Sighing slightly Alice was motioned for 8 to stay close as they continued on, leaving her box of half eaten mash laying on the ground.

.

.

CHAPTER 2

.

.

Alice shook her head chuckling slightly. It wasn't surprising she had missed 8's lab during her early exploration. Located near the stealth testing labs the harmonics lab was well hidden amongst the large concrete disruption towers that stuck u out of the earth. As they walked Alice could feel her skin prickling. When she'd been here before she'd been swarmed several times by nightstalkers. Back then she had been able to climb up one of the shorter towers and take shots from there. However with 8 tagging along that option was not going to work. So now she was on edge every sound a possible nightstalker ambush, every shadow a lobotomite laying in wait. The door to the lab wasn't hidden, but instead buried so that only the top 1/4th of the door was visible.

.

.

Looking around Alice began to think. She could dig the door out by hand. But that would take time and she wouldn't be able to protect 8 correctly. Grinning slightly as unslung her backpack and began digging through the compartments. As she did so 8 spoke. "%*.* !# %&^ .,;`~-" Alice grinned again as she found what she was looking for. Pulling the object out, Alice spoke. "I can't spend all day digging out the door. It would take to long, and we might get ambushed. So this will do the digging for us." Walking up to the door, Alice bend down and began using her hand to dig a small hole for her to place the object in. as the hole reached arms length in depth, Alice stopped and pulled out a small spool of wire, from her pack. Twisting the wire around the firing pin of the holy grenade Alice took care to ensure the wire had enough slack before dropping the grenade down into the hole. Covering the hole back up Alice was careful to not tug too much on the wire as she unspun it, and led it to a small hill a few yards away.

.

.

Crouching down behind the hill Alice made sure 8 was safely next to her before acting. Closing her eyes, and adjusting her goggles before ducking down and sharply pulling the wire. For a split second everything was perfectly still. Nothing moved, nothing made any sound, nothing happened. Then as though the world was ending again the ground shook violently. Instantly Alice's view was instantly full of dust and flying debris. And while most of the debris didn't reach them the bits that did pelted the dirt hill they hid behind like small bullets. As the dust began to clear Alice coughed slightly and stood up, her hands clutching her shotgun. They had made a lot of noise, and it was more than likely that they had attracted the attention of anything nearby. Jerking her head Alice motioned for 8 to move in behind her.

.

.

Moving through the dust cloud Alice smiled as she found that her plan had worked. The door to the lab was twisted and bent and it took only a few hits from the butt of her shotgun to make the door completely cave in and allow them to enter the lab. But it was here that Alice faltered. Here standing in front of the door Alice froze as she felt her heart rate begin to increase.

.

.

8'S POV

.

.

I'm continuously surprised by Alice's ingenuity. As smart as I am I never would have thought to use an explosive to uncover and open the door to my lab. As I follow her through the dust cloud I stick close to her. While the dust doesn't prevent my monitors from seeing what's going on, it does play hell with my sensors. It makes everything foggy and unclear. But as we near the door Alice stops. At first I'm not sure why. Has she seen a hostile creature? Has she been injured in the blast. But my question is answer by my audio scanners which pick up on her heart rate increasing. It's odd, but dala reported that Alice took only her heart back once she was able to. She allowed her brain and spine to stay separate but not her heart. Now her heart rate is increasing, and becoming very strong. Instantly my processors begin running through my archive, looking for a match or a similarity to the sound that Alice's heart is making. While at the same time my scanners detect the human act of breathing has increased as well.

.

.

To a human it would be a fraction of a second. But to me it's millions of inquiries later that my processors find a sound file with a 97% audio match to Alice's heartbeat. Opening the file I ignore the file itself and instead look at its properties, when and where it was taken, and what was happening while it was recorded.

.

'audio file 508276,

accelerated heartbeat cause by minor claustrophobia attack.

subject: 11 year old girl.'

.

Another string of inquiries later and the definition of claustrophobia pops up.

.

'claustrophobia: the fear of having no escape and being closed in small spaces, rooms or hallways.'

.

Instantly I process what is happening. Alice has this claustrophobia problem. She's afraid of enclosed spaces, and the hallways of my lab are certainly enclosed. I'm about to speak when I notice she's fiddling with the small wrist computer she calls a pip-boy. After a few seconds, soft music begins to play. My scanners instantly recognize it as song number 7 of the pre-static playlist created to ease and remove tension for the scientists and staff here at big mountain.

.

.

ALICE'S POV

.

.

Stepping through the door Alice felt herself shudder as her claustrophobia took hold of her. She wasn't paralyzed, thank god. No instead her breathing became shorter, as though trying to make the oxygen in the lab last longer. Stepping passed the twisted door, Alice led 8 into the lab. Unlike most of the other labs here in the big empty, this one still seems to be working for the most part. As 8 enters the lab lights flicker on illuminating the lab. We're in some kind of greeting room. Across from me a desk sits, an old computer terminal sits on it. The screen is cracked but as I sit in the ancient chair and click one of the buttons the terminal whirrs and flickers to life. I breathe in a small sigh or release as I discover it's not locked and I won't have to go through the annoying process of figuring out the password.

.

.

Most of the entries are pointless, internal memos, personal emails. Although I do find an amusing email about how one of the secretaries is sleeping with one of the scientists just to get a raise. Clicking off the computer Alice stood up and spoke. "ok. Before we go any deeper into the lab I have something to ask you. Is there anything in this lab that I need to know about? Any kind of robots, or hostile experiments, or…anything?" "&*" Alice nodded, and got up from the desk. But before following 8 down the hallway Alice stopped just long enough to plant a fragmine in front of the newly blasted open door. Now if anything or anyone tried to follow them the mine would go off, hopefully killing the pursuer but defiantly alert them to the fact they were being followed. Walking through the hallways Alice could feel herself on edge. The hallways were well lit but narrow. If it came down to a fire fight it would be about who could hit more targets faster. With that in mind as they walked Alice set about switching out the ammo from her shotgun from the red shelled slug rounds, to the blue shelled coinshot rounds.

.

.

Smiling Alice chuckled slightly as they walked. It was no secret she had NO love for the legion. In fact she would almost go out of her way to ensure trouble for the legion. She attacked supply trains, poisoned water supplies, and even on occasion would camp out on a mountain and sniper legionaries from a distance. Her development of the special coinshot rounds had been especially satisfying for her. as a tribal her tribes customs came before modern tradition. And in her tribe killing an enemy with something they valued was one of the ultimate ways to desecrate their souls. So now every legion coin she had would have it's edges filed down to a razor's edge, so now she could kill a legionary with his own money. But she'd also learned that coinshot rounds did a very wide range of damage. So they were perfect for confined spaces like these hallways. With coinshot she could send out a wave of razors that would slice through flesh, muscles, and bones, with ease. Of course if they encountered robots, they would have a bit of trouble, coinshot was strong, but not strong enough to do major damage to metal.

.

.

Still on edge Alice followed 8 down the hallway turning right into a small room and coming to a stop while 8 floated along the back wall. Even as she scanned the room she could tell 8 was manipulating the computers. as he floated along the computers around him would flicker and come to life for a brief moment before dying. "so what exactly are we looking for?" in response Alice watched as 8 floated over to an old prewar projector, and after hovering around it for several moments made the projector flicker and sputter to life. Moving over to the projector Alice watched as a balding man with glasses in his mid 30s walked up to the camera. Alice winced slightly as the man spoke. The sound was horribly degraded, at some points the speaking began very high pitched and at other times it slowed down so much it was almost imposible to tell what he was saying.

.

.

"is it on? Isn't this great? We have the most advance tech in the country here but we don't have a camera that can tell us when it's on. Anyways…." Alice watched as the man flipped through a few pages on a clipboard he held. "ah yes. experiment number 1012712270. I'd residing researched doctor Robert Parsons. Today we'll be testing my latest little toy." Parsons turned he revelived a small table that had been standing behind him. on the table was a devise that looked very similar to a LAER rifle. "This is the harmonic cannon or as some have taken to calling it, he harmo-cannon. It similar to my sonic emitter the rifle uses much more powerful sonic generators as well as using a small laser to ensure the sound strikes what it is aimed at. Or to be more specific." parsons gestured to something off screen quieting the cameraman to turn the camera. Nothing happened. Alice watched as again parsons gestured to something off camera. When again nothing happened. parsons sighed. "TOM! WAKE UP!"

.

.

off camera there was the sounds of someone waking up. "hu? Wha's goin on?" parsons sighed. "tom turn the camera please." "sorry doc, had a long night. Me and doctor Mandala-" but parsons raised his hand. "I don't care what you and dala were up to last night. Please just turn the camera." Alice chuckled as the camera turned, showing a sentry bot sitting in a cleared away area. After a moment parsons began to speak again. "this sentry bot has not been modified. It is for all intents and purposes, the exact same to any other sentry bot here at big mountain. Now if my calculations are correct when struck with my harmonic cannon the bot shall be rendered in operable due to the sonic vibrations caused by my invention. And since this is my invention I'll be firing it first. Wish me luck."

.

.

Alice smiled. the way the think tank talked luck didn't seem to factor in to science. alice watched as the parsons paused to exchange his glasses for a set of safety goggles before walking over to a large painted X on the ground. Taking aim parsons was silent for a moment. When he pulled the trigger the camera turned just in time to see the beam of light strick the sentry bot which began to shake and smoke. As it did so parsons spoke. "did you see that! The sound waves were so compressed they became light waves! I never exp-" but parsons was cut off by a defining explosion as the sentry bot exploded sending sharpness and flames everywhere. "jesus doc! Are you trying to kill us!" parsons straightened his goggles. "no tom. No I wasn't. and now I'm no-" but as the projected died, leaving Alice and 8 back in reality. Alice nodded. "so you're looking for this harmo-cannon thing right?" 8's monitors nodded. Alice sighed and popped her neck before speaking. "well then we had better get going."

.

.

8'S POV

.

.

my processors hum with joy as we move through my old labs. It looks very similar to how I remember it. Sure the paint is peeling, and A LOT of the metal was or is rusted. But for the most part everything is how I left it. I feel bad about lying to Alice. But I couldn't be sure how she would react if she knew what I was really here for. As we move through the lab I wonder, is what I'm looking for even still there?

AN: WELL CHAPTER 2 DONE.

.

HOPING FOR REVIEWS.