Chapter 48: Mixed Signals

Chapter 48: Mixed Signals

I knocked several times on the door. There was no answer. I looked around to check - yeah, this was the building where the mute woman had set up shop. I rapped on the door with the back of my knuckles again. Still no response. This was starting to get slightly worrying.

"Hey, uh..." I hesitated, not knowing what to call her... "Are you in there?"

There was a soft thud from behind me. I didn't have time to think - I just acted. I pulled the holorifle off my back and whirled around, pointing it at what had made the noise. I'm just glad I didn't pull the trigger, because the mute woman was standing there, looking at me with an exhausted expression.

"Oh..." I lowered the rifle when I realized who it was. "Sorry. Thought... yeah, I thought you were one of the Ghost People." The mute woman shrugged. She really didn't seem all that fazed that I'd just held her at gunpoint.

"Just a bit jumpy then, are we?" I heard Dean call out from his seat on the fountain.

"Shut the fuck up, Dean." I yelled back at him. I shook my head, and turned back to the mute woman. "You ready to go?"

She gave a curt nod, and started walking away... that's when I noticed she had more weapons than when I'd left earlier. There was a spear strapped to her back, like mine, and a knife was stuck in her belt. On her hip was a pistol, and... hang on, the automatic rifle was gone. She was carrying a hunting rifle slung over her shoulder.

"New gear?" I asked. She stopped in her tracks, turning back to nod at me. "Where'd the big gun go?" She mimed a slashing motion with her thumb across her neck several times, and then pointed over her shoulder with the same thumb.

"You got rid of it?" She nodded. "What for?" She held up the hunting rifle, miming the same aiming-at-nothing motion she'd done before, and then gave me a thumbs up after she lowered the rifle. "Better shot with that then, huh?" She nodded.This chapter is updated by nov(e)(l)biin.com

"Alright, fair enough."

I think I was finally getting the hang of moving along the rooftops. Granted, I was still pretty useless at getting up there in the first place, but... I'd like to see you try and climb up a drainpipe covered in slimy industrial pollutants that'll slowly kill you.

I'm just glad the Cloud seemed thinner up here. Better still, there weren't any Ghost People up here, either. Things didn't really start to get difficult until the speaker on my Pip Boy crackled to life.

"There - the switching station," Elijah's voice was peppered with static. "That's where you'll need to bring the mute." There was an especially loud burst of static, and then silence. I'm just glad I had the sense of mind to put a hand over the speaker to muffle the noise as soon as I heard static.

The mute woman scowled at my Pip Boy - and frankly I didn't blame her for being mad. Here we were, successfully sneaking along the rooftops, being quiet as a pair of ghosts, and Elijah... ugh. I couldn't help but sigh.

Right, if Elijah was opening his fat trap, that must mean we're close to the objective. I looked around, and realized that off to the north was a large four story building - and based on the map marker on my Pip Boy, that large building was where we needed to be.

"Okay," I whispered to the mute woman, looking around at the outside of the building. "I think that's the objective. Do you see any way inside?" There was a tap on my shoulder, I saw her arm move past my head to point at something. I followed where she was pointing, and saw a massive gaping hole in one of the walls... about four stories high, on a completely flat wall. There weren't any overhangs or parapets or anything nearby that we could use to even get close to the hole.

"Yeah.. I don't think that's going to work. If we can't find anything else, we can come back to it." She gave a nod, and the two of us kept moving along the rooftops... It wasn't long until I started to hear the familiar (and wholly unpleasant) sound of ragged breathing passed through a filter and echoing off every wall. There were Ghost People nearby.

The mute woman came to a stop near the edge of the roof and crouched down, holding up a fist in the air. She raised two fingers from her fist and beckoned me to come closer... I made my way to the edge, carefully and quietly, and peered over the edge.

Below us was a small courtyard, ringed on all sides by a series of ledges, and a staircase which looked like it led up into the building we needed to get into. Scattered all around the courtyard, however, were at least five of the Ghost People. Two of them were kneeling, apparently enraptured by something fascinating on the ground; the others were jerkily walking around the courtyard with blades, bear traps, and spears in hand.

"Fuck," I breathed. The mute woman nodded slowly, apparently agreeing with the sentiment. We needed to get to that staircase, and those Ghost People had to be dealt with... somehow. I don't think the holorifle would work - I could only fire four shots at a time, and that was pretty useless with five of them there... plus, I needed to be awful close for the shot to kill them outright - otherwise, they'd just stand right back up. The revolver under my arm was useless against the Ghost People, and the spear on my back... again, I needed to get awful close to chop their limbs off. I'd probably be able to kill one - maybe two if I was lucky and the mute woman helped - but then the rest would undoubtedly jump us. And who knows how many others were there that we couldn't see?

That's when I remembered: I still had three grenades. I pulled one of them off my armor, and got ready to throw it... but I hesitated. The five Ghost People were grouped pretty close together, but even though I was sure I could land the grenade right in the center of them, I wasn't sure that they would all be caught in the blast. And the more I thought about it, the noise from the grenade exploding would be sure to bring more Ghost People out of the woodwork.

But... that gave me an idea.

I backed away from the edge, and looked south. We were high enough that I could see a cluster of buildings on either side of a small alleyway about 200 yards away - perfect target. The mute woman was looking at me strangely - and even more when I pulled the pin, and tossed the grenade south, right into the alley with all my might. It sailed through the air like a baseball, and disappeared into the distance between the buildings. A few seconds after disappearing, there was a muffled "THWUMP!"

I peered down over the rooftop's edge just in time. Ever single one of the Ghost People in the courtyard stopped what they were doing and their heads snapped towards the direction of the noise. It was eerie - when they moved their heads they were perfectly synchronized, almost like they were acting with one mind. One by one, the Ghost People got up, and started shambling out of the courtyard towards the distant noise. After a minute or two, the courtyard was empty, and I didn't see any more of the zombies follow.

"Right," I whispered to the mute woman. "Let's go." As usual, my skills at dismounting from the roof were not graceful in the least - but at least this time I didn't fall flat on my ass. There were enough ledges and balconies that I never had to drop more than a single story at a time. The mute woman, on the other hand - she just leapt from the roof, grabbed a flagpole sticking out of one of the windows, and swung off it - landing gracefully halfway up the stairs. I was only at the base of the stairs by the time she landed.

"Showoff..." I muttered under my breath and followed her up the stairs. At the top, there was only one way to go - a small alleyway with a door off to the right, leading into the building. To the left was a small alley filled with a thick blanket of the red Cloud. It was like a wall of the red poison, boiling and churning in front of me, burning my eyes the closer I strayed. There were several pipes coming out of the nearby wall above us, and I could see - the thick concentration of Cloud was spilling out of a damaged pipe above us.

"C'mon, let's go." I said... but from behind me, I heard an echoing choir of ragged breathing. I wheeled around, grabbing the holorifle off my back. Inside the Cloud, I saw three pairs of glowing green eyes. They were slowly advancing towards us.

"Go!" I said to the woman behind me, aiming the rifle at the closest pair of eyes. "Get inside, GO!" The first of the Ghost People walked into the open air, the Cloud peeling away from its body like it was stepping through a waterfall. The holorifle discharged with a loud clunk and a bright flash; the Ghost Person was hit by a shower of blue cubes, falling backwards into the Cloud. I started backing up towards the door, pumping the holorifle and ejecting a spent cell when the other two Ghost People stepped into the open air. I looked down... and with a mounting sense of horror and dread realized that one of them was dragging along one of those gas bottle bombs.

"Oh, fuck that!" I said, firing one last time in the vague direction of the advancing Ghost People and running for the door. The mute woman was inside, holding the door open and waving at me to get inside. I ran as fast as I could, grabbing the edge of the large metal door as I passed the threshold. The two of us pushed against it, and just before we forced it closed, I caught a glimpse of the gas bomb sailing through the air towards us.

The door shut, and I pushed against it with my shoulder; the mute woman did too, and together we kept it closed like it had been welded shut. The door and the ground shook, and there was a tremendous noise, but the door held. I looked around - there were a few metal shelves nearby, filled with scrap metal and toolboxes. I got off the door, urging the mute woman to do the same, and grabbed the shelf, shoving it against the door and up under the door handle. She got the idea, and grabbed a second one, piling it on top of the first, bracing the two of them against the floor.

"That should hold them for a while," I hope. There was a loud bang that made me jump - it sounded like the Ghost People were pounding against the door now. I started looking around, trying to find anything else that we could pile up against the door, when I heard another noise - metal grinding against metal. I looked back - and realized that one of those kitchen knives I'd seen all over the place was sticking through the door.

"Oh what the HELL!" I shouted. I looked around for anything else to shove against the door as a barricade. "That door has to be 2 inches of solid steel - at least! What the fuck are those knives made of?!" I looked back at the mute woman just in time to see her throw a trash can at me. I caught it, and shoved it up against the door, between the shelves. The banging against the door continued, but the knife stayed where it was; I didn't see any others.

"Fuck..." I tried to steady my breathing. "That explains how it went through my shoulder so easy... damn." I backed away from the door, and reached into the pouch on my side for more microfusion cells. I was able to replace the two cells I'd spent, but... yeah, I was starting to run low on ammo. I'm gonna have to find more MF cells soon, or else I'm going to end up stuck.

I started looking around the room. It looked like a server room, with various pieces of broken computers and a few desks scattered around. The mute woman was looking around as well; her eyes darted around the walls and the ceiling. She glanced at the exit, and took a slow breath. I noticed that a few droplets of sweat had appeared on her brow; I took a hand to my own forehead, and realized I was sweating as well. When had that happened?

I looked down at my Pip Boy, and tried to figure out where to go from here. If nothing else, it would help me drown out the Ghost People pounding on the door. Then I realized - the only real light in the room was coming from my Pip Boy. There were a few emergency lights, glowing a dim red, but... I looked around, seeing another metal door off to my right. It looked like the kind that slid into the floor; there was another dim red light above the door. It looked like that was the only door that would lead deeper into the building - and knowing my luck, the door was locked.

"Do you see a fuse box or a switch or something?" I asked, looking around. If we could get the power back on, that might open the door. I heard a fingersnap off to my left; I turned to see the woman pointing at what was unmistakably a circuit box on the wall. I walked up to it, and saw some graffiti on the wall: "LISTEN BEFORE YOU LOSE AHEAD"

"Huh," I finally managed to force out through my ragged and heavy breathing. "That's... d-different."

The air between the two of us was even more silent than usual for a very, very long time.

The mute woman had taken the lead. It hadn't taken me all that long to collect all my armor and gear, but... the whole experience had left me rather shaken. Especially when I had to pull the needle out of the middle of my chest. That's an odd feeling, let me tell you - especially, since the hole in my chest didn't bleed.

I looked down at my hands, and realized that I was still, literally, shaking. I clenched both hands into fists to try and calm them down. Before I knew it, we were in another room, surrounded by lockers and desks, and sticking out of the wall was a RobCo terminal. The mute woman had stopped, and was looking around.

"Hey," I spoke up, my voice sounding odd - a bit ragged, perhaps? "I just... I wanted to say thanks." The mute woman looked back at me with a raised eyebrow. "No, seriously. I would've been fucked if you hadn't saved my ass back there. So... thanks for that."

The mute woman just shook her head, and tried to hold back a smirk. She waved me off, and looked over at the terminal on the far side of the room. I nodded, looking around. If she was going to check the terminal, I was going to have a look around, see if there was anything useful.

There really wasn't much. Most of it was just scrap metal and a few sensor modules and fusion batteries. I did find a few microfusion cells... two, but hey. Better than nothing. The weirdest thing I found, though, was a piece of paper that fluttered out of one of the lockers and onto the floor when I opened the door. I unfolded it and took a look.

To: William Ennis

From: Konrad Simmons

Damn it, Ennis! How many times do I have to tell you? The password for the Remote Maintenance Terminal is T7GF0SEW

Before I could make any sense of it, there was a small something that sailed through the air and struck me in the side of the head. I looked down to see a Sierra Madre chip on the ground; I guess the mute woman was trying to get my attention, since she was pointing at the terminal.

"You found something?" I said (after not so subtly picking up the chip and putting it with the others). She tapped the screen and gave me a thumbs up. I looked close, and saw...

"Ventilation system?" I asked. She nodded, and hit the enter key. Off to the west, beyond another metal sliding door, I heard an immensely loud clunk, followed by a quickly building whine.

"Huh... if that sound's what I think it is, then maybe this'll get rid of the Cloud in the rest of the building." The mute woman nodded, and gave another thumbs up. "Hell, maybe if we're lucky it'll clear out some of the Cloud from outside?" Her smile evaporated, and she just looked at me coldly. "Nah, you're right. We're not that lucky."

I checked the map on my Pip Boy for what had to be the fifth time. According to the map, this was the place. The two of us were in another cavernous room like before, except this one had no Cloud - obviously the ventilation had worked - and she and I were in a small metal office built into the side of the wall overlooking all the machines in the room.

Aside from the empty doorways that exited out to the other catwalks, there was only one other door, and that looked like the entrance to a service elevator. The mute woman was looking at the elevator uneasily, making a pulling motion with her hand.

"Alright," I said, looking up from my Pip Boy. "According to the notes Elijah put on my Pip Boy's map, there's a manual bypass room in the basement directly below us. That's where the power can be regulated, and I think that's where you need to go." The mute woman's eyes went wide, and she glanced back at the elevator. Her expression became worried, and then she looked back at me.

"What's the problem?" She looked back at me with an expression dripping with annoyance tinged with fear, and she gestured at the elevator. She made a few choking motions with her hands around her neck, and I saw her neck move like she was gulping - but, as usual, she made no sound.

It took me a minute, but I figured out what she was getting at eventually. That auto-doc that cut out her vocals cords was probably... well, I can only imagine what it would be like to be trapped in a metal casket with surgical implements pointing at me for hours. No wonder she liked travelling on the rooftops. I'd hate confined spaces after that as well.

"Alright, I think I understand. Let me see if I can find another way to do this without sending you down there." She smiled in relief and nodded at me. She opened her mouth slightly, but then closed it, frustrated. She pointed at me, then made a fist, pounding it against her chest armor with a nod.

Alright, I've got to figure this out somehow. Power regulation was the important thing here, and that probably meant some kind of terminal. Maybe that other terminal that activated the ventilation system would have access of some kind? I was about to leave and backtrack back to the other terminal when a glint of something caught my eye.

"Hold on a second, what's that?" It was something on the desk that was shoved up against a window... but it wasn't actually on it. It was sort of... embedded into the desk itself: some kind of indentation, almost like a button. I shrugged, and pushed it. There was a whirr, a clunk, and a panel in the desk opened up, and a RobCo terminal - a different model, and in much better shape than most of the terminals I'd seen so far - started rising up out of the desk. The mute woman was looking over my shoulder by now, interested by this turn of events.

"I think this... yeah, I think this might work. Hang on a second." I pulled out the chair and sat down, booting up the terminal. There was a series of clicks that came from the interior casing as the computer slowly warmed up, and loaded the RobCo Unified OS. The screen flashed, and I was greeted with a simple message:

Puesta del Sol Remote Maintenance Terminal

Please Enter Password

I was just about to type in the "SET TERMINAL/INQUIRE" command to start running the debug procedure that would allow me to hack into it when I remembered: would I need to? I started searching around in my pockets, looking for that scrap of paper I'd found earlier. I pulled it out, and typed in the password.

The terminal beeped, and a list of commands appeared - along with the message: Welcome back, Supervisor Ennis. It has been 74,890 days since your last login. There was only one command, however, that I was interested in: Power Regulation. I selected it, and a new message popped up: In case of emergencies, power regulation procedures can be carried out from this station. However, this practice is not recommended for regular use. Please see your supervisor concerning whether use of this station is warranted.

"I think I found a way to do the bypass from here," I said, getting up from the chair. "You should be able to use this." I patted the terminal, which reverberated with a metal echo. The mute woman nodded, gratefully. She looked at me, and smiled - it wasn't a smirk, it wasn't a smile she was trying suppress, it was a legitimate smile. She still looked a little nervous, despite the smile and the thumbs up she gave.

"Hey, uh... are you going to be okay here?" I asked. Her smile faded, and she looked back up at me with a curt nod.

"We're going to make it through this." Without warning, she grabbed my hand, and brought both our hands between us. Combine her grip with how she was holding my hand, it was almost like she was trying to start an arm wrestling competition in midair. She stared at me directly in the eyes for a few seconds, her gaze burning with an strange sort of fire and intensity.

Actually... it wasn't strange. I knew that look. I'd seen it all too often lately. It was the look of a warrior - or someone ready for blood.

"We're going to get through this," I said again, slapping her on the shoulder. "And when we do, I promise - that rat-fink son of a bitch who put these damn collars on us is going to die." She smiled again at that. She gave one last nod, and finally let my hand go.

I started walking towards the elevator... but I stopped, thinking of something else. I looked back at the map on my Pip Boy, scrolled through a few of the levels it had mapped out until I got to the surface. If my sense of direction wasn't failing me (like my sense of time) then this elevator, if it went up, led to the hole in the wall that I'd seen earlier... and given the collapsed catwalk behind us, and barricaded door behind that...

"You know, you're probably going to need to use this elevator if you ever want to get out of this place," I said, turning back to the mute woman. She was already sitting at the terminal, typing away. "You know that, right?" She stopped typing, and turned back to me. She didn't meet my gaze this time, but... eventually, she started to slowly nod.

I had to think of something. Something to say, some way I could... I don't know.

"You're going to be alright. Trust me, you'll make it out of this... We'll make it out of this. All that leaping around from rooftop to rooftop out there, with the death defying leaps - an elevator isn't going to beat you. I'm sure of it."

She just rolled her eyes, and despite a small smile being suppressed at the corners of her mouth, she turned away from me and went back to the computer.