By David C. Daoust
Mari’s options were limited. She had finally given up on sending a communiqué out to her family. She pushed herself away from the terminal with a huff. Even with all her hacking abilities she did not stand a chance against the AI, Noreen.
Considering she was in the central temple of a sprawling droid city located dead center of the frozen tundra that capped the small moon… Even if she managed to sneak from the citadel, AND managed to travel through the extensive cities’ droid-filled corridors and streets- there were freezing temperatures outside, that would surely turn her into a block of ice!
The oversized, finely furnished chambers she had been residing in- became much less homey, and more and more like a prison as the days passed.
She started taking walks through the massive temple, daily. When Nora inquired about these walks, she explained she needed to stretch her legs. But really she was trying to map out the winding corridors that made up the labyrinth that was the droid temple.
One such walk was exactly what she decided to do, once she’d finished her silent conniption thanks to being denied any connection to her family. A family which, last she heard, united with Grady, rose up against the Red Faction, tossed them from the moon, with talk of forming a republic. She wanted to know more. She wanted to tell them she was okay, even if she doubted that statement more and more as the days passed.
More than anything, she wanted to find her son, Craiden. She could not believe she left him! Why did she trust the AI so much? An AI which, apparently, handed her only son over to a ship of pirates! Pirates? What could pirates want with her son? Where the heck did pirates even enter into the mix to begin with?
Mari’s frustration barely dissipated as she traveled through high arching corridors, nor did her series of unanswered questions… Uhg, why was this place so big?
She had a long walk ahead of her, just to catch up with where she had left off her searching. It all felt pretty hopeless. She was not even sure what she was looking for, some way out, some way to get help, to send word.
Mari had already located the hangar. In fact, she went straight to the hangar on her first day walking. Easily retracing her steps from when she arrived days before. The Red Faction Starfighter, however, was all but dismantled. All other ships were clearly automated.
The more questions she seemed to pile up, the less she heard, or saw, of Nora. She didn’t know where that hovering droid had gotten off to. And Noreen herself, Nora’s mother, had not deemed to speak with Mari since she talked her into traveling to the Temple City to begin with.
Round and round all her questions swirled, unanswered and as unchanging as the corridors she wandered through, all to try and bury the helplessness of her situation.
Unchanging, all the way, until she rounded a corner, and found something new!
She could swear she’d been through here a dozen times. She glanced back to try and get her bearings, though the high arching corridor stretching to what felt like infinity just made her roll her eyes. Mari shrugged.
Before her stood an opening that was not there before, within was a small enclosed room.
Upon entering the alcove, she realized it was a lift. A massive grated platform was beneath her feet. The control panel jutted from the center of the far side of the platform. It seemed simple enough, there were two arrows, one pointed up, and the other pointed down. The down button was lit with a dim blue light. She assumed that meant down was her only option.
Mari clicked the button and watched as the opening sealed her within before the platform began it’s decent.
It started slow, but as it descended, it began to speed up. So fast in fact she almost felt as though she was falling. It was not beyond her reasoning, that this lift was not made for human passengers.
Just as she was about to scream out, the lift seemed to stop accelerating. Her heart still raced but she felt fairly confident she was in no danger.
Down and down the lift traveled. Mari, while excited at the prospect of something new, started to get fidgety- feeling trapped. Though then the lights began to flicker, and the smooth structured walls fell away to be replaced by the finely cut stony earth. It was clear she was descending into the moon.
A cold chill invaded the shaft, and Mari found herself worried that she had left the confines of the temperature controlled droid temple. Again, it was not beyond her scope, that none of this city was built for human occupancy.
But the heat that suddenly wafted through, as the lift doors once again parted after the industrial lift slowed to a halt, told her again, her worries were fruitless.
Mari exited the lift, watched as the door sealed again behind. The fact that it sealed seamlessly, answered her original question as to how she might have passed the lift, so many times, without noticing it above.
She took in her surroundings. She found herself in a steaming hot cavern, lit by hanging light fixtures paced throughout. The wall that had just sealed the door behind her, and the platform under her feet, were of the same material as the temple she was now beneath. The small grated steps that led to the stony ground were the last sign of anything designed by man.
The rest of the cavern itself smacked of natural formation. Stalactites hung from over head, and in the distance was a forest of stalagmites. Through it all she heard the rushing flow of water, a sound that called to her as she made her way through the cavern, to find a steaming reservoir of water, with a massive waterfall gushing from the cavern wall. The water rushed through a tunnel on the far side of the cavern, swirling around stone, as it vanished into the darkness.
The water was hot, through and through, even the water from the waterfall steamed. Mari could only speculate where the heat was coming from.
Feeling freer than she had in days, she left the small river behind. She explored through the forest of stalagmites. She spent some time navigating through it, until a bright light, illuminated the distance.
The heat wafted through, much hotter, but Mari felt it was safe enough to explore some more.
As she entered a wide opening, into a wide sprawling chamber, the natural formations of the caves and rough craggy ground, ended abruptly, to be replaced by more of the fine materials that matched the temple above. Her eye, though, was called to the source of the light.
She found at the apex of the great domed chamber, far above, she witnessed the titanic cannon that melded into the great temple above. The cannon fed a wide massive plasma beam of pure white light that stood like a column in the center of the wide, wide room. She’d never seen such tremendous power. Despite having been taught of the terriforming reactors at a very young age, she never dreamed of such a thing as she now witnessed.
Mari must be below the reactor itself.
The plasma beam bore its tremendous power down through this lower cavern. She realized she stood before a precipice, protected only by a rather frail railing that wrapped around the entire opening. The fiery beam threaded straight down through the massive hole.
The opening below seemed endless, as even the bright light of the beam seemed to vanish in the distance. She realized, now, the powerful energy barrier that protected, not only the built structure that surrounded the mouth of the opening, but her very life, was the only thing stopping the immense heat from melting everything within the chamber, including the dozen or so droids that zipped about the huge opening, going about menial tasks.
By their disinterest in her presence, she realized she was no closer to escaping.
It was all very interesting at the very least.
Discussion ¬