The Gate

Chapter 3

“What the hell happened?” Courtnie Featherstrom shrieked frantically as she threw open the security room’s doors.

Fifty heads turned to look at her as she entered.  She glared around at everyone, placing her hands on her hips.  Everyone was sitting in front of a computer, each set to monitor a camera placed in the forest.  Anyone caught in the camera’s lens was immediately arrested, no questions asked. 

“The—the computers have stopped monitoring,” a nervous security worker squeaked.

Courtnie’s attention snapped to the woman.  She was shrinking back in her seat, her dark eyes wide with fear of what Courtnie would do to her.  Courtnie almost laughed at how pitiful the girl looked.  She was small, shorter and skinnier than the average worker in the security room.  She couldn’t have been more than nineteen years old.  “Very good,” she said slowly, almost sarcastically.  “Care to tell me how they came to stop monitoring?”

Fifty heads began shaking simultaneously.  “No one knows, ma’am,” a more brave worker in the back called out.  “It might be a virus, someone may have sabotaged it.  It could be anything.”

Courtnie’s eyes widened.  “Sabotage, you say?”  She looked up, blinking.  “Excuse me.”

Before anyone could react, she stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.  Courtnie’s hands clenched into fists as she stomped down the long, dark hallway.  The Government’s building may have been large, but she knew how to navigate her way around.  And now, with her anger to guide her swiftly through the halls, she was headed straight for the prison wards.

Courtnie cursed under her breath viciously.  She couldn’t believe her ears when Fortis told her the news, that the cameras on both sides of the Gate had stopped monitoring.  She just couldn’t fathom how perfectly good cameras and computers could randomly malfunction like that.

That was, unless someone purposely infected them.

She could think of only one person who would do something so vile, one person who relentlessly tried to meddle in with the Government’s plans.  And even though they’d caught her long ago and locked her up, she still managed to be the bane of Courtnie’s existence.

Digging through her pockets, Courtnie pulled out a ring set of keys.  Every key to every door in the building was placed onto this ring, giving her access to anything she wanted.  Since she was the one in charge, she was the proud owner of the ring, making sure that everyone knew that she was the one who controlled everything.

Courtnie felt herself smile as she rifled through the keys, looking for the correct one.  Every key was hand labeled so that she wouldn’t be standing around all day guessing which key was which.  “Dammit, where is it?” she muttered to herself, becoming flustered as time ticked on.  “Aha!”  She smiled thinly as she tugged onto a rather large key labeled Prison Wards Entrance.  Finally.

She roughly shoved the key into the key hole, twisting it impatiently.  She heard a faint click and then pulled the key back out.  After dropping the keys back into her pocket, she pulled open the door and stepped inside.

The door locked automatically after she closed the door behind her.  Courtnie looked around, taking in the familiar sight of the metal hallway, before hurrying through.  Her footsteps echoed as she walked, incredibly loud in the silence.  Courtnie smiled.  She could only imagine how threatening this must have sounded to everyone on the other side.

She turned down another hallway, elated to hear the shrieks and cries of the woman trapped there.  Something about the woeful, helpless cries that amused her.  She smiled, waving at every cell as she passed, ignoring the hateful glares she received in return.