“Sure thing,” he replied as he ran over, changed out his gear, and aimed his hookshot.
Once the line was in place, everyone was able to pull themselves up on to the balcony. There were two doors at either end of it, but Michael headed for a large grate in the wall. There was already a hole in it, like something had blasted it.
“I’ve sent a drone ahead to scout. This goes in the right direction,” Michael told them as he pulled the cover off the grate and climbed inside.
Trusting his teammate, Ethan climbed in after him. The others were right behind him, although Jude grumbled something incoherent before getting in.
The inside of the vent was large enough for Ethan to crawl forward without a problem. It also wasn’t that long. The vent quickly ended, and Ethan soon found himself crawling into another room. It looked to be some sort of maintenance shaft that led upward. The bottom was about twenty feet across and round, but Ethan couldn’t see how far it went up. The room was gloomy and poorly lit by small yellow lights in the walls. There was a ladder that went up though, so they didn’t have to climb using his hookshot. The entire shaft also vibrated slightly as air moved through it, which created a low ringing noise.
“And now we go up. Don’t worry. I’ve disabled the cameras,” Michael said when everyone was inside. He was already on the ladder.
Since there was nowhere to go but up, Ethan’s team climbed the ladder one by one. Lily was last, while Ethan was in front of her, and Kyle was before him. There wasn’t much for Ethan to look at as he climbed. The walls were all the same dirty concrete. Every once in a while, there was a hatch that led out to a floor, but there was no point going through any of them. They were aiming for the top.
After going up a least a dozen floors, Michael came to an unexpected stop. There was still plenty of ladder above them, so Ethan frowned and looked up to see what the matter was. Michael was clearly staring toward the top of the shaft, although Ethan couldn’t tell what had got his attention.
“Uh oh,” the older man suddenly remarked. Ethan immediately tensed in alarm.
“What?” Jude asked irritably.
“Incoming from above. Get in,” Michael barked as he hurriedly reached and opened the vent next to the ladder. He then dove inside and turned to extend a hand.
Jude hesitated for a split second before taking his hand and then she was pulled inside the vent. With them out of the way, Ethan had a clear view up the shaft. There was a series of lights dropping toward him. Wait, was that a spiderbot? Hacks and glitches! This was very bad.
“How did your drone miss a spiderbot! They’re huge!” Ethan yelled. The giant robot filled the entire shaft as it used its many legs to descend with alarming speed. The clatter of its legs against the walls was now much louder than the normal vibrations of the maintenance shaft.
“It came out of a side passage near the top. Just get in the vent!”
“No time! I might make it, but the others won’t,” Ethan replied as he eyed the approaching enemy. An excited smile appeared on his face. He had an idea. It was risky, but he could probably pull it off.
Springing into action, Ethan shot the opposite wall with his hookshot, then grabbed the ladder with his legs and leaned back so that he was looking up.
“What are you doing?” Kyle asked in alarm. Lily was oddly silent.
“Making an opening. Be ready to take advantage of it,” Ethan replied as he reached for a javelin.
As the giant mechanical spider closed in, Ethan sighted on one of its legs and then threw his javelin with as much force as possible. With the power of evoking behind it, the projectile shot upward and ripped into one of the spider’s legs. The crystal weapon sank almost a foot into the steel of the limb and then exploded, blowing the limb right off.
As bits of metal rained down, the spiderbot slowed its descent for a moment as it adjusted to make up for its lost leg, and Ethan took the opportunity to throw another javelin. This time the crystal weapon blew off the next leg over.
Ethan didn’t get a chance to strike again. He had to lean out of the way of falling scrap and then the spiderbot was upon them. It’s bulk and many legs filled almost the entire maintenance shaft, and its eyes blazed with red light as it prepared to crush the intruders like a blazing meteor falling from heaven.
Rather than fight, Ethan moved to dodge the incoming mechanical juggernaut.
“Follow me!” he yelled as he dropped to grab Lily and then kicked off the wall.
“What are you doing?” Lily asked, but there was no time to answer her and she didn’t resist.
Instead, using his lifeline, Ethan swung them both across the shaft. As he looked at the attacking robot, they hit the far wall, and Ethan kicked off it so that they swung to the side a bit. This brought them directly under the spiderbot’s damaged legs, where there was an opening.
The giant robot didn’t let them pass without a fight though. Glaring at Ethan with its cluster of red eyes, it swiped at him with a working limb that ended in a long claw. Still holding Lily, Ethan shot a new lifeline up through space between the robot’s missing legs and activated his reel. Immediately, he was tugged upward toward safety. At the same time, he seized the Origin and sent a blast of aether at the incoming leg, deflecting it away.
Excitement raged through Ethan as he slipped through the storm of metal, and he let out an eager laugh. Yes! This was what he loved about Worldshift. The thrill of taking risks and reaping the sweet rewards of his skills. Without danger, he wasn’t truly alive. This thrill was a prize as great as any amount of money. He’d been so focused on surviving to climb the tower that he’d almost forgotten why he played this game in the first place. Without Lily’s support, he would have let all his problems keep him down.
A moment later, the huge body of the enemy robot was past. Ethan and Lily hung from his lifeline with nothing but the gloom of the empty shaft above them. A moment later, the lifeline shook as Kyle jetted through the air and grabbed it, just as the spiderbot passed by him as well.
“Wow, that was way too close,” Kyle remarked as he looked up at Ethan.
“It’s not over yet,” Ethan replied as he swung to the ladder and dropped Lily off there.
“Thanks, that was an amazing move,” she told him as he grinned proudly.
Below the players, horrible metallic screeching filled the air as the spiderbot used its remaining legs to slow its fall and turn around.
Standing on the ladder and holding his lifeline, Ethan reached for his quiver. “Let’s finish this thing off before we get another unwelcome surprise.”
“Ya, we should get out of here. I think we’ve made far too much noise,” Lily replied as she drew her pistol.
Kyle nodded and jumped to the far wall where there were some handholds. He then pulled out his pistol as well. All three players then opened fire at the enemy below them. Bullets tore into the exposed joints on the robot’s legs and the top of its neck as Ethan tossed a javelin at its back. The crystal weapon barely scratched the spiderbot’s heavy armor, but then it exploded with a loud boom. The shockwave rattled the robot, and its remaining legs suddenly gave out as it was thrown downward. The huge robot had taken too much damage to stop its fall. Sparks flew up as its giant body violently scraped against the side of the shaft and then it disappeared into the gloom below. A few moments later, there was a loud boom as the spiderbot hit the bottom.
“I see you all lived,” Michael remarked once he stuck his head out of the vent above them. “Good job.”
“Thanks, we couldn’t have done it without you,” Ethan replied sarcastically as he rolled his eyes. There were no hard feelings though. Michael and Jude had done the right thing.
After a brief and hurried conversation, the team decided to use the vent to leave the maintenance shaft. Their fight with the spiderbot had probably revealed their location, and Michael was sure the shaft didn’t go all the way to the top of the tower anyway. They needed to find another way up.
The vent led
into a large room full of humming servers and computer workstations. With his stealth cloak back on, Kyle quickly scouted the place out while the others waited by the vent’s exit. He found a few humanoid droids working at computers stations, but none of them were armed. It was thus easy for the team to sneak to the door. It was locked, but Michael quickly hacked it and got it open.
Once they left the server room, the team found themselves in a long hallway with doors leading off into more server rooms around them. The doors were all made of transparent reinforced glass, so they were easy to see through. The hallway itself was plain looking, with white walls and a grey-tiled floor. This meant it was easy to see anything coming, but also that there was nothing to hide behind. Any droids that got close would see right through their stealth cloaks.
“All right, this way,” Michael said as he walked down the hallway. Ethan was pretty sure he’d chosen the direction at random.
Thankfully, they didn’t stumble into any enemy patrols. A single hovering camera droid passed them by, but they were able to duck into a nearby server room to avoid it.
After a few minutes of walking, the hallway ended at a small hall that contained a row of benches and two elevators. They weren’t unguarded though. The hall contained two cameras, and three droids armed with rifles were standing next to the elevator doors.
As they peered into the hall from the entrance, Michael played with his interface. Ethan assumed he was taking out the cameras.
“What now? Do we seize the elevators?” Jude asked as she held her machine gun.
“No, they’re undoubtedly connected to a central command system that could lock them down,” Michael replied.
“So what do we do then?” Kyle asked.
Michael pointed at a door on the far side of the hall. There was a yellow sign on it inscribed with the image of a garbage can. “Let’s see what’s in there.”
Sneaking across the hall turned out to be fairly easy. With the cameras disabled, the only obstacle was the droids by the elevators, and they didn’t appear particularly observant. Holding their rifles, they stared straight ahead without moving at all. Ethan guessed they were there to guard the elevators and nothing else.
The only problem lay in actually opening the garbage room door. None of the guards were looking at it, but Michael moved carefully anyway. As everyone held their breath and gripped their weapons, they watched the guards as the door slowly swung open a few inches. None of the droids reacted.
Michael peeked through the door. He must not have seen any sign of danger because he then summoned a hover drone and sent it into the room on the other side before opening the door wider and motioning for everyone to enter.
The players hurried through the door. On the other side, there was a grungy-looking hallway that went on for about thirty feet before ending at the entrance to a larger room. The hallway was dark and lit only by a series of small yellow lights on the ceiling. The room beyond it was full of noise and shifting shadows. Ethan heard beeping and whirring as he cautiously crept to the room’s entrance and peeked through.
Ethan had been afraid he’d be confronted by a horde of guard droids, but instead he saw a room full of moving mechanical equipment. He was standing on an industrial balcony made from steel grating. About two floors below him, garbage of various types was falling out of large pipes and landing on several conveyer belts that ran across the middle of the room. As the garbage moved down the conveyer belts, it was picked up by several robotic hands that sorted it and dropped it in holes in the floor. Looking up, Ethan saw he was actually in another tall shaft that went up a long way. The garbage chute also went all the way up, with pipes sticking out of it that went to every floor.
“There’s an elevator we can use,” Michael remarked as he pointed across the room. “Even if it does come under central control, we won’t be trapped.”
Among the other machinery, Ethan hadn’t noticed the service elevator until Michael pointed it out. It was a simple-looking steel cage that blended in with everything else.
There was a ladder leading down from the balcony they were standing on, so they descended to the machinery below. As they crossed the floor, Ethan kept a wary eye on the nearby robotic arms, but surprisingly, none of them went berserk and tried to attack the players. They made it to the service elevator without a problem, and after a few moments of examination, Michael decided he could get it moving without triggering any alarms. Everything went easier than Ethan had expected.
Thus, the entire team got inside the steel cage of the elevator and they began to ascend. It was a slow process though. The elevator wasn’t very fast. It made a repetitive clanking noise as it passed by pipe after pipe and rose up the shadowy shaft. Ethan found it almost relaxing.
At the top of the shaft was another steel balcony and another hallway leading to a door just like the one they had used to enter the garbage room. Michael took the lead again and opened the door just enough for him to sneak a glance through it.
On the other side of the door was another white hallway lined by server rooms and offices, so the team of players crept out and headed down the hallway to their right. They had to wander around for a while and dodge another patrol by jumping into a server room, but they eventually found a stairwell leading upward. It was right in the center of a room at the end of a hallway. The back of the room was glass, and the metropolis could be seen outside. They were very far up now. The tops of the other skyscrapers were beneath them, and every other building looked tiny. Ethan took a moment to just take in the view. The gleaming city seemed to go on forever.
On the right side of the room were two elevators like the ones they’d avoided before. There were guards in this room as well, but they were stationed at the bottom of the staircase. Six humanoid droids with rifles and two floating hover drones with obvious guns sticking out of the front of them were protecting the area.
Lily sighed when she saw the droids. “I’m getting sick of these guys, and I think we’re near the top. Let’s just use another scrambler.”
Michael paused for a moment but then nodded. “Fine. That should give us all the cover we need, and we have breaching charges if we run into to any barriers.”
“Sounds like a great idea to me!” Jude said.
That decided, Lily pulled out a scrambler bomb like the one she’d used before and then slid it across the floor toward the droids. This drew the guards’ attention, but before they could react properly, the bomb went off.
A familiar wave of static washed over Ethan, and the droids all spasmed. As the hover drones dropped to the ground, the players stepped into the room and fired. All together, they promptly blasted the confused droids into scrap. Jude’s machine gun did most the damage, but Ethan got one with a javelin.
As they strolled toward the stairs, Jude gave Ethan a disapproving look. “You’re still using that thing? Why don’t you just throw rocks?”
“I like it, and it certainly does enough damage,” Ethan replied with a shrug. Jude just grunted as they climbed the stairs. She clearly didn’t understand his desire to use a weapon that required him to practice new skills. Weapons weren’t always about blowing up as much as possible.
When they reached the top of the stairs, the players looked around at a huge square chamber. Light streamed in from a series of massive skyward windows around the edge of the ceiling and from the walls—three of which were steel-reinforced glass. The last one looked to be made from concrete.
“We’re very close to the top now,” Lily remarked.
Ethan nodded as he studied the scene in front of him. Throughout the chamber were long lines of holographic displays showing an overwhelming number of colorful scenes.
The projectors themselves were very thin boxes about three feet high. They had a metallic sheen and little lights on them, which marked them as electronic devices. Above them flashed screens made of light that displayed images full of color and motion. Looking at the ones nearby, Ethan saw they seemed to display scen
es from around the city. The images were probably from surveillance feeds, since they were full of droids moving around on routine tasks or standing in various types of rooms.
The stairs the players had just climbed came up through the floor in one corner of the room. Ethan saw three more similar staircases in the other corners.
“There must be a lot of different ways to get to this one room,” Ethan remarked as he looked around.
“It’s a big building,” Kyle remarked. “I’m sure the way we took was just one of many.”
Michael raised his hand and pointed across the room. “I believe that’s where we need to go now.”
Everyone looked toward what he was pointing at. There was a door on the concrete wall with symbols engraved above it. The three key images were hard to miss since they were glowing green.
“Subtle,” Ethan remarked sarcastically.
“At least we know we’re in the right place,” Lily replied in an unusually sedate voice. Ethan glanced at her, but she seemed fine.
Kyle stepped forward. “Hmm, it certainly is a big empty room. Is it trapped, do you think?”
“Let’s just move. I’m sick of this place, and we can deal with whatever we find,” Jude answered in an impatient way.
Ethan gave her a look. “Better safe than sorry.”
She didn’t back down. “I want this annoying floor over with, and this looks like a rest stop before a boss. I’d bet it’s safe enough.”
“You’re just mad because you couldn’t shoot your way to the top of the tower,” Kyle replied in a snarky tone.
Jude grunted sourly. “I’m sure I’ll get an opportunity to unload some bullets soon. Let’s get going.”
“I could send a drone to scout around,” Michael suggested. However, Jude had already taken off her stealth cloak and was walking toward the door.
That gave her allies no real choice but to follow her. They had their own stealth cloaks, but they weren’t perfect, and Jude gave their position away. With a sigh, Ethan removed his cloak as well. In front of him, Kyle did the same. Keeping the cloaks on would hamper their movements and prevent them from using their movement gear.
Worldshift- Virtual Revolution Page 35
