The Vent
Chapter 4: The Vent
I'm not sure how long I was there. It was impossible to tell time when your cut off from the outside world for so long. It felt like I had been there for months, when it could have just been a matter of days. Lucky for me, now I had 2 others to talk to. We formed a group, and together, remained sane.
Everyone had been on edge since the Marill incident. Today though, everything seemed more quiet than usual. Dead, lifeless, as though everyone had dissapeared, but they were not. They were mearly hiding in fear, trying to live in the shadows, to keep away from any pain. No matter where you hid, they would get you. You cant escape from pain, and suffering in a place like this. It was inevitable, like death. One way or another, your time comes, and there's nothing to do....
It was colder than usual today, and in a stone and metal cell, no warmth could be obtained. I knew that we must be dead-smack in the center of winter. There was no doubt about that.
Over the extended time I had been here, I have had 5 more tests like the one before, where I lost consciousness. They were just the same, only with different Pokemon in the room. I did see that Bulbasaur during the next test I took. The wierd part of it was that he seemed deathly afraid of me once I entered the room, with a look of pure terror on his face. It confused me because I had no idea why he reacted like that. Of course the test after that one, I never saw him again...
Each test, the headaches got even worse, causing me to drop to the floor in pain in a shorter amount of time. Everytime, I woke up in the same position, face first on the cell floor, head throbbing uncontrolably. I was now expecting all of it to happen in the same order, like a daily routine.
I sat there, huddled in the corner, trying my best to remain warm. It was a feeble attempt, but I had no other option if I wanted to get warm. I wasn't going to go crazy. but I was getting really pissed off. I couldn't stand this place anymore! I had eaten almost nothing since I got here, causing my stomach to cramp horribly. I was freezing, and the chain only made it worse. Plus, to top it all off, I was getting skull spliting headaches everyday, and it was driving me mad! My only hope now was for my escape plan to work, but I didn't have everything I needed yet.
The discovery of what the "window" really was made this plan possible. I had discovered that what I thought was a window, was actually an air vent, which blew cold air into the room, giving the dungeon atmosphere. Thanks to what Sparks had told me before about this place, everything added up. He said that everything was made to look like a dungeon. Then, there was the warm air from the one room I felt during the first tests I'd taken. Finally, the vent never produced light like a window should in the day. That all added up to only one thing: a vent.
The only problem with the plan so far was that I had to get one more item that would be hard to get in order for the plan to succeed. I needed a scalpel, to remove the screws off the barred grate that sealed the vent shut. I already had a hairpin for picking the locks on the chain, and a couple bricks to stand on to reach the vent. Those were easy, but I wasn't sure how I was going to get a scalpel. I managed to think of a way to get one, but Mikka would have to get it. She would need to hide one in her shell when they brought her in for a quick test. It all depended on her...
I had to wait a while, she had only been gone about 5 minutes. While I waited, I started to talk to Sparks about the escape. He had seemed to like the idea of getting out of this "hellhole" as he called it.
"I would give a leg to get out of this cell and get some food!" he had told me before. He looked desperate to get out of here, just like everyone else in here. Unlike everyone though, we were getting out of here later today, when all the guards left.
After another few minutes, they finally brought Mikka back, and put her in her cell. Surprisingly enough, it was the same 2 guys who brought me to around the facility. They looked the same everyday, with same clothes and hair. They even carried the same guns I had seen them with before. The one black haired guy gave me a dirty look before he left with the other guy.
Once they left, I walked over to the right side of the bars and tried to see if she was okay. "Mikka? Are you alright?" I asked with concern. I heard a groan, and then a cough. She sounded hurt. I asked again, "Are you okay?"
Finally, she answered, "Yes...*cough*...I'm fine. They just threw me into the cell is all. Can't wait to get out of here..." I wondered if that meant she had gotten the scalpel after all. I had to know, so I asked, "Did you get it?"
"It took a while to get, but I mangaed to grab one while they were distracted with the papers. Here." she said. There was a metal-hitting-stone sound and I looked to the ground to be greeted by what I had wanted for so long. A scalpel, and my chance at escape. I picked it up and studied it. It was a nice gleaming silver, pretty much brand new, and looked completely unused. Now that we had everything that we needed, all that was left was to wait for the chance.
The chance came sooner than expected. Only about a few hours after Mikka brought the scalpel, the guards made one last check on all the Pokemon, walked out the door, and locked it behind him. This would be our only chance to get out of here. Quickly the plan set in.
The first step was to pick the locks on the chains hooked to our necks. It was a tedious task, making me very frustrated. I had to jam the pin into the little hole and try to release the lock, which I spent forever doing. Once I finally got it, I handed the pin over to Sparks, so that he could try to pick his. While he did that, I stacked the bricks on top of each other, and used them as a stepping stool to reach the grate. Then, I had to use the scalpel to unscrew the screws to open the grate. This, like the lock picking, was tedious and annoying. The screws were brand new and were screwed in tightly, forcing me to strain every muscle in my arms to twist them out.
Once I got 2 out, there was a tap on my foot. I jumped and fell off the bricks, landing on my head. When I opened my eyes, I was greeted by Sparks. He was hovered over me, staring at me with a smile, holding up the hairpin.
"Sneaky little devil must have crawled through the hole while I was distracted..." I thought as he brought the pin to Mikka.
I climbed back up onto the bricks, and finished pulling the last 2 screws out. The grate almost fell, but I managed to catch it before it could. If it had hit the ground, we might have gotten caught.
The only thing left to do now was wait for Mikka to get her chains off and unscrew the grate on her vent. There was no hole for her to crawl through to my cell, so she couldn't come with us. We would have to meet her in the somewhere ventilation system.
"I got the chain off. Hand me the stuff!" she said. I slid the bricks and the scalpel to the front of her cell, and she took them. I gave her instructions on what to do, and she okayed me. I heard her struggling to remove the screws, but she managed to get them out after a while. Finally, she we heard her gently put the grate on the floor and and then ask, "Now what?"
This was going to be very difficult to do since she wasn't in my cell. I told her to pass the bricks to me. I stacked the bricks so that I could get into the vent. Once I climbed in, I told Sparks to take the bricks to her and let her climb in to the vent in her cell.
"Well, how am I getting up?" he asked, looking up at me. I turned around and dropped my tail out so that he could grab it and said, "Okay, try and climb up my tail. But do it quick because I'm gonna be feeling a lot of pain."
"Okay," he said, reassuringly. He gave a quick countdown, jumped up, and grabbed my tail and began oulling himself upward. It was really painful, as I was not used to carrying that much weight on my tail. I got lucky and he managed to get up really quickly. Afterwards, my tail was sore, but we had made it! The vents.
The first thing I noticed was how cold it was in the vent. As an added bonus, the whole vent was made of metal, so it made it worse. We managed though. The vent went straight for a few feet, and then forked in 2 defferent directions. Just as we got to the fork, Rikka came crawling from the left path. This was the first time I got a good look at her, but it was dark and hard to tell. There was some light from behind us pointing on her, allowing me to see her better.
She was barely injured, and was actually quite clean. She looked sweet with a soft complexion, and had a charming smile that swooned you in a way. She looked at us with the sweet smile, and said, "It's nice finally to see you guys." She looked at me for a second and then said, "Wow, your in bad shape," she turned towards Sparks and said, "and so are you! How hard did they beat you guys?"
I looked at her and said, "That's not important right now. We have to get to the end of the ventilation system, find the exit out of the facility, and go get some officers or something to help us." Her and Sparks nodded in response.
We started through the vents, passing many forks and turns. It seemed endless, like a maze, only we weren't hitting any dead ends. We had to be quiet or someone could hear us crawling around and contact security, then we'd be screwed...
It seemed as though the end of the vent system would never come, but we found it. We took many turns we thought might be wrong, but we had succeeded! I studied it carefully. It seemed rusted slightly, a first so far. I grabbed hold of it and yanked on it, and to my surprise, it popped right off.
"That was easy! Another first..." I thought, still holding onto the rusted grate. I layed it behind me against the vent wall, and cautioned Mikka and Sparks to be careful to not step on it.
After a conformation hand signal from them, I slowly began to climb out of the vent. Strangly, the vent exit was right near the floor, so climbing out wasn't a big deal. I touched the floor, it's nicer, warmer feel on my feet making me happier every second.
I took a quick look at the new surroundings, and was quite pleased with them. A small thought crossed my mind, making the experience greatly enjoyable.
"We're in the facility."Chapter End Notes:Fairly short chapter. But whatever. The next few are short as well, then they get longer
I'm not sure how long I was there. It was impossible to tell time when your cut off from the outside world for so long. It felt like I had been there for months, when it could have just been a matter of days. Lucky for me, now I had 2 others to talk to. We formed a group, and together, remained sane.
Everyone had been on edge since the Marill incident. Today though, everything seemed more quiet than usual. Dead, lifeless, as though everyone had dissapeared, but they were not. They were mearly hiding in fear, trying to live in the shadows, to keep away from any pain. No matter where you hid, they would get you. You cant escape from pain, and suffering in a place like this. It was inevitable, like death. One way or another, your time comes, and there's nothing to do....
It was colder than usual today, and in a stone and metal cell, no warmth could be obtained. I knew that we must be dead-smack in the center of winter. There was no doubt about that.
Over the extended time I had been here, I have had 5 more tests like the one before, where I lost consciousness. They were just the same, only with different Pokemon in the room. I did see that Bulbasaur during the next test I took. The wierd part of it was that he seemed deathly afraid of me once I entered the room, with a look of pure terror on his face. It confused me because I had no idea why he reacted like that. Of course the test after that one, I never saw him again...
Each test, the headaches got even worse, causing me to drop to the floor in pain in a shorter amount of time. Everytime, I woke up in the same position, face first on the cell floor, head throbbing uncontrolably. I was now expecting all of it to happen in the same order, like a daily routine.
I sat there, huddled in the corner, trying my best to remain warm. It was a feeble attempt, but I had no other option if I wanted to get warm. I wasn't going to go crazy. but I was getting really pissed off. I couldn't stand this place anymore! I had eaten almost nothing since I got here, causing my stomach to cramp horribly. I was freezing, and the chain only made it worse. Plus, to top it all off, I was getting skull spliting headaches everyday, and it was driving me mad! My only hope now was for my escape plan to work, but I didn't have everything I needed yet.
The discovery of what the "window" really was made this plan possible. I had discovered that what I thought was a window, was actually an air vent, which blew cold air into the room, giving the dungeon atmosphere. Thanks to what Sparks had told me before about this place, everything added up. He said that everything was made to look like a dungeon. Then, there was the warm air from the one room I felt during the first tests I'd taken. Finally, the vent never produced light like a window should in the day. That all added up to only one thing: a vent.
The only problem with the plan so far was that I had to get one more item that would be hard to get in order for the plan to succeed. I needed a scalpel, to remove the screws off the barred grate that sealed the vent shut. I already had a hairpin for picking the locks on the chain, and a couple bricks to stand on to reach the vent. Those were easy, but I wasn't sure how I was going to get a scalpel. I managed to think of a way to get one, but Mikka would have to get it. She would need to hide one in her shell when they brought her in for a quick test. It all depended on her...
I had to wait a while, she had only been gone about 5 minutes. While I waited, I started to talk to Sparks about the escape. He had seemed to like the idea of getting out of this "hellhole" as he called it.
"I would give a leg to get out of this cell and get some food!" he had told me before. He looked desperate to get out of here, just like everyone else in here. Unlike everyone though, we were getting out of here later today, when all the guards left.
After another few minutes, they finally brought Mikka back, and put her in her cell. Surprisingly enough, it was the same 2 guys who brought me to around the facility. They looked the same everyday, with same clothes and hair. They even carried the same guns I had seen them with before. The one black haired guy gave me a dirty look before he left with the other guy.
Once they left, I walked over to the right side of the bars and tried to see if she was okay. "Mikka? Are you alright?" I asked with concern. I heard a groan, and then a cough. She sounded hurt. I asked again, "Are you okay?"
Finally, she answered, "Yes...*cough*...I'm fine. They just threw me into the cell is all. Can't wait to get out of here..." I wondered if that meant she had gotten the scalpel after all. I had to know, so I asked, "Did you get it?"
"It took a while to get, but I mangaed to grab one while they were distracted with the papers. Here." she said. There was a metal-hitting-stone sound and I looked to the ground to be greeted by what I had wanted for so long. A scalpel, and my chance at escape. I picked it up and studied it. It was a nice gleaming silver, pretty much brand new, and looked completely unused. Now that we had everything that we needed, all that was left was to wait for the chance.
The chance came sooner than expected. Only about a few hours after Mikka brought the scalpel, the guards made one last check on all the Pokemon, walked out the door, and locked it behind him. This would be our only chance to get out of here. Quickly the plan set in.
The first step was to pick the locks on the chains hooked to our necks. It was a tedious task, making me very frustrated. I had to jam the pin into the little hole and try to release the lock, which I spent forever doing. Once I finally got it, I handed the pin over to Sparks, so that he could try to pick his. While he did that, I stacked the bricks on top of each other, and used them as a stepping stool to reach the grate. Then, I had to use the scalpel to unscrew the screws to open the grate. This, like the lock picking, was tedious and annoying. The screws were brand new and were screwed in tightly, forcing me to strain every muscle in my arms to twist them out.
Once I got 2 out, there was a tap on my foot. I jumped and fell off the bricks, landing on my head. When I opened my eyes, I was greeted by Sparks. He was hovered over me, staring at me with a smile, holding up the hairpin.
"Sneaky little devil must have crawled through the hole while I was distracted..." I thought as he brought the pin to Mikka.
I climbed back up onto the bricks, and finished pulling the last 2 screws out. The grate almost fell, but I managed to catch it before it could. If it had hit the ground, we might have gotten caught.
The only thing left to do now was wait for Mikka to get her chains off and unscrew the grate on her vent. There was no hole for her to crawl through to my cell, so she couldn't come with us. We would have to meet her in the somewhere ventilation system.
"I got the chain off. Hand me the stuff!" she said. I slid the bricks and the scalpel to the front of her cell, and she took them. I gave her instructions on what to do, and she okayed me. I heard her struggling to remove the screws, but she managed to get them out after a while. Finally, she we heard her gently put the grate on the floor and and then ask, "Now what?"
This was going to be very difficult to do since she wasn't in my cell. I told her to pass the bricks to me. I stacked the bricks so that I could get into the vent. Once I climbed in, I told Sparks to take the bricks to her and let her climb in to the vent in her cell.
"Well, how am I getting up?" he asked, looking up at me. I turned around and dropped my tail out so that he could grab it and said, "Okay, try and climb up my tail. But do it quick because I'm gonna be feeling a lot of pain."
"Okay," he said, reassuringly. He gave a quick countdown, jumped up, and grabbed my tail and began oulling himself upward. It was really painful, as I was not used to carrying that much weight on my tail. I got lucky and he managed to get up really quickly. Afterwards, my tail was sore, but we had made it! The vents.
The first thing I noticed was how cold it was in the vent. As an added bonus, the whole vent was made of metal, so it made it worse. We managed though. The vent went straight for a few feet, and then forked in 2 defferent directions. Just as we got to the fork, Rikka came crawling from the left path. This was the first time I got a good look at her, but it was dark and hard to tell. There was some light from behind us pointing on her, allowing me to see her better.
She was barely injured, and was actually quite clean. She looked sweet with a soft complexion, and had a charming smile that swooned you in a way. She looked at us with the sweet smile, and said, "It's nice finally to see you guys." She looked at me for a second and then said, "Wow, your in bad shape," she turned towards Sparks and said, "and so are you! How hard did they beat you guys?"
I looked at her and said, "That's not important right now. We have to get to the end of the ventilation system, find the exit out of the facility, and go get some officers or something to help us." Her and Sparks nodded in response.
We started through the vents, passing many forks and turns. It seemed endless, like a maze, only we weren't hitting any dead ends. We had to be quiet or someone could hear us crawling around and contact security, then we'd be screwed...
It seemed as though the end of the vent system would never come, but we found it. We took many turns we thought might be wrong, but we had succeeded! I studied it carefully. It seemed rusted slightly, a first so far. I grabbed hold of it and yanked on it, and to my surprise, it popped right off.
"That was easy! Another first..." I thought, still holding onto the rusted grate. I layed it behind me against the vent wall, and cautioned Mikka and Sparks to be careful to not step on it.
After a conformation hand signal from them, I slowly began to climb out of the vent. Strangly, the vent exit was right near the floor, so climbing out wasn't a big deal. I touched the floor, it's nicer, warmer feel on my feet making me happier every second.
I took a quick look at the new surroundings, and was quite pleased with them. A small thought crossed my mind, making the experience greatly enjoyable.
"We're in the facility."Chapter End Notes:Fairly short chapter. But whatever. The next few are short as well, then they get longer