Chapter 25: The Plunge
The Duel was won, but the Warden refused to give us his Key. Another surprise was in store: from behind us, the former Gatekeepers ran towards the Warden. In the blink of an eye, two had restrained his arms, while the third, the Blue Gatekeeper, threw us the Warden's Master Keycard. From there, the Yellow released her hold on the Warden's arm, placed some liquid on a rag, and then held the rag to the Warden's mouth, with him collapsing soon afterwards.
"Go. We will cover you!" the Blue Gatekeeper spoke.
"Thanks, but why are you helping us?" I had to ask.
"That asshole was keeping all of our rewards for himself!" the Red Gatekeeper shouted. "When we were given this job, we were promised benefits that never came."
"When we saw your band bring down the Overseers," the Yellow continued, "…we also saw the refusal of the Overseers to give way. We just knew that the Warden would refuse to honor his end of the bargain when it came to anything, so we decided he had to suffer, made our way here and here we are."
"Now listen, before he wakes up," the Blue resumed. "The elevator to the Warden's secret room is behind a bookcase, but you need to enter in a code. Try angling the books in this order precisely: Red 4, Cyan 9, Green 3, Purple 6, Blue 1, Yellow 7, White 2, Black 8. If you get the order wrong, the books will reset. Oh, and can you give us some of the wealth you find there?"
Looking around the Warden's office, I saw what the former Blue Gatekeeper was referring to: There was a bookcase with eight shelves, each full with books numbering 1 through 0 on their spinal columns, and being color coded by row, with black, red, purple, blue, cyan, green, yellow and white rows in ascending order of height. I tried the combination suggested by the former Blue Gatekeeper, tilting back the red book with the number 7, then proceeding from there to tilt the others. Eventually, the eight books were tilted, and the bookcase retracted into the wall before opening away from us in much the same way a door would.
"That should lead you to the Warden's secret chamber," Red told us. "We heard rumors about it, and Blue managed to find the code after a bit of digging, but we don't know what treasures he has inside there."
"Oh, I think we know," Carnivore spoke. "We recently discovered that the Void is a space station. This 'secret chamber' is probably the bridge."
"Damn it!" Yellow spat. "I wondered why there was no exit out of this place! Bring it down like a bolt of lightning, will you?"
"We were going to do that anyway," Rebecca told them as the three of us entered the Warden's secret passage. Arriving there, we found an elevator. This must have been what his 'Master Key' was for, so I inserted it into the elevator card slot. Once the elevator opened, we inserted the card into another slot, yet the only other options that appeared aside from 'Office' were 'Reactor' and 'Control', both situated above the office, supposedly the highest point in the Void. We settled on pressing 'Control' and were taken up to a small chamber. Now when I say 'small' I mean 'around the size of our Cells'. There were four cardinal points to the chamber. One featured our lift, while the others featured chairs, computers and screens. At the very center of the room was a chair by itself.
"Take a look and see what you can find," Carnivore spoke. Doing so, I found a joystick at the far end computer, labeled N, along with what might have seemed like a throttle gauge. I quickly relayed my findings to my friends.
"Looks like I've found some sort of navigation console," Rebecca relayed, by a console marked W. "It looks like it has options to set Navigation Points, and also relays which position above Earth we are. It looks like we are right above Neo Domino City."
"How convenient," Carnivore reported by a computer marked E. "What I've got here looks like it reroutes energy to different thruster regions."
"Oooh, Carnivore, I don't mean to brag, but when I was young, I had faith in my typing skills!"
"Interesting, Rebecca. I didn't know you had skills other than seducing Void prisoners. I think we'll need your speed for operating the thruster regions. Get on the E console."
"What about the Central chair?"
"It looks like that is just a captain's seat. Probably used by the Warden while his cronies operate the others. It isn't important. However, seeing as I'm probably the only one physically strong enough, I'll take the pilot seat."
"Okay, so I'm on the navigation, then." I stated, but as soon as I moved to take my place, I felt a hand on my arm. I turned to see who had grabbed me there, and found Carnivore, only she was quite close to me this time such that it was only one small step that marked the distance.
"Not just yet, Toby," she told me. "In case this doesn't work, although I never thought I'd say this, but I'm glad to have known you and Rebecca."
"Thanks, Carnivore. I can hardly believe it myself; about a year and a half ago you were calling me an irritant, shoving me around, pushing me away and staying distant from 'Succubus' as you called her."
"I think I said then that irritants have a way of getting under your skin. What I didn't realize until now was that such irritants may actually become essential to your life; case in point a year and a half ago."
"What about that?"
"Do you remember your rebellion?"
"Where I was taken over and drained other people's Psychic Powers?"
"The same. Before then, I didn't see much point to open rebellion against the Void, thinking it quicker just to grin and bear it. But the way you tried to resist this place, even before being taken over by that mist, slowly got me thinking. When you finally snapped and attacked the guards, it made me realize that I was going about things all wrong."
"How… so?"
"I was just stagnating, Toby. Just letting my life rot away in my cell in the blind belief that they'd release me from this place given enough time, and that I just needed to survive. When you and what took you over openly revolted, it made me see that I was never going to get release. The guards and Warden would have just kept me in the space station, just like they tried to do to you. When you returned to normal, I knew we all had to do something to escape, which is why I suggested the War. So thank you, Toby, for making me see the truth and for giving us all the strength to bring this place down."
"Car…ni…vore…" I gasped, as she sat me down in my seat.
"Yuina. Yuina Woods."
"What?"
"I remember you wanting to know my real name when we first met. My name is Yuina Woods, and that name is something I only let very close people know. I have just one price for giving you that information, though, but think of it also as a further thank you for waking the true me up… close your eyes."
Doing so, I suddenly started feeling her hands on my cheeks. A few seconds after, I felt what must have been lips press against my own. Whatever it was, it was warm. I was actually leaning back due to the pressure Carnivore- no, Yuina's body was exerting, which meant that she must have been leaning forward. For some reason, the sensation of something being pressed against my lips was very relaxing. This was one of the few good things to happen to me while I was in the Void. Whatever it was, whatever Yuina was doing, it was one of the only things to happen to me that I didn't want to end. It was warm, it was soft, it was reassuring, it was welcoming, it was relaxing, it was so many other things that I just cannot remember it in its entirety. All I really knew about that moment was that it was bliss.
"No fair! I wanted to do that first!" Rebecca sighed.
Pressure on my eyes motioned me to open them, whereupon it was what I thought it was. Car- Yuina's eyes were also slowly opening, and it turned out that it was indeed her lips pressed against mine. After her eyes completely opened, she broke the kiss and leaned in towards my ear, whispering "You ready?"
"Yes," I whispered back. She stood up at that point, and took her place at the piloting controls. I, meanwhile, turned my chair around to face my controls.
"Okay, you two, now we crash this fucking prison! Toby, select a landing zone!"
"Locating an area now…" I fussed with the controls, looking for the perfect spot to crash. A few minutes later, I found it; just to the west of Neo Domino City. "Feeding you the coordinates."
"Received. Navigation system starting up!"
I could also see a holographic view of the satellite in mini by my console. From what I saw, three rings of energy appeared, seemingly circling on fixed pivots, as if to form a sphere around the whole satellite. The rings stopped together at a right angle to the satellite, and two of them split off in opposite directions such that, in time, one ring was hovering at the top of the satellite, and the other at the bottom.
"Activating re-entry protocols. Heat shields operational! I've got the nav computer guiding us through the re-entry bullshit!"
The screens at my terminal were starting to change, as if we were moving at an angle. The rings in the hologram also seemed to be going up, as if the satellite was descending through them. After a few minutes, it sounded like things were getting hot. The hologram satellite was bursting into flames, and I could somehow feel an alternate gravity source pulling me into the side of my chair. This continued for a few more minutes, until.
"According to the computer, we have achieved re-entry into the atmosphere without any trouble," Yuina reported. "We are now slowly descending. How far are we from our target, Toby?"
"Looks like we are about eight hundred kilometers due east," I relayed.
"Roger that. Rebecca, full power to the Starboard thrusters and aim them west. Toby, relay to me how far we are from the target."
Soon after that, the holographic satellite showed large fires coming from the right hand sides. "Distance to target, six hundred and fifty kilometers… five hundred… four hundred… three hundred and fifty… two hundred… one hundred."
"Divert power to the Portside thrusters."
"…ninety five… eighty… sixty… fifty… forty… thirty… twenty… we are now directly above the target, at eighty kilometers in the sky," I relayed again.
"Full power to the stern thrusters, Rebecca! It's time we finish this!"
From there, I could somehow feel the force of the descent. Yuina had probably increased the speed to maximum, because I found myself struggling to remain in my seat and not float into the air, and that was with the provided seatbelt.
"Divert all power to bow thrusters!" Yuina suddenly shouted. The bottom of the holographic satellite, I saw, burst into flames as the flames at the top ceased. Just as the vertical distance to the target I had set equaled 0, there was a large physical shockwave that seemed to shake the entire space station. That shockwave blanked out my vision such that I could only see a white flash of light… the same white flash of light that the small light of hope had grown to glow.