Author's notes - Sorry about the delay, I was unexpectedly away from my computer last night. Anyway, we're back on track! Wow, Whitebeard, hey! Good to see you again :). ChibiDawn, I guess great minds think alike! :) Given Scott's more innocent worldview, I thought it'd be really interesting to look through his eyes and hear first-hand what it's like for these kids, dealing with a constant stream of never-ending disasters. Look back to Brendan's first words to Zordon when they arrive in the Command Centre. "What are we killing today?" Rangers have knowledge and skills that teenagers just should not have. And yeah, I think that's a really interesting thing to explore. Every person in a stressful job has to learn how to cope when things get tough, and superheroes wouldn't be any different. Anyway, into chapter four! Where things get remarkably worse... :)
Chapter Four
With the prospect of finally getting some answers, or at the very least finding somebody we could ask, the three of us bounded up ten flights of stairs towards the central control room. At every floor we passed, Kimberly shouted, "Hello!" as we raced around the corner, but the tower seemed to be as empty as the rest of the city. Reaching the top floor, Kimberly stepped onto the landing, but as Brendan and I followed, the Pink Ranger skidded to a sudden stop.
"Uh, guys?" she began, and I heard a tone in her voice I didn't like. "I've found an answer, but it's not one you're going to like."
Brendan and I glanced worriedly to each other and reached the top floor with a burst of energy, following Kim through a pair of heavily-armoured doors.
"Damn it," I said.
This had gotten a thousand times worse.
The room was trashed. The windows and walls were still in one piece, but nothing else was. Rows upon rows of computer monitors had been smashed to pieces. Chairs were on their side, tables and desks had been flipped over, and shattered pieces of wreckage littered the carpet from one side of the room to the other. Lights had fallen from their fittings along the roof and hung at weird angles, while support posts holding up the ceiling had been violently ripped down. The destruction was almost total. My heart sank.
"What the hell happened here?" I asked.
"Look at this mess," Brendan murmured, gazing around the room in disbelief. "What did this?"
"Not what," Kimberly replied. "Who."
"Kim's right," I said. "If this is the only room that's been destroyed in the whole city? This wasn't an accident. This was sabotage."
"Look at the scorch marks on the walls," Kim said, and tapped her blade blaster. "It looks exactly like what happens when we shoot at things."
Brendan pointed to a giant metal girder that had been rammed through a map of the city hanging on the wall. "And I doubt that was the wind," he said.
"So this wasn't an accident," I said. "Whatever happened to the people of Lumelian, they aren't missing."
"They were kidnapped," Kim finished.
"And whoever did it smashed up the control room to cover their tracks," I added.
"So what do we do now?" Brendan asked. "How do we even contact Zordon and Alpha? We're right back to square one."
We split up to explore the room, our boots crunching the charred wreckage underfoot. My mind was racing through a hundred different scenarios, each one worse than the one before. But there was something strange about this whole case. I'd watched the Senior Rangers for two and a half years now. There was something they always did when they were confronted by a particularly thorny mystery, and it was something we needed to do right now.
Ask the big question first.
"So here's the thing. How do you kidnap five hundred people in one go?" I began. "Lumelian's a big place. Even if you went room-to-room, someone would've raised the alarm or gotten away to warn everyone else."
Brendan turned to me. "Are you even sure they're still alive?" he asked.
I met his gaze and couldn't reply for a second, until I realised the simple truth. "They have to be," I said. "If there had been a violent attack on the city, where's the damage? And if anything had happened, where are the bodies? Whoever attacked the city could've easily just killed everybody, but they didn't. That means they didn't want to."
"So they were taken for a reason?" Kim asked.
"Wherever they are, they're still alive," I said. "I'm sure of it. That might not be a good thing in the long run."
"But it's better than the alternative," said Brendan. "What about a mass teleport? We disappear from locked rooms all the time."
"The city's shielded, remember?" Kim asked.
"Not to mention, even the computers in the Command Centre would have trouble teleporting five hundred people at once," I said. "And that would take so much energy that Zordon and Alpha would've spotted it anyway."
Spotting a row of lockers against the far wall, Brendan made his way over, finding them locked shut with solid padlocks. They may have been strong, but they were no match for augmented Ranger strength, and he tore the first door open, revealing a cupboard filled with brooms and cleaning supplies.
"Brendan, what are you doing?" I asked.
He glanced over his shoulder as he tried the next locker, but it was full of stationary supplies. "What do people do everywhere in case something breaks?" he asked. The third door was blocked by an overturned table, but he quickly threw it aside. "They keep spares," and he pulled open the third door.
Staring back at us was a pile of undamaged computer equipment.
I smiled under my helmet. "Okay, we can rig something up that works," I said. "We need to get everything out of there so we can see what we're dealing with."
Kim dashed across the room to help Brendan, while I swept my gaze around the room with fresh eyes. Most of the computer cases had been shattered, but on the far side of the room, there was one table still standing, and the computer looked like it had suffered slightly less damage than most of the others. I raced over. The cables from the back of the machine led to a row of connection ports along the floor. The wires were torn and broken, but thanks to their colours, I could see where everything was supposed to connect. And underneath the machine were the same hexagonal indentations I'd seen on the computer in the entry hall.
Kimberly and Brendan dragged everything from the storage cupboard over towards me, and Kim swept the debris from the table onto the floor.
"It's not like I'm making a bigger mess," she said. "Can you get this switched on?"
"I'm wearing the blue suit, aren't I?" I asked. "I'll figure something out."
The computer was a dusty, older version of the cases lying in pieces around us, but the connection ports along the outside looked to be the same. Sorting the bundle of cables that Brendan dropped on the floor, I found the cables I needed and plugged the computer into one of the undamaged ports along the floor. Setting the transmitter next to the machine, I connected the two and held my breath, hoping I was right. Then, the transmitter began lighting up, and I let out a sigh of relief. It'd worked.
Brendan clapped me on the shoulder. "Dude, that was awesome," he said.
"Zordon, you there?" Kim asked, raising her communicator.
"Yes Rangers, we're here," came the reply. I glanced worriedly to my team-mates. Zordon's voice was so faint that even with our Ranger senses, we could barely hear him.
"Bad news," Kim continued. "We found the control room but it's been trashed. Something destroyed it."
"Right now we're thinking that somebody actually attacked the city," I added. "But there's no damage to any of the buildings aside from here, and we still haven't found any sign of the city's residents."
"What about the transmitter?" Brendan asked. "Can you switch the city back on? Get into their system and find the security footage?"
"There's good news on that front," our mentor replied. "From the data we're receiving, Rangers, the plan worked. Alpha's just getting us into Lumelian's computer network now. It might take a few minutes, but we're almost out of range. We'll work as fast as we can."
"Finally, some answers," Kimberly said. "Meanwhile, if that doesn't work, our only option is a manual search of every building."
"And here's a thought," I began. "What if whoever did this is still here?"
Across the room, Brendan wandered over to the window overlooking the city below. Sweeping his gaze across the landscape, his eyes drifted to the hotel that we'd passed before, and he remembered the water fountain in the lobby. His eyes went wide.
"I've got it!" he shouted, and spun back to face us. "The Joker!"
"Uh, Brendan? He usually attacks Gotham City," I said. "And I don't think kidnapping five hundred people is really his style."
"No, not that," Brendan said. "Look, I was watching a cartoon the other day, and the Joker planned to dump toxic waste into Gotham City's dam so that he'd poison the whole city at once. Think about it. Even if you don't like your dinner, everyone drinks water, right? Whoever our villain is, what if they did something to the city's water supply?"
I turned to Kim. "Brendan, that's brilliant," I said.
The Pink Ranger held up a hand. "Wait a second though," she said. "Not everyone drinks water at the same rate. People would've gotten sick at different times. It wouldn't have been enough to take out five hundred people in seconds."
"Maybe not, but it's the right idea," I said, and pointed to an air vent in the ceiling. "What about the air? If there was something in the air, it would've happened really quickly, and we wouldn't have noticed thanks to our helmets," and I raised my communicator. "Alpha, now that we're inside, is it possible to scan the atmosphere in here?"
"Possibly, just give me a minute," Alpha replied, then spoke again a few seconds later. "The computer's picking up unidentified particles in trace amounts. It wouldn't be enough to hurt anyone, but a concentrated dose delivered to the entire population at once? That would do it."
"Okay, so next question," I said. "How do you get five hundred people in the one room to knock them all out in one go?" I looked across the room to the tattered map of the city. Glancing around the diagram, an idea drifted to the surface. "You force them to. Alpha, where are you on accessing the city's computer network?"
"We're about seventy-five percent through the process," Alpha replied.
"What are you thinking?" Kim asked.
I gestured to the window. "The city's built in such a hostile location that I doubt it's going to have just a single control station for emergencies and disasters."
"Yeah," Brendan agreed. "What if something happened to the control tower?"
"Scott you're right!" Alpha replied. His voice was so faint, we had to strain to hear him. "According to the schematics, there's a secondary disaster control room, located on sub-level two in building four. The thin building with the flat roof."
Kim pointed out the window. "That's the one down there!" she said.
"Let's go," I said.
Leaving the transmitter in the control room, we raced out to the stairs.
"How is this gonna help us find the missing people?" Brendan asked.
We reached the ground floor. "Remember last week at school?" I began. "For the start of the semester, they had a fire drill. We had to evacuate all the classrooms and meet down on the sports oval."
"Faking an emergency would be a great way to move people around the city," Kim nodded.
"And if we know where they went, we might be able to follow them," I finished.
Reaching building four, we found a wide stairwell and followed it to the second basement. Making our way down a dimly-lit corridor, we stepped into a large room at the edge of the building. On one side of us was a wall of computer monitors, while on the other side were lockers and work benches. One of the lockers was hanging open, with breathing apparatus and what looked like one of those special radiation-proof suits hanging inside. Facing us across the room, though, were large crates stacked haphazardly against the wall, and they looked out of place against the ordered neatness of the rest of the space.
Kim raised her communicator. "Alpha, we're here," she said. "How'd you go?"
"Access granted! We're in!" Alpha's voice crackled through. But he sounded faint and crackly. We were losing the Command Centre.
"We're just attempting to reboot the city's systems," Zordon said. "This might take a few minutes."
"It's time we don't have," I said. "Can you start with the programs that deal with disaster protocols and emergencies?" Outside, I saw the lights in the hallway switching back on. I nodded to myself. Zordon and Alpha had somehow worked a minor miracle and given us our first real break. "Can you show us a map of the city?"
"You got it," Alpha replied.
The three of us turned to the wall of screens, but censors on the control panel lit up and a holographic map of Lumelian flashed to life before us. The three of us quickly jumped out of the way.
"Wow, wasn't expecting that," Brendan said.
"Were the fire alarms triggered recently?" I asked.
"Affirmative," Alpha replied.
Kim turned to me. "Looks like you were right."
"Can you replay what order the alarms were triggered in?" Brendan asked.
"But slowly," I added, "so that we can see where the citizens were directed."
As we watched, the top floors of the tallest buildings glowed red, then ten seconds later, the outer-most buildings began glowing the same colour. Then the lower floors glowed, then the floors below them. At ground level, the glow began spreading from the furthest buildings, closer and closer towards the centre of the city.
"Look at that," Brendan said softly.
"The people were evacuating to escape a fire, but they being herded like cattle," Kim said. "With all the chaos from the false emergency, nobody would've figured out what was really going on."
"But where did they go?" Brendan asked.
Kimberly watched as the buildings continued turning red. "I'm not sure, it hasn't gotten to the end yet."
I looked back to the crates across the room. "It means that whoever kidnapped the city's population had access to the computer system," I said. "That would require some pretty advanced tech."
"The city's protected though," Kimberly said.
"But we got in," I said. Something wasn't right here. I crossed the room towards the crates. "I mean, Lumelian's so well protected that the only way to do that," and I shoved the crates across the floor with a metallic squeal, "would be to have access to this room. Oh no."
Kim and Brendan turned to see what I'd found. "Wait, is that…?" began Brendan.
Facing us was a hole in the wall that led to a dark tunnel. Something had carved or melted its way through the thick metal foundations and into the city itself, blocking the gap with the heavy crates and clearly not expecting someone with super-strength to investigate. I peered closer. The tunnel sloped into the rock away from the building. The light only lit up the tunnel for a few metres, and beyond that was pitch darkness. The tunnel was about two metres high and wide enough for a person to travel comfortably, about the size of the upstairs hallway in my house.
"Whoever we're dealing with," I began, "this is how they got in to trigger the emergency system."
"Be careful," Kimberly said. "We don't know who made that."
"Do you think the people are down there?" Brendan asked.
"I can't hear them," I said, then held still. "I can hear something though. It's like a, it almost sounds like … buzzing."
Which is when a fourth voice echoed into the room.
"The arrogance of you humanszzz."
I spun around at the buzzing voice, while Kimberly and Brendan were back-to-back in a second. Brendan raised his hands and his twin Power Sai formed in a flash of aqua light.
"Who are you?" Kim asked.
Whoever was speaking took no notice. "You show up, presszzz a few buttonszzz and assume you're in control." The voice was strange, and it seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. It was scratchy, like listening to Rita at full volume, but it also had a weird metallic clang to it, as if a swarm of locusts was talking with Alpha's voice.
"But I can szzzee you. You are not the humanszzz we expected, but humanszzz nonethelesszzz. Great clumsy thingszzz. You swat aside anything szzzmaller than yourselveszzz without a second thought. Did you know there are insectszzz on every planet in the galaxy where there are people? Trillionszzz and trillionszzz of them. If we ever acted as one, the human race would be over in a second! And then we would take our rightful place as rulerszzz of the galaxy!"
"Who is 'we'?" Kim asked. "Who are you talking about? And where are those people you took?"
"Come and get them," the voice replied.
I turned to the cave. "They must be down there!" I shouted. "C'mon!" I charged into the tunnel, reaching for my blade blaster as I ran.
"Scott, no!" Kim shouted. "It could be a…!"
She hadn't even finished the sentence when the first bomb triggered. It went off like an Ultrazord blast, lifting me off my feet and slamming me into the cave wall. I crashed to the ground, dazed but unhurt, when the tunnel shook with a second explosion, rapidly followed by a third and fourth. In the control room, Kim and Brendan were thrown back through the wall, destroying the computers in a blaze of fire before the roof caved in around them. Back in the cave, I could only watch helplessly as the cavern collapsed around me. The floor cracked and gave way, and with a great roar of broken rock, I was swallowed up by the darkness in an avalanche of stone.
To be continued.