Chapter Sixteen

Patrick exited the restroom wearing the clothes of the man he had interrogated. They barely fit his height, but were far too wide around the waist. He found that he had to tighten the belt to its tightest notch to make it stay above his knees. Walking awkwardly, he made it to the office of the director of classified studies. He didn't bother reading the name on the brass plaque next to the solid oak double doors. They were not locked, Patrick just walked in. The director was in, sitting at a glorified desk quiet a distance away from the door. It was one of the generic types of offices one would expect for a higher up in a company.

Noticing one security camera placed facing him near the ceiling, looking over the desk, planted on the seats for the director's guests. An added measure to assure no harm befell someone so important. Patrick grinned and focused a small surge of heat, localized on the wiring of the camera. A silent fizzle assured him that the feed was down. It was now just him, and the director, who seemed to have not noticed him yet.

He took a seat in one of the well padded chairs. The director looked up after about three minutes of Patrick waiting silently.

"May I help you?" he asked, "I don't believe I have any appointments today."

Patrick dispelled with the bullshit and got straight to the point. "You have a prisoner in this complex," he said with as calm of a tone as possible, fighting his rage, "Where is she?"

The man perked an eyebrow, looking directly at Patrick. "I see…" he said solemnly, assuming the truth, that Patrick harbored similar powers to the "prisoner" he spoke of. "She is being held in the complex's lower levels. Access to that area is very restricted." He spoke the arrogant truth, knowing it to be impossible for Patrick to make his way down there.

Patrick smiled. "Tell me. Do you have a family?" His question was already answered by the photograph of the director and a woman and a young girl. He paused. The director said nothing, but merely eyed Patrick still suspiciously, wondering where he was going with what he was saying. "Yeah," Patrick said casually, "I used to have one too. Do you know what happened to it?"

The director still remained silent.

"My family, my sister, was killed by the bullets of an M-16. One of your company's I believe." Patrick was still very calm, at least in his voice and actions. His mind was ablaze will all the forms of possible painful revenge he could enact against this man. "Now, I give you two options," he said in a very business-like manner, "You can either get me down to this 'Sector 1'. Or… I can take an eye for an eye and kill your daughter. And trust me sir, I will not make it pleasant." Patrick spoke entirely seriously, though not sure in his heart if he could kill a child to satisfy his own personal vengeance.

The director's eyes widened in shock, seeing the dark truth. "V-v-ery well," he said with an extremely shaken voice. This was not something he wanted to gamble on. "The elevator is secured magnetically; you won't be able to get into it without proper clearance." He rolled forward slowly and reached into his desk.

"Slowly," Patrick said, wary to what it might be he was pulling out.

It turned out the director was playing a fair game, or as fair as an enemy could play. He pulled out a magnetic card, similar to the one the guard on the surface had. It appeared, however, to have a certain degree of importance to it. Patrick reached forward and snatched it quickly, inspecting it just as fast. He stood and looked at the man, knocking him unconscious just as he had the two men before him. He placed the limp body to make it look as if he had fallen asleep in his work. Certain the rouse would be adequate to at least make it appear that no foul play was involved should he be found; he walked out of the office, still wearing his disguise.

Finding the elevator to Sector 1 was simple enough. He merely had to follow arrows on the walls and maps placed for worker convenience. Reaching it, smiled and walked down the well lit hallway to the elevator. There were two guards. But they seemed to just be there for show and to make sure that no one tampered with the card reader, they didn't even give him a second look. Patrick swiped his card and the doors opened, revealing a large white elevator, big enough to accommodate the forty people that its maximum occupancy boasted on the wall next to the two arrows. Up and down. Only one was lit.

"Nowhere else to go," Patrick muttered as he pressed the button hard. The doors thundered shut and he felt a very sudden change in gravity.

It had to have taken a good minute before he felt the elevator stop. His ears had popped several times on the way down, making him wonder just how far under the earth this part of the complex was. The elevator had come to a complete halt and a loud tone told Patrick that he was at his destination. He gulped down his fear, half expecting to see an armada of soldiers aiming their military grade weapons at the doors, waiting for his arrival.

This, however, was the opposite of what he found. The doors opened to a massive white room with several people walking about and reading computer screens. The floor right in front of the walls was adorned with what looked like large circular landing pads, the walls themselves having all kinds of mechanical outcroppings that seemed to be designed to either plug into or be plugged into. Most were taken up by mechs, many of them the exact same appearance to the one that had attacked the city not two weeks ago. Above each pad was a large flat screen that held the status of the mech the pad contained. They were all powered down, some being repaired by robotic welding arms that extended from the walls when in use, but discretely concealed when not in use.

"Jackpot," Patrick said optimistically. He walked out across the floor, passing several people wearing uniforms similar to his. They were going about whatever menial task they had to do on the mechs. Patrick did not stop to ask where Raven was being held, fearing he might cause suspicion. He just continued walking towards a large set of automatic doors on the other side of the room. There were other doors in the room, but they were small and, Patrick assumed that they led to some aspect of assembly for the mechs in the room. The large doors seemed to stick out as leading to something important. His assumptions were assured when he finally could see text above the doors simply saying "Biological".

Patrick walked into the doors, hit by a rush of cool air, and found himself in a pressure sealed gateway between the two rooms. The doors behind him closed and the room adjusted with nothing more than a silent hiss. The doors in front of him opened and he found himself in a less massive room, equally white with several computers along the walls, all giving our readouts of some sort, most of which Patrick could not understand. There were people at most of the stations, sitting in what seemed to be general issue chairs with no comfort value. They were all typing or reading something absentmindedly. Some were talking to a colleague who was looking over their shoulder.

Patrick walked past all these people, already seeing where he needed to go. There, on the other side of the room, at least thirty feet from where he stood, was a completely closed off room, completely transparent in all aspects. It was barely furnished, spare a bed. There was a small part of the cell made of privacy glass, a small door leading into it of the same material. Though the privacy glass was probably merely an illusion of decency as the entire cell was networked with cameras, along with several on the outside looking in.

And there, on the floor, lay the crumpled form of Raven, collapsed on the floor, still in her usual uniform.