…Back on the ground floor, Ann and Gerald decided to take a final look around the place, seeing if they could get a few more blueprints. But apart from finding a few codes, which were too complex to solve without time or access to previous blueprints, they had to give up. Not just because it was too time-consuming but also since their objective wasn't the blueprints in the first place, but the Axel-Road.
"C'mon, let's get going,"
Hearing, Gerald's eager call, Ann nodded and hurriedly walked after Gerald. Who was already at the entrance? But before she could go in earnest, she heard a small clicking sound. Swiftly turning to where it originated, she saw a small hatch, it's orange-like colour probably rust.
Walking to the hatch, Ann studied the hatch carefully, but seeing as the sound stopped, she just shrugged it off as her mind playing tricks on her and continued on her way to the door.
But the clicks were no accident, and her mind was perfectly sound, because a few seconds later, a giant bang was heard from behind them, and a five-person squad leapt out of the hatch wearing masks and tactical body armour. Ann was stunned, and though she was shocked by their sudden appearance, she noticed that all of them held weapons, 3 of them held M16's while the other 2 who were women, held pistols akimbo. All dangerous, all aimed at her.
Thinking quickly on her feet, Ann jumped to the side, where the welding machines lay. Just in time too, as a spray of bullets shot at her, but to no avail. Seeing this, Ann let out a sigh of relief, before rushing towards the hallway with all her might, her feet practically bouncing on the ground trying as much as possible to stay unpredictable, all the while hiding behind machines from the occasional bullet storm.
Ann, finally far enough for the bullets to miss more than hit, desperately looking around for a solution. Before realizing that the solution was surrounding her the whole time!
'Goddamnit, why didn't I think of that!'
Sliding behind one of the newer looking welding machines, she took out its batteries, a large 100V lithium battery, and wrapped it with her shoelaces, after that, she took out her brother's lighter, which she used to reheat the packaged meals n the way here, and bunt one end of the shoelace.
Jumping up to face her pursuers, she tossed the bomb as hard as she could. It spun, crackled and even began to burn before exploding into flames.
The team, looking at the makeshift grenade, just ignored it, after all; it would do nothing to them, why worry?
What they had to worry about was what happened next, the bomb had struck a welding machine, and the flames from that melted the metal and caused the lithium battery that to explode too, causing an even larger flame.
This caused a chain fire, and if you looked at the last chapter, the whole ground floor was littered with welding stations, all equipped with welding machines.
One of the soldiers, who also ignored the bomb, felt the heat on his back, and turning around, he suddenly screamed in fright:
"Aah! It's a damn fire, everyone run!"
Hearing their squadmate's shout, they also turned around, and also seeing the giant fire, they quickly followed the example of their colleague, and promptly ran for the hills. But not before swearing at her:
"Damn you, bitch! In the name of the U.S. military, we'll-Ah! my hand!"
"Hehe... Idiot,"
Though she finally had the leeway to relax, she knew it wouldn't last long, as every building was required by law to have a fire sprinkler system installed. hence her increased pace to the door while the U.S. soldiers were running.
***
Gerald, on the other hand, slowly took his time to look at his surrounding: the hallway had a cyber-punk like feel, made of pure metal and filled to the brim with industrial fans and vents, then there were the writing on the walls, scratchy and scraggly lines sometimes covered the hallway, with words like: 'Death on the other side' and 'Turn back, intruder'. Furthermore, there was a strange smell that situated itself in the hallway, a particularly mortifying, yet entangling smell, like a mixture of hydrochloric acid and Iron.
'Gerald run! Get to the damn door!' she signalled
As he was too focused on the various sights and smells that he noticed around him, he failed to realize that Ann, who was usually placid and careful, was running behind him with all her might and then some, escaping from the soldiers who had already recovered.
By the devil's luck, she only reached him when they had already arrived in front of the door.
"Finally, that really took a while... Now, how do we open this thing?"
"Shut it, you buffoon,"
"?"
Before them was a giant door, It's entirety larger than an African elephant, with an unidentified black goop surrounding the door itself. Fortunately, the door was made of wood, or Ann would have to force Gerald to open the door every time they came, which would... Be more than troublesome.
Quickly, Ann walked to the door, her deep blue eyes looking for any way to open it since it's size was at least twice the size of Ann, even when tiptoeing. But as she quickly ran out of options, she tried the one thing she hadn't done: Pushing it.
Surprisingly, her push did open the door, but not in the way that you think: As she put her small hands on the door, in an attempt to push it, the black goop that had just been flowing around the door in rhythm, started pulsating before lunging towards Ann's hand, it's sticky and gelatinous structure preventing her from taking her hands off.
"Eek!"
Shrieking, Ann struggled in vain to separate her hands from the door, but to no avail. Finally, after tiring herself out, she began to seriously study the sludge in it of itself: It wasn't really doing anything. Holding her in place sure, but other than that, it harmlessly stayed still. So Ann quietly stayed put, looking back to see if the soldiers were anywhere near them until she felt something strange happen: she felt movement inside the sludge, then the door opened, taking the sludge with it.
Taking her hands off the moving door, Ann began to observe the room, giving her a small glimpse of the inside of the room, though not by much; as it was fairly dark. But as it opened, floor lights started to turn on, and in addition to the large panes of windows, illuminated the whole room.
-Creeaak!-
The door, now completely open, revealed what the two had been waiting for: the Axel-Road. Looking at it, both of them were absolutely stupefied by its sheer size, complexity and scale.
The machine itself was hanging from the top of the spire, it had layers, each getting progressively smaller than the last, like an artificial stalactite. Furthermore, it's giant size was not just to look intimidating but to carry the giant contraption at the end of the device, with red and black wires of varying sizes revealed from the inner lining of the smooth metal plates simultaneously covering and protecting its innards.
Under the machine was a conveyer belt, leading to a metal box, with only it's roof gone, presumably, this was where the weapons were created, and the belt was responsible for transporting it.
-Bang!-
Suddenly, with a loud boom, the door behind them closed, and the sludge reappeared on the edges of the door. Ann, still stressed from the appearance of the soldiers, finally began to study the room in earnest; looking around, she could see a control panel of sorts, consisting solely of a few yellow and blue buttons, and a colossal red one with a 'Do Not Touch!'. There was also the addition of a giant scanning device that was rectangular in nature and perfect for a certain blue paper in Gerald's bag.
"Damn, time well spent. My god, this looks amazing!"
As Gerald exclaimed, he hurried to retrieve the blueprint, after all, their purpose here was to test the Axel-Road.
"Give it here..."
"Hey!-Ow! What'd you do that for?"
After smacking him over the head, Ann took the blueprints and shoved them on the scanner.
Then, as if validating the blueprint, the machine started up, whirring and winding noises filled the large room, and a robotic voice sounded out.
[Analysis complete, weapon no. A224635. Fabrication in process.]
Slowly, the machine began moving, sluggish yes, but with fined-tune precision. But as it got longer, Ann slowly tensed up, 'what if it's broken, won't we have risked our lives for nothing?' She thought. But after careful consideration, chose to wait for a few more minutes.
Seconds passed, then minutes, until finally... IT came out...