Night 73: Security Checkpoint 2

[his_legacy]

[From here]

The sensation of being pulled from one point in space to another was one Link had grown well used to. Not for the first time, it dawned on him how useful having Oocoo here would have been.

He stepped off the pad, shining his light about the area to ensure its security.

There was strange machinery in here... Link frowned, taking note of the portal in the opposite corner of the room. He inspected the large machines, searching for switches or dials... Some indication of what to do next. He moved to wander between the prongs of the metal detector.

Doorways didn't exist for no reason.

Comments

[ryuuzaki]

[From here.]

The sensation of using these pads, or the doors, or the rings, must be an extension of motion sickness, he thought. The fluids in the inner ear weren't well-adapted to it. These people had managed to develop some kind of functional teleportation--no idea if it was Landel himself or the world that had produced him--but they hadn't yet found a way to adapt it to the human body, or to make it comfortable. It made L wonder if it was a recent technology even to them.

This must be the room that had been discussed on the bulletin board and in the notes Lana had brought. He shot a look in her direction: Not random. Not so far, which meant that they might be able to get more precise details from those people who had gotten further.

He tested the nearest door; it seemed to be so firmly locked that it might as well have been bolted shut.

Unless you wanted to try to crawl through the item scanner, something that didn't seem like a good or even necessarily feasible idea, the way out was through the arch, and the best thing to do would be to assume that any arch like this that they came across would shock anyone wearing metal. It would be easier to comply with the rules than to waste time attempting to disable the metal detector, or to learn the hard way, but compliance was going to be a tedious imposition. And there were those two doors on the other side of the room--there was no way of knowing whether or not something could get in through them, although the presence of another pad on the other side tended to suggest otherwise.

He holstered the pistol again, set the backpack on the belt, opened the front pocket, emptied the contents of his pockets into it, added the ring, zipped it all in, took off his belt with the holster, and set those in the main compartment. There were eyelets for the laces on the sneakers, so the shoes had to come off too.

When he was ready, he walked through the arch without trouble.

There was no point in testing the doors just yet--he needed to re-equip himself, and he did so as efficiently as he could. But it was irritating.

At least he hadn't worn the jeans.

[the tiniest of dual destinies spoilers]

[fourstonewalls]

Lana nodded -- not random, or at least this is a likely outcome. There was another pad glowing on the other side of the security checkpoint. What, precisely, would happen if they went through carrying metal was unclear; there were no trigger-happy security guards flanking the metal detector, but the note had said shocked, and since everything else (except the spelling) had been accurate, she had no reason to doubt it. She took off her coat and folded it, then divested herself of anything else stashed away, topping the pile with her shoes.

This was one security measure the courthouse had managed to avoid implementing, despite it being standard elsewhere in the country. Possibly it was just that no one wanted to listen to the Payne brothers competitive complaining. Perhaps she'd suggest it again, though; there had been too many tragedies in that building, and the Chief Prosecutor's word still meant something. At least it would for a little while.

Here, in the dark, though, she didn't feel safer. Naked, almost, and she poured the nervous energy into making her stack of possessions perfectly neat.

Then she waited, an expectant half-smile on her face, until Ryuuzaki made it through without incident. She set her items on the belt, stepped through equally undisturbed, and swung her coat over her shoulders.

[to here]