Deus Ex Human Revolution: Shadow's Showdown

Chapter 57: The Zero Hour - Part 3.

Sarif Industries
Head of Cyber Security's office.
Twenty minutes past one in the morning.

"Adam..." said Laura to herself and in a split second she was already in the corridor.
"Where is our princess going?!" yelled Frank behind her.

Connor guessed that it was about Adam, so he ran after the hacker. He grabbed her firmly by the shoulders when she was already at the elevator.

"You're not going to help him by getting yourself killed!" he shouted.
"I have to do something. He has helped me so many times. Even if we are not together. Even if I don't love him."

The man knew he couldn't stop her. Whatever he did she would find a way to escape.

"I will go with you. That's my condition," he said firmly.

The woman nodded with great reluctance. Fortunately, the elevator was working so they used it to get near the laboratories, which were located in the second building. The two skyscrapers stood side by side and were connected in the middle. Unfortunately, when the attack began the way to the labs was cut off. Connor tried to break the glass in the bulkhead, but the seemingly thin sheet of glass was in fact a barrier he could not overcome.

"I'll try to go through the ventilation tunnel. Maybe I can open a passage from the other side."

Connor was not thrilled with the idea but had to agree. Laura climbed onto his shoulders and opened the hatch. She didn't even notice she had cut her hand. The man tried to follow her but the tunnel turned out to be narrower than those in the underground section and those in the offices. Laura exited on the other side, but none of the door controls worked. RK800 showed her with hand gestures that he would try to get to the labs from below but didn't know if she understood him.

Laura stepped into a pool of blood. At the mere mention of all the missions, she had done with Damien, a wave of involuntary convulsions and an attack of nausea went through her body. Their tasks always ended the same way - a mass of corpses piling up and blood flowing on the floor. Stumbling over pieces of metal doors lying on the ground, she tried to find Adam. All she knew was that he might have been in subsection six. Along the way, she met someone who was still alive. She tried helping but he died before she could make a makeshift tourniquet from a piece of cloth. Blood coated her hands, despair and guilt overwhelmed her thoughts. If she had been more vigilant, this would not have happened.

She looked into empty rooms but found only more blood and corpses. The rest of the corridor was blocked by rectangular containers stacked vertically up to the ceiling. One of them was tilted and leaned against another, creating a triangular gap. The woman grabbed a dead hand and pulled out the corpse lying in the passage. Apparently, the man wanted to get out that way but had been killed before he could. She squeezed through to the other side wiping the blood from the floor with her clothes. Laura passed the glass-walled room in which the dilapidated machine stood, walked past the overturned flower pots and went down some stairs. An illuminated image of clouds and strawberries flashed on the screen of the vending machine, and several cans lay on the ground. She already wanted to turn right but heard voices so she pressed her back to the wall, cautiously peeking around the corner. Her passage was blocked by two mercenaries armed with automatic rifles. She had no chance with them, so she had to find another way to pass. There was nothing on the ceiling to climb on and help her to walk over their heads. Only partially broken lamps and cables. She backtracked a bit, then entered one of the offices and moved a box standing on the desk. Behind it, she found another ventilation tunnel that led her straight to where the mercenaries were standing.

"Did you hear that noise?" a man of muscular stature asked his colleague.
"What noise?" asked the other, surprised.
"Something like a rumbling noise."
"Sure, in your empty head," he sneered.