Chapter XLI: Building #345

Chapter XLI: Building #345

The waters of the Atlantic Ocean are calm, with little to no breeze. There, on a small island right in the middle of the Atlantic lies a mythical place referred to as Building #345.

Suddenly over the calm seas a massive airship appears. The exterior is blue-ish with gold lines surrounding it. It consists of four different quadrants, separated buildings from each other, one on the top right and top left, the other two quadrants are in the bottom left and bottom right. They are tied in the middle by what seems to be another smaller spherical building, the command center of the Methuselah, the most powerful airship in the whole world. It returns from invisibility mode and appears right there close to the mythical building 345.

A hatch in the bottom left quadrant opens and standing in the middle of that small hangar were all of the Terra Contego.

“Brother Marcus will go with you,” says Sylvia as she introduces a bald white man and with totally white eyes, wearing a modern-looking metallic armor. “He can prove useful in battle,” says Sylvia.

“Very good,” says Professor Ulysses.

Meanwhile Dwayne and Alexandra kept arguing because she wanted to go down there, and Dwayne didn’t want her to. “Oh come on!” says Alexandra, “No! No way!” replies Dwayne. “YES, I AM GOING!” yells Alexandra. ‘Against a woman you will lose, that’s for sure,” says Maxwell with a smile. “It’s too dangerous Alexa,” says Dwayne. “I don’t care, I want to feel useful in some way… I’ll be with you,” says Alexandra.

Dwayne, reluctantly, nods. “I won’t get in the way, I promise,” says Alexandra with a smile.

“Get ready, because we are going down. You will jump from here all the way down. Get ready,” says Sylvia.

Dwayne grabs Alexandra and says “You can’t jump that high” with a cocky smile. “NOW!” yells Sylvia.

The seven people jump from the Methuselah all the way down to the terrain. They land without any problems.

“I am detecting life force readings inside,” says Brother Marcus. “Miss Sylvia didn’t want to say what was inside here… so we must go and find out,” says Maxwell.

“Move!” says Ulysses, running in front of the team, like any good leader. “Behind ya buddy!” says Maxwell, “Yes, sir!” says Guile. “Yes,” says Alphonse.

And so everyone comes running into the building. On the inside the passage is divided in three ways. One left door, another central one, and the right one.

“I’ll go to the right,” says Dwayne.

“Maxwell and brother Marcus come with me to the left,” says Professor Ulysses. “Then that means Guile and me go straight into the center,” says Alphonse.

“Move out then,” says Ulysses.

“Come Alexa,” says Dwayne as he passes right through the door.

From one seven man group, they are now divided to a 3-team group, each one going split ways.

The first thing Dwayne notices when he enters is that he’s inside a chamber of some sorts. Blue capsules lay by his side, each with different strange inscriptions. Everything is broken and destroyed, nothing works, and it seems like it had been a long time since the building was last used. Alexandra gets close to some old and dusty documents by her side in a desk. She lights on her flashlight and reads the very screwed document.

“Top Secret Project, Project ZARIA,” she manages to read. “Zaria?” asks Dwayne while checking the broken capsules.

“Bioengineering… wow this is hard to read. It’s saying something about a third pillar, but… the papers are too damaged to be able to read anything.” She says. “Let’s keep on going, this place gives me the creeps,” says Dwayne. “Yeah, it sure does,” replies Alexandra.

Both of them walk towards a stuck door. Dwayne uses some strength and pushes it back. Inside was a computer center, but none of the computers were working. It did seem like the building hadn’t been used for many years, and everything was dark since there was no light. Dwayne gets close to a computer and tries to power it up. Incredibly it does, but after it boots up it asks for a password.

“Damn it,” says Dwayne.

Suddenly a feedback is heard, coming from some speakers.

“You know the password,” is heard from the speakers.

“Dwayne?” asks Alexandra obviously scared. “So I know it,” says loudly Dwayne. “Input your codename,” says the voice.

Dwayne gets close to the dusty keyboard and types GM00666. Incredibly the system boots up. On the screen the words “ZARIA” appear, with links to different documents.

“See what they did with us,”

“So this is where we were created?” asks Dwayne loudly. “Incorrect, this is the third fork of the BIO Project, the ZARIA. This is the third building where they created each of us,”

“So, there’s another NanoBIO?” asks Dwayne. “Our sister…”

“But I am not here for her, since she died a long time ago, even before we were completed. Partially, one of the reasons I came here was to look for her or information, but the database has been mostly deleted so this is useless. I just need a back up of some files, and the key to the Heracles,”

“Heracles?” asks Dwayne. “You will soon see it.” Was heard, then another feedback. “Look for me…. Level C, room 45… the main Computer Center, the true Command Center of this building,”

“Fine,” replies Dwayne as feedback is heard again. “I will go to that room, but I will ask you to stay here Alexandra,” says Dwayne. “But…” was all she could say. “I beg of you, if you are around when I battle my brother I will not be able to fight with all I have,” begs Dwayne. Alexandra takes a deep breath and nods. “Wait for me here,” he says as he sets off running away.

“Good luck…”

On the left side Ulysses, Maxwell and Brother Marcus made their way through a big mess of dead and bloody soldiers. “We must hurry!” says Ulysses. “Project ZARIA” reads Maxwell on a sign in front of a door.

“ZARIA… what the hell could that be,” says Ulysses. “ZARIA, codenamed 00999 was a third NanoBIO created by the US Government, a woman. Reports say that it was unsuccessful and she died, being the only failure of the whole project. So this building was abandoned, but still protected to scare any intruders,” replies Brother Marcus.

“A third NanoBIO…” whispers Ulysses.

On the center side Alphonse and Guile made their way through some narrow corridors. “It read Laboratory,” says Guile, reading a sign as they ran forward.

“Laboratory,” says Alphonse as he speeds up even more. The corridor was lengthy but it eventually ends in an elevator. “Come,” says Alphonse as he draws his katana and opens the doors by force.

“Huh, I don’t think that would work in this situation,” says Guile. “Hmm, true, we need the stairs,” says Alphonse looking for any sign. “Come,” says Guile as he punches a door down. “Fine,” says Alphonse as he goes running along Guile all the way down a few levels. Eventually they reach the lower level. “Laboratory,” says Alphonse. “Go,” says Guile as both of them run forward towards another narrow corridor, but this time with a visible door at the end.

Meanwhile Alexandra was waiting in the Computer Center when all of a sudden the door explodes and flies away crashing in a wall. Coming from the door was none other than Lucian himself.

“Princess, long time no see,” he smiles at her as he passes by walking forward. Alexandra stood there frozen.

“Dumb big brother,” says Lucian as he walks. “A trap!” yells Alexandra. “And it took you guys some time to find that out,” says Lucian as he enters by another door. “An ambush, DWAYNE!” thinks Alexandra scared to death.

Meanwhile Alphonse and Guile reach the Laboratory door and open it by force. Inside was a room with a metal table in the middle and other equipment, but more surprising was Alexander sitting in a chair with his white sword out. “Hello,” says Alexander with a diabolical grin. “Shit!” says Guile.

On the left side, the guys were up to a surprise as suddenly General Mack appears in front of them. Ulysses and the others stop in their tracks instantly as they are faced off with the mighty General Mack Mach.

“Leave this to me!’ says Brother Marcus as he draws a very big rifle from his back.

“Boom,” says Mack with a smile. “SHIT!” yells Maxwell as the ground trembles and breaks to pieces, sending the three men to an abyss down below. Professor Ulysses takes action and draws a cable from his jacket and throws it a nearby pole. “Hold on to me!” he yells as he throws the cable towards the pole. The two guys hang on to the Professor as he stops in his fall. “The cable won’t hold much,” says Maxwell.

“But I am a genius so I have an automatic clawshot ready to be deployed,” says the Professor with a cocky smile, hanging barely from a thread. Struggling, he grabs the clawshot from his jacket and quickly fires it up. It attaches to the ceiling of a small air vent.

“Hang on!” says Ulysses as the machine automatically starts rising them up. Suddenly the Professor’s jacket begins to break. Slowly each thread snaps.

“I told you to buy a good jacket dammit! Not this cheap piece of shit!” yells Maxwell in distress and in quite a pathetical way as he sees the jacket slowly tearing up apart. He closes his eyes and begins to yell. Suddenly he hears a voice: “ We are already up dammit, let me go,”. He opens his eyes and looks at the Professor’s face.

“The life force readings of the upper level have begun to move,” says brother Marcus. “Then… we need to intercept him in a corridor. We need to stop him,” says Ulysses with a far more serious tone. “Then lets move out,” says Maxwell, recovering from that pathetical moment.

Not too far away, Alexandra takes action and quietly follows Lucian movements as he follows Dwayne trails.

A three-way deadlock is taking place…. Is the final battle near?