The Island Project: A Thriller

by Taylor Buck

  “Look what I found wandering around the helipad. A friend of yours perhaps?” Braden asked Danner.

  Danner looked at the woman. At first he didn’t recognize her, then upon closer inspection he realized who it was. The woman from earlier? What was she doing here?

  “She was here earlier today...with a photographer. What did you…?”

  “A photographer? Is this the photographer you speak of?” Braden held his phone against the glass wall. Danner could see a picture displayed on it, which looked to be taken by a surveillance photo from on top of the building. The man pictured looked like the photographer he had escorted off the property earlier in the day. It was difficult to tell—the man had a black mask covering his face. However, the buzzed hair and athletic build fit the bill.

  “Yeah, that’s him,” Danner said.

  “What do they want?” asked Braden—clearly suspicious at the fact that Danner knew who the couple was.

  Danner was eyeing Kelly curiously. “Braden, what did you do to her? She looks…”

  “She’ll be fine! Now answer my question!” Braden hissed.

  “They said they were lost—that they had stumbled upon our facility accidentally. I drove them back out to the reserve parking lot.”

  “And you believed them?”

  “Why not? There are hikers all around these reserves. People hike by here everyday,” Danner said indifferently.

  “I don’t buy it. As soon as she wakes up I’ll find out what they’re really doing here.” Braden walked over to the adjacent containment faction. He placed Kelly on the ground with her back against the glass wall. He reached into his pocket and pulled out an RFID keychain. Then opened up the door to the containment.

  Braden patted his right thigh. “Come on, Carry. Let’s go. I’ve got some work for you,” he said coaxingly.

  For a moment, nothing happened. Then out of the back of the containment a juggernaut stepped forward and made its way up to Braden. It stopped when it reached him and sat back on its hind legs. “Good girl.” Braden ran his hand across the robot’s furry coat. He stroked it as if it were a dog. “See Rick. There’s really nothing to be afraid of. They’re quite tame if you know how to control them.” Braden smiled and slowly ran his hands along the back of the robot all the way to its head—scratching as he went.

  Danner couldn’t help but be sickened by Braden’s affection toward the robot. He was treating it like a domesticated animal.

  “Good girl. Now go!” The juggernaut jumped to its feet and shot quickly through the room and out the doorway.

  “Rick. I think you should watch this,” Braden said commandingly. He strode over to the corner of the room and returned with a computer with which he wheeled in front of the containments. He typed for a moment, and the large monitor displayed multiple surveillance camera angles throughout the building.

  “I want you to respect them…you soon will. You will witness another kill. But this time you can just sit back and enjoy the show—watch it hunt, watch it think.” Braden looked over at Kelly. “It’s too bad she isn’t awake to see it all too. I’m sure she will be soon. She will let us know why she’s here and then you will take me to Lorry.”

  Danner watched the monitor. He could see the man on top of the roof, the photographer. He was approaching the access door.

  The man opened the door and went inside.

  CHAPTER 34

  CERTA FACILITY ROOFTOP

  15 OCTOBER, 12:25 P.M.

  Tom Bennett stepped carefully down the dark stairwell. It was pitch black inside and he was forced to feel his way through the darkness with every step. For the past ten minutes he had been searching for Kelly on the roof. She had disappeared—simply vanished. Bennett was certain she wasn’t anywhere on the roof and he had searched the ground below the best he could from atop the roof. He was fairly certain she hadn’t fallen. Which meant there was only one other place she could’ve gone—back inside the building.

  But why hadn’t she told him?

  Bennett’s mind raced…she would’ve told him. He was certain of it. The more he thought it through; he could only come up with a single conclusion.

  Kelly was taken.

  Bennett realized that everything had just changed—everything. He was no longer thinking evasively. It wasn’t about escaping quietly any more. He had to get Kelly back, whatever that meant. Which meant that he was going back into the building to get her out. It wasn’t a question of whether or not to do it—he had to find her and get her out.

  Bennett thought about calling Kelly’s father, Dr. Adler. He would want to know if she was in serious danger. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked down at it.

  He couldn’t bring himself to dial the numbers.

  Not yet.

  Bennett ran his hand along the wall as he descended the stairwell. He used his cell phone to illuminate the steps. The stairs seemed to continue forever. He moved quickly though and eventually reached the bottom. The doorknob was directly in front of him. He reached out, grabbed it and gave it a turn.

  It was locked.

  Of course it was locked—Kelly had the keychain. Bennett realized he had no way of getting into the building. Every door required security access and the only way of getting in was by having the RFID codes. Bennett thought quickly. What else could he do? After a moment, he came to a surprise realization.

  The access codes…Kam has the codes!

  Bennett scanned his cell phone for Kam’s number. Dr. Adler had messaged it to him while he had gone to help Kam at the cove. He found it and quickly dialed his number.

  He heard the phone ring. The connection was choppy—cutting in and out. The reception was bad this far out in the forest. After three rings he heard Kam pick up the other line.

  “Hello?”

  “Kam. It’s Tom Bennett. Can you talk?”

  “Yeah. I just got home actually…what’s up? Kam sounded concerned.

  “Good. Listen, Kam—I’m short on battery life so I’m going to talk quick. The access codes that you pulled off of the keychain earlier today…can those be sent to a mobile device?”

  Kam paused on the other line, processing the request. “You mean you want the phone to act as an RFID?” he asked, piecing it together quickly.

  “Yes.”

  “Then, yeah. But I’d need to hack it…kind of,” he said.

  “Ok, what do you need to do?” Bennett asked.

  “Basically, almost all phones carry 14 MHz tags in them, which is how we use them to pay for everything. Those tags transmit IDs. Most ID’s are protected though, so you have to hack the ID in order for the tag to accept it.”

  Bennett was familiar with the technology. He knew where Kam was going. “Ok. I think I’m following you. So would you be able to send me the ID with those access codes?”

  “Hang on. I’ll let you know in a minute,” he said.

  Bennett could hear Kam typing rapidly on the other line. Kam’s tinny voice echoed through the speaker from his phone in the stairwell.

  “Ok. So I’m packaging the access codes into a single ID file. The file has a patch to overwrite the tag reader. I’m hoping I can just message it to you and it will work…hang on. Give me one second,” Kam said. He sounded focused.

  Bennett waited patiently in the stairwell.

  “Ok! Let me know if it comes through.”

  Bennett looked down at the phone. Nothing had come through yet. He did notice his battery was teetering around 18% capacity. Still—nothing had shown up yet.

  “Anything yet?” Kam asked.

  “No. Not yet.” Just then, a message popped up. “Wait! I got it,” Bennett said.

  “Ok. Good. Now just click on it and it should store it in your transmissions folder.”

  “Done.�
��

  “Ok. Now give it a try.” Kam said coaching Bennett along.

  Bennett held his phone up to the receiver on the door.

  BEEP. The door slid open revealing a small hallway.

  “It worked! Thanks Kam. I owe you one. Sorry—gotta run,” Bennett whispered, and hung up his phone.

  Thank you, Kam. You may have just saved Kelly’s life.

  The hallway was dark. Bennett didn’t want to use his phone light due to the low battery life. He needed it to access the other doors. That was most important right now.

  He stopped in the hallway and closed his eyes. He imagined the floor plan of the facility in front of him.

  Bennett had a gift for this. He had somewhat of a photographic memory. He could store and recall items in his memory better than most people. It was like an indexing system he used to record people, places, pictures and events. As far as he could remember, he had a talent for remembering things in detail. He focused on the building around him. He recollected the hallways, doorways, offices, exits, stairways, and bathrooms—everything he had seen so far. Then he began to map out a floor plan in his mind. There were a few missing pieces here and there, from the spots he hadn’t visited yet, but he was able to build a schematic of sorts that would help him navigate through the darkness.

  He came to conclude that he was presently above the lab. The helipad sat above the lab and he could see another door up ahead. Bennett walked up to the door and peered through the window.

  He was right.

  Outside the door was an open metal staircase leading down to the lab. The lab was dark—the lights had been turned off.

  The lights had been turned off.

  That man must have turned off all of the lights in the building. It would be difficult to get to Kelly in the dark. However, if he could remain unnoticed, he would be able to use the darkness to his advantage.

  The lab led to a hallway, which led to the containments. If the man with the gun had taken Kelly, he had most likely brought her to the containments. That was where Bennett would go. He would have to get there through the building—it was too risky to try to get in again through the skylight where he would be completely exposed.

  Bennett unlocked the door to the lab using his phone. The receiver beeped and the door slid open. He entered the lab.

  CHAPTER 35

  THE DEN

  15 OCTOBER, 12:45 P.M.

  It was cold. Kelly Adler tried to open her eyes—which proved an exhausting task. She felt as if her eyelids had been sewn shut. Disoriented and confused, for a moment she had no idea where she was. Then as her eyes slowly adjusted, Kelly began to make out the skylight above her.

  “Ah,…I see…visitor… waking up.”

  Kelly heard a voice in the distance. It was hard to piece anything together phonetically. It was as if her brain had slowed to a painful crawl. She could barely focus. She tried to move her legs and realized she couldn’t feel them at all. Slowly, two figures came into view. One was the man with the gun and the other was locked in the containment next to her. Kelly tried to speak and her words came out as pathetic groans.

  “Hmm…I might have…too large a dose. Oh, well…fogginess…wear off soon.”

  She heard the man say.

  Kelly craned her neck to look around. She could see that she was sitting on the floor of the containment. A large cable running up the wall propped up the left side of her body.

  “Can…hear me?” The man came up to the glass. He opened the door and walked over to where she was sitting. “What you’re feeling is the effects of Sodium Pent...

  …for the most part. It’s a bit of a cocktail…concocted actually…other useful barbiturates. The…dosage I gave…not harmful, but…may take…moment for you… reach clarity.”

  He bent down and looked at Kelly. “When you’re able to talk…I’d like… know…doing on the roof. You were quite easy to spot…camera—‘ya know?”

  Kelly stared back at him through glassy eyes. She still couldn’t talk.

  “Ok. I understand…not yet. I’ll let you enjoy some entertainment while you come…senses.”

  The man motioned to a computer monitor behind him. Kelly strained to focus in the distance. She felt like she was looking through a wall of Jell-O. Everything was warped and jumbled. She focused intently on the screen in the distance, and for a moment she made out a figure moving. Someone was in a doorway. Then she realized who it was.

  Tom. He was back in the building—probably looking for her.

  What have you done, Kelly?

  A flash of movement on the screen underneath grabbed her attention. Something else was there—moving quickly.

  The cat.

  The large cat was running down a hallway.

  Oh, no…Kelly thought. It’s going after Tom!

  She wanted to scream out to the men to stop. All she could do was stare—her eyes wide with fear. She followed the cat through the building and watched as it turned a corner and approached a door. The door opened. Which surprised Kelly. She was confused as to how the door opened for the cat. The cat entered the room and she realized where it was. The lab.

  It was in the lab…with Tom.

  CHAPTER 36

  CERTA FACILITY LABORATORY

  15 OCTOBER, 1:00 A.M.

  Bennett heard the door slide open on the opposite end of the lab. He immediately crouched down out of view. Even though it was dark inside, small red safety lights illuminated the interior, providing enough light to make out the silhouettes of the machinery inside the lab. Bennett was crouched behind the stairwell on the lab floor. He listened for footsteps—but heard nothing. He poked his head out from behind the metal beam supporting the stairway and glanced across the lab floor. The lab stations set up across the floor were obscuring his line of sight to the door. He stepped out slowly until he was a few feet away from the stairs. Another few feet and he was able to clearly see the doorway.

  Bennett expected to see a man standing in there. Instead, he made out a shape highlighted by the red light. He squinted his eyes in the darkness.

  Suddenly, the figure leapt high into the sky—a good twenty-five feet through the air until it landed atop the obstacle course. The jumping distance was extraordinary—supernatural. Bennett knew an ordinary predator wouldn’t have been able to achieve that kind of distance. It stood high off the ground on top of the obstacle course, scanning the floor from above.

  It was the panther.

  Bennett ducked back out of view. This confirmed his assumption about the cat. There was no possible way the panther was a living animal. He didn’t know what it was, but it was clearly some kind of machine.

  It can open doors, too?

  Bennett could only imagine what else it was capable of. He knew one thing—it was there for him. He had to get out of there, now.

  Bennett sat against the stairs and closed his eyes, thinking of his next move. He heard movement from the robot—shuffling. Then an idea came to him. He reached into his bag and pulled out a battery. Gripping it tight in his right hand, he stepped out and threw the battery across the lab floor. It hit the far corner and made a loud clanging noise that echoed raucously through the room. The robot immediately sprang from the perch and ran toward the noise. Bennett crept across the floor, moving from station to station. He could hear the robot running.

  It was fast.

  Bennett heard the footsteps reach the far end of the lab. He was getting close to the door…two stations away…one station away. Bennett looked back. The robot was standing in the middle of the floor on the opposite end looking back toward the door.

  It was staring right at him.

  Bennett didn’t hesitate. He ran. He ran hard all the way across the lab floor to the door. He could hear the robot running behind him. Bennett pull
ed out his phone and held it in front of him as he ran. He reached the door. The receiver didn’t register. The sound of the footsteps racing across the floor got closer and closer. It was right behind him. He could feel it closing in.

  He held the phone closer…

  BEEP

  The door opened and Bennett ran across. He looked back and saw the robot bearing down on him.

  The door was still open.

  The robot leapt through the air at an amazing pace. Bennett started off down the hallway, sprinting. The door started to close. It was halfway shut when the robot slammed into it—hard. Sparks shot into the air as the robot lodged itself between the doorway and the metal door. Bennett heard the noise and looked back toward the robot. The door remained slightly open, jammed. The robot was halfway through the door—stuck, but still running. It’s ball-shaped feet scraping at the slick surface below, flailing violently as it tried to regain traction.

  Bennett couldn’t believe how powerful the robot was. It had slammed into the solid metal door extremely hard and it hadn’t even phased it. The speed too—it had covered an incredible amount of ground in no time at all.

  Bennett couldn’t believe this thing was actually chasing him.

  A robot? I’m being chased by a killer robot…

  It sounded too far-fetched to be real. However, this thing was bent on destruction…and incredibly intelligent. Bennett had to find a way to beat it.

  The robot began pushing its way through. Bennett knew the door wouldn’t hold for long. He looked back down the hallway. The walkway continued for another thirty-five yards to the containments where he figured Kelly most likely was being held. He could run now, but he knew he wouldn’t make it. The robot had almost made its way through, and Bennett didn’t stand a chance in a foot race.

  There.