Chapter 15: Deathtrap
March 21st, 2314 – 2:00 PM – Robotnik's Base
Dr. Skeleck screamed bloody murder, as Tails watched in numb disbelief as the officers' corpses collapsed to the ground. The laser had vanished, but Tails hardly noticed, his face going white from shock at seeing the dead bodies before him. He had thought that watching the kids at the school get shot in Mor had been horrible, as was the dead tabby cat on the highway on the way to Carlboron. However, seeing someone meet such a brutal end right before his eyes was a hundred times worse. Tails thought he'd pass out from shock for a moment, but he managed to keep from fainting. It took an extreme effort just to hold back the vomit though.
Just as he thought he'd stabilized his stomach, a second flash of light burst forth from the wall. Now a laser beam was flashing towards him and Sonic. However, before he could move to dodge it, Sonic had already grabbed his arm and jumped. The beam cut through the air where their ankles had been only a moment before.
After they landed, Tails heard some whimpering in the room. He looked back and saw Dr. Skeleck murmuring gibberish to himself, as he was curled up into a ball in the corner of the room. Once again, a flash of light appeared. This time, the laser targeted the doctor. Sonic temporarily dropped Tails and picked up the doctor, jumping so that the laser just missed his feet.
They'd managed to live through three of the laser beam attacks so far, but Tails knew they couldn't keep doing this forever. The fox rushed to the door next to where Dr. Skeleck had been curled up before, and tried open it. The door didn't even rattle as he pounded on it, with how solidly armored and secure it was.
"The doors are both locked!" Zack screamed from the other end of the hall. "We're trapped!"
Tails felt himself going even whiter than his muzzle and belly fur. They were stuck in this deathtrap hallway, and two people out of their group of thirteen were already dead. At this rate they'd all be killed within five minutes.
Once again, the laser beam came out of the wall and targeted someone in the hallway. This time, it came towards Tails. He just barely managed to duck under it, and felt the heat of it as it whizzed across the tips of his ears. The bright blue light of the beam made it hard to see anything with how close it had gotten to his eyes. He tried to relax, and think of some way out of this, but too much of his energy was already dedicated to simply staying alive.
Zack pulled up his anti-tank gun and aimed it at the door he was standing next to. He fired one shot, the gun sounding like a gigantic cannon in this tiny room. However, when Tails saw the damage that had been done to the door, he couldn't believe it. Even though the gun was designed to shoot through tank armor, it scarcely made a dent in the door. Another beam sliced across the hallway, cutting a cop's head off. His body soon fell to the floor following the head. Now they were down to ten people, Tails himself included.
It's so hard to believe that a beam of light can kill people like that.
On the tail end of that thought, he thought of something.
Wait...a laser is basically a very intense beam of light. It's just like any other kind of light. That means that this laser can be bounced off of a reflective surface.
Noting how easily the laser was able to cut through almost anything, he got an idea.
Maybe we can reflect the laser somehow at one of the doors. It would cut a hole in the door to let us out. Zack's got that mirror...
After the next laser strike, Tails called out to Zack.
"Zack! Give me your mirror!"
"What!" Zack called from the other end of the room. "Why!"
"We can use it to reflect the laser so it will cut open the door!"
"Sounds like a good idea to me!" Zack shouted as he pulled out his mirror by its handle. "Here! Catch!"
Zack threw the tactical mirror across the hallway. As it flew over towards Tails though, the handle was cut off, leaving only the mirror itself. He dived forward to catch the mirror before it hit the ground. If it broke, they were dead.
Fortunately, Tails caught it easily, right before it hit the floor. Now all he had to do was catch the laser in the mirror. Then, he realized how dangerous this plan was. He'd have to hold the mirror in his hand while he did this. That meant that if he were even slightly off in intercepting the beam, the laser could slash through his hand or his arm, and cut it off as easily as if it were made of butter.
However, he shrugged off the worries a second later.
Well we'll all die if I don't do it anyway. Best just do it now, before someone else dies.
Holding out the mirror, Tails prepared for the next beam to appear. When the fox saw another bright flash of light appear from the wall, he held out the mirror. Lucky for him though, this time the beam focused towards him. The laser struck against the mirror, and Tails felt himself being pushed back a bit. He closed his eyes reflexively in fear. However, as he opened them, he realized his plan was working. The laser was reflecting off of the mirror and hitting one of the mirror walls.
Grinning, Tails repositioned himself and the mirror very carefully, being careful not to lose the beam. He focused the reflection towards the door Zack was standing next to, and the beam began to eat into the metal almost instantly. That place where it hit the door glowed bright red, then orange, and then white as the metal started to liquefy. He then guided the beam so that it made a hole in the door. The fox successfully managed to make a round circle in the door. The circle then toppled out into the corridor, leaving an exit. It was big enough for an adult to easily slip through.
"Good work Tails!" Zack yelled to him.
Tails smiled.
"Yeah! Great job!" Sonic said too. "Now let's hurry up and get out of here!"
Zack dived through the hole as fast as he could, being careful not to burn himself on the hot metal. The other cops then started running for the hole as well, but another one of them was cut down as the laser continued to seek targets. It was amazing how fast the other five cops managed to get through. Sonic jumped through as well, slipping through easily due to his small size.
Tails was about to go, when he realized he hadn't seen Dr. Skeleck go through the hole yet. He turned around to spot the doctor still cowering in the corner at the other end of the hall. Without thinking, Tails ran back, and shook Dr. Skeleck as hard as he could, trying to make him get up.
"Come on Mr. Skeleck! We gotta get out of here or we're gonna die!"
Dr. Skeleck looked up, and then he ducked again as a laser sliced across where his head was a second ago. That got him up and going, as he rapidly jumped to his feet. The two of them dashed side by side down the hallway, the laser beams trying to cut them down. Sonic and the others were on the other side of the hole in the door, yelling at them to hurry up.
"Come on! Move it!" Sonic yelled.
"Hurry or you'll be chopped to bits!" Zack screamed.
When they reached the door, Tails turned to the bat.
"You go first!" he shouted.
Skeleck didn't need to be told twice as he leaped through the hole. Tails quickly followed after him, wincing as his skin brushed across the cooling but still quite hot metal. However, within a moment he was safe on the other side. A hand grabbed him and helped pick him up. He saw that it was Sonic.
"Thanks..." Tails said.
"Anytime Tails," Sonic said back.
Someone else gave him a pat on the back, and the fox turned around to see Skeleck.
"Thank you so much. I would have died if it weren't for you. I owe you my life."
Tails smiled, but then it faded away into sadness. He looked back at the hole in the door they'd just come through. The place was littered with the pieces of dead cops all over the place. Many of them had been slashed in half or had their heads taken off. Red blood pooled all over the reflective mirrors. Zack was looking through the hole too.
"May their sacrifices not be in vain," the bobcat said. He then turned to address the group. "Come on…we gotta save the prisoners!"
"But Robotnik must know we're here now..." one of the surviving cops said.
"Yeah? Well our only escape route is through there," Zack said as he pointed at the hallway they'd just gone through. "I'm sure you don't wanna go in there again. Our only choice to stay alive anyway is to keep heading forward and see if we can find an alternate way out of the base. So let's go on then."
They turned down the next corridor, which was much shorter. It ended with a less secure door marked "Main Prison Complex". Apparently, that laser hallway was supposed to be the only defense.
"Why didn't you tell us about the laser hall?" Zack asked Skeleck.
"Maybe because that's the first time I've seen it turned on," the doctor retorted. "They must only power it up for intruders."
"I hope that's the last time we have to deal with one of those. It killed four of my men. I'll tell you, I'd love to go after Robotnik right now if we weren't so underpowered right now."
"I think I'd be right behind you Zack in taking on Robotnik, actually."
"What the--! Where did that come from? I thought you never wanted to come to this place."
"After seeing Robotnik's laser invention back there kill four of your men, I realize I want to stop him too. He shouldn't be able to thoughtlessly kill people that quickly. I mean, I saw some of my doctor friends die firsthand too, but that only encouraged me to run farther away. This time though, I want to help stop him. I never want to have to see people die in war like that again."
Zack smiled and let out a laugh.
"It would be good having you behind me; although you might wanna get some training first. You don't have what it takes yet for doing things like this."
"I can learn...I had to learn really hard to get through medical school after all to get my job. I can do it again."
"Being a doctor earns you a lot of money, like over 100,000 demens a year right? Meanwhile cops only earn chump change compared to that. You sure you'd wanna give up your money for something like what we're doing now?"
"Sure…why not? I've got enough money from my job already to last me the rest of my life."
Finally, they arrived at the door.
"Well," Zack said. "Let's see how many Robo's got in here..."
As the door opened, bright light spilled into the room they were in. Instead of another hallway though, this time large, open chamber greeted them, with the ceiling was six stories overhead. Meanwhile, with the exception of the front area of the room, the side walls were lined with cell after cell of sleeping prisoners. Each small cell occupied no less than ten people. Most had twenty. There would have to be thousands of prisoners in this place. Even so, little thought appeared to have been given to the creature comforts of these people.
They all slept on the floor, without mats or any sort of bedding. It also appeared they were dressed in whatever they happened to be wearing when they were captured. Some wore casual street wear, while others had on wearing expensive suits. Still others turned up with fast food employee uniforms, and even people in swimming suits could be spotted too. It was like a cross section of Freedomian society.
Twenty uncovered shower stalls and about twenty uncovered toilets were lined up across the back wall. These could never keep up with the demand from amount of people in this room. Catwalks serviced the upper cells, but they looked like they'd fall down at any moment with how sloppily constructed they were. Lots of various types of stains covered the walls, and puddles of water collected on the floor from the leaky ceiling. Nearly every surface of the room was either harsh metal, or rough concrete.
"My God..." Dr. Skeleck said, breaking the silence. "What a wretched, unsanitary place to have been thrown into."
"And even after you get out of here," Zack said, joining in. "All you have to look forward to is being a mindless robotic slave."
"Enough talking..." Sonic said. "What do you say we just free them already and get them out of here?"
"Heh, the kid's right," Zack said, walking over to the nearest cell. "We didn't come here to just look around."
"I gotta wonder though..." Dr. Skeleck said. "Now that we've got all the prisoners, how are we going to get all of them out of the base?"
"I dunno...that's a good question... I guess we could also go looking for an armory or something... We could get some of these guys equipped with guns so they could help us fight our way out."
Meanwhile, all of the talking had awoken some of the prisoners in the room. Yawns rang out across the room, as faces appeared at the bars to look at the newcomers. When they saw Zack and the other cops, these prisoners in turn started waking up the other prisoners:
"Hey kids! Wake up! The rescuers are here at last!"
"Mom, Dad! Get up! We're about to be set free!"
"Come on man, wake up! You don't wanna get left behind do you?"
As more people started waking up, they started screaming at Zack and his gang for help:
"Please! Open up our cell! We've been locked up in here for days!"
"Help us goddammit, before more of us get carted off to the roboticizer!"
"Get us outta here! They could come back any time!"
Soon, the yelling reached headache-inducing levels, from all the people simultaneously screaming for help. If Robotnik hadn't known they were in here before, he would now. Zack quickly barked out orders.
"All right men... It looks like these cells are just closed with nothing but simple barred doors and metal padlocks. We can probably shoot off the locks and such with our guns, so there's no need to go looking for keys. Just be careful that the bullets don't ricochet and hit somebody. Now, let's go get to work!"
Two of the officers took one side of the room, while the other two officers took the other side. Very soon, gunshots started ringing out, followed by the jangling of metal as locks were shot off of the cell doors. People started streaming out of the cells and into the center area. Luckily for the officers, they had the common sense to stay put and not just run off into the base. That would get them killed very quickly. Most were probably too afraid to go off on their own, and looked like they wanted instructions first.
"Everything's going good so far!" Tails said.
"Sure is Tails!" Sonic said back.
"This is only the easy part," Zack said in a stern voice. "I just don't see how we can get all of these people out of the base. There's too many. Even if we arm them, they'd have to walk out. Our truck can't seat near enough people. We didn't count on this many—URGH!"
Zack suddenly screamed out in pain as he fell to his knees. Sonic turned to look at Zack as he started screaming. He appeared to be gasping for breath. Upon closer inspection, Sonic could see a small bloody hole in the back of his neck. Blood spilled out of it, trickling down his uniform and pattering on the floor.
Seeing that the wound was in his back, Sonic instinctively looked at the space behind Zack. There was an odd whispering noise, and he could see blood dripping off of a needle hovering in midair.
In midair? How is that possible?
"Aaaaaaah!" Dr. Skeleck screamed. "It's that thing that captured me at my house! It's invisible!"