The elevator did not rattle. It hummed.
It was a capsule of white porcelain and seamless glass, dropping down a shaft that glowed with soft, rhythmic pulses of violet light. They were descending through the Titan's neck vertebrae, deep into the cranial cavity.
"It's quiet," Skid whispered, her voice trembling slightly. She ran her good hand over the smooth wall of the pod. "No gears. No steam. This tech... it makes the Empire look like they're banging rocks together."
"The Bastion was a warrior," Julian said, watching the lights pass. "Built for war. This Titan... the Glacial Sovereign... feels different. It feels like a library."
He touched the Black-Iron ring on his finger. Even dampened, the mental pressure was immense. It wasn't pain; it was sorrow. A deep, crushing grief that permeated the very air.
Why did you wake me? the walls seemed to whisper. The dream was peaceful.
"Don't listen to it," Lyra warned, watching Julian's eyes glaze over. "Stay with us."
"I'm here," Julian murmured. "But it's loud in here. It remembers everything."
HISS.
The pod decelerated smoothly and came to a halt. The doors slid open.
They stepped out into the Neural Cathedral.
It was a spherical chamber, easily three hundred feet across. The walls were lined not with metal, but with millions of hexagonal crystals, arranging and rearranging themselves in shifting patterns.
In the center of the room, suspended in a gravity-less field, was the Core.
It wasn't a star like the Heart of the Bastion. It was a Prism. A massive, multifaceted diamond that rotated slowly, refracting the violet light into complex holographic equations that floated in the air.
"The Brain," Skid breathed. "It's a quantum computer. A crystal-based processing unit."
"It's beautiful," Lyra admitted, lowering her weapon. There were no enemies here. No guards. Just the silence of a sleeping god.
Julian walked onto the walkway that led to the Prism. The crystals on the walls chimed softly as he passed—a musical greeting.
He reached the edge of the platform. The Prism spun slowly before him.
"I have to go in," Julian said.
"Into the crystal?" Lyra asked.
"Into the mind," Julian corrected.
He looked at his friends. "If I get lost in there... pull me out. Use the ring."
He handed the Black-Iron ring to Lyra.
"You're taking it off?" Lyra looked terrified. "Julian, the last time you did that, you almost burned out."
"This isn't energy," Julian said, his eyes already reflecting the violet light. "It's data. I need to be open."
He stepped up to the Prism. He raised his crystal hand. The blue corruption on his skin seemed to reach out, yearning for the purity of the diamond.
He placed his palm on the surface.
INTERFACE.
The Mindscape
The room vanished. The cold vanished. Julian was standing in a field of white flowers under a silver sun.
But the flowers were made of glass, and the sun was a burning gear.
A figure stood before him. It was a woman, tall and regal, wearing robes of woven starlight. Her skin was porcelain, cracked with age. Her eyes were empty voids.
The Avatar of the Sovereign.
"You are small," the Avatar spoke. Her voice was the sound of a glacier cracking. "And you are loud. Why do you disturb the Long Freeze?"
"The world is dying," Julian said. He didn't speak with his mouth; he spoke with his intent. "The Empire is draining you. They are turning the planet into fuel."
The Avatar sighed. A wind blew through the glass flowers, shattering them into dust.
"They have always drained us. We are the Batteries of the Old World. We hold the tectonic plates together. We filter the toxins. And the parasites drink our blood."
She looked at Julian's hand.
"You carry the mark of the Tuning Fork. You are a Breaker."
"I want to break your chains," Julian said. "I want to wake you up."
The Avatar laughed sadly.
"To wake is to suffer. While we sleep, we dream of the time before the smoke. If I wake, I must feel the pain of the drill again. I must feel the weight of the ice."
"If you don't wake," Julian stepped forward, "you die in your sleep. And the parasites win."
He showed her the memory of the prison. The men freezing in the dark. The Warden made of glass.
"There are people fighting for you," Julian said. "But we are small. We need a giant."
The Avatar looked at the memory. She saw Isolde fighting. She saw Lyra. She saw the riot.
"The Fleas are fighting the Ticks," she mused. "How amusing."
She stepped closer to Julian. She touched his chest.
"Very well, Breaker. I will rise. But know this: The Seven must be united. Alone, we are targets. Together, we are the reset."
She pointed to the horizon of the dreamscape.
"Seek the Verdant Walker in the Jungle. Seek the Iron lung in the Volcano. And beware the Gilded King in the Capital. He is not sleeping. He is waiting."
The world began to fracture.
"Now... hold on. I have been still for a thousand years. I need to stretch."
Blackgate-Zero - The Surface
Isolde stood on the deck of the White Raven, watching the last of the prisoners scramble aboard the ice-skiffs. The prison spire loomed above them, silent and dark.
Suddenly, the ice screamed.
CRACK-BOOOOM.
A fissure opened in the glacier, miles long. It ran directly under the prison.
"Cast off!" Isolde screamed. "Move! Move!"
The White Raven's engines roared, lifting the ship away from the ice.
The ground erupted.
From the depths of the frozen ocean, a hand emerged. A white, ceramic hand the size of a city. It slammed onto the ice shelf, shattering the glacier.
Then, the head.
The Glacial Sovereign rose. It was magnificent and terrifying. A humanoid giant of white armor and blue light, shaking off megatons of ice and rock.
The prison spire—Blackgate-Zero—was perched on its chest like a broach.
As the Titan stood up, rising to its full five-mile height, the prison crumbled. The spire snapped in half. The cell blocks slid off the armor plating and crashed into the churning water below.
The Titan let out a sound. Not a roar, but a Tone.
HUUUUUUUUUMMMMM.
The Aurora Borealis swirled violently, changing color from green to blinding violet.
The Neural Cathedral
Julian gasped, pulling his hand back from the Prism. He fell to his knees.
Gravity shifted. The entire room tilted as the Titan stood up.
"Julian!" Lyra grabbed him, shoving the ring back onto his finger.
"She's awake," Julian panted, sweat dripping from his nose. "She's awake."
"We're moving!" Skid yelled, holding onto the railing. "We're inside a walking mountain!"
Through the elevator shaft, they could see the sky. They were miles in the air. The clouds were below them.
"We need extraction!" Julian tapped his comms. "Isolde! Do you copy?"
"I see you!" Isolde's voice crackled, filled with awe. "You're in the head! The Titan... it's looking at us!"
"Get the Raven to the ear canal!" Julian ordered. "We're coming out!"
The Escape
They rode the elevator back up. The door opened to the outside.
They stood on a ledge on the side of the Titan's head. The wind was hurricane-force. The view was impossible—the entire Northern Hemisphere seemed to stretch out below them.
The White Raven hovered nearby, battling the turbulence. A cargo ramp lowered.
"Jump!" Isolde shouted from the deck.
One by one, they leaped. Lyra first. Then Skid.
Julian stood on the ledge for a second. He felt the Titan's mind one last time.
Go, little flea, the voice whispered. I will guard the North. Find my brothers.
Julian jumped.
He landed on the deck of the Raven. The ramp closed. The ship banked away, speeding off into the sky.
Julian stood on the aft deck, watching the Titan.
The Glacial Sovereign stood in the center of the shattered ice bay. It raised its hands, and a massive shield of hard-light energy formed around it. A fortress of solitude.
"Two down," Julian whispered, clutching the railing. "Five to go."
Lyra stood beside him. She handed him a canteen of water.
"Where to next?" she asked.
Julian pulled out the Void Walker mask. He looked at the silver surface.
"The Titan said to find the 'Verdant Walker' in the Jungle," Julian said. "But first... we need to resupply. And I need to learn how to use this."
He tapped the mask.
"The Empire is listening," Julian said, his eyes hard. "It's time we started talking back."