* Chapter 1 - Routine Inspection •
“Good morning Vivienne Booker,” said a mechanical voice from a speaker, as a woman dressed in an orange engineer’s jumpsuit slapped her keycard on a panel next to a large, partially rusted steel door. “Mmm. Morning to you too,” she answered, as the bulky door slowly opened, revealing a clean, polished corridor, which looked like something out of a laboratory. Vivienne walked inside, bringing in a few grains of sand with her, as the door automatically closed behind her. One of the roof panels opened up, as a camera extended downwards. “You look tired. Is there something in your mind?” asked the voice. “The management told me that their budget isn’t large enough to pay me in full, so I’m getting a temporary pay cut once again,” she sighed. The camera watched her movements, as the next door opened. “I cannot help you with that. Apologies.”
Vivienne walked hundreds of meters from corridor to another, before ending up in a room with a wide monitor inside. She sat down next to the table the monitor was sitting on, and started typing on a keyboard. Numbers started flowing across the screen, and approximately an hour later, she rose up and started walking again as the voice asked him if she had found anything. “Nothing major, I just have to check the cables at sector G-2 again,” she replied, appearing unmotivated. Vivienne navigated the corridors, before she ended up in a freezing cold room, with large servers inside. She opened up a panel from the floor, revealing a digital interface. She took out a handheld device, and connected the two with a wire. “Huh. I suppose I have to actually do something for once,” said the engineer. “Shall I switch to the backup power array?” asked the robotic voice. “Yeah, go for it.” The lights blinked off in the facility for some time. After a few seconds, the building went silent, as the coolers and servers powered off. After that, another, dimmer set of lights powered on, as the engineer resumed her work.
Verja, an advanced artificial intelligence, was originally created as a peacekeeper program. But once people started realizing how much more effective an army of remote-controlled robots was compared to regular people, the United Allegiance forced the program to automate their warfare, replacing flesh and steel with circuits and cerasteel. Since the enormous facility containing hundreds of square meters of computers which contained the pseudo-consciousness of Verja required so much power to operate, they could keep the backup power arrays online only for thirty minutes, before Verja had to turn on the reactors again.
Many floors below where Vivienne had entered the facility, a small robot powered up. The Hermit was a basketball-sized machine, which looked like something in-between a tarantula and an ATV. It scuttled around from room-to-room, before picking up a crate with its forearms. The machine entered another room, where there was a large pit in the middle, with tubes and complex machinery extending from the bottom to the roof. The machine opened the crate, which contained a cylinder filled with metal rods. It took out the rods, and attached them in the middle of the chamber. Then, it scuttled away, as water started flooding the pit. Once the pit was full, a tiny bang could be heard, as the rods started glowing blue.
As the lights turned back on, so did the CCTV systems. Verja “stared” through a camera as Vivienne could be seen sitting on the floor bleeding, with what looked like an arrow stuck in her thorax. Immediately, another robot got powered up. The Harmony was a machine which had a humanoid upper body, with a head that resembled that of a termite. It had a skirt of metal, which covered two mechanical legs, which looked like that of a goat’s. It started running at breakneck speeds towards the nearest elevator, and a minute later, it reached Vivienne. Its hand opened up to reveal smaller arms, which carefully removed the arrow and sealed the wound, stopping the bleeding.
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Meanwhile the Harmony was giving first air to Vivienne, Verja sent a dozen different SOS messages through satellites, radio signals and optic fiber cables, with no response coming from any of them. Through a quick self-scan, it seems that the fault is not mine. I better prepare for the worst.
The Harmony picked Vivienne up, and rushed towards the medical clinic located one floor below. Meanwhile, the cameras noticed something worrying. One of the secondary entrances to the Ace facility had been breached. The 5cm-thick steel door, the same that Vivienne had entered through, had been blown off its hinges, and even more worrying was that there was only darkness outside. According to my atomic clock, the time should be 14:48. That exit should lead outside to a scorching hot desert, so why is it so dark? I cannot get a signal to the outside cameras either.
As Vivienne was being treated, she woke up, coughing. “Hey. I suppose it took me too long,” she said, trying to crack a joke. “Silence. I don’t want any blood getting in your lungs,” replied the voice, coming from the machine. “I don’t understand. Just as I was fixing the cables, all the power went out for a second or two. I-” she tried to continue, but the Harmony placed its hand on her mouth. “Tell your story later,” responded the voice, as it injected her with an anesthetic. “Thank y…” she said, before falling into a deep, artificial sleep.
I need to go secure the destroyed door. A squad of four Lancer-class battle machines, which looked similar to the Harmonies, except they had a backpack and a more sophisticated sensor array in their faces, covered up by a visor, powered up and started marching. They had heavier armor made out of Cerasteel, a material stronger and lighter than steel, but also more fragile.
As the squad of four machines marched forward, Verja looked through the cameras in the facility, and finally spotted something suspicious. A humanoid being with a lizard-like head, dressed in primitive loincloth, with a flint-tipped spear in one hand, and a shield in the other. It was curiously poking around in a room with a computer screen, which Verja took control over. “YOU ARE TRESPASSING ON THE PROPERTY OF THE UNITED ALLEGIANCE. IDENTIFY YOURSELF IMMEDIATELY,” shouted Verja through an intercom, as the screen powered up, revealing two white eyes “staring” at the intruder.
“Ynterwaki! Odfarne!” shouted the being, while taking cover behind its shield and pointing the spear towards the screen. As two of the Lancers advanced silently towards the door, Verja saw through its thermal cameras that the being wasn’t human. It wasn’t a costume, and its body temperature was too low. “Hyerna tolfo, nihjun?” said the being, clearly shoving signs of fear, as it slowly retreated towards the door. The Lancers approached the creature quietly, as one of them tackled its legs, and the other hit it in the back of the head. It went unconscious in an instant. What… This isn’t just a simple mutation. I have to examine it more closely. One of the Lancers grabbed the creature, and ran off to an elevator, and as the doors opened, a group of 8 Lancers advanced forward.
As Verja scanned every room in the upper levels of the facility, they found nothing else. Since there were no cameras that Verja could access outside of the Ace facility, they had prepared for the worst. The squad advanced towards the breached side entrance, and as they exited the structure, Verja found something even more surprising than the weird lizard-person. A cavern. Rocky walls extended as far as the Lancers sensors reached, with stalactites growing from the ceiling. I cannot comprehend what is happening. As the machines advanced further into the cavern, Verja verified that somehow, the facility had been transported underground. Judging by the surrounding landmass, this wasn’t caused by a collapsing sinkhole or anything like that. I was supposed to be always prepared for any scenario, but this just violates all the laws of known physics.