They finally reached the mine. SAIR followed Lavidia and Batro like a pet, something never seen in that society due to the absence of animals. Mondra was already there, and upon seeing her boss and what she had behind her, she asked:

“What is that? Where did you get it from?”

“It’s a long story... that I don’t have time to explain now. It’s enough for you to know that it will help us explore the vault. By the way, Batro will come with us, and maybe other men later, if we need help.”

The girl shrugged, and the curious expedition began to descend the ramp that led into the first vault. After advancing through the corridor that had formed and examining the strange, fossilised constructions again, the four entered the crack that had formed when the second vault broke, and they started walking among the debris.

It was a hollow place inside the earth, where only some light came from the gap that had opened in a part of the roof, and from the side they had entered. As it was not enough to illuminate practically anything, SAIR deployed a small drone that began flying above their heads, illuminating the scene with powerful light. What they saw next couldn’t be more astonishing.

It was a city. A city originally built underground and equipped with a thick steel dome for unknown reasons. The same metal that generated that magnetic anomaly Labra had detected. In fact, fragments of rusted metal were scattered on the ground and in all directions.

“Sediments must have been deposited on the dome over the years,” SAIR asserted. “When the steel gave way, there was already another natural dome that preserved this place.

“How long ago could that be?” Lavidia asked.

“I don’t know. We would need to do a stratigraphic analysis from the ship. But I would say thousands... or maybe millions of years.

“That much?” Mondra’s eyes widened.

“I would say so. The curious thing is that it hasn’t been dismantled from below. Tectonic movements should have destroyed this place a long time ago.”

“And they did,” Lavidia pointed out. “That building over there,” she pointed to a nearby structure, “used to stand more upright.”

“Yes, but not enough. Everything is very well-preserved despite it seeming otherwise. Perhaps this area of the planet’s crust has very ancient materials. So ancient that they must be very stable.”

They continued advancing among the debris, and Mondra whispered to Lavidia:

“Seriously, where did you get this thing? How does it know so much?”

“It’s a specialized machine. I’ll tell you later.”

“Anyway, this place being well-preserved... doesn’t seem that way to me. Everything is in a deplorable state of... ruin.”

They continued moving, climbing over pieces of metal and rocks, in what was a gloomy landscape where shadows projected ghostly shapes under the drone’s light.

“Look there!” Mondra pointed. “Batro had climbed onto what looked like a statue, a male figure riding another being with four legs”. It could be recognized that way, even though it was lying on the ground. It reminded Lavidia a lot of those strange rock formations, those fossils, that had appeared on the slopes of her village after the earthquake.

SAIR was the first to arrive. Its peculiar shape gave it an advantage in walking, and it could easily climb among the debris. When the others arrived, the drone’s light intensified, and it rose to the top of the vault to illuminate the entire space like a small sun.

There wasn’t much more, as a solid rock wall was located a little further on. But that was more than enough.

Behind the first figure where Batro had climbed, there were others similar. They were statues or reliefs, depicting humans alongside strange objects. It seemed like this could have been some kind of public square or recreational area, or even a museum, with the city located behind. A population that might be on the other side of the thick rock wall or buried beneath it. Only that formidable steel dome and the sediments that had settled on top saved this space from sharing the same fate.

The debris and pieces of metal dislodged from above had crushed many smaller constructions and some other figures, but enough remained standing for these four intruders, the first to visit the place in ages, to contemplate them, amazed. The four stopped in the centre of that space, observing and trying to comprehend.

“Look, Lavidia,” Mondra pointed to a small group of human figures. “Have you noticed the women? If they are women, of course.”

“They are, without a doubt. They are just like us, except for those... large breasts.”

“Why would they be represented like that? Men, on the other hand, are proportionate.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that. They are taller and stronger than real men.”

“Yes, that’s true. Why do you think that is?”

“I don’t know. It’s all very strange, Mondra.”

“Are there women with such large breasts in the south?”

“No. I’ve never seen breasts like that. The largest I’ve seen are no bigger than a couple of ripe figs, at most.”

“Why would these women want such large breasts for?”

“Maybe they weren’t like us. Perhaps their milk didn’t generate as babies sucked but accumulated in those... ‘bags’, for lack of a better word, in a slow process.”

“It could be,” Mondra observed. “There are no girls, newborns, or pregnant women... Did they not have them?”

“I don’t know how a society without daughters would endure...”

“And why didn’t they represent them?” she wondered, looking at that unsettling array of figures. “It seems very strange that if someone wants to make a statue of a woman, as in this case, they wouldn’t depict her pregnant. Isn’t that her fullest form?”

“At least for us, yes.”

“They are women like you,” said SAIR, who had just returned from examining what looked like small vehicles. “And the men are men like yours. Like Batro. These are your ancestors, undoubtedly. It would be too much of a coincidence if they weren’t.”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“Okay, but where has humanity been since then?” Lavidia said.

“Hasn’t it been here?”

“I already told you, no. Ah! How I wish my grandmother were here! She could explain it better. She told me once that there are no archaeological records of any kind that go beyond four or five thousand years. The planet was entirely uninhabited until then.”

“Well, this is certainly much older,” said SAIR, looking around. “And curiously, the technology seems superior to yours, at least judging by the abundance of ‘rare earths’.”

“How can that be possible?”

“You would have to explain that to me, Lavidia,” SAIR noted.

“All I know is that our species gradually acquired knowledge, over the centuries, from a state of mere survival based on the consumption of insects and wild fruits and vegetables.”

“When was that?”

“I told you, four or five thousand years ago.”

“I mean, when did you acquire ‘advanced’ knowledge?”

“It was a little over a thousand years ago when agriculture was discovered, and writing followed. Specialized machines were invented just over two centuries ago. Later came computers, and since then, progress has been unstoppable.”

The hexapod listened to the brief history of Humanity provided by the woman and added, “Well, I’ve just been confirmed from the ship that the minimum age of these strata is at least a million years. It may even be much more.”

“What ship is he talking about?” Mondra asked her companion in a whisper.

“Where they have the central computer. I’ll explain later.”

“Someone was here long before you, Lavidia. Someone from your species... and perhaps from mine.”

“From yours?”

“I would bet on it. MIRV has been checking the data I sent it from that vehicle there —or what’s left of it— and after analysing the composition and its internal structures, it informs me that technologies very similar to the ones we commonly use have been used. As similar as the ones we found on the Moon.”

“Has this thing been on the Moon?” Mondra couldn’t contain her amazement.

“Yes,” Lavidia responded.

“Really?”

“Are you surprised, after all we’ve seen?”

The girl weighed the answer and said:

“Well, truth is... no.”

“What I don’t quite understand,” the hexapod continued, “is how it’s possible that these beings are like you, and yet your technology has nothing to do with theirs. You haven’t even developed computers with binary systems, nor do you use quantum computing... or anything like it. You don’t resemble them at all, but their technology is very similar to ours.”

“Can someone explain something to me?” interjected Mondra. “I think I’ve completely lost track.”

“I’m getting more confused too,” Lavidia replied.

“What I mean is that the people we are discovering here are very similar to you, and their technology is very similar to what I know. However, we and you have nothing in common; not even our technology is similar in any way.”

“Right,” the redhead confirmed. “But what do you mean by ‘binary system’, or quantum computing... what did you say?”

“Yes, quantum computing. It is an advanced method of calculation related to quantum physics, meaning that fundamental particles are involved. The binary system is older, but it is still used in certain circumstances. Basically, it’s a character system with only two numbers, zero and one. When a transistor is open, it lets the electric current pass, and it’s said to be in the ‘one’ state. If it’s closed, it doesn’t pass, and it’s said to be in the ‘zero’ state. With ones and zeros, you can represent any number and perform any calculation.”

SAIR noticed that his interlocutors didn’t seem to understand very much. Mondra had already disconnected from the conversation and was observing their surroundings, and the hexapod asked Lavidia:

“Do you know which system you use on your computers? Honestly, it’s something that intrigues me...”

“Our writing system has 180 letters. Are you referring to that?”

“Well, I would rather know how that translates into the internal language machines use.”

“Well, I don’t know. I’m not an engineer. But in school, they told us something...” the woman looked down, trying to remember. “Yes, I think it has to do with beams of light.”

“Beams of light?”

“Yes. It’s possible that we use the sexagesimal system. You know, 6 is a number divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 10 without resulting in a fraction. Well. So... I think light is broken down through a prism... into colors.”

“But...”

“Yes, that’s it,” she finished remembering. “In fact, everything revolves around six colors, which are red, yellow, green, blue, orange, and violet. Depending on the inclination of the beam, the spectrum is deciphered, and electricity translates it into the machine’s language.” Lavidia smiled after the explanation. She had just remembered everything perfectly. However, SAIR didn’t seem very satisfied:

“Using that form of computation seems very complicated to me. The binary system is much simpler.”

The woman shrugged. “I don’t know. I find it beautiful, the colors. In our society, aesthetics are very important.”

“Yeah, but...”

“Hey, girls! Look at this!” shouted Mondra from a pile of rocks, near the wall. Lavidia, SAIR, and Batro went over.

It was a small, cross-shaped crevice in the rocky wall at the back. It was perfectly defined, although the lower movement of the strata had shifted it a bit in its verticality.

“It seems that there’s another room inside,” she leaned over and tried to see with the light the drone projected as it approached the slit. “It’s like a kind of... pit, I would say. Don’t you think?”

“I think it’s more of a chamber. An enclosure,” said Lavidia. “And some shapes also seem to be distinguishable. How could we get in?”

“I sense a heat source in that place,” said SAIR. “It’s below us, a little further ahead. Maybe there’s an entrance, beyond.”

The hexapod moved forward, and the others followed. But a few steps later, the ground opened beneath their feet, and they all fell into the chasm, with Mondra being the only one saved as she walked away last.

“Lavidia! Batro!” she shouted, looking down. “Are you okay?”

The drone lit up the area, but almost nothing could be seen due to the amount of dust suspended in the air from the collapse. Below, the three explorers fell to the ground, and at that moment, another roar was heard, as if the entire vault was going to collapse. The structure was already very damaged from the holes they had made in the past few days, and with the last collapse, it finally fell completely. Mondra ran in terror, fearing for her life, and managed to reach the surface just as the outer vault finished collapsing.

From there, from the platform that the machines had levelled to access the vault, the girl could see how the hole had closed completely. Lavidia, Batro, the strange being, and its little aircraft were all trapped inside, buried under tons of rocks.