Visions and Vanishings: Part Three

     Hopefully Farren hadn't seen him locked in here, or else he probably would have played hero and came and saved him. Salthar rolled his eyes. What idiot would come and rescue him from a place so far up into space?

     At that exact second, Farren was shoved into the laser room, a guard yelling at him. "I want those lasers spotless, or I'll report this to Sloth! You're lucky I didn't bring him to you in the first place!"

     The door was slammed, then locked. "Yes, I'm very lucky," Farren said softly, looking at all the machines piled onto themselves. He sat down, and began to whimper.

     "Salthar, I let you down," Farren said, and let a tear fall from his cheek.

     Salthar thought about getting up from behind the laser, but decided it was better to see how much Farren had really cared about him.

     "And now you're probably blasted into tiny pieces of rubbish," Farren rambled on. "All because of me, and my stupid vision. I should have been able to tell if it was fake!"

     Salthar was desperately trying not to burst out laughing.

     "If our wishes never collided, maybe you'd still be safe! Grant it, you would probably be living in the Cockroach Towers, but still!"

     Salthar had enough, and he jumped out from behind the contraption, laughing so hard he also had tears in his eyes! "It's nice to see you, Farren!"

     The Gelert was astonished. "Salthar? What... but, how?"

     "I'll explain it all later. Sloth has been tampering with your future tellings," Salthar warned, but Farren already knew.

     "Yes, that should have been obvious! Then I had another vision, but I couldn't tell if it was fake or not, I just had to come!"

     "You and me both." Salthar sighed.

     The two stood in silence for a moment. Sloth had fooled them both, and now look at where that got them. Trapped. In a horrible storage room.

     "We need to get out of here," Farren said suddenly.

     "That should be obvious," snapped Salthar, but not in an angry way. More of a joking tone.

     "What I want to know is how Sloth tampered with my foretellings," Farren said, Salthar looking slightly guilty. "What is it?"

     "Oh, I know I should have told you! I was just very nervous," Salthar said, breaking down in fright. Farren tried to calm him, and urged him to go on.

     "Well, it all happened when you sent me to Meridell to help them with stopping the war. Of course, I told them, and they put a stop to it. While I was there, I couldn't help but go and see the kingdom of Darigan. All my life, I thought it looked amazing. I went, and saw Lord Kass and Sloth talking. They saw me listening in, and before I could escape, they had me. They threatened to leave me to starve unless I told them why I was there. I refused to speak, because once they left, I would have simply evaporated," Salthar said. Farren was looking nervously at him. It was all Salthar's fault that they were in this mess.

     "Then," continued Salthar, "after I refused, he brought out a guard that had this potion. I couldn't tell what it was. It was a dark, violet colored potion. He dripped a few drops of the liquid into my throat. It was then I realized it was a truth potion, and before I knew it I had been babbling the truth about why I had been there, why Darigan lost the war, and all about your future tellings. I even told them how you see the future! Through the Wishing Well."

     Salthar could barely say any more. "After that, they left me, talking softly about a new plan. I didn't want to mention it to you, because I know you would have never seen the future again."

     "You didn't tell me because you needed the neopoints?" interrogated Farren through gritted teeth.

     "Of course I did! I was not, and I repeat not, ever going back to the horrible lands of Haunted Woods. It's horrible out there. The food stands never got any money, and if it did, we would soon be in debt because of some horrible mishappening with the health of others. I barely survived down there, forced to eat Devilish Cake that nearly killed me every time I grabbed the fork," Salthar said. Farren was still clanging on to being angered, but also felt sorry for Salthar; he had never revealed what it was like down where he used to live.

     "You should have at least told me! We could have worked out a plan, or something," Farren said soothingly.

     "I know, and I'm really sorry. I just didn't want you to feel like I had betrayed you," Salthar admitted. Farren smiled.

     "Well, I'm glad you told me now, rather then later. But where do we go from here? This station is huge; we'll probably get lost even if we do escape," Salthar said, looking concerned. He suddenly realized they needed to get out of there.

     "Oh, I wouldn't worry about getting around," Farren said with a pleased smile. He pulled out a small map of the whole Virtupets Space Station. Salthar stood there, looking at it with glee.

     "Farren, this is wonderful! Where did you get it?"

     Farren shrugged. "Guest entrance."

     ***

     "Sir, please! They are dusting the lasers just like you asked," said a Kougra guard.

     "It's not them I'm worried about, Yoru, it's if they escape," Sloth said, pacing around the room.

     "Why is it so bad if they escape, sir?" asked Yoru, trying very hard not to disappoint Dr. Sloth. If you ever made him angry, you were going to soon find yourself in the middle of space.

     "The Gelert, he has a special power anybody would want to have. Any villain would want this power! With it, we could rule Neopia, make residents our slaves, and we would never lose another war," Sloth said thoughtfully.

     "What powers?"

     "That Gelert can see the future, Yoru! Anytime he wants," Sloth said, getting back into business.

     "How are you planning on getting yourself the power?"

     "Ahh, yes, I thought when you would be asking about that," said Sloth with an evil grin. "Me and Lord Kass have conjured up a vat filled with a special gooey substance called Sterofrite. Sterofrite takes any paranormal ability, and transfers it to the figure in the other tube. That will be me."

     "Wonderful, sir! Really excellent plan," Yoru said happily.

     "Yes, indeed it is a very good plan. The only thing that could go wrong is security. We have to make sure the two are kept watch on the entire time. We don't want them getting away, after getting so close," Sloth said.

     Yoru looked pleased with himself. "Sir, I wouldn't be worrying about that. The new systems I installed for the station includes all twenty four hour watches over all the rooms in the station."

     Sloth suddenly looked interested in what Yoru was saying. "Do show me this... high security room."

     The two left, walking down the steel hallways of the station, not aware of what was going on downstairs.

     ***

     "Are you... sure this... is going... to work?" Farren heaved, sweat pouring down his face as he pushed a heavy machine towards the entrance.

     "Absolutely positive," said Salthar, half-positive.

     "Review the plan again please," Farren asked in a begging tone. If anything went wrong, they would be executed at once.

     "Fine. This laser is supposedly the strongest, but smallest laser there is. We aim it at the alarm, which will shut the system off in this room. We have three tries, I think we will do fine," Salthar said, looking a little nervous himself.

     "And if it doesn't work?"

     "It's our only hope," Salthar said. They both sighed, and assumed the positions.

     First shot. The button was pressed, and the laserbeam came whipping out of the front, hitting a camera in the top right corner, shattering glass, and electric sparks fleeing from the wires it had snapped. Second shot. The laserbeam was released, but it hit the metal wall, simply reflecting back pathetically, hitting the ground.

     They both inhaled a large breath. "This is our last shot," warned Farren.

     "Yeah, wouldn't want any more pressure on me," Salthar said, half jokingly, half complete serious.

     Third shot. It pierced through the alarm system, which completely shorted out the battery, and the red light extinguished. The door opened without any alarm going off.

     "Do you have the map?" asked Salthar as they snuck out into the bending hallways.

     Farren nodded. "Let's get out of here."

     ***

     "Here, sir, is the observatory room for high security. You can see all of the screens present each different room in the station," Yoru said, presenting a large, metal room coated completely with monitors and screens showing all the movement in every area of the Virtupets Space Station.

     All the screens seemed to be working, all but one, which was hanging from the wall with nothing on the screen.

     "Where is the laser room located on this wall?" asked Sloth, looked very interested, and pleased with Yoru.

     Yoru scanned the different labels of the monitors until he came across the blank one.

     "That's odd," Yoru said to himself. Sloth, unfortunately, heard it.

     "What? What's odd?"

     "This is the laser room. But why is the screen blank? The only way to break a camera in the high security is to..."

     "Is to what?"

     Yoru gulped. "Well, you would have to shoot it with a laser."

     Sloth stood there for a moment, anger quickly spreading upon his face. "Idiot! You didn't discharge all of the lasers?"

     Through gritted teeth, he began to talk to the horrified looking Kougra. "Sound the alarms."

To be continued...