Normally I would say climbing out of a repair hatch on an elevator when it was working just fine seemed unnecessary, but there were problems with elevators. Like the fact that they were a perfect place to shoot intruders.
Khithae lifted Starla and some of the other resistance members out the top as we were descending towards the first underground level of the prison. It turned out hands were super useful for things like that, though most of the Bunvorixians could have probably hopped it with the right angle. A whole bunch of squirrels climbed up there as well- though they also stuffed themselves in the corners of the elevator. They weren’t as fragile as we might expect, but it would still be awful if they died.
A wall of ice was waiting when the elevator doors opened, Fluffy just behind it as the most durable option. A conveniently smaller one- it would take less effort for Ice Guy to create, but it still protected us just as well because the entire area was small. It was only meant to last for a moment so we could take in the situation. Immediately, beams of energy blasted the barrier… but not that many.
“I’ll handle those two,” I commented.
“Got it,” he said. “Ready?”
I cast Sleep. The two Bunvorixians slumped. “There were gaps. I don’t need a straight line.”
He clicked his tongue. “What a cheater.”
He dissolved the barrier so we could move forward. Some of the resistance members secured the two unconscious guards. They might be innocent… as much as anyone could be. At the very least, they weren’t members of the leadership class who were pretty much all complicit with the horrors. That said, prison guards in a place such as this were less likely to be innocent.
Up ahead, we heard shouting. “Nobody move!” the voices said. “The first one to step out of their cell will be shot!”
Good, my Knock spell must have worked as I intended. Kirk stepped up to a corner, letting a little flexible periscope bend around the corner. He had a little screen display on his back. It wasn’t adaptive like Midnight’s stuff- this was always a screen. A cheap one, but it let us see what we needed.
“Can you disable their weapons from here?” I asked Magnet Man quietly.
He nodded, moving up to the corner. He looked down at the video feed, a number of guards standing around a beagle-patterned individual that was likely only confident because he had a layer of others in front of him and a mobile barrier. The little dog was barking orders.
“All of you are getting double punishments for this escape attempt!”
It would be unfortunate if that ever came to pass because of us. It was also concerning that there was an implied level of punishment beyond incarceration, but obviously we hadn’t expected prisoners to be treated well here.
“What’s the plan?” Ice Guy whispered. “Sleep again?”
I shook my head. “I don’t have enough mana to take care of everyone. Once he’s done, we’ll make a show of force then get them to surrender when they realize their weapons don’t work.”
“Done,” Magnet Man said. “Except for a couple weapons. I’m just going to have to grab. Unfamiliar schematics.”
Reasonable. He was focusing on small adjustments that would make weapons simply not work. Fusing safeties, removing important pins, little things like that. But he’d have to know where they were, and these weren’t Earth weapons. Lots of high tech stuff that had different aesthetics. It was already good that he’d memorized so much in the time he’d been given.
“I’ll make the show of force,” I said, hefting my weapon. My gun, specifically. Now of course I wasn’t expecting a simple kinetic weapon to defeat advanced Bunvorixian armor… but actually, it could. I just needed to get enough shots in. Reduce would slightly weaken the kinetic force, but I wasn’t relying on that. I was relying on the enchantments. Mana I had spent a while ago, which was much more efficient for me right now.
“Fluffy, cover him,” Zeb urged the rust mole. Fluffy was happy to do so. I could barely see over him at my current height, but it was good enough, and I could shoot around him.
I did provide Fluffy with the tiniest casting of Energy Ward so his ears wouldn’t be hurt too much. My gear protected me from such things and the Brigade had regular checkups for that sort of long term damage. Fluffy had some extra gear, but his ears were sensitive and I’d be firing right next to them.
Barking and whining continued around the corner. A bit of braying, maybe. Canine sounds, you know. “I am the warden! You will respect meeeee!”
Oh good. I wouldn’t regret shooting the little guy at all now.
I stepped out with Fluffy. “The Bunvorixian Freedom Initiative says hello.”
I doubted anyone could really hear that clearly because I was already shooting. Bullets infused with lightning found their way towards a stationary target that couldn’t even dodge away with all the people around him. And the extra special barrier in front meant I had little chance of collateral damage in case I did miss.
Bunvorixian tech was made to resist incidental electricity and things like EMPs. Larger vehicles and ships would pretty much completely ignore it. However, the equipment of individual personnel focused on different factors. Ice wouldn’t have as immediate of an effect as I wanted, and electricity would work well enough. I did need most of the clip, though.
The first handful of bullets didn’t do much. No real penetration, though I could tell it was weakening some sort of personal force field. Once a couple of them embedded properly, arcs of electricity began to fry the armor. I wasn’t terribly concerned with whether or not I killed the warden, so I mostly aimed for his widest part. His belly.
All of the guards turned, raising their weapons. “Die!” some of them yelled. “Enemy attack! We’ll protect you, warden!”
Things like that.
“Good now?” Kirk asked, then stepped out, clearing his throat. “Ahem. The Bunvorixian Freedom Initiative has disabled all of your weapons.” Except maybe the few floating above them- and drifting towards us. “We have allied ourselves with Earthlings, who have similar grievances as ourselves against the very government you serve. Surrender, and you can all live. Except for the warden.”
“N-never surrender!” the warden said with his paws over his head. “Someone grab my grenade and throw it! Fight with tooth and claw!”
Apparently, I should have tried harder to kill him. Even if his voice was pained, he was clearly still functional.
“This grenade?” Magnet Man asked, waggling something above them. “I believe squeezing it like this primes it, right?”
Everyone froze. I assume it was like pulling the pin on a grenade, but I almost laughed because the device kind of squeaked as it deformed.
“Don’t fight for an idiot,” Kirk commented. “Are you going to eat shrapnel? Chew on antimatter?”
… Was that an antimatter grenade? I sure hoped it only had a very small amount, if it was. Well, I doubted they would have any weapons that could annihilate their whole facility. Bunvorixians weren’t that foolish, probably.
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“They’ll see the recordings!” the warden whined. “You’ll all be traitors to the state if you don’t save me!”
“We’ve already cut off any transmissions,” Kirk pointed out. “You think that there will be any recordings?”
I realized something. I released Reduce on myself at the same time as I cast Mage’s Reach. Then I sent it towards the warden. A couple guards made halfhearted attempts to help him, but I grabbed him by the scruff and lifted him towards us. He was within tolerance for lifting with one hand, so I could just… do it.
“Let me go, you fiends! Y-you don’t know it but I have all sorts of contingency devices that- mmrw!”
He was finally quiet after he was muzzled. It was a perfectly valid sort of restraint to carry, considering all Bunvorixians had sharp teeth.
“Everyone back up. You’re going to drop any comm links you have and into that cell there.”
“But-” they began to protest.
Magnet Man ominously nudged the grenade towards them.
“That sounds great!” one of them said. “I’m just gonna… yeah…”
It seemed they had little personal agency, because as soon as one agreed the rest just kind of went along. We closed the cell. I obviously wasn’t going to inform them that it probably wouldn’t lock for a while.
“Okay, prisoners, you’re coming with us,” Kirk said. “To be free, in case that wasn’t clear.”
These weren’t the people we were here for, but we hadn’t wanted to leave anyone behind. We also weren’t entirely sure which layer they would be on. Our layout wasn’t a complete and updated copy of the facility.
“How are we going to get out?” a curly furred poodle-like individual asked. I’m sure their coat was nice once, but it was currently matted and awful. Nobody looked fine. “They’ll be waiting at the top of the elevator, right?”
“A portal,” I said. The Bunvorixians already knew I could do that. And they’d easily figure it out after we were gone. “We just have to gather everyone together first. I’m more worried about how we get everyone to the same floor.”
There were dozens of Bunvorixians here. Even if we squeeze people in, that would be at least two or three trips up and down to each floor.
“What about the stairs?” asked the poodle.
“... There aren’t any stairs,” I said. “This is a secure facility.”
“No, I’ve seen them. At the back.”
“... Show us.”
There were stairs. And the doors might not ever have locked. Obviously they weren’t locked now. I had to hunch even more to fit in them than the normal hallway, but I wasn’t planning to recast Reduce on myself.
Why were there stairs? Fortunately, the poodle answered that without me even having to ask.
“The guards were constantly complaining about how slow the elevator was and how long it took them to get to the break room. So they added stairs. There will be more guards below.”
Of course. “We’ll have to deal with them somehow,” I said. “We can’t afford to delay or they might harm some other prisoners.”
“I’ve got it,” Zeb said. “Hey, little punk.” She growled right in the face of the warden. “I have your comms. You’re going to tell the guards to disarm themselves, or squirrels are going to eat your eyeballs.”
She’d temporarily loosened his muzzle so he could respond. “There aren’t even any squirrels- Aaaaagh!”
We got a lot of powerful reactions to the squirrels people had been too distracted to notice, but most of them weren’t screams of terror.
The warden quickly calmed himself. “Hah. Everyone knows squirrels don’t eat eyeballs. They eat nuts and stuff. Your threat means nothing.”
“Bloodmurder!” Zeb called. A red furred squirrel approached. “Tell him how many eyes bugs have.” The squirrel chittered at him. I wondered if that was the correct name for the squirrel or if she’d indicated that one some other way. “Tell him how crunchy they are.” The squirrel squeaked very enthusiastically.
“I’ll do it! I’ll do it! Just stop Bloodmurder!”
And true to his word, he did. It probably helped that he also had a couple dozen guns pointed at him. Relatedly, most of Magnet Man’s damage to the weapons was easily reversible- if not by him then by the Bunvorixians themselves. The Resistance would be getting a good chunk of decent weapons that they could use. Obtaining proper armaments was always tough for people in their positions.
“... So I get to live now, right?” the warden said. “And my eyeballs?” He coughed pitifully. “I think… I might be bleeding to death. Please…”
He wasn’t. Starla had already come to take a look at him once we secured the level. Relatedly, Khithae had her own report to give.
“I finished placing all of the scramblers.”
Kirk nodded. “We’ll just need to get to the other floors and-”
“All of them,” Khithae said, holding up her hands. Then one foot at a time. “I just climbed down the elevator shaft.”
“Good. Hopefully that will hold off any reinforcements. We’ll still need to keep moving.”
The second level deep ended up being just fine. Things went off without a hitch. The third level, however, was engaged in a firefight between escapees and guards. Some of that fire was heading towards the stairs, but it was better than letting stuff concentrate on the elevator as we were trying to get out.
Such a huge security weakness because of laziness. It was… just like people. They probably hadn’t expected every cell to open on its own anyway.
Magnet Man and Ice Guy got a lot of work protecting us from beam weapons on that layer. It took some convincing to get the prisoners to stop shooting at the disarmed guards, but I didn’t feel much pity for them. At least the regular soldiers couldn’t witness the horrors they were enacting every day.
On the fourth layer, we were prepared to use the warden as a shield, but everything was already over there. Unfortunately, that meant many casualties among the prisoners. They had outnumbered the guards and were healthy enough to take action when they noticed the doors were open, but it was not without cost.
The fifth layer was a surprise. Celmothians. It was a good thing we hadn’t gone for a resistance-first approach, because they had managed to snag some weapons. Fluffy was blasted in the face by the time I could call out that we were friendly. The rust mole then spent a lot of time trying to lick the fur around his face, with various levels of success.
“I can get you back home,” I explained to the Celmothians. Few of them looked to be in much better shape than the people we were here for, but they still had spirit. “Please avoid shooting anyone on our side.”
The bottom layer had the specific resistance members we were looking for. They were also in the worst condition of any that hadn’t been in a fight. As we’d seen previously, many of them were starving- to the point we could probably count their bones from a distance. The guards on the lowest level hadn’t even known the doors were unlocked… because none of the prisoners were reactive. They had mostly listened to the orders to disarm, though. I was still glad we had some Energy Wards active, and those who were fighting were taken down fairly quickly. The others were smart enough to be out of the way.
We immediately had Starla looking over the starving, more than half dead prisoners. “We can’t move them far. But it should be enough.”
Khithae called out a warning as we were trying to get everyone loaded onto the various medical transports. “The TP scramblers are getting hits!” she warned. “Reinforcements incoming in short order!”
I nodded. “Time to get going. Everyone, you have one minute to strap people in. We’re starting exfiltration in thirty.”
About twenty seconds in, I gave the order for Khithae to detonate the teleportation scramblers. It should throw off any immediate attempts to get people down here, and it would actually be easier for me to Gate as it would interfere with any systems they had up above. This facility’s main power was still out, though Khithae had needed to refresh her ability once.
I opened the widest Gate I could. It couldn’t have been any taller due to the ceilings, so I hit over twenty feet wide. Plenty for a bunch of Bunvorixians to run through side by side, and they could even push the medical best through three at a time without risk of crashing. At maximum output, I could manage almost three minutes of Gate uptime. We got through in two and a half.
I was the last person to step into Extra’s teleportation hall. We had with us our whole team as well as a lot of confused Bunvorixians who hadn’t even known Earth existed. Oh, and one warden. I wasn’t sure whether the Bunvorixian resistance or the Celmothians wanted to kill him more, but they could work that out with each other. I was going to go collapse on one of the chairs in the lobby. Even with a couple mana crystals throughout the mission, I had nearly exhausted myself. Manual control of a Gate like that was tough. I hoped Midnight’s thing had gone well.
