Chapter 5: Into The Catacombs.
Old Fort Freedom April 27 (9:29pm)
They had all spent the hour eating, from the rations Wolf had found, or reading from the journal A.J. had found. At about 9:30pm, Fox stood up on top of a table, having regained his leadership skills, he said "Okay everyone, were all going to find this Vladimir guy, from what Marvin told me, his quarters are in the basement, now lets move out!" They stood up making sure all their weapons were ready, once they were finished they made their way out of the room.?????? They made their way through the first floor, down the stairs and into the basement.
They finally reached the door to Vladimir's quarters. Fox now being the appointed leader of the group went up to the door, and reached his paw down, and around the latch of the door...it was locked. Wolf got one of his famous psychopathic looks on his face, and looked like he was going to snap at anyone who even looked at him wrong, And A.J. muttered a long series of curses under his breath. "Hold on a second theirs words on the door!" Said Benjamin. Benjamin started to read the words: "If you seek to open the door and be judged, You must face Death in the catacombs, Remember, Run fast and do not fear his sickle, And don't lose your way...or you will never come back."
"What could that mean?" Said Wolf, who had finally calmed down. "Hmm" said Benjamin in deep thought. "I know! It must mean that we must enter the catacombs, deep under the fort, and that a key is hidden deep inside the catacombs. But I Can't make sense of the rest of it." Said Marvin. "But how do we get to the catacombs?" Said A.J. "Well...if I remember right, I heard from someone, that way back when they first built the fort, they never finished fully covering up the entrance, because terrible accidents kept happening every time they tried to block it up, and many people were killed." "The area that the catacomb entrance was in was sealed up since they couldn't seem to seal the entrance." "The entrance should be in this basement." Said Marvin. "I know! We can check those blueprints that you found!" Fox said to Marvin. Marvin then took out the blue prints, and studied them for a few minutes. Then he said, "The catacombs entrance is behind a wall, in the storage rooms!!" "Yeah, but how are we going to get through a stone wall?" Wolf said. "Wait a minute, I have a MM1 grenade launcher with me!" A.J. said. "What's a grenade launcher?" Said Marvin. "It's a weapon." A.J. answered. "What type of weapon?" Marvin asked. "You'll see, but it definitely will get us through the wall" A.J. answered. "Okay everyone, we have a plan, now lets get to those storage rooms!" Said Fox. "You go ahead, I'll stay here and look at the door, there seems to be more words written in old loamhedge script written on it." Benjamin said. They all then headed down the hall, towards the storage room, leaving Benjamin to his studying.
It had taken them eleven minutes to go down the long halls of the gigantic fort, and reach the cellars. "Finally! Were here!" Exclaimed A.J. "It should be that wall!" said Marvin, while looking up from the blueprints he had in his paws. A.J. took out the MM1 from his duffel bag and a few of the explosive rounds; he then loaded the MM1 with the two rounds, and said "Okay, everyone out of the way!!" They all moved hastily back not wanting to be near the wall when it exploded. A few seconds later they heard a small "BOOM" and the wall had been blown away. "What a powerful weapon!" Exclaimed Marvin. They all stepped over the wall, and into the area around the catacombs entrance. It smelled like damp earth...and death. They all walked over to a large circle in the ground...it was a circular stairway leading to the catacombs...and Death.
Benjamin had been studying the door the whole time they had been gone, and had finally translated some of the other words. He then read the words out loud to himself:
"All of ye who stand in front of these doors shall be judged." He started to back up... but ran strait into someone! He whirled around it was a fox, wearing a non-leather black trench coat, black wire frame shades, black pants, a black long sleeved shirt and black boots. "Fox? Benjamin started to say. The fox grabbed him by the neck with one paw, and lifted him up high enough that that Benjamin's foot paws were at the red fox's stomach! And he held him up for a full three minutes with only one paw! Then after seeming to be getting board, he threw him a full thirty feet down the hall, still using only one paw, as if Benjamin was a blade of grass. He then turned to the door, and ripped the four hundred pound door of its hinges, as if it was just a toy. Still seeming to have not used any effort, and not tired one bit, he entered the room. Benjamin was dead.
Nine minutes ago, they had removed the musty, earthen boards that were half covering the entrance, and began climbing down the old stairs. Now, nine minutes later they had just reached the bottom of the stairs. They looked around them for a few moments they were at least six stories below the fort, and just a floor above the even older fort, Marshank. Their was a twisting corridor right in front of them, it was pretty much pitch black down there, and they had nothing to light their way. They slowly stumbled down the long confusing corridor, using their hands, and paws to find their way down the corridor. They continued down the corridor...down into the darkness. They had finally reached the end of the corridor, which opened up into a small circular stone room...that had stairs leading down, deeper into the darkness. Three minutes later they reached the bottom of the stairs, there were four separate corridors, they would have to split up. "Okay, looks like were going to have to split up" "I'll take the middle corridor, A.J. can take the one to the left, Marvin you take the one behind us, and Wolf you take the right one" Fox said. They all parted from one another, once again.
The Left Corridor
A.J. started down the apparently long hallway...that lead into the unknown. It was dark, and he could barely see a thing. He heard something behind him, he whirled around...it was a monster strait out of his nightmares, a monster in a circular shape with thousands of bodies covering it and moaning in pain, they were tortured souls, the monster was covered in the bodies of it's victims! "Join Us!" Said a loud, demonic like voice. "No!" A.J said. He hurried down the hall past the monster; the monster let out a long roar...one that sounded exactly like the one Wolf had heard...
The Right Corridor
Wolf was walking down the corridor when he heard it. He heard a rough breathing behind him...he whirled around to come face to face with a monster that was circular, and had faces on it, that seemed to be apart of it. Wolf then realized that it must be the faces of the things victims! He ran faster than he had ever ran before, as he was running it let out aloud wail...like the one that had terrorized him in the basement...
The Middle Corridor
Fox continued down the corridor after having paused for a second. He had thought he had heard screams. He trudged along...until he heard something behind him...he whirled around...It was a person...It was himself! He stared into the other Foxes eyes for a moment. Then the other fox started repeating: "Failure...Failure to avenge your parents deaths!" The words brought many painful memories back to him...about Andross...his Arch- Nemesis, which had killed his mother in a car bomb when he was only ten, and killed his father when he was only twelve. The thoughts brought cold tears to his eyes, thinking about them, his parents that he had lost when he was so young. He couldn't stand the "failure" chants any longer. He hurried down the corridor...
The Back Corridor
Marvin was walking down the corridor, when he heard moans behind him...familiar moans of the prisoners that he watched be tortured in unimaginable ways...prisoners that were innocent...he could have done something about it...but he didn't do a single thing. The guilt of it all had been eating away at him; he had even almost decided to hang himself. He then whirled around... their was a monster their! It was a large mass of what looked like bodies and faces fused together...the faces were familiar...they were the faces of the innocent prisoners, that he could have saved... but he didn't, no he didn't save them like the hero's of old would have, no he had just watched, while they screamed. "What did I do!" He said to himself, putting his face in his paws. "What did I do!" He repeated. He then started to cry, remembering how they suffered, and he did nothing about, he had just watched. "Why...Why did I just stand there, watching!" He said to himself. He couldn't stand it any more he had to get out of there; he hurried down the corridor...
Chamber Of Death
They all ran into the same room...the Chamber Of Death. They ran into each other, they were surprised at meeting each other. A.J. had a nervous and startled look on his face, Wolf looked like something scarred the crap out of him, Fox was crying and was saying: "he wasn't a failure", and Marvin was also crying and saying: "Why! Why didn't I do something!" They all slumped down on the floor. None of them told each other about what they saw.
They had finally calmed down, and just now looked at their surroundings, they were in a small chamber and there was a door at the end of the hall. They all got up and walked to the door. Fox placed his paw on the door latch, and slowly opened it. They all walked inside the larger chamber. There was a door on the other end of the room, some forty feet away. They started to walk across the floor when A.J. stepped on a stone...the stone sank into the ground, it activated a large blade in the ceiling, a booby trap. The blade swung down from the ceiling and back and forth. They would have to get by the large blade. "Wait a minute!" "The words on the door, they said: "You must face Death in the catacombs, Remember, Run fast and do not fear his sickle, Marvin said. "The Sickle must be this blade!" A.J. said. "So that means we just run past it with no fear and we'll be okay?" Asked Wolf. "Yes, basically." A.J. said bluntly. They all went one at a time across the room, and they all managed to get across the room without getting sliced and diced. They all passed through the door...into the chamber of lost souls...
Chamber Of Lost Souls
The room they were was large, and there were stairs in front of them that lead to a raised section of the room. They all walked up the stairs and onto the raised section, it had weird markings on it, one was a circle with strange words written in an unknown language, with a triangle shape in the middle with an eye on it. There was a large stand at the end of the raised section it had at least sixty keys on it. They all walked up to the stand and looked at the keys, most of the keys were very fancy and covered in jewels. "What are we supposed to do?" Said Wolf. "Look, up there!" Said Fox pointing to the wall above the stand. There were words engraved on the stone, the words read: "Thou shall choose thy key, but be wary not all is as seems, Choose carefully from the judges keys, or thou shall face certain death from the magic that dwells within the false keys." "I guess we chose a key and hope it's the right one" Said Marvin. Fox was about to pick up the fanciest key, when A.J. remembering the movie "Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade" stopped him. "Wait! It's that key!") A.J. said, pointing to a plain wooden key. "I hope your right!" Said Fox. Fox picked the wooden key up, nothing happened. They all let out a sigh of relief. They all started across the raised section, when they reached the circle like symbol, a loud painful sounding female scream, ripped through the air. In front of them almost out of thin air a young, female mousemaid appeared, she was see-through. She was a ghost.
Chamber Of lost Souls
They all stood there stunned, she then spoke to them, she said: "Do not fear me, I have used great amounts of energy to appear to you now." "My name is Rose, and I was killed at the battle of Marshank, long ago." "You must listen to me, this place is filled with thousands of lost souls, angry souls, and a great amount of evil ones." You must defeat the master of the summoned demons so that all of the souls of the beasts who died may pass on, some of them to the Dark Forests and some to Hellgates, but either way they all must pass on!" "Or this place will forever be a place of evil. " "The soul's of the dead must pass on!" With that she disappeared. They all stood there, shocked at what had just happened. They made there way through the passages to the small chamber. Once they were there, Fox said: "We'll rest here for four hours, then we'll come for Vladimir."
Old Fort Freedom April 27 (9:29pm)
They had all spent the hour eating, from the rations Wolf had found, or reading from the journal A.J. had found. At about 9:30pm, Fox stood up on top of a table, having regained his leadership skills, he said "Okay everyone, were all going to find this Vladimir guy, from what Marvin told me, his quarters are in the basement, now lets move out!" They stood up making sure all their weapons were ready, once they were finished they made their way out of the room.?????? They made their way through the first floor, down the stairs and into the basement.
They finally reached the door to Vladimir's quarters. Fox now being the appointed leader of the group went up to the door, and reached his paw down, and around the latch of the door...it was locked. Wolf got one of his famous psychopathic looks on his face, and looked like he was going to snap at anyone who even looked at him wrong, And A.J. muttered a long series of curses under his breath. "Hold on a second theirs words on the door!" Said Benjamin. Benjamin started to read the words: "If you seek to open the door and be judged, You must face Death in the catacombs, Remember, Run fast and do not fear his sickle, And don't lose your way...or you will never come back."
"What could that mean?" Said Wolf, who had finally calmed down. "Hmm" said Benjamin in deep thought. "I know! It must mean that we must enter the catacombs, deep under the fort, and that a key is hidden deep inside the catacombs. But I Can't make sense of the rest of it." Said Marvin. "But how do we get to the catacombs?" Said A.J. "Well...if I remember right, I heard from someone, that way back when they first built the fort, they never finished fully covering up the entrance, because terrible accidents kept happening every time they tried to block it up, and many people were killed." "The area that the catacomb entrance was in was sealed up since they couldn't seem to seal the entrance." "The entrance should be in this basement." Said Marvin. "I know! We can check those blueprints that you found!" Fox said to Marvin. Marvin then took out the blue prints, and studied them for a few minutes. Then he said, "The catacombs entrance is behind a wall, in the storage rooms!!" "Yeah, but how are we going to get through a stone wall?" Wolf said. "Wait a minute, I have a MM1 grenade launcher with me!" A.J. said. "What's a grenade launcher?" Said Marvin. "It's a weapon." A.J. answered. "What type of weapon?" Marvin asked. "You'll see, but it definitely will get us through the wall" A.J. answered. "Okay everyone, we have a plan, now lets get to those storage rooms!" Said Fox. "You go ahead, I'll stay here and look at the door, there seems to be more words written in old loamhedge script written on it." Benjamin said. They all then headed down the hall, towards the storage room, leaving Benjamin to his studying.
It had taken them eleven minutes to go down the long halls of the gigantic fort, and reach the cellars. "Finally! Were here!" Exclaimed A.J. "It should be that wall!" said Marvin, while looking up from the blueprints he had in his paws. A.J. took out the MM1 from his duffel bag and a few of the explosive rounds; he then loaded the MM1 with the two rounds, and said "Okay, everyone out of the way!!" They all moved hastily back not wanting to be near the wall when it exploded. A few seconds later they heard a small "BOOM" and the wall had been blown away. "What a powerful weapon!" Exclaimed Marvin. They all stepped over the wall, and into the area around the catacombs entrance. It smelled like damp earth...and death. They all walked over to a large circle in the ground...it was a circular stairway leading to the catacombs...and Death.
Benjamin had been studying the door the whole time they had been gone, and had finally translated some of the other words. He then read the words out loud to himself:
"All of ye who stand in front of these doors shall be judged." He started to back up... but ran strait into someone! He whirled around it was a fox, wearing a non-leather black trench coat, black wire frame shades, black pants, a black long sleeved shirt and black boots. "Fox? Benjamin started to say. The fox grabbed him by the neck with one paw, and lifted him up high enough that that Benjamin's foot paws were at the red fox's stomach! And he held him up for a full three minutes with only one paw! Then after seeming to be getting board, he threw him a full thirty feet down the hall, still using only one paw, as if Benjamin was a blade of grass. He then turned to the door, and ripped the four hundred pound door of its hinges, as if it was just a toy. Still seeming to have not used any effort, and not tired one bit, he entered the room. Benjamin was dead.
Nine minutes ago, they had removed the musty, earthen boards that were half covering the entrance, and began climbing down the old stairs. Now, nine minutes later they had just reached the bottom of the stairs. They looked around them for a few moments they were at least six stories below the fort, and just a floor above the even older fort, Marshank. Their was a twisting corridor right in front of them, it was pretty much pitch black down there, and they had nothing to light their way. They slowly stumbled down the long confusing corridor, using their hands, and paws to find their way down the corridor. They continued down the corridor...down into the darkness. They had finally reached the end of the corridor, which opened up into a small circular stone room...that had stairs leading down, deeper into the darkness. Three minutes later they reached the bottom of the stairs, there were four separate corridors, they would have to split up. "Okay, looks like were going to have to split up" "I'll take the middle corridor, A.J. can take the one to the left, Marvin you take the one behind us, and Wolf you take the right one" Fox said. They all parted from one another, once again.
The Left Corridor
A.J. started down the apparently long hallway...that lead into the unknown. It was dark, and he could barely see a thing. He heard something behind him, he whirled around...it was a monster strait out of his nightmares, a monster in a circular shape with thousands of bodies covering it and moaning in pain, they were tortured souls, the monster was covered in the bodies of it's victims! "Join Us!" Said a loud, demonic like voice. "No!" A.J said. He hurried down the hall past the monster; the monster let out a long roar...one that sounded exactly like the one Wolf had heard...
The Right Corridor
Wolf was walking down the corridor when he heard it. He heard a rough breathing behind him...he whirled around to come face to face with a monster that was circular, and had faces on it, that seemed to be apart of it. Wolf then realized that it must be the faces of the things victims! He ran faster than he had ever ran before, as he was running it let out aloud wail...like the one that had terrorized him in the basement...
The Middle Corridor
Fox continued down the corridor after having paused for a second. He had thought he had heard screams. He trudged along...until he heard something behind him...he whirled around...It was a person...It was himself! He stared into the other Foxes eyes for a moment. Then the other fox started repeating: "Failure...Failure to avenge your parents deaths!" The words brought many painful memories back to him...about Andross...his Arch- Nemesis, which had killed his mother in a car bomb when he was only ten, and killed his father when he was only twelve. The thoughts brought cold tears to his eyes, thinking about them, his parents that he had lost when he was so young. He couldn't stand the "failure" chants any longer. He hurried down the corridor...
The Back Corridor
Marvin was walking down the corridor, when he heard moans behind him...familiar moans of the prisoners that he watched be tortured in unimaginable ways...prisoners that were innocent...he could have done something about it...but he didn't do a single thing. The guilt of it all had been eating away at him; he had even almost decided to hang himself. He then whirled around... their was a monster their! It was a large mass of what looked like bodies and faces fused together...the faces were familiar...they were the faces of the innocent prisoners, that he could have saved... but he didn't, no he didn't save them like the hero's of old would have, no he had just watched, while they screamed. "What did I do!" He said to himself, putting his face in his paws. "What did I do!" He repeated. He then started to cry, remembering how they suffered, and he did nothing about, he had just watched. "Why...Why did I just stand there, watching!" He said to himself. He couldn't stand it any more he had to get out of there; he hurried down the corridor...
Chamber Of Death
They all ran into the same room...the Chamber Of Death. They ran into each other, they were surprised at meeting each other. A.J. had a nervous and startled look on his face, Wolf looked like something scarred the crap out of him, Fox was crying and was saying: "he wasn't a failure", and Marvin was also crying and saying: "Why! Why didn't I do something!" They all slumped down on the floor. None of them told each other about what they saw.
They had finally calmed down, and just now looked at their surroundings, they were in a small chamber and there was a door at the end of the hall. They all got up and walked to the door. Fox placed his paw on the door latch, and slowly opened it. They all walked inside the larger chamber. There was a door on the other end of the room, some forty feet away. They started to walk across the floor when A.J. stepped on a stone...the stone sank into the ground, it activated a large blade in the ceiling, a booby trap. The blade swung down from the ceiling and back and forth. They would have to get by the large blade. "Wait a minute!" "The words on the door, they said: "You must face Death in the catacombs, Remember, Run fast and do not fear his sickle, Marvin said. "The Sickle must be this blade!" A.J. said. "So that means we just run past it with no fear and we'll be okay?" Asked Wolf. "Yes, basically." A.J. said bluntly. They all went one at a time across the room, and they all managed to get across the room without getting sliced and diced. They all passed through the door...into the chamber of lost souls...
Chamber Of Lost Souls
The room they were was large, and there were stairs in front of them that lead to a raised section of the room. They all walked up the stairs and onto the raised section, it had weird markings on it, one was a circle with strange words written in an unknown language, with a triangle shape in the middle with an eye on it. There was a large stand at the end of the raised section it had at least sixty keys on it. They all walked up to the stand and looked at the keys, most of the keys were very fancy and covered in jewels. "What are we supposed to do?" Said Wolf. "Look, up there!" Said Fox pointing to the wall above the stand. There were words engraved on the stone, the words read: "Thou shall choose thy key, but be wary not all is as seems, Choose carefully from the judges keys, or thou shall face certain death from the magic that dwells within the false keys." "I guess we chose a key and hope it's the right one" Said Marvin. Fox was about to pick up the fanciest key, when A.J. remembering the movie "Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade" stopped him. "Wait! It's that key!") A.J. said, pointing to a plain wooden key. "I hope your right!" Said Fox. Fox picked the wooden key up, nothing happened. They all let out a sigh of relief. They all started across the raised section, when they reached the circle like symbol, a loud painful sounding female scream, ripped through the air. In front of them almost out of thin air a young, female mousemaid appeared, she was see-through. She was a ghost.
Chamber Of lost Souls
They all stood there stunned, she then spoke to them, she said: "Do not fear me, I have used great amounts of energy to appear to you now." "My name is Rose, and I was killed at the battle of Marshank, long ago." "You must listen to me, this place is filled with thousands of lost souls, angry souls, and a great amount of evil ones." You must defeat the master of the summoned demons so that all of the souls of the beasts who died may pass on, some of them to the Dark Forests and some to Hellgates, but either way they all must pass on!" "Or this place will forever be a place of evil. " "The soul's of the dead must pass on!" With that she disappeared. They all stood there, shocked at what had just happened. They made there way through the passages to the small chamber. Once they were there, Fox said: "We'll rest here for four hours, then we'll come for Vladimir."