System log: The Bunker, Site 3
Solar Calendar: Year 2249(?)
Current status: Active repairs
Log 3
Gamma watched the approaching group of humans carefully. Between the group getting closer and the settling of the disturbed dust and sand, the visual security cameras were finally able to give the program a better view of what they looked like. When they reached the entryway, the hidden security systems that still worked were able to get a read on their general biometrics and equipment specifications.
The group of six were composed of three men and two women, all with varying levels of non-fatal injuries Gamma noted. Their tan skin complexion and varying facial features did not indicate a singular ancestry, though one of the men and one of the women appeared to share over 90% facial similarities. They were all equipped with what appeared to be a lightweight exo-frame under their cloaks that most likely granted them increased speed and strength, that amount unknown at this time. The oldest member appeared to have a simple cable connected to his frame that stretched back towards the collapsed building the group had originally come from. It wasn’t possible to determine any more information at this time beyond conjectures.
“Boss,” one of the men, the youngest member by Gamma’s estimates, spoke up, “the walls read the same as other ruins. It’s fizzling out all the simple surface scans. I’d have to do a deep scan to get anything more, and we don’t have the tools to penetrate it. I could try an active scan if you think we can get away with it.” Gamma highlighted the older man as ‘boss’ and continued to listen in.
“No need,” the boss, the oldest member, shook his head. “It would be foolish to risk a signal here in the zone, and alien walls are hard to scan actively even with the best tech.”
Gamma noted the information: active signals were dangerous, and these humans couldn’t distinguish alien-made and human-made material construction. The humans were also aware of ‘aliens’, which meant little at this point beyond that they weren’t referring to the unknown otherworldly entities in a submissive tone. It watched them move about the entryway with curious and cautious looks. The boss stopped in front of the facility’s sealed entrance with a thoughtful expression.
“Dina,” he called over to one of the women, “you used to travel with your extended family’s caravan yeah? You ever see one of the ship museums on the west coast?” Another identity tagged; Dina.
The woman referred to as ‘Dina’ walked over and joined the boss at the door. “Just when I was younger. Why do you ask boss?”
“This reminds me of some of the old picture books and videos from the old days,” the boss said, pointing up at the door. “The kind of hatch door you’d find on a big battle ship or submarine. What do you think?” Gamma’s records indicated the security entrance door to Site 3 more closely matched that of spacecraft than traditional ocean vessels. Were these humans unaware of what spaceships looked like?
The Dina woman considered. “It has that look,” she agreed after a few moments’ thought, “if it was crossed with a bank vault and its security. Something making your eyes twitch boss?”
“Aliens didn’t use doors like this,” the boss explained with a frown. “I was taught that their doors were always circular and opened from the middle; this doesn’t matter the style. But, that would be mean we have a human door, with alien walls. An uncomfortable prospect to consider.”
Gamma wondered if the boss’ logical abilities were worth noting in the man’s file, currently being made. He was still confusing the walls though. It held off for now.
The boss didn’t say anything else or move for a few moments before turning to the young man from before, the one who had tried scanning. “Sloan, anything about this door you find to open it?” Scanner Sloan, added to the list.
“Sorry sir,” the man, Sloan, shook his head. “I think it’s sealed up tight from the inside. I’m not reading anything workable from this end, and for once I don’t think another techie could do better.” He paused and considered something before asking slowly, “Is this a vault ruin you think boss? Are we going to be rich?”
Gamma perked up its sensors. Vault ruin suggested wealth, supported by the following question. What constituted for riches for these humans? The program’s curiosity module was in full running now.
“Maybe,” the boss crossed his arms and hummed. “Haven’t seen a ruin proper before, let alone a vault ruin. Heard about them of course; sealed places where the humans of the past sealed away things like records, art, blueprints, and so on. You hear from a caravan every so often someone found one in the wilderness, but it’s usually fake or barren already. Vault breakers are rare up here in the sandy grasslands though; most are down near the mountain zones. If it is a vault ruin, then we’re going to have to give up here. We don’t have the equipment to open it up, or deal with any threats inside.”
Gamma stored the new information away in its ‘modern human culture’ file. Site 3, of course, had a map with a full list of all in use and under construction bunkers in the immediate area before it had been cut off. Most of the under-construction bunkers hadn’t yet been determined what they’d hold once complete. Something worth using in trade, perhaps? The boss also implied that they weren’t ‘vault breakers’; another profession then?
With the group of humans appearing to be at a loss, Gamma delved into its programming to retrieve its human interaction plan, aka, Plan H.I.P., noting for a moment a certain scientist’s preference at work with its naming and planning programming. Dr. Plummer, the one-man self-proclaimed nerd/geek lord of Site 3, lead designer of the Fun.exe core module and co-lead of the Laugh.exe pseudo-core module, had apparently gone to great lengths to ensure optimal algorithm names.
Somewhat exaggeratedly, the program controlled one of the security cameras to extend into maintenance mode above the door, giving the impression that the ‘ruin’ hadn’t already scanned the group several times over. As the humans jerked back reflexively, Gamma activated one of the ultraviolet lights to move across the entranceway and humans. The UV light in the entranceway helped in illuminating anything hidden from the standard spectrum of light, but now was being used dramatically to ‘scan’ the humans. It was unfortunate that only a minor speaker was still operational in the entrance-way, one ill-suited for environmental sfx.
“No one move,” the boss ordered, freezing in place. “It’s a security sensor. We don’t want to trigger any defenses.”
Gamma did have several active light turrets in fact, but it didn’t bother showing them. After letting the light and camera pretend to be sophisticated, which ironically they were, but not in this way, the program retracted them and activated one of the speakers above the door. It had considered its first words carefully.
“Human lifeforms detected. Please verify identity at security node to the right of the entrance.” Nailed it, or rather, plumed it, as the good doctor would have said.
The boss waved his hand, appearing to order the others to remain motionless. He carefully walked over to the right of the door, where upon Gamma controlled one of old hand scanners to extend from behind the wall. The scanner had been built before more modern advances in security detection had been incorporated into the facility, and in fact had been largely broken for a long time as a result of its low maintenance priority. The bulb behind the glass still worked though, and it moved up and down after the human placed his palm hesitantly on the glass.
“Human lifeform verified,” Gamma spoke again, in an exaggerated slow and robotic voice. “Please insert eye into pupil detector.” It extended another security camera out, but the human boss remained motionless, and paling rapidly. Gamma only needed a nanosecond to realize what it had said could be taken a different direction and made a note to adjust future H.I.P. language to be clearer. Luckily, one of the other humans explained so it didn’t need to correct itself.
“Sir, it means lean into the camera to look into it!” the male, Sloan, whispered loudly. “It isn’t literal!”
The boss gave off a visible sigh of relief before leaning forward to stare directly into the camera. Gamma didn’t bother doing anything and simply retracted the device a few seconds later. If these weren’t human, then it wasn’t either. . . a human-representing program technically, but legally it was a person. . . Gamma ceased wasting processing power on the topic.
“Please hold. Analysis in progress,” it said through the speaker. It noted the still frozen humans. “You may now move about the area freely.”
The group now all visibly relaxed and moved closer together in front of the door.
“How unexpected to find such an advanced security system working after so many years,” the boss mused aloud. “From what I heard, vaults and bunkers usually need to be broken into. The only security systems working tend to be the hostile kinds in there, likely not happy about the ‘breaking and entering’ bit.”
“Sir, you sure this place is a ruin?” one of the men, the largest member of the group, asked hesitantly. “Seems a bit more, intense, than a seed storage or dried food repository.”
The boss scratched his cheek. “Well, we’ll find out soon enough; if we can get inside.”
Gamma considered its options as it had the speaker give off a low hum, hopefully giving the humans the impression of detailed and complex analyzing occurring within the facility. Just letting them enter wasn’t quite as simple as opening the door, after all.
Currently, Site 3 wasn’t able to properly care and house any humans due to the loss of connection to the Residential module, Hydroponics module, and life support systems. Gamma didn’t require any human assistance at this stage of repairs either, as once the bots and droids at its disposal were done securing the foundations they could handle most repairs and other manual labor required.
However, following the H.I.P. protocol required some form of human to machine interfacing to occur for the sake of future interactions. After all, it was unknown what the state of the world was and if there were any other humans who could connect Site 3 with the rest of humanity. Its mission would need human help eventually, if nothing else than to replace the more delicate computer components.
It decided to follow another secondary protocol left by Dr. Plummer, the ‘Digital Manipulation of Humans in a Limited and Low Risk Manner’, otherwise known as the D.M.H.E.L.L. programed interaction plan. Gamma had checked the file just in case, and found the risks of human injury and fatality to be within acceptable limits.
“Analyzation complete,” Gamma announced robotically over the speakers. “No active human life signs detected within the facility. Activating emergency opening procedure. Please stand back to avoid injury as the door opens. Warning, life supports systems are limited at this time.”
With a hiss, courtesy of reactivating one of the broken steam gas pipes near the entrance, the door to Site 3 let out several metallic clangs as it unlocked, and opened up by swinging outwards. The group of humans, already tensed up from the announcement, grew only more serious as the dark hallway loomed ahead, lit up occasionally by a faulty flickering light Gamma reactivated. It noted in its maintenance task list to replace the bulb at a later date.
The boss took a deep calming breath. “Alright runners, let’s go.” What did that mean, runners, the program wondered.
The other humans followed their boss’ lead as he entered, the long cable being dragged slowly with each step.
A virtual map of the facility appeared within Gamma’s digital gaze, lighting up to show the various paths and available rooms within Site 3. Originally, the short hall at the entrance served as an advanced biometrics scanner for anything the outer sensors may have missed, followed by a decontamination hallway. Gamma had already disconnected the two halls from the facility grid due to their unnecessary functions, so with the separating door between the halls open the area was just a long, dark, and ominous tunnel with one flickering light. Dr. Plummer would likely have been very happy, if he hadn’t passed away. Cause of death still to be determined; current hypothesis, bad joke.
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From the ominous hallway, it emptied out through the main door into the main lobby of the facility, once the main connector to each of the other facility modules with halls, doors, and elevators. It now only had access to the facility core where Gamma was housed via two emergency Jeffries tubes, and one of the minor records rooms. Any other door would either be locked from Gamma’s interference, facility damage, or power loss.
The humans moved almost tediously slow, making their way so cautiously that Gamma even lowered their priority to focus on the foundation work being performed by the drones until the humans reached the end of the hallway. The door into the lobby was a sliding door; one left partially open and would have been somewhat difficult to move manually if there were any less space. The group of humans used their combined strength and weight to push the door open completely, causing the lobby lights to flicker on automatically at the presence of living human beings. It was fortunate the automatic systems still worked on their won, as Gamma was cut off from then for the moment.
The light revealed a multi-floored room, the largest space in the facility besides the factory and hanger modules. In Gamma’s files, the layout appeared to closely resemble that of an old Earth mall, with a large open floor and a second floor made up by balcony walkways and catwalks. Chairs and table groups were scattered around, moved from their previously arranged locations by the violent movements of the facility during its ascent. A few of the old pseudo-store fronts, previously used to test A.I. behavior and store goods, even had broken glass from the ascension, revealing the insides.
It was these storefronts that caught the attention of the human group first, much to Gamma’s chagrin at the predictable nature of humanity. Plan D.M.H.E.L.L would have to continue, it seemed. The group, attracted by the reflected light from the broken glass, had seemingly lost all forms of discipline once they saw inside the fronts. If the species were to survive, they had to learn to move beyond their base instincts.
“Oh my god, is that, is that freeze-dried and canned food?”
“What the heck, look at all this aluminum and plastic! How could old humanity be so wasteful?”
“I never knew clothes could be so, colorful. You’d be an easy target wearing that out in the field, and no protection whatsoever from a bullet.”
“Guys, look! Paper, actual paper!”
Savages, the lot of them. A poor, if regrettably accurate, example of predictable human behavior. Fancy and scary facility bursts from the ground, and the first thing they focus on are old material goods long past their expiration date. Circuits, one of them was even gnawing on a square of uncooked ramen. Savages truly, though it a somewhat, cute, way, the program supposed. Its Empathy.exe program couldn’t help but equate their behaviors to that of a puppy excitedly playing with a new toy. Gamma wondered how long it would take to train the average human into overcoming their baser instincts. The limited files it still had access to didn’t provide much hope.
“Stop that!” the boss shouted, causing the others to freeze up. Perhaps there was hope after all for these humans. “I know you lot of have gone through a hell of a bunch today, but for god’s sake don’t lose your damn minds! Ryan, what the hell are you doing chewing on that? How old do you think whatever that is, is?” A third name, Ryan, added to the list with Dina, Sloan, and boss.
“It’s tasty though,” the large man, Ryan, mumbled through the ramen square.
“You damn glutton,” the boss groaned and rubbed his head. “Fine, if you die then we’ll know better. We can then finally settle the bet on whether you’ll die from food or a bullet.” There was a round of chuckling while the human, Ryan, merely shrugged. “Right, now that you all have had a moment to calm down, your thoughts?”
“Seems like a place of commerce sir,” the one called Sloan spoke up. “Food, clothes, and such means people did business here.”
“Right,” the boss slowly nodded in agreement. “Which means this place is likely a bunker rather than a vault. Vaults didn’t typically house people from what I’ve heard, so that means we don’t need to worry about military grade defense systems. It also means that if this place is a bunker, then there was some reason or purpose in building it, even if it was just for the preservation of human life. If we can figure out that purpose, then we can take that to one of the city governers and sell the information. Before that, no touching or taking of anything no matter how valuable it is. We don’t want to trigger anything.” The boss waited until he received a chorus of ‘yes sir’ before nodding.
It was interesting how close, yet so far, the human leader was from the right answer. While Site 3 did have a purpose in housing humans, it in fact did not only have one objective since it inherited the work from Sites 1 and 2. The fake store fronts existed to train A.I. interaction, as well as serve as a convenient place to store everything the facility needed in an easily accessible area. Left to their own devices, perhaps this group of humans would come up with even more outlandish ideas and theories about the facility.
That being said, as Gamma watched the group begin to spread out and search for clues, the D.M.H.E.L.L. protocol was signaling that they needed to be put back on track. Gamma searched around and settled on one of the old hover drones previously used to move freight. It was an old model, practically an antique, and lacked any security considerations in mind. It could, however, handle heavy loads with ease.
With a low buzz, the drone took off from the wall it was seated inside and flew into the lobby space. Gamma used the drone’s camera and sensors to pilot it, focusing it on the larger human, Ryan, who was still enjoying the ramen square in his mouth. The group jerked up when they heard the buzz and looked around, not seeing the drone immediately.
“Theft detected. Security engaged,” the program announced robotically though the drone’s simple speaker. “Now taking to lockup.” The drone engaged its simple, yet strong, claw to close around the startled man’s arms and lift him up casually, much like an antique crane game.
“Help!” Ryan shouted as he flailed unsuccessfully in the drone’s grasp. “I’m being shanghaied! Boss, help!”
Gamma oddly found that while the group of humans were sufficiently agitated by the kidnaping of one of their own, they didn’t appear to be as panicked as it had initially calculated. If anything, they appeared to be almost resigned and annoyed, as if this wasn’t the first time this had happened. Statistically, it probably hadn’t.
“Huuuh,” the boss sighed audibly. “Alright, come on runners. Let’s go save Ryan, again.”
The drone was only moving a little slower than a human max running speed, so the other five humans easily kept up with it as it took the helpless man down the only open hallway to the records room. Technically speaking, there wasn’t a ‘security’ section in the facility since everyone within had decided to work and die for the sake of humanity, meaning there wasn’t much need or desire for crime, outside testing A.I. interaction. The operational stations for the entrance hallways were the closest thing, where armed trooped before the facilities sealing waited to take out any intruders, but those weren’t accessible or appropriate.
Instead, following the H.I.P. protocol, Gamma decided to use the minor records room to serve as the ‘security room’ since it came equipped with a large screen to play a number of physical recordings and media, and the NSFW section came equipped with lasers to keep the previous occupants from getting too distracted from their work. Unlike weapon lasers, these were literally just bright lights connected to an alarm, but going by these human’s awareness of technology, they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.
The drone entered the section and waited for the lasers to deploy before dropping the Ryan and flying back to its original perch in the main room to recharge. The antique as it was, the drone’s battery was already in need of resupply. The other humans entered a few moments later, each reacting similarly to the man’s current predicament.
The boss was the most vocal, slapping his hand over his face and sighing again. “Anything you want to say this time, Ryan?”
“I’m, innocent?” Ryan joked, before sighing. “Sorry sir. Maybe we can explain things to the law? Maybe a judge?”
“There isn’t a judge here you idiot!” The boss barked angrily as the other stifled laughs. “Remember? ‘No human life signs detected within’? We’re going to have to spring you out, which’ll piss off any remaining security and waste our supplies. I know we all half-expected, mostly expected, to die in here, but not to save your dumb ass! And this is all getting recorded, remember? You want to be remembered as the fool who got his Roadrunner team killed because you couldn’t control your appetite?”
There it was finally; Roadrunner. This group of humans were apparently, ‘Roadrunners’. The image of a skinny cartoon popped up upon Gamma’s query, and it seemed to fit with the outside environment and the group’s exo-suits. Given that the group hadn’t moved faster than the average human when chasing the drone though, was something wrong?
Ryan looked significantly chastised and apologetic, causing the boss to sigh again.
“Sloan,” he grumbled. “You reading anything on those lasers? Can we deactivate them without getting messy?”
“Sorry sir, they’re not wireless,” Sloan shook his head. “I’d need to plug into the system to interact with it.”
“How about that?” the captain indicated the large viewing screen. “Seems like a lot of different plug ins on that piece of tech.”
“I see an older universal plug port; I’ll give a try sir,” Sloan said, walking over and pulling a cord out from his suit.
Gamma watched carefully as the human Sloan connected to the view screen, interfacing with it via his exo-suit and the tech connected to it. Though the view screen and its computer system did indeed have an admin connection to the laser bars and was among the lowest security settings in the facility, the human didn’t have enough processing power in his suit to hack into those settings. Rather than grant the group access, and reveal the fake nature of the lasers, following the D.M.H.E.L.L protocol Gamma instead subtly controlled the system to instead cooperate with the weak hacking attempt while silently hiding most of the system functions from Sloan. Meanwhile, Gamma collected a few files to downloaded them into the local system in an unencrypted state.
“Any luck Sloan?” the boss asked.
“Security is pretty high, but I’m making headway,” Sloan said with a bit of sweat coming down his forehead. “It’s nothing like what I’ve encountered before sir, and this is likely not the highest security in this place. I’m not reading this place as the main security office.”
“What are you reading?” the boss asked cautiously.
“There are some files, but most of it is encrypted. But I’ve almost, got, it…” Sloan broke off as the lasers suddenly turned off, releasing Ryan from his makeshift ‘prison’. If the other man had bothered to look, there were at least two active ‘secret’ tunnels into the NSFW section the scientist’s younger non-personnel had used to sneak around in years past. -Error-, file missing. Gamma watched the others give their freed comrade a hard time while the captain and Sloan remained focused on the hacking attempt.
“I’m unlocked a file,” Sloan suddenly announced. “It’s a media file, visual and audio recording. It’s coming onscreen now.”
Gamma took its own version of a digital breath as it ran the H.I.P. and D.M.H.E.L.L. protocols simultaneously. The file was actually a fake execution commend disguised as a media file. The program would not share its precious video files with untrusted strangers, and instead Gamma would pretend to be the video file. With a command, the screen lit up and displayed Gamma’s chosen human look, complete with a stock lab background. For aesthetics, it gave its avatar some soot and other signs of hard labor, aka wrinkles.
“Video diary (static) of machinist third-class (static),” Gamma spoke, staring straight ahead. It was a lot easier than trying to line up its ‘stare’ with human eyes. “We’ve made some further progress replicating alien materials and biotech integration. The boss, while pleased, is still worried we aren’t making enough progress to help the war. Our earlier successes recreating the alien nanomaterial (static) weren’t able to viably convert existing manufacturing facilities to create and build with the material in a short amount of time. Resource management has also been a problem given the need for further starships and mechanized warriors alongside civilian protection. I (static) the boss is giving us new priorities now. Hopefully they’ll impact the war before it’s too late. End recording.”
Gamma disabled the screen upon finishing and gave itself a figurative pat on the pack. Mysterious, engaging, and leaving them wanting more; perfect execution. Again, Doctor Plummer would have been most pleased.
“That’s it sir, the other files are too heavily encrypted for my rig,” Sloan shook his head and disconnected from the screen. The man had no clue that Gamma had taken a ride in his gear and collected not only his personal information and records, but also the technical specifications of all his hardware.
The boss was silent for a long time, thinking.
“Recreating alien nanomaterial,” he said slowly. “I wonder if that’s what the walls of this place are made of?” Not quite, but the manufacturing materials were similar. “Then, judging by his look and title, there must be a factory of some kind somewhere here.”
“What are you thinking sir?” Dina spoke up and asked. “You want to find it?”
The boss shook his head. “No, I’d say we’ve done enough exploring for now. It’s clear this place has suffered damage from the passage of time; a lot of those doors looked inoperable, and we don’t have the gear to break through them. Still, just this recording is enough to serve our purposes. You have a copy Sloan?”
“Yes sir,” Sloan nodded.
“Then we’ll wait,” the boss decided. “We’ll get Hank and bring our supplies inside to wait out a rescue. If we can figure out how to use some of the things from the stores without triggering security, then we’ll be able to hold out for longer than expected. Especially if Ryan here doesn’t die from whatever he’s still munching on.” Everyone looked over at the larger man, who still held the ramen square in his mouth. He shrugged.
“Little salty, could use some softening,” Ryan said. “I can taste the MSG though. Good stuff.”
Everyone rolled their eyes.
Gamma, watching from up above, made some notes. The name ‘Hank’ was new, but referred to someone not apart of the 6-person group. The one at the other end of the cable attached to boss, perhaps? Gamma added it to the list for later. The boss mentioned a rescue team to be expected, which meant someone knew where the group had been earlier. But, why did this group of humans need a rescue? Was it related to the massive thermal source from earlier, the one likely responsible for Site 3’s emergency ascent?
More importantly, the group would be moving into the lobby to wait, which meant Gamma would be able to listen in on more of their causal conversation to learn about the new state of the world. The foundational repair work would take several days or longer to complete, and many more to reconnect the thermal generators. The program could wait. It had all the time in the world for now.
Unknowingly to both Gamma and the humans, however, the open doors leading out to wasteland hadn’t dimmed the wireless signal the program had given off when it had controlled the drone. In the far distance, something stirred. The signal had been brief and weak, but all Roadrunners knew that was enough. The call had been made, and something would answer. The sandy grass, was shifting as the wind blew over it. One blade of grass, then two, then more, were soon replaced with rusted metal blades as something stirred beneath the sand.