“Definitely stay behind that red tape.”

The next day, she followed her angrily rumbling stomach as the medicine she took for the day finally kicked in. Her abdomen felt like it had a massive pressure up until a wet pop sounded from her back thanks to Eta’s hug.

She smiled as the doors swung open thanks to a kind private, she crutched along, swinging to the pulsing pain of her ankle.

It faltered slightly at the thought of the bone extensions. She didn’t meet the height requirement, even though she stood at 5’8, the minimum requirement was 6’0.

Eta mentioned the extensions may put her past it easily. Her feelings mixed along with the smells of the mess hall.

A cacophony of clanking plates and voices wafted from the staff and soldiers wearing black with various lapels and ranks.

“Hey Mel! Over here!” Karla called from the back, “chows good today!”

After grabbing her tray, she settled in with the rest. Amanda arrived shortly after, quickly digging into her meal, simple steak and potatoes, greens on the side.

Melissa popped a bite into her mouth. Around them, hushed discussions and clinking silverware created a soothing white noise.

The distant rhythmic rumbles of the mid-summer storm bled through the mess hall door leading to one of many courtyards. She briefly half expected the wide door to burst open, that loper charging in and ripping everyone inside apart.

She rubbed the back of her neck involuntarily with a wince.

Their heads jerked suddenly as a clatter of shattering dishware and muttered swearing sounded from the kitchen followed by applause from the mess hall.

“Heya!” A man’s voice rang out from behind them, “there you are,” he strolled to Amanda sharing a kiss with her, “Hey babes.” He faced Melissa with a perfect smile as he plopped in front of her.

“How’s the leg?”

“Hurts.” She smiled wryly.

“Stomach?”

“Hungry, how’s the quarry in Irie?”

“Pretty damn pretty, were taking in shipments of opalcrete all the time, Refuge city plans on expanding.”

“So, we getting that hydroponic facility I keep asking for?” She keened out sweetly to the geologist and civil engineer’s raised brow.

“Maybe, I’ve given some plans to our contractors, and they seem to like it enough. The only issue is clearing out the sealed tunnels below Mithrop, there is a reservoir of water we can tap into,” he raised a finger, “but, Noctus, shit tons of them too left over from the original founding of that little town when they decided to settle at the main gate to the place.”

“Oooh watch out, they might be right under us.” Karla waggled her fingers.

“You’re right, Karla, they might be.” His voice went to a cold gravel, the sudden change almost making Karla jump out of her skin.

“They could very well be in a maintenance duct, corridor, waiting and biding their time because they’re smart enough to open doors and operate machines. Citadel Refuge is still a city inside another city.” Karla’s face was one of shock and a creeping fear that slowly saturated her features.

“There are some rumors floating around, each dark space, each dark hallway at night, I know I’m never sure if it’s just a simple laugh I’m hearing or something else. I’ve heard tapping inside the walls, too.”

Karla glanced to the group, all serious faces, it wasn’t up until she looked at Melissa, who broke into a fit of laughter as the group chorused her.

“You scary fuck, knock that shit off, gave me a damn heart attack.”

He smirked, “Alright, but. Seriously, don’t get lazy and think your just seeing things around here.” His display chirped as a timer went off. “We gotta’ go, it’s time to meet at the atrium.”

The group collectively got up and cut through ecology, through the medical ward and its massive spire of decks that rose like a smokestack, the windows across the 100-foot expanse bled the sunny day in vaguely golden hues that brought comfort to Melissa, save for her newly soured stomach.

It roiled akin to the shifting shadows of the plants on outside terrace, the sunny days often glinting off their surface with the workers on break chatting and taking care of the perennials with watering cans and nutrient powders.

Even looking at the glistening surface of her steak was too much. She already pushed it with the potatoes.

The elevator ride was smooth with a few painful bumps that made Melissa grip the polished, icy railing tighter as she withheld wincing pain.

It made her ankle feel like it was swelling as the elevator doors opened to the concentric ringed catwalks surrounding the monolith, there were multiple floors with spiraling stairwells leading to each.

The long walkway that greeted them spanned the half-block’s length distance.

They looked at the massive teardrop shaped stone sitting inside of a large concentric atrium. Ripley instructed new recruits, each wearing the same rank with the minor difference of a purple orb just under it.

The rest, save for Melissa noticed the recruits, she could only gawk at the massive geometric egg.

It was jet black with patterns seemingly engraved into it, a harshly geometric crystalline structure. The edges gleamed brightly in the white phosphoresce cast down from all angles.

It was a strange, almost organic multilayered, multicolored flowing script that was a stark contrast to the black surface. Sharp vivid colors all lined with a ghostly golden hue.

“This, is monolithic code, it is… asymmetrical, in its design.” Ripley had a briefly lived frustrated look as she instructed new Vaporial researchers, a large display flickered into existence, utterly dwarfing the thin cosmologist

Her demure hand rose, punctuating her words, “Your primary duties will focus upon decoding the information we record from this,” she gestured to the looming rock of information, “into useable data, we are translators first.”

The group gave their affirmations as she dismissed them, “please meet with Bishop and myself in the morning for further orientation, here at 0600 sharp.” She waved as the group of new specialists and young faces regarded the monolith on their way to a far-off elevator.

Ripley waved the senior group over, having noticed a new set of symbols she had not seen before etched into the blackened surface.

Strangely they were all too familiar.

Constellations of stars and planetary bodies.

She could not explain why, yet something about them nagged in her memory. Were they the very ones that all humans saw from Earth, but seen from a different perspective? How was this stone etched so thoroughly and... who may have written upon its surface?

What secrets within secrets lay within, why did it call to her akin to a palpable gravitational pull?

It was almost as if it wove its secrets into her very essence and yet withheld them.

“Director Vahlen, I believe I have found something rather different,” Vahlen’s empty stare at a portion of the monolith was interrupted, her jade eyes flaring in curiosity.

“Yes, Ripley, what have you found?” The group eventually made their way to the central monolith ring.

“This is a star system… however,” she squinted at it, a familiar stare of knowing, “considering how the stars are aligned on this side, I believe this would indicate its location somewhere near the Epsilon system, and upon this side...” She padded along the massive gantry spanning the middle point of the stone.

As she got to the halfway point Amanda kept withholding a shit eating grin as Ripley saw it and hurried her steps, letting out an airy laugh with the others.

As she got to the other side 100 feet around the middle ring, she pointed to a set of familiar stars and shifting symbols, moving one of the high-definition cameras mounted on the railing.

The image popped up one of the displays facing them. “Is our solar system.”

“Understood,” Vahlen said, she peered at the stars again, she connected a few in her mind, one being Orion’s Belt, “do you think these constellations can be used as a waypoint?”

“I believe we may, I do require historical astronomical records to compare with what I am finding.”

“Good, thank you Ripley, I’ll leave you to it.” Vahlen noticed something in the monolithic code as she panned her head to look at it, a repeating pattern she kept seeing. A set of three concentric hexagons, they pulsed an eerie dark corona.

It was near their solar system.

So close, getting closer by the day.

Another black moon? Where did this one come from, and were there others? She couldn’t shake the possibility of a potential full-blown invasion of other black moons.

Or perhaps a different apocalypse that threatened her borders.

A nagging memory prodded her and yet, she couldn't seem to pluck it from its stubbornly closed box. Something about an entity formed of the discards of the universe. Something hungry and malevolent, stuffed into its own stubbornly sealed coffin.

“Heya, sorry we ran late." Tom said quietly. The strange silence of the monolith atrium had always felt off to him. Something that he could, but couldn’t explain. It was as if staring into the massive info stone placed a disquiet in his bones.

Writing the very story of its oblique creation into his marrow, all he wanted to know was. How?

“Doctor Dufrane, would you care to explain your findings on the monolith for our newest member?”

Tom gathered himself, looking at Melissa, ensuring she wasn’t still just gawking with her mouth wide open at the thing and paying attention.

"This giant rock is artificially made," Vahlen frowned. "You can see microscopic tool marks where individual pieces were fitted together under a microscope, or maybe something with super fine motor skills and macroscopic vision.” He walked to the lone particle display, pressing a few keys, feeling the static tingle on his fingertips.

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“But the composition is unlike anything I've seen before. Some of these elements shouldn't exist together naturally, like a jigsaw puzzle, but somehow fitting random things together that don’t belong together."

He scanned a few more images closely, “Solidified room temp mercury, bismuth and granite welded together, and strangest so far, plasma crystallite. Our primary metal…” he shut the screen off, pointing at the giant rock and scratching at his stubbled chin.

“Like silicates, if humanity tricked a rock into thinking, than whatever made this, tricked all types of matter and mineral into doing so.”

"The monolith itself, it’s material is called veilstone. It borrows from other places to build itself."

Melissa perked up slightly, remembering her conversations with the group about the borrowers principle. A thing borrows from another reality or unseeable source, amplifying its latent traits, or enhancing things that simply shouldn’t exist.

"It’s always borrowing, isn’t it?” The mere concept of something adding knowledge from unknowable sources made her mind spin, was it digging up old data? Or maybe it was being added to from other dimensions.

When she got to Ravensmantle and was taught the basics of permeative influence her entire life and everything she thought she knew was put in jeopardy.

Ravensmantle confirmed multiple realities truly existed, there best example being that of an old radio that played the news from the very year they were in. And yet the events were different entirely. In radio world, that world survived the initial wave of death and disappearance, killed the black moon, and saved the earth.

And furthermore, the scariest aspect of that particular world. Melissa Hawthorne died in Zone 17, a funeral was held, and another took her place.

She pushed aside her self-hatred and doubt, but the question that always plagued her. What if she was replaced one day? What if she was the survivor of every reality that she didn’t make it out of, somehow borrowing the other Melissa’s time, granted to the living as her other died?

Bishop spoke in mumbles while Tom replied in gibberish, lost to her mental periphery.

A hand on her shoulder brought her back to reality. “Heya, still here?”

“Yeah, lost in my thoughts.”

“Well, let's get lost in an interesting place.” He pointed at a security booth barring a high security elevator bank. She perked up at realizing where the group was headed. She admonished herself for not paying full attention.

“I didn’t miss anything, did I?”

“Nah, just jabbering. How you and Dakra doing?” She stiffened slightly.

“We’re doing well.” He rose a brow of focus, the blue shine in his eyes seemed to scan her intently.

“It’s above board.”

“And the business?” A smile turned playful frown swapped her facial expression instantly.

“Very, very well. The benefits are... astounding.” The group passed the security booth, Bishop lost in a conversation with Ripley, her touching his arm and laughing.

As the large elevator doors closed Bishop spoke, using his hands to punctuate after pulling a map of the facility they were traveling to, as soon as the map of the octagonal, multi leveled, prison-like structure was up on the display he pressed a few keys.

Amanda glanced at Melissa, “you’re pink.” At the words, her face deepened a shade.

“Cherries,” they chorused, making her smirk.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Uh huh.” Amanda drew out suspiciously.

The group felt a backwards tug as the elevator shifted directions. Her second, or third home, even. A beautiful bio lab awaited her. She was certain the facility was set away from main central point of Refuge and it’s 2-mile spike.

“Alright, we’ve got ourselves a special tour today, brand new object in storage being heavily studied.”

She awaited the familiar bump as it coasted on old, geared tracks, mostly anticipating the coming pain and discomfort as it jostled to a stop. The elevator doors slid open after the elevator shuddered to a halt a few minutes later. Her wince and hiss of quiet pain was lost to the doors.

“Welcome back to the Vaporial Library.” There was a simple waiting room that greeted them, Amanda looked slightly disappointed, Bishop smirked, gesturing to the clerk's desk.

“What the hell happened to you two?”

“Hey Tatero, I tripped.” His concerned face trailed to Bishop and his red tinged leg.

“I ran into a dog.” The group snickered.

“Sorry ya’ll, lemme know if you need something.” He gestured for the group to pass through the scanners, just before she passed through, he passed something to Melissa’s hand as she passed something else back.

Amanda hid a smirk as Melissa slipped it into her pocket with a quiet thank you to Tataro.

As they went through the airlock, systems around them buzzed briefly, a series of neatly rowed red dots appeared on the ceiling from all sides, scanning the group as they trailed down the walls. A little display showed their names as the scans completed.

Each had PTL 3 clearance, given to them through their hard work and dedication to Ravensmantle, each earning it, along with their ranks over years.

All were sergeants, Bishop a Commander and next in line to lead Ravensmantle.

Despite their lower ranks, each acted as an advisor to both he and Vahlen, if they didn’t agree on something. If common ground wasn’t found for the sake of their country.

The world would pay for it.

After a green light winked on above, the heavy door lazily coasted up. The space opened akin to an ocean’s yawning abyss, covering a few city blocks in space.

“Good morning, my soon to be subjects!” His voice echoed throughout the massive atrium they were greeted with. The people bustling around echoed his call followed by some laughter through multiple levels of wall mounted catwalks surrounding a central spire.

It trailed below into the darkness, only illuminated by the bank lights surrounding the spire like a dark vertical car tunnel.

Bishop witnessed the same thing in Ripley’s stare, she looked small compared to the large girder and steel supported catwalk.

“You are doing this every time?” Ripley crossed her arms with her brows raised.

“Why yes, I do believe it to be important to introduce levity, mon reine.” He purred.

The group smirked as they said in unison. “Cherries.” She turned her flushed face defiantly. “I will allow this, mon roi.”

He smiled in kind, meeting her eyes and flushed face. He winced at his mauled limb, completely bandaged under his black uniform pantleg.

His steps felt... Squishy.

Amanda stood in awe as she did every time she entered the beautiful prison for haunted things, glancing around at the other containing units set around the massive panopticon, “Movie, movie, movie... all of it.”

"Be wary of what you see here, Ms. Smith. For some objects, the mere act of observation can lead to dire consequences, some things are quite literally deadly to look at."

Bishop turned to the Eco/Bio department.

“Creepy.” He stated as he rolled his shoulders.

The big yellow sign above beckoned them through another opened gateway, Amanda noticed the recessed design, and the little metal pins holding the door down should the hydraulic system give way.

Nobody beat hydraulics. Liquid and liquid based systems didn’t compress.

Bodies did.

Bishop gave another roll of the shoulder, cracking his neck and relieving a knot, he sighed in relief as she flinched at the sound and her thoughts of being crushed.

Vahlen stood in front of a containment cell with completely blacked out windows. She was giving a presentation on a particular object, the photo on the info pamphlet next to its barricaded door displayed an old television, the antenna bent at odd angles.

The TV screen was shattered.

A few dozen men and women in black uniforms armed with rifles on their backs and loads of gear strapped to them were taking notes on something they couldn’t hear.

She looked at the rest of the approaching group, waving them over before looking back to the small team she was briefing.

“Look away and start shooting.”

“What happens if you don’t?” one of the soldiers asked, his curly blond hair tousled in a mop on his head, he was busy taking notes. His lapel said ‘Acquisitions.’

She pointed at the containment chamber, her voice went suddenly cold and clinical, her eyes darkened hollows in the bright lights overhead.

Even from a distance, watching it happen felt unreal to Melissa, her eyes shined within those knowledgeable hollows. Like an all knowing presence or primordial deity telling an ancient fable.

“A TV turned on in a dark room once. Before I realized what was happening after tasting bubblegum and copper, hearing the static and the little girls sing song voice, my team were reduced to red mist. Their eyes went first and that's how I knew not to look.”

She made eye contact with the blonde haired man. “Instant death. To those of you that are new to the Acquisitions team, there are objects with no designation, no rules, and no handling or containment guidelines that exist in the world in untold amounts and variants.” She slapped her hands together, everything seeming to brighten.

“Remember, don’t touch it if you have an uncanny valley feeling and when you do feel it, check your detectors, back away, and assess.”

The faces of the acquisitions team solely focused on her lethally charming smile. “Understood?”

“Yes, Director!” Their chorus boomed through the library.

“Carry on to level 14 – Containment Wing and meet with Johnson, he will discuss anomalies and others that exist due to Cadre influence and will orient you for your first expedition to the Outlands.” They filed off and Vahlen fired off another warning.

“And those TVs, they’re everywhere nowadays! And there are rumors of more like it!” Mike, a senior member with touseled blonde hair shot a thumbs up at her.

Vahlen approached the rest in long strides, solely focusing on Bishop.

“Soon to be subjects? Are you planning a coup?”

“Well, I believe it’s important to ensure I’m likeable up until you give up the mantle.”

“You do understand I’m immortal, yes?”

“Such as all Ravenguard, I’ve no limits in how long I shall wait.”

“Get comfy, then.” Her charmingly lethal smile was met by Bishop’s before turning her attention to the newest.

“Doctor Hawthorne, how are you?”

“I’m still in bad shape. But I’m here, I’m headed to my lab to grab something for Abberro.”

“You?”

“I am very well, thank you.” Despite the charming smile and gentleness, Melissa sensed a strange disquiet. It felt as if the air around Vahlen turned viscous, a cloying thickness of internal struggle and how she tried keeping her eyes focused.

Regardless, they drifted to someone pushing a cart of sealed boxes into the Bio/Eco area.

As the cart bumped up and over the gap in the floor, a shimmering multicolor mist hissed from the overhead pipes, the person pushing the cart backed away, letting it go.

As soon as Vahlen saw the multicolored smoke travelling to the man of its own accord, she sprinted towards him as her voice boomed through the chamber.

“Farlow! Cover your face and run for your life!” The piercing shriek of the alarm drowned most of her words.

He took a few steps before suddenly seizing as the gas enveloped him, following his face as it whipped away.

The crunching of his bones was audible for all in the silent space, somehow sounding over the blaring klaxons, all eyes were fixed on him as his neck twisted almost completely around with a crunch.

The light left his eyes, yet he stood.

No longer shrieking, simply staring at Vahlen, the cart rolled further in.

Farlow's expression dropped any pretense of emotion as the remaining gas on his face coated it like an oil slick.

“Farlow, is that you?” Her voice was quiet, a plea on its border.

The edges of his silhouette shimmered at the question, his voice had a confused lilt, as if he had no idea where he was, “Yes, why?” He chorused briefly.

“What is your station?”

"Yes, why?”

She tried again, “Specialist Farlow, what is your first name?”

“I can’t seem to remember...” His eyes were blank.

They looked at her.

Yet right through her.

Confused muttering broke out behind her as a containment team swept in wearing white Sabre suits and bearing odd looking weapons with conical nozzles swaying back and forth, they had hose lines running to tanks on their backs.

“Please, Farlow, just give me something, tell me you’re in there.”

He grinned wide, a somewhat confused thing. “Yes, why?” Vahlen stared into his eyes, hoping they’d have a spark of light, life, anything.

She saw a smiling shell.

Melissa glanced up from the ground at a shaking Vahlen.

She put herself between the group and the gas, standing mere feet from him as he died.

Unable to save him as his brain and body were scrambled.

One of the team members ripped Vahlen away from him ordering her back, she spun from their grip and addressed them as the team pushed ahead, “Maxxi, the canister.” She was cut off.

Their rainbow striped hair whipped as they jerked their head back, the sides and back shaven to their scalp with the rest in a messy ponytail that fluffed out.

“Don’t worry, we got it boss.” They adjusted their black coveralls with a triple white stripe on each shoulder and their chest, they turned their head to the frozen in place eco-expert, “Hey Melissa, nice to see you again, sorry about all this, but hey, you’ve seen worse right?”

She shot them a questioning look before one of the containment team called for help.

Maxxi jerked their head towards the suited team, eyes lowering at the non-responsive Farlow and his blank-eyed stare as they left to go help.

The team gently pushed Farlow back with long rods, pinning him to the floor while the rest of the team put up the tent, a spring-loaded quick deployment dome. They surrounded it, their massive forms blotting the little white biohazard tent with red tape, they dwarfed Maxxi and the others.

The main panel of the tent read: Ghost Buster.

Four stuck the nozzles into the tent, Farlow was still asking questions, where was he, who was he, why was he here?

Maxxi called out, “Farlow, it’s okay buddy, close your eyes and breathe out really hard for me, okay?”

“Okay.” The C-Gas specialist gestured to their team with a nod as soon as Farlow exhaled the last of the gas from his lungs.

He was completely fogged as more rolled in large vacuums on dollies, the technicians along with them rushing to plug them into the outlets lining the walls while Maxxi shouted orders, their shoulder length curls whipping right and left as they palmed the door’s panel.

Vahlen turned to the others. “C-Gas, one touch and the principle rips you apart and puts you back together wrong.”

She put her hand to her neck, swallowing the lump in her throat.

Melissa stared at the ground while doing everything she could to not nervously laugh.

“It’s not really, him, is it?” Vahlen shook her head.

“Not anymore I’m afraid.” She looked at the closed door, almost trying to peer through it for a moment.

“Just bits and pieces.”

Ripley met Melissa’s thousand yard stare, tilting her head to gently get her attention, she looked into Melissa’s eyes, peering almost right through her with a soft smile. “It is okay, death is an unfortunate cost for knowledge and... even Farlow understood the risks to his very life.”

“He did, I’ve never seen it happen so closely,” Vahlen was busy noting down what she saw to the finest detail with a look of duty and resignation on her face. She continued writing, holding their gazes.

“Remember, what we experience must be recorded, however horrible.”