Tepid Trip

A motorboat arrives at the coast of Hades isle, stopping beside a pier. On the small motorboat was an old man who drove the boat and a young male, Mark. Stepping out of the boat while waving goodbye to the driver, Marked walked along the pier towards the ground, looking up and at the massive volcano that hades island is famous for. He continues his way from the pier towards the distant volcano and stops after being a few feet away from where the pier ends and the island began.

"...Hades Island, I don't like to come here because a dormant volcano is still a dangerous volcano, no one knows when it will blow.."[b][/b]

A voice called out from Marks' vest pocket. "So what do I gotta do Boss?"[b][/b]

Mark pulls his PET out to respond to his canine navi. "well first, I have to find a computer here so I can access the closed off network where our client lost their custom weapon at. What he was doing there is beyond me, but more than likely foolishness was the reason."[b][/b]

"So after yah find it?"[b][/b]

"Well then I'd jack you in and leave the rest to you."[b][/b]

"Aright Boss."[b][/b]

Mark begins to scan his surroundings for anything of note that might lead him to the volcano computer.

The first thing anyone notices about Hades Isle is the smell. Sulphur and brimstone mixed with a subtle pinch of fear. No wonder no vegetation grows here; it was probably driven out by the smell. The second thing is that Hades is constantly, almost imperceptibly rumbling, a tiny, constant tremoring that makes it seem as though dangling off an edge, only a hair's breadth from collapse.

Ahead of Mark is the entrance to a cave on the side of the once-volcano; to the right of the volcano itself is a big metal computer box, with several thick pipes stabbed into the ground from its' underside. Research equipment? It has an antenna... but more than that Mark can see, out of the corner of his eye, a positively ancient-looking jack in port on the thing, right alongside a newer-looking infrared receptor. This thing is... pretty old.

There's still that cave as well, however.

Mark quickly spots the old computer box beside the volcano base."...That looks like the computer, well that was easy enough."[b][/b] Mark approached the computer box and examined it for a jack in port, and found it. Reaching into his vest and pulling out his PET, he prepares to send his navi in through the infrared port until the navi interrupted him. "...Hey Boss, what's inside there?"[b][/b] Mark looked up and around to see what his navi meant by "there" but concluded that he may have meant the cave besides them. He responds to his navi, "Nothing, we are not going to look in there."[b][/b]

"Aww come on Boss! Can we take a look?"[b][/b]

"No."[b][/b]

"But why not Boss?"[b][/b]

"You are asking me to walk into the cave of a dormant vocano that is clearly still active due to the rumbling, and the strong smell of sulfur give sign of hazardous material in there. Now jack in."[b][/b]

Mark aims the PET at the infrared port...but nothing happens. "...Ember, what are you doing?"[b][/b]

"I'm not going in till I at least see what's in that cave, it's not like I can do it at my own time. Please Boss!"[b][/b]

Mark quickly grew frustrated."...Ember! You WILL obey me! Now jack in! Now!"[b][/b]

The navi remained silent

"...You know I'm going to have to write out this misbehavior in your AI don't you? Don't force my hand Ember!"[b][/b]

"What would it hurt Boss?"[b][/b]

Mark was ready to give his navi a pretty thorough answer; however, he relents and just sighs. Granting his navi it's wish would be the most efficient way out of this problem. "Fine then, we will examin what's inside. But this behavior is going to stop immediately!"[b][/b] he puts the PET back into his shirt pocket and slowly approaches the cave entrance, carefully looking inside to see what is within the cave.

Cursory glance won't get you the secrets, "boss". The cave goes down, down down. There are small, LED lights on either side of the half-natural cave's winding way down, as well as at least a few other wires leading to and fro. All of it seems fairly old.

"Hmm...Intriguing..."[b][/b] With his curiosity piqued, Mark begins to follow the LED lights down and into the cave step by step. He holds his undershirt over his nose to try and reduce the intense smell of sulfur inside the cave.

The path continues to wind down for quite a ways, the smell of sulphur lessening as the cave grows warmer and warmer. Eventually the passage opens up into a larger chamber, with several sheet-covered things linked by wires on the far side of the chamber. In the center of the chamber, and far newer looking than everything else, is a control console with a holographic display that is currently showing a layout of the caves.

It seems that this chamber leads down three paths besides the one Mark came in through; the one to the right dead-ends quickly but has a red dot-- a cursory glance reveals that there's what looks like another console at the end there.

To the left two more paths branch out, one leading back upward and capped by a blue dot; and then a final path leading yet further downward, capped with an arrow.

Mark walks up to the control console and studies the holograph. his navi spoke out to him, curious of what's happening. "...So Boss, what is it? What's in here?"[b][/b] Mark looks around him to see all of the various sheet covered objects linked together by wires "I have no clue, they are all covered in sheets, but right now those aren't important. Take a look at this.[b][/b] Mark pulls his PET out and aims it's camera at the hologram. "This looks like it's a layout of the cave."[b][/b]

"Seems there's something at each end Boss, let's go take a look."[b][/b]

Mark glances over at the right most and shortest cave as portrayed on the hologram, and sees another console at the end. "Well it looks like the red dot is another console, guess we can check there if the one outside the cave took us nowere."[b][/b]

"But...What about that blue dot? And that Arrow?"[b][/b]

"I say the blue dot might be another console, the arrow might lead to someplace else... there's a likelihood that our client would be the adventurous type, they may have went into one of the consoles deeper into here."[b][/b]

"See Boss? I told ya we should have looked in here!"[b][/b]

"It was a good call on your part, now first we should examine all of our options, let's see if there are any other jack in spots under these sheets."[b][/b]

Mark steps away from the control console and towards one of the sheet covered objects, he begins to try and pull the sheet up and off whatever it was concealing.

It's a... netbattle console? Those haven't been used in ages anywhere. Judging by the other sheet-covered objects' sizes, they are also netbattle consoles.

"...Net battle consoles"[b][/b]

"Eh? What are those doing here?"[b][/b]

"if my history is accurate, these were used long ago for net battling competitions held on this island, incidentally I think it's very first contest held here was as a ploy for an evil organization... I think."[b][/b]

"Well what do you think the other sheets have?"[b][/b]

"Judging by the shape, probably more net battle consoles. Anyways let's check the tunnel with the blue dot then and see what's there."[b][/b]

Mark abandons the net battling console to travel down the left passage, heading towards where the blue dot was on the holographic map.

The tunnel eventually ends with some kind of glass dome a small depth beneath the surface of the ocean surrounding the island, surrounded by natural steam vents in the earth of the ocean floor. Just below this steel-and-glass canopy is a control console. Its' screen is turned off, but the power indicator is green.

Mark carefully approached the control console, weaving around the steam jets to avoid getting burned. As he comes close to it he finds that though the screen is off, the device is still powered on. Mark fans himself in an attempt to cool off from the intense heat and humidity in the area as he searches for some place to jack into the device. "Whew!...let's not come back to this place, instead we will look here and get it over with"[b][/b]

"You okay Boss? You look sweaty"[b][/b]

"Those steam jets are making the area really hot and humid...and rather thick and hard to breath in. Ugh... If there's a jack in port on this thing then let's make our business quick."[b][/b]

There's a panel on the front side of the console that likely houses whatever means one uses to jack in to this thing, but it is clearly machine operated, as there is no tab to pull, no button to push, nothing that would allow Mark to open it manually.

After intense study of the console, Mark came to the conclusion that there is no manual way of accessing it and the jack in port it conceals, he sighs and pulls his PET out of his vest to communicate with his navi."Well shoot, looks like we aren't jacking in to this one."[b][/b]

"Why not Boss?"[b][/b]

Mark abandons the console and heads back out to the beginning of the fork in the caverns "The console has an automated lock on it, I cannot open it manually"[b][/b]

"Can't you bust through it Boss?"[b][/b]

Mark rolled his eyes in response to the silly suggestion.

"look, I'm not strong enough to break that kind of material without fracturing my hands first, for now we are heading to where the arrow was."[b][/b]

"Roite then."[b][/b]

Returning the PET to his vest pocket, he makes his way down the other cavern to find out what the arrow represents within it.

Mark abandons the console, heads back to the main room, and then down the last path.

...And down.

And down.

And down.

Eventually Mark stops, realizing that the arrow probably indicates that the tunnel goes down a good bloody long ways, but doesn't indicate what it leads to. He can either keep going downward, or head back. It's quite a trip either way...

As he continues to descend deeper and deeper into the cave he realizes that it must be a long ways down. He looks back to see how far he was and contemplates on whether or not he should ignore the path and return to the earlier consoles or just continue on the path he is already in. After some thought he decides that he's already far enough and should at least look into what else the caverns has to offer. The client could possibly be unpredictable and the location of the custom weapon would likely be hard enough to get to in order for them to actually request help in finding it. On top of that, Mark's own curiosity into the workings of the machinery of Hades island was getting the better of him despite the constant pleas of his common sense requesting he turn back less the rumbling of the volcano cased a cave in or worse.

His navi remained silent along the trip, waiting for anything of note to come to his operator's attention.

The tunnel gets very, very warm, and very humid as Mark continues further and further downward. A few times he almost considers turning back-- but some grim sense of purpose, of presence carries him forward.

Finally the path bottoms out at a circular chamber, part of the wall covered by a glass(?) panel that is holding back what appears to be molten magma. No wonder it's so hot.

The far end of the room houses a pair of double doors and a keypad.

Mark was too busy in fascination over the area to curse himself for coming down to this broiler of an area. The convection from the magma made the room incredibly hot and caused Mark to get all sweaty once again. Still, he wanders towards the keypad on the far end of the room while staring at the mysterious transparent material that holds off the super hot magma as well as insulates the room from getting hot enough to roast whatever went in here, truly a marvel of science to the young net scientist.

His navi soon cried out."Boss! What's going on?"[b][/b] Mark takes his PET out yet again to allow his navi to see the area. "Woaw! Boss looks at all that lava!"[b][/b]

"Yes I see it, it's all being held back by some kind of super insulating material. Normal glass would melt under such heat."[b][/b] Mark turns his attention back onto the keypad, then briefly glances at the large double doors before looking back at the keypad again, only this time closely examining what kind of keypad it is and what input it takes...And if it has a jack in port at all.

Upon closer inspection, while the double doors are dirty-- they're covered with a fine layer of soot and ash, not dust. They're fairly well-maintained and new.

The keypad appears to take a 9-digit combination. It does not seem to have a jack in port, being significantly newer than everything else here.

Mark walks over and smears his finger against the double doors, the "dust" that was on the door turns out to be grimier than normal dust is. "Hmm...volcanic ash...why would that be on this?"[b][/b] he returns to the keypad and wipes the soot off on his pants before pushing random numbers on the keypad purely to examine if the device is still functional or not.

[Input: 239345231]

The holo-display returns an error.

INCORRECT CODE. TWO ATTEMPTS REMAINING BEFORE CHAMBER PURGE.