Ominous Experiment (part 5)
1280 Words
Their hearts were pounding heavily.
“What button did you push?” Rylan asked after a pause. But Owen didn’t answer nor did he want to and just closed his eyes.
The instructions started playing in the elevator,
'Please do not open the door manually or push the buttons while the elevator is moving. Please do not put a weight of more than 200kg in the elevator. You are now ascending to the 15th floor.'
Both of them slumped over and yet again sat down defeated, catching their breaths.
"What the heck... What is this elevator on... 15th floor? I thought we only had like 3 banned floors!" Owen threw his hands in the air frustrated. “You mean to tell me we are sandwiched between two hells?”
"We survived that s**t but God knows what is on that upper level, I hope they are not deadly, or dangerous, or anything related to death!" Rylan stated while shaking his head. “Was it really the 7th floor we worked on, F6?” he asked but gave a tired sigh. "I had to pick the stairs so many times y'know?"
When Owen looked over he saw that Rylan's shirt was covered in blood and in a slight panic he spoke up, "Oi you need to cover up that wound on your ankle and arm, or it can get infected." Owen pointed at the bleeding areas and injuries Rylan sustained from all the dragging.
"They do hurt, but I'll manage." Rylan bandaged them up with his already torn sleeve and pressed his hands tightly against it to stop further bleeding.
"It's strange..." After a pause, Rylan spoke up again.
Distressed, Owen replied without even looking at him, "Huh... What is it now?"
"That thing, it seemed like it had thoughts of its own, agility and strength aside, his reactions were exactly like a human." Rylan said squinting his eyes, "If it were a machine, it would stop to analyze or wait for orders, or anything."
Owen gave him a disgusted look and was ready to throw hands at him. "You mean to tell me that, THAT thing was a human? I doubt we would be alive if that thing had a brain!"
"Probably, considering all those dead bodies which appeared to be experimented on and later discarded as if they failed to succeed in something," Rylan raised his brow in wonder as the b****y scene from the cage came back to his memory.
"It seemed like a monster to me, alright..." Owen cut him mid-sentence and gave a tired response.
"It isn't the monster Owen, the one who created it, is the real monster."
Both of them went silent.
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part 5
New discovery
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With a sudden shake, the elevator slowed down.
"What the hell! What now? Why is it stopping!?" Owen stood up.
Ting! 'Attention please, we are facing some technical problems right now, the elevator can no longer ascend, welcome to F9 the 10th floor.'
It stopped. How many floors were there exactly? Both gave each other a confused look and were hesitant to get off. They pushed F14 the 15th-floor button but ended up on the 10th-floor. Was there a technical issue or was someone stopping them from ascending through the elevators?
'You can now proceed to exit the elevator. Please leave before the door is closed.'
The door opened and a whole new area came into view. It was well-lighted but there was nothing but white tiles and glassed hallways.
"Should we be getting off? What if it's messing with us, I can try to hack this elevator again and make it work?” Owen suggested.
Rylan agreed, "You work on that, while I'm going to check this place." Rylan stepped out first.
"Why the hell would you go on like an i***t and roam without a proper weapon? What if there is something like that creep on this level again?"
"There might be survivors like us on each floor, keeping in mind the buttons I checked in this elevator, this building has a total of 23 floors, the F0th being the ground floor and the lowest." Rylan scratched his chin thinking. “I believe we were deceived to believe this facility has 7 working floors and all the other floors are underground.”
Owen was taken aback. “How can you say that they are underground?”
Rylan held his arm and put his finger on side of his mouth, “Just think...If we were on the top floors, then the sequence we know is wrong and just superficial. Originally...we worked on the 17th-23rd floor, to begin with. Further up is the rooftop, then obviously all these other floors are deep underground!”
“Fine, let’s go with what you say, but how come we never saw that many people leaving or even rumors about such employees?”
Rylan snickered, “It’s easy...they used different elevators and passages.”
Owen didn’t want to think more on this matter and just said, “Whatever, let's focus on finding a damn signal or a phone that works.”
However, Rylan seemed to have other plans, “Anyways...I’ll go look if there are any survivors, they might need help.”
Hearing this absurd thing about saving people, Owen urgently stood up and shouted, "Rylan! We can't save everyone-" grabbing Rylan by his collar Owen’s anger level spiked.
"Why do we have to rescue others, we should call the military soon as we get out!" Gritting his teeth Owen didn't let go of his hold.
Rylan’s expressions were calm and he patiently listened to his partner’s cussing. When Owen was done, Rylan sighed and slapped away Owen's hand saying, "I know, I'm not that generous or powerful enough to save lives. I'm saying this because I think we need more people to figure out the area, and if we can find someone who used to work on this floor..."
Owen’s eyes relaxed, "Ahh, then we can access the map and have an idea of each floor!”
Rylan gave him a short smile and nodded. "Now you're thinking."
“Fine... But be careful and don't get lost!" Owen turned away and started taking out his mini pod. “I’ll set the destination to the 17th floor.”
Rylan stopped mid-track and turned back to tell Owen something, "No wait, make it 23rd, our lab is on that floor. I need to get something before we leave this facility."
Not bothering anymore Owen nonchalantly asked him,
"Do you think there will be a chance of escaping so easily in this situation?"
Taken aback by his sudden change in attitude Rylan bit his lip suppressing his anger and closing his eyes he replied, "I don't know, for now, let's focus on what we can do."
Rylan went on through the broad hallway and entered what appeared to be a common lounge room. There was a circular sitting place and around the sitting place were many other doors. Rylan chose one door on the left depending on his half-assed luck and before trying to open it he read a small crystal board on the wall that said,
"Dead but not forgotten."
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-Information Available-
F0= 'Dungeon'
The lowest floor of the H.G.E.F is inaccessible to regular employees, the facility has hidden a lot of facts from its workers and they have a whole dungeon at the bottom of this messy place. Status of other floors: unknown. The total layout of the building is unknown.
Species: Humanoid AI (armed)
The task at hand: Keep the 'subjects' in place
Findings on Map: F1-F5 status: unknown
Current Floor on map: F6-F10 status: The 10th Floor
- Writer
