I don't own anything other than OCs
CH6
Chase was squeezing past the loose dirt and roots he had before. Skye was following but she was lagging behind.
"You okay back there!?" Chase called behind him.
Skye's muffled 'yeah!' was the response he received. She clearly didn't like getting this dirty.
Chase crawled past the turn and into the section of the hole that led him into the cave.
"After this bend it should be a straight crawl to the opening!" He called out again.
"Okay!" Skye yelled in slight frustration.
Chase eventually made it out of the hole and into the cave, he forgot about the drop and fell on his chin. He groaned and moved to the side.
"Watch out, there's a drop when you come out of here." Chase warned.
Skye came out soon and landed on all fours. She scanned around the cave as Chase flashed his light around.
"Creepy place." Skye noted.
"If you think this is creepy, wait until you go over there." Chase said as he pointed his light on the platform.
The two curious pups moved over to the platform and peered inside the grate. Skye immediately recoiled and covered her nose, the odor was still there.
"Eeeew! What is that!?" She squealed in disgust.
"Smells like something dead doesn't it? I guess we'll found out once we get in there." Chase said.
Skye looked around nervously, she wasn't so sure about this anymore. Chase used his claw to pull out the multi tool and began unscrewing the grate. Even though the screw ends matched with the shape of the multi tool's screwdriver, they were tight and were apparently made of out of Cobalt or Titanium.
He eventually got them loose after a brief struggle and unscrewed them out. He then pulled the grate aside.
"Ruff! Ruff! Grapple Hook!" Chase Barked before said hook came out of his pup pack and hooked on to the side of the shaft.
Chase stopped before he lowered himself and peered down into the tunnels. He can see in the light that the place was a room of some kind, a maintenance or storage room by the looks of it. He could make out metal cabinets, pipes, junction boxes, some kind of contraption below the grate against the wall, and a closed door at the far end, he assumed it was open yesterday by the sound of how far that 'thing' had ran. Looking and listening, there was no sign of any other being in the immediate area.
Chase got back up and breathed deeply, fear gripping him.
Skye placed her paw on his back. "You okay?"
"Yeah… I've just got a bad feeling about this place." Chase assured, though lightly hoarse at the end.
"We can go back if you want?" She asked in concern, hoping he would say yes.
Chase shook his head before grabbing the chord attached to his hook. "No, this whole thing will eat me up if I leave it alone. I have to see what's up with this place."
With that, he cautiously began to lower himself. Skye moved over to the shaft and peered over, ready to pull him up in case of any danger. Chase got a good look at the room as he looked around with his flashlight and came to a soft landing on the cement floor.
"Alright Skye, coast is clear!" Chase called up. As Skye climbed down, Chase's light caught something on the floor against the wall to the right of them. His light revealed it was a dog bed.
Curious, he walked over to it. Skye noticed and followed. It was damp and moldy, and appeared to have lost it's original color. The pups didn't have to get too close to catch it's full scent, especially Chase. Besides the smell of mildew, he picked up the scent of another animal. He got a little closer, A wet dog… female, so that was a dog I saw, Chase thought.
"Wonder if she's still in here." Skye pondered allowed.
"You smell it too?" Chase asked.
Skye nodded.
"There's no telling how big this place is or if there's any other entry point, we'll just search the areas we can and see if we can find an answer or see if that dog needs help." Chase informed.
"Sounds good to me." Skye approved.
With that, the two moved over to the metal door. It's handle was just short enough for Chase to angle his claw up and grab it, but fear gripped him before he could pull it down. What is in here that's giving me this fear? He questioned himself. He hesitated before he fought through his anxiety and pulled the knob down. The door creeped open slowly, revealing a polished black floor and white walls. Chase took one step out and nearly recoiled back in the room.
"What is it?" Skye asked, noticing.
"…turd! It's scattered all over the floor!" He answered abruptly as he motioned to all of the animal droppings that dotted the hall outside.
"Guess that explains the smell." Skye said as she covered her nose.
"We'll just have to watch our paws as we walk." Chase said. Skye didn't seem so sure as she watched Chase walk out, but she followed him out regardless.
Chase immediately flashed his light around both ends of the hallway, the left side ended with a door at the end. He gulped when he moved the light over to their right and couldn't see the end, like a never ending dark abyss that went on forever. He expected to see red eyes of some monster peering back at him the longer stared, but eventually looked away and stressfully sighed. "What the hell is this place?"
Skye raised an eyebrow at him upon hearing his whisper. "Hey! Language!"
Chase rolled his eyes. "Come on, Ryder isn't here."
"But still, as the leader of the PAW Patrol you don't want to make that a habit." Skye warned.
"Give me a break Skye, won't happen again." Chase smirked playfully.
Skye huffed but couldn't help but return the smirk. Chase scanned and listened to see if the area was clear before he noticed something that could be very helpful by the door. He carefully walked over to it and grabbed the slip of paper off the wall. Skye walked over and noticed it was a map.
"Sight A Subterranean Research Complex, Level One." Chase read the title aloud.
"A research facility under our noses? How long has this place been here?" Skye asked in disbelief, tilting her head as she stared over the map.
"Probably a long time, as large as it looks it didn't just get built overnight and construction crews digging a massive hole in the ground would surely have been noticeable?" Chase guessed.
"FIP Corp." Skye noted when she saw the logo in the top right corner, which were blue bold letters with a shooting star trailing at the end.
"Wonder what that stands for?" Chase pondered.
The map itself was a standard workplace map that displayed two different wings with various rooms, safety equipment locations, and two staircases leading down to level two though it strangely didn't show any emergency exits. The hallway to the right of them did go down quite far until it bent left and the left hallway had a generator room at the very end. The room in front of them was an office and had a long window though it was too high up for the pups to look in. The room they initially entered was an air filtration room which explained the hatch, machinery, and the narrow hole connecting to the surface.
The two pups decided to first go into the offices in front of them and saw they were desolate like the halls. Various documents and computers lay atop the desks covered in dust, all were unplugged.
"Where is everyone?" Skye asked aloud.
"Might be home, it is past midnight after all." Chase suggested.
"Yeah but with a place this big and important they at least have to have some security somewhere?" She probed.
"They could be in another area."
"Look at all of the dust, it looks like it's built up like this for weeks and no janitor would let that slide, not to even mention the droppings on the floor." Skye pointed out.
Chase shook his head. "I don't know Skye but if we start looking around I'm sure we'll find something, even if we have to search this whole facility."
With that, the pups looked around the room for anything that could tell them what the deal was with this place though Skye reluctantly so. Chase could understand, after all they're out past their bed time in a place they probably shouldn't be and it wasn't even her idea, and if they were caught well the consequences might be much more harsh than being grounded. Though she still helped him and because of that he hope she shared his concerns that they needed to get to the bottom of this.
After a few minutes of searching through the documents Chase found one of the lab results. Of course this paper had to be the one with coffee spilled on it so he could only make out the top half. It was about a canine specimen titled subject 01 and a human boy known as subject 00, it mentioned 00 was successful but 01 had failed for the third time. That was all he could make out.
"Hmm." Chase hummed, intrigued. He decided to pass the paper to Skye who walked up to him with interest. Chase decided it was time to hit the labs once she was done with the lab results, completely oblivious of the horrors that awaited them there.
A/N: Well that chapter took kind of a toll on my inspiration, the next one probably won't be out until next month.