"Something is coming," Jayson exclaimed without moving an inch. "And I don't like the looks of it.."
"What do you mean, Jay?" Sandra asked. "I can't see anything from that direction..." she added. "Can it be just your imagination?"
"I hope so, but this thing's different. I can't see them coz they're still hiding, but I know the feeling when someone looks at you with bad intent. Take a closer look at the forest behind you.." Jayson slowly replied. "but... just do it slowly though.. they might notice you and charge immediately." he emphasized.
Sandra turned around slowly as Jayson instructed her to do and she saw what he is trying to say and she cussed after seeing what Jayson meant.
"Holy Cow!" Her eyes widened as she saw the glimmering red eyes of double the human-sized baboons hiding in the forest holding weapons and other stuff. One of them hangs on a branch while playing a play station, another is looping the ropes on its hand, some others sat on a ladder doing continuous lice finding on their heads and more others keep on staring at the participants waiting for a moment to strike, holding their spears and swords with an intent to kill them all.
"What should we do?" Sandra whispered with a terrified sigh. Her hair stood giving her goosebumps.
"Everyone!" Jayson called, still not moving an inch from where he's standing. "I want you to listen to me for a second."
The participants got confused about what he just said though they stared in his direction and the others gathered near them. They all fell silent. Jayson's words echoed in their area that even the Baboons were staring.
"And why should we do that?" someone exclaimed, breaking the silence.
"Yeah! Who are you?!" another shouted. People started to make a ruckus.
"You might be that 'Hachiro' guy that the Game master mentioned!"
Alex's eyes turned sinister as he eyed the guy who said the name he hated the most. The guy looked down as if feeling guilty and ignorant of what he just muttered.
"I am Jayson Green of GSSTI." He raised his hand and looked everyone in the eye. "We are sent here by ORION," he said in a proud voice.
"ORION?!" the participants murmured.
"Green? As in the Green Enterprise?!" someone exclaimed.
"Precisely. And, if you don't want to die, you'll follow what I am going to say because it might be the only thing that can get us out here safely... but first I want you to stay calm." Jayson instructed.
"What do you mean?"
"Someone is watching us and they are ready to strike at any moment.." Sandra said with eyes trying to hide her fright.
"It is what she said, so.." Jayson continued and louden his voice. "Now...get your asses inside the bus slowly and don't do reckless stuff. We need to get outta here fast."
They didn't understand what he was trying to say but after hearing his name and the company he's from, most of the participants did not hesitate to follow his orders.
People slowly entered the bus, Jayson and Sandra got in last and took their seats without looking at their back.
"Fasten your seatbelts, just in case," Jayson added.
One of the participants glanced outside the window and he saw what Jayson was trying to avoid, humongous baboons carrying weapons, looking like the ones in the planet of apes movie, are hiding in the forest near them. The blood froze in his veins, making him nauseous and he turned pale. One of his teammates held his hand and saw what he was looking at. She shouted in freight but Jayson took the chance to calm everyone down.
"As you can see, they're out there.." Jayson said in a whispered calm voice, he stood beside the driver's seat. His composed face stared at each of them trying to control the situation. "If we stay here any longer, we'll be forced to have the short end of the stick. So, first of all.."
The participants stared at each other as though they were still bewildered but deep inside they thought of escaping their situation.
"...who knows how to drive?" he added.
"This bus is driven by auto-drive, right?" Alex muttered, "..then we can just hack its system to make it drive itself.."
"That's right!" someone exclaimed. "I can try it..." a skinny blond guy stood from the crowd raising his hand. He's frightened by the looks of it but he swallowed his fear to get himself out of their situation.
"What's your name?! Who are you?" Alex took a step to face the guy coming.
"I'm Ethan..." he stopped and looked down, anxious about Alex's deadly stare. "Ethan Marx. I'm no one suspicious, trust me."
"Marx, huh... I wonder where I heard that name..." Jayson asked, pulling Alex's sleeve, and stepping forward. "I'm Jayson Smart and that guy is Alex Green. Sorry for his attitude. De, do you know how to get through the bus's program?"
"Ahh... I guess I can." He raised his head at looked at Jayson's deep blue eyes. "My dad designed this bus and I helped him program it when I was in middle school. It's way easier to hack than to program it though..." he added, scratching his hair. "The Mar Co. is one of the producers of mechanical products here in Luna, so I guess..."
"Marx company, huh? That's reliable. See Alex?" Jayson eyed him for once to make his agitation stop. Alex looked away and stayed in a corner near the steering wheel. "Ja, help us get outta here and I guess I can help you with the hack.." he added. He pulled Alex's shirt to send him towards Sandra's way. "Just tell me what I have to do.."
They went to the controls and started hitting keys to configure the settings of the bus they were in.
"All we need to do is to reconfigure the settings after we detach this bus to the main system of Scorpio," Ethan said.
"How can we do that? All systems inside the city are monitored by Stonehenge..." Jayson replied. "We can't easily access their database and--"
"That is why we will hack their systems.." Ethan said. "It's our only way out and we better do our best... besides, these programs like the vehicles running can be found only on the tip of the iceberg.."
"Oh.. I see... so you're saying that this thing is only found on the extremes of the Great Shield, then we can just.." Jayson muttered.
"Yeah.. that's what I'm hoping for..." Ethan replied. "I can reprogram it and rewrite its system by the key my Dad made and was passed to me just a few months ago...This was the secret thing that the Mar Co. has even though we're just a subsidiary company of Scorpio. I hope they didn't overwrite that part in its system..."
"You bet... we'll just have to do our part..." Jayson said and continued hitting keys on the keyboard he attached to the bus's hard drive.
"You can count on me, as well." Sandra smiles. She went near the entrance to see what the baboons are up to. She saw one of them eating Cheetos and the other eating popcorn while sitting on a rock ten meters away from them. They seemed to be harmless at first glance but the ground suddenly shook like something big stomped its gigantic foot.
"What was that?!" Jayson exclaimed, looking confused. He stopped what he was doing.
"You should hurry on the hack, Jay..." Sandra shuddered. "I guess their boss is trying to charge towards us with that sledgehammer... and that would be very very bad..."