Chapter 33

As he pushed the lever, the gigantic cylinder chamber started to rise from the ground. Eventually reaching the ceiling and locking in place, separating the inner of it from the outer, where he stood. An airtight chamber.

He pressed the button that the man had previously pushed, which made the gas that had once been sucked out from it re-emerge inside. Only this time the tortured one was different. A man instead of a woman.

“How is she?” Zulu asked as he watched the prison fill with unknown gasses.

‘Good, I think.’ Ten replied sitting on his shoulder and facing her. ‘As good as a one winged creature would be I guess.’

Seeing the man awaken just as the gasses become too thick to see through Zulu smiles and turns to look at the creature.

“What is she?” he asked making a glowing orange knife materialize in his right hand.

The chains that had bound her had been broken, but her ankles and wrist still had the iron bands. The weight of which was astounding for their size. It wasn’t something that would detriment him, but if he wanted to make this things escape easier, he knew it best to remove them.

And as if she knew what he was thinking, she held out her wrists and waited. She showed no fear, no hesitation in her movements. She was without a doubt alert and awake, even though she seemed extremely frail she did not look weak. Her eyes gleamed gold, sparkling even when light wasn’t too abundant.

‘Stop staring.’ Ten said

He frowned as he realised that he was. The fact that she had no clothes made him feel even worse. He dropped to his knee as she was sitting on the ground and placed his knife against the iron bands, cutting them with extreme care as to not burn her if he could. He was unsure if her immune system could handle any avoidable problems.

“Can you understand me?” He asked her but saw that he got no response. Only her stare that remained unwavering.

‘She can.’ Ten answered. ‘We were told that.’

“I know that Ten.” Zulu sighed, annoyed.

‘You know she thinks you’re talking to yourself.’

Zulu rubbed his forehead with his fingers. “I know you can understand me, you can stop pretending.”

He waited and let his knife dematerialize. He knew he could wait. The door to this room was locked and the people on the other side weren’t suspicious of his actions. But no matter how long he waited, it seemed to him that she wasn’t going to react. She was not lifeless. He could tell that she was just waiting too. Her calmness annoyed him and he was in no mood to be treated like this by someone he had just helped.

Eventually giving up on this waiting game, he stood up and brought out the headgear that the man in the chamber was previously wearing. Though it looked similar to his, he could immediately tell that it was vastly different, it served a different purpose to his. This seemed to be used only for easy access of data. It held no direct link to the brain, hence the easy removal from the man’s head.

“Ten?” he asked.

‘Connect me’

And he did. Zulu brought the wires from his own and allowed it to break into the circuitry of the machine.

“So what can you tell me?”

[‘There is no A.I….Give me a second.’]

He tightened his grip upon the headgear, but otherwise remained calm in his appearance.

“Tell me when you find something important.” He stated and turned around to find that the woman was standing right behind him, her right wing stretched out, expanded. She stood only an inch shorter than he.

Keeping his surprise to himself. Zulu took a simple step back, but found that she took a step forward as he did. Not allowing him to create distance. So he placed his free hand on her shoulder, and gave a gentle push…which sent her tumbling to the ground.

She was weak he remembered, and instead of helping her he simply watched as she moved back into a sitting posture, staring at him. She was trying to do something, he could tell, but he just couldn’t figure out what. Not that that was the first problem he had.

Knowing that he would soon get a full rundown of this place, destroying it was one of the first things he wanted to do. He smiled thinking about how the President would react. Would he be happy, probably not.

Having just replaced her with what seemed to be the head of the facility in the chamber he knew he had two options. Kill her along with all of the others imprisoned, as death would be better than living, as well as kill the soldiers that were in the other room.

Or he could free this one, and others that wanted to live, giving them the chance to run from this place and still kill the soldiers in the other room. Though he highly doubted any of them could possibly move too far. Considering how weak this one here was.

Either way he had to kill the soldiers, that was a given. And it made him mad, mad at himself.

He had acted partially on impulse, on emotion, not logic. He knew that he had every right in putting the man in the chamber, for the man had attacked him, but he could have simply left him when the man recognised him for what he was. A Zulu. He did not regret his action though, he simply disliked the reasons that lead him to them.

[‘This place is what you suspected.’]

“An experiments lab.” He said out-loud, hatred in his voice. “How many others are there?”

‘It doesn’t say.’ Ten appears hovering near him. ‘But there seems to be at least a dozen.’

“tch” Zulu scoffed and picked up the rifle the man had confiscated from him. “Locations?”

‘No data.’ Ten replied. ‘But they report to the President.’

Zulu looked at the woman still waiting on the ground. “You have two choices.” He said to her. “Die now, or make a run for it when I clear out the rooms.” He paused a second and raised the muzzle of his rifle to the woman’s head. “I will not kill all those on base to help you.”

The woman pushed the muzzle away from her forehead. Indicating to him what she wanted. He gave a slight smile, he knew that she would. “Wait till the lights comeback on.” He said to her and walked over to the locked door.

A/N

Hello All,

Chapter's relatively short, sorry for that. It's going to take a while to get back into writing.

it's been a damn long time. Still have note for this story, so it hasn't changed.

To those that are still reading, Thank you for coming back.

To those that are new, thank you for reading.

And to all the others that skipped to the last chapter. Go back and read :P