“What now?” Taylor Sharpe inquired in a husky whisper as she kneeled stiffly next to Alma Warren.  Both were positioned before the latter’s elaborate contraption on the floor of the storage hall adjacent to the auditorium.

            “Just hold on here so I can work,” Alma mumbled to Taylor without looking up as she continued tinkering between the gears of a metal unit mounted on wheels.  She lifted a hand and indicated toward a brass handle that had appeared between the gears.  The young woman obliged, grasping what she assumed to be the equivalent of a mechanical emergency brake on the device.

            Dark rings of sleeplessness hung under the convicted Alpha’s eyes, which were flushed a strung-out pink, but all the same, she hardly blinked as she meticulously worked on her creation.  “I’m serious.  Keep your little mitts around it tight until I say so, and don’t let go for anything else.”

            “Got it,” Taylor grumbled, clenching her knuckles harder as she passively witnessed the catlike woman picking at chunks of metal jutting out of the device at odd angles.  It was obvious the whole mechanism had been designed from scratch by the treacherously off-balance woman.

            “I’m just about set with my gear,” Alma said to Halle as she neared for an update.  “We can start loading up the vermin in a couple minutes.”

            “Wait,” Taylor uttered, a frown etching into her forehead as her suspicions were coming dangerously close to being confirmed.  “Loading up.  You mean…”

            “Fantastic.  We’re ahead of schedule, then,” the black-haired vixen said, ignoring her underling’s babbling.  “I knew you’d pull through.”

            “Thanks for the vote of confidence.  Let’s just get it all together before we celebrate, though,” Alma commented gravely.

            “Agreed.  Roger?  Gail?  Is Sonja back yet?”

            “She said she’d just be a couple more minutes.  It sounds like she rounded up a couple dozen strays,” Roger grunted.

            “Why’d she have to spill all her shit here, anyway?” Gail asked as she disdainfully kicked at an open duffel bag of tactical gear and weaponized apparati Sonja had abandoned by the back wall.

            “Not like it matters.  The floor’s clear of pests,” Roger shrugged, shooting a steely glance up at the paralyzed balconies of Betas above.

            “What about her?” Gail growled, squinting over at the young Alpha chaperone Halle had ordered to stay when the teachers were shepherded out.  Rising from her chair, the grizzled animal of a woman advanced on the teenaged girl like a beast stalking its prey, clomping her boots dramatically with each step.  “I don’t trust the look of her.”

            “It’s not like you’ve ever trusted anything in your life, sis,” Halle chuckled.

            “And with good reason,” Gail hissed as she came to a stop in front of the hostage Alpha, who remained stock-still against the wall, where she’d been ordered to remain on threat of liquefied Betas.  “What’s your name, missy?”

            “M-M…”

            “Spit it out already,” Gail ordered as she lifted one of her kerambit blades again and used it to brush the girl’s dirty blonde bangs off her forehead, revealing her auburn irises more clearly.

            “Mona,” the girl managed with a heave of her chest, trembling at the sight of the knife but somehow remaining in control.

            “That’s enough, Gail.  We may need her for labor in a few minutes, and I really don’t feel like working next to someone who shit their pants,” Halle said with a sly smirk.  “Come on, put away the flatware.”

            “I’ll be watching you.  Every second.  Even if you think I’m not,” Gail droned harshly to Mona, sliding the tip of the blade one final time through the girl’s hair before backing away again.  “So don’t try anything funny.  I’m not one for funny.”

            “She’s really not,” Roger cut in gruffly.

            “Listen to Frankenstein.  He knows all about it,” Gail whispered as she waved a hand at the towering brute of an Alpha and took a seat again to continue playing with her metallic toy between her fingertips.

            “Please,” Mona peeped in the silence, drawing the surprised attention of everyone who could see her.  Her voice was on the verge of cracking and her eyes remained locked to the floor.  “Please leave everyone alone.  Don’t h-hurt anyone else.  They haven’t d-done anything to y-you.”

            “And just why should we do that?” Halle queried pleasantly.

            “They’ll… they’ll give you whatever you want.  Whatever it is, if you just leave everyone else alone.  Aegis will.”

            “My dear, believe me, no matter the outcome of today’s festivities, nobody is getting what they want.  Not unless every single Omega volunteers to commit seppuku with blades the size of radio towers, anyway.  Then maybe we could say we got everything we wanted,” Halle smarmed with her hands tucked politely behind her back as she ambled toward the cowering young Alpha, before finally coming to a stop right before her.  Standing a full head taller than Mona, the stone-cold glace from Halle was hardly necessary to help make the point.  “But I don’t foresee that happening, so we’ll just play the cards we’re dealt.”

            Mona’s jaw hung slightly open, and she was clearly scared out of any attempts at further retort.  Halle, satisfied, gave her some space again with a sweep of her dark ponytail.

            Across the room, Taylor bit her lip, summoning the courage to speak up to Alma without being prompted first.  Her palm was sweaty as it continued gripping the handle.

            “So those racks…” Taylor said, eying the rows of metal towers and black rectangular units that resembled something like a room-sized computer hard drive.  The entire space was filled to capacity with them, forming a veritable maze of cold steel.  “They’re to hold…”

            “Yep.  Let go of the switch now,” Alma said, again without looking up.  “Don’t go away yet, though.  I might need you to again.”

            “I don’t understand,” Taylor continued, her heart rate rising steadily.  She touched a fingertip to her freckle-dotted cheek, willing herself to stay calm.  “I thought the idea was to keep them all in their seats, so we can keep track, until the ransom comes through.”

            Alma couldn’t help but let a snicker emerge from her cracked lips, and at last she rewarded the confused Alpha hire with eye contact.

            “God, they did not trust you with much, did they?” Alma muttered merrily, wiping some grease from her hands onto an equally filthy rag.  “You really think we’re here to pad our wallets a little?”

            “What do you mean?  I thought… I thought that’s what this whole thing was about,” Taylor pressed uneasily.

            Alma sighed before digging her hands back into the protruding gears.  “You better start getting with the program soon.  No, we’re not here for a fucking Aegis paycheck.  We’re here to start making things right again.”

            “By… sticking thousands of kids into boxes?”

            “Betas, newbie, not kids.  Now c’mere,” Alma said, waving a hand toward her face.

            “Why?”

            “Because since you’re gonna be helping us load up here in a few minutes, you’re only going to slow us down if you don’t know what we’re doing, so it’s time somebody explained, but I don’t want too many people picking up on it.  Get it?” Alma muttered through gritted teeth, shooting a furtive glance at the packed balconies.  Hesitantly, Taylor leaned in close and allowed the woman to press her lips to her ear and utter a more complete version of the plan.

            Every passing word caused Taylor’s blood to drop a few degrees colder until her whole body was trembling.  Alma’s lips had curled into an uncontrollable smile as she finished divulging the true intent of Halle and Gail’s plan.

            “No,” Taylor grunted hollowly, yanking herself away from Alma and backing away on her hands and knees, the strength momentarily sapped from her limbs due to shock.  “I’m… I’m not…”

            “Yes you are.”

            “I couldn’t.”

            “Might want to change your tune real fast. then.  Your employers aren’t going to be big fans of dissention,” the hardened Alpha suggested with a sarcastic shrug.

            “You heard me.  I’m not doing that,” Taylor scowled throatily, digging her fingers anxiously into her dark locks, and earned a pitiful shake of the head from Alma.  “I’m not going to be part of… this.  I’m not going to help you k-”

            “Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear,” Alma lullabied under her breath, then raised her voice loud enough for Halle to make out: “Ladies?  I think we’ve got a little problem here.”

            Ben was surprised that he hadn’t vomited yet.  The walloping after-effect of the adrenaline rush from his close encounter with Sonja had kicked in once he’d crawled about ten feet into the vents to avoid the multi-limbed spy droid, and nearly every major function of his body was in painful overdrive.  Sweat poured down his forehead, his vision was swimming, his breathing heaved as needles on every inhalation, and his heart was all but ricocheting off his other organs like a grenade ready to burst any second.

            The rolling nausea as he steadily began to grapple with the apparent gravity of the situation was just a natural byproduct.  Unthinkable and nightmarish a prospect though it was, seeing those two marching out of the auditorium and being able to rush right at him with such clearly murderous or worse intent had to be an indication that everyone inside the room was in just as much danger, too.  What had become of the guards that were supposed to be posted inside?

            It was hard to estimate how long he’d been mindlessly crawling forward through the silvery darkness of the metal tunnel, but Ben had a feeling this rush of terror had carried him much further than he normally could’ve made it, because the exhaustion was beginning strike to as well.  His body was punishing him for not even pausing to let his bruised elbows rest, but he also had a feeling that if he did stop, everything would finally catch up to him and he’d become violently ill, so he refused.

            Mercifully, the tunnel had begun to widen as the path forked into what Ben assumed to be a vent used for Alpha access, and suddenly he could stand up again, allowing him to move with considerably increased swiftness.  The journey eventually took him past a grate with wide enough slats that he could’ve easily fit through, though as he stealthily approached the openings, he realized the drop was more than ten feet: an absolute death sentence for someone of his height.  Realizing that getting out just yet wasn’t an option, Ben fought yet again to hold back the sickness and returned to his original path.

            “I knew Halle made a mistake when she picked you up,” a voice hissed from below, positively pulsing with wrathful acid.  With the acoustics, the sound boomed like something belonging to an Omega, though he knew it had to be an Alpha.  Ben paralyzed himself defensively at the mere introduction of such a hateful tone, then realized the noise had come from down below through the bars of the grate rather than inside his hiding place.

            “This isn’t going to work,” came the answer.  The source of these words sounded considerably more human, and as he cowered in the dimly lit tunnel, Ben chewed the words over and realized he recognized the voice, though he couldn’t say from where.  “You won’t be able to pull it off.”

            “I always tell her we have to be sure about these things, but does she listen?  Of course not,” the first voice grumbled.  Ben heard a crack, like the sound of a hand slapping across skin.  “Get moving.”

            This response was followed by footsteps marching beneath the tunnel and then growing fainter.  Pressing his ear to the wall of the vent, the Beta detected the sound of a door opening and shutting fairly close by, not more than twenty feet down the way.

            Whoever they were, Ben realized, they were probably not the pizza delivery people.

            Hardly thinking about it, the Beta began sprinting further down the tunnel.  Ben tried not to laugh at himself as he scrambled, following the direction he’d heard the door close.  Even if he did manage to hear something useful from the pair, it wasn’t like there was a single damned thing he could do with such information, was there?

            Unless he could get outside again.  Surely someone was aware of what was happening here, or would be soon?  If not, he would have to get help on his own.  No matter his doubts in himself, he had to try.  There were over one hundred thousand people in that auditorium, probably terrified out of their minds, especially if that redhead had more killer spider-robots up her sleeves.

            He turned a corner into what he strongly suspected to be a vent hanging over the room the two Alphas had entered.  As he took a step, the air in Ben’s throat was sucked away, and he realized too late the decline in the vent’s pathway dropped out from under him.  Tumbling down the cold slide, he slammed into an undulating metal plate at the end that projected a rumbling echo through the walls.