Both Dean and Rickle continued on their way, exiting from one excavation site and moving toward the temporary base up ahead. Even though it was a temporary base, it covered an extremely large area.
After all, the base was used to extract large pieces, taking them carefully apart and placing them together. There was also on-site research that would be done and more.
“Don’t you guys have sensitive noses as well?” Dean asked as they were closely approaching the front entrance of the building.
“For…certain things. We’re not animals; we’re just higher beings. Our senses are all better than that of the average human, so they don’t work as well as yours… I mean, as well as yours used to,” Rickle replied.
“If you’re asking whether I knew there were people here or not, the answer is yes, I knew. However, I wanted to know what their reaction would be. At first, judging by how they acted, I thought they were just employees of NIRV, but it’s quite clear they’ve placed something above even the founders.
“So something is going on, and before we enter, I think it’s best if you keep your sword out,” Rickle said with a smile.
Dean did as told and took the sword out from his guitar case, but kept the guitar case on his back this time. Rather than Rickle taking the lead, he was the one who went ahead first.
They entered the first area, the reception area, and what was quite odd about it was how it was void of staff. There were several seats that remained empty and untouched. It was hard to tell if it was a sudden evacuation of sorts or if it had happened a long time ago.
Sniffing the air, Rickle couldn’t smell any blood, though, so it wasn’t as if they were attacked or anything like that. They went down one of the halls, and it came as no surprise when a person at the other end immediately started charging toward them.
“Narrow hallway makes things a bit easier.” Dean pointed his sword, and a bright energy shot out from the tip, covering the entire Altered’s body until there was nothing left.
The two of them continued down the corridor, eventually coming across a sliding secure door. It didn’t matter, as Dean swung his blade, and the top half of the door fell. On the other side was a rather large room.
“This looks like a training hall,” Dean said, taking a step inside. “The scratches on the walls… were they making beasts here as well? Does that mean they had a nest crystal?”
“It’s the only way they could have… and do me a favor,” Rickle said. “Can you leave one alive for me?”
Several Retrievers moved their way, running toward the two of them, infected. Using his sword, Dean blasted one away with a short burst that hit the center of the Altered’s body and caused them to fly through the air, but they didn’t disintegrate like the ones before.
Right after, Dean used the sword and swung it about, cutting limbs that were coming at him and even slicing one of the Altered in the air in half. Eventually, after dealing with a few of them, he left the last one alive, stabbing him through the shoulder with the blade and continuing to charge forward until he had pinned the person to the wall.
“Good job, good job; you really have been keeping up with your Qi,” Rickle said, moving in close and placing his hand on the Altered’s head, pushing it back against the wall.
With his thumb, he pulled up the skin on the man’s forehead and looked directly into his eyes.
“It’s definitely not the symptoms of a Crazed Altered who’s been consumed by its black blood. This is an infected Altered… and from the way you’re looking at me, can you see me, do you remember who I am?”
Just as Rickle said those words, the breath of the man began to fade. His heart had strangely stopped beating.
“Did you do that?” Dean asked, pulling the sword out of the Altered’s shoulder. When Rickle let go, the man’s body fell to the floor.
“Do you think I would do that when I was asking him questions? Anyway, let’s hurry—I’m getting more worried by the second,” Rickle said.
Finally, after passing through the large training room, they entered what looked like a research lab. There were several large terminals, testing tubes, and tables laid out with various equipment one would see in any NIRV lab.
Just like the rest of the place, it was completely empty, though, and as Rickle moved to the terminal, he noticed that it was still on.
“It’s still hot,” Rickle said. “Which means the terminal had to be doing something within the hour.”
“Can you get in?”
“Can you not ask stupid questions?” Rickle replied as he started to type away and was looking up all the information he could. Everything that was taking place at the base, and he had even gotten into Rumper’s personal files.
“So what does it say?” Dean asked.
“There were a large number of infected fossils and beasts that were found. Rumper had been getting rid of them himself. Based on the experiment files, he’s made a large amount of serums.”
“And, he was getting paid to give these to the One Gang? That’s what you said, right? About the whole thing?” Dean asked.
“No, he was paying the One Gang to take the serums,” Rickle replied. “That’s what makes this whole thing strange.”
“I need to look… when did this start? There are so many infected beasts that they found. Was it related to this site?” Rickle started to type furiously away until he had eventually found something.
“This is where we need to go. This is where things started. I have a bad feeling about all of this. Let’s head to the site immediately,” Rickle ordered.