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edupunkn00b · 1 month

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Meus ex Machina, Chapter 11: Hesper

Edited public domain image of two hands reaching for each other, lit in deep blue and neon green.

Prev - Hesper - Next - Masterpost - [ AO3 ]

Logan meets Hesper and he's only left with more questions. Everything has a beginning, though, and not even Abracadabra was what it is now.

“Kiddos are all in bed,” Patton sighed as he settled into the seat adjacent to Luc, reaching over to ruffle his hair. Janus opened his eyes in time to catch Luc’s faux scowl at Patton’s tousle.

“Gorgeous as always, mon cher,” he whispered, smoothing Luc’s auburn curls back into place. “Simply gorgeous.”

With a blush that rivaled his hair, Luc smiled but quickly sobered and blew on his tea. “You said you had news?”

Setting aside the little flash he caught from Patton, Janus nodded and straightened in his seat. He took Luc’s free hand as he shifted away from the comfortable home he’d made nestled against his side. “I do,” he began, working to keep the worst of his worries shielded from the other two.

And from the children’s drowsing minds.

Luc and Patton’s expressions told him he needed more practice. “What is it, Jan?” Patton asked, reaching for his other hand as Luc gripped his brother’s forearm. Together, they made a little triangle as the night sky darkened outside the big bay window. “Is it bad?”

“It’s… an opportunity,” Janus licked dry lips and painted on something like a smile. His scars pulled at one side of his face, hampering the intended encouraging effect. “I was contacted by the new mentalists department at Abracadabra.”

“The start-up? How—“

Janus’ eyes flicked down to his own wrist and his great-grandfather’s antique Casio, an anachronism even in that time.

“The ‘Foundation…’” Luc sucked his teeth and he closed his eyes, likely hiding his battle for control. After a moment, he calmed and met Janus’ eyes with a crooked smile. “What did those capos want from you?”

Janus sighed, a low near-growl. “They offered me a job.”

“Me, too,” Patton whispered, rubbing little circles against Luc’s arm. “This morning.”

“You both said ‘no,’ right?” Luc’s eyes were wide as he looked between them. His smile faded at Janus’ silence. “Love, tell me you said ‘no.’”

“I…” Janus slid closer to each of them. Patton only tightened his grip on Janus’ hand. “I believe this is an opportunity we can’t discount. We—“

“We need to stay as far from them as we fucking can!” Luc’s fingers tingled against his skin and he moved up to grip Janus’ sleeve. Safer that way. But he didn’t concede. “You think just because they’ve stopped hunting Powereds we’re suddenly safe?”

“No. I think we’re safer together. I think we’re safer integrated into society rather than maintaining this us vs. them mentality. Let us be a part of the shared solution. We have so much to contribute, we—“

“Oh, open a fucking history book!” Luc closed his eyes, orange flickering beneath his lashes. When he opened then again, his tone was softer. Just barely. “Love, they’ve just moved on to co-option. Sure, now they want to work with the ‘right kind’ of Powerds like you and Pat and—“

“Luc,” Janus warned, stroking his arm. An itch at the base of his spine told him they wouldn’t be alone for long.

But Luc either couldn’t—wouldn’t?—hear him. He released Janus’ arm and had begun counting on his fingers. “Step two is when they tell us it’s only the ‘risky’ Powerds they need to tamp down on. ‘Four legs good, two legs better,’ right?”

“Luc!” Janus said more forcefully, casting a quick glance at Patton.

Both of the elder Powerd’s hands now gripped Luc’s arm and he tugged gently, keeping him seated. “Lukie, maybe Jan’s right. Maybe we—“

“What, we should heel at the corporation’s side? Strap on our own muzzles so we can duck step together when they figure out their final solution is cull the herd of the dangerous Powerds like—“

“Like Re?” Low and quiet from the hallway, Virgil’s voice managed to cut through Luc’s rant.

Luc deflated, eyes glowing as he swallowed his next argument. “Yeah, Virge. Like Re, and maybe Ro, too. Anyone they think is dangerous and uncontrolled.” He frowned at Janus. “Or uncontrollable.”

“Dangerous?” Virgil asked, sliding into the room and sitting cross-legged on the coffee table between them. He jerked his chin at the pictures of Luc and Patton’s old orphanage. “Like you?”

“Now, Kiddo,” Patton began. “That fire wasn’t his—“

Luc cut him off with a sad smile and a little shoulder squeeze before turning to meet the teenager’s eyes. “Yeah, Virge, dangerous like me, too.”

Virgil’s memory of his truncated hospital stay flooded Janus’ mind, nurses sprawled on the floor, blood pooling from eyes and ears, soaking through their face masks.

“Yeah, I know it wasn’t his fault, Pops.” Virgil’s eyes were teary behind his floppy bangs as he turned to face Janus, hands shoved in his pockets. “What do these capos want you to do?”

“Tin Man, let’s go!” V called over his shoulder from the top of the stairs. Orange lights still glowed from the ceiling but at least the alarm had stopped.

Patton and Silvertongue had already run down to prep the transport and map their route. A low whine from the engines filtered up from below, a little shimmer to the air as dust kicked up from the lower landing pad.

Behind him, The Prince huffed, loudly, as Logan struggled to get situated in his suit.

Logan focused on breathing, ignoring the pounding behind his eyes and the ache in his arm. He briefly regretted not sleeping while he could, a regret that dissolved when he closed his eyes and The Muse’s shaky smile filled his vision.

Palm sweaty, his hand skid along the edge of the mech’s chest cavity but he caught himself, fingers wedged between the collar and chest plate. He pulled and pushed against the mech’s waist with his stronger stump, muscles trembling.

“Sorry,” he grunted. “Almost got—“

“Oh, come on!” The Prince snapped, physically hauling Logan higher and depositing him inside the mech. Logan swallowed back a curse and glared at the Powered.

“Don’t ever do that to me again!” he growled.

The Prince rolled his eyes and pushed him toward the stairs. “Or what? You’ll fuck things up?” He glanced down at the mech’s heavy durasteel boots. “‘Sorry,’” he muttered, anything but. “Didn’t mean to step on your toes.”

Heat flooded Logan’s face and neck, hurt and rage warring just under his skin. “You son of a—“

“Princey! Mac! Now!” V’s beckoned from the stairwell, glaring at each of them in turn. “Or we’ll leave you both behind.”

The transport door clanged shut and they shot up into the sky and over the churning Atlantic. Logan didn’t know how much of his altercation with The Prince everyone else had heard, but save for a few quiet mutters between The Prince and Patton up at the controls, the team was silent. He felt the brush of Silvertongue’s questioning thoughts, a warm request, no, an invitation to share. Logan simply shook his head and concentrated on checking the mech’s systems.

Satisfied he was powered up and ready, he watched the screens at the front of the transport, following as they raced over greenish grey waters.

Before long, Patton banked right, aiming for a landing platform somewhere off the coast. Which coast, Logan had no idea. Before them stretched a sprawling city, bright lights casting a haze in the low clouds. Silver towers sparkled, rising up out of the jagged reefs of the drowned coastal city that had come before it.

“I can’t tell if he’s still there.” Patton broke the silence, pointing to a screen where flickering orange lights blipped at seemingly random spots.

“He’s here,” Silvertongue’s eyes were closed but his voice was clear. “Prince? Can you cover our approach?”

“Happily.” The Prince tapped a different screen and it resolved into a view of the landing platform. His eyes half-shut as he watched the dozen or so deck crew move between the ships. Without warning, they ducked low and drew up neon-striped hoods. As though fleeing from a sudden squall, they all sprinted toward the big building at the center of the platform.

All but one.

The last hold out shielded their eyes from some unseen attack and peered up at the sky. They staggered to the closest ship, a tool in their hand.

“Take her down quiet as you can, Popstar,” V murmured and moved closer to Logan, showing him a tablet. “Any idea what he’s doing, Mac?”

The image on V’s tablet followed their approach, zoomed in as far as it would go. V had set a split screen to infrared. The figure—Hesper?—wielded a gun-like tool, glowing orange under infrared, bright white sparking from the tip. This close, Logan could make out a welder’s face plate under his hood.

“Soldering something onto the hull?” Hesper moved a few feet, leaving behind a rapidly cooling palm-sized circle. He repeated his actions then jumped to the next ship in line. “A tracker, maybe?”

“Not an explosive?” V asked, frowning.

Logan watched the screen and shook his head. “It’s too cold. And he’s using quick cool-solder. Safer for microprocessors but not as strong.” He shrugged. “Explosive casings are heavier, thicker. He’d need to use standard epoxy or… magnets, maybe?”

After a long moment, V nodded. He slipped the tablet into his vest and opened his mouth as if to say more, but the transport shuddered under their feet. “Everyone ready?” Patton asked, hand hovering over a door panel.

The Prince nodded, eyes now closed as he moved to the doors, joining V and Silvertongue.

Logan lowered his own face shield and helmet. “Ready.”

Patton slapped the controls and the big door opened with a bang. Hesper didn’t even look up as they circled him, just pulled his hood lower over his head and shuddered.

Before Logan could ask what The Prince was doing to him, Silvertongue sent a single word, -“Now!”-

The Prince’s eyes shot open and Hesper spun around, the movement knocking back his hood to reveal form-fitting headgear.

He tapped the helmet, shaking his head. “Guess this wasn’t worth the price I paid for it if you could still get into my head so easily, dear Prince.” He tucked the soldering gun under his arm and then, finger by finger, peeled off his safety gloves. He left them where they fell and flexed his bared hands. “Glad to see you all came out to play. Well…”

Looking up at Logan, Hesper seemed to stare right through his face plate. “We know how it is. Too bad I have to take a rain check tonight.” He flipped on his solder gun and ran straight for Logan.

On his heels, Patton grabbed at Hesper’s jacket. He wormed out of it then dodged V’s attack. Overcompensating, Hesper slid and landed on his back, centimeters from the mech’s left leg.

Without thinking, Logan stepped up and down, foot pressed—slightly—on Hesper’s chest.

Patton hissed behind him but grew still, arms loose and ready at his sides. Immediate danger passed, V inspected the devices Hesper had fastened to the ship’s hull. He scanned each with the tablet’s sensors before prying off the closest and crushing it under his boot. “Basic trackers,” he said, nodding to Logan, and they all turned to Silvertongue.

“What is all this, Hesper?” he asked, eyes hooded. He didn’t look happy at what Logan had done, frowning in his direction. But he didn’t stop him, either, so Logan just waited, foot locked on Hesper’s chest.

“My, my, my… My dearest Tongue of Silver,” Hesper purred. Head tilted, he managed to look down at Silvertongue even from his sprawled position on the cracked peri-ment platform. “You’ve brought along an extra army of one this time.” He thunked his knuckles against the mech’s ankle servos. “All for me?”

A not-quite shadow flashed over Janus’ face, quick, nearly too quick for Logan to catch. Even with Silvertongue’s back to him, The Prince must’ve felt it, whatever it was, because he stepped closer, eyes boring into Hesper’s obscured face.

“Release him, Machina,” Janus instructed, gaze focused on Hesper. “He’s clean.”

Hesper leapt to his feet with an acrobat’s grace the moment Logan lifted the mech’s foot. “Why, thank you.” He bowed his head with a flourish and Logan watched his mech’s reflection shift and warp on Hesper’s shiny helmet.

With no way of knowing where Hesper was looking, Logan felt like it was everywhere at once.

For all his theatrics, Hesper now behaved as though they were nothing but a minor inconvenience, impolite visitors who crashed an open house. He hummed under his breath, easily picked up by his mic, and made a show of brushing off his synthcloth tactical pants and straightening an old vest that looked a lot like V’s. Sighing heavily, he produced a pristine white cloth and bent over to polish away a smudge from his boots.

Janus watched him with half-lidded eyes, hands flexing at his sides. “What are you up to now, Hesper?” He gestured around them, voice sharp. Acidic. “Why here?”

“And what makes you think I didn’t trigger your alarms so I could have a little company, hm?” He shrugged and carefully folded his handkerchief before secreting it away in a breast pocket. “You know… just like Re used to?”

“Wha—”

Before Logan could finish his blurted question, The Prince stomped forward, hands splayed in front of him, a glowing haze forming between his fingers. “Take my brother’s name from your mouth, fiend,” he growled, drawing close to Hesper. “Or I’ll rip it out with your tongue!”

But as The Prince moved, the air… flickered near his right foot. The mirage tugged at Logan’s mind the same way the faulty Pickerbot had back at the DC, the first time, before he’d found the flaw in its circuitry.

Remembering V’s concern about explosives, Logan flipped on his HUD infrared. Heat poured from the cracked peri-ment, far more heat than could be explained away by the underlying HVAC piping. The ground glowed in blinding purples and white, spiking well past 85° centigrade.

“Prince, look out!” he shouted and pushed his servos to a run.

Patton’s call to Logan cut off and he copied him instead, half-carrying, half-dragging V and Silvertongue away in the opposite direction.

The Prince swore as Logan slammed into him and knocked them both to the ground. Arms locked around him, he pulled The Prince with him into a roll. He stopped, propped onto the mech’s elbows, erecting a cage of durasteel limbs and torso around the Powered just as the floor exploded behind them.

Precisely where The Prince had stood a moment before.

“Are you—”

“I’m good, Tin Man. Let me up,” he muttered, shimmying his bulky shoulders out from Logan’s mech suit shield. -”Thanks,”- he said in Logan’s mind as he stood.

“Anytime,” Logan said aloud and followed him to Silvertongue’s side. Patton crouched a few feet behind him, inspecting V’s hand.

“Tell me!” Silvertongue was demanding, eyes molten gold. “Tell me how you did that without—”

“Without you poking around in here…” Hesper’s laugh was crusted in ice as he waggled his fingers around his head. “Ma cheri! L’amour de ma—”

“Tell me!” Janus’ shout reverberated through Logan’s skull. Even The Prince took a step backwards, head bowed and one hand pressed to his temple. Patton slid closer, nodding quietly to V and Logan watched them all, waiting for any sort of hint of what he had planned.

Hesper just laughed again. “There was no guilt to sense, my dear Silvertongue,” He shrugged. “Not from me at least.” Hesper gestured, almost bored, at the jagged, steaming hole in the landing pad, then at The Prince. “It was his anger, his rage that triggered the charge. I wasn’t sure it would work, but our dear Prince of Dreams always did have quite the temper.”

He fully faced The Prince then. “Ever since you were a little boy.”

Patton reached out and just rested one hand on The Prince’s shoulder. Given the recordings Logan had seen of Papa Bear wrestling an activated Muse into control, he had no doubt a light touch was all he needed to keep The Prince steady.

“Enough with the games, Hesper,” V said from Silvertongue’s other side. “No-one believes you dragged us out here in the middle of the night for a parlor trick.”

Hesper shrugged again, backing away toward the edge of the landing platform. “Worried I’m going to make it a habit of interrupting your beauty sleep?”

He stood on the ledge, one foot hovering behind him. “Besides,” he directed his attention to Logan again. “I know you weren’t all asleep.”

Face flushed beneath his mask, Logan’s fingers flexed against the controls but the suit remained still. Then Hesper stepped off the platform and onto a waiting airskiff.

“Ta ta, for now!” he laughed, voice amplified to carry over the roar of thrusters as he flew off into the smoggy night air.

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edupunkn00b · 7 months

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Meus ex Machina, Ch. 3: Alone

Edited public domain image of two hands reaching for each other, lit in deep blue and neon green.

Prev - Alone - Next - Masterpost - [ AO3 ]

Logan is left alone in the Mad Lads HQ when the team leaves to battle Hesper. But first a peek at three years after they purchased the old Louisa May Alcott museum… -

2093, Concord, MA, USA

“When will they ever stop? When we teach them a lesson?”

Patton’s hot chocolate rattled against the pair of teacups set on either side of it, the force of the hand slapping the table shaking even the pictures on the wall. “Now, Kiddo,” Patton inhaled, exaggerating the movement and giving the pair a gentle smile. Let’s all take a—“

“No! I will not take a breath! And I will not calm down and wait for the Powerless running the government to follow the arc of progress or whatever pacifying bullshit—“

“Language!”

“Papa Bear, it’s alright…” Patton's oldest friend's voice was soft, soothing. He brushed his hand, pacifying or calming, it almost didn't matter at this moment. They couldn't all be frothing at the mouth. “Let him get it out.”

“This isn’t simply some phase I will get past!” He growled, jerking away from the other two. “We’ve been trying things your way for three years now and look where we are!” Arms flung out at his sides, he looked around their newly finished HQ. “We have to hide away behind a forest laced in tripwire because the only thing the Powerless know how to do is hate.”

He stood, shaking his head as he stared at the vidscreen, the latest atrocity playing out in full spectrum splendor. “Maybe it’s time we used our powers for real change and made them stop.”

2105 New Boston, MA, USA

The spiral stairs closed up the moment Silvertongue’s head cleared the opening and Logan was left alone in the cavernous main room. The orange warning lights slowly faded away, returning the room to its earlier almost sunny glow. After scanning the walls for any sign of the cameras he was certain would be active, he gave up. Perhaps Silvertongue might show him where they were. Or maybe even Patton.

He shuddered at the memory of that soft, teddy bear of a man with his hand raised, admitting he’d at least attempted to kill someone.

Who the fuck are you to judge, Sanders? You nearly slaughtered thousands.

Rising to his feet, he walked the perimeter of the room, moving the mech carefully between the wall and the high-backed sofa, then again, sidling past the large table. He peered down the hallways at either end of the room and through the doorway that led to a room filled with computer screens and what looked like several medbeds. Advanced, far more advanced than Logan had even seen at the research center at the University.

White hot fire sizzled through his veins at the thought of his old school, burning away to a dusty, empty ash. His degree was his hope, his path out of the life his genetic lottery loss had cursed him with. Sagging in his suit, he tried to maneuver his way through the just-slightly-too narrow doorway but all he managed to do was nearly trap himself under the lip of the door.

Fuck if that wasn’t the way he wanted to be found when the super hero league showed up again.

Next he tried the hallways and, while they were wide enough, the ceiling dropped significantly in both directions. He would need to stoop-shuffle his way at least fifteen meters, with no way of knowing if there’d ever be room enough to stand. It didn’t matter if the elevators would fit his suit if he couldn’t get his suit to the elevators.

Unless he planned to live in the front room, he was going to need his chair to get around the base.

You’re talking like you’re planning to stay.

He’d left the chair next to the big doorway. Stepping carefully, he approached the panel Silvertongue had shown him and freed his hand from the mech’s cavity. He told himself he was only testing the lock but when the door whooshed open, phantom muscles ached to run and leap outside. To pound against the grass and not look back.

Where would he go? Wanted by Abracadabra, wanted by the University. Unwanted anywhere else. Except… He looked around the room, the plate of chocolate chip cookies still sitting on the table. Unwanted anywhere else except here. The overgrown grass outside was still trampled from their path through the woods. Silvertongue had hiked six miles each way to fetch him.

Maybe it was worth finding out why.

He tapped the panel again and watched the door whoosh back down, hiding away the rest of the world, then he put his arm back in the mech and opened up his chair.

In his rush to get out of the suit, Logan had forgotten to crouch before beginning to climb out of the cavity. He only remembered once he’d completely extricated himself from the machine and hung from the mech’s clavicle. He panicked and his arm seized, fingers spasming into a useless claw before losing his grip and he fell to the mech’s feet with a thud.

Pain shot through his head and his back and he looked up from the floor just in time to see his suit tilt toward him. The piercing wail of the Abracadabra DC’s alarm system filled his ears and he cried out, covering his head with his remaining arm.

But the Picker Bot just kept coming, looming over him, hands at the ready to tear and fold him into packing totes. Cold, heavy durasteel grazed his scarred head before the bot froze with a tooth-rattling clang.

When the bot remained still, , Logan uncovered his eyes and saw he was… safe. He’d managed to stay tucked in a tiny triangle of space between the bottom of the door and his mech, its shoulders pinned against the wall above. Shaking, he lay there for an unconscionably long time until he thought he could breathe. His back and his side ached, and his head throbbed. He reached up, tentatively tapping the growing lump at the back of his head. His hand came away wet.

Careful not to bump the mech and knock it out of its precarious position, he squirmed out from his pocket of safety and dragged himself over to his chair. He’d opened it up often enough on his own to be able to manage. He just… he hadn’t been quite so tired the last time he’d done it. By the time he’d wrangled the thing open, his face was drenched with sweat and he’d pinched two fingers in the folding mechanism.

Panting, he leaned against the open chair for a few minutes before pulling his way up and into the seat. Grateful for his remote mech controller, he set the device in his lap and slowly, slowly, slowly shuffled its feet forward until it stood properly. The battery was running low, but he managed to get it into a corner and down in a crouch, facing outward, to make it easier to climb into later.

The humiliation of having to ask one of the Fantabulous Four for help getting back into his mech was too much to even consider as an option.

When his breathing had finally slowed to a more measured pace, he turned his chair around and headed to the room with the medbeds. With any luck he could find some gauze or a wash kit or something for his head. The bleeding had stopped, but it had left his hair matted and gross. There wasn’t much to be done about his shirt, but it was likely none of them would even look closely enough at him to notice the dried blood at the back of his collar.

He puttered around the room but the space had been built for giants. Even Ultraviolet, the shortest of the Powered group, was at least a half a foot taller than Logan when he’d had his legs. In a chair, the equipment and shelves along the walls were hopeless out of reach. He scavenged what he could from the drawers below the sink and underneath the medbeds, finding a box of gauze pads and rubbing alcohol. Fortunately, he could reach the faucet itself, and the sensors actually registered his presence, instead of seeking out a face-shaped object at ‘eye-level.’

By the time he was done cleaning the gash at the back of his head, Logan was exhausted and cold, his now clean but wet hair dripping down the back of his neck. He’d lost track of exactly when they’d left, but he wasn’t sure how much more time he would have. Hunger called to him and he snagged his unfinished cup and three—three!—cookies from the common room. He ate one and wrapped the other two into a napkin for later. There wasn’t much else to do but pick a hallway and explore.

He finished his drink and tucked the cup between his thigh and the chair and rolled to the left. The corridor was long but wide, and his chair easily fit through, with enough space for someone to even walk alongside him. Doors dotted the hall, each closed, with a rectangular panel to the right of each. He touched the first one as he passed and the door slid open revealing stacks of linens and towels. The door opposite it held an assortment of electrical panels and switches, some sort of breaker room.

If the rows and rows of circuit breakers were all still active, the Powered’s facility was huge. Several banks were labeled with what one might expect, first floor lights, kitchen appliances… Three sections were marked as ‘med bay,’ and ‘computers.’ And one entire bank simply said ‘SECURITY! DON’T TOUCH! —V’

The entire left-hand panel was covered with red switches, each covered in a little plastic bubble in what Logan could only guess was an attempt to prevent accidental changes. Tiny LEDs blinked beside each switch, and additional wires ran out from the top of the panel and into an old-fashioned analog alarm bell drilled into the top of the cabinet.

Whatever the hell that controlled had to be important.

Logan let the door close and began to roll away, but returned to the linen closet when he shivered again. Palming it open, he pulled out two thick towels. One he draped over his shoulders to absorb some of the water from his drippy hair, the other he partially unfolded and lay over his lap like a blanket.

He rolled further down the hall. The next door opened into a fitness center with impossibly large free weights and exercise machines, tumbling mats and bars. Despite the modern equipment, the sunshine streaming in through giant windows, the whole place was entirely too reminiscent of his physical therapy room back at the hospital.

When he was still struggling to regain his speech, the ‘therapists’ had simply talked over him like a piece of furniture, moving his arm and what was left of his thighs and left shoulder like some ragdoll. At least when the director was watching. When she wasn’t, they’d let him sit in his hospital wheelchair for the requisite hour and a half, waiting for an orderly to bring him back to his room.

Logan let the door close and moved on.

The final door didn’t lead to a door at all, but instead an elevator. ‘True to Janus' word, his chair fit nicely and, if he’d manage to find a way to get his mech suit to fit down the corridor, it would fit inside the metal and glass cage as well.

He rolled inside and turned around. Instead of a bank of buttons, there was simply another rectangular panel. Shrugging, Logan pressed his palm against it and the wall lit up with options. None were numbered, simply listing destinations. Giddy with choice, Logan read each one aloud. “Roof garden, observatory, swimming pool, tech lab, library…”

Well, all were labeled as destinations except for ‘Basement.’

Confident no-one would wonder what he might want with a visit to any of the other locations, Logan decidedly tapped Basement and held on as the elevator zoomed down, his stomach left somewhere in his throat, lights zipped past the glass compartment until, at last, the elevator stopped with a dull thud and the doors opened.

Hallway lights flickered to life as he rolled out, but there was no hum of electricity and, when he looked closer, the lights appeared chemical, illumination flowing and swirling brighter, following his path like those old-fashioned glow sticks he’d read about as a kid.

The corridor was much narrower here, still wide enough for his chair but certainly not wide enough for his mech. Without the hum of electricity, it was quiet, the ever-present whine of his own wheelchair’s motor almost deafening as it echoed against stone walls. The mortar between the stones was old, and Logan guessed it might have been part of the original house that had once stood in the place. Or he would have, had that strange elevator ride not taken him as deep as he suspected.

The first door he encountered opened to a small closet filled with bedding, cleaning supplies, and an enormous first aid kit. Besides the elevator, there was only one other door in the corridor, all the way at the end. A bit of light spilled out from a square window set in the door.

And something was moving on it.

He rolled closer, still too far away to clearly see. Logan was still several feet away when something pounded against the door, rattling the window. He stopped his chair.

“Jannie?” a muffled voice called, scared, wavering. “Jannie! Is that you? No… Jannie? You said you’d come!”

Logan froze, afraid to breathe.

“Jannie? That’s not you. Where are you? I hear you, not you. Always not you. Just that one time, well sometimes. It’s so hard to tell the difference between your whispers and your visits, but there was that one time…” The man’s voice started babbling, the banging growing louder and faster. “Jannie! Jannie jannie jannie jannie jannie jannie…”

The banging matched the tempo of his words, each growing louder and more insistent.

“Jannie!” The voice bellowed and Logan rolled backwards, the narrow corridor without affordance to turn around properly. “Jannie! Jannie! Please! Why don’t you come back?” He rolled so fast he passed the elevator, slapping his hand against the panel. The door opened immediately and he rolled inside, the haunting voice echoing down the corridor.

“Come on, please,” he whispered to the deaf device, slamming his hand on the elevator controls and hitting ‘Medbay.’ “Please close, please close, please close…”

“Jannie…” One last, pitiful cry pierced through his chest as the elevator door slid closed and the compartment shot up to the main level. Logan rolled out of the elevator and into the hall, bumping into the far wall. His hand shook too much to properly control his chair and tears poured down his cheeks.

Who the hell had they imprisoned down there?

And was he next?

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