[ BACKLOG – Eight Months Ago ]
Astate Colony
Unpopulated Jungle Island Chain – Underground Research Facility
"Into The Darkness" – Part III
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Captain Zane Akina slowly walked through the dimly lit walkway of the underground facility's main laboratories. Sweat dripped from his face as he tightly gripped his disruptor. His senses were at the ready as he listened for any sound, smell, or movement which could indicate danger.
Damaged lights buzzed and flickered in the distance and shattered fragments of broken glass crunched under the weight of his footsteps as he made his way down the narrow hallway. An occasional electrical conduit sparked and sizzled which only added to the heavy weight of anxiety which filled him.
An automated female recording eerily called out a foreboding warning every few minutes over the loudspeakers as red emergency lighting swung about the area like a beacon from an old Earth lighthouse.
“WARNING – ENVIRONMENTAL BREACH DETECTED – ALL PERSONNEL OBSERVE CONTAINMENT PROCEDURES IMMEDIATELY. A LEVEL ONE LOCKDOWN AND QUARANTINE IS NOW IN EFFECT!”
The power in this area of the facility was erratic with lights flickering on and off and damaged equipment thumping noisily as it attempted to function. The area had the smell of a hospital, but it was somehow wrong. There were strong chemical odors and odd scents Zane couldn’t identify. This entire wing of the underground facility was somehow different from the other areas. There were no corpses like before. Zane wondered if this area was the epicenter of the carnage and destruction he had seen spread throughout the rest of the facility.
With nervous trepidation, Zane gripped his weapon tightly venturing further into the labs passing surgical tables smeared with substances he couldn’t identify. He noticed a stained, bloody lab coat on the floor of the narrow hallway, but no body or victim. It was as if this entire area had been wiped clean of all traces of life; abandoned and forgotten and left only to the whispers of a violent, but unknown history. Bending over, Zane took the ID badge from the jacket of the lab coat. The ID belonged to what appeared to be one of the labs top research scientists, a Dr. Artimis Ballentine. There was no trace of the doctor or what fate he had met. His coat and badge were all that remained to testify to his existence.
Zane noticed a sign that read, “EXPERIMENT LAB A”. A nearby door appeared to have heavy security access. The door was sealed shut yet Zane could see traces of something, perhaps blood, running past the door indicating it had been opened at one time. Perhaps his reactivation of the facility's power had reengaged the safety systems designed to contain whatever arcane experiments had been conducted here. If that was the case then he most likely had already been exposed to any potential danger. The risk of entering was still high, but no higher than the risks he was already taking. If he had been exposed to a virus or germ - there was little he could do now but to continue his investigation.
Determined to gain entry, Zane leveled his weapon at the door. His disruptor would probably take some time to cut through the solid steel of the heavy door, but he demanded the truth. He wanted unequivocal evidence of NeoDyne’s intentions and ambitions. The secrets locked behind the door could ruin NeoDyne forever. He had to know what lie beyond and justice had to be served. The dead in this place demanded nothing less.
Before pulling the trigger, Zane noticed a keypad and security access pad beside the door. He reached for Dr. Ballentine’s ID badge. It was a long shot, but perhaps cutting through the door would not be required. Carefully he inserted the doctor’s badge and swiped it through the magnetic reader.
To his surprise the lock went from red to green. A loud hiss filled the air as the large door suddenly opened revealing a massive room on an incredible scale. To Zane’s eyes the reality of what he was witnessing was beyond belief and far beyond the most intense nightmare he had ever experienced or on the battlefields of war.
He slowly entered the large experiment chamber with a sense of awe that both impressed and sickened him at the same time. What sort of godforsaken place was this?
If hell truly existed this place and its contents were its counterpart in the world of the living.
Glass canisters, each filled with fluid, contained the dead fetuses of unborn humanoid children who had seemingly been grown using artificial and technological means. Humanoid in appearance dozens and dozens of experiment canisters lined the walls their contents sickening to look at and even more terrible to contemplate to a person with any moral or ethical standing. Zane noticed some canisters contained different species, he thought he recognized a Klingon, perhaps a Krivaldi, and several other species of which he had never seen. Babies, brains, and organs of unknown function lined the walls in this house of horrors like some sort of twisted, biological library.
Some of the canisters had been smashed open their contents missing while others bubbled and flickered the result of decaying systems having been reactivated by the return of electrical power. Akina grit his teeth in anger. NeoDyne had finally gone too far. There was already enough evidence here to destroy the company forever, but instead of turning around and leaving something compelled him to stay to learn the final truth of this place. It cried out to be explored and Akina had to learn what NeoDyne had been doing and what had gone so terribly wrong.
At the center of the room was a massive, round column that stretched upwards to the ceiling some many stories above. Built into the column were dozens of doors. Set at an inward angle, the doors sealed individual pods which surrounded the column. There were thirty some pods arranged in a circle around the metallic column. Some of the pods were dark their systems having failed or perhaps had been shutdown intentionally. Zane carefully moved about the column slowly. He noticed several pods had been damaged their heavy glass doors shattered as if something had escaped. Venturing closer, Zane gazed into one of the sealed pods wiping away the thick condensation that clung to the outside of the glass.
“Children”, Zane blurted as his eyes made contact with what appeared to be a young humanoid male who appeared to be either asleep or in some form of suspended animation. Zane quickly moved around the dais looking into the active pods which were identical – children and teenagers were sealed in tubes for some unknown purpose.
Holding back the urge to be sick, Zane steadied himself taking several deep breaths. His growing anger helped stabilize the raw emotions which were pouring through him. Starfleet, the Federation, all the civilized races of the quadrant had to know of this place and the atrocities that had been committed here.
A flickering computer terminal suddenly caught Zane’s attention. Moving toward the computer, Zane found the system to be active and undamaged. The unit appeared to have its own dedicated power supply and had been unaffected by the power shutdown. What was more amazing was the terminal was still active and someone appeared to be still logged in.
Closer inspection revealed the identify of the logged in user; Dr. Artimis Ballentine. It was the same name that was on the ID badge he had found earlier. With full access to the system, Zane quickly went to work searching the terminal for files. After several minutes he opened what appeared to be the doctor’s research notes. Opening the files, Zane scanned the text as he produced a device which he quickly attached to his tricorder. The device, a covert tool issued only to high level intelligence operatives, had the capability to tap foreign computer systems, crack security and encryption routines, and download large quantities of data for later analysis.
With administrative access, hacking the terminal would be easy.
The tricorder would download as much information as it could until either its robust memory capacity had been reached or there was no data left to be extracted. A small AI built into the unit effectively broke encrypted files or simply stored the data for later decryption. The covert device was extremely efficient at draining a computer of valuable intelligence information quickly and efficiently for later analysis.
Zane read some of the notes as the tricorder went about its work. Most of the data he couldn’t comprehend. It was all medical information – blood counts, chemical analyses, and genetic mappings. There were notes on experiments that had been terminated or had been successful, but nothing that spoke to what the scientists were attempting to accomplish.
The tricorder at last beeped indicating it had reached its maximum memory capacity. The data it now held could be used to seriously cripple, if not destroy NeoDyne. Safely tucking the device away in his backpack, Zane continued to scan the doctor’s personal log files. There were a few mentions of success after many failures and setbacks. Ballentine kept referring to needing a sample from the ‘other’ to complete his work. It appeared the doctor was trying to reconstruct something through his experiments, but there were no specifics. Log after log referred to the "initial sample". Another log again referred to "the other key" for success to be achieved. Zane continued to get cryptic clues from the doctor's writings. The doctor spoke of obtaining the combination of both keys. It appeared that the doctor already had one of the so called "keys", but the other eluded him. There were references to utilizing the "one key", which Zane had no idea what the doctor was referring to. Perhaps it was something medical like a protein or molecule. Medical matters were beyond his expertise, but the mention of these "keys" intrigued him.
The doctor went on to report some successes with the first key and a breakthrough with one experiment using newly developed techniques. The doctor referred to one experiment as producing the best results thus far, but that additional testing and observation would be required. There were more demands for NeoDyne to find and deliver the second key and some highly technical notes that described some medical process in detail, but which Zane could not comprehend.
Leaning against the computer terminal , Zane continued to pour over the records absorbing as much knowledge as he could trying his best to learn the dark secrets of this facility and the sinister motives of the scientists who had once worked here.
[ To Be Continued ... ]
