Quick Note: The time setting of this story is assuming that the original series (not counting Evolution) took place in the early 2000s, and that this story takes place around this time period (2014).
Chapter 1
Urban Exploration
My breath fogged in front of me as I pulled my jacket over the rest of my freezing torso. Alia flicked on her flashlight, casting a pale band of white light across the darkened bridge to the factory entrance. Isaac, standing next to me, followed suit, his miniscule torch shining maybe half as bright as Alia's did. The crisp night wind bit through my thin gloves when I pulled them from the jacket to turn my light on as well.
"You guys ready?" Alia spoke through her painters mask, eyeing the makeshift barricades guarding the otherwise wide open doorway.
Isaac smiled and nodded, holding his flashlight under his face in traditional campfire story fashion, giving his expression an eerie glow. I gave her a vaguely affirmative grunt, and we began to walk to the entrance.
"Remind me again why we're doing this?" I asked Alia.
"Come on Alan, it's a big old abandoned factory! What isn't cool about that?" she responded.
"Crumbling foundation, unsafe flooring, feral animals, oh, yeah, and asbestos."
"Well, true. But we have stuff for that. Also, we could get some cool pictures!"
"Yeah, and I will give you credit for this one, it looks pretty easy to get into."
Alia shone her light on the concrete barriers that lined the entrance, and easily climbed over them, motioning for us to follow. Isaac scrambled over them in no time, leaving me and my awkwardly lanky frame to struggle over the angular mounds of rock. I tripped and fell over the last set of barriers, scuffing my knee through my pants. I get hurt too often on these trips. I caught up with the other two, who were staring into the lower level of the complex.
"Hey, you okay there?" said Alia.
"Yeah, just a scraped knee, as usual. What are you guys looking at?" I replied.
"Well, we're stuck." Isaac chimed.
"More specifically, we don't exactly know how to get down"
I shone my light down into the lower level. It was a bit of a way down, about 10 meters. No way we could jump. I looked over on the other side of the factory, and found three cables hanging down from the roof right in front of me.
"Hey, I think we found our ride." I said, nudging Alia. I grabbed on one of the cables and stuck my flashlight in my mouth. I hugged the cable, closing my eyes and sliding down. It seemed strangely worn, as if it had been used for this multiple times. I attributed it to weathering. I felt my shoe touch the ground and I let go, landing on the solid concrete floor. I pointed my mouth at the upper level and gave Alia and Isaac a thumbs up.
Isaac slid down at an alarming pace, nearly breaking his leg from letting go too early. Alia took her time though, slowly shimmying down, eyes clamped shut. I waited, tapping my foot against the cold, polished concrete.
"You can let go now Alia." I said.
She opened her eyes and slowly placed her feet on the ground.
"Don't know why, but heights always freak me out. Not a good quality for an urban explorer."
"Don't worry about it, no one really likes heights."
"Hey! What about me?" Isaac wailed. "My love of heights is why I'm the climbing champ!"
"If you count falling off a 2 meter wall as being 'the climbing champ' then I guess so." I said, snickering.
I pointed my light over at Alia, who was walking to the other side of the factory. I followed her, and stopped when we reached a big, gaping elevator shaft. I felt the icy cold draft of air flowing from it against my face, I didn't need to look to know that it was deep.
"I hope you know that this is where our adventure ends." I said, stepping further away from the edge of the drop.
"Now hold on, I have a hunch that the elevator might still work." she replied.
"What?!" Isaac and I exclaimed.
"Okay, hear me out." Alia began, turning towards both of us. "An unusual amount of things in this place are worn out and smooth. The cables, the floor, and if you look closely, the tracks on the shaft. So, I'm going to try something."
She moved to a panel on the right side of the shaft and inspected the buttons. Alia knelt down and knocked off the cover of the panel and pulled a screwdriver from her jacket. She hit it against a large red button, and then stood up, waiting. The stillness of the night was abruptly broken by a deep mechanical rumble from the depths of the factory. The elevator rose to the current level and stopped. The door rose open, the metal slats moving erratically. Alia spun around on her foot and looked at us smugly.
"Okay, I get it. But don't you think that riding in a rusty old elevator is just a little dangerous?" I said as she strode on in.
"Sure, but isn't everything we've been doing a little dangerous?"
I groaned and followed her in. I really did trust her, she was right about it still working. Isaac gleefully entered with us, and Alia selected a button from the panel inside the lift. The metal groaned and ground against the tracks as the door descended over the opening and the elevator sank past ground level. The temperature noticeably dropped as we descended, my breath was a thick vapor in front of me, as was Alia's an Isaac's.
"It's really, really cold in here." I said, shivering.
"No argument there. I'm freezing." Isaac replied, rubbing his hands together.
Alia laughed. "Aren't you guys from Canada? Isn't it cold all the time there?"
"Yeah, but we didn't take trips to underground factories every day."
I shivered at the oppressive cold that loomed around us, and my heart jumped when the elevator halted abruptly. The door slid open, revealing another door, which parted and revealed a large, hollow room. Wires and circuitry hung from the walls, casting eerie shadows across the room. Alia stepped forward, out of the lift, walking towards to the center of the room. A dim humming came from below the floor and Alia stopped. The hum grew louder as a cylinder rose out of the floor, bathing the room in a brilliant white light. One more cylinder rose from the base, inside the first, and the machine stood tall above Alia, iridescent golden stripes lining the black metal. We gazed upon it, with only the idle hum of the contraption providing noise.
"Whoa." Alia said, her words echoing through the room.
A switch popped out from a panel, it's handle set upward. I stepped up next to Alia, and Isaac followed behind me. We stared at the switch for a while, unsure of what to say.
"Should we… should we pull it?" I said before recoiling at such a terrible suggestion.
"I almost want to." Alia said, to my shock. We didn't even know what this thing does and she wants to mess around with it?
"This is crazy. Absolutely insane."
"There's no way I'm gonna turn that thing on, it's probably a bomb or a nuclear reactor or something crazy like that." Isaac commented as he walked around the room.
I gaped at the machine, wondering if anyone even knew it was here. Someone must know it's here, it's huge. Alia pulled out her camera and snapped a few photos of the eerie contraption looming above us, before looking around to find the next passage to explore.
"Hey, look what I found!" Said Isaac, pointing to the rightmost wall. A ladder protruded from it, the worn silver rungs reflecting the light. Alia began to ascend the ladder. Isaac followed behind, shoes rhythmically clanking on the metal. I began to follow, cautiously watching the machine to make sure nothing bad would happen, and I ascended the rungs quietly. The room we had entered was just as cavernous and as the room below, but this time, with no light aside from our torches.
Alia snapped picture after picture, and Isaac went about finding every thing there was to find in this place. I found a dusty chair sitting just behind a large piece of machinery stretching from the ceiling and ending in front of me. I sat in it and inspected the machinery, which had a computer monitor and a keyboard at the end.
"I think this might be the old control center of the factory." I said, wiping off the dust from the screens. Alia and Isaac walked over and looked with me.
"That's so cool." Alia mumbled, blinding me with the flash on her camera.
"It's a wonder this place is still intact after so long." I mused, inspecting the ceiling and walls, the wires and cables hanging like thick vines. The shadows flitted about the room erratically, making weird shapes. A high-pitched ringing made me jump in the seat, and I jerked my head towards Alia. She held up her phone, which displayed the time, midnight.
"Time to go back."