When Austin locked eyes with Aaroon and Reya again, he knew it was his time to take the lead. Without a word or even order, he began creeping towards the double doors at the end of the corridor, knowing everyone else would follow his lead. It led, as the scouts said, into a wide, empty room the size of the Alcove.
It had computer screens lining the walls and desks - There weren't anyone there, though - No weird, creepy people Austin thought the Watchers would be like. No one, not even behind the desks and chairs across the room. Just… no one. The room was empty. Not even a spec of dust littered area as Austin and his friends wandered around the place, searching for clues,a way out of this place, something.
Instead, on the floor before them was a sphere the size of a baseball. It had a blinking red dot on it, blaring noiselessly red 𑁋 No, it wasn't a dot, Austin realized. It was a button.
Austin tentatively walked up to it and picked it up. Just as Austin heard Reya's "Austin wait𑁋!" Austin instinctively pressed the button down. He thought something bad was about to happen when the blinking red button stopped blinking red. Instead, as Austin set it back down on the floor, out of where the button was before was a hole and, from that hole, was a recording projection of a blue holographic person 𑁋 A business woman, with red hair, an urgent expression on a stern face and freckles dotting her high cheekbones.
"Hello," the lady said in the holographic recording. "I am lead researcher, executive chairwoman, Dr. Tetia Evermore, president and director of the Research Associates of the International Department of Research, Studies & Affairs' research division, or RAIDRA (pronounced "raider") for short."
Austin locked eyes with Reya, and she nodded. This must be the lady who had sent Austin those letters. Suddenly, Austin became curious as to how the lady did it, but didn't voice his concern right then. He wasn't entirely sure they were all out of the mud just yet; he didn't want to worry anyone even more than they already must have been worried.
Instead, Austin decided to listen to the obvious recording.
"I want to commend you, young survivors, for the completion of the Labyrinth Trials' Phase 1, Operation: Libration," the executive business lady in the recording continued.
"The hell... What the hell is this?" Aaroon asked, sounding annoyed and irritated.
And rightfully so. Trials? Operation? Liberation? What the fuck was going on with this lady? Why were any of them in this situation? They lost friends and loved ones, and for what? An operation? To complete a trial? That was some bullshit.
Still, Reya interjected, interrupting Austin from his dark thoughts with her wisdom.
"I think," Reya interrupted, finger up, her eyes never leaving the holographic recording. "we're about to find out."
"You must all be proud of yourselves, for this day is a good day," the hologram president continued on, and Aaroon just snorted out, clearly unhappily irritated for being ignored. "But I would understand if you do not share the enthusiasm of today's achievements. I imagine you are all confused. Anxious. Fearful. In shock. I can do nothing to ease your distrust or any of these feelings other than explain the reason why… To explain why, what you experienced, was a necessary set of experiences needed from you to save what few in society still breathes."
"Anybody else thinking what I am?" Aaroon couldn't help but remark. "That's a total red flag for me."
"This lady is crazy." Zackery laughed nervously and without humor as he agreed, but his eyes - and ears - had been glued to the hologram still; everyone else were, too —It never left.
"You must try to remember, " the holographic president continued, her tone nothing if not urgent and serious. "If you cannot, then allow yourselves to heed this: Disaster has fallen upon our world. Meteors and asteroids and solar radiation from solar flares and solar storms have brought Hell on Earth, reshaping entire continents and devastatingly weakening the planet's atmosphere - Society as we knew it is no more.
"Entire continents have shifted and the climate of these very regions have drastically changed from what they used to be, into warp dysmorphic lands with weather that follows unnatural weather patterns. The very animals themselves have been mutated. Entire ecosystems, tainted in fire, death and mutations.
"There was so much death - so much carnage and chaos - So many lives lost to droughts, to starvation, to the heat — and the cold — to fear and discord as the very animals that were once our prey has become our predators - Not just on an continental scale, but on a global measurement," the lady in the hologram continued, her face expressive in empathetic sadness and urgency as she spoke. "Entire governments have fallen and the peoples of whom have remained are on their own. The death toll post the devastating disasters were unchartable, but it was nothing compared to what followed."
Austin, who was listening to the lady speak, was perplexed. What could be worse than what all she just said? How can innumerable death get any worse than, well, being innumerable? Deciding to listen even more closely, Austin heard every word she said next, immediately realizing just how worst things could get.
"We believe the combinations of the solar storms and solar flares from the Sun co-opted with the invasion from the space rocks burning through our planet's atmosphere, aided of climate change, allowed the the succession of a microscopic biological sybiot-agent species breach Earth's lower atmosphere which resulted in the most wide-spread, calamitous epidemic this world has ever known. We call it: 'The Taking' - A ruthless microscopic symbiotic virus that mutates organic matter within living organisms on a cellular level.
"It is dangerous. Extremely contagious. Uncontainable. Costly. And thought to have been cureless...Until evolution, however, arose a new generation 𑁋 one, not only immune to its fatal effects, but, also, one that have adapted to possess extraordinary abilities. And, while not everyone was immune, as there were a lesser percentage of humans possessing these extraordinary 'Traits,' as we call them, there was still a high percentage of the remaining human race that was still susceptible to the deadly effects of the Taking.
"So, to combat this threat, the surviving governments of the world banded together with all their remaining power, resources, and wealth they had left to form the Research Associates of the International Department of Studies & Affairs, or "RAIDRA," pronounced as RAIDAR.
"Our sole purpose as RAIDRA associates is to find a cure to the Taking. In your cells, deep, deep down within the nuclei of your cells and genetic coding, lies the answers - the answers for humanity's salvation!
"But, to get to the cure, the path will not be without its hardships. You have passed the Labyrinth Trials, but make no mistake: Do not expect an easy path from here on out, because the road to the cure will be rocky. That much of a warning is a must-be-said. However, you can achieve the wonders no one else can. Believe in yourselves as we believe in you and know that the fate of the human race lies in your successes. In time, be ready to begin the next phase. For now, rest. Replenish the energies you will need for the next trials. And, finally, always remember: 'RAIDRA knows best'."