Awaken Online: Inferno (Tarot #3)

by Travis Bagwell

  “This is just weird, right?” Julia asked, eyeing the doorway. “They have this gigantic blast door blocking off this chamber, but they don’t manage to close it, and then they weld metal into the gap?”

  “And it looks like they did it from this side,” Finn noted, switching back to his Mana Sight briefly. He could just barely see that the metal didn’t sit flush with the surface of the door on the other side, the lines of mana jagged and irregular.

  “What happened here?” Finn murmured.

  “That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to figure out,” Julia grunted, glaring at the blast door as though it was refusing to give up its secrets.

  “Maybe they cut the conduits and deactivated the pylon, but they weren’t able to get the blast door fully closed for some reason?” Finn suggested tentatively. “They could have welded this thing shut as a way to prevent the rest of the corrupted from getting back inside or somehow restarting the pylon.”

  Julia tilted her head as she mulled on that, but she didn’t look convinced. “I considered that possibility, but I’m not sure that’s the right answer,” she murmured.

  Finn’s brow furrowed. While possible, he agreed with Julia that the explanation felt off somehow – incomplete.

  He eyed the slag. Maybe he could get a glimpse at whatever was inside the room through that narrow crack. That might help address some of their questions. He placed a hand against the rough metal and leaned forward. Peering into the surface with his Mana Sight, he peeled back at the layers of mana one-by-one, straining to see the other side.

  Only a moment later, he gave up, letting out a frustrated sigh.

  “It’s too thick, and the angle is too narrow,” he grumbled. “I can’t get a good look at what’s inside.” His daughter’s frown deepened.

  Kyyle chose that moment to enter the room, the lumbering earth elemental in tow.

  “What’s going on?” he asked, noting their sour expressions.

  “We’re trying to figure out what the hell happened here,” Julia offered, gesturing at the door and the metal wedge in the frame.

  “Hmm, well, maybe Brock could help?” the earth mage suggested. He turned to the attendant that floated along beside him. “Were there any records of what happened to the pylon before the connection to the rest of the facility was cut?”

  The earth elemental’s glowing green eyes went distant. A map of the section suddenly appeared in the air beside him, with several yellow dots highlighted along the walls near the reception area and the adjoining sections. “The records from the reception console indicate that the main conduits to the other sections of the facility were destroyed simultaneously. The power in this section was online when that occurred, so it may be safe to assume that the fire pylon was taken offline sometime after that event.”

  Finn chewed on his lip, sparing a glance at the nearby walls. His gaze lingered on the threads of crystal that ran through their surface. “Okay, let’s start with what we know then. The walls appear to be using the same neurogem material as the mechs. So, the block of metal we saw obstructing one of the main conduits when we entered this section must have been meant to prevent that process. Which means, the staff in this section severed those connections intentionally.”

  His eyes shifted back to the blast door. “But with the pylon online, the crystals may have still been able to remove the obstruction.”

  “So, the staff must have decided to shut down the pylon as well,” Kyyle piped up.

  This earned him nods from both Finn and Julia.

  “And we have a pretty good idea of why they were trying to do that,” Julia observed in a dry voice, glancing in the direction of the room where they had trapped the corrupted. “If the mechs have some sort of bug or virus, it could have propagated if they accessed the other sections. Could you imagine if they had managed to take over the entire facility? The staff must have done all of this to prevent the corruption from spreading.”

  Her brow furrowed for a moment, and she continued more slowly, “I think they effectively decided to starve them out. Their plan was to cut the power and then let the corrupted go dormant – hoping that their Najima wouldn’t provide enough power for them to breach the blast doors leading out of the section.”

  Finn was nodding along with her explanation. That felt right – an obvious deductive chain based on what they knew. However, as his attention shifted to the walls adjacent to the blast door and the remainder of the room, he noticed scorch marks riddling the stone and the piles of disabled attendants littering the room. There must have been at least twenty. There were no human corpses, but he hadn’t expected to find any.

  It was clear that a fight had gone down in here…

  How did that square with their narrative?

  His daughter was following his gaze, a knowing look flitting across her face. “I picked over this room with a fine-tooth comb while you two were playing around with that security mech.” She waved at the walls. “The damage indicates that a battle occurred here. Except that it doesn’t make any sense for the staff to fight out here or try to seal the blast door from the outside,” she muttered, shaking her head.

  “So, what do you think happened?” Finn asked, watching her closely. Julia seemed to be mulling on something, and he knew the signs all too well. It was a sense of discomfort which left her unable to stand still. Almost like an itch that she couldn’t quite scratch.

  Her eyes shot to Finn. “I’ve actually been working on a theory… but it seems impossible. Silly, really.”

  “I want to hear it,” Finn replied firmly. Julia shot him a surprised glance, her eyes widening slightly.

  Chewing on her lip, her gaze darted back to the blast door. “Okay. I’ve been toying with this for a while now. What if… what if something entered the pylon chamber before the staff made it back here?”

  A heavy silence met that question, her companions giving her an inquiring look.

  “The staff cut the main conduits simultaneously. We know that. They were also probably traveling in two big groups since they would need to guard themselves while they cut the conduits and melted down the slag – which would have drawn the attention of the corrupted. And that’s putting aside their casualties. So let’s assume most of the staff was busy dealing with the two conduits.”

  Julia suddenly whirled and tapped at the highlighted points on Brock’s map. Her fingers traced a path back to their location. “In which case, they would have had to make it back here and take out the pylon. After scouting this place, it’s clear that this would have taken at least a few minutes, even if they were hauling ass and didn’t encounter resistance from the corrupted.

  “And during that time, the mechs were still roaming the section,” she added.

  “Probably absorbing any mana they could get their hands on and assimilating members of the staff,” Kyyle offered. “That would explain the broken equipment, the damage to the walls, and the lack of human remains.”

  Julia’s initial reticence burned away, her eyes shining as she glanced at the earth mage. “Exactly! And once the staff cut the power from the rest of the facility, that would have left one clear source of mana…” She trailed off, letting the implication hang in the air.

  “Shit,” Kyyle muttered as his eyes swept to the blast door. “I see where you’re going. Once they cut conduits and mana wasn’t flowing in from the other sections, the pylon would have stood out like a beacon to the corrupted – the motherlode of all mana. By the time the staff made it back here, the mechs may have already started swarming the chamber…”

  Julia nodded, waving at the piles of rubble. “And if I’m right, they used the last of the attendants to hold off the corrupted just long enough for them to take the pylon offline. Look at where the piles of rock are positioned – in a rough line near the entrance to this chamber.” The map updated as Julia tapped at the locations of each of the drained attendants, the points of light creating a clear defensive line across the room.

  “S
ure,” Kyyle offered slowly. “But how does the door factor in here? Why didn’t they manage to close it all the way? And why did they weld metal into the seam?”

  Brock’s rumbling voice suddenly interjected. “I may be able to help ascertain some answers to those questions.”

  Without waiting for a response, the elemental approached the doorway, his arm drifting forward and the rocks comprising his hand shifting and rotating. He immediately shoved the reassembled appendage into a hole carved into the surface of the wall. A faint pulse of earth mana rippled through the nearby wall – just the faintest flash of mana, not enough to draw attention.

  The whole group tensed, eyeing the entrance to the room and the blast door warily for any signs of activity. However, as the seconds ticked past, no sound penetrated the din, and they gradually relaxed.

  “It appears that several of the staff were still inside the pylon chamber when it was taken offline, and the command to close the blast door was issued from inside the chamber,” Brock rumbled, oblivious to the tension. His glowing green eyes continued to stare into the distance as he accessed the facility’s systems.

  “So, someone – or multiple someones – attempted to lock the others out here?” Kyyle asked, horror lacing his voice. “What a dickhead thing to do. If Julia is right, then they would have been dealing with a swarm of the corrupted lured here by the pylon…”

  Finn stared at the surface of the door, a troubled feeling squirming in his stomach. “People do terrible things when they’re desperate. It’s possible that they did it to save themselves.”

  His eyes shot to Julia, noting her staring at the doorway with her brow furrowed. She didn’t seem convinced. Her initial explanation was still rebounding through his head, refusing to be ignored. “Or there was another reason – like they found something in that room that they couldn’t afford to let escape,” he said softly.

  His daughter met his gaze. “I still think that’s the answer,” Julia said firmly.

  “I don’t get it,” Kyyle said, shaking his head. “How did you reach that conclusion?”

  “Think about it strategically,” Julia began. She waved at the room they were occupying. “Why try to fight the corrupted out here at all? Why not just push inside the pylon room as a group, shut the giant, impenetrable blast door, and then calmly deactivate the pylon? Maybe sit back and wait for a rescue from the other sections? And if someone did try to save themselves and sacrifice the others, that still doesn’t explain why the door didn’t close all the way or why they welded metal into the gap from the outside.”

  “Like you said, there could have been a few corrupted inside the chamber. Maybe the person got desperate and blew the pylon while trying to save themselves?” Kyyle suggested, although he didn’t seem to buy his own rebuttal.

  “Sure. Except why not just take out the mechs and then close the door? Even our group is probably capable of defeating a handful of those things, and these people invented them. It’s safe to assume they could take out a few of their own security mechs. And, again, why did the group out here bother to weld metal into this gap?”

  “Unless there was something in there that they couldn’t kill,” she continued, her tone dark. “Remember, it would have taken the staff some time to get back here after they cut the connections to the rest of the facility. That might have been enough time for some of the corrupted to make it inside – and possibly begin to mutate or evolve again.

  “That would also explain why the group inside the pylon chamber decided to close the blast door… and why the door didn’t fully shut. There must have been something in there draining the pylon. In which case, they prioritized taking out the pylon over waiting for the blast door, which caused the power to fail before the door could close completely.”

  Julia abruptly paced to the door, her fingers tracing the scorch marks. “The staff out here then used their last moments – sandwiched between a horde of corrupted and the door – to weld the thing shut,” she said. Her eyes turned to Kyyle. “They must have had a damn good reason to do that.” The earth mage went silent, chewing on that explanation but unable to muster a counter-argument.

  As he listened to Julia, Finn could see her reasoning process. It was a straight and logical path with an ominous conclusion – one he would prefer not to be the case. However, he was having trouble poking holes in her theory. It neatly addressed all the facts that were laid out before them.

  “Okay, let’s start over,” Finn said, pacing a small circle.

  “The staff cut the conduits to the other sections, then rushed back here to find the corrupted swarming the pylon – since that was now the most concentrated source of mana in the section. The plan was probably to push into the pylon chamber and shut the blast door, but some of the staff made it inside while the rest held off the horde behind them. The staff inside discovered something dangerous. They initiated the door closure prematurely and then sacrificed themselves to take the pylon offline.”

  He whirled, gesturing at the piles of rubble lining the room they were standing in. “The rest of the group outside then found themselves sandwiched between the corrupted and the blast door. But the door hadn’t fully closed, and there was still some sort of new threat inside that chamber. So, acting quickly, they used their last few minutes to weld the gap shut as they held off the rest of the corrupted.”

  Silence met that explanation. Both Julia and Kyyle were staring at the door, unable to muster a rebuttal. That narrative fit – at least, better than any other explanation they had come up with. And now the same thought was rebounding through their heads.

  What the hell was inside that chamber?

  And, even worse, was it still alive?

  “I mean, we’re still sort of guessing here,” Kyyle offered tentatively, although he didn’t sound like he believed what he was saying. “We don’t know for sure that there’s something in there. We could just find a few skeletons…”

  “And if there is something in there, why didn’t it turn the pylon back on?” Julia offered slowly, trying to pick apart her own theory.

  “Yeah, that,” Kyyle offered quickly, jumping on any other possible explanation.

  “The pylons require substantial mana of the proper affinity to activate, and the mana must be directed in the proper sequence,” Brock interjected in a rumbling voice. “It’s possible that the corrupted might not have been able to bring it back online.”

  “You’re not helping,” Kyyle muttered.

  “I hate to agree with the floating avalanche over there, but based on the information available and Julia’s reasoning, there is an 87.56% chance that there will be an opponent inside the chamber,” Daniel interjected, flitting through the air toward the door. “We can also safely assume that whatever is inside may have also had access to several human corpses that it could repurpose – which suggests that it may have been able to regenerate its mana and is likely now in a dormant state like the other mechs.”

  Finn nodded, sparing a glance at Daniel. That was the same conclusion he had reached. He’d have to add “enhanced deductive logic” to the ever-growing list of the AI’s improvements.

  “Okay, let’s assume for now that there’s something in there waiting for us,” Kyyle admitted grudgingly. “What the hell are we going to do about it? We can’t exactly leave the facility without bringing the power back online. So, we have to open this door somehow and try to restart the pylon. But we had trouble with just one of the corrupted, much less whatever the hell the staff felt was dangerous enough to lock inside this room.”

  “We could lure it back through the complex like the others and trap it somewhere else,” Julia suggested tentatively. Her eyes were on the map that still floated next to Brock.

  “I have a feeling that this thing isn’t going to give up this position,” Finn said. He waved at the door. “The corrupted seem to have retained some level of intelligence or memory of their past lives. Remember the mech we found in the security checkpoint? Why did it retu
rn to that location? There was no mana nearby.

  “My guess is that the human parts that were assimilated belonged to one of the security personnel stationed here, and the mech was just returning to his post. After taking apart one of the security mechs, it’s now clear that the neurogem simulates neurons in our body. In that case, it’s not a stretch to assume that the mechs might retain some of the memories and abilities of the staff they assimilated.

  “In which case, whatever is inside the pylon chamber may understand the importance of the pylon – even if it can’t figure out how to turn it back on,” he concluded.

  Kyyle rubbed at his eyes tiredly, mulling on the problem that was staring them in the face. Then his wrist flicked at the air and brought up the model of the security mech they had dissected, the wiring around its cores and Najima suddenly highlighted in yellow.

  “Okay. Okay. Running away may not be an option,” Kyyle said in a weary voice. “So, the next question is, how do we fight this thing? In a direct confrontation, our best bet is overwhelming force. We would need to sever the connections to their power supply simultaneously – the mana cores embedded in their chest and their Najima – to prevent them from repairing,” he offered, waving at the schematic.

  Kyyle gestured at Julia. “We might not be able to lure this thing away, but our other option is still attrition. The corrupted we’ve seen so far have a limited mana supply stored in their cores, and the assimilated Najima are slow to regenerate that mana. We could just try to survive long enough that the thing runs out of power and is forced back into a dormant state to regenerate.”

  Julia was pacing the room now, rubbing at her chin in thought. “Between those two options, the first is going to be tough since we don’t know what exactly we’re facing. So, our best bet is probably to enter the fight with attrition in mind. That means we need to be sparing with our resources and bait it into burning mana. Then we wait for a possible opening that might let us take it out.”