"Isn't this a bit too dark?" I thought, a ripple of unease trembling faintly at the edge of my mind. Even Erin, usually serene as a breeze in the crypts, now shared in my suspicion.
Unfazed, not a hair on her head disturbed, Gelemia strode straight into the heart of the gloom as if this pitch-black chamber were just her backyard. Her voice, bright and cheerful, reverberated down the empty walls, ricocheting over and over, almost mocking the silence until it pressed down tighter.
"Hellooo! Anyone around?" Gelemia's voice rang out, bouncing across the empty chamber and stirring the heavy stillness.
I held my breath, tongue struck nearly dumb by the odd pressure in the air. "Can't you be a little more careful? This place is too quiet. Aren't you the least bit suspicious?"
Gelemia only grinned, tossing a glance over her shoulder as if I had told a tired old joke. "Suspicious of what? The southern sector is infamous for this sort of mischief. Just weeks ago, they pulled the fire alarm just to evacuate an entire Alteker unit because a squirrel got into the kitchen."
"I think this is just their latest expensive prank," she added, marching onward without a hint of doubt.
"But... it's far too dark." My gaze tried to pierce the void. Silhouettes of control panels huddled in the corners, broken and brooding. Pipes jutted out of the ceiling like veins of steel, and cables hung in fat bundles, weaving giant traps both above our heads and underfoot.
"Careful, Fionn. I know this scene," Erin's voice slid into the corner of my mind, flat but brimming with prickling worry. "It's like a scene from an old movie I once watched. This is the moment when the protagonist, without even realizing, walks right into the villain's trap, whether it's a monster, some vengeful spirit, or a creature too wicked to name."
"You really do have a taste for horror," I managed a half-hearted laugh, chasing away the parade of dreadful images skipping across my imagination. "Don't tell me… is it Cabalena?"
"No. I don't think it's Cabalena. Whatever we had with her, that chapter's closed, isn't it?"
"For us, maybe. But what about Alteker? Are we sure that's finished?"
Erin only snorted softly, leaving a flock of unanswered questions circling in my mind.
"If we're going by old movie patterns," he continued, "this is the part where the hero finally senses danger. Their friend pulls out a flashlight, they edge forward, and they find someone collapsed at the far end of a hallway that feels far too long for any proper room. That person whispers—or screams, if the script demands—warning them to run. When they try to escape, that's when they blunder into the villain's web. The trap was set long before they ever saw it coming."
A strange cocktail of amusement and dread twisted in my chest. "You're awfully detailed with these descriptions," I muttered.
"Next thing they know, bam—a white-hot flash explodes, blowing the shadows wide open, and suddenly? They're dropped, lost as anything, right in the middle of somewhere completely unknown." Erin's tone danced between storytelling and a cautionary tale.
"Seriously, Erin, what movie did you fall asleep to? Actual horror, or were you just messing around with scary stories?" I called back, my voice falling somewhere between amusement and disbelief.
"Voir. Ray. Hope," Gelemia whispered, barely more than a breath. In that instant, a gentle thread of light floated upward, weaving and flickering, illuminating a seven-meter circle around us. Almost like a will-o'-the-wisp determined to keep the shadows at bay. The control panels finally revealed themselves: shattered consoles sprawled across the floor, cracked displays yawning open as if groaning in protest, and the cables, those coils of wire, slithered through the air like metallic eels.
Water dripped somewhere above, each drop a sharp note falling from ancient pipes onto the ruins below, slicing through the silence that stretched around us as if we stood at the edge of an endless canyon.
"You still think this is all just some elaborate prank?" I shot Gelemia a sidelong glance, masking my anxious laughter with a veil of sarcasm.
In the glow of that pale, drifting light, I could make out the color draining from her cheeks—she looked almost as washed-out as these walls, untouched by sunlight. But her steps were sure, her gaze slicing through the darkness as she took in every scar and heap of debris, studying the situation as if the whole room were a puzzle quietly waiting to be solved.
"This is dangerous. What if the southern sector really was attacked? Help me look—see if anyone's made it out." Her tone snapped with a new urgency. Gone was the breezy banter and half-smile; now she spoke through a strain of worry, tightly camouflaged behind her firm resolve. Instructions that used to float in the air now landed with the weight of commands.
I followed in her stride, every movement painfully awkward—maybe it was the dust choking my breath, or maybe it was the way my own footsteps shattered the hush. Each clack of my boots against metal rang far too loudly, jarring in a world that seemed to be holding its breath.
Suddenly, Gelemia halted. She whirled around, shoulders stiff, tension crystallizing in her every line. I caught a flicker of doubt in her eyes before it shifted into something fiercer—a sharp, commanding glare.
"Didn't I tell you to search for survivors?" she snapped, her voice cutting, though I could hear the tremor of fear she fought so hard to conceal.
I froze, swallowing hard as I tried to steady my breath so it wouldn't betray my nerves. "Yeah… I'll look," I managed, pushing aside the tremor in my voice with a thin smile, "but… you're the only one with the light."
Gelemia's conjured glow hovered steadily in the air, casting a soft circle upon twisted cables and scattered debris. The slender ring of light pushed the shadows back, at least for a few paces ahead.
She let out a short sigh. Gripping what resolve she had left, Gelemia pressed on down the corridor, her eyes intent, scraping over every patch of darkness the light had yet to reach, determined to lay the ruin bare.
A few seconds slipped by in tense silence, broken only by the drip of water from a pipe overhead, every drop echoing through the emptiness.
Trying to keep my nerves in check, I whispered, "Do you see anything, Erin?"
His reply was barely more than a whisper, almost lost to the stale air. "Nothing here… If this was really an attack, we'd be stumbling over bodies, Alteker or otherwise. But all that's left is ruins. Just silence. It almost feels—"
"—like everyone just disappeared," Gelemia said, her words soft and fleeting.
We moved forward, each step through the corridor sweeping up dust and stirring shadows on the verge of fading. Then, out of the hush, came a different sound—a brittle voice, faint but real. Somewhere ahead, a heap of rubble shifted, sending pebbles tumbling and shattering the suffocating silence.
Without thinking, Gelemia rushed toward the noise, and I chased after, my heart hammering in my chest like a war drum.
There, behind a pile of collapsed stone and metal, a figure was caught between the wreckage. His Alteker uniform, once moss green, had turned almost black from dust. Sparse hair, nearly shaved, clung to his scalp, while a deep gash cut across his brow, blood streaking his weary, dirt-stained face. He lay half-crushed beneath the rubble, his breath ragged, teetering somewhere between life and death.
"Arlo, are you all right?" Gelemia's cry sliced through the stillness as she knelt beside him, her hands reaching for his, which lay motionless in the dust. Arlo's breath rattled in his chest.
"Ah… Gelemia… why did you come here? You have to… run," he managed, the words trembling on the edge of a failing breath, as if someone was pulling each word from his soul.
"Where's the Captain? Please, tell me what happened!" Gelemia whispered, frantic, her hands shaking as she tried to steady him.
Arlo coughed, blood bubbling at his lips. "Go… now! Tell the others… someone's broken in…"
A swallow caught in Gelemia's throat, the sound so stark it might as well have echoed along every station wall. I imagined her gulp was the size of a fist.
"Arlo, are there any survivors here? You—just hold on, stay with me—"
"No time… they're missing… the enemy's still around… Leave, now…" His sentences broke off, each one weaker than the last.
Chills shot up my spine, prickling like wild weeds pushing through cracked stone. The enemy… still here? Through all the darkness, not once had I glimpsed a hint of movement. Or maybe… maybe we simply didn't let ourselves see it.
At the edge of my vision, while Gelemia still hovered over Arlo, calming him with frantic urgency, something massive took shape. There, looming without warning, stood a figure towering four times the height of a grown man. Its stance was rigid, almost clinical, as though we were nothing but ants under a scientist's gaze, dragging crumbs across the floor.
Alarms blared in my mind. "This is bad," I whispered. Instinctively, my hand shot out, grabbing Gelemia's shoulder and pulling her out of the whirlpool of panic.
Together, we looked up. Instantly, we were statues, feet refusing to budge, rooted to the spot. I could feel that Gelemia wanted to nod, to move, but her neck had turned to steel, locked by pure tension.
The shadow unfurled its palm. A sphere of light blossomed there, glowing like a miniature sun. The silvery glare sliced the darkness apart, bringing the beast's shape into terrifying focus. Its head jutted forward, scales glittering with damp, midnight sheen. Its body melted into the shadows, yet every detail stood out in stark relief—the jaws half-parted, glistening fangs bared, breath pouring wildly with each heartbeat.
That monster, its presence as suffocating as an orca whale dredged up from nightmare, grinned wide and whispered, its voice cool and sharp as a blade pressed to the heart.
"Well, isn't this a surprise—some still remain."
Panic snapped through me, lightning in my bones. My body screamed to run, and I didn't resist—the only thought left was to yank Gelemia away. We bolted, the faint light already swallowed behind us, praying our legs could outrun the shadow of death scraping at our heels.
My mind wailed in warning. Whatever faced us here, it was something I could never match—an enemy not one, but many levels above me, towering as if brewed straight from the fevered edge of a nightmare. Yesterday, I'd survived Cabalena only by luck so thin it could have snapped beneath a breath. But this—this orca beast, four times a man's height—no scrap of bravado could make me believe I'd walk away victorious.
I looked back, heart pounding like a war drum in my chest. Together, Gelemia and I darted headlong into the dark, aiming for the gate—our breath the only sound against the thundering panic in my mind. There was no banter, no shouts wasted for courage. Right then, life was precious, and curiosity far too costly when death was breathing cold on the back of your neck.
The gate's glow surged closer, footsteps dwindling from ten, to five, then three short strides out of reach. Salvation was almost within our grasp.
But the monster, growing weary of human sluggishness, stretched out its hand. The sphere of light in its palm unfurled wide, wild and hungry, and in a single furious heartbeat it devoured the entire chamber—drowning every last shadow in a flood of blinding brilliance. The radiance shot straight through my eyes, but it seemed to swallow the world whole. My senses were wrenched away, battered by a howling storm of white that hissed in my skull.
I screamed, or thought I did, though my own voice was lost, swallowed by the overwhelming glare. All thought scattered. The world dissolved.
When I could gasp again, breathing in ragged bursts, it took everything to pry my eyes open. No darkness greeted me. No battered ruins, no scorched stone or twisted metal of the Wetlands. Instead, I blinked into pure strangeness. I rubbed my stinging eyes, half convinced I was still hallucinating. Gelemia stood beside me, her eyes wide as moons, shock etched deep on her face and mirrored in my own.
My breath refused to steady. "Where… are we?" The words crawled out, caught on the edge of my throat.
This new world—there was no trace of stained iron or burning stone. All around us spread a sea of green, swallowing the horizon. Towering trees pressed upward, their canopies reaching so high they seemed to stitch into the sky, branches crowded thick and wild. The air carried an orchestra of strange sounds, insects and birds layering their calls into a foreign symphony, noisy yet—somehow—oddly soothing. A crisp wind raced through, tossing the leaves and tugging at my hair with gentle fingers.
The whole atmosphere felt impossibly vast, bursting with life, vibrant and wild in every direction. This was nothing like the Wetlands. There had never been a place this lush, this alive, this breathtaking.
"Where… are we?" I asked again, this time to Gelemia, half hoping she'd conjure some rational explanation.
"A forest..."
She stared, eyes glassy, searching the endless green for understanding.
"This is a forest." Her gaze drifted skyward, tracing the arch of ancient branches overhead. "We're aboveground, outside the Wetlands."
"We're—on the surface."