The Dimensioners - Chapter 2

SYNOPSIS: When a young man wakes up to find himself a prisoner without any memories of his prior life, he seeks to escape. Not knowing who to trust or what is real, he fights to find the identity and home that he has left behind, but ends up finding out more than he was prepared for.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I started writing this novel some time in 2020 and originally posted a few chapters on Wattpad. Since I hardly ever venture over to Wattpad anymore and I see that Vocal has become a lot more fiction-friendly, I decided to give it a shot at posting some of this work in progress here. THIS IS THE ROUGHEST OF DRAFTS and one day I will finish this novel, but for now, here is 'The Dimensioners' in its infancy. I hope you all enjoy!

READ CHAPTER 1 HERE:

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CHAPTER 2

Axton had spent what felt like several hours being tested by Marcus on his strength, dexterity, logic, and problem solving skills. At the end of it all, he was exhausted as though he had already worked a full shift. He was being led to a building connected to the prison area through a dimly lit tunnel. Two men in black, like the ones who had escorted him to his cell the night before, were accompanying him and he had the letters T.T.A. marked on the back of his hand in bright ink. Axton had been trying to think of what the letters could stand for ever since Marcus had traced it on the back of his hand with a laser that didn't burn his skin.

Transportation Testing Agent... Travel Technology Administrator... He hoped it was one of those. He imagined being able to work with cars and planes and it made him a little bit less tired.

They reached the end of the long tunnel and were greeted by a huge black door that looked to be about twice Axton's height. A keypad like the one next to his cell was on the wall next to the door. One of the guards put his palm against it and the door slid open immediately. They walked through a smaller hallway and the guard used his hand to scan open one more door before they stepped into a large dark warehouse. There were at least 100 people in the warehouse, most of them with their heads bent over mechanical parts moving across conveyor belts and some of them operating heavy machines that looked vaguely like cranes but different somehow.

"Lira!" the guard to Axton's right called.

A beautiful woman with skin like ebony, who looked to be even younger than Axton was, turned to face them. Axton's stomach fluttered as she approached them.

"This is Axton," the guard told her. "He's your newest worker."

Lira looked Axton up and down and then gave a satisfied nod. "Nice to meet you, Axton. I'm Lira." She extended her hand out to him and for a second, Axton just stared at it, unsure of what she expected him to do with it.

"Oh, yeah," he said, shaking her hand too quickly, "nice to meet you too."

She looked at him curiously and he heard one of the guards chuckle under his breath.

Axton's face grew hot and he was instantly thankful for the dim lighting in the warehouse.

"Well," the other guard said, "we'll let you catch him up to speed, Lira."

"Thanks Will...Anders," she said to both of them and they left through the same door they had entered through.

Lira walked back to the machine she had been working on before they called her. Axton followed.

"So uh... what does T.T.A stand for?" he asked her.

"Time Travel Assembly," she said without looking at him.

"Time travel?"

"Yeah," she said, "you'll be helping assemble time machines."

Axton began racking his brain again. He was familiar with the concept of time machines but he couldn't picture one in his mind. He wondered if he had actually seen one.

"Oh... cool," he said, not wanting to admit that he had no idea what that would entail.

"Don't worry," she said, facing him then, "it's a lot easier than it sounds."

He exhaled. "Good."

She laughed and handed him a vest and a hard hat. "You'll be needing those," she said.

He put them on carefully. They felt just as unfamiliar to him as his prison uniform had when he first put it on.

"Follow me," she said.

Axton did as he was told, avoiding the gazes that followed him through the warehouse. Lira led him to one of the conveyor belts that already had about a dozen or so people working on it. He watched as the workers screwed things into place onto mechanical pieces that resembled small breaker boxes.

"These pieces here," Lira said indicating the breaker boxes, "are the control panels for the time machines, which means they are very important."

Axton nodded to show he understood.

"All you have to do is tighten the screws into place as they move along the conveyor belt and then put them back," she said. "You know how to use a screwdriver, right?"

"Yeah," Axton said, not exactly sure how he knew.

"Good," she said. "Well, you can get to work. If you need any help, Ramirez can assist you." She waved at a man with tan leathery skin and a long scar down his face. "If you need me, you know where to find me."

And with that, she walked away.

Axton gulped and approached the conveyor belt slowly. The man called Ramirez was staring at him without pausing his work on the control panels.

"Um... hey," Axton said.

"Hey," Ramirez responded in a small voice, to Axton's surprise. Ramirez didn't take his eyes off of Axton and Axton waited, expecting for him to say something else but the other man remained silent.

Axton cleared his throat and fumbled with the control panel in front of him. "What time do we get out of here?" he asked. He looked around the warehouse, searching for a clock but there wasn't one. There were also no windows anywhere in sight. He began to think back to if he had seen any clocks or windows in the tunnel leading to the warehouse, in his cell, or in the room where he had met Marcus. He couldn't remember seeing any.

"We get out of here when the guards say we're done," Ramirez responded.

"How long does that take?"

Ramirez shrugged his big shoulders.

Axton shook his head and watched Ramirez carefully. He was shifty-eyed and the scar on his face made the hairs on Axton's arms stand up. Ramirez didn't know any more than he himself did, Axton decided. Axton picked up a screwdriver and began working on the control panels gliding across the conveyor belt, avoiding Ramirez's gaze as he did so.

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Axton shifted his weight from leg to leg as he stood in the food line. He wasn't sure how long he had been working but he was sure it had been several hours. The food on his plate was less than satisfying to look at. Some wet green beans, powdery mashed potatoes, a sorry slice of ham, and a piece of bread that he could feel sticking to the roof of his mouth just looking at it.

"Axton!" someone called across the cafeteria. He looked up from his plate and saw Lira waving at him. His stomach fluttered again. She was sitting with Ramirez and some other people he recognized from the warehouse. Axton walked over to their table and sat next to Lira.

"Hey guys," he said. The rest of the table greeted him politely. He could feel Ramirez's eyes on him once again.

"Axton, this is Dev," Lira said gesturing to a man with jet black hair and copper colored skin, "and Selah." She gestured to a woman with skin the color of butterscotch and streaks of gray in her long dark brown hair despite having a very young looking face.

"Nice to meet you two," Axton said.

"Oh, he's a gentleman," Dev said, adding a slight Southern accent to the word gentleman. Everyone at the table laughed, even Ramirez with a deep chuckle that only reached his face by his scar wrinkling.

Axton felt his face grow hot again.

"Lighten up," Dev said, punching his shoulder lightly, "we're just messing with you."

"I know," Axton said, forcing a smile.

Dev, Lira, and Selah continued conversing, laughing and cracking jokes. Axton looked down at his food to avoid Ramirez's burning gaze. He poked at the green beans and flipped the ham over several times with his fork, trying to force himself to have an appetite. After several minutes, he gave up and pushed the tray away from him.

"You not gonna eat?" Ramirez asked in that small voice of his.

Axton shook his head. "You can have it if you want."

"I call dibs on the ham," Dev said, reaching across the table.

After Dev took the ham off the tray, Ramirez pulled it closer to him and began scarfing down the food so fast that Axton was sure there was no way he could differentiate between what was what.

"Look what I got," Selah said. She pulled a small sealed plastic bag from her breast and held it in her fist tightly so that only the corner of it showed. From where he was sitting, Axton could see what looked like a red-orange powder inside of it.

"Where'd you get that?" Lira asked.

"I do favors for one of the guards sometimes," she responded.

"What kind of favors?" Dev asked.

"Doesn't matter. Point is, I got this."

"What is it?" Axton asked.

Dev shook his head. "It's pixie dust, newbie. You just sniff it and," he gestured wildly with his hands, "you're on another planet."

"Should you be telling me that?" Axton asked.

The others laughed again.

"Guards don't care about pixie dust, Ax," Lira said. "We just keep it a secret so that no one else tries to steal it."

"Oh," Axton said, becoming very self conscious about how much he had to learn.

"Don't worry, you'll learn soon enough," Selah said. "Tomorrow in the warehouse, you can join us for lift off." She tapped the pixie dust in her hand.

"Uh... okay," Axton said. Marcus's words played in his mind. I wouldn't be too quick to make friends around here. You never know who you can trust.

"Yes," Dev said excitedly. "I love watching newbies' first lift off."

A guard shouted that dinner was over and they all stood and collected their trays. When Axton looked up, Ramirez was still staring at him.

"Can I help you?" Axton asked finally.

Ramirez shook his head and looked away for the first time. "You just look familiar." He packed up his tray and walked away with Axton now staring after him.

READ CHAPTER 3 HERE:

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-Chanté