Searching For Andromeda 33 Hollow Space

Silence.

"Something doesn't add up," Ephraim says. "Anna, you said for years this was abandoned. How come the system didn't just shut down? How is ANDROMEDA able to s.n.a.t.c.h some power supply?"

"That boggled me too," Samuel adds. "The moment I got here, there're lights emanating from the flowers—who turned out to be monsters too—but they weren't the source of light illuminating the room. More like . . . the flower-monsters were just . . . garnitures. It's bright from pretty much everywhere, which is odd because I didn't see the source,"

"I-in other words, it's like it's daylight when Sam and I fell here, except the light source is missing." Says Esmeralda. "Atop us is a waterfall and somehow I can't see the other end. It's just an endless pitch-black darkness,''

"It seems all of us see to have almost the same starting point?" Ephraim asks, clearly fascinated.

"We all landed to a waterfall, right?" Asks Esmeralda, "wait . . . we did? But if that's the case, then why didn't we see Berthold when we fell?"

"Something doesn't add up," Ephraim says.

"We were near each other at the time the ground collapsed, aren't we?" Berthold exclaims. "And judging from the information Anna gave earlier, Ephraim and Hiroaki are the first ones who fell down, next is me, and then the two of you."

"And we didn't wake up in the same place, I think," says Ephraim. "Isn't that right, Anna?"

"Yes," Anna answers. "Since I gained access to the chip of my security, I have the information to almost the whole place. The grounds you all found yourself to was called [Jungle – Simulation Room]—I don't have the information on how it was used, but perhaps it harbored the test subjects—the creatures chasing all of you earlier."

Anna then proceeded to project another image to all of them. Ephraim and the task force soon saw what seemed like a three-dimensional hologram projection of what seemed like the laboratory. It had several sectors corridor to corridor. There seemed to be a place lower ground as well.

"Unfortunately, this is the only thing I could show to all of you," Anna says with a solemn tone. Ephraim and his team then started circling over the hologram projection of the place. Samuel looking down below at the lower grounds.

"The building looks unstable," Samuel says as he caresses his chin. "How do oxygen circulate around here? And the proportions . . . the stability of the buildings wouldn't be able to work if it's built like this. Sort of like a tree with branching places except the tree itself is broken."

"That's an exceptionally creative description," Anna grins as she walks towards Samuel. "I like what you said. This laboratory LITERALLY is a tree,"

"Really?" Esmeralda tilts her head. "I don't see it . . ."

Anna then started to manipulate the hologram projections of the place. And then it came to place—it did look like a tree. There was a trunk—and then corridors, perhaps—with branching parts and sectors of different kind.

"Currently, we're here," Anna says and then points at a place at the MIDDLE portion of the tree just above the trunk. "This room's information is botched, but thankfully I was able to gain access."

"What about these black areas?" Asks Esmeralda. "It looks like a tree, but it's like we're on the upper branches . . . but then again it looked incomplete,"

"Because it is," says Anna. "Samuel—is it? He's correct. The proportions are a bit on the odd side. And that's because the tree is incomplete,"

"Incomplete?" Ephraim asks.

"I told you guys earlier I don't know what this room is for," she says. "It's in the middle of everything else and it's the only place situated in this trunk-like tunnel."

"Wait, trunk-like tunnel, similar to the trunk of the tree—" Berthold says, and then, his gaze drops down to the chasm below them. He was stepping in a gla.s.s floor, which is why he could see the endless darkness below.

All of the team members started to look down.

"So what we're seeing is what's inside the 'trunk' of the laboratory?" Samuel asks. "It's giving me gooseb.u.mps,"

"Y-yeah, it's so hollow . . ." Esmeralda exclaims, and then faces Anna. "H-have you tried looking down to it?"

"Well I just gained my hologram form, and it's my first time here," Anna answers, "so maybe I should go down and check it out. Be right back!"

Without another word, Anna tried to slip past through the gla.s.s floor—

—only to fail.

She sprung back, her body glitching as she tumbles down to the gla.s.s floor. Anna scowls, and then tried to slip past through the pane once more; to her surprise, she was sent back once again—like that of a ball tumbling back on the air as it hits the floor. Anna blinked several times, s.h.i.+fting her gaze to the astonished task force eying her.

"Er . . . it looks like I can't go in," says Anna. "For some reason . . . ?"

"Maybe it's because you got no access to go there?" Berthold asks. "You told us after all, that you're unable to see other sectors because you're incomplete."

"Well, sort of. But this is . . . weird," Anna exclaims, "I don't understand why I'm being repelled when there's just absolutely nothing down there . . ."

"I get you," says Samuel. "Clearly it's a blank s.p.a.ce. Gravity's pull wouldn't repel you either, instead it should PULL you in, as per its name. Either way, I'm weirded out as well," Samuel exclaims, clearly bemused. He placed both of his hands to the gla.s.s floor—his reaction evident to everyone else. The fascination of a researcher with the eyes that is filled with a.n.a.lysis.

It wasn't just him. Everyone was pulling their hypotheticals at this point.

"I don't understand," says Anna with her glowing cyan eyes, indicating she was coming up with an a.n.a.lysis as she stared beneath.

"There's nothing there. My code should be able to gain access. I can't see anything else but a hollow s.p.a.ce."

"It can't be that you're the same charges with the electrons down there—or is it the gla.s.s?" Asks Samuel, knocking on the gla.s.s floor. "It's pretty st.u.r.dy, after all."

"Electrons are in constant motion as they circle around the nucleus of that atom. When both have a negative charge—their lines of force are repelled. Similar charges repel, and dissimilar do otherwise. They attract. Two electrons will tend to repel each other because both have a negative electrical charge," says Anna.

"But you see, Samuel—I'm a Hologram. I do have electrons but I'm a bit of a special case. I can pa.s.s through mediums easily because I am programmed to blend with atomic particles and slip through them." She says. "That's how my system works. I appear to be 'walking' because I try to align my feet to the atomic particles of the solids below. This gla.s.s . . . I am definitely able to slip through it, but it's the force below that repels me,"

"If you can't disrupt the molecules below," says Ephraim. "Then it's not a hollow s.p.a.ce."