I woke up the next day and got myself slowly out of bed. I rubbed my eyes and checked the clock in my room.

IT WAS 11:40?!!?

I ran to the bathroom, quickly took a shower, and brushed my teeth. I put on a red shirt with simple black jeans and ran downstairs to where Coal and Obsidia were.

"Hey guys, good morning! Where's mom?" I asked them quickly. Coal shrugged while Obsidia had a playful grin on her face.

"She's in the yard! I think she's doing some gardening." I looked through the window in the kitchen to the backyard where I saw her actively slamming a shovel into the ground. I decided it wouldn't be the best time to talk to her since she seemed occupied.

"Alright well, make sure you guys help her once you're done eating breakfast. I gotta go now." I stated.

"Wait a minute. Where are you going?" Coal asked me after swallowing a mouthful of cereal with milk.

"Yeah! You never go out of the house!" Obsidia exclaimed. I turned to them and stated loudly,

"I'm hanging out with some friends at the Waterway Café!" I tried to speak as loud as possible so Mom could hear me but she must've had those outdated wired headphones because she still couldn't hear me.

"Alright then. Have fun." Coal said, taking another big gulp of milk while Obsidia waved enthusiastically. I waved back and headed out the door in a sprint, grabbed my bike, and pedaled my way to the café which was pretty far away.

And I mean, really far away.

I hadn't realized it before even though I should've, but based on what my built-in GPS stated it was around four and a half miles away. Great grief... at the very least though, I could enjoy being outdoors and looking at the birds that flew through the trees. I heard rumors that these birds were governmental spies, and even though I would like to believe the opposite, I'd still not be surprised that the birds were some sort of spies. Even if they're not from the Redwoods.

I knew with my bike I absolutely was not going to make it in time and I started to wish the car didn't break down. Man, why did it have to break down?!? I mean one second we were doing just fine in the house and the next my brother had to park the car right on top of a bottle—

CRASH!

I wasn't paying attention and I slammed into a girl going around fifteen miles per hour. I groaned in pain since I scratched my knees and elbows but other than that I was fine. But what about the girl? I got up and walked over to the girl I hit and...

Emily!?

"Emily, what the hell are you doing here?" I asked her, she was holding her arm and I examined at it carefully, it was covered in blood. It looked like I might've scratched her more than I presumed.

"Crap alright uhm, stay still okay? I'm just going to.." I looked at my red shirt and ripped a piece of the cloth from the bottom. I gently clutched Emily's hand and wrapped the cloth around the gash on her arm. She winced in pain as I finished wrapping her arm, she stood upright and looked at me.

"Look where you're going, idiot." She said.

"You still haven't answered my question, idiot." I changed the subject.

"I, well. It's because I needed to tell you something."

"A phone call or a text message would've been just as fine!" I exclaimed.

"No! I can't access my home phone right now so talking in person is the only way I could communicate with you." I wondered about something else too and decided to ask it.

"Alright, that explains you not calling or messaging me. But that still doesn't explain how you knew where I was going so accurately." I stated.

"This road is the road that leads to the Waterway Café. I sort of got lucky, or well unlucky in this case, when I bumped into you. I kind of wish I had a safer way to talk to you but of course... ow." She said. I looked at her gash while standing and saw that the bleeding wasn't going to stop until it was either stitched up or bandaged properly. I looked to my left and saw that there were simply more trees so I couldn't go there. I looked to my right where the road outstretched far into the distance to the café, there's no saying I'll get any sort of help there. That meant the only way I could bandage up Emily properly was by going straight ahead where she was walking from.

The school.

I laid her down at the back of my bike and pedaled slowly towards the school while using the small mechanical engine in the bike's chamber to speed up. I knew there was a possibility that the nurses' office might be closed but I didn't want to risk Emily getting an infection because of me.

Once we got to the school which was relatively close to where we crashed, I helped Emily get off my bike and we rushed over to the nurse's office near the B building. That's when out of the corner of my eyes I saw something that made my heart drop. I pulled Emily's shirt so hard that she fell to the ground. She looked like she wanted to beat me up, which was understandable.

"WHAT WAS THAT—" I cupped my hand and closed it around her mouth. I signaled with my other hand to be quiet and I whispered in her ear,

"I just saw Veronica." She looked at me like I was crazy. But I pointed beside the wall where we were hiding behind and she looked around the corner. She turned around and her mouth was wide open.

"Why is she here RIGHT NOW?!?" She whispered back. I shrugged as I saw the cloth on her gash start to come loose. I needed to hurry up and get to the nurses' office but based on the distance between where we were and the office. There was no way we were going to make it in time before Veronica saw us. I overlooked the wall once again and saw that she was talking to a large man. Based on the fact that they have the same hair color and I believed eye color, I didn't know for sure since we were rather far away from them, I'd say that the man she was talking to was her father.

"Veronica Mayfield! Did she or did she not tell you to secure the perimeter!?!"

"Yes, she did! But with the perimeter being so large and with the creatures in that forest it's virtually impossible father!"

"Nothing is impossible, Veronica! Now listen to me very closely. This girl, the Ruby one, is a part of a family that keeps our lives afloat. If we dare cross with them in any way shape or form we won't have the lives we've lived for decades! That's why you must secure the perimeter and the basement from any more intruders. We've already had a breach, and I don't think that Ruby girl would like another one." He walked off towards the D building while Veronica clenched her fists and muttered something that I couldn't hear from here. But based on her looking exceedingly pissed off and kicking the dirt under her, I bet she was saying not-so-nice things.

"I think now is our chance, let's go before my arm turns into a sack of flesh with no blood!" Emily whispered behind me. I still wasn't too sure that Veronica wasn't going to see us and I knew I couldn't take any risks. I grabbed a rock right next to me and saw that there was a bush not far from here and her. I hurled the rock towards the bush with all of my mouth! And...!

And I accidentally hit Veronica with the rock right across the back of her head, knocking her down on the ground. I was speechless and completely frozen but Emily knew this was a perfect chance to get to the office so she grabbed my hand and we both ran to the nurses' office as the door closed behind us, we both sighed a massive relief.

"I can't believe I just did that." I nerve-wrackingly said.

"No offense to you George, but you have terrible aim! I saw what you were aiming at, that bush right? Man.. still though, it worked just as well! Hehehe!" She said, grabbing bandages, stitches, and gauze. She set it down on her lap and looked at them in confusion.

"Uhh..?"

"Here, let me do this for you. It's the least I can do since I was the one that side-swiped you in the first place." I said, grabbing the stitches and unraveling the cloth. It was soaked in blood and once I threw it away, I got back to her quickly and examined the gash. It wasn't as bad as I thought and it looked about two and a half centimeters wide. I took a deep breath, applied gauze, and began stitching the area where the gash was. She banged her fist on the chair she was sitting on so hard I thought she would break it. Hell, what would happen if she broke it?

"Here, squeeze my arm and if it hurts too much, I'll stop," I said, putting my right arm in front of her. She immediately grabbed onto my arm with both hands and she squeezed the ever-living hell out of my arm. I thought my essence was being sucked out of it.

But I continued on and eventually got the stitches to close the gash. Then, to protect the stitches from accidentally ripping apart, I wrapped the bandage around her arm. I sighed and wiped my forehead as her arm looked as good as new. Even though there was still blood all over the place.

"That should do it," I stated, going to the back of the office and washing my hands. Emily looked relieved as she was astonished by her bandage.

"How did you know how to do that?" She asked me.

"My mom works as a nurse so I learned it from her. She always says having a calm head in these situations is the key to making a patient feel comfortable. Of course, I never expected this much blood!" I exclaimed, drying my hands as I went over to her.

"Do we have to clean this up?" She asked me.

"This is the only building that has no cameras apart from in the very back where the drugs are. So we should be fine if we don't clean this up." I said with a wink. She smiled and sat up.

"Anyway. We're in this situation in the first place because you wanted to ask me something?" I asked her.

"Not ask you, tell you something. And I think that conversation with Veronica and her father proves my theory instead of denying it." She looked down and sighed profoundly.

"A week ago, maybe a couple of days ago even. I was walking around the campus because I wanted to skip my elective since it was boring." I don't know how burning the kitchen meant her elective could be boring, but oh well.

"As I was walking through the campus though I stumbled upon those three girls from the basement. They were tackling some sort of animal and putting it in a cage. Even though I wanted to intervene to see what they were doing, that was when Veronica and whoever that Ruby girl was came in and took the caged animal to the D building. I wasn't able to follow them after that since I would've probably been caught but if my suspicions are true... then they're using that basement for much larger things than just storage." I swallowed my saliva and broke into a cold sweat.

If they were using that basement we were in earlier for trapping creatures in the forest, that was just sickening. I couldn't imagine what experiments they were doing on those poor animals.

"Then why don't we set those animals free?" I finally asked after a long pause.

"Huh? Sorry, I don't think I heard you. For a second I thought you said—WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!" Emily jumped from her seat and chased after me. I looked both ways through the glass doorway and saw that Veronica was still groaning like a baby on the floor. I sneakily went out of the nurses' office and went to the front of the B building. Emily was following me the whole way and asking me in excitement,

"Are we really gonna do this?! Breaking into a Redwoods' secret basement?"

"Why not? We've done this before, we could do it again!" I stated. I ran from the B building to the D building in which Emily ran with me. Side by side with her felt exhilarating as we got to the back of the D building. We saw that there were now multiple cameras staged around the windows at the back of the building.

"Shoot. Looks like we can't go through the back. We certainly can't go through the front or the sides since cameras are swarming every entrance. Any ideas?" I looked towards her and was staring at three hoverboards stacked on each other.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" She asked me. I nodded and we got onto two separate hoverboards while Emily carried the third one. We pressed the button to elevate and we hovered up to the second floor of the building, Emily used the third board we found and smashed it against the second-floor window. I expected alarms and sirens to blare around us but in reality, there was nothing other than just glass from the window shattering on the floor. We entered through the broken window and put our hoverboards at our sides. We might need them later if we wanted a quick escape.

We walked towards where the stairs met the second floor and went down slowly one step at a time... or well I did. Emily instead went four whole steps at a time, nearly broke her leg at a rough landing, and hid at a wall dividing the stairs to the main hallway. She pointed towards the other side of the wall while I walked over to her. I peered around the wall and saw two robotic guards guarding the entrance to the basement. One other guard was going straight towards us, probably because of the glass shattering on the second floor.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" Emily asked me again.

"Born thinking," I whispered back. As the robot got closer, I stuck my leg out causing it to trip. Emily grabbed the third hoverboard and slammed it into the neck of the robot. The robot was completely decapitated and lay still on the cold ground.

A bit harsh, but it's a lifeless body that had been murdered. No harm, no foul.

"The rest of those robots are going to notice their friend over here hasn't come back. Do you have a plan?" Emily whispered to me. I thought for a second and saw the massive frozen magma sword the robot was wielding. I glanced at my hoverboard and sighed.

"Yeah, I do have a plan. It's just going to be a risky one."

"George I'm the definition of risky. Just tell me!" She whispered back. I whispered to her,

"Alright. Follow my lead." I placed the robot's decimated head which was oozing electricity and oil on my head. I knew this was risky in a case of a fire but this was the only way to save those inferred animals. I locked on the robot's decapitated head which was wreaking of oil and tried to pull out the magma sword it had with one hand. Of course though, since it was massive, I had to use two hands to barely get it over my head. I grabbed some special kind of handcuffs that were made of... Cobalt? Anyway, I looked at Emily who stared at my handcuffs.

"So that's the plan? I sort of like it, adds a little bit of spice to our rescue mission." She whispered to me.

"Shut up while I put these handcuffs on you," I whispered. As soon as I put it on her, I whispered to her once again,

"Here's the plan. You'll act like you're a prisoner that was found on the second floor which explains the glass breaking. You'll try to struggle to get free but I'll be able to keep you close to me. Don't struggle too hard though, just make sure it looks believable." She nodded and stared at the wall separating us from the other robots. Listen, I know this was a horrible plan, but we were only thirteen at the time. So please, give us a pass on planning and our eventual undertaking.

"Ready?" I asked her.

"Ready." She stated silently. I grabbed her by the wrists and yanked her towards the robots.

»Oħ, ǐt sěěms yǒǔ'vě fǒǔnd ǎn ǐntrǔděr!« One of the robots stated. I nodded cautiously while Emily struggled to get out of the handcuffs.

"AHHHH! LET ME GO, LET ME GOOO!" She screamed and spat on my robot mask. Even though I wasn't a robot I still felt offended by that.

»Hǎh! Sěnd hěr dǒwn tǒ tħě pǐts!« Said the other robot. I nodded again and I went to the newly built steel door. I saw a keypad as well as a facial recognition scanner. I didn't know what the password for the door was, so I tried to look around to see if there was any code labeled on a board or piece of paper on a wall. But because of my mask, I could barely see anything.

"Psst Emily! Can you see if there's a password anywhere?" I whispered under the head. I saw her struggle under the handcuffs while also looking around for any code.

"NOTHING. IS. HERE!" She screamed out. The other robots seemed amused by Emily's act.

»Wħǎt îs tǎkǐng yǒǔ sǒ lǒng?« The robot asked. I started to sweat profusely as I didn't know the passcode and had already done that stupid facial recognition. So, with no other options, I tried my best to imitate their accent.

"Ahem. Whæt is the c-codeis?" I butchered it.

»Brǒtħěr. Tǎkě ǎ lǒǒk ǎt tħǐs!" One of the robots said, going to wear that robot was decapitated. As the other robot hurried to where the corpse was. I knew I only had a couple of seconds before they figured everything out, so I unlocked Emily's handcuffs quickly and smashed the sword into the passcode. Causing the door to automatically unlock. I didn't know that was the passcode for this stupid door! Emily rushed in and kicked open a grated door.

However, this caused her to be electrocuted since the door was filled to the brim with electricity. Meanwhile, behind me, I saw the robots started to chase after us. I quickly got the robot mask off of me and threw it at one of the robots, causing it to stumble and fall on impact while I quickly closed the steel door.

I saw that Emily was on the floor injured. I went to her body, narrowly avoiding the electrocuted doorway, and checked her pulse. It was weak, exceptionally weak. I needed help and I needed it fast, I saw that the door to the actual entrance into the basement was gold and had a platinum-plated door knob but I didn't care. I used the handcuffs that I had gotten previously, jammed them into the doorknob, and pulled. This caused the platinum doorknob to come loose as I used all of my strength to lodge the doorknob loose enough. I then reached my hand inside the gap that was made from the door knob becoming loose and unlocked the door.

I stumbled into the basement and looked around me. There were animals in cages, weapons, explosives that could level a small city, books, and that same CD I saw in the box I had previously (which I just realized I had accidentally left in Mrs. Foyagers class five weeks beforehand. Oops!), and finally sets of keys scattered everywhere around us.

I heard a loud bang on the doorway followed by multiple footsteps that also started to bang on the door. I knew I didn't have much time but I could get some of these animals free. I hurried myself to the first cage which contained numerous butterflies. I saw a sign that cautioned that they were poisonous to the touch. I looked around for all of the keys and only obtained five of them while there were seven cages. I tried the first key on the butterflies and they still wouldn't budge while more bangs started to erupt from the steel door at the entrance of the basement. I tried the second key and it didn't work, on the third key it fitted in but I couldn't turn it. I was starting to lose hope as the fourth one also didn't work.

I used the fifth key as quickly as possible and as the cage suddenly unlocked I gasped and ran as fast as I could to the second cage. The cage contained a mix between a tiger and an eagle as its wings extended far beyond the cage and its beak and claws were razor sharp. I fumbled over the first key as it tried to bite my head off and I unlocked the cage on the first try. It tried to pounce on me but fortunately, I dodged its beak just in time and went to the third cage where I tried two of the keys before it finally opened. The cage contained just an ordinary owl...

That had a massive tongue sticking out of its beak. I looked at the sign next to it and it stated a danger of it being venomous. I gulped and just as the owl flew away towards the basement ceiling and as I was getting to the third cage—

BANG!

The steel door burst open. I rushed over to Emily and dragged her inside as the butterflies nearly caught us.

As far as I could tell, running down the stairs were at least four robots and three other people with lighter footsteps. I ran around as fast as I could as the tiger-hawk hybrid chased me around the entire basement. Soon enough, the robots were the first to enter the basement and it seemed like all time had stopped.

The calm before the storm.

As soon as Veronica's father followed by two bodyguards came into the basement, all hell broke loose. Monkey experimentations in the seventh cage were going insane, the tiger-hawk hybrid pounced at one of the robots and took a chunk of its chest out. The butterflies surrounded one of the bodyguards and it collapsed. A set of gigantic frogs in the sixth cage tried to break the cage. The owl with the large tongue only licked one of the robots, but the robot disintegrated into dust.

I thought it said venomous, not acidic!

I tried to get to the fourth cage but it was already broken free. A swarm of angry bees started to head for the second bodyguard.

He screamed for help, yet I grabbed one of the keys and tried the fifth cage. It opened successfully on the first try and out came a slow snail that was bright red. Probably meant that it was incredibly hot to the touch so I avoided it.

I grabbed the two remaining keys at the far side of the basement as the butterflies were the first to get out of the basement. I ran towards the rabid monkeys and unlocked them causing one of them to punch me in the gut and rush over to the basement entrance. After shaking the punch off since it wasn't a powerful one, I got to the giant frogs which were the calmest of them all—apart from the snail—and I opened the cage one of them even thanked me by licking my face. I smiled at the chaos that I created.

I soon realized after around five seconds that the animals were starting to create a pathway for us through the destruction of the basement. I rushed out of the basement with Emily in my hands and skipped two steps at a time until I was on the first floor. I ran to the hoverboards we left behind as I turned around. The frogs were the last ones to come out of the basement.

Where was the snail then you may ask? I had no idea. Maybe it had some ability to teleport for all I care. Because now we've completed our goal. We liberated these animals and now it was time for our grand escape! I fastened Emily to the hoverboard and checked her pulse once again. It was starting to gain strength back again but it still felt weak.

I activated the hoverboard, flew out of the D building, and levitated down where I could ride much faster. In the distance, I saw black military trucks stop at the front of the A building but by this point, all of those animals were free. As I checked the time I saw that it was 11:58 AM. I knew I was going to be late but by this point, I didn't care. All I cared about and my priority then and there was to keep Emily safe and free those animals.

And I accomplished both of those goals simultaneously.