A/N: And here I am with Chapter 12! Thank you to everyone who reviewed last chapter! A special thank you (even if he told me I don't need to say it every chapter) to TheFierceDeityMask for proof reading this chapter! Enjoy!
The four friends carefully made their way down a long hallway lined with heavy metal doors. There were many labels and posters on the wall warning of toxic or flammable chemicals or to beware of electrocution. They had destroyed a few small groups of Helicopter Drones, but had seen no other humans, so far.
Natalie looked around with a small frown, "Where are all the workers? We should have seen someone by now, right?"
Lance glanced back over his shoulder, "They're probably in hiding and hoping their robots will take care of us. Factories like this are usually covers for secret and illegal activities." He gestured to a nearby hazardous chemicals warning, "Judging by some of the chemicals listed on these warning posters, they're doing some dangerous stuff."
"Like what?" Anna asked.
Lance shrugged and turned around again, "The development of high-tech weaponry. There are a few that could be used for bio-weapons, too."
Matt grinned, "Wandering through here reminds me of when Natz and I were working to take you down, Lance."
Natalie smiled, "You're right. I'm glad he's on our side, now." She nudged Matt's shoulder, "I don't want to have to fight another one of his fancy tanks."
Matt tried to cover his laughter with a cough as Lance sent an irritated glare back at them. Clearing his throat the swordsman asked, "And speaking of dangerous, high-tech weaponry, is your satellite laser up and running still?"
Anna's eyes widened and she stared at Lance, "You have a satellite laser?!" At his nod her jaw dropped, "How in the world did you get that?"
"Hacked it during my attempt to take over the world," Lance said with a nonchalant shrug. "I changed all the access codes, too, so no one else can use it. I don't know whose it was originally, but the logs said nobody had used it in the several years prior to my hacking it. I haven't fired it since we fought Akron, though; we haven't come across anything needing a blast that strong."
The ranger turned her stare on Matt and Natalie, "And you guys beat a guy with a giant space laser?" The two nodded with Natalie muttering something about barrier magic and Anna shook her head in disbelief, "He actually used it on you and you're still standing? That settles it: you three aren't human."
Natalie's laughter was short-lived as Lance stopped so suddenly that Matt walked into his back sending the gunner stumbling forward one more step. He let out a hiss and jumped back again, knocking Matt off balance. Anna steadied the flailing swordsman with a hand on his back.
"What's wrong, Lance?" the mage asked with a frown.
"Spikes," was his one word answer as he gestured at the floor.
The rest of the group stepped up next to him and looked down at the steel spines jutting out of the ground. The obstacle stretched out to cover the last bit of hallway before the door.
Lance grunted, "They stretch too far to jump over and they're too close together to step between."
Ann placed one foot on top of a spike and carefully pressed down before wincing and pulling her foot back, "Ow! It went straight through my boot!" She sat back on the cold floor and pulled out her ocarina to heal her foot. Once that was done, she looked up at the others, "There's no way past them!"
Natalie looked around and spotted a lever recessed in the wall a little ways back, "Hey there's a switch here!" She reached out a hand and pulled down on the lever. The spikes lowered into small holes in the ground and stayed down as Anna cautiously stepped forward again.
"Good work, Natz," Matt grinned. A whirring sound came from above his head and he instinctively dove to the side, narrowly avoiding a pair of copper-colored robots dropping out of a hole that had opened in the ceiling. "Not so good work, Natz," Matt joked before slashing at the nearest Copper Fish. His attack left a dent in the robot, but didn't take it down. Instead of being destroyed, a defense mechanism sent a small jolt of electricity through Matt's sword and up his arm. "Hey, not cool!" Matt yelled, strands of his hair sticking out from the charge.
"Thanks for the warning, Matt; I'll be sure to avoid stabbing them," Lance smirked before firing a Double Shot at the damaged bot. The two bullets ripped through the copper plating on the drone and its thrusters detached and flew at Lance's feet before detonating. "Kamikaze-ing after death seems like cheating," grumbled Lance, wincing at the raw skin damaged by the blasts.
"Something tells me that electricity might not be the best way to go on these, Anna," Natalie warned, eyeing Matt shaking his semi-numb hand. "They're hovering, though, so maybe…" A magic wind formed around the mage, tossing her orange hair before being directed in a wave at the remaining bot. The floating drone was sent into the wall, but hovered back into the fray, its plating heavily dented.
The robot focused some electricity into the hole on its front, charging a ball of energy to fire at the party. It never got the chance to fire, though, as a long note echoed out and a small tornado swept the robot back into the wall where it collapsed defeated, its thrusters too badly jammed in place to fire at the party before exploding. Anna lowered her ocarina with a grin, "I'd almost forgotten about my gust spell!" Matt walked over to the two downed machines and began prying steel plates and springs off of them to stuff in his Adventure Pouch.
"I didn't even know you had any spells other than Ivy and Renew," Natalie said. She turned to Lance, "Speaking of, do you need healing from that blast?"
Lance rolled back his singed pant leg revealing the angry red skin beneath, "Eh, it stings, but I'll live. If you don't think you'll need the magic later, then you can heal it now; if not, then it can wait." Before he had even finished speaking a soft white glow around his leg healed the damaged skin. "Thanks, Natz."
"No problem," Natalie said before eying the dismantled robots, "I hope we don't get attacked every time we flip a switch; that would be annoying."
DDDDDD
Four switches later saw Natalie yelling in frustration, "Argh, I am so sick of fighting these Copper and Steel Fish!" Her voice echoed down around the large room the party stood in and a door opened. A man in a lab coat peered around the edge of the door warily before spotting the party. His eyes widened in amazement and he opened the door further, beckoning the adventurers inside.
Natalie, Anna, Matt, and Lance exchanged glances before silently agreeing to follow the worker into the room. After the group walked in, the stranger shut the door and turned to address them, "I didn't think anyone could get in here while the factory was on lock down! How did you four do it?"
Matt chuckled, "Err, we had some help from a two-ton animal, that's how. You all need a new door, by the way."
The man waved the comment aside, "Never mind about the door, there are much bigger problems to worry about."
Lance's eyes narrowed, "Like what?"
"Like our top project suddenly going haywire, or the fact that the entire system is being hacked from an unknown source, or that our useless employees are being useless," the man raved, throwing his hands above his head, "take your pick!"
"All the other stuff aside, what's this top project?" Natalie asked. When the man looked reluctant to tell them about it she added, "Maybe we can stop it for you."
The worker sighed, "The Praetorian. It was the crowning achievement of this factory. It's a large, mobile weapon equipped with the best gear we had ever designed and is strong enough to take out two fully-grown dragons at once. Two days ago, a virus that swept through the core system of the factory, cut off all communication to the outside, and initiated the lockdown sequence so all the doors leading out are locked. At the same time, it powered up and took over the Praetorian and began firing at everything in sight." The worker let out a shuddering breath, "After that, it turned on all of the defense drones and traps installed to stop intruders. Most, maybe all, of our best employees have been killed already; the only ones left either don't know how to work any of the computers with any level of competency or are too lazy to try."
Anna crossed her arms and frowned, "Sounds like quite the mess. These three apparently bashed the front door in, and we've taken care of all the robots and defenses on the way here, so you can leave now." She sighed, "We're actually just passing through and are in a rush, so I doubt we can do anything more to help."
"Just passing through? The only other exit is in the same room as the Praetorian; you'll have to take out the weapon or sneak past it somehow if you want to go out that side," the man said. He fished around in his coat pocket and pulled out an access card, handing it over to Anna, "Here, take this, it will open any of the smaller doors in the factory leading to storage rooms and such. Take anything you want or need; consider it payment for the hassle you'll have to go through to get out."
Anna accepted the card and stuffed it into the pouch containing her ocarina, "Thank you and be careful leaving." As soon as the man slipped out the door, she turned to the other three with a groan, "Ugh, now we have to kill a death mech if we want to leave?"
Natalie sighed, "Just our luck, I suppose. I doubt we'll be able to break down a door in the same room as this Praetorian silently."
"Definitely not," Lance agreed heading back out the door. "Any well designed attack robot will be equipped with motion and audio detection, possibly even radar. We'll have to take it out."
The four friends turned a corner and found themselves facing double doors covered in hazardous chemical signs. A faint stench came from under the doors. Matt pushed one door open to reveal a series of catwalks over a pool of green ooze. An unspeakable and sickening smell washed over the party. Even Lance looked ill as he took the first step onto the catwalk with the other three hesitantly stepping after him; taking as shallow of breaths as possible.
"Ugh, that smell; I think I'm going to be sick," Natalie groaned with her face tinted green.
Anna covered her nose with her sleeve, "A whole pool of toxic waste? Yuck."
"They should just dump all this stuff in the ocean. We'd all be better off. No one likes seagulls anyway," Matt said with his nose scrunched up. Anna elbowed him in the gut. "Hey, it's true!" Matt exclaimed with an arm held protectively against his side.
A purple tentacle shot out of the toxic pool and landed in the middle of the party, separating them into two groups and setting the catwalk shaking. Lance and Anna were on one side, and Matt and Natalie were on the other. A large purple squid hauled itself out of the water onto the metal grating, dripping green ooze. Before it had straightened up, Anna had launched a Spark Arrow. The arrow landed between the squid's eyes and lightning arced across the monster's face, but didn't stick and instead bounced off of the creature's rubbery flesh.
"That is not normal," Anna muttered to Lance.
Lance grunted and fired a Plasma Shot at the monster.
"Hm, to eat or not to eat," Matt mused from the other side of the squid as he attempted to slice off one of the tentacles, only to have his sword also repelled by the monster's skin.
Natalie snorted, "I vote 'not to eat'; it just crawled out of a pool of toxic ooze." A crackle of energy formed around the mage and lightning dropped on the massive squid.
The squid inflated as it sucked in air before blowing it back out again in a smokescreen. Under the cover of the haze, it lashed out with a tentacle, catching Anna in the stomach and throwing her sideways past Lance and into the railing. The archer slumped there winded for a moment before standing back up. Just as she made her feet again, she was knocked back into the rail by Lance being sent careening into her. The two fighters sat there groaning for a moment before Lance stood up and pulled Anna to her feet.
"We need to do something about this smoke," Lance muttered, eyes narrowed as he tried to see what the squid was doing. The smoke was so thick he could hardly see Anna standing at his shoulder. A shout from Matt followed by a metallic thud and a gasping sound from Natalie was heard. Lance suddenly whirled to face Anna, "Your gust spell! Use it to blow away the smoke!"
Anna pulled out her Ocarina with a nod and blew on it. A wind swept through room pushing the smoke aside to reveal Matt leaning on the railing for support and holding his head; a trickle of blood ran down his face from his hairline; more concerning than that, though, was the fact that the two fighters couldn't see Natalie anywhere from where they were standing.
Matt blinked dazedly as the smoke cleared and saw Natalie's Crystal Staff abandoned on the catwalk in front of him. The dizziness Matt suffered suddenly vanished as he snapped his head around searching for the mage. Not seeing Natalie lying anywhere on the metal walkway or, thankfully, floating in the toxic pool below, Matt looked up at the squid. The horrifying sight of Natalie slumped in the squid's grasp met his eyes. A tentacle was wrapped tightly around her waist; pulling the unconscious girl towards the squid's mouth. All other thought shut down for the swordsman. Matt snatched up his sword from where he had dropped it and slammed it into the catwalk sending a tremor through the metal. Distantly, Matt registered Lance and Anna's sudden shouts but was more focused on the sight of Natalie about to be eaten as he channeled as much mana as he possibly could through his Heaven's Gate. Large spires of ice formed along the catwalk from the point of his blade all the way to the Squid. The ice spiked up all around the squid and sliced through the tentacle holding Natalie. Matt lunged forward to catch her as she fell, snagging the girl before she hit a spike of ice. Clutching Natalie close to him, Matt tumbled out of the way of a flailing tentacle and ran back out of range. He set the mage down near the double doors the party had come through before turning back to help Lance and Anna finish the fight. He took two steps before the exhaustion that came with using lots of mana hit him and he slumped to his knees.
Anna swore quietly, staring in amazement at the jagged ice surrounding the squid pining it in place for the moment.
"Be amazed later, Anna, it's using some kind of acid to get out," Lance snapped firing off another Plasma Shot.
The archer shook off her amazement and fired three arrows in rapid succession. She was mildly surprised as a fourth arrow made of pure lighting appeared and also slammed into the squid, curtesy of Thor's Hammer's enchantment. The monster's movements stilled as the electricity temporarily paralyzed it, but didn't kill it. "Damn it, why won't it die?" Anna cursed.
Lance shook his head and swiftly loaded six bullets into his gunblade. He leveled his weapon at the squid and unloaded all of them one after another at the squid's back; his weapon steamed slightly as the last bullet fired. The squid let out a high screech and flopped sideways onto the catwalk, finally dead.
With the majority of its bulk out of the way, Anna and Lance could see Matt kneeling on the ground a short ways away from where Natalie lay unconscious on the floor. Anna wasted no time dashing forward and leaping over one of the massive tentacles barring the way, ran past Matt, and skidded to a halt next to Natalie, pulling out her Ocarina once again. Lance followed close behind her, but stopped next to Matt to help him up. The swordsman blinked at the hand in front of him before taking it and staggering to his feet.
Looking over at the defeated squid, Matt laughed breathlessly. "Calamari for dinner?" he asked Lance, letting the gunner support most of his weight.
Lance snorted, "No thanks; I like my food to be not poisonous. We had enough of that last journey."
Anna was still playing her healing magic for Natalie. The first round of healing didn't wake her, so the archer started up again; a different tune filling her mind and coming out on the instrument. The healing glow was brighter this time and it wasn't long before Natalie's eyes flickered open. The mage inhaled deeply and immediately winced in anticipation of pain that didn't come. "Are you okay, Natz?" Anna asked anxiously as Natalie sat up.
"I'm fine now. I just thought I had a broken rib or two. I guess not since you told me you can't heal broken bones," Natalie assured the worried archer.
Anna smiled, "I think I can heal breaks now, actually. It was a different healing song this time, and you definitely had at least one rib broken."
"Wow, when'd you learn it and why didn't you tell us?" Natalie asked in amazement.
"I learned it about, oh, two minutes ago?" Anna said with a blush, "It just came to me sudd-" The girl broke off and put a hand to her head and moaned, "Oo, I hate that feeling."
Lance, who was still supporting Matt, spoke up suddenly "Think you can make it out of this room? I think I'm going to hurl if we stay around this stench any longer."
Anna nodded and Natalie stood up, grabbing her Crystal Staff from where it had fallen and then helped the archer stand up. The four then slowly made their way through the next set of doors. Lance glanced around the next area checking for any enemies. Seeing nothing he lowered Matt to lean against the wall before standing a little ways away to keep an eye on both hallways for trouble; Natalie helped Anna sit next to the tired swordsman.
"What's wrong with you, Matt? Do you need some healing?" Natalie asked in concern, leaning forward.
Lance was the one who answered, still facing down the hall, "He's not wounded; it's just mana exhaustion."
Anna piped up from where she sat, "You should have seen it, Natz; it was awesome! He practically froze the entire catwalk, along with the squid."
Natalie looked at Matt in surprise, "How'd you do that?"
Matt shrugged, "Dunno. You were about to get eaten by a huge plate of sushi and I just snapped. Don't ask me to do it again, though; I'm beat." Feeling recovered, he hauled himself to his feet and held a hand out to help Anna up.
Natalie went to stand next to Lance and frowned contemplatively at the intersection, "So which way do you think we should go now?"
Matt came up on her other side with an easygoing grin, "I agree. Let's do that."
Lance and Anna, who was now standing next to him, grinned as the mage slapped a hand over her face, "I was asking a questi-" She broke off with a sigh, "Never mind, let's just go left." She turned and started walking down the hallway.
There was an eerie silence as the party trekked deeper into the factory. Computer screens lined the walls here. Most of the screens were black, but a few held blue screens with error messages or had images of broken hearts displayed on them. Anna stopped to look at one that was flashing between a broken heart and a short message that apologized for something and muttered, "Creepy," before hurrying to catch up to where the others were gathered around a large steel door.
Lance was leaning over a terminal. "I think this is the Praetorian's testing room. Let me see that access card the guy gave you," he said holding out his hand. Anna passed it over and the gunner swiped it through a pad on the wall next to the door. There was a quiet beeping noise and a green light lit up over the door before something started grinding behind the wall. The steel doors slid open and a cloud of cold mist billowed out around them.
The four friends readied their weapons and stepped inside. The door slid closed behind them and a whirring sound was heard as the lock reengaged. They stood in a giant circular room lined with computer terminals. A massive opening in the ceiling showed that night had fallen while they had been traveling through the factory. Flood lights mounted around the gap lit the room and revealed a hulking black machine hooked up to the wall on the far side of the room.
The Praetorian was still and silent. Its black metal plating was accented with blood red orbs that doubled as extra defense on the joints. The robotic hand dangled loosely at its side, clutching a long, gleaming sword with a blood-red blade and an obsidian black hilt; a black shield formed the other arm. To the left side of the currently non-operating Praetorian was another set of doors with a heavy seal on them. Matt held a finger to his lips and began stealing around the edge of the room with the rest of the party followed close behind. Lance kept throwing furtive glances at the sleeping weapon; knowing that if it had been equipped with motion or audio detection, like he thought it was, then it was only a matter of time before it activated. His fears were soon founded as, with a strange flickering to static of all the monitors in the room, the red gems on the Praetorian flashed and the robot began hovering with its sword and shield held in front of it.
The robot moved to hover in the center of the room, ready to eliminate the intruders as it had been programmed to do.
A/N: Next up: the Praetorian fight! I've already started writing the fight, but don't expect it for the next few days. I have a bunch of stuff planned that I need to fit together for the upcoming battle. If any of you have something you'd like to see, leave it in a review! See ya!