Chapter XVI
Martin started angrily pacing behind Lorenzo and Adz. “I thought I told you two to delay the update until next week?” He ranted as he angrily shook his fists in the air. “We were supposed to add some more data in with this update, so that we wouldn’t have to do any routine maintenance for awhile!” He shouted.
Finally calming down a little, he took a deep breath and sat in his plush black chair. Staring at the two of them a tad sheepishly after his outburst, he asked them, “Well? Anything to say about it? Who let this slip?” Adz glanced over at Lorenzo.
“You want to tell him?” he asked. Lorenzo (aka Lorenzochomp as a username) shook his head in affirmation and looked over at their boss.
“Okay, so I’m gonna have to break it to you this way.” He began.
Martin didn’t look very happy, because he thought he could see where this was going. “Oh-” He started, but Lorenzo kept on speaking.
“We didn’t release the update, Martin. The Generator is auto-updating itself now. Apparently it has developed a sort of intelligence of some sort, not enough to do anything much, but enough.” He finished with a small shudder as he thought of the possibilities of ruin that could come from this. Martin looked overtly shocked.
“How?” He asked.
Adz answered for Lorenzo, who was now chewing on a hangnail and looking downcast. “We don’t exactly know yet, Martin- but we’re working on it as we speak. Apparently, Dave was right in a way.”
Martin asked, “In what way?”
At this, Adz looked a little tepid as he replied quietly, “It’s like Glados.”
Martin immediately jumped up. “What?! It can’t like kill us or anything can it?” He waved his arms around excitedly as he looked out of his window and rushed his hand through his hair, a nervous tick of his.
Lorenzo spoke up again, “No, probably not Martin. But it’s still pretty dangerous with it’s information, and could do some harm to Dave in the game… He’s the one in danger here…”
*****
Dave gauged he was roughly one hundred meters from the giant stone entrance way to the gigantic stone citadel before him, looming up like a idealistic deity.
‘That’s, immense…’ He mused silently, awestruck at the literal immensity of the situation he found himself in. He sidled up to the wrought iron gate, muka baby close behind. ‘Hmm, how to open it?’ He pondered.
Suddenly, as if reading his very thoughts, the gate swung open very slowly. ‘Interesting.’ Dave mused. ‘A trigger system probably set this off… Touche, whoever constructed this.’ He looked up once more, in order to get a parting glimpse of the connecting mountain range behind the citadel, before he wandered in.
‘The mountain probably connects in a cave system to the back of this citadel-like spire.’ He thought. ‘Probably means I have to go through this whole place. Dangerous most likely…’
He continued on his way inside the idyllic hall. All seemed calm and serene, although an almost tangible awareness of foreboding struck Dave. ‘There’s some sort of malice hanging around the air in here.’ He thought as he continued cautiously onward.
*****
Cameron awoke with a gasp. ‘Ack, it’s freezing in here!’ He thought as his mind literally seemed to have frozen over like he had an extreme case of brain freeze.
He tried to make his mouth move in order to get some words out, but found he couldn’t- he’d seemed to have forgotten how to make the syllables work and mouth move at all. He gasped once more as the frigid air tugged on his clothing. ‘Boy! It sure is cold in here!’ He thought as he struggled to regain all of his senses that seemed to have dulled while incarcerated wherever he was currently.
“Some sorta, cryogenic-” Before he could finish grating out the words, he suddenly belted over in a fit of nausea and promptly banged his knee on something- hard. “Oww!” He gasped as he sat up stiffly.
Moments later, finally able to stand, he got to his feet unsteadily and unsure.
‘Where am I?’ He thought once more as he gazed around at the murky gray industrialized steel that surrounded him.
‘Hmm. There aren’t any visible seams… no entrance…. How’d I wind up in here?’ He thought.
His captors, whoever they were must have had some means of communicating with him. He’d have to wait until they tried again. Meanwhile, he sat- trying to meditate on what had happened before he’d awoken here.
‘So, Dave and I were exploring Cyanide… We stumbled into some teleportation device, a firebird shot at me while some old wizened creature like an ancient Indian shaman whirred me away to- some place. What happened to Dave?’ He thought.
As he continued to delve deeper into his thoughts,and the mystery surrounding his abrupt departure from Dave’s company, he sat- wondering what had become of the world in his absence, and where in the world he was…
Revised Edition 7/2/13
