NOVEL NEXT Chapter 161: Turrets
Location: Solar System; Earth; Outside of Shanghai; Song Medical
We wake up bright and early the next morning. It's time for our second trip into the Song Medical research facility. This time we're prepared and won't be stopped by those turrets in the hallway. Our PA400s will ensure it! We're currently getting ready to leave, which means the big and bulky suits need to get off the yacht's roof. Tim is so nice and uses his telekinesis to do so while we others prepare breakfast or take quick showers.
Twenty minutes later, we're ready to suit up. As pretty much everything that's been built with the least bit of convenience in mind, the suits have a wireless connection that lets us link them to our interfaces. That means we can open them up with a single tap on a holographic button. We do so, and the six suits let out steamy air around the seams. Once the steam is gone, the top half at the back of each suit folds down and gives us a view of the interior.
There's not much to see… With the connection to our interfaces, there is no need for an internal holographic suite, which leaves the inside pretty lackluster. Basically, there's the padded interior with holes for our arms and legs, and that's it. There aren't even any controls, as hidden sensors in the padding detect our muscle movements and convey them to motors within the suit's limbs to follow along with our body's movements. According to the instructions, this should let us forget that we're wearing a literal tank around us.
Let's see how that works out, I guess. I climb up into my suit and struggle a bit to get my arms and legs into their designated positions. It's tighter than it looks. At least the padding adapts to perfectly fit my body shape. A verbal command to my interface closes the suit back up, and I'm fully enclosed a minute later.
External cameras project my surroundings directly into my vision, which eliminates the issue of not having a window to see through. In the top right corner of my vision appear the words "all systems operational," and I try to see if the suit responds to my body's movements by lifting my left hand. It works smoothly, and I barely feel any resistance. Riding the success, I take a hesitant first step. That works perfectly too, and I'm quickly doing short jumps and sprints to get used to the strange feeling of being within a literal ton of metal without noticing it. Looking around, I smile at seeing the others doing pretty much the same.
Five minutes later, we're all ready and head out back toward the research center. There, we run into our first issue. The suits are too bulky to fit into the tunnel entrance. Good thing I have the perfect solution for that! Now that we've been inside before, Clara has a perfectly fine set of coordinates that let me use my Teleportation spell to get the six of us, including our suits, into the security room inside the research center.
We arrive in the middle of it with a purple flash, and every single one of us stumbles upon arrival. A few error messages appear in my vision, but they disappear just as fast. We find our balance after two wobbly steps. The final message says "connection reestablished," and if I have to guess, I'd say those things weren't made for teleporting around.
Anyway, Nick and Alina set down our weapon boxes and flip them open. It looks a bit strange with those giant hands of the PA400s, but they are just as nimble as our real hands, so it works rather smoothly. Now comes the hard part… Deciding which weapons to take. Well, actually, that's not really the hard part, as we all just take all three of them. No, the hard part is deciding which ones to use against the turrets in the hallway and who gets to take them down. Because one downside of the suits is now very obvious… We're required to walk single file with those bulky things.
In the end, the decision on who gets to be the vanguard is rather simple for me… Lucy is the only one with real military training, so she is the obvious choice. Now I just have to convey that to Nick and Tim without telling them about our past. Luckily, Alina makes that very simple.
"I think Lucy should take point… We're used to that formation, so why change it? I'll be our rearguard again," she says in a no-nonsense voice, which leads to instant agreement from the boys. Problem solved, I guess.
Lucy holds the rifle up. "I think I'll try this one first… It's fully mechanical, so no electronic or magical interference can prevent me from firing it." She looks at me to address my AI. "Clara, can you project the known locations of the turrets on my interface? Maybe I can take down a few by holding my gun around the corner before exposing myself."
"Absolutely, that's a good idea! I'll have it ready when you are in position," Clara's voice comes out of my suit's speakers, and Lucy nods.
"Alright, then let's get started!" She starts walking toward the hallway and crosses over the splintered remnants of the security gate. The glass pulverizes under her heavy steps, and I can feel slight tremors in the ground. Those suits really are heavy… It sounds a bit dumb, but I think we should get out of them as soon as we're through the anti-magic part of the hallway… Who knows if there is anything underground further in, and how stable the ground still is?
But that's a later problem… For now, we follow Lucy. I'm the second one right behind her. My steps pulverize the glass even further, and once Alina in the rearguard is through, there's probably only dust left. We walk past the first inactive trap with the nozzles in the wall, and soon approach the 90-degree bend in the hallway. Lucy stops right before it and exchanges a few more words with Clara.
I'm linked into the conversation as well, and Clara's final words address me directly. "Do you want the overlay as well?"
I shrug. "Sure, I'm just standing here anyway… You can ask the others too, I guess."
Seconds later, my view changes and adds an overlay that shows the hallway after the bend. There are six red circles on the roof, indicating where the turrets are hidden. Lucy takes one step forward and lifts her weapon. If she extends her arms a tiny bit further, she can shoot around the corner.
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That's exactly what she does a second later. She also immediately pulls the trigger to open fire. Three red circles wink out of existence before there's any reaction. Then, the remaining three spit out rotating turrets that home in on Lucy's gun. The bullets start flying and impact the corner wall, Lucy's arms, and the rifle.
The rifle is the first one to give, and Lucy throws it away as soon as it jams. But not before one additional turret gets destroyed. Next is the corner of the hallway… Pieces of stone and metal get blasted away and impact Lucy's suit without causing any damage. The same can be said for her arms. The bullets just ping off her heavily armored form.
Still, Lucy pulls back with a curse as soon as her rifle has given up the ghost. The reason why she curses becomes obvious just seconds after when a new set of six turrets appears a bit further down the hallway. Not good!
"Dammit," Tim swears. "What now?"
I hold out my rifle for Lucy to take. "Wanna try again?"
She shrugs. "Might as well do so… But let me try something first."
She takes a step back, away from the dangerous corner, and suddenly her suit hisses and opens up. I gasp.
"What are you doing? Are you crazy?"
She pulls her left arm out of the suit's sleeve and puts it close to her torso, then her suit closes back up. "No, I'm not, but I have to try something, and I don't want my arm to be part of it," she chuckles. "But, uhh, can you lift my suit's arm so that it's extended to the side?"
Oh, I see now. Yeah, that makes sense. I nod and do as she asks. Once fully extended, she must have activated a locking function as the arm stays as I put it. Lucy gives me a resolute nod and then approaches the corner again with the empty arm sleeve in the lead. It looks silly, as she's waggling sideways, but it works.
Her arm and only her arm enters the danger zone, and Lucy stops before her torso is exposed. We all hold our breaths when the turrets spin up with a whirring sound. Seconds later, the bullets start flying, and while a lot of them miss, more than enough find their target. The previously hidden lasers also start firing their red beams every few seconds, and those things are much more accurate. There are two of them, and they concentrate their fire at a single point.
Lucy almost waits for a full minute in the bullet rain before she waggles back and shows us her arm. I let out a breath in relief. It looks completely fine! Sure, there are a few minor dents and the spot where the lasers burned looks scorched and even a little bit melted, but all this is just on the surface… The PA400s have multiple centimeters of armor! It did a way better job than we would have expected.
I hear the grin in Lucy's voice when she speaks up. "You know what that means, right?" Her suit opens up immediately after, and she puts her arm back in the sleeve.
Alina pumps her fist in the air. "Yeah! Let's show those turrets who's boss!"
Her silly antics get a laugh out of everyone, but that's exactly what we're going to do now.
Lucy finally takes my rifle and gets ready to step around the corner again. This time she won't be the only one, though! I pull out my laser gun and dial it to maximum power. While Lucy takes down the turret, I'll be on the lookout for the lasers and new surprises we haven't seen yet.
"Hold up!" Tim's voice stops us before we can start, and Lucy practically stops mid-step.
I turn back around and see him holding out two rifles. "Take them. In case yours gets destroyed again. Then you won't have to come back to get new guns."
I nod in thanks. That's thoughtful of him. Taking the rifles, I turn back around and hand one of them to Lucy, who slings it around her back. I do the same with the other one.
Lucy finally takes her step and turns the corner. This time, the turrets are ready and immediately start firing. Lucy doesn't stop, though, and takes another step forward while returning fire. My overlay shows me that she's already taken down one of the remaining eight turrets.
After another step, there is enough room for me to move out as well, and I immediately do so. My eyes are glued to the roof, and I look for the red flash of a laser turret firing while Lucy continues to mow down the regular ones.
There! A red flash from slightly ahead of me, almost on top of Lucy's head. I lift my gun and pull the trigger. A beam of light exits my gun and impacts the roof. Sparks follow, and the turret remains silent forever. One more…
Ten seconds later, I spot the second one and take it down without issues. The bullet rain has considerably lessened in the meantime, and I switch targets. I manage to nail down one turret before Lucy has cleared all the others. I lower my gun a bit while Lucy stays alert.
"Did you get them all?" Lydia calls out from behind us.
"I think so," I reply. "Give us another minute, then you can come out."
"Okay!"
I look back at Lucy and notice that the rifle on her back is now in her hands. The other one lies discarded to her side. "Can you send out another drone, Clara?"
"Certainly, you two also might go back while I do so."
Good idea. We slowly trace back our steps and round the corner again. "Change of plans, Clara will do the scouting." The others nod in understanding, and another drone takes flight.
It flies up and down the whole hallway, but nothing pops out of the roof. I guess it's safe for now. "Okay, let's head further in, but stay alert!" I say and tap Lucy's shoulder. She goes around the corner, and we follow her. When we're past the first line of now destroyed turrets, Nick calls out from behind me. "Can we maybe locate the anti-magic tech? That would make things much easier."
That leads to a round of searching the wall, the ceiling, and even the floor of the hallway until Lydia makes a lucky discovery. It happens when she stumbles over a larger piece of stone on the ground and tries to catch herself on the wall, only to break right through.
A 30 by 30 centimeter piece of wall crumbles under her heavy hand, and she face plants on the ground. Luckily, the armored suit is padded, and she quickly gets back up. My gaze is glued to the previously hidden chamber behind the wall, though. It features another nozzle that suspiciously looks like a flamethrower. Just like the ones before, the feeding tube is long gone. But that's not the interesting part. No, much more interesting is what is right behind the flamethrower.
It's an unremarkable piece of a strange metal. It looks semi-liquid but also solid at the same time. It also emanates a feeling of magical absence even through the anti-magic field.
Lydia, now back on her feet, stands closest to it and gasps. "Is this…?"
Oh, I think it absolutely is!
"Congratulations, Lydia, you just made our first major discovery!" I call out and would have hugged her if we weren't in those bulky suits.
"Holy shit!" Tim shouts at pretty much the same time. "A flippin' Artifact. Wow!"
We collectively decide to go back to the security room as we've got more space there. Now, ten minutes later, we're out of our suits and stand in a circle with Lydia holding the anti-magic Artifact in her hand. It looks so inconspicuous… Crazy how such a tiny piece can kill off all magic. It also feels stronger than the other anti-magic fields I've been exposed to so far. I'm actually not sure if I could teleport right now…
"What do we do with it?" Nick's question hangs in the air.
After a minute of awkward silence, I reply. "I don't know… It's too inconvenient to keep it on us, but I also don't want to leave it somewhere unattended… It's too valuable for that."
"Why don't you give Victoria a call?" Clara says over the speaker. "That's what she's here for… She can also escalate it further up the chain."
Right… Of course! Vic or Aria will know what to do!