The singer exits, removes his wrap, and takes his shirt off under the attentive looks of the ladies.
"Alright, off I go!"
Zachary kneels down and prepares to enter the tight conduit.
"Ouch! Does anybody have a cloth?"
"It's hot?"
"Of course it is!" rails Lauren.
Duh! She raises an eyebrow, dashes to the medical unit and comes back with a towel.
"Here, that's all I found."
"Thanks!"
"I spilled cold water on it," she proudly puts.
Behold, there's a genius among us.
"Water has better thermal conductivity than cotton. Everybody knows that!"
Her only defense is to ape me. I believe she got the message—I don't like you either.
Zachary rolls his eyes, sighs, throws the towel inside, grabs the staff, and re-enters the conduit.
"All good?"
"All good!"
The musician progresses slowly, panting heavily under the dry heat.
"I thought this was supposed to cool the engines?"
"Oh, it does! Believe me, the thrusters are much, much warmer," affirms Alvin.
Two minutes later, and Zach arrives at the obstacle.
"Okay, I'm at the bottleneck. I can't see what I'm doing. Where is the relay box?"
"It should be next to the door. Given your position, it should be on your left. Can you probe the room with the staff until it makes a metallic sound?"
"Just a moment, I need to pierce that grid first."
Zachary rams the vent several times until we hear a loud bang. Thankfully, it wasn't reinforced steel!
"I'm not reaching anything."
"Can you go further?"
"I'm afraid to drop the staff. It's almost entirely inside."
"Dang, we need a longer stick."
"Obviously," puts Lauren.
Man, what's up with this girl. I face her and send a very ferocious look. No filter this time—if you poke me, I bite.
"Wait! I think I found something. It feels like a square, but I can only reach the top."
"Try hitting it, see if it's metallic."
"It doesn't sound so. Are you sure I won't get electrocuted by blindly touching things with the staff?"
"No, because it's made of wood. Only the tip is conductive."
"Well, I'm holding the tip right now."
Alvin and I exchange a quick look. Yikes, Zach is obviously not an engineer!
"Flip it and try hitting that thing again."
"Okay."
A clanking noise resonates through the vent.
"Got it!"
"Perfect. Now, smash it repeatedly as hard as you can to destroy the relays," asks Alvin.
"Yes, sir."
"Do we have spares?" I wonder.
"Yes, we have at least nine replacement pieces for each component in the lower deck storage."
YOU ARE READING
The Mysterious Cities of Light: Abnormal Circumstances
Science FictionA student on the edge of his 20 is desperately seeking meaning to his life when he comes across a band of young adults investigating a series of enigmatic events. As the group realizes it's being framed by a mysterious entity, Cameron's eagerness to...
Chapter 12 - Into the Wild
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