128 (Operation Armageddon: Book 1)

Chapter Six: The Bomb | Part 1

"Now what?" Megan sighed, plunging her head into her palms. Matthew went closer towards the boot of the car before transitioning into a crawling position and peeped underneath the vehicle.

"Be careful, Matthew! You may get hurt by the—," Emma warned but stopped the moment Matthew held his left hand up, signalling that he understood. Reaching under the car with his right hand, Matthew steadily grasped onto an object and pulled it out, revealing what it was.

"The... the lava lamp?" Jake stared at the object Matthew was holding in shock. "But it's broken!" Emma cried in despair. "What is it going to do now? All that is left of it is its base!"

"Exactly. You insert the lava lamp on its base, not the side or the top. It should still work," Daniel added, immediately understanding what Matthew was trying to prove to them.

"But how would you know that would still work?" Emma whined.

"Well, as you said earlier on, we should just try it," Matthew referenced Emma's quote just moments ago.

Emma sighed. "Well... I... all right then. I guess it's worth a try. Let's get back to the—," she said before getting cut off by a loud roaring and thumping sound, followed by many faint screams.

"What was that?" Emma questioned. "Let's get out of here first," Matthew told them. The group sprinted up the stairs, anxious to see what was happening above at the lobby. Finally, they hopped out of the stairway, only to see what terrible of a thing had just happened.

A fallen and broken door had caught their sight.

"No, no, no!" Emma screamed, trembling in fear. The group all knew what had just happened.

Captain Jones was gone.

"Stay close; he couldn't have gone too far in this short period of time," Matthew said, looking around, wary of his surroundings.

"Guys, where could he possibly be? This gallery is quite big, and seeing the number of people he has trampled on while heading towards somewhere, he could very well have escaped far from here..." Daniel quivered frightfully as he pointed out the bodies of gallery visitors lying all over the place.

Matthew continued to look left and right in an attempt to locate the beast but to no avail. He thought about where else to look at. Facing his head downwards to think, Matthew pondered carefully.

Suddenly, a jaw-dropping thought hit him. If he was looking down to think, why couldn't he look up?

He quickly shot his eyes up towards the roof of the gallery, spotting a monstrous figure with fierce and menacing eyes glaring back down at him. "Everyone, get out of the way! It's above us!" he screamed.

The whole group disassembled as each of them ran forward in the different directions they were facing. Captain Jones, now infected and turned into the nefarious creature, smashed down onto the ground floor, cracking the marble tiles that made up the floor.

Matthew, who had screamed to everyone to run and drew the most attention, was targeted by the creature first. Running exceptionally fast, it was obviously about to catch up to him.

Just as he was about to hit a dead end, he took the opportunity to slide to the side. Unable to stop its momentum, the creature smashed right into a wall, bashing open a hole in it to another room.

"Holy shi—," Matthew huffed before his short-lived relief turned into more panic. This time, the creature first spotted Megan and thus targeted her.

"Oh, so you want to come at me, you meathead? Bring it on!" Megan provoked as the creature pursued her with heavy footsteps, so much so that the ground trembled. Megan quickly grabbed a vase and smashed it right into the face of the animal multiple times until it shattered entirely.

Scratches emerged on its face, but they did not hinder its determination to continue to attack anyone in its way. It quickly got up and began slashing at Megan. Before it could do any real damage, however, its attention was drawn to someone else.

Emma held up a pistol. She aimed at the creature and shot it three times in the torso. Hence, the creature froze, still standing for a few seconds, before it fell to the ground, causing a tremendous vibration that moved through the floor.

The whole group turned to look at her, utterly impressed by her confidence and unexpected attack on the creature.

"Y-you saved us, Emma! Thank you!" Megan praised her.

"Whoa, where did you get that?" Matthew asked her.

"Well, to be perfectly honest... I hadn't gotten over the incident at Allentown with Captain Harris, and I've been pretty paranoid. So, I... brought a gun for self-defence, although I could never really get the courage even to touch it. Not until now," she replied, slightly ashamed by her need to have a gun for protection.

"Emma, you saved us, so you shouldn't be embarrassed about anything," Matthew said.

"I guess..." Emma shook it off awkwardly.

They then walked to the room with the lava lamps. Megan, holding the base of the last lava lamp gently with both hands, carefully placed it into the hole in the shelf.

For that moment, nothing happened. Then, a whirring mechanical noise sounded. The floor began to vibrate. One of the tiles on the floor levitated upwards, revealing a plastic box containing a key. Matthew steadily opened it and removed the key.

"Looks like that was a smart idea after all," Jake blushed, embarrassed that he had criticised Emma's idea earlier.

Meanwhile, Matthew headed over to the back exit. He struggled to fit the key for a moment as his hands shook nervously, doubtful for a moment that it wouldn't work. Instead, when he placed the key into the keyhole, it instantly unlocked the door.

"Great. Now, all we need to do is to find the passcode," he declared as he glanced around the museum.

Jake looked at his phone, frowning for a bit. "Uh, I need to use the loo. Give me a moment," he said all of a sudden as he hopped away towards the restroom, seemingly urgent.

"At this time? Are you serious?" Emma glared while Jake continued walking up to the second floor as if he hadn't heard her.

Just then, Matthew received a call. Grabbing his phone out of his pocket, he answered, "Hello?"

"I can't hide this from you anymore," spoke somebody in a voice full of hoarse. It was a man's voice. He sounded pretty sick, as he had coughed before he had even said a word to Matthew.

"Who are you?" Matthew asked.

"I am Edward, the museum's main technician. If you have any other questions, hold them for later. There's no time to talk about anything else right now. I feel awful about what my boss is doing. So, I'm here to help you escape. Now quick, the passcode for the digital lock on the back exit is '5-6-9-2'. Hurry, I don't have much time." The technician said.

"Wait, who's your boss?" Matthew questioned, knowing that it was vital for him to know who was behind this assassination attempt this time.

Unfortunately, Edward didn't notice a figure that had been standing behind him for quite a while already, long enough to know what he was up to.

"Ja—," he mouthed before a gunshot was heard. A dying groan was audible as the technician was cut short. Following that, there was a distorted voice in the background which spoke menacingly following the murder of Edward.

"I told you; we will not tolerate traitors."