(Authors Notes: Well, this only took me a little over a year to update. Sorry about that by the way... guess I just lost interest for a while. O_o Anywho, back to fic...)
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Twilight
Chapter 5
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Sally slept lightly and only for a couple hours in the early morning, when the sky had begun to lighten but the sun wasn't anywhere to be seen yet. Beyond that there wasn't time for sleep, and anyway, she didn't really feel particularly safe doing so.
When the sun has risen enough to beam warmly down at her, she faded back into consciousness. Sally found herself laying out on her back, nestled beneath both a thin metallic emergency blanket designed for space as opposed to ground and the folds of her rather battered jacket. Yawning, she blinked up at the sky blearily. Quick eyes judged the position of the sun and she guessed that it was probably already nearing 8 or 9 in the morning.
Time to get up.
She yawned again and sat up, scratching lightly at the side of her face with her good hand. When her hand fell away it had dried blood caked under her fingernails, and she wrinkled her nose at the sight.
'I must look like a mess,' she reflected grimly.
Ah well... there wasn't much she could do about that. Re-adjusting her sling around her sore arm she made a mental checklist of all of the things she needed for the day.
Flashlight. Compass... she thought she remembered seeing one of those in the Emergency Kit...
Shortwave radio. Power cell that seemed to be totally *unwilling* to work with the main radio... she glowered at it. Supplies. Oh, and her gun. She smirked. She was going signal hunting. And if she were lucky enough, she'd find it. And if she was very VERY lucky, she's be able to use to send a distress call of her own...
She frowned.
So why did she feel so antsy about this all anyway? Huh. She shook her head, trying to quell the feeling. It was just because it was an old signal that's all, she was sure. They probably didn't have very good search and rescue teams around in those days. She was sure that Lady Une would find her once she sent out a SOS. And then the rescue teams would be here to rescue her, and look for her missing partner.
~~~
About 5 hours later Sally had decided that if she ever got *out* of the jungle, she was never going back into one. The jungles of China had been one thing... it had been much easier to maneuver in the foliage there. The foliage was just thick enough to hide them but not thick enough to prevent them from moving about with moderate ease. Here though, here the foliage was thick, so thick in fact that her progress was slowed considerably. A lot of her time seemed to be dedicated to maneuvering *around* trees and about trees instead of *through* them. Frowning, she rechecked her compass and kept on moving.
Her only consolation for the slow travel was the fact that the signal was becoming progressively clearer the further north she traveled. As she had discovered the night before the signal was a distress call. Not only that it appeared to be on a constant loop... it would repeat the "please send help" phrase five times over, pause, and then continue again about five minutes later. There were also other things it said beyond the comment that they were citizens of the former United States of America... it also informed the listener that they were peaceful scientists on a research mission, and pleaded for assistance from any nation at all.
Both the rotation of the distress signal and the nature of the plea told Sally a lot about what she was to expect at her final destination. First of all the fact that it the signal had never been shut down indicated to her that she should be prepared to find some sort of abandoned way station... or perhaps a still occupied facility. Either way, it would be either vacant... or full of long dead bodies. She shivered a bit despite the humid heat, chiding herself mentally. You have an over active imagination, she told herself sternly. After three hundred years, NOTHING was going to be left...
But the nature of the signal did leave her wondering why, exactly, no help had ever come for these people. That, she reflected ruefully, she wouldn't be able to answer until she got there...
Assuming she ever *did* get there. She growled softly at yet another tree as she half climbed half maneuvered to get around it. She had had no luck so far and the more time she spent out here, the closer it came to nightfall again. She glanced up at the sky apprehensively, only to find that, from her present position, the foliage was too thick to see though. Frowning, she estimated to herself silently.
She had been beating about bushes and trees for approximately five or six hours. If she was right, it was now about noon, with about six seven more hours to go before nightfall. That gave her roughly two hours to find the source of the signal and send her own out before having to head back to the cruiser... unless of course, she intended to spend the night. Abandoned pre-war facility? *That* didn't appeal to her very much. Shaking her head she continued walking.
She was in luck. Breaking past the next tree, she found that the jungle opened up, revealing a rather large but heavily overgrown clearing. Triumph and curiosity crossing her face, she stepped into it, then stopped, inspecting her surroundings with awe.
~~~
Wufei came too with a start, moaning softly with the effort. For one frantic second he wondered where on earth he was, and then the events of the previous 24 hours came back to him in a flood. He moaned again, but this time sounded much more disgruntled.
He sighed, then glanced down at his body. He let out a surprised sound, which was followed up with a soft sigh of relief... he was no longer restrained.
He tilted his head back up. He could see the faint light of day flitting down through the trees, but he couldn't feel any of it, the foliage was too thick. His mouth slanted down into a pensive frown as he realized that he had no idea what time it was.
Wufei sat up slowly, gritting his teeth against the pain as strained muscles protested the action.
Strange. He rubbed absently at a wrist, blinking down at it. The physical evidence was there, indicating that he had been restrained over the last twenty-four hours. He could tell by the reddened marks on both his wrists and he was sure if he rolled up his pants he would find the same markings on his legs.
Yet for some reason the presence had decided to let him go. For some reason the thought was oddly disquieting as he climbed to his feet.
After a moment he decided that he had more important things to think about right then... he remembered the presences' ominous warning from the night before.
He needed to find Sally.
He was loathed to admit it, but he was more than a little lost. He moved instinctually through the bush, unsure of his final destination. He had nothing to tell him what direction to go. So he followed vague trails where game had made their way through the bush. It came to a shock to him when he broke through the bush and found himself blinking in sunlight. For a moment he blinked to clear his eyes then let out a shout of joy and broke into a run.
A glint of metal at the far end of the clearing had appeared, gleaming dully in the mid-day sun. Despite its mangled exterior he could tell instantly that it was the cruiser.
~~~
It *was* a ruin from the dark days before the AC wars. Impressed but cautious, Sally decided to made a thorough inspection of the clearing, before approaching the half buried building opposite her. Her sharp eyes took in everything as she tread carefully through the underbrush. Even so she was startled when something crunched underneithe her shoe. Kneeling where she was near the center of the clearing, she reached down, touching the loose gravel under the grasses that was buried amongst a pale yellow powder. They puzzled her for a moment, until she figured out what the odd substance may be. Gravel amoung powder... it was probably the remains of concrete.
Frowning, Sally climbed back to her feet and began to walk backwards to discover where the odd stones and gravel began.
She soon discovered that the deteriorated concrete extended in a large and roughly circular shape around much of the relatively large clearing. Obviously, she guessed, the humans that once operated here, used helicopters or some other type of to get out of the forest. That didn't seem to make any sense to her. If the people could get in... then why couldn't they get *out*...?
"Or maybe they did get out and just forgot to turn off their damned machine," Sally muttered to herself under her breath. That caused a smile to crack across her face. Smirking she decided she had enough of theorizing... she was going to discover the truth for herself.
Sally turned her attention to the object in the clearing that fascinated her most. Those were the large dual set of steel doors at the very far end of the clearing. As she approached them she could see that, though time had eroded them a lot and vegetation hung thickly about it, there was evidence that the doors were attached to a much larger building that appeared to extend back further into the bush.
She was within a couple feet of the heavily rusted doors when she tripped over something large and solid. Cursing a blue streak, Sally hopped on one foot in pain for a moment. Now both her ankle *and* her toes hurt. However there was no one was around for her to complain to, let alone care and after a moment she gave up doing that and crouched down beside the object.
"Ohh... hello. What are we?" Sally questioned out loud. Carefully she reached down with her good hand and began to brush dirt and foliage from the metallic object. After a moment she had uncovered a very rush encrusted plate. Frowning slightly she squinted, trying her best to make out the lettering upon it. It obviously written in English, but it was a very ancient script. "Philadelphia 2nd - bio-genics research." she read. Her puzzled expression grew and she scraped at the rest of the plate only to find that the rest of the words at the top had been eroded away. However underneath the top there appeared to be more letters... after a couple of moments of struggling with the vegetation she managed to uncover it. "Commissioned on this date of June 30th of year 2012." Sally reread the words and blinked.
By the old calendar years, if she recalled correctly, the years 2013 and 2014 were the years of the Great War. That was roughly three hundred years Before Colony. She looked up and stared at the ominously shut doors of the facility where they stood out starkly against the green that surrounded them. "No wonder no one ever came for you." She whispered. "There probably wasn't anyone left that could." A brush of cool air blew against her sweat-streaked face and she shivered. She frowned deeper. 'No time to be getting the willies Sally,' she reproved herself mentally. Climbing to her feet she stepped determinedly over the plaque. The moment she cleared it her short wave radio at her hip click on again.
"Please help..." It began loudly.
Sally jumped a good foot in the air. "Jeez!" She said. "Stupid thing!" She added, once her heart had stopped pounding quite so hard. She forgot that she still had her radio on. The vocal loop of the distress signal had merely started up again. "Yes I *know*," she replied, clicking it off again deliberately. Well at least she knew she was at the right place now, she thought with a half smile. The distress signal came through crystal clear and static-less for the first time in over twelve hours.
Running her hand over her brow, she continued forwards towards the doors. "Now to get you open..." She muttered.
~~~
Wufei made short work of inspecting the completely wrecked cruiser. Sally had abandoned it much earlier that day, he could tell as he unearthed the remains of a fire his partner had covered with greenery. Sally had left quickly, but not quickly enough for him to assume that she had been attacked... there were no signs of a struggle or anything of the like. Which only left him to infer that, wisely Sally had trekked off to try to find the source of the signal in the first place. "Smart woman," he muttered out loud to himself, a half smile gracing his lips. Instead of sitting around like a stupid idiot waiting to be either found or killed, or waiting for her partner to return, Sally had set off to ensure her own survival. He would have only done the same in her position.
His suspicions were confirmed when he spotted a small folded piece of paper stuck in the seat of Sally's now twisted seat. Picking it up he discovered it to be a note to rescuers.
"If you are reading this I'm not here." It said. Wufei rolled his eyes. "Our mission has failed. One man, Dragon, is down - lost in the crash. I'm okay. Found out that our objective is an old distress call from the Before Colony United States of America of all places... going to investigate. Suspect I can use radio to send our own signal..." Sally had then signed it "Water" and dated it.
Wufei paled considerably, re-reading that bit of the note. '... found out our objective is an old distress call from the Before Colony United States of America of all places... so I'm going to investigate. Suspect I can use radio to send out our own signal...'
Things clicked in Wufei's mind. Distress call. The people that the presence showed him, the people with dark skin and black hair didn't appear to *have* the technology to send out a distress call. More than likely whomever Sally was off to investigate were the uniformed people with the masks and the flamethrowers. If it were an "old" signal Sally had picked up, then that would make sense...
He folded up the note, sticking it into one of the pockets of his fatigues. His mind went over the possibilities rapidly.
Darkness wasn't safe. He had learnt that last night -- the presence had attacked him the moment darkness had fallen. He glanced up at the sky, his ebony eyes narrowing. There were six, maybe seven hours of daylight left. He calculated. They had been stranded now for about 30 hours... by this time the Preventer Headquarters were probably looking for them. They would look first in space... and then when they realized they weren't there they'd turn their attention to the ground. They'd have their ears open by now at very least. If Sally managed to send a signal out right *now* their locations may be pinpointed, and they may have the opportunity of getting out of here by nightfall.
And if they *didn't* get out of here by nightfall? He cursed softly. He did *not* want to spend another twenty-four hours in this place. They had better get out of here by then. He made a quick physical assessment of the supplies that Sally had left-admittedly not much, but enough, and within minutes was hot on Sally's trail.
~~~
It took Sally nearly a half an hour to uncover the doors enough that she could try to pull them open... only to find that they were firmly locked shut. For a moment she assumed they had rusted shut and that a little bit of encouragement would help them open, but that refused to work.
Letting out a soft sigh of frustration Sally was nearly about to give up and somehow hack her way though the bush in attempts of finding another entrance, when a gleam of a different color of metal caught her eye from off to the side of the doors. Eyes narrowing, she walked over to it and pulled more vines away from it. After a couple of more minutes of digging, she could see it was a small covered square. A couple of moments after that it became apparent to her that it was a control device of some sort.
Absolutely fascinated, Sally blew dust and dirt from its face, pressing down on it from all possible angles. Finally when she pressed near the bottom something clicked and it swung open quite suddenly. Sally took a surprised step back, then made a face as a small horde of bugs ran from the light as the inside of the panel was reveled.
The bugs couldn't deter her for long. Sally let out an exclamation of delight. It was a keypad! It was an archaic keypad from the Old World, and it had the basic numbers 0-9 on it. "This is going to be a piece of cake," Sally muttered to herself. Smiling hugely, She rooted through her side-pack for her screwdriver and settled down to break the rest of the panel open.
It was a little less than twenty minutes later when an odd heavy thudding sound came from the doors and Sally raised her head. Smiling she climbed to her feet, wiping her brow with the back of her hand yet again and approached the doors. This time when she yanked on them they slowly gave way with great moaning protest. The instant the doors were open a crack stale air rushed out to meet her, pregnant with decay and disuse and Sally wrinkled her nose. Her smile of excitement didn't fade however and she reached down and rooted through her sack, coming up again with her flashlight. Injured hand holding the flashlight trained on the blackness that appeared in the crack between the doors, she pulled one of the heavy doors the rest of the way open with her other one.
"Hello?" She questioned softly as she stepped inside...
~~~
