“I’m not sure what I’m looking at, but it’s absolutely terrifying,” Synel said.

  “You can still head back to the surface,” Summers replied. “It’ll probably only take you an hour or two.”

  “I won’t leave my apprentice to. . . whatever this place is.”

  “Can I leave?” Asle asked.

  “No,” Elias answered. “We need you.”

  They were staring into an abyss, so large Summers was sure he could see the other side of the planet, albeit from the inside. The sheer scale of it was staggering, like the world had been hollowed out. A miniature sun seemingly floated at its center, surrounded by a tangle of rock and metal structures. Every so often a burst of energy would shoot towards the sun, striking one of many building sized antennas that reached towards it.

  “Elias, you sure we’re safe?” Summers looked to the man. “I don’t like that we don’t know what killed your. . . people.”

  His previous troops had all but been eradicated when they’d ventured into the caves. Supposedly, it was much deeper than they were now, in the ‘guts’ of the massive machine.

  “For the last time, yes. They were most likely killed by environmental circumstance, far from here. Probably.”

  “I don’t like hearing maybes when our lives are at stake.”

  “If you’d like we can find another expert in interdimensional transmissions. Oh, wait, you killed him.”

  Nearby, several dozen ‘guards’ surrounded them, most were the samr’s people, Leah and Elias having brought a sizable amount of the more monstrous, ‘elite’ troops of their army. Ayra, and a few of their best people had also come. They weren’t necessarily needed, but Pat had insisted that they be there to ‘keep an eye’ on the samr, as well as protect Asle and himself.

  Apparently, Asle’s connection to the anchor would allow her to link to whatever it was they needed to find, something Elias called a node. She had something like administrator access to the thing, so unless they consented to having whatever pieces of Wendel she’d integrated torn out of her, something that was by Elias’ own confession, extremely dangerous, she’d need to be present.

  “Nothing has attacked us this close to the surface,” Leah reassured.

  “Not yet,” Summers added. “Aren’t you two geniuses? Was your best plan seriously ‘let’s head into the weird murder cave ourselves’?”

  Leah made an annoyed noise.

  “We are investigating an anomaly with our strongest assets. And we will be doing so as carefully as possible, with our people scouting ahead.”

  “Right. . . and we’re sure that. . . sun thing, isn’t going to give us cancer?”

  “That was the iron core of the earth, something they converted into a reactor of sorts. And no, even though my colleague told you it emits something akin to radiation it isn’t the same. Though I would recommend against getting too close. Or staying in sight of it unnecessarily.” She paused. “And you may want to destroy those clothes when we’re done here.”

  “. . .Fucks sake.”

  Summers looked around, the moon sized chamber aside, the cave had led to what was essentially a maze of metal panels and half destroyed corridors.

  Much of it reminded Summers of the old, outdated equipment he’d been trying to maintain back at his old base. Decay and rust having reclaimed large swathes of the structure, while wires hung from the ceiling in vine-like clusters. If Elias hadn’t been sure this place was still somehow functioning, Summers would have been skeptical there was anything still functional here.

  “Fine, so which way are we going?” Summers asked.

  “We think a node is likely to be near one of the power conduits,” Leah gestured to one of the nearby ‘antennas’ stretching towards the core. “If we’re able to secure it long enough for the child to link the anchor, we can leave.”

  “Uh, miss. . . Leah,” Ayra began. “How many of your troops have you been sending down here?”

  “Fifty-three, I could send more, however. . .” She regarded Ayra. “We’re on a timetable. There’s no sense in sending others into the meat grinder if we’re not seeing results. And organizing a proper assault force is. . . ill advised.”

  “Why? Surely enough force would solve our problem.”

  “Yes, however. . . if something has somehow survived on this barren rock, I don’t suspect it will only be one or two specimens. I’d rather not pit an army against a planet’s worth of enemies, especially if they’re somewhat intelligent and capable of mobilizing. Which means a quick and decisive strike followed by extraction is preferable.”

  Summers glanced at the woman.

  “What makes you think they’re intelligent?”

  “Animals couldn’t thrive in an environment like this. I suspect what we’re dealing with is either a security system of some kind, or a remnant of those that built this place. We’d have seen a response to our incursions if it was a truly sapient force, thus far, it’s only acted defensively in a few key areas.”

  “That’s. . . not ominous at all.” Summers once again stared at the massive superstructure in front of them. Frankly, he had no idea how there was breathable air down here, though if it was somehow being treated artificially it might explain why the surface was still habitable for humans. “Just how do you plan on having Asle link with this thing? You made it sound like it was easy but now that I think about it. . . Asle do you know how you’d do that? I know Elias was working on a tool but-”

  Asle held up a horrifying, black blob of metal and what looked like a fist-sized maggot.

  “They gave me this.”

  “. . .I’m a little disturbed you’re okay with touching that.”

  “Me too,” Asle said.

  “It’s just a transmitter,” Leah explained. “It should allow her to grant the anchor access to this device, she simply needs to think about it, and the anchor will execute the instruction to the best of its ability.”

  “Wait, it can think?”

  “It can pull from our own expert’s knowledge, but no, it doesn’t have a will of its own. That’s by design, it requires someone to instruct it to act. Asle,” she stressed the girl’s name, “somehow managed to skirt our own hierarchy when she absorbed a piece of Wendel. That hadn’t originally been a concern but clearly you people have a talent in breaking things. I’m still not sure how you somehow altered the anchor itself.”

  “I tried to break it,” Asle said. “To make a monster explode.”

  “That. . . you were trying to collapse a gate?” Elias asked.

  Asle shrugged.

  “That’s. . . horrifying. Do you understand – no of course you don’t.”

  Asle gave Summers a pointed look.

  “What?” Elias looked at Summers. “Why are you looking at him?”

  “Not important.” Summers said before Asle could get a word in. “We should get moving, timetable and all.”

  Leah sighed, and their group began to move into formation, heading forward, into the abyss.

----------------------------------------

  “Hold,” Leah called.

  They’d been walking for the better part of a day without much incident. Summers had, correctly, suspected that wouldn’t last.

  “What is it?” Summers asked.

  “I lost a scout,” she paused, “correction, two scouts.” She tensed. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s close.”

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  Summers hefted his rifle as he gestured to Ayra and the others, they moved to the back while the samr’s people took point. Leah, surprisingly, stayed at his side in the front.

  “Should we be worried?” Summers looked to the woman, who was simply contemplative.

  “I’m not sure.”

  A muffled explosion ahead tore their attention away.

  Summers raised his weapon, training it on the hall in front of them along with every other person there.

  “Leah, do we know what we’re dealing with?”

  “No, my people weren’t able to-” Leah stopped.

  Ahead of them, a small, human sized figure appeared. Rather, it might have been human at one point Now, Summers wasn’t so sure. It walked with a staccato, disjointed limp, rusted wires and torn metal weaving through bone and long rotted flesh. Empty eye sockets stared blankly ahead as tubes and long cables attached to its spine trailed behind it, feeding into some device in the walls that followed along. It paused as it sensed their group.

  “Fire!” Leah ordered.

  As one, a dozen of the samr’s people unloaded their weapons into the small figure. It didn’t so much as move, despite that, Summers watched as every single round rebounded off an invisible force inches from its form. In the same instant, a bolt of energy forked out to the soldiers that had fired, their bodies jolted with the force of the attack before dropping to the ground as a smoldering pile of meat and bone.

  A small group of the samr’s people stepped in front of Leah and Summers, spoiling Summers aim and raising their weapons in kind only for Asle to call out.

  “Wait!”

  Leah held a staying hand, as if realizing something at the same time Asle did.

  The small not-quite-human figure stood there, just watching them.

  Summers gripped his gun, resisting the urge to blow its head off. He glanced down at the still smoking bodies of their guards.

  “It’s some kind of defensive system,” Leah explained. “I don’t believe it will attack unless we do so first.”

  “. . .Are you very fucking sure about that?” Summers asked. He was gripping his weapon so tightly that he could hear the metal beneath begin to strain.

  “No, but it hasn’t killed us yet.” Leah gestured to two of their guards. The duo moved in, closer to the skeletal man. It didn’t react.

  At Leah’s instruction, one pulled his sidearm and leveled it on the figure’s head, as he fired, the guard practically burst into a fine red mist. The other, however, was completely unharmed.

  Summers could swear he saw the second guard sweat.

  “Okay. That’s. . . sort of proof. What now?”

  “We keep going,” Leah answered.

  “It just microwaved a guy.”

  “You have no idea how close that is to the truth. . . I’ll send my contingent, assuming it doesn’t respond, we move.” They looked back to Ayra for confirmation, she nodded to Summers.

  “. . .All right.” Summers looked at Asle. “How’d you know.”

  “He missed, but he’s not dead.” She gestured to an elf at her side. The man held the same stoicism as every other elf, but Summers could sense he was a bit sheepish.

  “Lucky him.”

  In short order, Leah’s people skirted around the creature. Eventually, they woman herself approached, Summers and the others close behind. Summers kept Asle behind him as they slowly, carefully, edged around its side. Some minutes after they’d passed, it started forward, startling the few elves still in the hall, as if oblivious.

  Even then, it didn’t react, not even looking in their direction. Not that it had eyes, at least as far as Summers could tell. It was, essentially, a dead body being held up by the machinery that wrapped around its frame. Even the tubes that trailed behind it looked like some kind of life support system, but, judging by the desiccated skin and bone they fed into, they’d long outlived their purpose.

  When they were clear of the creature, Summers turned to Leah.

  “Did every one of your scouts attack those things?”

  “Apparently, yes,” Leah said. “Let’s just hope there aren’t any-”

  As if on cue, two more of the skeletal creatures meandered around the corner at the far end of the hall. The group stopped as one, staring at the new arrivals as they impassively stared back.

  Leah took a deep breath.

  “This is going to take a while.”

----------------------------------------

  It took them another three days of walking. Mostly, because they’d run into more than one group of the metal corpses, some blocking the halls entirely, and had to find a way to bypass them. It hadn’t taken them long to learn physical contact also resulted in death when it came to these things. Thankfully, they’d come prepared, and while the creatures seemed to be patrolling the halls, they didn’t bother with the various side rooms or blocked hallways, allowing the group to camp for the night with little difficulty.

  “I think we’re close,” Leah said, checking something like a tumor on her arm. A reminder that the samr’s technology was as disgusting as it was impressive. “If these readings are correct, we’re within a mile of a node.”

  “Good.”

  They walked for several more minutes until Leah’s scouts found a large room with a device at its center.

  “Ah. . .” Leah’s voice trailed off.

  “What?” Summers looked to her. “Your scouts find something?”

  “I have, as well as some unfortunate news. We have found the node. . . however, it’s very well guarded.”

  “How well?”

  “There are fifty of those creatures inside. Most are around the node itself.”

  Everyone else stared at Leah for one long, hard moment.

  “Nope.” Ayra finally said, breaking the tension. “No way, we’re not risking our people for that.”

  “We should find a different node, whatever the hell it is.” Summers added.

  “You understand this is a planet sized structure, yes?” Leah said. “It will take us a month at best to get to the next closest node. That’s time we don’t have.”

  “We should do it.” Asle said.

  “Asle, those things can fry you and we don’t know if screwing with that thing will set them off.”

  “I don’t believe we have a choice,” Leah said. “If we want to save the planet, then this is simply a risk we must take.” She paused. “I’ll move in with the child. A smaller group is less likely to draw their ire, and she might need my help attuning to the anchor. Once we’ve established contact, we may be able to shut down whatever this defense is.”

  “Or set it off and kill us all,” Elias added.

  “That’s not helping,” Summers said.

  Before anyone could object, Asle moved forward, into the room.

----------------------------------------

  Asle strode past several of the creatures, either uncaring or unaware of her presence. Leah followed close behind, surprised at her sudden move. That was fine, she doubted she’d be able to do whatever it was that needed to be done here without her help. She’d acted so quickly only because she knew if she didn’t, Summers or one of the others would have volunteered themselves to go as well. That wouldn’t help here, it would only cause problems, and needlessly risk the other’s lives.

  Her small frame made it easy to skirt the creatures and make her way to a large, cylindrical device at the room’s center. It was clearer here, making it easier to move around. The creatures, however, were still everywhere she looked. Thankfully, Summers and the others were covering them from the entrance, she wasn’t sure how much help that would be, but it couldn’t hurt.

  “What now?” Asle asked.

  “Put the device here,” Leah indicated a small, metal indent on the machine. “This is an access port. I have no idea what kind, but the device should be able to interface with it regardless. Call for the anchor, the same way you make a portal. Once we have contact, I can handle things from there.”

  Asle nodded, doing as she’d instructed. The insect-like device formed itself into the space, practically seeping inside.

  “Now, put your hand on it, and focus,” Leah said.

  Asle nodded, taking a breath, and closing her eyes.

  The device responded, and in the next instant, she’d known they made a mistake.

  Several of the creatures turned towards them, their expressionless faces locked onto hers. But before they could do anything, gunfire rang out. Shots slammed into the side of the creatures’ heads, accomplishing nothing, but distracting them. Summers barked orders as the men that had fired took cover before the creatures could retaliate. It bought her just enough time to open a portal between themselves and their enemy. There was nothing like a cave here, they couldn’t escape, but she could encase herself in the rock and dirt that was in the equivalent space of her world. Just as she’d done when she’d first discovered this power.

  The muffled sound of lightning slammed against her makeshift barrier a second later, forcing her to focus.

  Leah put a hand on her arm.

  “You need to order the anchor!”

  Asle split her attention, pressing a hand into the device, trying and failing for several seconds to do as Leah said. Then, something clicked, and Leah’s death-grip on her loosened.

  “Good!” Leah turned to the device, a smile on her face. “Oh, very good.”

  The shots intensified for several seconds. Asle grit her teeth, focusing all her will on protecting herself.

  Then, suddenly Asle felt her control slip. The portals disappeared, only for several dozen to reappear a moment later, one near each of the creatures.

  Hundreds of black tendrils tore from the newly opened tears, wrapping themselves around the metal skeletons, even as they tried to cook them in retaliation. They were torn from their posts, reeled back in through the portals as one, leaving an empty, cavernous, and eerily silent room behind.

  Asle looked up at Leah, who had her hand outstretched.

  “Was that you?”

  “Yes.” Leah flexed her hand. “I think we have some access to the device, now.”

  Summers and the others peeked out from the corridor, staring at the scene. A few of the severed tentacles were still on the floor, writhing.

  “What was that?”

  Leah smiled.

  “That, child, was Matteus.”