The Aethernet Falls

Chapter 10 - Observations

The Observatory was abandoned as promised. When the large ground car rolled into the open lot that served as a parking area for the long-gone staff Clarissa got the impression that it wasn’t perhaps the best place to be.

Large cracks ran up and along the concrete facade, penetrating into the large dome that housed the telescope. They were severe enough in some places to cause segments of the wall to crumble away, revealing the reinforcements within the walls. One segment of the dome had collapsed. The front had no windows in that most pure of ways; every single window had been broken, leaving the occasional jagged remnant in the otherwise empty frames. To top it all off, the entire place was covered top to bottom in colourful graffiti.

Boros had been impressed by the dedication to get the perfect tag near the top of the dome. Judging by the layers upon layers of paint everywhere else, there were probably a good number of graffitos that had made it to the top, too.

It had made Clarissa uneasy. Unsure whether or not they should actually go in. Somebody might already be squatting there.

Greco looked disgusted in the rear view mirror. He scoffed and muttered something under his breath. But he pulled the car to a stop all the same, just outside of the front doors. They hung open, nearly torn off their hinges.

The entryway was much the same as the outside; covered in graffiti anywhere someone could get something in. Most of the glass from the broken windows was scattered on the floor inside. Boros took it to mean that they were the first method of entry. The doors had been blown out from the inside. He only hoped the still closed doors labelled Atrium and Offices, hadn’t yet been breached. I tried one of them, the door to the atrium, and found it locked. Suddenly, he was concerned that they wouldn’t be able to get it open themselves.

Greco stayed by the doors covering his nose and mouth with a handkerchief, Boros hadn’t even noticed the smell of the place. He wasn’t even sure it had one.

Meanwhile, Clarissa was exploring the back of the reception desk, not sure what she was looking for. She was surprised to find a door behind them, even more so when she discovered it was unlocked. She peered through first, carefully not to make a sound in case someone was inside. She screamed when the door closed behind her.

“Sasa!” Boros had shouted and was running, pulling the handgun out from his waistband. He threw the door open to find Clarissa alone, standing there. She turned and grabbed onto him, pale in the face.

The room, as it turned out, was a small break room with a bathroom attached. Inside the lone toilet stall was a small pile of bones, flesh, and decaying clothes.

“Guess one of the idiots that decorated this place didn’t make it.” Greco was behind them now. Boros hadn’t heard him come in. “Didn’t want to report it.” He reached for something in the pile. Using the handkerchief as a barrier between himself and the filth he produced a rusting knife that Boros hadn't noticed before, “and rightly so. It seems.” He dropped the knife back on the pile.

Clarissa had removed herself from Boros now, but she refused to look at the pile in the corner.

“Come on.” Greco said, holding the door open, “I have a key.” He flashed a little silver device. “If the solar grid is still hooked into this forsaken place.”

Clarissa left first, and Boros followed. He was slightly surprised Greco hadn’t slammed the door on him, but he had held it open for the both of them. The two siblings walked into the centre of the room waiting for Greco to open whichever of the other two doors he had access to. They said nothing.

“They gave me this key at the opening party. I guess it was meant as a symbolic gesture, but they assured me it worked all the same.” He slid the key into a small slot on the wall, “Assuming the power is still coming from the panels. Who’s to say that the hooligans that stabbed our friend in the bathroom didn’t smash those up too.”

The door proved him wrong. The servos that opened it whirred to life and the door swung gently inwards. Unlike the entryway, the Atrium was completely untouched. It was left as though the researchers that had abandoned it when their funding was cut might return at any moment. Large arrays of screens on the walls began an archaic boot-up sequence, workstations came to life, the telescope itself had tried to realign to zero but was stuck in place where the debris from the dome had jammed it in place.

The three of them walked together now, Greco trailing behind the two siblings. They were walking close together, and everyone seemed to be following Boros’ lead. He walked up to one of the workstations and blew the accumulated dust of decades revealing the observatory logo and a sign in screen.

“I could probably get into one of these given enough time.” He said. “I’m not a hacker or anything but I’ve had some experience getting into computers I shouldn’t have.” He began typing on keys that stuck with years of neglect and debris buildup. Clarissa looked on, interested. Or perhaps unwilling to wander off on her own.

“What would you want with that?” Greco sneered. “Anything in there has to be way out of date.” He began wandering around, vaguely remembering the layout of the place.

“The work on the Founders was interdisciplinary. Everyone that could worked on it, and this place was still running at about the right time.” Boros was still typing into a command console. He would mutter a curse from time to time when the keys stuck or he mistyped a line of code. “You should probably move the car from the front. We don’t want to advertise that we’re here.”

Greco hadn’t thought of that when he parked it out in the open. The empty lot, he had recalled, was always for parking. He wasn’t sure there was anywhere else he could put the car. “Yea, alright. Don’t worry, I won’t leave you here.”

Boros hadn’t even questioned it. He assumed the man would come back. He believed that Greco was hinging all his bets on him and that he wouldn’t dare take off. He wasn’t so sure now, but he took the man at his word.

Clarissa brushed off the portion of workstation not taken up by the computer and lifted herself onto it. Boros muttered something and the lights came on in the wide open space, flickering in some places, but they were working. Clarissa’s smile returned to her face.

“Say Bobo, where did you learn to do that?” She was kicking her legs, it was what she did when her feet couldn’t touch the floor.

“I worked with a guy for a while. He taught me a few things.”

“Oh, anybody I knew?”

Boros stood up, taking a brief break from the furious typing, “No. I showed up to work one day and he was shot in a dozen different places.”

“Oh.” Sometimes Clarissa could act like a child. It didn’t bother Boros, but it didn’t help the situation either. He knew it was a way of shutting out the world around her. She retreated into her own little world where everything was innocent. Nobody died and everyone was nice. He envied the ability to shut out the world.

“Sasa, can you see if any of these stations are unlocked? It’ll make things go faster.” Boros knew that something to do would take her out of her little reverie, she would be reliable again, though probably craving whatever she had been dosing with when he had found her.

Clarissa moved to the first work station when the door was thrown open. Boros could hear the servos whine in protest as Greco came bursting in. He ran down the short stairway to the workstations and ducked slid behind the one Boros was working at. He was breathing hard.

“What’s wrong?” Boros asked the man, leaning over the desktop.

“People. Coming. Truck. Guns.” He managed. He was shocked. Boros had never known a man to go into shock so easily. He chocked it up to the man’s sheltered lifestyle. Even as the second to the minister of defense and power he would only have to press a button to activate the defense grid. Even then, there hadn’t been a war in nearly half a century.

“Is the door locked?” Boros hardened his face and fondled on the desk for the handgun.

“No time.” Greco sucked in air. “I think they saw me.”

Boros had to give it to the man, he was recovering quite quickly. He didn’t have time for another thought before his heart pumped even more adrenaline in his bloodstream.

“He went in there.” A voice shouted in the distance.