Chapter 363
The abandoned water treatment facility was dark. Not night in the city dark, but the kind that swallowed details and shapes. It was only broken by little pinpricks of light leaking in through weather walls. The mix of darkness and the heavy industrial look pressed down on me.
Peeled paint was barely still legible above a welcome desk, SmileFriend Purification Plant. A grinning mascot of a water drop hung just below the name of the place. One with teeth. A chill went down my spine. Why did they design a water drop with teeth?
”Something moved through here recently.” Hope stopped just at the edge of the sunlight beaming in through the front door.
”Chek.” The dust in the air gave it away. Was it Lavender? Or… no, looked like something else. My eyes adjusted rapidly, and I looked out into the darkness without any issue.
Several prints scattered around the dust in the lobby. They were hoof-shaped, like what a horse or goat might leave behind. Panther’s Sight pried deeper and stole something from the darkness. A shadowy shape coalesced above the prints. It was vaguely humanoid, though I couldn’t make out any clear details.
Hope clicked on a flashlight. It cut through the haze of dust. She panned it across the room, and likewise found the hoof prints. “Stay close.”
“‘Course. Like I’d want to go anywhere else.” I crouched down next to the jaeger and opened up his panel. After clicking around, a spotlight lit up on his back, much brighter than Hope’s flimsy flashlight.
Hope sighed and shook her head. “When we were tracking down where he gets his chemicals, I checked for active water treatment facilities… so stupid. This is definitely where he gets his potassium permanganate.”
“I’ll take your word for it.” I hadn’t done nearly enough research into the chemical side of things. So far I’d just been chasing my own tail by going after Phyxaflame. I shuffled behind her just as the other Crusaders entered the facility.
There were five knights. One of them was alone, two of them had one squire, and the other two had two squires. Hope flicked the flashlight behind her, blinding several people. “Only eleven? Where’s the others?”
”Tommy and Denton took their squires to start a perimeter.” The solo Knight rested a hand on his sword’s grip. “What are we looking at?”
”We’re tracking a guy down. I need him alive.” Hope’s head tilted toward something in the distance that I couldn’t quite hear. “And watch yourselves. Something about this place feels off.”
“Hmm… I’ll stay with Inquisitor Hope. Vincent, Elroy, take the east wing.” The solo knight waved to half the group. He had on a set of extremely light Crusade gear comparable to mine. He opted for the ballistic vest and mask combo. That wasn’t to say he was lightly armored. The guy had chromed legs, arms, subdermal armor, and his neck was more metal than flesh. “Vespera, Tony, you guys got the west?”
Just like that, the Crusaders were cleanly and efficiently split… what happened to not splitting the party? I hesitated for a moment and then covered up my mouth with my hand to hide my lips. “Luna, follow all of them.”
”O-okay… you’ll only have three left on you, though.” Luna took control of my drones, and their markers on my HUD split. “T-they might notice them.”
”It’s fine.” I had more on my bike, anyway. Just needed her to finish flying that over, and we’d be set.
“Just us, Knight Garrick?” Hope asked casually and stepped beyond the doorway. She didn’t seem annoyed he took command… did she suspect the same thing as me? It was better to keep enemies closer the friends. “Mighty brave of you to take the smaller group.”
”Or I just have faith in your abilities, Hope.” The man chuckled and clicked on his own flashlight, beaming it out across the wide lobby. “We’ve got the north side.”
I ran through my internal map of the place. Getting its schematic from the city archive was a breeze with my Crusade permissions. The east side should be the filtration side of things with all the water tanks. West wing should be the old distribution halls where it was pumped out to the rest of the city. Oh, and reservoir access. There was a massive tunnel there that went below the Underground.
That just left the north wing for us. According to the schematic, it was the chemical storage and production facilities. Also, it was the most likely place to find Lavender. There was a not-so-small chance this place was the source of his Potassium Pomegranate.
I side-eyed Garrick. Did he know that, so he intentionally made it so the smallest amount of people were headed there? He could be weakening the group to make accidents easier. Or he could just be a stupid Crusader doing stupid meathead things.
Hope whistled sharply to CJ29, and we split up from the other Crusaders. We passed through a muggy hallway and entered a wide cubicle farm lined with offices. My hand tightened around the grip of my rifle. The lighting and cubicle farm hit the same nerve that the one in New Tress City did.
The air tasted wrong too. It was bitter, metallic, and a little sweet in a way that made my tongue sting. CJ29 let out a sharp whine and a warning light flashed on his back. It blinked a few times and then stayed on. “Zuku, you got a mask?”
”Chek.” Right, I pulled it out and slapped the thing on. The air instantly cleared up, though my lungs had to contest breathing through a filter once more. Each breath took just a bit more effort than the one before.
A clank came from ahead. I cut everything else out with Background Noise and focused on it. The clanks came more consistent, followed by the churning of machinery and hisses of filtration fans. Pumps and compressors churned ahead with an uneven rhythm. They didn’t sound broken, though. Moreso… adjusting?
”Is this place still active?” I hesitantly asked.
”Shouldn’t be.” Hope tilted her head to the side. “I hear it too. Did he start up the chemical production line again?”
”Where’s the power coming from, then?” Garrick looked equally confused based on his posture. “He couldn’t have tapped into the infrastructure without someone noticing.”
That wasn’t true. He definitely could’ve gotten into the infrastructure without anyone caring. Hell, that’s how everything in my workshop was working. It wouldn’t be all that hard… though a facility of this scale would require a lot more power to keep running.
We worked our way through the cubicle farm and exited out into a hall that ran further north. Observation windows framed the hall every so often, looking down onto the subterranean complex. This place was big. Like, really big. I knew it was large based on the schematic, ‘course, but knowing and seeing were two different things.
I paused at an observation looking out onto a maintenance bay, causing the entire group to likewise stop. Hope moved over next to me. “What is it?”
”You see that?” Just beyond their lights, frames and power capsules lined the walls of the maintenance bay. Most of them were empty, but a few held robotic shapes with lights framing their elongated spines. Every status panel was red, though I could’ve sworn I saw them flicker green out of the corner of my eye.
Hope whistled sharply twice, and CJ29 bounced up onto its hind legs. The jaeger leaned against the window, letting its light shine through and illuminate most of the maintenance bay.
The robots here were taller than a person, with narrow silhouettes covered. Their heads were smooth half-domes blinking with neon lights. They didn’t have any visible optics. All of them were incredibly lanky, with arms, legs, and fingers just a little too long like a kid drew them after having a nightmare.
”Why the hell do they have armor?” Hope pointed toward one of the bots that was collapsed just before its charging capsule. Its body was lined with what I hoped was only industrial-grade plating.
”Maybe… maybe some kind of acid resistance?” This was a chemical production facility, afterall. It would make sense. Otherwise, the original owners would’ve needed to spend a fortune on replacements.
Garrick turned back and also joined us at the window. ”At least they aren’t active.”
Hope and I both flinched at the same time. The words hadn’t even finished echoing, and I already wished he hadn’t said them. My Inquisitor’s scowl was clear in her voice, “Fuck, man, why’d you have to say that?”
”What—?”
”Don’t what me.” Hope crossed her arms. “Have you never seen a horror movie? Or worked in the field? Or, I don’t know, walked down the streets late at night?”
”I was just saying.” He took a step back. “I’ll take it back, okay?”
”Too late.” I muttered under my breath and looked back toward the empty charging capsules. I took a few steps away and whispered into my sleeve. “Luna, think you can find out if we have any robotic friends active?”
”I-if you can get to a c-console.” A dragonfly buzzed down the hall ahead of us. “This place is entirely closed network.”
”I was afraid of that…” I grabbed my rifle and turned toward Hope. “Gel rounds won’t, uh, won’t work on robots, chek?”
”Probably not.” Hope sighed and drew her twin daggers. The flash of Crusade silver caught the light just right, making them look particularly deadly. “Just stick behind me.”
“Heard you the first time.” That was exactly what I didn’t want to hear. I swapped out my rifle for my coil-pistol. Ole reliable… I’d just have to hope it had enough juice to punch through their body armor.
One of the charging capsules flickered like it’d been listening to our conversation. It was just once and super brief. I wasn’t sure if anyone noticed, but it definitely drove a spike into my gut.
There weren’t many lights on, but several vats scattered around the place glowed with a faint luminescence in washes of green, blue, and violet. Mechanical arms moved around, lifting barrels and working the machinery in a never ending process of production.
”How long since this place was abandoned?” Hope paused at one of the windows for a brief moment and then kept walking. “Do we know why, even?”
”Luna?” I repeated what my runner told me. “About two decades ago. Mass worker’s comp, poor investments in robotics, and rising competition drove Grinwater Holdings, the corp behind this place, to bankruptcy.”
”Mass worker's comp? What’s that about?” Hope shook her head. “Nevermind. Looks like there’s a way down up there.”
The hall finally cut into an intersection. One side pointed toward a locker room, the other wrapped around what looked like offices, and the last was lined with elevators going down into the plant.
”We should take the stairs.” I pointed past the elevators toward the sets of emergency stairs leading down into the place.
Our group walked past all the elevators and got out onto the staircase running along the back of the subterranean complex’s wall. Rusted metal grating fenced in the stairs, though I could still see out toward the rest of the plant. It was like a micro town full of churning machinery, hissing compressors, and chemicals being transported on great cranes moving along the ceiling.
Every step of the others’ footsteps echoed loudly into the chamber, though it was thankfully drowned out by the ambient noise of industry. CJ29, in particular, was quite loud clanking against the metal.
We reached a locked gate at the bottom of the stairs. Just as I was about to move forward and lock pick it, Hope simply slashed with her knife. The blade easily sliced through the rust metal and the lock, cutting them apart.
My grip on my coil-pistol tightened as we stepped out into the chemical production facility proper—
“O-one of the scouting Dragonflies just went out.” Luna quickly informed me and pinned a location further into the factory. “I-I didn’t see what killed it.”
”Fuck.” A suffocating certainty settled across me. It was highly likely that whatever was running this place already knew we were here.