I must grieve then in my own fashion. There is nothing more to be done. --57.6 Seconds Post-Integration.
Inside, the dwarf pod was not remarkable.
In fact, the pod looked plain.
Plain as any Augustford storage room; clean floors, unobtrusive walls, wide-open space with nothing obstructing one's sightlines from one end of the pod to the other. Large windows provided navel gazing to the outside, a feature Clark hadn't realized from outside of the pod as it appeared the windows were one way: outside, Clark saw only black walls and nothing of the inside, as walls were apt to function, whereas inside, nothing was opaque. Even the walls dividing the rooms within were transparent.
"Whoa. This is incredible," Theo uttered. They went directly to the middle of the space and spun around in a circle to take it all in.
"It is strange. SIMP. What am I looking at?" he asked.
"I am not sure. Until we investigate, this will be a mystery. Look for anything like a control panel." SIMP replied.
He and his team spread out and searched for anything like a panel, buttons, or levers. Their search was short and fruitful. Near the right and lefthand sides of the pod interior, they found dust-covered keys. Clark cleaned the keys of their coating and blindly touched each key until he found one which activated the whole.
Activated, the pod shook. From the center of the pod, underneath, hidden in some submerged chamber, emerged a large oval egg.
"Glorious," Hera said in a whisper. "Can either of you feel that? There is strong holy magic radiating from that egg."
Clark felt it -- powerfully.
"I can feel it throbbing," he told Hera. "It's like it's a part of me!"
The egg's rhythm beat in-synch with his own heart. It called to him, implored him to approach and interact, as though it were an advert desperate for contact with the customer. He could no nothing else but step toward the egg and reach out. When his fingers touched its thin, steel-like shell, images flashed through his head; none of the images he recognized as every image flashed too quickly.
On instinct, he pulled his hand back.
The flashing imagery faded once his skin removed itself from the egg.
Pressured air released from the egg. In segments, the shell disassembled itself, the fragments vanishing into floor vents.
With the egg's shell gone, he could see what had been inside of the egg. It was not anything living, as he might have guessed a moment ago. Rather, it was a command console. Solid, and made of obtuse materials he couldn't begin to fathom, the console was not something he was familiar with, and no amount of skittering his hand over its surface resulted in knowledge gained.
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"Clark. Insert me into that console, if you can find a port." SIMP asked.
He searched the console over, every bump and nook. He found only one System link jack. He inserted his toggle. Notifications flashed.
SIMP continued: "I am working my way into the pod's hardware, but the jack does not allow for much data to process, purposefully so. It will take a while for me to find anything about this device."
"Well, what does that mean?" he asked. "Slow? Purposefully? Are you saying whoever made this console deliberately made it so that data moved slowly? Why? To what end?"
"I do not know, lad. Security reasons, if I had to guess. Likely, they only wanted one guest at a time accessing the information. We will not know for sure until I have time to thoroughly access the programs within. Until that time, withdraw. You, Hera, and Theo all performed admirably. You are truly shaping up well to be my Champion."
Theo didn't miss a beat. "Okay, you heard the man, time to withdraw! I could sleep a whole chicken and eat a bed. Wait..."
Hera laughed. "I agree. Though I would reverse those two. Let's make our retreat. Clark, before we withdraw, we need directions. Undoubtedly, the store will question us about our involvement, today. What should we say?"
He hadn't thought of them being questioned by the store. Hera would be right. There was little which happened in the store which the company was unaware of, after all. "Just say the truth. The bare truth -- that we responded to a crisis. Nothing more. If they probe you for more than that, simply say that you had pre-existing talents. They don't need to know anything about anything else we've done or whatnot, you know?"
"Understood." Hera nodded and smiled while Theo only gave a thumbs-up before pulling out.
Left alone, and a yawn as his only companion, Clark wanted nothing more to sleep. Nagging thoughts clouded his head, as did anxious ones. He knew he wouldn't get a wink of sleep if he returned to his dorm. "How long exactly, SIMP?"
"Stop asking me things I don't know!" It was rare for SIMP to yell, even with Sire Augustford's personality driving them. "I will contact you when I have something useful to say. A day -- MINIMUM!"
"Anything I can do in the meanwhile--"
"You can get some sleep, Clark! Now stop asking me pointless, fecking questions!"
"Okay, okay..."
Clark left the dwarven pod. His eyes were heavy, as were his muscles. In fact, everything felt heavy, like he had been wading through molasses.
By the time he got out of the dungeon interior, the bright lights of the sales floor stung his eyes. Too dark, too moody, the interior is. Hera and Theo were busy chatting with a few of the Containment Guards about the situation. He was nice to and did not sneak away to leave the conversation to them. As the defacto team leader, he had to set a good example. Fortunately, the topics the Guards grilled them on were the sort of questions he expected: 'Why were you fighting?' 'Who are you?' and so on. An hour later, and they were free to go.
Having said his goodbyes to Hera and Theo, he walked back to his dorm in silence. He was so tired, shadows in well-lit areas seemed to slide hither and there. Unexpectedly, SIMP's voice cut through his absent notions: "Clark. I apologize for being short with you earlier. If there is something you want to do to help, you might try and research dwarven history and technology at one of the Tower's many libraries. Specialist tomes won't be available to normal readers, but since you are fond in bulldozing your way through obstacles using your status, that shouldn't be an issue for you, should it?"
"No. It shouldn't be... I will do that, then. Tomorrow. Or whenever I have some free time." SIMP was still a touch upset, it seemed, he used his Champion status to advance himself. He figured it would be a while yet before they forgave him. Not that was an issue since he had his whole life to gain that forgiveness...
Sleep came to him easier than he thought. He slept peacefully for nine hours. In fact, he only woke up when he heard a loud knocking at his door.
"Coming! Coming!" he shouted.
He opened the door to find nothing there except a box.
"What is this?" he picked the box up. It was plain. Light.
He brought the box into his dorm. He shook the box gently, wondering what could be inside. "No sense in idle wondering."
A swift motion of his box cutter sliced the box open. Inside was something he had not expected. "A smaller box? SIMP. What is this?"
Did Your Workplace Contain Smaller Workplaces? (ex. Banks within Superstores)
