’s game and with you not giving me the space to deal with it, it’s mostly theirs. And also the code is corrupted. And that’s a unique skill as far as I’m aware, so-”
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
Farrah yanked him towards her so that he’d have his back against the door.
“What the fuck, girl?”
“You had your arse exposed on 3 sides, babes,” Farrah mimicked his condescending tone with a headshake.
A knock came on the door behind them, followed by Vega’s voice whispering Farrah’s name.
Dan immediately dismissed the screens and changed the grip over his crowbar, finally holding it like a weapon. Farrah swept the hallways with one last glance, before knocking three times on the door and asking:
“What’s my last name?”
“Umm, I don’t know?” A whisper came back.
Farrah shrugged. That was fair enough. She’d said it three times at most since they’d met, and she couldn’t blame Vega for not remembering.
She nodded at Dan, to attack if it was a zombie on the other side of the door, and pushed down the bar-handle. When no alarmed sounds or gestures came from Dan, she told the two:
“Hold the door, figure out if you can lock it open. I’ll be back in a sec.”
She hastily ran down the left-side hallway and picked up the thing that’s shimmered on the floor. It was a beaded bracelet, with a metal dolphin charm, and several shells squished in between plastic beads. It was one of those beach souvenirs people got when they went anywhere in southern Aireshire of the Belvcroe isles. It was the kind of tacky memorabilia Dominic would wear.
Pieces were starting to snap into place, and Farrah hastily joined the other two.
“Umm, I think there is a bunker,” Vega reported.
The door led onto an inner courtyard, it was square, with cement paths running from the centre of each of the buildings’ walls towards an elevated helicopter landing pad. Gravel buried the grass that would have otherwise grown in the four quadrants of this space. A helicopter stood on the gravel, some five or so meters away from its designated landed pad.
“It’s empty,” Vega added, once she noticed where Farrah was looking. “All doors but that one are locked, and there is an access, umm, hatch, there,” She gestured twice in the same direction, to the right of the helipad.
“Can one of you hold this while I go grab a chair?” Dan spoke, having given up on getting the door to stay open.
Farrah turned around. With only one set of doors opening from the outside, but all of them opening from the inside, this felt an awful lot like a trap.
“Take it off its hinges,” She told Dan before turning to Vega and asking, “Can you get up there?” She gestured to the roof.
Vega nodded.
“Do it.”
The woman gave her a weird glance, but lept up, grabbing the edge of the roof that was only four or so meters above ground, and pulling herself onto it.
“Okay, that’s two escape routes,” Farrah gestured for her to come back down. “Push comes to shove, I can rocket-launch a wall.”
“You and what Power pool?” Dan asked as he struggled to get the puns out of the hinge leaves with his crowbar.
Vega quickly came to assist. Much less concerned with property damage than the other two, she gave the hinges one good hit, completely detaching them from the door. She caught the metal thing before it could land over the gravel. Dan gave her an apprehensive look, before turning to face Farrah again:
“Your Tech is on Novice. It’s not ‘one rocket for 10P’ season.”
“Warren,” Farrah corrected. It all caught up to her the second that word left her mouth. She could see the sky above, and the walls were distant and disinterested in swallowing her alive. “You’re right about the code being corrupted, I’m in Warren, you’re in Tech, ‘Scan’ is blocked, and that bird shouldn’t be there.”
“What domain are you in?” Dan asked Vega, pulling up some screen in front of him again.
“Uhh, Derelict,” She lied. “Who do you think is doing this? ‘Data Corruption’ and ‘Skill Disruption’ would both have to be at Expert to offset you. And they could be anywhere, hiding in plain sight and we wouldn’t know.”
“Well, there was a car outside,” Farrah spoke, as she approached the helipad. There was indeed an access hatch, a square 2 by 2-meter double door angled at its base. It led straight into the only set of doors that opened from the outside and had a black keypad built into the side of the helipad.
“See, but how would someone survive out here for 2 years?” Dan replied. “I think this is controlled remotely to hide the zombie nest.”
“Why are you so set on this zombie nest? So far we’ve seen more evidence of Vega’s theory than yours,” Farrah began to rummage through the top pocket of her rucksack where she kept some pre-Fall trinkets, including her long-dead phone, housekeys, and the keycard she’d picked up all those weeks ago in Samborough.
“The exact phrasing,” He scrolled with his hand over an invisible screen, separate from the one he’d been reading off, “was: the containment units have been fully upgraded, and we will be ready to begin the breeding phase at the start of the next trimester. Something something, irrelevant… Mutations are occurring at a rate in the bottom 25 percentile of the estimates, and containment measures will not have to be upgraded in the upcoming year, unless carrying capacity of site GR-75 is exceeded. Something, something, site GT-18a has shown-”
“Stop!” Vega cut him off.
He looked at her in surprise, an expression that quickly merged into a mixture of concern.
“Is everything alright?” He asked.
Vega glanced at Farrah, who did her best to convey that this wasn’t her story to tell. That message didn’t seem to have fully come across, as Vega clumsily changed the topic:
“Is that master key working?”
Farrah gave her one last silent and concerned eyebrow raise, before tapping the white card against the black pad. It didn’t bip. No light indicator turned on. And they stood in awkward silence for a few seconds.
“No, seriously, are you okay?” Dan asked again, “Sorry, I didn’t read out the graphic stuff about the uh-” he sounded like he was just about to say out loud which parts he’d omitted. “zombies. But yeah, best not to think about what OBELISK was doing,” He agreed. “I’m just here for their terminals.”
“So that’s what your horse is called?” Farrah tried to lighten the mood as she put the key card away.
“Yes and no,” Dan replied, joining her by the access hatch. “As I said, I’d rather not tell you. Especially with all the secrets you’re keeping yourself.”
“Hey, I told you why we’re here,” Farrah stepped aside, letting him try to pry the metal doors open.
“And what about you, revenge on the zombies I’m guessing?” He asked as he failed to find a crack large enough to jam the tool.
“No, it’s to get my memories back,” She replied.
“Right…” He muttered. “Sticking with those stories…”
“Sticking with being antagonistic,” Farrah muttered in response. They were all in such close proximity that they could hear each other’s desynchronised breathing. “Can you ‘Data Shied’ around who or whatever is causing the other disruptions? Also, hack the lock, and Vega will punch through it.”
“How the fuck do you know about ‘Data Shield’?” Dan finally gave up on prying the hatch open.
Farrah shrugged. She’d exchanged information with Collectors who had it, and who had a much more agreeable personality than Dan.
“I’m not sure, umm, …” Vega spoke, before cutting herself off. “Maybe it’s, umm, not a good idea to go to the, umm, facility. It’s just …” She took a deep breath, “They say memories and experiences aren’t good or bad, that they just are and we should allow them to exist and merge within us but I don’t – there’s nothing good worth finding down there.” She maintained eye contact with Farrah as she spoke. The woman frowned, but let Vega finish, before replying:
“There’s your thing that you mentioned this morning. Plus, we’ve come all this way, so whatever motivated you to stick with me for this long, hang onto that for just a while longer. It’s hard,” She was one to talk, she caught herself thinking. She’d never returned to her house in Samborough. She was too scared that she’d find the master bedroom empty… A spark of determination flashed over her eyes, “And I am the biggest hypocrite there is for pushing you to do this because I never returned to my family. I abandoned them on the day of the Fall, I chose to remain in this shitshow, and although I know they’re waiting for me, I’ll never be ready to face them.”
So much of that was true. It was more complex than a few sentences could encompass, but it was mostly true. She didn’t mention how she was scared that they were all gone, that there was nothing after death and that her only way to see Hubby, mum, and pa again would be to become like them. Instead, she put a hand over Vega’s shoulder and gave her an encouraging smile.
“Let’s finish this journey. Let’s make everything worth it,”
“Hi,” Dan awkwardly raised a hand, turning towards them, “Do I also get a motivational speech, or is that just for fake high school BFFs?”
“Do you want a motivational speech?” Farrah smirked, ignoring his comment about their fake backstory that they’d long since given up acting upon. “Because I usually only reserve those for people whose hands I’d put my life in.”
Dan rolled his eyes, and climbed up to the helipad, taking a seat on its edge.
“I’m good, I just felt like none of that was really meant for my ears,” He looked up from his screen, “For what it’s worth, Devs, Vega, I am putting my life in your hands.”
“We know,” Farrah patted his knee, “You know your stuff.”
“I’ll ping you when I’m done with my ‘stuff’,” he replied, his eyes returning to the screens, “Maybe you could look if anyone’s left any biscuits in the coffee room?”
“What a nice way to tell us to bugger off,” Farrah chortled, before nodding for Vega to follow.
“Do you mean it?” Vega whispered once they’d made it to the other side of the helipad. “We haven’t… I haven’t been that honest with you about so, umm, many things, and it feels unearned… What you said…”
Farrah narrowed her eyes, trying to get a good read on the woman. Vega was like an open book most of the time, but Farrah couldn’t figure out what she was thinking now, as she fidgeted with her sleeves and looked to the ground. She wasn’t sure where this self-doubt was coming from, as she knew that Vega was more than aware of her skills and build.
Farrah checked her ‘stats’ screen, before bringing up the reason she’d phased the end of her speech the way she had:
“I think it’s best we do this now, because we have some time, and we don’t know who’s down there. You can do the quest you mentioned this morning on me. I’ll burn a luck point, and that way we don’t have to worry about finding any specific device.”
“Umm, it’s alright, you don’t have to do that.” Vega smiled shyly, “I’ll go down there. For better or for worse, I’ll live either way. I’ll stab Dan after all of this is over, so don’t worry about it.”
“He doesn’t have the ‘Phoenyx’ skill,” Farrah explained. “Well, at least I don’t think he does. He gave me a lot of crap for doing that quest. So it would have to be me either way.” She understood how Vega had come to the conclusion that Farrah was offering this to manipulate her, but in fact, if things did get dire, she’d activate ‘Last Stand’ so the amount of Luck wouldn’t matter. She explained just as much to the woman.
“But… I just don’t want, umm, to hurt you,” Vega spoke, looking everywhere but at Farrah.
“It can’t be worse than some of the quests I had to do,” Farrah spoke. “Just take the knife out quickly, and we’ll both be fine,” she got out one of the more sharp cooking knives from her rucksack and handed it to Vega.
Then, she dropped her rucksack to the ground and holstered her pistol. She took a few steps to stand back against the cold concrete helipad, and lifted her tank top to expose her abdomen. Vega’s gaze lingered on the tattoo of bold flowers that ran down the left side of her stomach, up to her sternum.
“This is ever so slightly awkward,” Farrah spoke, as she felt her cheeks burning up, as if she was just now realising the sub-text of this. “Can you-”
“Yeah, yeah, sorry,” Vega tried to focus as she met Farrah’s eyes.
She crossed the distance between them, and pressed down on Farrah’s stomach as if looking for where her most vital organs would be. Her gloved hands came to a stop right under her ribcage, and she locked eyes with Farrah.
“Umm,”
“Yeah,” Farrah nodded in reply to the unspoken question.
Vega gently kissed Farrah’s lips before stabbing her in the stomach.
Farrah’s mind short-circuited for lack of a better word. The pain was fairly mild, but she could feel her own blood running down her abdomen. She was torn between telling Vega off, because this was not the time, nor the place, but especially not the time. But a part of her wanted to slide her hand through Vega’s hair and kiss her back.
Phoenyx
· Lethal wound
· Instantaneous
Cost: 1L.
“Vega, what was that-” She pushed the woman off her.
“I’m sorry!” Vega’s expression instantly became horrified as she took several steps back. “I just – umm,”
Blood was still dripping off the knife, and Farrah wiped what blood had remained on her stomach with her inner tank top.
“No, it’s fine,” She reassured the woman, “Look, I’m perfectly fine. But that was really not the time to start making out.”
“I’m sorry,” Vega apologised again, as her tone shifted to embarrassment. “It’s just that, umm, I thought, you know, it would make you feel better about being stabbed.”
Farrah covered her eyes with the palm of her hand, partially to hide a blush, but mostly because of how far-fetched that logic was. An image flashed through her mind, dug up from layers upon layers of memories on quests, domains, and other System nonsense. Perhaps some people would have found comfort in that one final act of intimacy. Except that Farrah wasn’t one of those people, and that she’d been very, very far from dying.
“Did your quest resolve?” She asked, not allowing herself to dwell on memories.
“Mhum,” Vega nodded. “Thanks …”
Farrah nodded in reply with a smile.
“Let’s see if Dan has managed to get that door open.”