Jack and Angelica pried open the manhole cover carefully. A ladder dipped down into blackness. The sound of running water could vaguely be heard. Fetid air blasted up from the wound. Jack pinched his nose.
"It's this or death," Angelica observed. Jack nodded.
He held his breath and climbed into the sewer. The ladder was covered in rust. As his foot touched a rung, it snapped and fell into the invisible churning water. He hung there for a second, until his foot found the next rung down. Assured of his safety, he resumed the climb. Angelica was above him. As she entered the hole, the manhole cover was slid into place.
Jack emerged from the pit above a river of brownish-green water. If it wasn't water, he didn't want to know what it was. He looked around and saw to his left a ledge. On the ledge was an old wooden boat. The ledge itself was ten feet above the water. Conveniently, that was also where the ladder ended.
Jack swung himself out on the edge of the ladder. He felt rust sliding off the ladder and into the water, but he let go and landed akwardly on the ledge, stumbling a bit as he did so. Angelica was quick to follow, but as she did, she lost balance and began to fall. Jack desperately reached out and caught Angelica's hand. The tips of her boots were five feet above the water. Jack exerted himself, and hauled Angelica up to the ledge. He let her go, and she sat there panting for a while.
"Thanks," she gasped. "Just think about if I landed in that water."
"I don't want to think," Jack joked.
He properly observed his surroundings now. Above him on the ground there was the echoing boom of a missile impact. He saw that the ledge didn't lead anywhere. It was merely a ledge set in for no good reason except, seemingly, to house this decrepit old boat.
"I think," he said slowly, "we're supposed to ride the boat down the sewer river."
"Aw, no way," complained angelica, but Jack had already picked up the boat and set it near the edge. Below, water churned. The smell was more intense down here, but as with all intense smells the nose blocked it out after about two minutes of being within its grasp. "Get in the boat," Jack ordered.
"No," said Angelica.
"Would you rather swim?"
"Point taken." Angelica clambered into the boat. Jack entered, and with one last look up at the manhole he pushed the boat off the ledge. It tumbled end over end. But miraculously it landed upright on the turbulent waters. It was immediately whisked away. Jack, seeing a low-roofed tunnel ahead, pulled Angelica down. The boat shot into the tunnel.
It was dark. It was confusing. It was hellish and horrifying. Water surged in the tunnel, around the edges, loop-de-looping on the tunnel walls, creating a horizontal vortex of sorts. A logo on the boat caught Jack's eye. "Robloxian Sewer System Association: Serving The People And Places Of Robloxia For All Time," it read. Jack thought, Thank you RSSASTPAPORFAT. Your name is unpronounceable, but you may have just saved our skins here.
They emerged from the low-roofed tunnel, gasping for air. The river now widened, green water creating rapids of fetidness. The boat skipped over the rapids, and here came the turbines. They were large, and tossed sewer water as they spun. The boat was heading right towards the turbines. Jack held his breath. Yup, this was it. They were going to die-
Then they stopped. Jack and Angelica looked and saw a sewer worker looking at them. As they passed into the next tunnel, the worker saluted.
"The service here is just exemplary," Angelica remarked.
The boat suddenly dipped down into a steep and almost vertical slide. The pipe began to narrow. Jack pulled Angelica down again. The boat began to spin, increasing in speed until a casual onlooker would have seen a large wooden bullet surging down the stream of water. The boat landed point-down in a tray of very clean water, in contrast to the raging storm of water that continued to plummet into uncertain depths.
OOO
Roblox Blog, Grand Year 2013, 3:44 PM
TOWN OF ROBLOXIA REDUCED TO RUBBLE BY UNKNOWN TERRORIST ORGANIZATION! POLICE CHIEFS, OF THE TOWN OF ROBLOXIA AND ROBLOXITY, DEAD! UNKNOWN CASUALTY NUMBER!
The Town of Robloxia was struck by a devastating attack from a terrorist force! Refugees are being shipped out as we speak. Correspondent Fackler has more on the attack:
"The terrorist organization arrived at 11:20 this morning. A half-hour later, torpedoes were reported to have been fired at numerous houses. Ten minutes after that, communication ceased from the local radio station. Relief troops are being sent in to possibly uproot the terrorists. Councilman Jacenman is also expected to arrive on the scene. Fackler, Roblox Blog, the Town of Robloxia."
We will have more coverage of this incident as more details are uncovered. Refugees are heading for the Greenwood Town, twenty miles away.
OOO
Jack surfaced from the upturned boat, gasping. Angelica surfaced beside him. They stared around them.
There were people there, in little groups of threes and fours, staring at them, weapons drawn. The weapons were simple; among them were superballs and linked swords. They didn't look to be related to any known organization, and their clothes were varied in make and fanciness.
"You came from the Town?" the spokesperson asked suspiciously. He was incredibly unshaven, and wearing a hoodie and baggy jeans that sagged all the way to his knees. Thankfully the hoodie obscured anything that might have been revealed.
"Yes," Jack panted.
The man put away his linked sword. "It's okay," he called to the groups. "They're refugees. Let's get 'em somewhere warm and dry."
Jack and Angelica were helped out of the water. A scarf was wrapped around Angelica. The groups formed into one and lead the two onto a set of worn stairs. They were made of bricks put together with haste. The steps were lopsided, and the bricks were different colors from each other. The stairs lead into a pipe that ran for a long distance back through the wall.
The spokesperson walked with a sort of swagger. He seemed to glide across the ground effortlessly.
"What's happening up there?" he asked Jack.
"Fighting," replied Jack. "A lot of houses have been destroyed, but half the people've been evacuated."
The spokesperson's hands clenched into fists at his sides. "I swear," he growled, "I'll skewer all them Associates."
The group arrived at the other side of the pipe. There seemed to be a temporary structure there: a two-story house, simply built. It was made out of the default plastic blocks.
"This is where you all live?" Jack asked.
"Yeah," said the spokesperson. "We're CTs."
"CTs?"
"Counter-Terrorists," explained the spokesperson.
"Oh."
"The name's Andes, by the way," said the spokesperson. "Andes254, that's my full name."
"I remember you sent a message to the ToRPD," said Jack. "How'd you know?"
They entered the house.
"We've got cameras," said Andes. "They pop out of the ground and a guy operates them from here. We looked one day, and what did we see but the Associates' ship coming straight on a beeline for the Town?"
"How do you know the Associates?" Jack asked, as they sat down at a wooden table.
"It's a long story," replied Andes.
"Tell me," Jack replied.
"Okay..." Andes thought for a bit. Then he began.
"When I was a lad, I lived in the mountains with my parents. We were a happy family. I would always go out and get wood for 'em. It was one day when this HUGE ship appeared and blocked out the sun. Then it destroyed the mountain town. From the wreckage, I was the only one left alive. But while I was alive, there was this soldier shooting people, who were still alive and were trying to move. He kept screaming, 'Hail Associates!'. Then when they left the name was burnt into my mind.
"I swore vengeance on them. I ran away from the mountains and went to the Town of Robloxia to start building an army. I searched for brickbattles to train myself in the arts of combat as it used to be, and soon I made friends in the arenas. They banded together with me. We're the Disaster Crew, brickbattlers and part-time CTs. We didn't hear from the Associates for years, and all the while we were wary. Training was a daily regimen thing for me.
"Then we heard about the terrorist attacks at the East End Deposit, and we knew the Associates had returned. So we recruited more brickbattlers who had heard about the Associates... and, well, here we are, livin' in a sewer."
"And you're planning to make an attack on them?" Jack asked as Angelica sat down still wrapped in a towel.
"Yep. We've been planning it ever since the East End Deposit went KAFLOOEY!, and we think we've got a pretty good idea of what we're gonna do."
"Well," said Jack, "if it makes you feel better, we knocked a pretty big hole in the Associates' ship earlier."
Andes's face split into a large grin. "I was worried we'd have to do that," he said, relieved. "Say, want to come with us to attack the Associates?"
"Sure," said Jack. "But I'd like some scotch first. I'm really getting hooked on the stuff."
OOO
They set about it at night. The stars were out.
The sewer had an exit that protruded out of the ground a mile from the Town, in the desert.
Andes' plan was simple:
1: They would enter the shadows underneath the parked Associate ship, and one of them would toss a rope up into the crater created by Buster. Whoever had a change of heart midway through would turn back then; otherwise, it was a one-way trip.
2: They would enter the ship, and find whatever made it run smoothly. Then they'd destroy that and let the ship sit there, marooned in its own shadow.
3: They would free any prisoners that the Associates had taken.
4. If the Associates caught them, they wouldn't hesitate to use whatever was nearby as a weapon of self-defense.
5: They would make a daring escape, preferably through some sort of window or brittle, flimsy wall.
The little group of CTs hurried towards the distant silhouette of the parked ship. Against the bloodred sunset it was a round, obese beast, sitting there, waiting for some inexperienced prey to enter its maw. Many people already had. Jack prayed to whatever god that would listen that the innocent civilians killed didn't die in vain. That beast would have its head mounted upon the wall of the gods, if all worked according to plan.
He remembered Namek. Namek would be on there, for certain. Decahedra didn't seem to be the type that let prisoners go. But why would Decahedra keep Namek, rather than kill him outright? There had to be an extra dimension to the kidnapping.
He realized that, with all the thinking in his head, he had lagged behind the others. He sprinted to catch up with Andes. It wasn't too hard. Andes' baggy and loose pants made his walk speed hampered. They kept catching around his knees, and he kept pulling them up.
Jack reached the ship first, and waited for Angelica to catch up. When she did, they both waited for Andes.
Jack drew a line with his foot in the sand. It stretched nine blox. Andes and the brickbattlers stood behind the line, and Jack and Angelica stood in front of it.
"Fellows," Jack said.
He thought in his head for inspirational speeches he could draw from. He found a few, mainly from 2009 and 2010, and drew aspects from them.
"We have a line in the sand," he said. "Now, Angelica and I have crossed it. We're going to enter the ship. However, I know there are some faint-of-heart people out there who aren't ready for battle. Those people, y' can turn back now. You don't have to step over the line, and it'd be best for you if you didn't. But the greater good's on the line. You cross it, you're fighting for the good of all Robloxia. You don't and you're fighting for yourself. But it's a choice. Take it... or leave it."
There was hesitance, but Andes crossed the line almost immediately. A few of the more practical brickbattlers crossed after him.
"Anybody else gonna cross?" Andes asked to the crowd.
More hesitance; then there were five that trickled reluctantly over the line. The rest hung back.
"You won't just save yourself if you cross," said Angelica. "Aren't you planning for kids with your womenfolk? You'll save them too."
A few others crossed the line.
"Anybody else?" Jack inquired.
The three that remained shook their heads.
"Okay." Jack nodded at Andes, who was holding the rope. Andes tossed the rope up into the hole. It made a muffled thud as it hit and caught on a spike of exposed framework. They climbed up the rope quickly, then rolled it back up once everyone had made it to the top. They stowed it in a damaged cabinet nearby. Then they hurried down the exposed corridor of twisted metal and sparking machinery.
"To bo honest," Jack admitted to Angelica, "I'm surprised so many people actually came with us."
"Why?" asked Angelica. "They're all on the same side."
"Right, right. But they don't know us that well, and neither do we know them that well."
They approached a corridor. The lights in the corridor were shut off, because nobody had any use for a corridor that ended in a gaping crater.
"Let's go," said Andes eagerly, and they entered the Associate ship.