Imposter System

The door opened up to another door. Alexis had to insert her credentials once more. What surprised Matt was a face appeared on the screen. It was one created using three-dimensional modeling so it wasn't any specific person's face. It turned to look at the two of them and began to speak.

"Commander Alexeyev, access to the hangar has been denied. Ship is currently on emergency lockdown. Please return to your quarters."

"Override code Uniform, Mike, Alpha, Charlie, Tango, Uniform, Alpha, Lima, Lima, Yankee. ID number One, Three, Three, Seven, Eight, Zero, Zero, Eight, Five." Once Alexis finished, the face on the screen broke apart into green lines of ones and zeroes and a robotic voice sounded out.

"Override accepted, Welcome Commander." The door grinded up, and after several seconds, the duo was hit with a wave of cold air. The temperature in the hangar bay was significantly lower than in the main ship. Alexis led Matt into the hangar and he couldn't stop looking around like an excited kid.

In the game, the Hangar is the most important place in the ship. It is where the fighter planes are situated in order to flee the ship, but it is also where all of the most powerful weaponry is kept. This was obviously referring to the combat suits, but it also meant mechs! Standing almost thirty meters tall, a mechanical monster lied dormant in the hangar, waiting to be activated and wreak havoc on those unprepared.

In the game, it was impossible to man a mech yourself. What seemed to be a major design flaw in the game was quite simply a safety mechanism. Such a weapon of mass destruction is loaded with its own independent artificial intelligence and layers of subroutines to prevent it being misused. Once the captain activated the self-defense mechanic and targeted a player, those mechs would activate too. Alexis saw Matt eyeing the large construct and she shook her head.

"Don't even think about it. That is the MEDUSA class war machine. It was tested in the milky way's asteroid belt to destroy potential world-ending asteroids. It could turn a thousand-meter-long asteroid into rock fragments in minutes. In order to operate one, you need a team of three and are still only running auxiliary functions since the AI is the main controller."

She continued toward a corner of the hangar, and hanging from various horizontal beams were dozens of suits. Matt recognized several of them to be the basic model, but he saw some Pyro suits similar to the one the 'gatekeeper' used. He also recognized the EMP suit that he so feared. Fortunately, he could only see one here, but this was just the long-term storage.

To his dismay, Matt spotted a single 'Tactical Medical Suit.' Fortunately, it did not seem completed as it was still hooked up to various machinery. Alexis went forward to one of the 'Space Marine' combat suits and began to activate it. Although he told her not to wear the black suit due to its connected to the living metal, since he discovered that he could control the infection, he didn't stop her from suiting up.

Once she completed the login sequence, the suit opened up like a monster waiting to swallow her. She turned around and stepped backward into it. The suits fibers closed in around her like a living creature, before forming a solid metal exoskeleton around her. Matt watched in awe, since in the game, all it took to equip a suit was a click of a button and you were suddenly wearing it. In a way, Alexis did exactly that.

Matt instinctively used his Detect Life and saw that Alexis was fine inside the suit. If anything, her vital signs seemed to be even more vigorous. Matt attempted to exert control over the living metal parts on the suit, but they seemed completely inert. There was likely some secret method to bring the living metal to this point. Alexis walked over to him, now a meter taller than him. The suit really reminded him of the one from the game. It was almost exactly the same.

On the back of the suit were several compartments that held various weaponry. He didn't get a chance to properly inspect one of these suits the previous training, so he was quite interested in all the various systems. Compared to the 'Pyrotechnian' suit, the 'Space Marine' suit was a lot less bulky, however, it was still very heavy. The suit came with a built-in respirator to survive in extreme environments. When she activated the microphone, her voice echoed out with a reverb.

"I'm all set, let's go."

Hearing the sound of her voice through the mask, Matt had some strange thoughts pop into his head. However, he didn't voice them out loud and went toward the lift. Based on his previous encounter with Willard, Matt had a fairly good idea where to look for him.

The place that they met for the first time was likely his main stronghold. There would be much in the way of technology to get past. The jamming device that he acquired from the captain's soldiers would come in handy. Ever since gaining it, he's kept it fully charged and deactivated in his pocket.

They entered the emergency shaft in the back of the hangar and proceeded to climb their way to the correct floor. Based on the layout of the ship, this emergency shaft should be the same one that Willard used previously to arrive inside of Matt's lab. A maintenance shaft was connected to the emergency shaft outside of several rooms. As they got close, they suddenly heard the sound of a turret forming and charging up.

Matt quickly went to activate the jamming device, but the turret seemed to be on a closed line. Before he could do anything else, Alexis had already withdrawn one of her weapons and fired a burst of three rounds disabling the turret with accuracy. The guns used by the combat suits were much larger and bulkier than a standard gun. Just the size of the ammunition alone was as big as a can of soda.

With the turret disabled, the duo knew they were at the right place. Alexis tore open the hatch and the two of them entered a long, dimly lit hallway. The maintenance shaft was much smaller than a regular hallway, but in order to ensure someone wearing a combat suit could properly move around the ship it was just big enough to fit Alexis. They carefully walked, occasionally having to shoot down a turret. When they reached the ladder, they exited out into yet another hallway, but much larger than the narrow maintenance shaft.

Although the path they took was different than the first time Matt came here, they still ended up near the same location. Just down the hallway they arrived at a fork, and the emergency stairs were just around the corner. Ahead of them was the sealed and reinforced door that Matt first encountered when he came to ask Willard for him. He couldn't help but let out a laugh at his naivety. Willard was one step ahead of him since the beginning.

"Intruder alert, intruder alert, intruder alert…" A female robotic voice began to sound out at the door as the two came within thirty meters. The two heavy turrets began activated but Alexis was too quick. She easily dispatched and disabled the turrets. Thinking back to how she got kidnapped before, being in control and destroying all of Willard's devices was satisfying.

Without even bothering to be diplomatic, Alexis directly pried open the reinforced door. Inside was the room that Matt recognized from his first time here. The large computers seemed to be in sleep mode and there was no sign of Willard. There was another door that led further to the side, but before continuing forward, Matt remembered something.

"Guard the door, I'm going to get rid of shepherd… or try to, at least." Matt said to Alexis as he walked up to the computers. He pressed randomly on the keyboard and a login screen appeared across all of them. Without bothering to mess around with hacking, he found a port and stuck the thumb drive into it. He had received this from Scorch a long time ago, and decided to give it a shot.

Quickly after inserting it, the screens changed to black with several lines of green text appearing. He didn't know what was happening, but decided to leave it alone to do its thing. The two moved to the next door and continued forward. What they discovered on the other side of the door could only be described as disgusting and inhumane. Hundreds of glass containers filled with some sort of liquid held strange humanoid-like monsters in them, suspended and hooked up to dozens of wires.

These creatures all had the telltale sign of living metal. However, Matt noticed that there were many animalistic features on their facial structures. Many of which were pig-like. There was only one thing he could think of to describe these dark-skinned creatures. But before he could voice it, they began to open and spill out their contents. Suddenly, hundreds of small, medium, and large creatures began to charge toward them in a bloodthirsty frenzy.