Vigo's Lament: A Dystopian Thriller (Age of End Book 3)

AGE OF END:
VIGO'S LAMENT

AGE OF END: VIGO'S LAMENT

by Chris Yee

Copyright © 2016 by Chris Yee. All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events or locales is purely coincidental. Reproduction in whole or part of this publication without express written consent is strictly prohibited.

ISBN 978-0-9973536-4-8

Cover designed by Rebecca Frank

http://RebeccaFrank.design

Published by To The Moon Publishing

http://www.tothemoonpublish.com

ONE

SIMON LIT THE fuse of the bomb, wandered over to the evacuation pod, and propped it up against the glass. He backed away and crossed his arms. A smirk crept across his face.

Evacuation Pod A will eject in ten seconds.

He watched the group inside panic. The fuse burned down, and a loud blast violently shook the floor. The air was shrouded with smoke and fire. He kept his eyes on the smoke, waiting for it to clear. As the pod became visible, he saw the glass was intact. Only a small crack formed at the base.

“Goddamn it!” he yelled.

Evacuation Pod A ejecting.

Vince and his group shot away from the Spire and out of Simon’s reach. A strong gust of wind blew through the opening before a door slid down and sealed the hole.

Simon yelled again, this time directly at the man to his right. He drew his gun, aimed at the man’s head, and pulled the trigger. The other men flinched as the body fell lifeless to the floor. He lowered his gun and shrugged, nudging Greene’s body with his foot. “At least we killed this bastard. Let’s go. We still have work to do.”

He walked to Greene’s desk and slammed his fist against a big red button. The blaring alarm went silent. Next, he grabbed the microphone and pushed the blue button next to it.

“Attention, everyone. This is Simon, speaking from Greene’s office. As you may have guessed, Greene is dead. I’m looking at his bloody corpse right now. Your leader is gone. His empire is over, and a new age has begun. I will free all of his prisoners. You are free to go as long as you don’t get in my way.”

He hit the button again and put down the microphone. He stood up, rubbed his chin, and snapped his finger at his men. “Kill everyone wearing a Spire uniform.”

“Yes sir,” they said all at once, marching out of the room.

He looked up at the screen above Greene’s desk to see a map of the Spire. He took the controls and rotated the three-dimensional image, zooming in to get a better look. His eyes searched the layout of each level.

“There,” he said, pointing to a blinking light on the map. “The cell room. That’s where he’s keeping them. Now, let’s see if I have control from up here.” He fiddled around a bit more. “Here it is.” He pressed a button.

Power to the cell room has been disabled. Locks deactivated.

“Good work, sir,” Jonah said, walking up behind him, holding his turtle mug.

“Christ, Jonah. You and your tea.”

Next, Simon looked for the safe rooms. “Let’s make it a little easier for my troops.” He scrolled through and pushed another button.

Power to the safe rooms has been disabled. Locks deactivated. Evacuation pods deactivated.

As Simon closed the directory, he noticed an intriguing log hidden among the rest of the files. “What is this?” he asked with interest.

“It looks like a record of where everyone in the building goes,” Jonah said, after taking a small sip of tea. “They must be scanning people when they walk through doors.”

Simon chuckled. “That sounds like something Greene would do. That prick never cared about privacy.” There were thousands of employees listed, each with entries dating back fifty years prior. “Ha! Greene’s in here too. Let’s see where you were before I killed you.”

Reading through the logs, something struck his curiosity. When they broke through the third wall, Greene was up in his office, but he did not go to the evacuation pod like Simon would have expected. Instead, he went down to the floor below.
Level 149
. He went to one of the labs and stayed there for four minutes and thirty-two seconds. There was a small camera icon at the bottom of the screen. Simon clicked it and activated video footage from the lab.

The top corner read
Vitality Lab No. 88.
There was no sound, just the image of Greene, huddled over a desk. His actions were hidden in shadow. A small girl stood next to him, tugging on the sleeve of his shirt. She seemed frightened, probably from the flashing lights of the alarm. Greene finished up what he was doing and turned around to pick her up. He ran out of the door, leaving behind a closed book and a pen sitting beside each other on the desk.

Simon stared at the book. “What are you up to?” He zoomed in on the book, but the image was too blurred. He shut off the screen and stood up. “We’re going down there,” he said to Jonah. “We’re going to find out what he was doing with that book.”

“It has to be something good,” Jonah replied. “If that’s the first place he went after we broke in, it must be important to him.”

Simon bent over to search Greene’s pockets. “Exactly. But what is more important than getting out alive? He had plenty of time to get to that evacuation pod, but he chose not to.” He found a plastic key card. It had the City emblem imprinted on the front.

Jonah shrugged. “My guess is as good as yours.”

Simon stuck the key card in his pocket and walked towards the door. “Come on, you’re coming with me.”

They left the room and strolled down the hall with a squad of Crowns following. They entered the elevator and pressed
Level 149
. His men remained silent, out of both fear and respect. They were honored to be a part of this revolution, but they were also nervous that Simon would lose his mind and shoot them in the head in a fit of rage.

The doors slid open, and they walked to the lab area. Simon stopped in front of No. 88. “It’s this one,” he said, reaching for the key card. He pulled it out of his pocket, but the door slid open on its own. A pleasant voice chimed through the speakers.
Welcome, Mr. Greene
. The lights flickered on, revealing a desk against the back wall.

“So this is what a testing lab looks like,” Jonah said, exploring the room. There was a hint of fascination in his voice.

“That’s right. This is where it all happens.”

“It’s strange. I expected it to be more, you know, like a lab. This is just a normal room. It’s like an office.”

“I agree, it’s not what I expected, but that doesn’t really matter, I suppose.”

“Wait,” Jonah said, pointing to a sign hanging from the ceiling. “Operation room? That sounds a little more appropriate.”

They walked to the door underneath the sign, and it slid open. The room was sterile and white all over. White tiled walls and floors, complete with large glaring lights from above. Everything glowed with an uncomfortable feeling of cleanliness.

“Now this is what I expected,” Simon said.

“Jeez. I feel like I shouldn’t bring tea in here. It might stain the white.”

“No one’s going to care. I certainly don’t. Spill away to your heart’s content.”

“No, no. Someone went through a lot of trouble to clean this room.” He went back out and placed his mug on the desk, before returning. “Besides, we might want to use this room. If we dirty it up now, we’ll just have to clean it up later.”

Simon chuckled. “Why would we use this room? It’s a testing room. It’s where labbies do experiments on innocent people. That’s its only purpose. We have no use for a room like this.”

Jonah shrugged. “You never know.” He walked around and studied the operating table in the middle. Stacks of machines sat next to it, with wires tangled up at the base. A large tank of compressed gas sat next to them. On the side, was a crudely drawn man sleeping. “Knockout gas?” he asked.

Simon watched him. “Why are you so interested in that stuff? Planning an operation?”

“I’m just fascinated by the resources they have. This is so much more than what we have. Now we have access to all of Greene’s stuff. Doesn’t that excite you?”

“Not in the slightest. What
does
excite me is that book on the desk out there. Greene thought it was important enough to come down here in the middle of a large-scale attack. Whatever’s in that book has to be good.”

He left the operation room and returned to the desk. The book and pen sat on top, just as Greene had left them in the video, right next to Jonah’s turtle mug. He picked it up and ran his fingers over the leather bound cover. Words were printed in gold ink.
Monitor Journal: Project Monika
.

He looked back through the door to see Jonah pushing buttons on the machines, and shook his head. “What a moron,” he said, looking back down.

He flipped to the first page and began to read. As he made his way through the entries, he was caught off guard. It was one of the most unexpected things he had ever read in his life. He clapped the book closed and called over to Jonah. “Hey, quit messing around and get out here. We have work to do.”

Jonah came out and immediately grabbed his tea. After a nice long sip, he looked at the book. “What did you find?”

Simon handed it over. “You’re going to want to read this.”

TWO

ELLA AND RUPERT paddled. The waves crashed against the raft, rocking them up and down. Alan shook Vince’s shoulder, trying to snap him out of whatever daze he had fallen into, but he just stared at the horizon with lifeless eyes. Charlotte and Izzy nestled in the corner. Izzy clung to her arm with a solid grip, and Charlotte wrapped her other arm around the girl’s back to hold her close. Fred sat at the center of the raft, gently pecking at the stump where her wing used to be. The Spire was far behind them, barely visible anymore. Just a speck in the distance.

Alan waved his hand in front of Vince’s face one last time and gave up. “Do you think we’re almost there?” he asked as he turned to look ahead.

“I doubt it,” Ella said. “It’s only been a day. Remember how long it took to get out here in the first place?”

“And that’s when you had Barnabus’ motorized boat,” Charlotte pointed out. “At least for part of the trip. We don’t have one of those. We still have a long way to go.”

Alan shook his head, disappointed. “Damn, I’m getting pretty hungry.”

“You’ll have to wait until we get home,” Rupert said. “Or maybe we’ll get lucky and run into that abandoned boat again. You can raid the pantry.”

Alan held his stomach as it rumbled. “Psshh! Like that’ll ever happen.” Right on cue, an object appeared on the horizon. He stood up and peered ahead. The shape slowly formed into what looked like a boat. He chuckled and slapped his knee. “What are the chances of that?”

Charlotte watched the shape carefully as it became clearer. It was unquestionably a boat, but its shape was growing quickly. Too quickly. This boat was not stationary. It was moving towards them, and fast. It was not abandoned either. Three men stood out on the front deck, all wearing the same uniform.

“Those are Greene’s military uniforms,” she said. “They must be Greene’s soldiers, heading back to The City.” She squinted saw the man in front looking back at her. He was pointing towards them and yelling something to the others. The three men gathered at the front and drew guns at the same time. Charlotte flinched. “And those are Greene’s weapons.” She pointed to the guns at the middle of the raft. “I don’t think they’re looking to have a friendly conversation. Quick, get your guns!”

Ella, Rupert, and Alan scrambled towards their bags and pulled out the weapons they had picked up from the Spire. Ella tossed a rifle to Charlotte, who caught it and left Izzy’s side to point her sights at the boat. Izzy curled up in a ball and rocked back and forth with the waves. Vince did not move. He stared off as if nothing was happening.

Charlotte held up her hand. “Don’t fire yet. They’re out of range. We can’t afford to waste bullets. From what I see, we outnumber them, but they almost certainly have more firepower. We need to make every shot count. Be careful. These men were trained by Greene. They are highly specialized and extremely dangerous.”

“Well, duh,” Alan said.

They focused their aim, waiting for the boat to come closer. Waiting for Charlotte’s order to fire. A hard thud came from behind, near the back of the raft. They swung around to see Izzy sprawled out, her body shaking uncontrollably.

“What’s happening?” Alan said, dropping his gun and trotting over. “What’s wrong with her?”

They looked to Charlotte, who shrugged, glancing back and trying to keep her sights on the boat at the same time. “She’s having some sort of seizure!”

The girl was nearing the edge of the raft, but Alan grabbed her arm before she went over. “What do I do?”

“Just make sure she doesn’t fall off,” Rupert said. “The three of us will deal with these men.”

Alan held her shoulders down. “What if she’s dying? We have to do something!”