Operation M.I.A: Missing in Action (IN NEED OF REVISING)

(Part II) Chapter XVI

With the aesthetic the upstairs room gave me, the basement is a complete step in the opposite direction. This room is much more modernly designed, with sleek, metal walls and an air conditioning system so loud it could be mistaken for a dinosaur's roar. Bright, fluorescent lights cover the ceiling Rows of tables are filled with men sitting, typing away on their laptops. At the far end of the room is a gigantic monitor, showing a map very similar to the one Dr. Scientist gave us.

"This must be one of their meeting places," I mutter to myself. None of us leave the stairway, for obvious reasons.

"Okay, men, may I have your attention, please?" a voice calls out from a corner of the room. All heads and eyes (from both the workers and our group) focus on a man wearing a Nike T-shirt and jeans (odd choice of wardrobe, if you ask me) walking up toward the map.

"Our reports show that three of our establishments have had some sort of interference and have been taken down as of yesterday," the boss guy says, pointing to Denver, Peru, and the Pacific Ocean- all three of them being places we visited yesterday. "This also indicates that we've lost three girls as a result."

"Have the perpetrators been identified?" one of the workers ask.

"Considering all of our workers who were present at these locations have either been arrested or killed, no. But the Black Shadow has stated that he ran into a meddlesome group of teenagers last night while flying one of our most recent captives to her settling place."

"I'm guessing the Black Shadow is their boss or something," Elle whispers to Sam, who nods and then puts a finger to his lips.

"I say we just leave. Clearly the last thing we want right now is to be spotted by these guys," Shanna suggests. Nobody's able to reject this idea, so we start taking the stairs back up to leave.

What stops us is when someone's foot causes the wooden stairs to creak just a bit too loudly.

HEATH

Music: Shoot and Shoot from Gradius II Arcade

"Who goes there!?" the boss yells. The board creaking already causes us to pause for a brief moment and wince, and this makes us freeze altogether. The workers start walking toward the stairs, pointing and shouting when they notice us.

For a few seconds, it's hard to tell if we're going to flee or fight. Skylar basically makes the decision for us, bolting right out of the stairway. The rest of us follow without hesitation. Behind us, the workers voices get louder and louder as they start marching their way up the stairs.

Luke starts to open the front door when the boss yells from behind us, "You little rascals aren't going anywhere."

The boss slowly walks toward us, examining us closely. He has an eyebrow raised as his glance shifts between each of us. He begins nodding and saying, "Mhm..." to himself.

And then he gets a couple eyeballs full of pepper spray. Elle blasts her vial right in his face. He screams and falls backward, covering his eyes with his hands. The rest of the workers enter fighting stances, but Elle, Skylar, Shanna, and Avery aren't even frightened. Wearing face masks to protect their own eyes, they run right up to all of the workers and run in zig-zags or back-and-forth lines, spraying pepper spray the whole time. Men fall to the ground left and right, yelping in pain and crying from the sting of the spray.

Once all of the men are down, the four girls return, high-fiving each other with grins on their faces. And then, just to make sure there are no loose ends, Luke uses the power of his Rock of Doom to cause the roof to collapse on top of all the workers. Those who don't die right away are either knocked unconscious. Furthermore, I shoot any of them that I see move.

"That sure showed 'em," I smirk.

Right before anybody starts to move back toward the door, however, Shanna randomly sniffs the air a few times.

Music: Maximum Speed from Gradius II Arcade

Then she asks, "Does anybody else smell smoke?"

I, along with several others, proceed to sniffle a few times as well. And sure enough, I smell something burning. At first, I believe it to just be the fireplace. Then I remember that both wood and pepper spray- both of which are present in the room at the moment- are flammable.

"It might be a good idea to leave," Skylar nods.

The ten of us rush the very short distance to the front door. When we reach it, Mackenzie reaches out to open it, and upon simply touching it, pulls her hand back and shrieks.

"It's burning to the touch!" she yells.

I try touching the metal door handle, and I have to pull away quickly. When I take a look at my hand after that, there's a small red spot forming where my hand made contact with the doorknob.

"Welp, this seems like a nice way to go, I guess," Sam mutters.

"No one's going to die!" Sean yells, grabbing a candelabra off of a table and hurling it at a window. The window shatters, providing an adequate enough opening for us. Sean uses his fists to break off some more glass to increase the size of the hole.

"Could we not have just opened the window?" Mia sighs.

"I already tried. It was locked," Sean replies.

After exiting, we turn around to find the fire starting to grow around the backside of the cabin, and at an alarming rate, at that. Pretty soon, it starts spreading to some of the trees surrounding the cabin.

"I guess this is where the phrase 'spreading like wildfire' comes from," Sam laughs.

"That wasn't even clever," Elle says, rolling her eyes.

"Guys, if we stay here any longer, we're going to be trapped here by the fire. Let's just go already!" Avery urges. I then signal in the hovercraft (which for some reason was doing something really far away), and take control. I then lift us up into the skies, and before flying away, take one last look at the fire. Other than increasing its spread even further out than before, nothing much has changed.

"Guess what Smokey the Bear said about humans and forest fires works in reverse as well. We can start forest fires just as well as prevent them," Sam smirks.

"Yeah. Just gotta hope no one traces this one back to us," Luke mutters.

Maybe not the most impressive chapter, but whatevs. Next chapter will have another cringey idea (and if you look at the playlist you can probably figure out what it is)