Chapter Seven
Team Minus One

A week has gone by when one day Gadget comes to the house and yells for Robert, Vanessa and Connie to come.  Charlie has already headed back to Japan to tend to his business.  "Everyone come, quickly," he screams as he runs through the house.  As they all gather around him, he says, "I have a surprise to show you, but you gotta come with me."   "What is this all about Daddy?" Vanessa says, as she is as puzzled as the rest of them.  "You will just have wait and see with the rest of them," he says as he motions for them to come outside with him.  As they reluctantly follow his outside, they all get into his van and head out on the road.  As they drive for a while, Gadget hits a button and there is a crackle sound outside the van.  "Just my little way of making sure we are not being followed" he says.  They just look at each other as they sit in the seats and wonder what is going on.  

After a more than an hour trip, they head into a state park.  As they drive on, they come up to a road that winds up a mountain.  As Gadget gets up to the road, he veers off to the left and heads through a small, dirt path in the woods.  He drives up and comes to the side of the mountain.  He then hits a button and part of the mountain appears to move.  As he drives through, the mighty door closes behind him.  Once they are inside, he hits a few buttons and suddenly the lights come on and they are inside what appears to be an abandoned hangar.  "What is this place?" asks Robert as he shuffles out of the van along with everyone else.  "This is our new headquarters," shouts Gadget as he stretches out his hands and smiles like a child on Christmas, who just got all of the toys he asked for.  "I understand it is our hangout, but how did you pull this off?" he asks.  "I merely took it over and updated it.  This was originally the headquarters of Dr Warlock and his followers, a group of madmen who were bent on sending the world back to the dark ages." Gadget says as he gives the look of reminiscing.  "I do remember them, they sure were nuts, but they gave us a good fight.  Still remember when we discovered their headquarters and stopped them from sending a nuclear bomb into the heart of North Harbor, how they all took poison pills and killed themselves." he adds as the smile drifts from his face and is replaced by a solemn look.  It is now when the wrinkles of time show through and his age really begins to show.  "It took us years before we could come back here.  The place gave us the creeps.  But we never did tell anyone, not even the police about this place.  We figured it may come in handy to us someday." he says as he tries vainly to smile.  "But enough about the past, this building has some glorious new adventures waiting and I have been sneaking up here and modernizing It." he says as the familiar glint returns to his eye.  If there is one thing that can quickly cheer up Gadget, it is the pride he gets from showing off the fruits of his labor.  

As the group makes their way through the building, they are both stunned and shocked.  While they see all the new electronic gizmos that Gadget has placed around, like surveillance cameras, security systems with trip lasers, motion sensors and barometric pressure sensors, they still see the remains of the past residents.  There are large carvings in the stonewalls.  These very ornate carvings depict demonic beasts that could only come from the very pits of hell or the very twisted minds of a mentally disturbed person.  Robert only prays that it is the latter and not the former.  While he is not a religious man, he does have a fear of the supernatural.  As they continue through the fortress, they see more carvings in the walls; some depict scenes of sacrifices and of demon summoning.  "Daddy, could ya pick a creepier place?" asks Vanessa, as she senses the apprehension of her teammates.  "Don't you worry any about them carvings No one has been in here in a few decades.  Any old demons that may have been conjured have long moved onto greener pastures" Gadget says will a devilish grin.  He is getting a kick out of trying to scare them.  He can remember back when he was young and they first entered this hellhole and how scared he was.  Even today, the hair on the back of his neck is standing straight up.  While no one was able to prove it, there were rumors of all kind of crazy stuff going on here.  The kind of stuff that was spoken of in hushed voices backs then, but is found in many of these so-called horror movies.  Things like demonic possession, human sacrifice, blood orgies and other stuff that is commonplace in this corrupted world seemed so scary back then.  They were enough to keep anyone, but the Silent Jury from even looking for the hideout of the Dr. Warlock, the self proclaimed father of modern Witchcraft.  

As they enter what is the main room, they are all in awe.  There is a giant oak table with chairs around it.  Up on the walls are a large selection of monitors that are all on and showing different news channels.  There are a few chairs right in front of the monitors.  On the far end of the room are glass cases that house each of their suits of armor.  They hang on mannequins.  "This is like the Hall of Justice," shouts Robert with delight.  For the first time, he realizes how cramped it was back in the basement of the school.  Here they had room to stretch out.  "Excuse me Mr. Gadget, but where do you get the power for all of this?" asks the ever inquisitive Connie.  "You are your father's daughter, aren't you." he says with a smile.  "Dear girl, this place has its own generators that are run on a combination of solar power from panels that are on the mountain, from flowing water that goes through the mountain down to the river below and lastly from thermal energy from the Earth itself.  The previous residents have set up most of it.  They were quite ahead of their time when it came to generating power and such.  I only hope nothing goes bad as I wouldn't know where to look if there was a problem." he says as he wipes off his forehead with a handkerchief.  "I was quite surprised when I came in and found that the place still had full power.  It was the first time in over a decade that I tried the power and it came right on, with no problems whatsoever" he says.  

After some time spent looking around, Robert and the two girls decide to go off and check out their new surroundings.  As they go from room to room, they find more and more bizarre carvings.  "We will need to do some serious remodeling," says Vanessa as she makes a face at one of the carvings of a large man with a bull's head.  "It is quite disturbing," says Connie in her usual quiet voice.  With that they keep looking around.  As they come to one room, they notice a door at the far end that is locked.  "I wonder what is down here," inquires Robert as he tests the strength of the lock.  Even after years of neglect, it still holds strong.  "I really want to know what is down here, any idea girls how we can get down there?" he asks, hoping they can come up with something other than brute strength.  Vanessa pulls out a little kit and moves Robert aside.  "Now before you make any smart comments, yes, this is a lock picking kit.  With my father and his backwards ways, it was the only way I could get at my armor." she says with a smile.  "Yeah, we believe you, don't we Connie" Robert kids.  Connie just smiles, as she does not want to insult her newfound friend.  Vanessa works a few seconds on the lock and it clicks open.  "Now isn't that easier than just smashing the door down?" she says as she puts her kit away.  With that, they slowly walk down the stairs, carefully as there is little light.  Robert fumbles around for a light switch and finally finds one.  As he turns it on, the stairs illuminate and he can see that their journey is a long way down.  The stairway is a long, straight shot, but it is a steep climb and there are no guardrails to hold onto.  Robert holds onto the side of the wall as the girls make him head down first.  He takes his time down the slick and steep stairs.  He does not want to fall as the drop to the bottom is far and the bottom looks quite hard.  The stairway seems to be cut right from stone and the dampness has made it a treacherous descent.  As they near the bottom, they see a large cavern at the bottom.  

As they enter the cavern, they are surprised at how well lit is. While not exactly sunlight, there is sufficient light. What is even stranger is that there are torches around the cavern that are lit. Robert goes over to one and pulls it off the wall. As they all look at it, they are amazed. It is not a real flame, but almost a magical flame. It illuminates without being hot and never seems to run out. These torches must have been going for the last few decades without any gas or oil. Robert puts it back as it is spooking him. But as they look around the cavern, they are even more spooked. There is a bunch of scientific equipment that looks to be working. But the creepiest is a large casket in the middle of the room. But it is not a normal casket, it is one that is hooked up to machines and it looks frozen.

Chapter Eight
Frozen in Time

As Robert moves closer to the casket or what appears to be a casket, the girls move behind him. Their curiosity moves them closer but their common sense keeps them out of harm's way. Robert puts his hand on the casket and pulls it away. "Damn that's cold" he shouts as he pulls away his hand. It is so cold, it burns. As he looks closer he sees there is a window at the top of the casket shaped container. He pulls off his shirt to the sound of catcalls from the girls. He turns to give them a dirty look and then proceeds wrapping the shirt around his hand. "There is no way I am touching that with my bare hand again" he says as he slowly wipes his hand over the glass. The first wipe does little to offer any visibility inside. It takes two more swipes before he jumps back. "What is it?" Connie asks as she takes a step back. "There is a man inside there" he says as he points at the casket. Vanessa walks over slowly and looks into the glass. Inside he sees a young man, maybe eighteen years old inside. His eyes are closed and he is obviously either dead or in a state of suspended animation. The other two also join her as they stare in there. "What should we do?" Vanessa asks. "I think it would be best to let your father's know about what we found" he says as he takes charge of the situation. They are all in agreement that it would be best to let Gadget and Charlie decide the next step.

An hour later, the entire gang is inside the cavern. Gadget and Charlie are examing the casket and figuring out how it works. "This technology is even beyond what we can do now. How did a cult like this get their hands on such technology?" Gadget says as he pokes and prods around the machine. "There could be witchcraft involved." Charlie warns as he tries to keep Gadget from getting too close. But the inquisitive mind of Gadget is too hard to try and rein in. His thirst for knowledge is too great to think about the personal risk he may be putting himself into. He must know how this works. After a few minutes, he looks up and says "I think I know how to release the person inside. But I have serious doubts if they are still alive." Robert has a concerned look on his face "Why do you think he is not still alive?" Gadget begins pushing some buttons on the machine as he answers "The chances of this machine functioning for the last thirty years without any hitches is remote in itself. But then to have someone emerge from being frozen that long is even more remote." After a few more button pushes, the top of the casket starts to rise. The chilled air pours out of the casket and makes it next to impossible to see anything. After a few seconds, it starts to clear up. Gadget brings over some large blankets and puts on some insulated gloves. Charlie also follows suit and they move over and cover the body in the blanket. The boy is thin in build and fairly tall. He has long blonde hair that is sealed in ice. They slowly pull the boy out and Robert comes over to help. They place the body down and Gadget turns on a portable heater he brought down. He did not think he would need it so soon, but when they said a frozen body, he figured he better bring it. They bring over more blankets and wrap them around the body.

Throughout the night, they take turns standing guard over the body. Gadget and Charlie have long retired to their rooms, but Robert and the girls still think the man may be revived. It has been several hours and the body is slowly thawing out. They keep moving the heater to try and evenly thaw the body. It was Vanessa's suggestion and it made sense to the rest of them. As the night goes on, sleep begins to overcome each of them. One by one, they fall asleep and soon the body was forgotten.

When the morning came, Gadget and Charlie came down to wake up the kids. As they came upon the group, all three were fast asleep on their makeshift beds of pillows and blankets they brought down. "Rise and shine" Gadget said loudly. One by one, the trio opened their eyes and wiped away the sleep. "Quick, come here." Charlie said. Gadget walked over and saw that the blankets where the body was wrapped were laying there without any body. "Did you guys do something with the body?" Gadget said with a concerned voice. "We just moved the heater around to evenly thaw him. Why?" replied Vanessa. "Because the body is gone" said Gadget. That put some spring in their step and they all rushed over to see the empty, damp blankets. The heater was still going as well, but there was nothing but blankets for it to heat. There was what looked like a trail of water that led off into the cavern. They followed it until it came to a dead end. The water led to a wall and just stopped. They all looked at it and could not figure it out. Then as if one mind, Charlie and Gadget started feeling around the wall for a button or switch that would lead to a door. After a few mintues of searching, Charlie pulled on what appeared as a small rock jutting from the wall. It really was a well disguised lever and once pulled, the wall slowly went up. In its place was a hallway. The hallway was well lit with the same magical torches. They decided they came this far and had to carry on.

As they made their way down the hallway, they could hear a voice. Someone was here and they may be dangerous, so they better be careful. They started to walk quieter and slowly made their way down the hall. A light shined from a opening on the right side and that is also where the voice seemed to come from. As they neared, they suddenly wished they had their armor with them. Who knows what kind of creepy stuff could be hiding in these caves. Little did they know that they were soon going to see something that would blow their mind.

Robert was the first to look into the room. He could not believe what he saw. Lying on a bed was the man they saw in the ice. He was thawed out now and laying there. He could not tell if he was alive or not. Standing over him was a demon of some sort. It was big, black in color and appeared to be made of stone. But it was not regular stone, but a smooth stone that almost had a skin like appearance to it. Before he could tell the others what he found, the demon sensed their presence and turned to see what was there. For something so big, he was quick and was in the hallway within a second. He had two large wings which he kept behind him. As he stepped into the hallway, he hissed and showed his claws and fangs. Everyone took a step backwards and waited for it to attack. But before it could pounce on them, a voice from the other room said "Stop." The creature turned back towards the room and looked in. Inside the room, the man slowly crawled to his feet and said "Hold your attack." The monster stepped back as the man slowly made his way into the hallway. The man walked into the hallway and leaned against the wall. He was wearing a strange outfit that looked almost like a super hero outfit. There was a long cape that trailed behind him and the outfit was a mix of leather and chain mail. It was black in color with red trim. "You must be the ones who revived me. I give you my thanks." he said with some strain. He was still feeling the effects of being frozen for so long. "What is that thing?" Charlie asks. Everyone was thinking the same question, but he was the first one to voice it. The man smiled and said "Don't worry about Damian, he is just my gargoyle guard. He was just protecting me." Gadget moved closer to look at Butch. His curiosity once again got the better of him. The creature seemed annoyed by Gadget looking so closely at it. "Is he really made of stone?" he asked. "Yeah, but not any stone you ever seen. It is a magical stone from another plane." he replied. He then quickly added "By the way, my name is Daniel."

Silent Jury © 2006 Tom Zjaba

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