TERRA EMPIRE: ON THE EVE OF WORLD WAR

Episode 21: TAKE REFUGE IN THE CEO ROOM

A roar of security alarms was also heard to the place where the six men who were trying to escape were. Jack turned to Professor McQueen and asked, “Does that alarm work automatically, Professor?”

The one asked shook his head, “No! Someone must have pressed the emergency button in one of the rooms in this building.”

“Bless him,” Howard Tramp commented with a loud applause.

“But we are not yet safe, at least until all ****** below are captured,” Jack said with a grim face. “Let SWAT and SFPD handle it. Our current task continues to escort the President until his condition is completely under control.”

“I think we should make contact with the outside world,” Bill gave a suggestion.

“We will do that after finding a safe room,” Jack responded. "You see for yourself, aren't those people still chasing us?"

"There is no safe room in this place other than Mr. Tramp," said Professor McQueen.

"That's true, Mr. The tramp?" Jack looked at the junior Tramp.

Duncan nodded, "All the rooms in this place are very open. Only my room was designed by a professor with a closed form and high-level emergency facilities."

"High level of urgency?" Jack frowned.

"Safety from frequent earthquakes in San Francisco" Professor McQueen added.

"That means we're going to the room where the three of you met before the gala opening?"

"Not the one on the second floor. I have a dedicated workspace on the sixth floor" Duncan replied.

The faces of those around him turned wry, except for Professor McQueen of course because he knew it first. Howard Tramp first reacted with a loud moan, "Can't we just take the elevator?"

Although including those who do not like the possibility of having to climb the stairs to the sixth floor, Bill responded, "Sorry Mr. President, the risk is great if we take the elevator. The people chasing us can figure out where we're going."

"Bill's right," Jack chimed in. "Better we keep climbing these stairs. It only goes up four floors, really!"

"Four floors you say?" again the President groaned, which was certainly just an empty talk because he finally followed the others to the sixth floor.

“So far to your room?” asked the senior Tramp among the gasping breaths so that it set foot on the intended floor.

“It's close there,” Tramp junior pointed to the room which is at the end of the corridor of the sixth floor.

The Duncan Tramp workspace at first glance looks like a regular workspace, with a medium-sized work desk, a leather-wrapped padded chair, a large-size white board inscribed with a complex mathematical formula, and, and the shelf contains thick books. Which shows that the room was a facility owned by the CEO is a well-known brand of PC Monitor perched on a table and the existence of a private meeting room to accommodate a meeting of five-six people who blend with the workspace those.

Jack closed the door of the study as soon as his two friends came in. He turned to Tramp Junior and Professor McQueen, "How safe is this room?"

“Enable the security code, sir!” professor McQueen told his boss.

Iron trellises without cavities cover each window from the outside and inside, respectively, thick steel doors also line the door of the room from both sides – from inside and outside – and each wall was apparently also barricaded with thick steel that rose layer by layer from the meeting of the wall with the floor to the ceiling.

The room became narrower than before due to the thick diameter of the steel walls, even so it does not reduce the comfort of the people in it because as the rise of the steel walls the room temperature automatically becomes lower. It seems that it is in the program systematically so that anyone who is in the room does not then overheat during shelter in it. The appearance of the room is more robust than before, it feels like a bomb or missile bullet has not been able to penetrate it, so the ****** it is impossible to penetrate into just armed with a machine gun.

With relief Howard Tramp threw his body onto the sofa, unwind after running around and climbing the stairs so far away. Professor McQueen followed the President shamelessly. The tension that had just been experienced was no greater than the horror of the terror that had just escaped them. Therefore, sitting on this soft sofa is like a priceless gift.

“Cek anyone who still survives in his position,” Jack turned to Ryan.

Ryan, who was in charge of communication equipment, immediately checked the situation outside, many times he called his colleagues by calling their respective posts where the result was a silent response. He turned to his boss as soon as the call to the last post never got an answer, “I think they're all dead.”

“Means we are the only ones left,” Bill said.

“Job!” Jack stared at the phone with annoyance because on the screen only a blank signal bar was listed, apparently no signal that could reach the room where they were.

Professor McQueen interrupted. “Free it! The thick steel plates around us make this room impenetrable to cell phone signals. Need reinforcement by using a repeater in the control room on the second floor, but that is not necessarily the maximum.”

Ryan responded riled, “In other words we're isolated here? How can we contact the outside world?”

“There is nothing we can do but wait.” Duncan said.

“But while waiting we can still observe what is happening outside,” Professor McQueen said. “I'm sorry Duncan, but I have to do this because I just remembered that Lana and her friend are still out there.”

“What do you mean, Professor?” Duncan frowned.

“If you may, sir..” Archibald McQueen pleads that junior Tramp give him space to type something on the keyboard board on the table belonging to the boss.

“Please!” Duncan then stepped aside to give him a place.

“Two weeks ago I added this facility but still haven't had time to test.” Professor McQueen muttered to himself while typing something on the board. “… I thought it would be boring in this room if it was not added facilities that allow to peek out.The person who takes refuge here may feel safe as well as bored, so he needs something to give him access.”.

Duncan Tramp's workbench was buzzing and some of its parts were moving right and left until it finally formed a wider cross section of the table to load a row of six television screens in front of the Professor. The size of each television screen is about fifty inches, where each screen is divided into six smaller display screens. Only after the screens appeared pictures of the situation in several different places Jack and his friends understood that it was a monitor to monitor the situation on each floor at Machina Factory.

Indeed, not all angles can be monitored because according to Professor McQueen there are dozens of CCTV installed in the building and he can only connect six to this system, but at least the one on the screen is very helpful for them to see the condition from the first floor to the floor where they are, the sixth floor.

“Woow, this is a great monitoring tool, Prof!” praise Jack.

Duncan. “You never stop surprising me, Archibald!”

Archibald McQueen did not listen to their praise for being busy looking for Lana and Jordan on each screen, especially the one featuring the fourth floor where the storage space the two teenagers were in…

***