Snippet #1879209

For a moment, silence fell over the cavern-like test chamber. The echoing groans from the catastrophic crash of the Relaxation Center finally faded away. For the moment, all was still. Three side of the enormous room were complete. But on one side the floor, walls, and ceiling ended, and a huge, endless area continued as far as the eye could see. Dust, or perhaps smoke hung in the air, lit up by lights on huge railed panels in the far distance.

About a third of the intact portion of the center hung off the edge of this gaping expanse which never seemed to end.

Light filtered through the ceiling of the test chamber. Vines crept down the walls through skylights in the ceiling. Pieces of the once immaculate testing area had fallen, and littered the area. Ceiling fragments, wall panels, and portal surfaces were all scattered, and misplaced.

A large, three foot wide red button sat in the far corner of the room. A large, cube shaped box covered in lichen sat on a high ledge, just big enough for it to sit on. The section of wall just behind it was made of a white material, on which a portal could be shot, given that a portal gun was present.

After another long moment, small sounds traveled to those ears that were listening. Sounds of small footsteps, and scuttling, and movement. As well as an indistinct voice muttering to itself. Sounds echoed, magnified by the unexplainable, cavernous, pit.




Angie stared down at her friend. Her legs trembled with the effort of standing. She was almost sure she saw him start to stir when suddenly it was too much. Her weakened body gave out, an she lost all strength in her limbs, falling to the cold floor. She tried to get up, but she lacked the physical power, and the will. Her stomach gnawed at her from the inside, as if trying to eat itself in the absence of food. She knew there was some dry food which she and Pete had stored with them in suspended animation.

She felt herself losing her grip in the world of the conscious, and fought to stay awake. She looked back at the isolated chamber that had kept her alive this past year. She managed to crawl on shaky limbs to it, and reach up, feeling blindly around the inside until her hand met an item. Not the food she was looking for... The dual portal gun. She knew it would be her key to escape. Holding it made her feel a little better...

She couldn't think on the subject any more as she collapsed like a house of cards, unconscious.