Volume 16 Tower of Babel Chapter 859: Past Battles
Compared to the previous exploration of Channel 1, the two were more cautious this time - because Ke Lan saw some disturbing scenes in his "sense of vision":
It seemed to be a routine maintenance of the passage. Four armed men wearing protective suits resembling powered exoskeletons and holding guns walked in the front. Behind them were six staff members carrying various tools and equipment.
The protective suits worn by these staff members were several sizes smaller than those worn by the armed personnel. Not only did they lack armored decks, they even lacked power modules. Coupled with the heavy maintenance equipment, the six people's pace seemed extremely laborious, and they soon left a distance from the four armed personnel in front.
The four armed men in front stopped and urged impatiently... But despite their urging, none of them were willing to lend a hand to the staff who fell behind. They just stood there with indifferent looks on their faces, uttering a few complaints from time to time.
This was a very standard team of ten. The one walking in the front was obviously the captain. In addition to a gun, he also had a melee weapon similar to a sword - but these people were all shrouded in a thin layer of mist. Ke Lan could only see a rough outline and could not see their faces or the details of their equipment.
Ke Lan tried his best to maintain the same speed as the team of ten, "following" them slowly and moving deeper into the passage.
"Hurry up! Don't waste any more time!" The leader of the four armed men, the "captain", turned around and shouted to the six already panting staff members behind him, "It's time for dinner in two hours. If we miss the time, those bastards won't leave any food for us!"
After hearing that they might not have time to eat, the six people obviously moved faster... but soon, they returned to their original slow pace... After all, the physical consumption was real, and even if they wanted to go faster, they were unable to do so.
Finally, amid the complaints and curses of the armed personnel, the ten-man team took a full hour to reach the first "one-way valve" - based on the conversation between the team members, Ke Lan knew that it was the first "one-way valve" that had failed, and their mission this time was to find the cause of the failure and repair it.
"Hurry up and work!" The captain leaned the long knife in his hand on the ground and shouted loudly. The other three armed men dispersed with guns in hand, each standing in a direction and looking around vigilantly.
The one-way valve is much dirtier in the "visual experience" than in reality. All kinds of garbage fill every gap in the mechanical structure. Even the hatch used for maintenance is blocked by a large piece of black filth. If the staff want to open it, they can only use a hammer to break up the hardened filth, and then scrape it off bit by bit with a shovel.
"Hurry up, time is running out!" The captain knocked the ground with the tip of the knife, and a dull sound immediately spread along the metal passage to the depths. The sound waves bounced back and forth between the walls of the passage, making a "gulp gulp" sound, which sounded like a huge monster swallowing something. The passage they were in now was the esophagus of the giant monster, and the deep darkness was connected to a wriggling stomach...
This imagination made Ke Lan feel a little uncomfortable. He withdrew his gaze from the darkness deep in the passage and focused on the workers who were working.
Two people were still prying the deformed and stuck maintenance door, while the other four were using special tools to clean up the garbage stuck in the valve gaps and corners. At this moment, a bright orange light suddenly flashed under the flashlight, and a staff member immediately squatted down and reached out for the orange thing.
It was a complete orange, even the skin had not been peeled off. One side of the orange was slightly dented due to the collision, but it was not rotten, and there was no visible mold on the surface... This was a very fresh orange. Fruit of this quality was not something that ordinary residents could afford every day, even on the Ark, let alone in the Hive City where resources were extremely scarce.
As for why a fresh orange appeared in this channel specially used for handling hazardous waste, Ke Lan could only assume that there was an error in the garbage sorting process in the Upper City District, and the oranges, which should have been considered domestic waste, were mixed with the hazardous waste.
Ke Lan clearly heard the sound of the worker who picked up the orange swallowing saliva. He looked around and saw that no one noticed his action, so he quickly wiped the orange with his palm and tried to put it in his pocket.
At this moment, another staff member suddenly flashed behind him and grabbed his arm.
"What are you doing?!" the man who picked up the orange asked in surprise and anxiety, but he had to keep his voice low to avoid more people discovering the situation here.
"I was just about to ask you what you are doing?" The worker who held him spoke in a very low voice, and while speaking, he pulled the former's wrist hard.
"This is what I picked up! Don't snatch it from me!" The man who picked up the orange was eager to put the orange into his pocket, but his hand was no match for the latter's. Under the latter's clamp and pulling, his entire arm could not move at all.
But he did not dare to struggle too much - if he attracted the attention of the armed men, not only would he lose the oranges, he would also be severely beaten .
"Are you fucking stupid? I didn't say I wanted to snatch this broken orange from you!" the latter cursed in a low voice, his tone full of annoyance.
"Then let me go! Pretend you saw nothing and do what you should do!" the man who picked up the orange immediately responded.
"I say, do you want to die? Don't you think about where this place is... Can the oranges picked up here be eaten?" The latter did not let go, but continued to maintain a stalemate.
"This orange isn't rotten, and there's nothing dirty on the surface, so why can't I eat it?" The man who picked up the orange said confidently, "At worst I can just rinse it with water and wash off the radioactive dust on the surface... Do you know how long I haven't eaten this kind of fruit?"
"Are you really not afraid of death? You--" The latter stumbled and fell to the ground before he could finish his words - the "captain" of the armed men had walked behind the two of them at some point, staring with his head down at the man squatting on the ground, holding the orange tightly in his hand.
"Bring it here." The captain said in an extremely impatient tone.
The worker who picked up the orange hesitated for several seconds, then handed the orange over reluctantly.
"Huh?" The captain took the orange and let out a puzzled sound from his nose, as if he was also wondering why an intact orange appeared in this passage for handling hazardous waste - but despite his confusion, he did not forget to kick the worker again, knocking him to the ground like another worker.
The force of his kick was not small. The first worker who was kicked was unable to get up for five or six seconds. As for the second person... Ke Lan clearly heard the crisp sound of a bone being broken.
The "captain" didn't seem to care that the injured workers would slow down the progress of the work. He seemed to have already determined that the team would miss the meal... However, he was still quite satisfied with the unexpected discovery of "Orange".
Although Ke Lan couldn't see his face clearly, as for the characters that appeared in the "sense of vision", as long as she stared at them for a while, she could more or less feel some of their emotions.
For example, the worker who picked up the orange is now full of resentment, while the team leader has a hint of joy in his irritability.
Ke Lan wasn't sure whether the pleasure came from the violence or from the orange, but in any case, the captain didn't throw the orange away, but put it carefully into a pocket.
"Boss, what did that guy pick up?" an armed man who was closer asked, "Isn't it some glowing radioactive waste? Last week, an idiot secretly took the radioactive waste he picked up out of the dormitory, causing more than a dozen workers in the dormitory to suffer from acute radiation sickness... If this happens again, we will definitely be criticized by the people above us."
"Don't worry, it's just an orange." The captain waved his hand, signaling his subordinates not to worry.
"Oranges? Why are there oranges here?" The subordinate was obviously a little confused.
"Maybe there was a problem with the garbage disposal equipment in the upper city... What a pity, it happened to be in this damn Channel 4. Even the inside of the outer shell must be full of radiation." The captain patted his pocket. "But as long as we process it a little, we should be able to sell it for a good price in the black market in the lower city. Those gangs might even fight over it..."
"Boss, you've made a fortune." The armed man said with some envy, "You're going to treat us guys to a good meal, right?"
"Huh, how much do you think an orange can be sold for?" The captain who had just said "it can be sold for a good price" suddenly changed his expression and said, "I think I will have to pay a lot of money to treat you good-for-nothings to a meal. You really dare to say that, kid?"
"Boss, you are as stingy as ever..." He had only said half of the word "stingy" when a black shadow suddenly passed over his head - the armed man's words came to an abrupt end, and along with it, the upper half of his head disappeared.
The corpse with the top of its head cut off fell straight to the ground. The captain was stunned at first, and then he shouted loudly: "We are under attack! Everyone, get close to me immediately! Execute response plan number one!"
Ke Lan did not see the black shadow clearly, not even its general outline - time stop could only stop reality, and the "sense of vision" shared by Ze Luo with Ke Lan, even in a stagnant state, the black shadow remained blurry, and would not become clear because the picture was frozen.
Ke Lan felt that these "senses of vision" most likely came from the memories of those who had seen these images. In their memories, there was no real appearance of the black shadows. And naturally, it was impossible for Ze Luo and Ke Lan, who were "reading" these memories, to see things in these memories that even the creators of the memories themselves had not seen.
The remaining two armed men quickly raised their guns and ran towards the "captain", while the staff members were in a mess - Ke Lan couldn't help shaking her head after just one look... The No. 1 response plan that the "captain" mentioned should be some kind of pre-exercised plan for dealing with emergencies, but judging from the performance of these staff members, either they had never conducted actual drills at all, or the quality of the personnel was really too poor...
The worker who picked up the orange didn't get up from the ground until this time... But before he could stand firm, the black shadow went straight through his chest, and boiling blood spurted out more than ten meters away.
"Fire! I tell you to fire!" The captain held up a tactical flashlight and swept the beam of light around randomly. In his other hand, he held the sword and waved it in front of him nervously.
At this time, Ke Lan discovered that the sword seemed to be a chainsaw sword driven by an engine. As the captain swung it, the friction sound of the chainsaw continued to come from the sword shrouded in mist.
"But... that thing... we can't lock on to the target... if we fire indiscriminately, we will hurt our own people!" another armed man holding a gun said urgently.
"Why are you still caring about this at this hour?!" The captain put the flashlight on his waist, picked up the gun hanging in front of his chest with one hand, and fired at the high-speed moving black shadow... However, none of the bullets fired from the muzzle could hit the palm-sized black shadow, but instead knocked down three or four staff members who were unable to dodge.
"Open fire! Cross fire, block that thing's movement path!" The captain cursed as he fired, "Have you forgotten everything we taught you in the training camp?!"
