Project 66: portal’s tempest

== note that this story is the unedited copy, and has some mistakes and grammatical errors. please let me know if you find one. A new chapter is uploaded every few weeks. ==
this story was written for the project 66 discord server, meaning that all apostrophes (*) are meant to symbolize italic or bold fonts.
**Portal's tempest**
== **Chapter 1: a deck of cards and a cold stare** ==
**Location: Earth, New Mexico, scrapped outpost.**
Knight:
The orange tinted sky rose above the twisted metal garbage left there by people a decade ago. The air was almost toxic, but manageable from the use of masks. But despite the precautions, the lifespan of most the living things in the area still seemed much shorter then they were many years ago, before climate change was a big problem.
Nowadays, even the beautiful costal cities that was once large and prosperous, flooded and became overwhelmed with trash that used to fill the oceans and seas. The point was that humanity ruined the planet and thus, ruined themselves.
“I heard that Earth had over 9 billion people living on its surface” said the young, robed woman whose name was Dina. She picked up a card from the faded deck.
“I can’t imagine how crowded it was! I bet there was lots of traffic!”
A chuckle came from the old, grey haired fellow (Bryan)as he placed down 3 cards on the the pile. “You better believe it! Many people had travelled through the streets! Even after the economic crisis and many wars for resources. “
Bryan looked at the few cards he had and smiled. “You guys better watch it, I have almost won!”
I scowled at the 18 cards in my hands. Non of which matched the colour or number of the one on the top of the pile, so I had to pick up another one from the deck.
Dina laughed, the hazy sun reflected off her face, illuminating it for once. “You really have no luck! Don’t you?”
I looked her dead in the eyes and sarcastically said “don’t you have 23 cards?” She blushed turned down the rusted radio that was playing some old 2030’s music.
“UNO! Haha! I win!” Said Chloe, who we completely forgot was playing. I turned to Bryan who looked very disappointed, since through this entire evening, he hadn’t won a single match and this was the closest he got.
I picked up the old, chipped cards and placed them in the worn box. “I told you people, It’s time we better start getting ready for bed. So, I’m gonna go”
Chloe sighed. “Yea… that was fun though! Maybe tomorrow?”
“Maybe not, I think I might have to sign up for the military.”
“What? Why?”
“Well” I sighed. “I haven’t found ways to get any money for quite a while. And collecting and selling the trash around here isn’t profitable.”
The other 3 just stared across the old table and shook their heads in disbelief.
“When will you be back?” Asked Dina
I stood up to leave and pushed in the plastic lawn chair underneath the table. “I… don’t know, but I will see you again one day.”
I tossed them the pack of cards and walked out of the run down bar and across the street. While the foul air was a nuisance, that wasn’t my main concern at this time. In reality, I was scared. Scared of the high mortality rates involved with what I was about to get myself into.
== **Chapter 2: ethical issues** ==
**Location: UCA, Reds cave.**
Fennec:
A single, cold, glowing lamp hanging by a thread lit up the dark room, and an eerie silence filled the tense walls. The only noise was the ticking of a clock from my kitchen.
I looked around at the mixed expressions of my comrades. Most wondered why I called them to meet me at my home.
“You know why I brought you here, right?” I stood up and asked. “We have a problem. It is those creatures from the other world. Humans.”
They are looking to get into our universe and take our resources.” I clicked a button on a remote that was hidden under my bright red poncho. A blue image formed above the middle of the large open table. It displayed a planet. Not from our universe, no. It was Earth.
My friend Bloo stood up. “Why should we be concerned about them Red? They can’t do that much damage, can they?”
I nodded. “They can’t. But that doesn’t matter right now. We cannot share our world and things with theirs. They have wars and conflict that can certainly affect us. Not only that, they think they are the best species. They would surly treat us and the creatures here like animals.”
“They also have nukes!” Gamezlord blurted out “Yes! you heard me, they have nukes… And powerful weapons!”
I sighed. “They do have powerful weapons…”
Lamp raised his claw. “Well, what can we do? We shouldn’t interfere with them…”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
“What if…”
“No gamezlord, we are not nuking them back…”
“Awww…”
Gamezlord shrugged and got up to grab a soda from the fridge. I looked at my shark friend, who didn’t say a thing yet. “What should we do tri?”
“We obviously can’t attack them, that won’t be good for anyone in any world. So, what if we get UPA to get rid of the people that are trying to get into UCA. They are trying to get resources and information right? So if those people never come back, then they will think it is too dangerous to explore!”
That was actually a ridiculously good idea. Was it ethical? Probably not, but unless we did something about it, a full out war would break out.
== 
**Chapter 3: need some help? ==
Location: Earth, New Mexico, desert wastelands.**
Knight:
It was a long drive. My old car doubled as refuge and a house since I couldn’t afford anything more then that. Once I finally got to the location the fuel was almost depleted, and the check engine light was blinking. And FYI dear reader, most of the fuel in the gas stations was used up anyways. What was the point stopping? The desert around here was full of trash, and people living in the scraps waiting to jump people for their food, water and other necessities. Stopping would easily mean getting stranded in the hot wastelands.
So I drove fast over the cracked roads and cranked the volume up on the radio.
It was so strange how there were still people operating the cell towers and channels, but it was just better not to think about it too much.
*WELCOME! This is wasteland radio! Playing all your favourite songs from the 2040s! In todays news, a missing trading cart. Where did it go? And will the vital medical supplies ever get to grass county’s outpost? And, for all you brave explorers out there looking for the coolest junk and scrap, the local navy has found a new submarine thought to be lost to time in 2026! More about that at 11…*
I had no idea that New Mexico had a navy, considering that this was a landlocked state. But again, it was probably for the best not to question it…
BAM!
My thoughts were interrupted. It was the tires that gave out suddenly and I had to screech to a halt! A dark figure wearing a mask, a tank top, a black pair of sunglasses, and what I could tell was zero deodorant approached my worn down car. “Damn it!” I thought. “That idiot probably put down some tire spikes to catch me!”
I rolled down my window. Looking dead in the eyes of the man, who looked rather stunned.
Unexpectedly, he asked “Do you know how fast you were speeding?”
“Is this some joke?” I replied. “Yes I know how fast I was going! What are you here for? Are you going to rob me or something?”
He pushed the glasses off his face. “Not exactly. Do you know your tires are flat?”
“Yea. You made them flat dumbass.”
“No, I didn’t. There is a pothole in the road. A big one! It’s been wreaking the tires of cars drivin’ down here for years! I finally got to see it happen today with you! I would have asked the others who ran over it if they wanted their tires fixed, and well… they keep runnin’ away like scared dogs. I have to keep pushing the cars off the road with the help of my buddies.”
He gestures over to the other cars on the side of the highway.
“I own a tire and oil change business. I can totally fix your car! At a price”
I look behind through my rear view mirror. Sure enough, there was a pothole the size of a
toaster. “Sure. What does it cost?”
“Just some sunscreen and water. This place is boiling hot! And it gets hotter every day, and our well is getting low.”
Now that was a good price, and even I can’t deny a deal like that. So I take them up on it. 4 hours later… they have finished. While they fixed my car and changed the tires, I helped them out with a few chores. Like washing clothes and removing some scrap from the surrounding areas. They waved goodbye as I gave them a few litres of water from the trunk of my car, and some good sunblock I scavenged from an abandoned drug store days earlier.
“Thanks!” I yelled. After a few more hours I soon got to my location. By this point, the sun had set and all that remained was the orange tint of light remaining, and a dark, hazy fog. I pulled into a recently paved parking lot and parked within the freshly painted lines. There was a new office building. Specially for enrolment in government departments. A shiny neon sign with the words: DIMENSION LABS caught my attention. A glowing white triangle plastered on the sign lit up and I entered through the door under it.
== 
**Chapter 4: a fluffin’ good time? ==
Location: UCA, Click’s Bar.**
Click:
It was a slow day, and it has been like this for weeks. The few customers that have come through my bar have all been looking for directions other places or needing to use the restrooms. This place may have been the only stop to get a drink on this block, but still, the point stands: I need customers.
The name’s Click. I’m a fluffer. I own this bar. The record players, the booths, the tables, everything. Unfortunately, the revenue I got was not enough. And I might need to close this place down soon. My friend who owned a café offered some assistance. She had a wonderful workshop underneath her treehouse cafè, and she offered me a job for woodworking. It sounds like fun, but I don’t exactly know how that works. I know a bit about mechanics, but not wood.
The door opened and a void creature entered. He had many tentacles and a vicious smile. The tuxedo pattern on his body glowed in the empty bar.
“Welcome to Clicks Bar. How can I help you?” I asked.
He raised one of his inky tentacles. “The name’s Tux. Can I have a margarita?”
“I’m guessing the name is from the pattern on you?”
He nods.
I put the drink on the table and he picks it up and swirls it around. “ This bar is closing soon, right?”
“Yes. How did you know?”
Tux looks around. “No one goes through these parts of town. And frankly, no one besides us two are in here.”
I considered that he may be very observant, but I then said “you saw the sign outside my bar. Didn’t you?” His smile faded a bit. “yea I saw it.”
He placed a 10$ bill on the wooden countertop. “Keep the change.”
The door slammed behind him as he left. And once again, I was standing here in the empty, dim restaurant.
== **Chapter 5: take a number.** ==
**Location: Earth, New Mexico, recruitment site 7.**
Knight:
“Take a seat and grab a number.” The dry voice at the other side of the room said. A middle aged woman sat in a chair with a disposable mask and fake crystal earrings typed away on the transparent screen. She didn’t even look up as I sat down and took one of the paper slips. “They will see you shortly. As you can see, we are very busy at the moment, so your patience is appreciated.”
I looked around at the empty white room. The buzzing lights being the only noticeable noise. “There is no one else here though?” I asked.
She sighed spoke under her breath “I’m off my meds again, damn it. “ she went into the back office. “Well, since no one else is here, it’s your turn then…”
I’m really starting to hate this place, it creeps me out. Not just this office, but…
It doesn’t matter… whatever.
The hallways seemed to stretch forever. Ok, not really. It was just a few meters, but it definitely felt like it took forever to get to the office the receptionist pointed at. 
The office wasn’t really an office, more of a back door of sorts. A person was waiting on an iron crate by a military truck.
“So, I will ask you a few questions. If you say yes to most of them, we will have you join us!” The man said.
“What exactly is this I am signing up for?” I asked carefully.
He just replied with a terrible explanation about alternative dimensions and stuff.
“Is this even a good idea?”
He motioned to a cool looking robot suit. “Of course! You even get a cool robot suit and name!”
“But it is safe. Right?”
“Absolutely! 100% now. To the questions! Do you like adventure?”
“Erm, yes?” I have always loved the old action movies and games from when I was a child. Something about them always looked amazing. But this guy was giving me a strange vibe. I didn’t like him and I don’t know why.
“Can you work in a fast paced environment?”
“I mean, I guess? I was formally a waiter…” this wasn’t even remotely true. But hey, a guy’s gotta live right?
“Do you like uncertainty?”
“Well, no? Why woul- I mean uh… yea!” Lying wasn’t a great strategy. But he seemed to believe every single word I spoke.
“Do you have any previous experience with any military-like training?”
“Yep.” This however, was true. I had some air cadet experience from years ago. Though I doubt it would actually be useful.
“Well great! You’re all set to go!”
“That’s it? No tests? No resumes? No checking my media history?”
He leaned in right next to me. “We don’t have many volunteers… in fact, a few who  *quit* recently.” I did not like how he said the word quit. It’s almost like he…
The stranger proceeded to shake my hand and throw me into the truck I spoke about before. Did i mention he was much stronger than he looked? He even made me sign a binding contract while asking all the questions. How rude! He the jumped in the front of the vehicle, turned on the silent electric motor, and then drove off with me in it.
== 
**Chapter 6: the old days die hard.** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Mira:
Hello! Welcome to wherever this place is! I’m guessing you are… well, I don’t know exactly, but you caught me while feeding Nibbit. She is my pet bird!
I’m sure you already know this, but i’m a test. Number 3 to be exact. Hey, we’re all tests here.
That red suited guy over there with the 3 eyes and the cigarette? That Jack. A.K.A 17. And that other person in the green with the blue glowing visor? That’s Neko. She’s a little strange to be honest, she barely says anything to anyone. Neko mostly just likes to carve pictures into the cell walls. The other day, a few guards gave her some paints in secret and that seems to make her very happy…
obviously there are more people around, but usually they keep to themselves. Like pilot. I swear, he is always making plans to break us outta this terrible place. Too bad he really sucks at actually getting them to work…
Some people call this laboratory Dimension Labs while others just call it facility-8. But what it really reminds me of is this old video game I played as a kid. It was like a puzzle game with portals and robots, and I loved it! Wish I could play it now… Portal was the name, right? It’s been a few decades, and well… I’m probably not the gamer I used to be.
Unfortunate. Those games and movies being lost to time is just sad. So much wasted art and fun.
After 2040 people just kinda stopped inventing things. There was too many problems, and too many people using up valuable resources for anything fun or enjoyable to be made. I even remember some states banning the production of many movies, films, and more just to save our species. *idiots should have just done more to prevent this for the future. But NoOoOo! Humans are selfish and greedy!*
Well, it could be worse, and I could be dead… so I will give it that…
“Ah! Nibbit! Don’t eat the metal screw!”
[End log]
== **Chapter 7: this was a bad idea…** ==
**Location: earth, Arizona, route 40**
Knight:
“Hey what the hell man! I applied for a job! Not a kidnapping!” There were metal bars covering the windows and front like a weird combination of a taxi and a police car. Except this was some giant, black armoured vehicle going over 150 km an hour. “What is the rush anyways? Why are you going so fast?” The idiot in the front didn’t even hear me at all and just blasted some rock music in the front.
“Can you at least turn it down? It’s so loud in here!” He still didn’t turn it down. It was then I realized that the glass was sound proof and he couldn’t hear me anyways. “Ok, this might be really bad. What on earth did I sign up for?”
The thoughts stopped when the giant truck suddenly screeched to a halt making me hit my face on the seat in front of me.
The guy got out and walked towards a rundown gas station to probably go to the bathroom
Maybe I could get out? Probably not, but it’s worth a shot…
I jiggled the handle and after that didn’t work, I got some lock picking tools and tried to find a keyhole. (Spoiler, there was no keyholes) and after even that! I banged on the windows trying to catch someone’s attention (another spoiler alert, there wasn’t anyone else around)
Eventually the guy got back (with 2 chocolate bars and an orange soda in hand) and got into the truck. He scrolled down the window between me and him.
“I got you somethi-“
I seized the chance and tried jump into the front and punch him in the throat. He retaliated by pulling out a dart gun and shooting my leg with it. I realized that I definitely made a mistake after that, since my body started to go numb and I fell asleep. While that happened, he just shook his head and told me that he was just trying to be nice and it was nothing personal…
What, he’s the good guy in this? No way! I guess he was acting in self defence but…
You can read this? You can read my mind? Well, you should know I’m probably asleep by now… but how? How do you do that? Or am I just talking to myself? No, clearly you are just one of those dumb thoughts. You probably don’t even exist!
What? Should I be awake by now? A few sentences for you is a few hours for me…
Well, ok. Fine. I will open my eyes. Not now right now, of course.
== **Chapter 8: darkness is around us.** ==
**Location: UCA, the voidlands, firelight outpost**
Bot:
The purple landscape was illuminated every day by the lights of many oil lanterns and candles. Down below in the small town, some locals joined by the fire to cook food and heat up water. Meanwhile, in the sky; the glow of the supermassive moon brightened the surrounding world. The glowing green moss also made it better for sight as they lit up more of the twisted purple pillars of rock. Despite all of this, the town was a dim sight and the walls that surrounded kept even more of the darkness at bay.
It was early in the morning here in lamplight. While the Voidlands doesn’t follow a traditional time cycle, it still has a pattern. The moon rises in the place of a star, making it easier to know exactly what the time is.
UPA usually patrols around this area, so the daily tasks were assigned to each of the guards a few minutes ago. I could hear the sounds of them outside. The alarm clock buzzed and scared my friends Watch and Bitt. And Watch fell out of his hammock.
“You have GOT to shut that thing off! Stop it with the fire alarm noises!” Watch sighed.
“Beep!” Bitt agreed with him. I patted him on the head and pulled on a sweater and pants. (I may be a robot, but hey. Cmon! Everyone should at least have a sense of dignity! Plus it’s cold outside.)
“Beep beep!”
“Oh please.” I replied. “I’m no microwave! Of course I won’t forget to bring you some computer chips on the way back!” Those were Bitt’s favourite snacks, and why wouldn’t they be? They are delicious. I bet most people (at least other robots) would agree.
“Hey! Bring me some too!” Watch yelled from inside the lounge.
Obviously the voidlands wasn’t an ideal place, but us three? We were here for a mission. A deal was going down between some bad people and my job? It was to stop that trade from happening.
Some of Monochrome’s biggest assistants chipped off pieces of a few more minor crystals that power the dimensions and are trading it for something (that I don’t know about yet) big. Yet another plan by some evil creatures to destroy some stuff and cause chaos.
Yea bad stuff like always.
Fennec told me to scout out any suspicious activity as well. Especially to check on the UPA agents. She said that 1 of them is probably ShapeShifter. A void guy who can actually take the form of everything.
Well, I should get ready. Got a ton of work to do.
Cya! -Bot
== **Chapter 9: at least you get some really cool epic robot armor!** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight :
A white padded room with a single light overhead clicked on. Before that, I woke in the dark. The room had almost an industrial feel like it could open up at any point. A 2 way mirror lined the wall I facing towards. An intercom buzzed to life.
“Hello. Welcome to Facility-8. Usually we would do some stuff to get to know you, but you attacked your driver here. So we will skip the tour and other less important events.
Please note that your name will now be number 66. So you can forget your original name now.”
“What? You just want to me to just forget my own name? Really?”
They didn’t even listen to me. Is this going to become normal? Everyone is just not even talk to me like a normal person? Usually I can tolerate that, but it is weird if people just actively try not to listen to you… and 66? I’m not calling myself that.
“So. You may have noticed that you did sign yourself up to become expendable. But there is some things you won’t need to worry about such as food, water, and disease. All of that is treated. You will never need to deal with those problems ever again.”
“So.. free food and you don’t care what happens to me? I don’t know whether to be happy or very, very scared.”
“You don’t get paid for any of this, but we keep you alive!”
“WHAT?! This isn’t like some sort of slavery is it?” I got upset and tried to get up to leave. Unfortunately, my feet were stuck in place like glue. If I didn’t like this before, I certainly didn’t like it now!
“We do also give you some really cool robot armor!”
“I COULD NOT CARE LESS ABOUT THE *COOL* ROBOT ARMOR! LET ME LEAVE!”
They also ignored that. Now that I think about it, the speaker is probably a recorded message. But nonetheless, I squinted at the mirror. I could definitely make out some shadowy figures behind it.
Cmon dude, don’t panic. Im fine! Im fine. Im not gonna lie, I kinda want to know what this so called armor looks like and what it does. But for now, I have got to know what that other guy meant by *other universes and dimensions.*
I was definitely right about the walls and tiles being able to move, because they opened up into this giant futuristic room with all sorts of machines. A whirring noise started and I could see the process of some actually really cool things for me being made in a glass box a few feet away. An arm thing quickly and precisely cut sheet metal into 4 rhombus shaped pieces and then added a bunch of pre-made material to the inside of it. Meanwhile, another arm put in blue glowing glass to a pointed grey helmet and expertly welded it together somehow.
Another, smaller arm held a small microphone and speaker. It was about to place it into the helmet when the intercom spoke again.
“You are much too loud for you to deserve that. Let’s get rid of it.”
The tiny mechanical arm threw it into a nearby incinerator. Before I even had time to ask what it was for, the platform I was standing on shot down into the darkness below and so did the now complete pieces of what was in the big box.
Once the tile I was on slowed down, I guess it was my turn to get a box because 4 giant metal plates slammed around me all containing those said pieces of tech. Some clamps fastened my arms and legs and what happened next I kinda don’t want to talk about. Basically, that damn machine welded the pieces of the armor onto my various limbs. Did it suck? Absolutely! Everything burned and I was practically on fire!
After what felt like forever, the metal plates of hell separated, and I fell to the ground.
This is embarrassing, but I ended up just curling up into a ball and trying to yell obscenities because that was probably the worst feeling possible. What? Can you blame me?
That stupid speaker played again. “Ok 66. You can proceed to the end of the room. You will find a guard there to escort you to your living arrangements.”
It was hard to even get up but what was the point arguing? It got me nowhere and speaking of which…
Why can’t I speak? I mean I can, but no one can hear me? Wait… I. Can’t. Talk. **AHHHHHHHHHHH**
== **Chapter 10: even gods feel merciful** ==
**Location: UCA, red’s cave.**
Fennec:
Pacing around the ambient cave was nice sometimes. Sometimes, it’s a distraction from reality. Other times, the simple action gifts me ideas. Whether it be to play god and create a new world, or to just make some plans. There’s infinite possibilities! But with my head down, wandering around the corners of my furniture and trying to come up with something to fix this problem ethically was hard.
On the one hand, we just can’t let those humans return to earth or else they would end up destroying our world. But on the other hand, we can’t just keep them here since they are made of material that could break anything in UCA and that could get dangerous if they fall into the wrong clutches. This is perplexing. Usually, I would have just let them stay forever and be happy but we simply just can’t.
“We could send them into another universe? Then no one can get ahold of those tests.” Lamp told me.
“That would make them a danger to those universes as well. Especially if they find a way back to here or earth.” I replied.
He shrugged. “What if we just launch them into space in another universe?”
“They’re almost immortal. I doubt that would be good for them. I think there is only one thing we can do.”
I told them what we would have to do, and team’s eyes widened into surprise. They nodded solemnly at the plan. We had to kill them. It was the safest option to keep our worlds safe from destruction and war.
== **Chapter 11: broken silence** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
Ok, this is bad! Turns out, I can still talk and hear myself, it’s just that whatever the heck is on my head is soundproofed which means no one else can. From what I know, I definitely can’t just take off this helmet. I will get to all of that later but for now… what am I supposed to do now?
I was thinking. sprawled out on the floor of course since I still don’t want to move an inch. I was thinking about things before this, I mean yea. It was boring and disappointing, but it’s better then now. I miss my friends who I would play cards with. I missed my family, and I definitely missed my car, I have had that thing for many years and it never let me down. Yes, it was old and rusty, but what can you do? So is everything else on this planet…
A an 20 minutes later, I got up. The pain didn’t wear off yet, but it was manageable enough. Finally, I got a good look at what really happened. I won’t lie, I looked cool as hell. A sleek, pointed, armoured chest plate, triangular arm and leg coverings imbedded with lights, and a sharp, glowing helmet with protection and lights all over.
Ok, don’t think I’m just totally cool now because of it, nope. I still want to destroy everything here, just slightly less.
I wandered through some hallways with the guard. Screens lit up sections of the massive halls. They all played informative videos of some specific device with many wires, lights, and shapes. Some would say it looked beautiful, or like a remarkable piece of electronics. I say it looks too messy.
On the other side of the cracked concrete and cold blue pillars lied a gigantic window with massive barrels full of what was probably chemical compounds and other substances. One labeled *COOLING TANK* was the biggest of them all. It sat there, surrounded in dense wires and covered in silicon and plastic. The label on the side of the tank was a WHMIS symbol. Those shapes and patterns were universally used and recognized to represent how dangerous, toxic or reactive a chemical was. They aren’t used much anymore nowadays, but they were always good to know. Especially when sorting through abandoned items to find since you definitely don’t want to accidentally pick up something corrosive, right?
I remember an old buddy found a compressed CO2 tank once, and it ended up exploding from the pressure when he accidentally dropped it. (Luckily none of the shrapnel hit them… he was just a little bit stunned.)
We passed a few offices and more industrial areas, and now that I think about it, everything looks really new while everything on the outside looks smoky, dusty, dry, rusted, and tattered. Was everyone left to fend for themselves while a select few 1000 people got to stay in a sterile workplace? Maybe I shouldn’t worry about the specifics of it right now.
The guard lead me to yet another empty room. I stared at him, and he just shrugged in return as he closed the boring white door. A TV descended from the ceiling with a list of things I should probably know. (I didn’t really care about most of it… but there were some important things I committed to memory.) turns out, there is a lot of really cool things I could do now, and some slightly more confusing things too. Like hey! I am 10X stronger! But, I can’t talk because I don’t have a radio to speak through. (That’s probably what that little thing the machine threw into the fire was… not cool!) I also couldn’t ever get outside diseases, but I also couldn’t ever eat food again unfortunately. But then I guess I don’t need to worry about that anymore somehow? I’m not sure how it all works, but there is more I won’t get into.
The video was around an hour long. Finally, the guard opened the door and lead me through another hallway. This one was much smaller, with potted plants, office doors windows with shutters and drapes, and of course, picture frames containing various photos of otherworldly places, rocks, and plants. There were also some very normal pictures of other people with pets and families. Weirdos… the only thing anyone should have framed is pictures of Mac n cheese.
Eventually, the hallway opened up again into a giant cargo area with pale light reflecting through the evenly spaced pillars of stone and rebar. Silent vehicles wizzed past with items ranging from steel pipes to medical equipment. Many old cargo containers were lying around and even suspended overhead accompanied by the grinding noises of rusted metal that hasn’t been oiled in years.
A large, scrappy cargo vessel lay in the dry shipyard, barely staying afloat.
Bold letters titled the S.S Finn were imprinted on the boat, they were faded beyond recognition. But still yet, the impressive ship rose over the horizon.
We quickly rushed past the port into another building. This superstructure from the outside looked like a nuclear reactor with many out-of-place elements that looked straight from a sci-fi movie. A split tower with a triangular shape stuck out as the most odd. A glowing beam of light shot from the sky. You could dismiss it as lightning, but this light was completely straight with a single loud boom noise coming soon after.
A shockwave rippled through the air, and a gust of wind blew through the pier.
Eventually, we reached the strange building. A sign reading *facility-8 portal division*. We entered, and disappointingly… there was no portals. Where are the portals? Only another sterilized clean hallway. The guard took a left and he pulled me into yet another room, that was really big with a hole through the middle and weird cells lining the circular room. (I swear, there aren’t many more hallways after this) we passed by a few glass cells with metal creatures, kinda like me in a way. One sat in a dark corner of the padded cell. It’s eyes staring right through my soul. It had a look of pure hatred, like it wanted to tear me and the guard up into pieces. I shivered and quickly followed the guard as I read the sign on the cracked glass that read -29.
Another room beside it hid with a cold blue door that developed a thin layer of frost. This one read -0 in the middle. A faint crying noise came from inside the frozen room, and a voice spoke out. The voice was almost incoherent from the soundproofed door. Whoever was inside spoke poetically about the stars.
More cells lined the walls, each with other people wearing the same type of armor I did, and that was slightly worrying to be honest. There was a door at the end of the circular room leading to a large space made of concrete and twisted metal. bunk beds and seating lined the inside of most of the closed spaces. A lot of armoured personnel sat inside, playing card games and chatting. They all looked up at me when I entered as the guard shut the metal barrier to the room.
== **Chapter 12: outside at epsilonR** = ==
==
=
**Location: epsilonR, safe layer**
???:
The planet EpsilonR is unforgiving with its extreme temperatures, weather, and alien creatures. A young girl wearing protective gear sits on the balcony of the modular home. She stares at the mixed red and blue grass while crickatics ran through the foliage. She looks up through the metallic trees above and sees unknown birds with glowing wings and writes some text in a journal which will soon return to earth as valuable information about this world.
Her hair blows in the warm winds as she heads outside. A giant bubble protects her, the space base, and a small section  from the dangerous elements of the outside.
It was an unusually beautiful morning, which was rare since it is often raining acid and storms brought heavy winds. It was all going just fine for the girl, and what a waste of such a precious time it would be if she didn’t go out to explore more about this strange place.
A glimmering new rover sat inside the garage of the base. It was brand new since it was rare to get a day like this on EpsilonR. It had chain tires, protection, survey equipment, and more that was perfect for collecting data.
She walked over to the vehicle and got into the drivers side where she sat down and started the rover. A nearby crickatic was curious about the big metal structure the girl was in, and decided to jump in the cockpit as well.
The girl looked at the dog-like creature that stared back at her. It was a harmless creature, not even capable of hurting a human. Those creatures could survive almost anything. Even the conditions  inside of the dome (which was specifically designed for humans.)
“What are you doing here alien?” The girl asked…
The crickatic just blinked in response.
She sighed and petted it. “Sure, you can stay…”
She pushed the gas pedal and off they went through the blue grass and bright fields as a slight breeze comes.
== **Chapter 13: introduce yourself lad!** = ==
==
=
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
“So… who are you?” A voice rings out. It came from someone with pointed dark red armor, a bright white visor, (sorry… 3 visors I guess? I dunno, they look like 3 glowing white circles where their eyes should be. Obviously that person’s eyes were under the helmet,  right?)
The maroon guy stands up and drops his cards flat on the table without even thinking about the fact he showed the rest of the armoured people what he had in his deck.
The person sticks out his hand towards me. “I’m 17, but you call me Jack. What might your name be?”
I couldn’t really respond, so I just shook his hand tried to mime what could possibly be sign language hoping he would get the hint.
He didn’t at all. Oops…
Instead, jack just looked at my weird hand gestures and got confused. I walked past him and pointed at a notebook another person was holding and writing in. They looked up, and actually understanding what I meant, ripped out a piece of paper and handed me a pencil and said paper.
After 2 minutes, Jack finally got it.
“Oooohhhh… so you’re mute!”
I nodded my head and shrugged. Hey, if they can’t hear me, then it’s probably best to just use body language and paper.
A bright white and yellow armoured person with 4 visors, and a bird on their head read the note I written. “Your name is knight? That’s such a cool name! Is it really your actual name?”
It wasn’t, but my real name was never really good, so I just always called myself “knight”.
“I’m 3, but you can call me mira!” She carefully picked up the bird from her head. “This is Nibbit!” Mira placed the bird into my hands where the small grey creature looked at me and chirped.
I petted Nibbit and put it back with mira.
“So… I guess you are a little but confused and concerned?” A purple plague doctor leaning against a wall said. “I’m doc, or 9 if you want to know my number.” He tipped his hat and smiled (I bet. It’s hard to tell with the mask.)
“We are all tests. Those… things you passed outside of here? Those are negatives. Everyone in this area are positives. Positive tests are safe, and generally cool. Negative tests on the other hand… those humans… if they even are that… are extremely dangerous.”
Doc sat down by Jack who went to talk to someone he was previously playing with.
Mira glanced at an open cell titled “66”. “This is your room.” She said sadly. “We can get you some more “comfortable” things, like hammocks, string lights, pictures…” she went on about decorations and design.
“But first…” the person who gave me the paper said. “Have this.”
They gave me the notebook and pencil.
I quickly scribbled down “thank you” in the notebook and showed it to the “tests”. (It’s weird calling people that, but whatever…)
A clanking noise is heard across the room as a confident employee struts up and looks me down like I’m inferior to it. He rips the notebook out of my hand for no good reason.
Its arms open wide, holding my chance at communication. I reach out to grab the book back as he exclaims loudly to all the angry looking tests.
“You don’t need this, do you 66? You’re not realllly mute, stop fooling everyone for sympathy. It isn’t right you know!”
“Give it back to him 49! That is his only way to talk to us!” Mira yells from across the room, with Nibbit chirping angrily by her side.
Jack chimes in and says “49, your just an asshole. Give the book back to him, or else we will tell 255. He doesn’t like you, remember?”
49 quickly sobers up, and suddenly becomes terrified at the thought of seeing this “mysterious figure”.
“I-I’m nugget! 49 of course! H-have your stupid book b-back, I-I never n-needed it…”
Nugget then proceeded to run into a wall and fall over.
Who was 255? Why was 49 so scared of them? I asked Jack, using the notebook 49 just sharply slapped into my hands.
“Well, you are gonna have to see him yourself…” he said, looking to a darkened, cracked cell as a banging noise was heard from it.
== **Chapter 14: secret surveillance** = ==
==
=
**Location: UCA, the voidlands, firelight outpost**
Bot:
“Are you in position?”
“Yes.”
Watch was back in the apartment. He had access to all the security cameras, audio tapes, and electronic devices around where the deal was going down. He never needed a radio or walkie-talkie since we could both send signals and texts to each other without anyone knowing.
Me and Bitt were hiding in a bush, and waiting for Shapeshifter and the others to arrive.
“Beep?”
“Yea, Bitt, they should arrive soon.”
They ended up arriving 20 minutes after I said that, and Bitt headed back to base because he didn’t like sitting in a pile of shrubbery, doing nothing but waiting. I wanted him to stay here, since he was actually really good on missions. (Trust me. I know.) but he left because it sucks out here. Touché Bitt…
A figure came out from the darkness. Some might say it was a shadow, but this thing was not just some void creature. This creature was the definition of evil. It was monochrome himself. His face contrasted against the cold darkness of his body as 2 glowing white triangles. The glimmering cloak barely had form. It was more of a reflection of grey, but in reality, it glowed with colours most mortals could never see.
“Abort mission. It’s monochrome.” I told watcher. “This thing is more dangerous than anything conceivable”
“I will contact GL. He’s the only one who can get you out of there safely.”
I heard the conversation on the other side as watch tried to get in touch with GL and the others, but it was a failure. I crouched down in the bush, not wanting to make a noise.
Another shadow revealed itself. Darkness flooded through its veins. A paper bag covered its head as it walked up to monochrome. It was Shapeshifter. A shrouded veil flickered with and glitched like in a video game that covered parts of him. Shapeshifter talked in the ancient language of Code, and pointed towards the bush I was sitting in. Turns out Shapeshifter hid from the view of the cameras and watched me and Bitt jump in the bush and set things up for a trap. So we didn’t trap them, they essentially trapped us. Monochrome flicked his ghostly head around instantly, his cape following the sudden acceleration. A hand raised, and he shot massive void tendrils right at the bush I was in. I quickly dashed out, revealing I was really in the that Shapeshifter suspected. Winds unfolded, and I took off into the starry, dark sky yelling at watch and Bitt to leave the premises. NOW.
== **Chapter 15: not nice to meet you** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
Thanks to one of the tests named pilot and his good lock picking skills, I easily got out of the communal room everyone else was staying in.
I was looking for the cell right in the corner. The one covered in scratch marks, cracks, dripping with oil, and… blood? I hope that’s not blood… a sign on the door, rusted and scratched, read 255.
Jack was sitting on the railing with Doc and Rubic both leaning on it, behind me, but facing crooked cell I was standing in front of.
“Is this a good idea?” Rubic leaned in to whisper to jack, probably thinking I couldn’t hear him.
“Probably not, but everyone we’ve tried to get and tell 255 to stop being so mean didn’t work. I think this new guy can get him to be reasonable.” Jack whispered back.
“What if he responds with violence and hurts him or kills him?”
“We can fix 66 up. Easy peasy.”
I was about to knock on the door, but instead, I spun around, annoyed by their pure ignorance and what they wanted from me. So, I did what any reasonable person did, and stuck out my middle finger directly in their line of sight.
The 3 looked at each other and sighed.
“I think he heard me” rubic whispered back to Jack and Doc with absolutely no hint of being able to read the room.
I proceeded to walk back to pilot, who was still by the door, but something stopped me. Jack was standing behind me. “You wrote down that you needed a radio to talk, right?  I’ll get you a radio, if you try to get 255 to be a little nicer…”
Damn it…
I knocked on the rusted door. The noise echoed through the tunnels and walls of the area. After a few minutes, a complex metal claw shot through a hole of twisted scrap in the door. It navigated to the door panel and gently punched in a code, opening the automated contraption of broken pistons and barely functioning circuits. Inside, the cell looked much bigger than what was portrayed on the outside.
The lights above were smashed, except one, flickering and buzzing. Wires were exposed from the walls, scratches and oil stains covered the walls, and cracks spread throughout the glass. The other tests were standing in front of the cell, watching through said window, and chatting.
Half of the cell was shrouded in a cloud of darkness where the light didn’t touch.
4 glowing eyes illuminated a small bit of the shadow, it stared at the plastic table that was surprisingly clean compared to the rest of the room. But despite that, old claw marks still appeared, and oil dripped from the ceiling onto it.
“Who are you?” The darkness called out.
I wrote some stuff on a page in the notebook and ripped it out to give to the thing in the void.
“A knight hm? Sit down.” It said, pulling a chair out from under the table and revealing its dinosaur-like appearance.
It thew the chair against the wall, where it clattered on the window, adding yet another crack, and freaking out rubic who was looking through it.
Okay…
I picked up the chair and set it down by the table. One of the legs was missing and the whole thing was covered in grease, but I was not about to complain to the seven-foot-tall robot lizard person who just threw a chair so hard it broke a presumably bullet-proof window.
It was never good to act nervously around psychopaths. I remember one of my friends saying that long ago. I’m not so sure it was true, but that was something to keep in mind. So I tried my best not to act scared around this guy. You are 255 right? I asked him with the pen and paper.
“Yes.” He replied. “You aren’t supposed to be here. Correct?”
I shrugged. I’m not sure, I wrote.
“Did those fools outside send you?”
I nodded
“Mmmm… they want me to do them a favour. Don’t listen to Jack. He lies.” 255 said, getting mildly upset. His tone shifted to an aggressive sound. “You aren’t cut out for this job I’m guessing.” he said. Pacing back and forth like a supervillain. “It wasn’t what you thought it was. And to be honest, nothing’s made any sense. Correct?”
255 knew a lot more about me then I thought… “yea” I wrote.
He rips some wires out of the wall, plunging the room into complete darkness. His eyes blazed in the shadowy room.
“I need to put you through a couple of tests. No, not literally… I need to see how strong you are, and if you are worth the metal and plastic.”
What?…
“I like you, knight. But let’s see if you are worth saving.” It was then that 255 charged at me without mercy.
== **Chapter 16: I’m the best!** ==
**Location: who cares?**
Nugget:
Gah! Who are you? Why are you listening to me? Mind your own business! What? You want to know who I am? I’m Nugget a.k.a 49. I’m the best test here! No one seems to see that! That idiot purple guy? What was his name again… ah yes. 66? He obviously doesn’t need that stupid notebook. In fact, what was he thinking? Trotting in here like some kind of VIP? We can’t have anyone with that attitude around here! Stupid. So stupid!
Anyways, back to me! Everyone is so mean here! They don’t understand that I’m more important and cool than anybody there! 255? He’s a bitch, yea. You heard me! That dragon guy can screw off! Mira is too obsessed with that dumb bird. If I had the nerve, I would get rid of the thing. It won’t shut up with its squawking! (Except 255 would try to hurt me as revenge. I don’t want to accidentally kill him with my bare hands.)
Oh, you wanna know about 17? He’s stupid. Sure, jack’s charismatic, but that’s all he has going. Yea, whatever. He can smuggle almost anything into this room, but he is quite rude to me. If I had my way, I would make him respect me. But again, I don’t wanna injure him too badly. Pilot? He’s a friend of mine. Always looks up to me like everyone else rightfully should.
“No I don’t. I’m not your friend because you’re rude, who are you talking t-“ ha! Haha! Classic pilot! What a joker… I know everyone here like the back of my hand. Ask me about anyone! Go ahead!
…
Fine. Be like that. 
[end log]
== 
**Chapter 17: a good ol’ fashioned test of strength** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
I dodged the giant robo lizard by leaping to the side and 255 smashed into the wall, splattering oil and other debris everywhere. Unfortunately, I lost my footing and slipped from the large puddle on the ground. Meanwhile, 255 freed his alloy claw from the rubble. I fell on my butt while said robo lizard looked down at me with pure menace. But, I had an idea. The notebook! It was on the table with a few minor stains and rips. I got ahold of it and ripped out some pages. Soaking them in the oily black liquid on the floor. I crumpled up the wet pages, and threw them at his eyes. Hopefully temporarily blinding him.
Every single piece of paper missed and slapped the back of the wall with a large SLAP. 255 caught the last one without even flinching.
He calmly said “Well, it’s a start.” And tossed the crumpled sheet aside.
He smashed the ground where I just was sitting with a massive fist. I luckily rolled out the way, but he still caught me with his other mechanical claw and picked me up like a stray cat, holding me by the neck.
I screamed, but clearly 255 couldn’t hear my pleas for help, not that it would’ve stopped him anyways... His eyes flickered a deep red, and he threw me through the window.
The guys standing outside, watching had to jump out of the way as I sailed past them and banged into the lead banister, the red paint flaking off of it and promptly dissolving.
I covered my head with my arms as 255 marched out onto the broken glass with rubic, jack, and doc trembling at the sight of him. He turned towards them and yelled to go away. They ran off, and 255 glanced back at me, and laughed. He picked me up again, but this time, put me back on my feet.
“I need you to let me punch you in the face.” He said, handing the notebook to me.
“What?” I wrote “why though?”
255 didn’t even care to answer that. He instead just punched me right in the jaw and I fell asleep. Again. Yes, you heard me. Again. 
5 minutes later…
“66 is fine… relax 17,”
“Are you sure? Shouldn’t he have a concussion?”
“what? No… remember? I told you already, his suit heals him faster, and takes most of the damage.”
“Oh right.”
“Yea. Like all the exploration test suits. I didn’t tell you that before? Cmon man. You should know this by now after being here for 4 years. Your suit is like that too.”
“That’s good.”
Jack and doc were sitting over me. Doc had a flashlight and he was pointing it directly into my eyes. I carefully got up, plucked the flashlight from his fingers, and pushed it into the big pit where after a minute of falling, a clunk! Was heard from the bottom.
“Please 66! Can you stop being salty? We’re sorry alright!”
I shoved a note in his face. “No! Nothing has made sense all day! and frankly, you people aren’t helping! Making me talk to a psychopathic robo lizard!”
I got up (yes, for the 16th time probably), slapped doc for whatever reason. (He did literally nothing, but I’m angry at him nonetheless)
After everything today, a nap would be really nice right now if I’m honest…
== **Chapter 18: what a wonderful world.** ==
**Location: UCA, Click’s Bar.**
Click:
The sign in the bar was flipped to show some big bold words that read CLOSED in red. It wasn’t like anyone would visit there anyways since the street is almost always empty. It was time to leave for a bit. Just to see my friend in the mountains and trees of the stompy woods. She was always welcoming, caring and wonderful, but of course she was. She is a stompy. A balloon-like creature with short arms and legs; Often called nubs. Like me, she owned a restaurant as well. But she had a bustling cafe with customers coming from across the universe just to try her specialty tea and cookies. She discovered those special foods from another universe and decided to sell them to the public. How she found them though, is a mystery. Yet she does say she had a friend on earth that showed her the secret recipes and helped her when she got trapped in the other world, Earth.
I was heading to the Stomp Cafe to see her. We’ve been chatting through mail for a while now since the trip was too long. It’s been a few years, but it’s the Cafe’s 50th anniversary and she would love a small surprise.
I took the taxi rail to a stop just outside the chaotically complex city. The station it stopped at was beautiful and overflowing with flora. A large tree covered the roof with a flurry of flowers and leaves as the sunlight passed through the delicate branches. Lovely sounds of rainbirds chirping and fluttering leaves filled the air. The wooden rail station looked and smelled like it had a fresh coat of brown paint, covering the exterior. 
“Do you smell that?” The creature with a fishing hat on a rickety wooden bench said. A big grin appeared on its face as it lifted its head to sniff the warm air. “The flowers have bloomed for this joyful occasion!”
“Why, perhaps they have!” I replied to the creature. Its ears perked up, and he handed me a pamphlet. “If you’re interested, FlowerFest is tonight. It’s a small town celebration welcoming the bloom of the flowers! Everyone is invited! There is free food and a local band coming to play some melodies!”
“That sounds wonderful!” The grassy fields of Florain are famous for a magical flower that blooms for one week every year. The town is even more famous for the amazing festival they have commemorating the spectacular event. I remember going to the celebration every year when I was younger, and it always lived up to the hype! So why not stop and stay tonight? Hotels are cheap and limitless here anyways, so it won’t be too hard to find somewhere comfortable.
The rest of the day consisted of hanging out with the creature in the hat (whose name was ironically Fish, and unsurprisingly was a fisherman.) and helping set up an assortment of magical flowers all over the town square. Fish set up his trading booth, covered in the prettiest blue and green flowers. “They mask the scent of the fresh seafood.” He told me, carrying a box of violet viperfish. Fish was right. The scent of the seafood was almost unnoticeable when next to the bright flora.
Another fluffer with a green coat of mossy fur set up a booth next to Fish’s stand. The green fluffer had been moving a ton of garden tools and accidentally dropped all of them. “Aw man! I almost had it!” He murmured to himself as he kicked a nearby marigold spade.
I rushed over and picked up a shovel, a pitchfork, a bag of soil, and other items and brought them to the booth covered in a blanket of leaves and ferns.
“Thank you! Uh… whats your name sir?” Said the green fluffer, relieved that nothing had broke.
“No problem! My name is click! What is it that your booth is for if I don’t mind asking?”
“I sell plants, flowers, fruit, you name it! But I mostly sell cotton. It’s the fluffiest around! All from my nursery. Flumer’s greenhouse!” He had a big toothy smile on his face, obviously happy to be at such an amazing place.
I laughed. “Well… I guess I gotta get something now, don’t I?”
“Aww. Welllll you don’t havvveee to, but it would be cool!”
“Ha! Nah… I’m messing with you! Of course i’m getting something! I have a friend I’m visiting soon, so a bouquet from the best town to get flowers is actually quite convenient.”
I bought a bouquet of some pretty red and gold magic flowers. But as I turned around to go and check out the other events, The fluffer gave one last tip. “Those flowers are very powerful. You can pluck a petal for a random effect. Sometimes, they are really great! It can gift you something of good fortune. But, there is a chance it could backfire and give you bad luck or bad fortune.”
“Good to know.”
The sun by this point had set, but that’s when people came out to celebrate. The magic flowers sparkled with tints of red, blue, and purple and glowing yellow pollen rose into the atmosphere, floating into the sky with a flash of light kinda like a reverse meteor shower. It was an incredible sight to witness, and creatures flooded to watch it on the edge of the town where the fields stretched into the horizon.
The entire evening was full of local music and the scent of fresh flowers. But even though staying up all night would be fun, it was time to find a hotel to stay in for now since I had a long journey ahead.
Luckily, I found one far enough away from the crowds that I could stay there without being worried about the sounds and lights.
Tomorrow is a big day. A big day for travelling.
== **Chapter 19: stiff as concrete** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
There were a few old couches pressed against the wall. It was rock hard like a brick, and it smelled faintly of chlorine. It’s better then nothing I guess…
“Uh… hi again?” It was pilot. The person who opened the door previously with his lock picks. He sat on the opposite couch.
What is it that you want? I wrote.
“Tough day?”
I nodded. Will they actually get the radio?
“Probably… it just might take a few months.”
I should’ve expected that.
“So? Why are you here? What draws you to dimension labs?”
It’s a long story…
“Ah.”
Why are you here?
“I’ve been here for a few months. I needed a job to help my family out because we all couldn’t afford the healthcare that my sister needs.”
She got better though, right?
Pilot didn’t reply.
…
Pilot? Are you alright?
By this point, he got up and left. But I quickly got an idea and stood up to run after him.
Pilot! Wait! I have an idea! I waved. We are leaving. Tonight. I remembered the route here through the facility and you can easily get through the doors right?
“Listen 66,” pilot said. “It’s no use. I’ve tried. We have all tried to escape. Hell, 255? He knows every vent, closet, and room in here. He even has a hole that tunnels through the  lower floors but that bastard won’t help. They have employees everywhere. Watching and waiting. They have other tests dedicated to hunting us down if we leave, and they aren’t friendly. Trust me.”
What if theoretically, I got the help of 255?
“It’s not worth it. That thing will shred you to pieces. I’m not even kidding. He eats metal, and what are you made of?”
Uh… cells?
“You really are an idiot, aren’t you? Or do you just not care about your own life?”
I shrugged. What could possibly happen anyways? An hour passes, and I have somehow kept my word.
“You want me to WHAT?” 255 roars. “I am NOT doing that you IMBECILE!” His cold tone shifts to a loud, jagged laugh. “I don’t do favours 66, especially ones as stupid as that! And to think I thought you were better than the others?”
But instead of backing down, I did something unbelievable.
I… I gave 255 a hug. I know, it was a dumb idea, but… he calmed down.
“… it’s just not a good idea. This… is more serious, 66.” 255 exclaimed, wrapping his arms around me. He quickly pulled away from the hug, and his voice returned to the cold, emotionless way it was before. “Now. Get out of here before I rip your skull in half.”
== **Chapter 20: racing the wind** ==
**Location: epsilonR, cliffs layer**
???:
Tires screeched and the girl with the crickatic hopped out of the rover which now had a thin layer of metallic dirt and foliage. They have been driving for about an hour, stopping every now and then to place down a marker and collect some samples of the grass, dirt, and rocks.
“Have you been here before?” She asked the alien, who was eating a sandwich the girl had made for herself. The crickatic ignored her and continued to eat on her lunch.
“Hey! You can’t have that! That’s my food!”
The crickatic ran off with the sandwich and the girl chased behind him, both of them running along the sandy white cliff faces. Static electricity fizzed through the shining sands on the edges of the crevices. Those pits went deep into epsilonR, and the bottom bubbled with lava and molten glass. The duo ended up avoiding every single hole in the ground.
After 15 minutes, the girl sat down with the alien dog. “I give up. You can have it.” She said, defeated. The crickatic happily ate the last remaining piece of the sandwich.
A big gust of wind blew through the air, and the ground shook with the distant sounds of crashing rocks.
“I think that’s our sign to leave.” She said, gently putting the crickatic back in the rover. She once again started the engine, sliding the pixelated buttons and levers on the digital display. The wheels slid under the rover as some hidden magnetic machinery turned the ordinary rover into a floating car. It blasted into the sky without a sound, and they were off to the next layer of epsilonR!
== 
**Chapter 21: stories through the multiverse** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
A few months had passed, and still no sign of the radio. Over that time, I learned sign language with the help of Mira and Gun (another newbie that joined a few weeks earlier. He apparently had a deaf cousin that he learned sign language from. Gun also had an obsession with well… guns and ammunition.)
In fact, the team learned sign language. All 60 of us. Mostly to pass the time, but also to communicate with me and a few other mute or deaf tests.
My friend pilot was the first person to pitch the idea. “What if we found a different way to communicate with knight? It would be a fun thing to do, and it would be a pretty useful!” He said.
I even got close to Jack, Rubic, And Doc somehow. It was probably because Rubic and Doc were the only people able to fix everyone up, and Jack was actually quite a stand up dude. (Even though he did make me meet 255, who I had now learned was called Apex.)
Every night, someone would tell stories in the makeshift stage made out of steel sheet metal and wood. Tonight, it was Mira’s turn.
“Now, you all know about dimension 80, the infinite tree world, but have you ever heard of the underwater vent dimension? This one was classified with the help of Chirp, who named this newly discovered world: dimension 1029! Give it up for Chirp!”
Everyone clapped at Chirp’s accomplishment!
“Alright. So, dimension 1029 is a universe full of a new composition of water. It is not only much lighter, but also a clear red from the concentration of iron. T the entire universe seems to be a world of water, and there is a ton of special life and energy inside of this dimension. So far, we have classified 600 amazing species living here! The unfortunate thing is, the pressure is very immerse and the vents are very hot. Humans are not able to live down there…”
Mira’s speech went on for around about 15 minutes, and at the end, everyone headed to bed.
“Hey! Mira!” I signed. “I have a question. How did you guys manage to survive down there? Did you use a submarine or something?”
“Oh yea! Absolutely.” She responded. “Me, Chirp, and tooth had to sit in a tiny submarine, while also having to make sure we had enough oxygen and the pressure wasn’t too much for the sub.”
“Sounds like it was hard!”
“Not as hard as some missions, sometimes the universes we have to explore are very dangerous. Like lava everywhere, black holes, or even other sentient, smart creatures. You should see universe 130. It’s a giant world of intelligent shapes.”
“Woah… weird.”
“Indeed. Speaking of which, you get to go on the next mission with us! It’s to a universe called 999. Apparently, it’s like a bunch of different galaxies combined. From what I heard, it’s like a child’s dreamland. Like fluffy creatures everywhere, magical crystals, and there is a city in the sky!”
“Really? How do you know about it?”
“I know pilot went there once, he said it was amazing, but a lot of the creatures there aren’t that friendly. I remember him talking about a wolf person. Not sure what that’s about though.”
When I first heard about alternative universes, I thought everyone else was crazy. For the first few weeks, I just couldn’t believe that other dimensions existed. All with their own unique worlds full of life and laws of physics. But I soon found out they really did exist. And not only that, humans have found a way to link them together using special portals and magnets. How, you might ask?
Well, I walked past chambers of animals that you would never find here on earth. Like big, fluffy spider-like creatures with 4 adorable round eyes, 4 legs, a stinger, and 2 big antennas. It had a British accent, and somehow spoke perfect English.
“You there! Human!” It shouted through the glass to me. “Could you be a kind sir and free me from this petty imprisonment? Those others have caged me like some crazed animal! Where is the respect? They certainly cannot test on me! Mr. Fluff…”
Another creature sat in a big glass tank. This one was white and fluffy, bigger than a Great Dane, and also spoke in somewhat good English.
“Mr. Fluff, don’t get the attention of that human.” It said in Disgust, “That one is clearly too worried about itself to help you or me.”
A blob of water and reeds paced up and down the lengths of its container. It spoke in a muffled, wet voice. It didn’t listen to the other alien things, it instead mumbled to itself.
“Does this world have lakes? I would love to go for a swim right now…”
Looks like the other tests were right. There were alternate universes, and our job was to explore them.
== 
**Chapter 22: the argument of gods** ==
**Location: UCA, somewhere near red’s cave**
Bot:
Some how, us 3 got out of that town safely. The rest of UPA fought Monochrome out of the town too. Me, watch, and Bitt headed to red’s cave to regroup and plan what we should do next to make sure Monochrome doesn’t try anything dangerous or evil towards UCA. Fennec had just been talking with the other creators when we burst in.
“Bot? Watch? Bitt? What are you lads doing here? Didn’t I tell you that this meeting was strictly for the creators and I? She snarled. Fennec was in a really bad mood, probably from discussing things with the others.
“Hm. I thought I was a creator? Why wasn’t I invited?” I replied, getting increasingly frustrated.
“It’s private. Non of your business, Bot. Plus, you’re too immature to make big decisions with us.”
“Immature? That’s the problem? You PROGRAMMED me to be like this! I haven’t changed since the last 500 years!”
She closed her eyes and sighed.
“That’s not the point. Your job is to save UCA from destruction. Not make decisions for the universe. That’s our job. Now, get your friends and go. We will talk later.”
“But-“
“No. Go, get some rest. You guys need it.”
I huffed out of her cave along with Watch and Bitt. It was useless trying to convince her otherwise, she only sees me like a child. But I had a plan. Watch was just as disappointed as I was. He worked for UPA and Bolto’s team for years as an assistant, helping track enemies and monitoring the creator crystals. Watch had more experience then anyone in the industry and was incredibly loyal and helpful for the creators and protection teams for UCA. If anyone deserved to help make decisions for UCA’s safety, it should’ve been Watch. Bitt on the other hand was more of an emotional support robot.
Ok, on to the plan.
We get help from someone else, someone just as powerful that can scare off monochrome. But who would that person be? If the creators aren’t going to help, then who else?
Hmm, what about…
I told them about my plan. “I got it. LIGHT and VOID! They balance the spectrum, and I don’t think they want a new creature taking over the spectrum. That’s because they want their realms to take over the universe instead.”
Watch grabbed my shoulder. “No. You aren’t doing that. They HATE you! Remember?”
I can’t believe I forgot that one detail, those dragons don’t like the creatures in the grey side, and they especially hate me.
Just then, Fennec opened the door. With a big smile, it was clear she was hiding what she was thinking before. Her fluffy fur flowed in the breeze, and she proudly stood by the cave entrance. She didn’t like talking to or about me around the other creators for some reason, yet she was always liked to talk to the other creations with the other creators. I guess Fennec had her favourites… and I wasn’t one of them.
“Was it monochrome?” She said with a happy expression.
“Ye- wait… how do you know that? Did Gale call you?” I replied.
“NoOoO, I gUeSsEd! Of course Gale called. That squib does her job right. Unlike a certain robot I know…”
Watch shifted uncomfortably, he didn’t know Fennec was talking about me. Fennec looked up at watch.
“My lad, you did everything perfectly.” She told him. “You followed protocol, and helped the best you could.”
“Oh, thanks.” He said. I could tell watch was blushing, even if it wasn’t possible for a sentient security camera to.
“It’s Bot I have a fluffin’ problem with, you two are good to go now.” She tells Bitt and watch, who both nervously leave. They take the rocky path back to stompy woods, and Fennec yanks me back into her cave.
== **Chapter 23: sometimes, cutting corners is best.** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
A guy wearing a tuxedo and surrounded by security personnel entered the big community cell. He wore modern aviator shades, and had brown spiky hair. He definitely had the stereotypical rich kid vibe, like he owned the place.
“Who is that guy?” I signed to Jack.
Jack looked up from the table and signed back; “N. his name is N. He’s one of those idiot executives whose only concern is how much money he rolls in for the company.”
Pilot shovelled his blueprints and plans back under his bed while Mira quietly placed Nibbit in one of the small vents so the mysterious man wouldn’t see him.
N stood in front of the door. If he had any pitty for us, he certainly didn’t show it, because he had not an ounce of emotion on his face.
“66 and 22, you have to come with me.” He said, pointing directly towards my general position.  “And the rest of you, take down the decorations. You know they aren’t allowed because it’s against protocol.”
Everyone except 49 booed. 255 (who decided to hang out with us for some, scary reason,) threw a table at the wall. “Noo! That’s my favourite table!” 100 said, now in tears (I have no idea how that was possible, but apparently it was. What has this world come to?)
10 minutes later, me, pilot, N, and some of the armoured personnel stepped through the door of an… obstacle course?
After a brief lecture of what to do, N told us this.
“You have 20 minutes to complete the entire exercise course. If you fail to finish it in the given time, or you fall off, you must restart the entire course.” He pauses for a second and presses a button. “Your time starts now.”
Pilot dashes through the beginning. He effectively climbs a rocky vertical slope, and leaps to catch a platform suspended by a rope. Unfortunately, he misses entirely and tumbles into the water.
N turns to me. “What are you doing? Your time is ticking 66! Get up there and do the damn exercise!”
*righty then.*
I stumbled up to the rock wall first. It was almost entirely smooth, save for a few cracks and branches sticking out like a sore thumb. I grab one of the cracks, and then another. And another, until… finally I grab a branch at the top. But it crumbles, and I fall into the water. Just like Pilot did, only a bit more embarrassing.
Over on the shore, Pilot snickers, and N just shakes his head disapprovingly. “Both of you, try again.” He says, mildly annoyed.
“I think we’re gonna be here a while,” Pilot laughs.
“Ha! Definitely!” I sign.
We walk over to the starting point again, and the timer is reset. This time, we decide to work together. Pilot helps me up over the rock wall, and I show pilot how to land right on the swinging platform. Obstacle #3 proves a bigger challenge, and we both fall off into the water again.
Attempt after attempt, we both keep failing and falling, making N more upset each time.
“What is this stupid company doing? Hiring total newbies all the time!? If I had my way I-“ pilot cuts N off from his rant.
“Ok come on N, where on earth are you going to find any *soldiers?* look at 66! He’s a garbage collector!”
*no wait,* I signed. *I’m a treasure hunte-*
“And I doubt anyone here actually has experience that you want. Heck, no one in the world has the experience you want! It’s unrealistic!”
N was furious and was so red, you would think he was about to explode! N was probably the type of person to never be argued with, yet here pilot was, yelling at a powerful individual about how most of the tests aren’t built for this type of exercise and experience since most tests were just normal people.
He had finally had enough, and just made us go through the obstacle course until we were exhausted and soaked.
“Whew! What hard work!” Pilot said exasperated. He swung a towel over his shoulder. “How on earth do we get through that last obstacle?”
*Honestly, I’m not sure man. We run out of time as soon as we reach it!*
“Hmm… what if… we try a different way of getting around the obstacles to cut back time?”
*what do you mean?*
“Do you see that wire over there?” He pointed to a thin coil of steel thread connecting the starting point to an obstacle ear the end. “We could climb that and get to the other side without having to worry too much about the timer!”
*that wire is not suspended over water though. What happens if we fall?*
“We won’t.”
Back at the beginning of the course, the timer started its countdown. 4:59. 4:58. 4:57… pilot scaled the wall gracefully like a goat, and then hoisted my sorry butt up the rock wall. The wire was attached to the ledge we stood on, and a few hundred feet away was the other side with the end of the wire tied to another hook, essentially making a tightrope.
Pilot looked over the edge. The floor was probably 50 feet below us. “Hey! Why don’t you go first!”
*what? No. This was your idea!*
“Ghhhhh… fine.”
He pulls up a different rope that was hanging from the hook and hands the end to me. “If we fall off, then we can just slide to the floor slowly.”
*that could work*
Pilot goes first, and hugs the wire after fastening the other rope to his waist. He inches along the wire very slowly, trying not to look down. After about a minute, he makes it to the middle. I had to get on the wire with him, or else we would have to restart yet again. So I go for it. Rope in hand, I crawl along the wire with the oh so fast speed of a sloth. Eventually, I reach pilot in the middle. I wanted to ask him why he stopped, but I couldn’t considering I was holding onto the wire for dear life.
“There is a problem.” He said shakily. “I’m scared knight.”
He looked into my eyes. He was a tough person, not showing any signs of weakness or emotion. But despite that, under the helmet was still just a terrified kid. I unclenched the wire, and slowly signed something to him.
*you are the bravest person I’ve ever met pilot. You’ve got this. The objective is only a few meters away.*
He sighed, “I guess so…”
*we don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, we can go through the normal obstacles instead if you want…*
Pilot regained his breath, and pulled himself along the wire to the end within a minute, and then pulled me over the ledge as well.
*someone doesn’t take no as an answer I see!*
Pilot didn’t see what I said, because he was already on the next obstacle. “Cmon knight! There is only a minute left! Hurry!”
The obstacle in question was this giant spinning tower. Big wooden logs soared around and around really fast. We didn’t have a second to lose, and the switch was right on the other side of the obstacle! We twisted and ducked out of the way of the flying logs, and fell onto the finishing ledge.
With 10 seconds to spare, we both flip the lever to finish.
== **Chapter 24: downtown trolly** ==
**Location: UCA, town of Florain**
Click:
Throughout the night, distant music and lights flowed through the air like a chinook: Warm and subtle. The celebration seemed so far away from this room, despite being only half a block away. Maybe it was the sound proof walls, or the magic flower’s influence. Whatever it was, it led me to be well rested and prepared for the trip to the next stop. I thanked Flumer and Fish for the hospitality, and paid for a trolly ticket to the next and final destination.
I soon got on the carriage. It had peeling emerald green paint, with painted gold outlines and an old wooden interior with cracked brown leather seats. I sat down in one of the many empty seats and placed my sleeping and camping gear overhead on the rusted wire rack. The trolly wasn’t very big, but it was no big surprise considering most people came here to stay in Florain from the city.
The trolley screeched and pulled away from the station, and 4 large, wooden winds unfolded from the top of the vessel and lifted it into the clouds. They clung to the trolly like glue, but eventually the carriage overcame the fog and skirted through the sky. Decorative floating temples and homes rested above the clouds, while the horizon filled the sky with a massive flying city and beautiful green and red foliage covering the wooden buildings and gardens. Beautiful paper lanterns hung by a thread over the streets of the city.
A fuzzy speaker turned on, giving the few people in the trolly a small tour.
*Hello everyone, this is your conductor speaking. This wonderful floating town we are passing through is called Cloudeir. Famous for its ancient modes of sky transportation, Cloudeir is the home town of the steam wings. These are used in almost every historical town and village in UCA as transportation to higher places, and it is even used for floating buildings! In fact, this trolly uses steam wings like every single other trolly in UCA.*
However, Cloudeir was not my destination, and after stopping at a sky station to drop off and pick up a few other passengers, it was time to hit the road (err… sky) again. Puffs of steam swallowed the trolly, and it lifted into the sky from the platform.
The carriage soon left the cloudy red city, and when the clouds cleared up, we soared over a gigantic mountain range, nicknamed “North Cliffs”. The nickname wasn’t a joke. These mountains truly were the most northern part of the grasslands. Yet, they confusingly weren’t all that distant. Most of the peaks maintained a thick layer of fog and some bright white snow at the tallest points, while the green valley below sparkled with a large blue lake. Beyond the mountains were cliffs that stretched upwards forever, and dark skies of dust. No one was allowed in the grey wastes, and for good reason. They were the borders of the spectrum, and no one goes through there, unless they were gods.
We landed safely in the Stompy Woods station. I thanked the captain and dismounted from the trolly. The Stompy Woods was a big forest city with big tree houses. These giant trees could house hundreds of stompys easily! Making the forest more of an urban sprawl with dozens of businesses and homes.
The one such cafe I was looking for wasn’t too hard to find. It sat on a hill across the lake, in a small but beautiful tree filled with dangling lights and paper stars. Mounted on this cherry blossom tree was a sign that read “Stomp’s cafe”, and there was even a small line in front of the shop.
An hour long walk later, and I was inside the cafe. There she was, my friend Rosemary was handing out her special cookies and treats to the customers.
== **Chapter 25: shadows of light** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Knight:
N was surprisingly calm about the fact we cheated. In fact, he was impressed. In his words it was “better to cut corners then to die not thinking outside the box.” 
We left the training arena, and started to head back to the test room, when he stopped us.
“Tomorrow, you will be going on your first mission with 17 and 3. Your job is to collect samples of any and all materials you can find, and send them back here. You will be going to dimension 999. We will brief you more on it at 10:00 am. Get some rest.”
The day of the mission came faster than we expected, and we said our goodbyes to everyone else. (Even nugget.)  because apparently these missions have high mortality rates. (Don’t think about it, Knight. Don’t think about it…) Mira and jack were not at all surprised by the news. They were experts in exploring and documenting universes. However, they were trying to hide the fact that they were concerned about me and pilot.
Pilot overheard them talking secretly in the corner. He said they were wondering if it was a good idea to even let newbies explore the dimensions. “Dimension labs is running out of time. They need people finding new resources fast to keep humanity afloat.” He said, while spying on Mira and jack. “They say dimension 999 is generally safe, except for some of the aliens. They don’t like humans apparently.”
*interesting.* I signed. *what do you think it’s like?*
“Remember when Mira was talking about the dimensions they’ve surveyed? They said there was some sort of dog creature living there, and how similar it was to earth? Minus all the trash and pollution of course… like how it used to be. Green grass, big trees, blue skies. All that, but more magical. With dragons and crystals?”
*it sounds like a world straight out of someone’s imagination!*
“Oh it is according to Mira!”
*a change of scene will be nice, how long are we going to be there?*
“Should be an hour and a half, max.” Jack said, slightly annoyed. “You too shouldn’t be eavesdropping ya know.”
Pilot froze. He didn’t expect Jack to be behind him, and he certainly didn’t expect to be heard by them. “Uhhh? What? No… we weren’t listening to you, we were talking about… uhh…” pilot plucked Nibbit off of the ground. “Nibbit! We were talking about Nibbit!” Nibbit hopped out of pilot’s arms, and flew back to Mira angrily.
“Fine… we were eavesdropping on you… but it’s his fault!” He pointed to me.
*DUDE!?*
15 minutes later, we sat on a bench in the observation room that pointed towards the big portal machine. N paced back and forth, briefing us about what to do in case of emergency, what samples and info to bring back, and what to watch out for. Meanwhile, the other scientists were working on opening the portal. Some +’s ran around, making sure everything was in check. “T-minus 3… 2… 1…” brilliant bright white light illuminated the entire building! In the contraption appeared a small white triangle that consisted of light, barely big enough for someone to step through. The 4 of us made our way to the spinning portal.
Mira ducked through first, and the rest of us followed after her with a cart full of tools and boxes to put the samples.
“Where is the green grasslands and magic forests?” Curiously asked pilot? “Why is everything grey? And why are we different colours?”
“Good question. It’s light. Light in these worlds work much differently. The colours are much more prominent, and what we see as grey on earth, turns into a completely different colour.” Look back through the portal! Everything looks much more monochrome!” Mira said!
I stared at my feet. Instead of my armor being grey and cyan, it was purple and yellow! Pilot appeared to be a much brighter blue, Jack was a much more vibrant red, and Mira was more white then yellow!
“Woah! Knight! Your armor is amazing! It’s so pretty!” Pilot said!
Jack picked up a shovel and scooped the shiny grey sand into a beaker. “We have work to do guys, and we don’t want to risk wasting time. Remember, this universe is still really dangerous.”
“Aww… ok…”
We all grabbed a tool and got to work collecting samples of everything we saw. Mira ran to a rock and chipped off a few pieces, while I carefully yanked some glowing grass. Pilot rolled the cart over to each of us, and silently labeled the containers.
*what is that?* there in the distance was some sort of… crystal? I walked over to what it was, and before I knew it, I reached out to touch it. The ground suddenly trembled and violently shook, the sand flew through the air!
“What the *hell* was THAT?” Pilot yelled! He fell on his butt into the sand, while Jack and Mira ran around frantically collecting all the supplies and shoving them back into the cart.
They all crossed back into the portal safely, but I was still a few hundred feet away from the portal. The ground shook even more, and a giant snake thing crashed through the ground. The giant snake towered over the portal, and dove back through the ground, slicing through it like butter. I was speechless, what is that thing? It was like a giant metallic worm with yellow stripes?
“Hey idiot! Get over here before it wants to eat you!” Jack called from inside the portal!
*oh shit* I ran towards them, but it was too late. The snake thing saw the portal and smashed it with a quick swing of its tail, and the glowing triangle dissipated into sparkling white particles. The snake thing wasn’t done though. It turned towards me and made a bloodcurdling roar.
*oh SHIT* I ran as fast as I could away from the beast, but the land around me was crumbling into oblivion, *NOPENOPENOPE NOT TODAY! WAS IT BECAUSE I TOUCHED THAT SHINY THING? I WONT DO IT AGAIN, I PROMISE!* by this point, I would need a miracle to… wait, is that… a dog in a skirt?
“A dog in a skirt, is that really who you think I am?” It said, it stood in front of the crystal I was looking at a few minutes before. The snake thing quickly disappeared back into the sand, leaving a giant hole in its wake. Clearly it was scared of whatever this small furry creature is, but why?
The small dog walked up to me, and held out its little black paw for some sort of handshake. “Hi! I’m Redwolf!” It said, smiling with a cute little face. Redwolf had big yellow eyes, 2 big fluffy ears-like things, a black and purple coat of fur, and a red dress with an even redder bandana.
“You must be the bad guy trying to steal my crystal!” It said in a friendly tone. “Are you a human? You look like a human!” I tried to respond, but of course, I couldn’t. So I whipped out my trusty notebook.
“There is no need for that, I can read the subtitles.”
*subtitles?*
Redwolf laughed. “You really know nothing do you, human! This world is a living story, and I am its creator, and I know what you are thinking.” She said this with a hint of menace.
*you can hear me?*
“Yep!”
*that’s a relief, it’s been so long si-*
“You know you are under the arrests, right?” Redwolf interrupted. She snapped her fingers, and everything went dark.
== **Chapter 26: dominating force** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Pilot:
“No… not knight…” I felt dizzy and sat down on the staircase. The other two joined me. “He’s stuck in there, stuck in that stupid dimension with whatever that thing was.”
Jack thought for a minute. “We need to get dimension labs to open another portal. We need to find and bring him back to earth…”
“But how? We can’t just open a portal! This dumb place would never let us!”
Mira stood up. “It’s no use waiting for a solution, I have an idea. We need to get him out of there ASAP!”
We followed Mira back to the community cell, avoiding all the pesky staff trying to ask us questions about the universe we surveyed. We will be caught and questioned, but for now, getting the help of the others was the most important task.
Mira and jack headed to the positive community cells to tell everyone what happened and what to do, while I ran down the negative wing to convince the monster himself, 255 to help us get our friend Knight back.
Without a hint of emotion, 255 agreed to help. Mira and jack gathered the rest of the positives into a giant auditorium at the bottom floor. It wouldn’t take dimension labs to get us back in the cells, but for now that didn’t matter. Both Mira and Jack were long standing veterans of this company. They were the type of people who would be respected by everyone.
“Before we start, please make sure the doors are locked, the entries are barricaded, and the security sensors are off so *they* don’t get in or hear this.” Mira said on the makeshift stage. 3 positives went around, smashing the sensor, while rubic and doc pushed some bulky furniture in front of the doors. The confused Tests quickly hushed down to hear what we had to say.
“So, as you know, almost every week, we lose someone to a universe. This is not good. Today, we lost a very good friend to one of those places. He is stuck on the other side, and we aren’t sure whether they are dead or not.” Mira called Doc to the stage, and motioned him to bring out a piece of paper he was carrying in his journal. “This list contains the names of everyone who either died or was trapped in a universe. As you can see, it contains dozens of people. And this list only counts the casualties this *year*. How many more must perish at the hands of this corrupt administration?”
The crowd was undeniably concerned, and we were flooded with questions. “What do we do?” “How do we get our colleagues back?” “This is ridiculous! No one needs saving! Clearly those people were weak!” (That last line was said by nugget. Who was then beat up by 6 other people as the crowd booed him.)
Mira responded to the questions by telling everyone to ask her later when we figure everything out. “Ok, here is the plan.” She told the 1000+ people in the auditorium.
“So, as you know, the only way to save our friends is with the portal. Meaning… we have to take over the portal machine from the company. Also meaning… we have to take over the company. *or at least this building.*”
“How do you think we do that? It’s impossible! And stupid!” Nugget yelled from the back.
Some Tests were about to start pummeling him again, when Mira stopped them. “He has a good point. This is stupidly reckless. But it doesn’t have to be if we do it right. If we don’t do this, who would be next? It could be any one of us! Lost to whatever horrible dimension or experiment those idiots in the executive branch wanted.”
*BANG!* the furniture in front of the doors was slowly giving in, and it was clear the company’s task force was trying to force themselves into the room. Mira told everyone to hurry back to their respective community cells, and to wait for further instructions. By the time sector-8’s task force of experienced negatives broke in, they were quite confused to see not a single trace of the crowd. We watched them from them balcony hurriedly run around, checking every corner and niche for anything.
All they found was the broken furniture in front of the doors, and a note dropped purposely from that traitor, Nugget.
== 
**Chapter 27: underwater interrogation** ==
**Location: the S.S predator, the leviathan sea, UCA**
Knight:
The small closet style room had chains hanging from the ceiling. A dusty wooden cupboard slid gently from side to side. In fact, the entire room swayed back and forth. The single circular window in this room barely glowed a darkish blue. *this can’t be universe 999, so I guess I’m back on earth?*
“You aren’t. This is UCA” said a voice behind me. It didn’t sound like Redwolf, but it could be… “I’m not Redwolf either.” The voice said, walking around the table to reveal itself to be… a tv monitor? For once, I wasn’t even scared or angry. Just confused. “Fennec brought you here. She desperately wanted to interrogate you, but she had to go fight some spider mech thing that came for the exact same crystal you did.”
*fennec? And can everyone read minds in this place?* I thought.
“Redwolf is her nickname, and no. Only me and a few others can read the subtitles.”
*what are these subtitles you guys keep talking about, and what is going on?*
“Well… I would tell you, but honestly I don’t know. Fennec doesn’t tell me anything. She just wants me to do my job. Stupid really, but I can’t do anything about it. The subtitles are just words we can see. That’s how I’m able to talk to you right now, but that doesn’t matter. I have a proposal for you.”
The lightbulb flickered above while the room swayed again. *a proposal?*
“A lot of creatures here would kill you if they had the chance, including Fennec. It’s not safe here. So, I want to get you home. However, there is of course, a catch.”
I felt sick, but overjoyed at the same time. This robot wanted to help me. But on the flip side, I was a walking target. *you want to… help me?*
“Precisely. But only if you agree to helping me with something in return.”
*what do you want me to do?*
“I want you to help me destroy a crystal. I want to prove to Fennec that she can’t get away with bossing me around. It won’t be too hard, I can deal with all the difficult stuff while you can break it.”
*whats so important about these crystal things? Redw- er… Fennec looked pretty upset when I first saw her, but she got all friendly when she was talking to me. My friends back home said something about the crystals being all powerful. Is that true?*
“They are actually really important, but we only need to break a minor one to piss off fennec. I know the perfect one.” The tv robot summoned a transparent hologram crystal. It was cloudy and white. It even held a small electric charge just like the one in the grey sandy place. “This is the sand crystal. I’m not too sure what it does, but I think it just weakens the wyrms a bit. Nothing too powerful.”
I didn’t like this guy one bit. He certainly didn’t show any emotion, I mean… he is a robot after all, but he probably was right. The other Tests had mentioned before about how dangerous some of the other creatures were. Especially that dog, Redwolf. Yet nobody said anything about this robot person. Maybe he felt bad for me. Maybe he was bluffing and wanted to kill me. Maybe… he just wanted to toss me to the wolves after I did what he wanted.
“I know what you are thinking, but listen. I’m your best bet. Don’t believe me? Read this.” He pressed a few glowing buttons on his arm, and the glowing hologram quickly switched to a military style instructional video titled: *what to do in case of extra-dimensional invaders.*
It was a message sent from Redwolf to this robot documenting what to do if in the vicinity of a human or other creature not from this realm. And it was absolutely terrifying. There was even a part dedicated specifically to humans in the Test suits. It was evident that she wanted to get rid of us Tests at all cost.
The video was soon interrupted by some sort of call. “Stay still. I have to take this. My boss is calling.” The robot spun around and headed outside the room. I could hear his muffled words through the door. “*sigh.* what is it Fen?… yes I’ve taken care of him… no! What? The armor is all gone. Yea. Every piece. Our enemies won’t find it. Am I alright? Yeah. Stop doubting me Fen. He didn’t put up much a fight. Ok. Love you, goodbye.”
He reopened the door and effortlessly picked the locks of the handcuffs that chained my arms to the table. “We don’t have too much time until she gets back to check on us. Follow me. Oh, and FYI, my name is Bot, and there is a person I have to meet first. I think you would find him quite a pleasant character.
7 minutes and 26 seconds later, and we had reached a relatively normal room. Both knocks on the door. A dark inky blob opens the door cautiously. And quietly shuffles us into the small, cramped suite. Bot softly introduces me to everyone in the suite. “This is Sqwit.” The black blob of tentacles waved at me. It wore a box on its head with a poorly drawn smiley face. “Sqwit will help us get off this boat without drawing any attention. That squib over there? That is Pyro.” The large squib had a body of molten lava. It stared out of the tiny window at all the bubbles flowing by. “You probably shouldn’t touch him. He is around about 800°C.”
The fact there was a sentient blob of magma on a boat with technology in another universe that mimicked earth’s would have been absolutely mystical if I wasn’t so disoriented. I was too tired to care about how everyone was able to speak fluent English, or if my friends knew if I was ok.
“I will meet you three later, on the docks. For now, I have something to attend to.” Bot slammed the door.
Sqwit sighed while Pyro started to jump on the tiny bed in the corner. “I guess we are babysitting a human after all.” Sqwit turned to me. “What is your name, *human?* where are you from? How did you get here?”
*uhh… my name is Knight, I’m from New Mexico, U.S.A, and I dunno, a portal I guess?*
No response. Maybe they couldn’t read my mind like Bot and Redwolf.
*man… guess I’m out of luck. Unless… maybe I could write something for them to understand. but what if they’re illiterate? What if English here looks completely different to English on earth? How is this even the thing I’m worrying about? This entire universe wants to get rid of me! Ahhhhhh! This is so difficult! Think Knight, think.* Whilst worrying, I accidentally walked straight into a portion of the plain grey wall. It lit up with a bright glow, activating it.
Pyro snickered. “How do you accidentally walk into a holowall?”
“It must be really stupid, pyro.” Sqwit said at my offence.
A search bar quickly popped up like on a search browser, and to sqwit’s horror, I pressed a volume button next to the text I just wrote. **I’m. Not. Stupid!** The plain text to speech loudly confirmed Sqwit’s doubts.
Pyro did some silly dance moves on the bed! “Haha get owned Sqwit! He totally embarrassed you!”
“Oh shut up pyro. Bot still wants us to take care of a human for a few hours. We can’t even work on our main priority right now. Taking down the captain of this wretched ship.
**what? Why?**
*sigh* “it’s not what it sounds like… they’ve been hu-“ *BEEEEP!* a loud phone call suddenly interrupted sqwit’s explanation. Sqwit shoved me aside and answered the call on the holowall. It was Bot.
“There has been a change in plans. She knows that knight is still alive. Get him outta there!”
== 
**Chapter 28: plan B** ==
**Location: the S.S predator, the leviathan sea, UCA**
Bot:
*How did she know? How could she know? It doesn’t make any sense, unless…* I pulled up a branch of my own code on a hologram. Of course. She had planted stupid bug on me. She heard and saw everything! I found the camera, and quickly ripped it out like a pesky parasite. At least fennec didn’t try to transfer me to a microwave or something, but now is not the time for worrying. I have to find Knight and the others ASAP. I rushed through the halls, hoping to get to them first, and luckily, I ran straight into them, knocking pyro over, torching my favourite sweater. Aww…
After staring at each other for 5 confusing seconds, we all breathlessly barrel down the hallway. ended up knocking over 6 other squibs including the captain, 15 stompys, a mosspy, and a really angry D-Rex named Smelvin. (Which dumbass would name their child Smelvin? After this, I ought to ban the name from UCA. That is, if Redwolf doesn’t decide to do crimes against what the humans would call the Genova convention to me. Fingers crossed she doesn’t, but by this point, I couldn’t care less.)
Sqwib pushes me and knight into a storage closet, and pulls pyro through the hallway, telling us that they will distract her. Outside, Redwolf catches up to them. Luckily, she didn’t see us enter the closet, and even better, she was probably clueless that squib and pyro were with us.
We keep quiet, hidden under some buckets and broomsticks. Knight quivered and curled up into a ball. Poor guy. He was scared out of his mind, in a strange new place. He wasn’t like us, he was like a glitch in the code, knight didn’t belong here. No human did. That was what the creators wanted. They didn’t want humans coming here. It wasn’t that they disliked them, they were a pest to their perfect world. But what did I know? I was just one of their failures. Humans were something else entirely. Not an enigmatic enemy, not bound by the laws of the gods. They might have once belonged with us, but they are filled with unexplainable emotions. Desire, love, hatred, fear… no creature in this world was this complex. Few displayed such deep feelings or thoughts.
Humanity was the first civilization to collapse in on itself. Greed and ignorance caused their population to decline, and many resorted to violence and anarchy. But they still stayed the same. They still had complex lives and feelings. Was this why the gods didn’t want them here?
Knight slowly poked me and pointed to the door, shattering my train of thought like glass. The silhouettes were gone, and the outside hallway was utterly silent, save for a few distant sounds of laughter.
I quietly peeked out of the supply closet. As expected, there was no one around. Even after all the chaos that happened a few minutes before. Smelvin and the other seemingly annoyed creatures strewn across the hallway likely saw Redwolf and chased after her excitingly, wanting autographs and whatnot, hopefully forgetting what happened earlier.
“The coast is clear. You can come out now knight.”
Knight stepped out of the closet. He was visibly shaking, and even wielded a broom, prepared to hit things with it. *are you s-sure?*
“*sigh* yes. There is no one around. See?” I gestured around. “Not a soul in sight.”
*o-ok…* we proceed with caution as Knight cowered behind the broom, and hid behind various potted plants and other things whenever we saw someone. After an hour of this, I snuck Knight into the lower levels of the ship. This area was much more mechanical, and was off limits to the general public. The cramped walls with pipes and other electrical equipment opened up into a balcony with rusty stairs down to the bottom floor.
“Look over there! Do you see those circular things? Those are the escape pods. We can use those to get to shore.”
Knight regained his senses, and started to act more like himself. He wasn’t acting so afraid anymore. He definitely was trying to be cautious, but at least he wasn’t cowardly hiding behind every object. good on him.
I tossed Knight into the escape pod, and from the inside, I shut the door, and pulled down the *release* lever, hoping not to trigger the alarms.
== 
**Chapter 29: the essence of Italy** ==
**Location: somewhere in the leviathan sea, UCA**
Knight:
For the first time in a while, I was finally able to get a better view of my surroundings and what was going on. The tiny escape pod floated to the surface of the sea. The visibility was abysmal, but in the distance, there were giant silhouettes of beasts from afar.
“So, what is it that you humans eat? There is… bread… more bread… and… even more bre- ok, who stocked this? Oh! There is pizza… your kind eats that right?” Bot said, riffling through the storage chest.
*yea but-*
“Oh hey! Look what I found, sugar cookies! Straight from this really good cafe in the stompy woods! We shoul-“
*I have a suit on, bud.*
“Ah. Well… I guess we don’t need these…” he climbed up the ladder and tossed the pile of cookies into the dark ocean water. The packaging dissolved instantly and some sea-life swam up to eat the soggy cookies.
*do you like cookies?*
“Mhmm… never had one. How about you? Do you like cookies?”
*I haven’t had one in forever! But yea, they are pretty good. Especially the frosted ones.*
We sat on top of the bright red escape pod. The deep black water glimmered with an orange tint. The “sun” was rising. It appeared much larger than the one near earth, and it had a cute little face. Bot waved at it, calling to the bright star. Somehow, it waved back and smiled.
*friend of yours?*
“His name is Spoofy. And he is a star! Do you hear that!? You are a star Spoofy!”
We ended up chatting all about the things we found interesting in our oh so different worlds, finally seeming to have found relief for once upon this small escape vessel, like old friends.
The fog was clearing up, and the faint sight of land appeared in the distance with many buildings and houses. There was a forest surrounding the small town, the reflections in the windows glowed a beautiful red from the Spoofy’s sunrise.
Bot became more… robotic again when he saw the town. “Perfect. We’re almost there. When we get to that town, I need you to put on this.” He pulled out a grey puffy jacket and a beanie.
*what’s that for? A dress-up party?*
“Hah! No. Robots wear clothes in UCA. Other creatures would probably think you are a robot, so it’s generally weird not to.” Bot tossed the jacket on some chair attached to the interior with straps. “Just put it on.”
The bright red pod drifted slowly to the port. We got out, and he kicked it away. *why on earth did you do that?*
“You don’t want them to find us, correct?”
I nodded. The last thing we needed is for whoever they are to get to us. They certainly didn’t want Bot doing this, and they definitely wanted me.
“So… what’s with earth right now? Did they finally get things together over there?” Bot asked out of breath. He ran with me to the nearest restaurant like school children. “Do they still have world peace?”
*HA! When did we ever have world peace?*
“It’s a trick question. Seriously though, how are things?”
*bad as ever unfortunately. The previous generations wrecked it. Didn’t even think about saving the planet until it was too late. Those bastards. They’re all dead now, so now we have to deal with it. But hey! I found an old box of Mac n cheese a few months ago, so there’s that. I think I still have it in my ca-* I trailed off. I left one of my only good possessions in my car, in that parking lot, in the middle of nowhere. It was probably stolen by now. Ransacked by the desperate. (Or that weird lady in the recruitment building.)
“What’s this “Mac n cheese”? Is it like some sort of box pet? Or a cool device? Like a holowatch?”
*nah dude. It’s just pasta.*
“Pasta?”
*it’s like an Italian food.*
“What?”
*sigh. Never mind.*
Bot sat across from me in one of the pretty booths in the shiny red and green restaurant. It had a beautiful view of the port, maroon flags waving around on poles, the sun (I mean Spoofy) shining brightly in the sky, scooter-like vehicles zipping around the wooden board walks, grassy forest beaches in the distance, overshadowed by a massive sea, it really did look like Italy here in this prestigious port.
*are you sure you’ve never been to Italy? This is almost an exact replica of the postcards I’ve seen.  Even the music in the background sounds like earth’s.*
“We traded once, UCA used to be apart of earth almost. Did you know that? They probably taught that in your schools. Right?”
*I never really went to school. But how come I’ve never heard of this universe before? Wouldn’t it be known everywhere? Wouldn’t having relations with another galaxy be some sort of major event in history? Hell, getting the first picture of a Blackhole was big! And that’s nothing compared to this!*
“Must’ve been the war.” He sighed. “You humans wanted too much from us. Guess they never told you that hmm?”
A big blue blob with a bow tie and a giant towel on its back came up to us, notepad in hand (okay, not really, the waiter had no discernible limbs to be honest.) it spoke in gibberish to Bot, who replied back in the same way. The blob creature hobbled back into the kitchen, and brought out a floating glowy cube on a slab of rock.
*huh? What on earth is that?*
Bot leaned in on the table towards me. “Touch it.”
*why?*
“Trust me. Just touch it!”
*jeez! Fine! I surrender!* reluctantly, I put my index finger on the weird cube. Instantly, a rush of energy and euphoria rush through my body, and any pain or discomfort was relieved within a few seconds. *is that like some sort of drug? Wha-?*
I soon learned it was a comfort cube. Zero side effects, zero health issues, zero problems. It works on any person, creature, or robot.
*how does this work?* I asked Bot, who stayed silent. After a minute, he responded. “It’s just a low level spell on a rune. Nothing much. It’s quite useful for creatures with difficult situations.” Bot shrugged. He attempted to touch the cube too, but instead it delivered a small burst of light and fell to the plate, disintegrating into dust immediately upon impact. “Still doesn’t work on me I guess…” he sighed.
The television in the corner played in the background. We weren’t all that focused on it until we heard Bot’s name, along with the most insulting comment about me I’ve ever heard. (Besides whatever 255 and 49 said about me.)
**AMBER ALERT! WARNING! FUGITIVE ON THE LOOSE! LOOK FOR THE WEIRD PURPLE HUMAN GUY! HE KIDNAPPED OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR BOT! IF YOU FIND OR HEAR ANY INFORMATION ABOUT BOT OR THE HUMAN IN THIS MATTER, PLEASE CONTACT U.P.A VIA LETTER, HOLOTEXT, OR CALL! THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION. STAY SAFE U.C.A!**
This caught the blobby waiter’s attention, and it screamed at the top of its lungs, rushing out of the restaurant, tripping over multiple cracks in the sidewalk. We watched it waddle as quickly as it could to the nearest phone booth. All the other customers slowly turned their eyes towards us, placing me and Bot in the centre of attention.
He shook his head, watching the blob slap in a bunch of random symbols in the phone booth, while crying. “I believe it is time for us to run again.” He placed some unknown shiny coins and feathers on the table, presumably to pay a bill, and yanked me out of the restaurant place.
== **Chapter 30: spacey sandy storms** ==
**Location: EpsilonR, heat layer**
???
*It shouldn’t make sense that such a dangerous planet could be so kind for a change* the girl thought. *We have to go deeper, for the sake of exploration.* the flying rover headed into the sandy hot gorge. She pulled up her suit, making sure to make it airtight. “The heat seeps in if it’s not!”
She didn’t need to worry about the alien dog, it was happily comfortable enough, even in the extreme heat. She placed her hand on the happy thing. “I think… I will name you Bruce. Do you like that? The name Bruce?” Bruce decided ignored her. Sniffing the molten air instead.
The duo didn’t intend on getting out of the rover, the ground was much too hot for that, seeing the black sand sway and move like lava. It might’ve not been hot enough to melt the metallic dunes, but it would for sure act like quick sand, dragging anything under into the heated liquid glass below.
The girl pressed some buttons instead and took some photographs to analyze back at base. Above, where there was perfectly clear blue skies just a minute ago, had changed. There were greyish yellow clouds of smoke and storms that rolled in. *uh oh.*
This early signal was one of an electric storm. A bad one too. It would surly fry the rover if they ascended into the storm, but the hot sand was rising. There was nowhere to go but forward. Maybe this crevice led to a larger valley with more space and fewer clouds above. That would be useful. So, she hit the accelerator with force. Expecting a surge of speed, but… it didn’t work?
== **chapter 31: Flight of a lifetime** ==
**location: outer edge of that “Italian” city port, UCA**
Knight:
“Great. She knows and is likely on our trail” Bot hissed to himself. We hid far from the angry town. Bot had been pacing back and forth for an hour. We had been sitting in a dark forest, since it wasn’t out in the open, like the field behind the city was.
“We’ll have to find a Portal rune.” He told me. If he was still annoyed about Redwolf, he didn’t show it. Instead, he regained that calm, collected attitude he had when we met on the submarine.
*What is that?”
“It’s exactly what you would expect. Cmon. Let’s go.” Bot had suddenly grabbed my arm, setting off multiple alarms off in my head, and flew high into the sky.  
*HOLY SH-*
Bot looked down at me, disappointed. He mumbled to himself “tests these days. Not as strong as they used to be…”
(I don’t think Bot has much faith in me.)
The trees and giant mushrooms passed by like a blur under us. In the distance, there was a shiny giant forest. As Bot chatted away about whatever it was, he thought of. I didn’t care though. I was too focused on the fact that I was flying through the sky by the grasp of some random person, who by the way, was acting carelessly. He was flying in loops, throwing my helpless flailing body into the sky and catching me, and doing some other stupid things. By the time he set me down on the oh so amazing ground, I was almost on the verge of tears. (Again.) I was going to start kissing the ground, but remembered I had a stupid helmet on. Instead, I bonked my head on the grass for a few minutes.
After I got up, I seethed at him. *REALLY? WHY DID YOU DO THAT?* I wanted to punch him so bad, so I did. I swung at his head, expecting to knock some sense into him, but he caught my arm in a flash of light. “I wouldn’t recommend doing that, Knight. You know damn well I can crush you in a second.”
I lowered my fist. *sorry… it’s just tha-*
“You can take off that jacket now.” Bot said, avoiding my eyes. He pulled the jacket that covered my identity off. “You are safe here.”
*Are you… embarrassed?*
…
*I didn’t mean to swing at you… I’m sorry Bot!*
…
*I just don’t wanna be scared, ok?*
…
Bot looked at me with his stone-cold glare. “My apologies. I won’t do it again.”
He turned around the corner a massive tree that looked like a giant skyscraper. Glowing neon signs and everything. I quickly followed him as he speed-walked down the street. Bot was right, I blended right in with the colourful lights and fluorescent crowd.
“THIS IS THE STOMPY WOODS!”  He yelled at me over the loud sounds of bustling traffic. “FOLLOW ME!” He vanished into an alleyway between 2 massive old trees. One had a giant poster advertising some weird-looking berries. The other had a giant slide wrapped all around the trunk. It looked like a giant lazy river, with all the creatures floating down it gently.
In the quiet alley, Bot clicked a button, and out popped an old dusty tube made from a cloth-like material, fastened only with string and scrap metal. It polluted the surrounding area with the sound of a loud vacuum cleaner mixed with the noise of a dying sheep.
“This will get us where we need to go. Click this button on the outer ring to enable the jet stream.” He said, climbing into the fabric tube. “Oh, and whatever you do, don’t try to touch the sides. They could rip, and you don’t want to fall a few hundred feet, right?” Bot pressed the button, and in a flash, he was gone. Propelled through the tube with nothing but air over a frictionless surface.
I prepared myself and got into the tube, shutting my eyes tight as I pressed the little green button.
*here goes nothing…*
== **Chapter 32: top secret society** ==
**Location: Earth, Arizona, Dimension Labs Facility-8**
Jack: 
255 luckily swooped in and picked up nugget’s note he left to get us in trouble. But that didn’t stop the higher-ups from being suspicious about us. 
I was drilled for a long time, hours before they let me see the rest of Tests again. So was Mira and even Pilot (who I thought was going to crack under the pressure), but we all held strong and gave the same fake response about how “we were just organizing some stand up comedy and didn’t want any other staff to come since it was purposefully making fun of them.” 
The interrogator (Drone) didn’t like that at all, especially after hearing the jokes I had “planned” to tell the crowd about him, but he didn’t see it as a threat to the company, so he booted us off back to our cells.
“That was surprisingly easy. Did you guys stick to the story?”  I asked Pilot and Mira when I got back.
“It was hard, but yeah. That interrogator was really mad when I told him the same story.”  Pilot told us in the lounge. The lounge was barely even comfortable. It was a few crappy mismatching tables and couches that Dimension Labs either bought as cheaply as they could, stole them from the piles of garbage in the city, or from people’s houses. I remember one Test had been complaining that her couch had gone missing shortly before she had arrived. She had of course, became infuriated when she saw what she described as her futon in the employee break room. 
Mira leaned against the wall. She clearly didn’t feel like sitting down, the couches were filthy after all. Instead, she was on her toes, ready to do whatever needed. “So, what do we do to get ahold of the portal machine?” 
Suddenly 255 materialized out of nowhere. He had overheard the entire conversation so far because of course he did. 255 always thought not just 1 or 2 steps ahead, but a thousand. He threw down a clunky jumble of scrap metal and plastic welded and screwed together.
“What’s that?” Pilot asked.
“A prototype.” He grumbled.
“What does it do?” 
“Portal machine.” 
“Really?!?” 
“No. It’s a map.”
“Awww… is that all it does? Display maps?”
“Well it cooks a great grilled chee- YES THAT’S ALL IT DOES!”
“Why is it so big tha-“
255 stared at pilot with the most evil, hateful death stare until he got the point.  “It uses artificial intelligence to map the surrounding area and create a detailed 3D picture listing everything in the room and how they work. See?” 
255 turned on the loud smoke machine, and it quickly created a detailed hologram of the lounge area. He proceeded to select certain objects from around the area. 
First, 255 hovered his large metal claw over the pipe above us in the hologram. **THIS OBJECT IS MADE OF INSULATED RUBBER AND PLASTIC INFUSED WITH STEEL. THIS OBJECT TRANSPORTS WASTE PRODUCTS.** next, 255 clicked on Pilot in the hologram. The machine began to describe every single material in Pilot’s suit, but it also included Pilot himself. 
“it doesn’t look like it’s just a map.” Pilot said under his breath.  
Ignoring Pilot, 255 turned off the audio.  “This device will go on for hours if you let it. The point is, if we can get this into the portal room, we might not even have to hold the entire facility hostage to get ahold of the portal technology. We could just build it ourselves.”
“Hm, sounds like a good idea. But wouldn’t it take a long time to build something so complex as said portal machine? We don’t have much time.” Mira asked.
For a second, 255 looked like he was about to break out in laughter, but of course, he didn’t. “I built this stupid device while you idiots were getting drilled by 79. The portal device is really just a beefed up particle accelerator. It won’t even take a day to build. The real problem is figuring out what we need and how to get it.” 
We all sat, thinking what to do when a pink and grey figure ran up to us, clearly having *also* overheard the conversation. “OOOoooooOOH! What is it that you lovelies need? Me and Marharb-y can get it for you!” 
“And who are you?” I asked, confused. 
She whipped out her hand for a handshake. “I’m Reli! 69! The bestest possum person ever! And that over there, is my favourite friend (who I like to steal hats from,) Marharba! We know a great secret place full of all sorts of special stuff! Scrap metal, first aid stuff, batteries, and even more hats!”
Mira cheered enthusiastically. “That’s great! Where is it?” She asked.
“Ooooh silly! I can’t just tell you! It’s a secret! You’ll have to catch me for it!” The possum girl ran off with our much needed secrets.
“She does this sometimes…” Marharba shrugged.
255 stood up and swiftly grabbed Reli by the tail as she ran by and picked her up like a stray cat. “Listen *rodent*, can you tell us where these “supplies” are? If not, I’ll rip you to shreds. Deal?” 
Reli frowned and scrambled out of 255’s grasp. “FFFFFFfffine! You are no fun lizard man!” 
255 turned off the machine. “Get this into the portal room.” He said, pushing it towards us. “I’ll deal with building it once you give me the digital map and information of the machine with this.” He held up a sleek black card. “You place this onto the screen when it’s done scanning the portal device. It collects and stores information with instantly.” 
I turned towards Mira and Pilot with the black card and a bit of determination. “We are all on Dimension labs’s watch list. We need to get someone who’s trusted by this company to set up 255’s machine. And I know exactly who: Doc.”