The Institute 02 Through The Maze

Chapter Two: Through the Maze

The message from Naomi appeared on her wrist-comm early the next morning. It was short, almost cold in its precision, giving nothing more than a set of grid coordinates and a time. There was no further explanation, no real instructions, not even a "Love N!", just a location somewhere deep inside The Zoo.

Ser tapped the screen, bringing up the route. As she suspected, she would have to descend through the lower levels before she could climb back up to wherever SRI's location was tucked away. Ser pulled her jacket tight and stepped out of her apartment, locking the door behind her with a flick of her wrist-comm.

The hallways of ZULU-13 stretched endlessly in either direction, dark and dripping, the walls spotted with patches of rust, mold, and decay. A cracked drone hovered overhead projecting flickering advertisements for some new body mod that promised "the edge you need to survive." Ser snorted softly at the irony as she made her way to the nearest stairwell. The lifts were unreliable on this side of the building, and she wasn't willing to bet on one working when she needed it.

Descending deeper into The Zoo felt like walking into a different world. Every floor brought her closer to the underbelly of ZULU-13, where the air was thick with the scent of sweat, chemicals, and machinery on the verge of collapse. Each level was a microcosm of its own, filled with people who had long since accepted the reality of their existence. Here, there were no polished streets or shining skyscrapers. There was only survival.

As she passed the third level down, she began to see the telltale signs of the life that thrived in the shadows. A group of men huddled in a corner, passing a glowing vial of something between them. Ser could smell the sharp, acrid scent from where she stood--chromepunk, the drug of choice for the hopeless. It was cheap, easy to get, and it killed you slow, one hit at a time. They didn't even look up as she passed.

Further down, the hallway widened into a maze of makeshift stalls and markets. Traders hawked their goods, everything from used cybernetic limbs to hacked software patches for outdated neural mods. Ser kept her eyes ahead as she weaved through the crowd. The buzzing sound of malfunctioning droids filled the air, their mechanical arms jerking unpredictably as they tried to perform basic tasks. One had a broken speaker that sputtered out a jumbled mess of automated responses:

"Thank you for your purchase...error...restart system..."

Beyond the markets, the atmosphere grew darker, more sinister. Neon lights flickered, casting eerie shadows across the walls as small groups of people disappeared into doorways marked with strange symbols and holographic sigils. These were the dens where the real debauchery of The Zoo took place. Synth-drinks laced with hallucinogens, VR clubs where people plugged into lives they could never live. They'd pay whatever chits they had for a few hours of escape, even if it meant losing themselves in the process.

Ser caught glimpses through open doors--people slumped in worn-out chairs, wires snaking from their heads into the blinking terminals that sucked them into another reality. A woman in a metallic bodysuit leaned against a doorframe, her eyes glowing faintly as she watched Ser pass, her lips curling into a smile that didn't reach her eyes.

Ser pushed deeper, heading toward the grid coordinates Naomi had sent. The lower she went, the more chaotic it became. She had to dodge a group of rowdy youths, all modded with neon tattoos that pulsed in rhythm with the music blaring from their wrist-comms. They were laughing, a little too loud, their eyes glassy from whatever they'd taken.

Eventually, she found the lift Naomi's coordinates had led her to. It was old, its doors covered in graffiti and grime. The buttons on the panel were worn down to almost nothing, and the whole thing looked like it hadn't been maintained in years. But it was her only way up. Ser pressed the call button, half-expecting it not to work. To her surprise, the doors slid open, revealing the lift's dark, cramped interior.

She stepped inside and selected the floor Naomi had indicated. Naomi had never been that far upstairs in Zulu-13. The doors slid shut with a groan, and the green lines of a laser scanner passed up and down her body. There was a quiet double beep and the lift began its slow ascent.

As the lift climbed, floor after floor, Ser felt her nerves start to tighten. What awaited her at SRI? Naomi had painted it as a sleek, scientific, off-the-grid institute. But from the state of the lift Ser wasn't sure. She ascended for what felt like an eternity, leaving the lower chaos behind. And then, with a soft ding, the doors slid open.

Ser blinked, momentarily stunned.

The hallway in front of her was impossibly clean, a stark contrast to everything she'd just passed to get here. The walls were smooth, polished white, illuminated by soft, sterile lighting that made the whole place feel like it was carved out of light itself. There was no sound, no hum of malfunctioning tech, no distant shouts or clatter of machinery. It was perfectly silent, and the silence was already creeping her out

On the far wall, a sleek, minimalist logo caught her eye--SRI. Beneath it, in sharp corporate lettering, the full name spelled out: Scientific Research Institute. The letters were etched in a way that made them gleam in the overhead light, cold and impersonal.

This was the absolute cleanest place Ser had ever seen. It felt like stepping into a different world. A world so far removed from The Zoo that it was in another galaxy.

Ser stepped slowly out of the lift, feeling the stark difference in surroundings as she entered the pristine world of SRI. The hall stretched out before her, impossibly clean and cold. The floor beneath her boots was polished to a mirror shine, and the walls seemed to glow softly, illuminated by hidden lights that cast no shadows.

Everything here was eerily perfect. It was a far cry from the rusted metal and flickering neon of downstairs. Even the air was different--crisp, filtered, without the chemical tang she'd grown used to.

The coldness of it all made her uneasy, the still silence pressing in like a weight. She walked down the hall slowly, letting her eyes take in the surroundings. Everything about this place screamed power, control, and money. This wasn't some off-the-grid backroom operation. SRI had serious wealth.

As she made her way down the corridor, she caught sight of an android at the customer service desk. Its design was sleek, polished chrome with synthetic skin that gleamed under the soft light. It sat perfectly still, its expression frozen in the neutral, almost pleasant smile that was supposed to mark it as non-threatening. But there was something in its precision, its mechanical perfection, that made Ser's skin crawl. The android's eyes, glowing faintly while watching her, seemed to track her approach with its inhuman precision without moving.

Ser stopped at the desk, looking at the droid for a minute before clearing her throat.

"I'm here for the internship." she said, her voice sounding too loud in the sterile quiet of the hall.

The android blinked once, and its eyes dilated as it processed her words. Then it spoke in a smooth and perfectly modulated voice, devoid of any emotion.

"Very good," it said, its head tilting slightly. "Please continue to door number 305." and raised its arm pointing down another long hallway to her right.

There was no acknowledgment of her presence beyond the words it spoke. No smile, no further instructions. The android returned to its default position, hands folded neatly in its lap, as if her arrival had been nothing more than another routine task to process.

Ser started walking again, her boots tapping against the polished floor. As she passed more doors numbered in the cold, metallic font, she realized why this place felt so alien. Everything about it was designed to be functional, clinical, sterile, and with all of tha combined it was totally detached from anything she was familiar with. Everything seemingly worked. There was no chaos here: no grit, no... humanity.

Ser came to door #305 towards the end of the corridor, the same sleek design as the rest, unmarked except for the number etched into its surface. Ser paused for a moment, letting the weight of the situation sink in. This supposedly was her way out, the chance Naomi had promised her. But it was also a step into the unknown--into a world that suddenly felt distant, strange, and eerily sinister.

Taking a deep breath, she placed her hand on the scanner set into the wall next to the door, watching as the light shifted from red to green. The door slid open with a soft hiss, revealing what lay beyond.