The day was here again, the second attempt for PROJECT: SAHSRARA, once again installed in that same cylindrical chamber; there it was, a construct virtually identical except for one important detail, the life support chamber in which a partial clone of Living Portal-B rested peacefully. The platform had also been reinforced below with more beams, the railings were built with greater thickness and height, 3 meters high, while the ring itself, although it had the same design as the previous one, also had an additional shielding layer and a more powerful electromagnetic link between its components, in order to allow it to operate with more incoming energy. The terminals where operators worked were now behind transparent polymer covers to protect them from impacts or attacks, while the observation room now had a section of monitors and emergency switches to assist the procedures below.
From the expanded entrance hall, a larger contingent entered, this time made up only of firstgens, who were led by a secgen known as Dong Gil, who just arrived from a destabilization mission in Sudan, an expert in urban guerrilla tactics and armed counterinsurgency. Division managers also arrived, with Raon and S-1 separating from the group as soon as they entered the premises, already equipped with their tactical suits and putting on their helmets as Hae Jun and Bae Rin did right behind. The similarly equipped guards were waiting the order, preparing their compact rifles as Kang Ma-ri arrived, this time willingly making part of this field test planned for her, after endless days and nights training her new skills.
- We're ready - Raon said through comms - Activate the portal now.
- I just hope we still have the element of surprise. - S-1 added.
- And that Soo Young can control the idiotic clone's brain – Dong Gil retorted.
- Notify us if something goes wrong with the
- Roger that, stay alert - the twin nodded.
Then she addresed the others to enter with her:
- Are you clear about what our mission is?
- Assault group will deploy on enemy site and spread by section for diversion – Bae Rin responded.
- Each squad will attack a key point; surveillance center, test labs, power plant and server area – Hae Jun continued.
- Lab destruction ASAP, so I will go head-on to attack it with my team – Dong Gil added.
- Our team will jam security systems to create chaos inside the enemy field - Hae Jun
- I will neutralize the main power source with my own - S-1 confirmed
- I'll go with the director to extract key data on the Society and the false Raon - Goo Joon said.
- Once we're done, everyone must fall back or be left behind. - Raon stated
- Is all clear?! – S-1 asked out loud.
All Awoken ones shouted at once:
- Yes ma'am!
Mari then intervened:
- And what...will I do then?
- You will stay here until we call you.
The rings by that point were already spinning rapidly, with the vortex in their center pulsing like a luminous bubble; soon these would slow down to allow it to expand to its final size, and the groups of four would stand in tight formations, taking their positions before receiving Raon's signal. Through the bubble a white room with a single entrance appeared, which meant the first moments of the insertion would be crucial and they should be deployed rapidly, taking into account that, by this point, some pointed structures could already be observed in the corners of the room:
- Nulifiers. - Raon said.
- Disabling now... – Goo Joon replied.
He took out a small device and pressed some commands with one hand, causing the narrow pyramids to spark, partially cracking:
- Go! Now! Now! Now! - S-1 shouted.
One by one the groups entered with their weapons raised, the first demolishing the entrance with a grenade, while the others followed right behind to head their destination points. The first Society staff to see them fled, but others in orange suits attacked derangedly with whatever implements they had, dropping like flies without remedy as the groups began to be confronted by squads of guards with shields throwing tear gas at them, which only filtered through the firstgens' helmets. The enemy site went into alert and sirens began to sound, echoing in the brains of everyone present while security personnel mobilized en masse to try to contain the breach.
Within the enemy command room, several people were urgently meeting to get their briefing:
- What's this?! Why aren't nullifiers working?! – shouted the site overseer.
- They disabled the system beforehand – said a vigilance staffer.
- Of course they did; so, they finally came. And even attacked from that chamber, out of all places.
It was a young-looking guy in a golden-white lab robe, who so pointed:
- It is a unique opportunity, gentlemen; certainly our aberrant, Kim Ra-on, comes among them.
- Likely - said a fourth man - Not feeling her psichobend is definitely the best signal of her hiding it.
A fifth just entered the room, obscured in the shadows besides the emergency lighting:
- If she came to us, it is better to wait for her to try and go back.
The fourth replied:
- Then we can capture her most vulnerable form, as hiding her trace consumes energy.
- Assistant Hatham, send in D and P counter-teams to hostile insertion point.
- Roger.
- And you Altmann will be at the head. I want her alive.
- Whatever, deputy - he replied - Let's see if the walking Ragnarok is as hard as they said.
He headed out, and the guy in robe then asked:
- Deputy 30-01, Overseer Schlecht, perhaps we should... reconsider leaving the subject alive.
- Why? - the deputy asked
- Less dangerous and more profitable if we only extract the abrrant's brain to control her abilities.
- The order is given, Ripke, don't insist - Schlecht replied - I won't let you tamper any more brains.
The guy didn't say more and sat to wait more news, while overseer and deputy left to coordinate the next actions and, out there, site guards engaged the Division's psychic operatives. Both parties were losing men one by one, the first being shot down, ripped and crushed by mind powers while the second fell by neural shocks, explosive and flesh-eating ammo, however in much lesser number.
Ding-gil's team arrived at the labs, and began to shoot at every single one of the scientists and guards there, the secgen mowing down the turret drones and cyber-hounds while his men threw incendiary grenades to burn down every enemy asset, not leaving trace of any threat behind them. Hae Jun and Bae Rin's team were instead having problems, because they encountered an enemy they could not hit, and apparently had the same power as them, and evenmore, behind all enemies a man in a suit watched with a smile as the firstgens fell swiftly as Society guards pushed onwards.
- We won't reach the center...objective has failed... – Hae Jun exclaimed desperately.
- Roger, we must fall back now – Bae Rin added.
Altmann grinned, and did not move a muscle as he dragged Hae Jun in the air towards him, carrying and a long carbine with his other hand which he prepared to shoot at point blank; it was when Bae Rin threw a flash grenade at the enemy's face, making him cover up and miss the shot; she took Hae Jun back as she fell, and before runnig back the hallway, she attached an explosive to the ceiling, managing to demolish her enemies' path while they both returned to the portal. S-1's diminished team of two had reached the main generator, a nuclear fusion reactor she knew that if attacked in any way it would explode, so she sent her engineer to the consoles, soon finding a hidden lever which he pulled and pushed again, causing everything to grind to a halt slowly. The twin gestured him for both to leave the place through the elevator from which they descended, and as soon as they moved back up in a fell swoop, a swarm of drones broke from the shaft walls to fire 50 millimeter rounds at them as the machinery shut down section by section, from bottom to top.
The fourth team reached the server area, and the first line of defenders awaiting them were thrown around as Raon kept using her powers so minimally no one could distinguish her from the firstgens while slipping among them, taking advantage of her opportunity and going into a ventilation duct. Using the electromagnetic jammer integrated into her suit, she disabled the electrification and laser grids placed every so often as she turned corners and avoided falling into holes leading to lower levels where she didn't wish to end up, while behind, her subordinates encountered new obstacles. The enemy squad at rearest, blocking access to the coolant-surrounded terminals, threw some grenades emitting an odorless and colorless vapor upon impact which began to devour the firsgens' armor, disintegrating the nervous systems of the unfortunates within the minute.
Dong Gil jumped on a desk, finishing a couple scientists who tried in vain to shoot him with rifles took off fell guards, all the while the remaining enemies running for cover were mauled by his men, whose numerical strength was still at the same capacity as they had entered the portal. With his telekinesis he made a sealed chamber explode, releasing streams of pressurized air and leaving behind only a trapdoor. He sent the firstgens to open it, ensuring it was safe for them to enter the narrow, upholstered hallway just below; they got down there, advancing with their flashlights lit, walking in constant alert along the long stretch, poorly lit by guide lights, until they came across a new door which they quickly ate away with a charge of superthermite.
On the other side, there it was, what they'd been looking for:
- Put this all down! - Dong-gil shouted
Meanwhile, Raon reached the mapped point; she knew the terminals left behind were nothing more than a decoy for those who tried to steal information, her team serving only as cannon fodder. Now she arrived at the real server room where the real secrets were kept, all the stored knowledge that did not appear within the attackers' memories, but from which Goo Joon and his team managed to deduce a code pattern within the transmitters' mind-copying language, small clues planted in disparate locations that created an image. It is there they found a coordinate guide next to the diagrams of some terminals appearing as "_MASTER/blackboard_" after deciphering the puzzle, the repository that, if the data had been correctly interpreted, digitally stored and connected the enemy internet.
S-1 finally arrived at the elevator antechamber in the general maintenance area, which was still filled with the bodies of the fallen along with those who sacrificed themselves for her to reach that point; she certainly did not esteem them, nor could she forgive them, but she would pay them her respects with a brief bow. More enemies arrived at the room armed with strange weapons, firing as they positioned themselves to block their exit; the vice-director's only escort took two of them down with semi-automatic fire while she dodged:
- Ma'am...I only have one more round left...
Saying this, the man fell to his knees and upon seeing himself, he realized there were needles injected into his flesh; the twin realized that they inoculated some kind of pathogen which was drying and turning his skin pale at an accelerated speed. She saw how her telekinesis did not work, a subtle watery shine glowing over the hostiles when using her power, an energy barrier; next she made a great jump and, describing a turn in the air, positioned herself behind the attackers, bursting their heads:
Once all fell limp, she asked:
- Can you continue, Lieutenant?
The man shook his head, replying:
- You know what to do...
- Yes.
S-1 left there without letting a single one of those lethal needles reach her, as the engineer took a string on his vest and pulled it, unleashing hell through a new wave of enemies. The vice-director ran to the server area, breaking through reinforced doors with her fists, advancing through the hallways and greeted by turret gunfire. She felt it; someone was watching her from the cameras, and soon the speaker crackled open:
- So there's more than one. How curious.
From his position, as the orange-overall personnel got rid of the rubble blocking his path, the overseer mused, smiling.
Hae Jun ran straight to the portal chamber while Bae Rin stayed behind, raising a psychic barrier to nullify the needle shots that killed the rest of the team; agent Min was the first to jump as the director instructed to the two of them exclusively. They would take advantage of the fact the bubble was completely transparent from the perspective of destination, and would wait with the first defense already assembled in the face of an inevitable counteroffensive, the second and third ready along with the two backup contingencies ready to be implemented as soon as containment of initial security broke. The infiltrator would run along one of the walls and then jump on an enemy breaking his neck, followed by shooting his own weapons, alternating shapes in half confusion, since her own ammunition ran out as fast, then pressing a button on her handgun to begin a countdown while she defeated the last enemies and a new wave arrived towards her.
Where Dong-gil had arrived was a functioning lab without any human personnel, and before them stood tubular tanks, four of which begun to open without any warning while they checked to see if there was anything of value. Translucent and gelatinous liquid was spilled and four figures got out, the Einherjar cybrogs which, completely rebuilt and renewed, attacked by drawing implements towards them, landing precise blows capable of separating the nerves of the men who, caught by surprise, had nothing to do against their melee combat prowess. Dong-gil himself watched as the revived Sigurd knocked down his lieutenant using seemingly harmless blows, with only a stapler as a club held in his right hand, runnimg then in his direction to hit a hook at his neck, which he dodged while the sergeant spoke:
- So Kim Ra-on sent you to finish me off.
- I will make sure to carry out my order.
- Nothing you do will prevent our final triumph.
They began to dodge each other's blows; Dong-gil tried to hit shots from all the weapons he levitated around him pointing inwards and outwards, surrounding both of them and preventing the other three from escpaing or trying to aid their superior. Just before jumping through the trapdoor, the weapons master had activated his own jammer to deactivate the laser traps and circular blades under the false floor of the corridor, but now he had deactivated it again; the obstacles it difficult for any of the winners to get out of there alive. The blow exchange continued, and the other three continued surrounding, avoiding the shots in search of an opening; the secgen took out his gun without bullets, which pulsed with a red light that went faster and faster, throwing it into the air and, using only one hand, manipulating the thermal energy of the subsequent explosion to impact his opponent.
Raon entered the server room after passing the traps, preventing them from touching her; she walked to the access terminal, decorated with holographic screens displaying constant datapack input and output.
Goo Joon then entered from where she came:
- You got here, finally…
- Your tactic was costly, director, but it paid off.
- So it seems; have you found access points yet?
- I'm about to achieve it - he responded.
The IT chief pointed to a little, scarab-like machine plugged with cables into the terminal
- Good thing is my hackbot came with enough minutes in advance to break security protocols without needing to expose ourselves, a non-sentient AI being essential to it.
- Don't repeat to me what you said yesterday. Come on, we don't have all day...
Finally the device beeped, turning on green lights; Unrestricted access was ready. The genius handed his superior a pair of contact lenses in a case and he himself took a pair:
- Good. Begin exploration. – he commanded – Remember, ma'am, if you want to save the information of interest, think of a G.
- Heard.
A plethora of documents and multimedia files came into view of both in a kind of augmented reality on which they searched with all the mental speed of their enhanced brains, reading with astonishing and even predictive speed everything they found, which was a lot. Among the mountains of information he was able to find all kinds of historical events, staff members from that site and many others, giving him the idea of the magnitude this Society had; Raon was able to realize that, out of all registered superhuman or supernatural phenomena, too many were exaggerated, and others outright false but, unfortunately, others were terrifyingly real and powerful. There was one in particular that mattered to her more than the rest, and so she paused when he saw her own name recorded in previously censored data; she observed a detail previously unknown to her, and it was that her first captive held a recording device integrated to his eyes.
- This Sigurd guy wasn't lying – said Raon – And here we have the addenda…
- The photo, according to this file, was the only thing left from their failed attempt...
- Elijah's. The question is, where is he now?
- Wait...here it is. He is recovering, and already back into his quarters and assigned base
- Ow, look at this – said the director, looking at more photos – he really recorded everything.
Goo Joon was able to contemplate images of a world that, until the previous portal experiment, only Raon and Soo Young had been able to glimpse in a hazy way, the desolate and dark wasteland empty of all life, everything soaked in blood, and those dog monsters approaching. But the most shocking thing was the interior of a place that seemed to be made of distorted metal while and covered in emaciated and visceral flesh, like a cancer growing unlimitedly on a burned tree, At the end a large room that looked like a bloody scabies wound with pus. But unfortunately, what resided there could not be distinguished beyond the impossible pain implements that appeared in the audio recordings along with an infinite number of invisible screams; the computer scientist was terrified, but the director was now more intrigued than ever to see a three-horned being rising diffusely in the images.
- It can't be. It doesn't make sense, how? – Goo Joon questioned – It's abominable.
- We have what we need, but I fear – Raon replied – we'll have to wait for her move once more.
- Her move? What are you talking about?
- Kang Ma-ri crossing paths with our two worlds, the photo and recordings reacheing these terminals at a date Elijah did not, and the psychotic outburst affecting a hippie like Soo Young... could not be casualty.
- Makes sense. Not even with the machine is it possible for us to open a vortex to two places at the same time, and according to what I have read here so far, not for them either, not even by their living portals.
- Watched recent inventory requests; they use interdimensional resonators with which specifically search for psychic imprint like mine. After discovering that world, they failed to find trave until… Shanghai
- A third factor must have intervened for us to find your double, ma'am.
- Yes, and we must be better prepared for what this person pretending to be me has to do with it.
-Why would that entity do all this in the first place? Why did it want to make us fight among ourselves?
- Keep us distracted and allow us to reach it, so that one or the other tries to attack it and set a trap for us. But if the being's anything like me, it'll surely have another, deeper purpose.
- This just leaves another doubt.
- But we don't have more time.
- Yes. This will be sent to engineer Ye right now; he will prepare it for storage.
- Let's go, then.
The computer scientist was the first to run away, strangely desperate to return to the vortex; Raon tried to catch up at the exit of the fake terminal floor after following him up the stairs, but suddenly new turrets were deployed from the walls of the hallway. The director heard an elevator move, but then she would deal with it since, for now, she had to start dodging the projectiles while she took out her contact lenses, jumping between walls and ceiling, crashing the robots together with her mind; she began to hear many footsteps running heavily towards her, and she prepared herself. After ripping the gun off the last drone, she saw the shadows of guards about to turn the corner, but at the same time, such gloomy reflections were distorted by the sound of metal being ripped out by hand, shooting, screaming, lamenting their cursed fate as they dropped like flies, the new shadow appearing before her with a smile.
- It's done; electricty should shut down now.
Lights turned into darkness, once the electricity from the nuclear fuel finally ran out, and then only red lights remained, while the cameras and heat or motion sensors turned off; more guards were heard coming, and the twins advanced, ready for the next attack.
Dong Gil, recovering quickly, walked through the corridors filled with dead or bleeding personnel straight to the portal chamber; behind him he heard more footsteps than ever, and hurried to block their path peeling off sheets of metal from the walls behind him, along with his remaining grenades, two or three, which he left with the latch loose, ready for someone to trip with them. He saw Goo Joon, who, without seeing him crossed the portal; he ran towards the bubble too, and received a kind of net that entangled his feet, causing him to fall; a group had just arrived along the opposite corridor from where they had come, carrying more net launchers that, by rolling on the floor and pushing themselves backwards, they were able to avoid, but not before causing the casualties they wanted to those who did arrive on their side.
When he crossed, the others were already waiting, and Bae Rin was the first to assist him, removing the net by cutting it with her knife, helping him up while Hae Jun prepared the second line in formation. Goo Joon spoke with Engineer Ye and overseer Han whle Mari waited nervously outside the platform; the weapons master quickly recovered his usual mobility and prepared to leave the room to prepare the third line.
On the other side, those who remained were now able to watch as two dozen enemy soldiers positioned themselves waiting to launch their attack across the universes; however, and stunning everyone, they never entered, but rather seemed to stand with their backs to them, blocking retreat. Agent Min knew that at that moment her most relevant interest was precisely who they had come to look for, that is, the director, and that they had received superior orders to wait; soom a person arrived that she recognized with a cold in her spine; tall and pale, carrying his carbine and staring at her through the vortex, smiling as if he was specifically mocking her.
Bae Rin had now arrived with the actress, and said to her:
- Director Kim has been blocked from leaving.
- That means…
- Come up with me, we must be well prepared for when the moment comes.
- Okey - said the actress, and whispered to herself - I wish this works, so don't die, you two.