“Can I help you, officer?”

“Yes. We are looking for a person named, Mark De La Cruz.”

Mark stared at the officer in awe. “That’s me sir. How can I help you?”

“We’ve received some noise complaints from those buildings over there.” The officer pointed to buildings that were vacant for three years.

“They’ve been telling us for the past few months that they’re getting no business due to the noise that is coming from your factory. Mr. De La Cruz, we would like to bring this to your highest attention.”

Mark had never noticed the problem as he was accustomed to the noise. He was so use to it, that he could barely hear his kids talk to him, even when they were up to his ear.

“I never had this problem before; I will get right on it. Would you like to come into my factory so we can investigate the root of this problem?” The officer agreed and followed Mark.

The journey to the other side of the factory was about to begin. Mark and the officer were in a race against time. They had to be done by dawn. If what they were trying to accomplish wasn’t completed by then, the officer was obligated to call for backup immediately to wherever he was at that given time. Mark’s workers handed them a few snacks, a flashlight, and some protective ear pieces for the noise. The construction workers lined up behind the caution tape. Kent watched as his boss and the officer slowly went into the dark end of the factory. They were soon out of sight of the workers.

“A little dark over here.” Mark shouted.

“Just... a little...” The officer placed his right hand over his holstered gun. “How long has it been since you’ve been at this end?”

“About four years. I never knew that I had this part of the factory. The contract never guaranteed that I would get this part so I just cut it off....” A deafening sound came from the even further side of the factory. Mark and the officer covered their ears whilst ducking to the ground. The sound stopped. They grabbed their flashlights and moved in all directions.

“What was that?” Mark hid behind a crate.

“I’m not sure. I’ll check it out Mr. Mark.” The officer peaked around the box and saw nothing but chunks of metal and bolts all over the floor. The officer didn’t know what was happening. He took out his walkie and called for back-up.

“I think it’s safe, Mr. De La Cruz.” Mark got up from behind the crate.

“What was that?” Mark picked up a metal bolt and examined it.

“I’m not sure, Mr. Mark. I would need a special team to come help us with this.” Mark knew that this was going to turn into a massive police operation.

“As long as you guys have warrants, then that is fine by me.”

“We have the necessary paperwork, Mr. Mark. It won’t be a problem.” The officer said, hiding his smirk from Mark.

As the officer called for backup, Mark saw a bright light about fifty feet away from them. He took out his phone and called for some of his engineers to come up with him and investigate what was ahead.

“Tim, Kent. Come to me and bring some equipment that will help us with our journey.”

They didn’t hesitate one bit. They grabbed one of their newest invention and ran to where their boss was. They knew it wasn’t going to be easy finding them so they took out a couple of flashlights and continued to go forward.

A large metal gear flung past both of their faces. Mark quickly ducked to the ground as the metal gear bounced off three walls before striking the officer in the face. The officer dropped to the floor. Mark dragged the officer behind a crate and looked around to see where the metal gear could had come from. Poking his head over the crate, Mark caught a glimpse of another metal gear flying towards them, landing at his feet.

“There has to be someone or something controlling these metal gears.” Mark took a couple of bolts that were on the floor and threw it in the direction of where the metal gear came from.

He then picked up a metal gear from the floor and scanned it for anything that he can use for the journey ahead of him. A blue location chip caught his attention on the top right of the metal gear. He looked closer and saw a logo on the location chip. The logo on the chip was the same one that the officer had on the back side of his neck. Mark didn’t pay any attention to it though as it wasn’t an important thing to think about at the current moment. The officer got up and felt his head for any bumps. Mark helped the officer up and went along with their journey.

“This side of the factory doesn’t look like my company anymore.” Mark picked up a box and read the label on it.
“Owned by the....” The rest of it was scribbled out. He threw the box on the ground and continued his journey.
“I bought it from this guy who I meet a very long time ago. At the time when I met him for this deal, he didn’t hesitate to give me the company. He practically gave me it for free.”

“Did you catch his name, Mr. Mark? Maybe we can have one of your workers do an online search to see what the big deal was about the guy and this factory.”

“Yea, maybe...” Mark took a crowbar from the floor and pried open a crate. Unknown weapons started spewing out of the crate.

“Activating Self Defense. Weapon Capacity at... 100%” The crate uttered.

“What was that?” The officer picked up a weapon from the floor.

“I don’t know. It was probably nothing.” Mark picked up a weapon and pressed a button on them. The weapons started to heat up and turn red. Bullets came flying out of them. The engineers were within view distance of Mark and the officer. Mark and the officer hit the ground with their hands on their heads. The sound of footsteps and bullets bouncing off of metal walls was the only thing they heard. Explosions was heard all around them. The officer knew that he had to call for backup.

“My engineers should be here any minute now.” The bullets started to get tenser every second. More bullets flew out of the guns nozzles, causing an unbearable sound to be heard all across the factory. The workers that are behind the caution tape covered their ears.

“They better hurry, Mr. Mark.” The officer ran across to different crates until finally getting to a safe distance from the bullets. Mark was shortly behind him.

As Mark was about to slam the door, Tim’s foot stopped

“Mr...... Mark,” Tim gasped for air, “We... didn’t know what to do bu.... but run forward. There was so much back there. This part of the factory really needs to be shut down.”

Kent got up from the ground.

“I have to agree, Tim. This place is not like our factory back there. Someone or something has to be in control of this. Why was this place even built? That doesn’t matter. We need a full police investigation for this. Call the military! Call the army!” Mark and Tim stared at Kent as he was having a fit.

Tim took out his backpack and gave Mark and the officer some tools that would help them on their journey, as well as some flashlights for himself and Kent to use on the journey ahead of them as well.
“A lot of stuff has happened here, Mr. De La Cruz. I’m going to call for backup to our position so we can fully investigate what is here.” The officer grabbed an old chair and sat on it.

“Sounds good. I am going to keep going with Tim and Kent to figure out what is ahead. We have only fifteen minutes left to do what we can or else this will be out of our control.” 

“Mr. Mark! Look! There’s a three way intersection here. I think we should split up and see what is on the end of each tunnel.”

“I agree Tim. Let us split up. It’s too dark to tell but maybe there is a map around here that we can look at to actually see where we are going.” Kent grabbed a rock and threw it down one of the tunnels.
“You know what. I’ll take the middle path and you guys pick whatever other paths you want. We all just can’t go on the same paths.” Mark instructed.

“Yes sir!” Tim yelled as he was going down one path.

“I have a funny feeling about this.” Kent shouted.

Mark, Tim, and Kent continued their journey through the tunnels. It would take them at least an hour to explore. They only had less than ten minutes to do whatever they wanted to do until it was time to go back. The police officer was still unconscious from the large metal gear. Unexpectedly, the tunnels started shaking uncontrollably. Rubble and rocks fell from the ceiling. They ran back to the starting point of the tunnels.
“What do we do now?” Tim and Kent asked?

“We can’t stay here anymore. We have to go back. My flashlight is running very low on battery. It would be near impossible to go back now, but have faith. We will get back within a couple minutes.” Mark took out his flashlight and turned it on. He pointed straight ahead of them and lead the way back to the light side of the factory

There were five minutes left on the clock. Mark and his workers had no choice but to run back to the factory. Everything behind them was exploding. Mark, Tim, and Kent were exhausted.

“We have to leave Mr. Mark! We can’t stay here any longer.” Mark could barely hear anything as he was slightly unconscious.

“Ok.....Ok... Let’s get out of here. This place is about to blow up.” The three ran as fast as they could back to the factory. Explosions, metal pieces, and a bunch of expensive equipment flew around and past them. Lasers and guns started firing randomly as an automatic self defense mode was activated for all of them. They ran for their lives.

“Ruuuuuuuuun!” A voice behind them screamed.

Tim turned his head and caught a glimpse of a person-like figure running towards them. Kent turned as well and caught a glimpse of a shine on the person’s helmet.

As Mark was turning his head, the officer sprinted right past him. This gave Mark and his workers motivation to run even harder. A dim light was appearing in front of them. Mark’s workers were close to the exit until his workers fell straight to the ground. They were too exhausted to run.

“Tim, Kent, come on now! We have to go!” Mark dragged them both by the shirt collar. They were about fifteen feet away from safety. Explosions were happening all around them. As mark was about to cross the caution tape line, he lost grip of Tim. Mark threw Kent to safety and went back to get Tim.
“Mr...... Mr. Mark?” Tim groaned.

As Mark was about to reach for Tim, the door slammed shut. Mark got up from the floor and peaked through the window of the door. The last thing he saw was Tim smiling. Mark was devastated.