Cʟᴀɴɢ Dᵢₙ𝓰 ᴰᶦⁿᵍ ₜₕᵤₙₖ
The flashlight fell down the elevator shaft, as darkness shrouded us. We could only watch helplessly as it fell. Lily was more nervous than we were, obviously letting her carry the torch was a bad idea in hindsight. She was the last to start climbing, so it seemed like a good idea to have her light up the path for us at the time. I looked up at Coda, and there again were a pair of golden eyes staring back at me. I had forgotten that we didn't need the flashlight in the first place. A smile crept on my lips as my hands let go of their hold. The falling sensation felt familiar, like I was floating in space. I felt a surge of energy as time slowed down and I grabbed the nearest cable, just a few feet below Lily who held on for dear life as it swung. Time now in full reverse I could see the flashlight "falling" its way back to us. This really is convenient sometimes.
I grabbed the flashlight and Lily looked down at me in surprise. "Oops. Sorry." She squeaked out in embarrassment. Coda was laughing to himself about it. We had already been climbing for twenty minutes and there were still a few dozen feet to scale, she did well to hold onto the only light source for this long. I carefully handed her the flashlight, "Tie it to your belt so you don't drop it again." She nodded and turned to climb again.
To get to her office was going to be a journey itself, we needed to get there before the Nephilim Feathers recharged. Apparently GenTech either doesn't believe in staircases, or really believes in elevators because there weren't many other options. Actually, there were no other options. Aside from that, we also were racing the clock on the support systems for the cages that housed the monsters Lily was so afraid of. She was able to keep mostly calm about the blades Coda woke up, but she was still trembling as she thought of these things.
I'm not sure we made it in time as the air was already stale and the temperature was dropping. This indicated that other systems had already cut power. The elevator was at the bottom, but by the time we had arrived it didn't have any power. It was probably turned off during the evacuation to avoid any accidents. Normally the emergency lights would still be on, but those were gone as well. I caught a glimpse of Lily's watch as she reached further up the cable; it was already 2315.
Soon we were only a few feet away from the top. As we approached the end of our climb in the dark, the still air around us began to stir and left me with a deep sense of unease. My fingers squeezed the cable and the cold feeling eased the tension a little. Coda stopped ahead of us as if he felt the change as well. Our attention was on the door a few floors above us as it shook slightly. It vibrated again like something heavy had hit it.
"I was really hoping we would get there in time." Coda said as he kept climbing. There was no sense in going back now. If we stopped here, there was a chance we'd be caught here fighting a fully recharged pair of Nephilim Feathers. This might actually be the worst place for that. Whatever was beyond that door had to be a full magnitude easier to deal with by default. It was just our luck that it was the same floor as Lily's office.
As he reached the floor we needed to enter, there was a slam against the door. Dents along the frame and door could be seen. Whatever was in there knew we were here and wasn't happy about it. Coda reached for one of the Nephilim Feathers and aimed at the door.
"It could cut through concrete, so a door like this…" he said, tossing it with all his strength as a new dent appeared on the door. "Shouldn't stop it from doing it's job." The small blade didn't stop at all at the door and from the other side muffled cries were heard before the door suddenly burst and was sent flying across the shaft. Coda agilely leapt out of the way and grabbed another cable after kicking off a wall. The door made the cables sway as it crashed against them and the walls on its way to the bottom, narrowly missing Lily and I.
The tail of the creature looked like a wrecking ball that really wasn't in the mood and needed a place to vent it's frustration. The large scales on the ball were thick and jutted out toward the end, while the tail was thick and muscular. It slithered up into the doorway as the creature turned to face us. There stood a reptilian monster that looked like a cross between a rhino and a crocodile, with teeth hanging out of its snout like an evil smile. The size of the creature's head alone took up most of the doorway as it's snout could barely fit. As if it knew we would come to it, it stepped back and patiently waited for us. Its eyes locked on us like magnets. Thick drool began to fall from its mouth, slowly dripping onto the ground with a sizzling sound. The white tile floor turned black with each drop.
"Do you think it will let us pass?" Lily said as she struggled to hang onto the rope after she almost fell from panic. "Not likely. I made it pretty angry." Coda shrugged. The knife was buried in the creature's side, wedged between its scales. "It didn't go deep, but it went deep enough it can feel it."
He gives me a knowing look. "Well, no point in hanging around." I say as I climb past Lily to where Coda is. The creature gives a low growl as we climb into view. "Lily, you might want to hold on tight. This isn't going to be fun."