The Severed Tower

by J. Barton Mitchell

  “What?” Ravan demanded.

  Mira shut the Lexicon and slipped the strap over her head. “Turn off your light.”

  Ravan stared at her like she was insane.

  “Do it!” Mira told her sternly. “I’m going to turn mine off, too. For just a second. When I turn it back on, you do the same.”

  “Why?” Ravan flipped off her light. The illumination diminished by half.

  “There’s something I need to see. Just pray I’m wrong.”

  Mira took a deep breath—and then flipped off her own light. Everything went completely, utterly dark.

  And in that darkness, shapes were revealed.

  Floating bubbles of blackness in all shapes and sizes, all throughout the air, bouncing in slow motion into each other. So dark they somehow stood out.

  And other things. Worse things. Things roughly humanoid—but not.

  Devoid of any features, with eyeless faces of smooth, oily darkness. Strange hands rose up, reaching for the girls with impossibly long fingers of putrid—

  Mira screamed. Both girls flipped their lights back on.

  The hallway again. Dirty and crumbling, but empty. There was nothing there now.

  “What the hell was that?” Ravan shouted, aiming her rifle all around.

  “We’re in trouble,” Mira said, icy terror beginning to form in her stomach. “Put the gun away, it’s useless. Get behind me. Back to back. We have to keep shining our lights at everything in our field of view. We’re going to move down the hall for the door at the end.”

  “What for?” Ravan planted her back against Mira’s.

  “Because we need to find a way out of here right now.”

  They started moving, shining their lights all around.

  “Those things—they looked like people,” Ravan said.

  “This place is flooded with Dark Energy,” Mira said, shining her light everywhere in front of her. The floor, the ceiling, the walls where each met. “It’s an Anomaly. A bad one. It’s why we’re dizzy, why it’s getting hard to think. It’s changing our molecular structure, which means it’s messing with our brains.”

  “That doesn’t tell me what those things were!”

  “They’re called Void Walkers. They’re … impressions, sort of, all that’s left of the consciousness of whoever came in here before us.”

  “You’re saying that’s what’s going to happen to us?” Ravan almost turned around, but Mira shoved her back in place. They had to keep moving, had to keep thinking.

  “Yes,” Mira said. “Just keep looking everywhere with your light. They can’t do anything if you’re looking at them.”

  “Why?”

  “There’s something in chaos theory that says things don’t actually exist until you look at them.”

  “That’s crazy,” Ravan said tightly.

  “It is what it is! I don’t understand it, I’m not a scientist, all I know is Dark Energy works the opposite. It only exists when you’re not looking at it.”

  It took a while for Ravan to process that concept. “So—we just, what? Keep looking at everything and we’ll be fine?”

  “Until we can’t think straight anymore,” Mira replied, “and we’re just two vegetables sitting on the floor. Then they’ll come for us.”

  “I am not ending up like that. How much time?”

  “Funny thing. Technically, we should already be gone.”

  “Why?”

  “Dark Energy works fast. It’s created by any preexisting source of radiation. I don’t know why, but if you bring an outside source of radiation into a field of it, it acts like a dampener. It slows down the effect.”

  “You’re carrying something radioactive!” Ravan fumed.

  “It’s a long story. I need it for something important. And don’t complain. We’d already be like those things if we didn’t have it. At least now we’ve got a shot.”

  “How much time?” Ravan asked again.

  “Half an hour, maybe less.” It was true. The plutonium’s radiation wouldn’t hold off the Dark Energy for long. Mira just hoped the exit was on the other side of this door. If it wasn’t …

  They reached it, and it was as she thought, reinforced steel. A card reader rested to the side of it, probably for allowing entry, but they wouldn’t have to worry about that. It was already yawning open.

  Mira opened it the rest of the way and moved in, shining her light everywhere, with Ravan at her back.

  While the first rooms had been interesting, they were more or less mundane, and they provided no clues to the underground structure’s function. This new room changed all that.

  The walls were lined with old computer consoles covered in dust. Half the monitors were dark and dead; the rest were either flashing on and off or showing frozen images of error messages. Three chairs sat at different places at the computers, designating individual work stations. On the wall, just visible under a coating of grime, was a huge electronic map of the United States, with small, pinprick lights embedded all through it. Most of them were dark and lifeless now, like the cities and places they used to represent, but the occasional one still flickered weakly under the dust. All of it bathed the room in an eerie, flashing, and pulsing hue of dim color.

  The wall across from them held something even more unexpected. Windows. A whole row of them. It was too dark to see what was on the other side, but a door was inset next to them.

  Mira was having a hard time processing it all. Was the dizziness back? Honestly, she couldn’t tell now. She wasn’t sure what “normal” was anymore. She shook her head, tried to think as they moved.

  “It’s some kind of control room,” Mira managed, “but for what?” Keep reasoning, she told herself. Keep thinking. She moved to the nearest computer bank and wiped away years of dust with her hand.

  Ravan eyed it all strangely. “Where are we?”

  Mira’s head swam. She lowered the light to rub her temples.

  Something moved on the other side of the glass and she instantly raised the light back up. There was nothing now.

  Mira swallowed. “Ravan. Keep your light up, we have to concentrate.”

  There was nothing near to help them, which meant only one place left to go. They stepped through the door in the wall of windows. The room beyond was circular—its walls curving outward, well beyond the reach of their lights. Wherever they were, it was huge.

  “This … Dark Energy,” Ravan began, her light shining up. “You said radiation creates it?”

  Mira tried to think, to push through the fog in her head. “Any source of radiation that was here before the Strange Lands would create a fountain of the stuff. A generator, scientific instruments, even a microwave would—”

  “I think it might be a little bigger than that.”

  Mira followed Ravan’s light upward. Something massive filled the center of the chamber. At first she only saw dusty metal, painted white and black. Whatever it was stretched up to what must be the giant, circular door in the ground they had seen earlier, more than a hundred feet above them.

  Mira eventually recognized it. “Great,” she said in a whisper. “It’s a missile silo.”

  And they were in its launch tube. What was in front of them was very unmistakably a giant missile, resting stoically where it had been placed who knew how long ago, towering upward toward the door in the ceiling. Ravan’s light found the USAF logo on its side, and it became clear that what they were looking at was just the top of the missile, only its warhead. The rest of the thing’s girth lay below them, in some deeper chamber.

  “Okay. We know what it is. Now how do we get out?” Ravan asked, shining her light all around. There were no stairs, no ladders, nothing that would allow them to reach that huge door. Climbing the missile wasn’t an option either. It was sheer and smooth, and there were no handholds.

  Mira tried to think, but it was getting harder. Her thoughts formed like ice in a—

  Something moved back where they had been. They shined their li
ghts inside.

  Nothing.

  “Jesus…” Ravan said through clenched teeth. “We gotta think quick, I’m starting to fade here.”

  So was Mira. She forced herself to concentrate. An idea occurred to her. An unlikely one, but it was something. She moved back into the control room and Ravan followed. Together they brushed off the computers and knobs and dials, revealing the different controls: FUEL PRIME; TARGET ACQUISITION OVERRIDE; WARMUP PROCEDURE; LAUNCH CYCLES; ENGINE A, B, C. GO/NO GO. All archaic, lost terms from a technological world that no longer existed. Mira’s attention moved over them as she looked for something that stood out to her. Eventually she found it.

  LAUNCH DOOR OVERRIDE

  “Bingo,” Mira said. It was a big, blue rubber button, and Ravan dug out as much of the dirt and grime as she could. The button clicked as she pressed it in. Mira looked back out to the launch tube hopefully.

  Nothing happened. “Damn.”

  “Wait,” Ravan said, blowing more dust off the control board, revealing two different colored lines running from the launch door switch down through the maze of buttons and knobs. She brushed more dirt away, following the lines to where they ended—at two key slots.

  The keys still stood in their holes. The girls looked at each other.

  A sound came from behind, like something dragging itself toward them.

  They spun, shining their lights. It was gone. There was nothing.

  “Shine behind me,” Mira told Ravan. “I’ll shine in front. I turn my key, then you turn yours.”

  “We have to turn them at the same time, idiot,” Ravan said, watching the darkness behind them warily.

  “How do you know that?”

  “Didn’t you watch any movies growing up? They always turn the keys at the same time. Do it on three.”

  Mira frowned but didn’t argue. “One … two … three.”

  They turned their keys. The panel sparked violently. Then it lit up in bright colors underneath all the dust.

  Ravan and Mira looked at each other triumphantly. Ravan hit the launch door button again. From the huge room beyond came a crash, then a massive shuddering and the rumbling of hydraulics. Dirt fell in a torrent from the ceiling as a sliver of sunlight lit up the top of the old silo.

  “It’s working!” Mira shouted.

  “What if the Ion Storm’s still up there?” Ravan asked.

  “I’ll take an Ion Storm over Dark Energy any day.”

  Then an explosion of sparks erupted from a corner of the huge ceiling, spraying outward in a vicious arc. As it did, the sounds of the opening door cut off, the whine of hydraulics faded. The door shuddered … and then collapsed back down. The daylight disappeared.

  Ravan screamed in frustration and punched one of the windows.

  Mira looked back up at the ceiling through the control room windows. It was just as dark as before, with the exception of the sparks shooting out from up top now.

  She stepped back into the launch tube and shined her light up. The sparks were coming from a large metallic box at the edge of the door, with large cables running out of it.

  “It’s a junction box,” Ravan said behind her. “Big one. Runs that door, I bet.”

  “Can you fix it?” Mira asked.

  “Sure. Probably just needs a few cables resoldered, but how am I supposed to get up there?”

  “I think I have an answer for that.” Mira turned to Ravan. “You’re probably not gonna be a fan.”

  “Well, isn’t that a big shock,” Ravan said wryly.

  Both girls noticed something then. Ravan’s flashlight was dimmer. It was starting to die.

  “That’s the opposite of good, isn’t it?” Ravan asked.

  Movement from behind them—back in the control room. The girls spun.

  Mira had a fleeting image of two featureless, smooth black figures reaching for them … then they vanished under the fading flashlights.

  “Polar opposite,” Mira said.

  23. AMPLIFIER

  MIRA AND RAVAN BURST THROUGH A DOOR and slammed it shut, then lit it with their flashlights, staring as if they expected something to explode in after them. Nothing did.

  “Keep your—” Mira began.

  “Eyes on the door. Got it.” Ravan put her back to the wall. “What are you going to do?”

  “Make an artifact combination,” Mira said. “If I can find what I need.”

  She flashed her light around the room. It was what she’d hoped—a storage closet full of all sorts of things—bottles, tools, nuts and bolts, chains, brooms, cleaning supplies, spare linen, rubber bands, office supplies, brushes, and disused furniture.

  And it was all artifacts.

  Mira stared at the stocked shelves lustfully. If she had more time to spend here, this place would be profitable, but time was something she was running out of fast.

  The closet had its own sink. That meant they could do what they had to right here, which was good news. Assuming, of course, she could find the right components.

  “What does this artifact do?”

  “It’s called an Amplifier,” Mira replied. “Magnifies any element it touches. In our case, it’s going to be water.”

  “Magnifies it by how much?” Ravan asked suspiciously.

  “A lot. We’re going to flood the silo and ride the water up to the top. Then you fix the junction box. Doors open. We swim out.” Even to Mira it sounded crazy. “Easy.”

  “What if we can’t get the doors open?” Ravan asked angrily.

  “Then we’re both in a lot of trouble. Look, it’s this or nothing. I can’t think of any other—”

  The door to the room rattled and Ravan spun her light back to it. It stopped instantly.

  “Ravan, you have to keep your—”

  “I know!”

  Mira looked back to the shelves and shook her head. It was getting harder and harder to think. In about fifteen minutes they’d be lucky to remember their names. She tried to remember what she needed, and it was like trying to think while half-awake.

  Mira unslung her Lexicon and set it on the floor. When she unlocked it she opened it to the artifact combination section and flipped through the pages there. They were alphabetical. Aleve. Ambient. Amplifier. Android. Anr—

  Amplifier. She open the pages and studied them, and at the top was a summary.

  Name: Amplifier.

  Effect: Amplification of element: air, water, heat, cold, electricity, possibly others.

  Effect Time: Immediate.

  Area of Effect: Must physically touch element.

  Power Effect: Power source dependent; larger coins = more amplification. See Note 2.

  Duration: Power source dependent; larger coins = longer duration. See Note 1.

  Multitier?: Yes. Two tiers.

  Underneath the summary were diagrams and charts, notes Mira had made about the combination’s use with different elements. But she ignored all that, looking down to the list of ingredients at the bottom, and then compared it to what she had in her pack.

  She still needed a Focuser for the first tier, as well as a vial of water, and, ideally, a nine-volt battery.

  Mira quickly scanned the stuff on the shelves. There was a box of drywall screws. One of those would be fine for the first-tier Focuser. She was hoping for something spherical, and she remembered the pool balls in the rec room, but that meant going back into the hall with those things.

  No, a screw would have to work. She also saw a box of Duracell D batteries.

  D batteries could work in a pinch. They produced almost the same effect—but the phasing would be off, which meant it would be more powerful. That wasn’t going to matter, either—more power in this case was probably better.

  But what about the vial of water? That was going to be tougher.

  Mira studied each shelf but saw nothing. She looked to the floor piled with boxes of different things, and shone her light on them, flipping through each one.

  After the fourth one she found somethin
g. A case of tonic water, all in separate glass bottles. Would tonic work, Mira wondered? Did it have to be plain water? She’d never researched it, she didn’t know.

  What other choice was there?

  Mira sat her pack down and started rummaging through it. She pulled out a toothbrush and a tube of some kind of paste, as well as the other components she would need for the combination. She opened and squeezed the tube, and a thick, gray substance squirted out onto the brush. She quickly started spreading it on the drywall screws in the box.

  “What’s that stuff?” Ravan asked.

  “Ever get bubble gum in your hair as a kid?” Mira asked back. “What did your mom do?”

  “My mom was too drunk most the time to do much of anything, but I think you mean peanut butter. Spreading it in the hair loosens the gum.”

  Mira nodded. “This works the same way. We call it Paste, it’s a mix of silicone, magnet shavings, and mercury. It separates artifacts from each other, loosens the molecular bonds between them and whatever they’re fused to. It’s how we get artifacts loose.”

  As Mira spread the paste over the screws they sparked and sizzled, vibrating, pulling loose. She reached in with her fingers and worked one of them free. She smiled. They might get out of this yet.

  The door rattled behind Mira. She spun, saw the handle turning and raised her light at it.

  The rattling stopped.

  Ravan was slouched against the wall, staring off in a daze.

  “Ravan!” Mira shouted. It snapped the girl out of it, and she raised her flashlight again. Mira glared at her. “You have to stay awake or we’re both dead! The only reason we have a shot is because there’s two of us—we can watch both directions.”

  “It’s so hard…” Ravan said, blinking her eyes, trying to focus.

  “Talk to me, then,” Mira said. “It’ll help.”

  “About what? I don’t got any gossip to share.”

  “I don’t know. Tell me your story.” It was the only thing Mira could think of. “Tell me who you were before the invasion.”

  Ravan shook her head angrily. “Screw that. Everyone has stories. I’m tired of hearing them. It doesn’t matter who you used to be.”

  “Fine. You pick the topic. But talk.”