//------------------------------// // Chapter Twenty-Two:The mystery in the gleaner weapon labs // Story: Gleaner Chronicles: American Monsters // by sevenofeleven //------------------------------// P.S. 167 Basement The oval security doors that blocked the group’s progress were the color of old pennies; shiny brown and totally closed. The keypad next to the doors was off. There was a blue flash from Mackie’s horn as he used his telekinesis to open the doors. Margot idly did a scan. At first she sensed nothing, but at the end something sparked. She added more power and looked deeper, there she found a security spell. It was primed to explode when the doors were forced open. Margot came out of scanning mode and yelled. “Mackie stop!” Mackie turned toward Margot. “What?” “Stop trying to force the doors open, they will explode!” Tibbs eyes widened as Scootaloo took a few steps back. Before the doors could separate, Mackie turned off his spell. Tibbs glared at Mackie. “Is your head in the game Mackie?” Mackie gazed back, silent at first then said, “Yeah boss, it’s in.” Scootaloo and Margot exchanged glances. For a moment, silence filled the room. Tibbs flashed a steely blue gaze at Margot. She nodded and went to work. Scootaloo moved up to get a closer look at the door. Margot focused and scanned the doors deeply. There was a bunch of things to do. She had to find a way past the keypad, power up the doors and of course make sure not to set off any alarms or security spells. It was almost too much to remember all of the details, but she managed to cast a spell to power the doors and keep it hidden from prying scans. Hacking the keypad was easier. After she added a few more bits of energy the keypad lit up. Tibbs looked at Margot as she typed in the code. The status light glowed green and then the doors opened. For such large doors they opened without a sound. She stepped past the doors into a white passageway scanning for security spells. So far, Margot didn’t sense any. Tibbs, Mackie and Scootaloo followed her. The white passage seemed to go on and on. A quick scan showed some unusual results, so she scanned a bit deeper. What Margot got back was disquieting. The passage was actually a transition from one universe to another. They were walking into a pocket universe. At the end of the tunnel, there was a light green hallway with beige tiled floors. Some sort of message or directory was written on the wall next to the edge of the passageway. Margot couldn’t understand what the blocky glyphs said. Tibbs grimaced. “What’s that?” Margot just shrugged. Mackie hoofed through his saddlebags. “Leet gave me a map of the area, we just have to go down this hall and make a right.” Scootaloo attempted to look past the darkness at the edge of Margot’s light spell. “Are we under the school?” Mackie shook his head. “No, we’re in a pocket universe. The white passage was our transition between our world and this mini universe.” Tibbs grimaced. “More crazy magic.” Scootaloo faced Mackie. “How does that work?” Margot knew. Her employers, D-Core, sometimes made special labs in pocket universes. Usually the labs studied dangerous magic or tech. If the experiments broke containment, the scientists could collapse the universe. Of course, the experiments and scientists that were in the lab were lost forever. Either the pocket universe dissolved or it would start to shrink. She didn’t want to think about either outcome. Now they were in a pocket universe and any mistake could trigger a collapse situation. “Well, Scootaloo, the Gleaners made like their own little world here. If they lost control, they could destroy it.” Scootaloo’s eyes widened. “What happens if they do that while we are here?” Margot thought for a moment. Tibbs grimaced. “Don’t worry, we’ll be gone before that happens.” “Will we see caspers and zombies here?” Scootaloo asked then looked around. Mackie looked around. “No, Leet said that they abandoned this place for some reason.” Tibbs grimaced. “If we wait here anymore, we might see some Gleaners. Let’s get to it.” Margot thought about telling them what she knew, but then maybe it might be too much. They continued down the hall past a dark lab. Scootaloo didn’t bother peering through the window for some reason. The group made it to the intersection without incident then they walked down the hallway that led to the right. For now, Margot was getting slightly bored. Maybe this would be a milk run she thought. This area just had a bunch of small offices or labs. At the end of the hall was a white security door with a keypad. Margot looked at Mackie. Mackie shrugged. “Leet didn’t give me any keypad codes. He figured we would find a way past the keypads.” Margot hacked the keypads and the doors opened. Inside was a glass room with four black metallic cubes taller than Margot. Past that, a few steps away was a table with three small pedestals and three flat keyboards. Also there were three chairs in front of the keyboards. Behind that was a pale gray wall with bits of tape stuck to it. Margot figured that something had been placed there for reference. Tibbs stood in the corner and faced the door. Scootaloo followed Mackie as he headed for the first chair. Margot walked into the glass server room then scanned the floor for the power cables. It took her a moment to find them, and to start dribbling electricity to them. She had to slowly feed power to the servers like she was giving her foal a drink. Margot had an image of herself giving a unicorn foal some water then it faded. That made her frown. She should have thought of a human baby not a foal. Was she spending too much time as a pony? Margot pushed those strange thoughts back, and focused on the servers. A mistake here could cost them information, and also their lives. Lights began to flicker, and become steady as electricity flowed into the servers. Disk drives began to whirr. After a few more moments, the servers were fully powered up. The room was starting to get warmer. Mackie looked at the servers then hit a button on the first silvery pedestal. After that he passed his left fore hoof over the keyboard. A black screen with a prompt appeared above the pedestal. Scootaloo looked at the screen. “What does it say?” Mackie looked at the screen. “It’s in Gleaner. Think there is an option to switch to English.” Then he looked through his saddlebags for his notes. It took him a few minutes to find his notes and to type in the right command. The text switched to English. Margot stabilized the spell powering the servers and went to check on Mackie. Mackie’s fore hooves flew all over the keyboard as he typed in commands. “Ok, guys, I found the specs for the railguns. Gimme a sec while I download them to the flash drive.” He had to go back and fish through his saddlebags for that. Margot watched Mackie. Tibbs grimaced. “Come on Mackie, I don’t want to be here at night.” Mackie nodded. “Sure boss. I don’t want to be here at night either. I do want to know why they abandoned this place.” He plugged in the stick and started downloading. After that he went through the files some more. “Boss, I found out where they keep the prototypes. A working prototype would help us a lot.” “Where are they?” Tibbs said. “Section 5c,” Mackie replied. “Good, let’s get it and go!” Tibbs said and looked around again. “We need to know why they abandoned this place,” Mackie said. “No we don’t. We might be pushing our luck. Let Leethoof do his own recon.” Margot wondered if Tibbs was right. Mackie sighed. “Fine, we get the prototypes and go. Let me check one thing. I thought I saw some vmails.” Scootaloo scrunched up her nose. “Vmails? What are vmails?” Mackie smiled. “Vmails are video messages you send to other ponies. Gimme a sec, think I got one from the Site Manager, Adam Conyer.” A white coated earth pony stallion with short red hair and blue eyes appeared on the screen. He looked around for a moment. Margot thought it looked kinda overdramatic. Then the stallion started talking. “Okay. It’s May, the thirteenth at two forty five pm. Site Manager Adam Conyer reporting. Seriously, I don’t have a beef with Dr. Geist. The guy has been pretty civil and helpful to me, and my projects. That being said, I think he sh-, um, crapped the bed big time here. Just got back after a huge power drain shut down the labs. I guess I should be thankful that the servers were on their own power or you wouldn’t see this. Since it’s my job to provide a good working environment for the people working here, I gotta say something. My gut says that Geist is responsible somehow for the power loss. My project, Dragonslayer never needed that much power and the Eraser project doesn’t need that much either. Damn, I gotta go and verify that my gut is right. I have to face off against Geist. A creature that doesn’t have a face. I get it that he or it thinks that having a body is a waste of power and is vain but it does come across pretty creepy. There are too many times when he just appears out of nowhere and makes me almost jump out of my fur. So far, my underpants have been unsoiled. It’s not like I can hear him coming like the rest of the staff here. I’ll post more.” When the vmail ended, Scootaloo faced Mackie. “What’s DragonSlayer and Eraser?” Mackie nodded. “Gimme a sec.” Several documents appeared on the screen. “Dragonslayer is a code name for a new type of metal golem with gauss guns and rocket launchers. It seems that the Gleaners are having problems pacifying Japan and other far east countries. The changelings there attack in huge swarms and the Gleaners can’t handle that. Also the local dragons have allied themselves with the changelings. Eraser is the name of the new gauss gun.” Mackie clicked on another file in Conyer’s directory. Conyers showed up again, but this time he seemed angry, his ears kept going flat on his head and back. “It’s May, the fourteenth at four pm. Site Manager Adam Conyer reporting. Damn, I was right, it was Geist. The other project heads let me inspect their labs and status reports. I didn’t find anything. After that I emailed a request to Geist. That glowing ghost bastard never answers his emails. He just shows up and talks. At least with emails, I have something as proof. I hung a bell on my door so I would have some advance warning he is in my room. Shit no. I heard his voice behind me again. Now, I know he can do teleportation. Freaky ghostlike bastard. At least this time I was too angry to be surprised. “Hello my boy, what do you wish to talk about? Oooh yes. I’m very busy Ooh yes.” “Do you know about the power loss incident we had on the thirteenth?” “Oooh yes, my boy. I know. Oooh yess.” Really? I have to twist whatever you have for an arm for the info? “I would like to know what you did to cause this incident.” “Ahh, my boy. You do realize that my activities are above your paygrade. Oooh yes they are.” I had to take a few breaths so I don’t ruin things by punching this wanker. Yeah like I should be nicer, but even without a face to look at, I was picking up some attitude. “You’re correct but I’m responsible for two projects that Hopecrusher has personally given me control over. Also I’m responsible for maintaining this facility and providing a safe working environment for my staff and everyone else that works here. Your experiment or whatever has interfered with other projects. Projects that your boss, Hopecrusher has authorized.” If I was dealing with something that was solid and breathed, I probably would have heard a sigh. “Well, my boy. I do understand your predicament. Oooh yes I do. Give me a day or so and I will give you a detailed report on what caused the incident. I don’t want to needlessly interfere with other’s work. Oooh yes, that is not how I operate.” That’s it. The glowing bastard is gone. I have to wait two days to find out what happened. I really wanted something faster but he has Hopecrusher’s ear so I have to be patient. Shit!” Mackie grinned. “Well, that Dr. Geist sounds like someone I don’t want to work with.” The vmail ended and the screen went black. Scootaloo used her left fore hoof to point at the screen. “What happened next?” Mackie looked though Conyer’s directory. “That’s it. He wrote no more vmails and I don’t even see any emails either.” Tibbs grimaced. “Did Geist kill him?” Even Margot looked at the screen to see what was there. Mackie did a search for more vmails. “Got one. It’s a vmail from Leslie Tallis, acting site manager.” A brown earth pony with black hair and red eyes showed up on the screen. “Oh shit, oh shit. Gotta get a grip Lessy. Gotta get a grip. It’s, it’s May the seventeenth and Conyers is dead. What the fu-, I gotta stop freakin cursing. Gimme a sec. Okay. Conyers is dead, but before that things have been going south. Projects have been proceeding fine, but this place doesn’t feel safe. I have been feeling like something is watching me. Oh yeah, there are cameras everywhere, but this feels more personal. It’s like something is watching me and then it will kill me at the right time. Gotta keep it together Lessy. To make things worse, today I started to feel like something is at the corner of my eyes. I turn and look and of course I see nothing. I reported this to the FacilSec, you know Facilities Security ponies. They just looked at me like I was nuts. I know other ponies have the same feelings of being watched, and seeing things that are not there. Then Conyers was found dead in his office. Seriously, if I didn’t see the the room with my own eyes, I wouldn’t believe it. His eyes were bloody holes, and the chair next to him. Oh Celestia and Luna freakin save me! I was an atheist but damn, I could use some serious help. The chair’s front feet had blood on them. Not on the tips, but a few inches of blood up on the leg. It was like the chair stuck- No, no, no. Oh, I can’t deal with that now. I asked the FacilSec pony if he had video and of course he said no. They don’t keep site managers under surveillance. I knew that was a lie, but the fear in the FacilSec pony’s eyes was enough for me. They did tell me that Conyers died on the sixteenth. As per regulations, the facility is on lockdown while we find the killer.” Mackie played the last vmail from Leslie Tallis. For a few moments she just stared into the screen. “It’s May the eighteenth. Jenkins is dead. Okay, he was just the janitor, but this time I saw how he died. He was eating his lunch in the big meeting room we use as a lunchroom. The table just took a step to the left, and crushed him like a bug. I heard his ribs snap like brittle twigs. Then the table stepped back. He just collapsed in his chair. How did I know this? The FacilSec ponies called me into the security room, and showed me this. Heck that room even with the air conditioning on stunk of fear. They also offered to show me how Conyers died but I didn’t want to see. I bet that Dr. Geist is responsible. Not directly but maybe his latest experiment has gone off the rails. I sent him an email. He will meet us here. I’m going to authorize an emergency evacuation of this facility. I need Geist to give us some idea what we are dealing with so it doesn’t follow us into the world. My life kinda sucks, but I would like to live some more.” Tibbs looked at Mackie when the vmail ended. “Is that all? Chairs and tables don’t move on their own and they don’t kill.” Mackie did a search from more recent vmails or emails. “That’s it.” Margot looked at Mackie. “What about Dr. Geist?” Mackie did a search. “Nope. He has sent emails, but those come from another server. I think he has his own servers.” Scootaloo’s ears drooped for a moment. “What happened to the dead ponies?” Tibbs grimaced. “If we stay much longer, we will find out and that might be too late.” Mackie nodded. “Tibbs is right. Let’s get the prototypes and get out of here. After I log off, Margot can you shut down the servers?” Margot nodded and went back to the server room. She wondered if they could get what they want before things got more interesting. Unlike the curious cat, curiosity won’t bring them back.