I sat on the dust-covered bench, elbows on my knees, hands clenched, fingers pressing hard into my palms. Silence surrounded me, pressing in as if to remind me of what Cortana had said: Terra.
The Age of Strife.
My eyes fixed on the dimly lit expanse ahead, but I saw nothing, my mind swirling through fractured memories and broken, half-formed thoughts. I was on Terra, during the Age of Strife. No Imperium – not yet. And the Emperor of Mankind likely had not yet begun his holy conquest.
The muted voices that had echoed through my mind before returned, like distant whispers hidden just below the surface. There were things I was supposed to know, tasks I was supposed to complete. Faces came and went in flashes, dissolving before I could grasp their details. One face, familiar, flashed before me, cold and calm as steel – the God Emperor.
Then another voice, "The map is in your head…"
I closed my eyes, hoping that doing so might organize the mess.
Focus. I took a slow breath, filling my lungs with the stale, ancient air of the mall. The Emperor's face lingered for a moment longer, before fading into darkness.
I opened my eyes. The blue glow of Cortana's projector flickered, casting eerie shadows that stretched across empty storefronts. Her fractured, digital form glitched in and out, her missing parts distorting the light. She watched me with an almost… patient expression.
She was a remnant of another age, another humanity. I could practically feel the weight of time around her, pressing down, as if the entire universe had left her behind to rot here. Somehow, she was still clinging on, flickering between code and decay. It was strange - she looked human enough, but she wasn't, not really. More like a shadow.
"Is there anything else I can help you with?" Her voice came through in jittered bursts, each word sharp and oddly broken, like a cracked vox.
I didn't answer. The question lingered in the air, fading into the stillness of the mall.
Instead, I studied her form, taking in the soft glow of her remaining features. Her half face held no expression, only a polite patience. She was a tool, no different from the weapon I held or the armor I wore. Yet there was something unsettlingly human about her – a spark that drew me closer, one that almost seemed to look back.
I stood slowly, stepping forward. My boots left deep impressions in the dust as I approached her projector, fingers twitching by my side. "You said… 26,754?"
She nodded - or tried to. Her head jerked awkwardly, almost in a shiver. "That's correct. It is the year twenty-six thousand seven hundred fifty-four years."
No point in denying it any further. I was in the past, somehow. And I was here for a reason that I... did not know yet.
I glanced back up at her, at the half-missing face and the blue pixelated glow, still steady, unyielding. "Do you know why the Hereteks wanted this place?"
Her form flickered, pixels stretching before they snapped back. "Summer Mall was a highly regarded site for commerce and trade, especially for products developed by 343 Systems. At its peak, it was-"
"Not… what I meant." I took a step closer, voice low. "Why now? What did they think they'd find here, in this… forgotten ruin?"
Cortana blinked, a slow processing hum filling the silence.
"Unknown. I am unable to interpret designation: Heretek." Her image shimmered again, more frayed. "Warning: Data corruption detected. Functions at sixty-seven percent."
Figures. I let out a slow breath. The old memories hadn't returned, but fragments from those voices had filled a hollow in my mind. This mall wasn't important because of products or commerce. Something else was buried here, something I needed to find.
I let my eyes drift past her, to the empty halls and shattered displays, the dust thick enough to coat everything in a uniform gray. There were too many layers of time here, too many layers of ruin. Each step I took seemed to press deeper into history, as if I were descending through the layers of a world long dead.
"Cortana," I said, glancing back. "Do you have access to anything outside this mall?"
She blinked, her form shimmering before reassembling itself.
"Negative. I am bound to this location." Her mouth twitched, half-formed words breaking in static. "However, I… detect… a signal. Weak, faint… ancient, but… continuous."
My brows knit together. "Where?"
She gestured in the direction of a dark hallway, half-collapsed. "This mall contains an extensive network of subterranean chambers. The source is located further below. I know nothing more beyond that. This information was not given to me."
The air felt colder, heavy with secrets that lay buried just below our feet. I could feel it now, a low thrum, like the pulse of something long asleep. I took one last look at her. "Show me."
She led the way, her fractured form gliding just ahead, her light spilling over the path. Each step felt heavier than the last as we passed old storefronts – empty, forgotten. Shadows clung to the edges, hinting at something that had once lived and breathed here, only to die centuries before.
We reached a stairwell, the air thick and damp. Cortana hesitated, as if she, too, felt the gravity of where we were headed. Her head tilted, catching my eye, and for a moment, there was an almost human look in her remaining eye—something close to concern.
"What's down there?" I asked, my voice low, careful.
"Unknown." She tilted her head, her voice softening to a whisper. "Only the signal. It… shouldn't exist. By all estimates, it should have ceased thousands of years ago. Perhaps the backup generators were more efficient than previously catalogued."
I took a breath and descended, Cortana's light guiding the way. Shadows stretched and twisted on the walls as I stepped further into the darkness, each footfall heavy with the weight of eons. The sound of my breathing echoed, merging with a faint, mechanical hum that seemed to grow louder with each step.
The stairwell seemed endless, its steps crumbling under my boots, each one casting a faint echo through the thick silence. I glanced back, half-expecting to see Cortana hovering behind me, her faint light illuminating the path, but the stairway was empty. Her programming wouldn't let her follow. She was trapped, bound to the upper levels like a phantom of this dead place.
Her parting words still echoed in my mind. "By all estimates, it should have ceased functioning thousands of years ago."
With one last glance up, I continued downward, my fingers trailing along the rough wall. The texture was gritty, layered with a thick coat of dust and something older, an almost fossilized crust of decay. Each step brought with it a strange pull, like I was crossing through layers of time. I could almost feel it in the air, each shift in temperature, the oppressive weight of this place growing thicker.
Eventually, the stairs opened into a wide corridor. The walls here were smoother, polished. Strange symbols lined the walls, faded into shadows but still faintly visible. Curved letters and geometric shapes twisted into patterns that seemed to pulse in the dim light. I couldn't read them, but the sight of them made me pause, my eyes following the grooves, tracing the ancient language. Whoever had built this had left their mark, their history, a story that had survived the millennia only to be buried beneath layers of dust and ruin.
I pressed forward.
As I moved through the hall, strange artifacts littered the ground. Broken remnants of machines lay scattered, their metal shells twisted and warped, gears and wires spilling from the hollowed-out forms. I bent down beside one, studying its surface, brushing my fingers over the exposed circuitry. Tiny lights still flickered in places, like stars in the metal, faint and dying. These relics were old – so old, I could barely imagine when they'd last functioned, last served their purpose. And certainly old enough that my [Tech-Shaping] could no longer recognize them as machines.
I moved deeper into the underground, stepping over fallen beams and shattered glass. Strange objects lined the walls, boxes and cases filled with what looked like ancient, everyday items. A box of shoes, still pristine in their worn containers. A shelf filled with strange plastic shapes, their purpose a mystery. I reached out, touching one of the objects, feeling its cold surface under my fingers. It was eerie, as if these items were frozen in time, as if someone had left them here only yesterday. Other objects disintegrated into dust when I touched them.
The corridor curved, leading me further down, deeper into the earth. The walls narrowed, pressing in on either side. I could barely see now, the faint glow from distant cracks in the ceiling casting strange shadows. It was so dark that not even my Custodian physiology could cut through the shadow. So, I pulled out a standard-issue lamp from my [Inventory]. The beam sliced through the darkness, illuminating ancient mosaics on the walls. They depicted scenes – people gathered in large groups, some kind of celebration, faces frozen in joy and laughter. It was unsettling, to see such happiness in a place so empty and dead.
I turned away from the mosaics, my light catching something further down the hall. A doorway. It was large, built into the rock itself, its edges carved with intricate designs. I approached slowly, my footsteps barely making a sound on the dusty floor. As I stepped closer, I noticed the faint outline of what looked like a control panel beside the door. It was broken, wires dangling from its base, but the door itself remained intact.
I hesitated, my hand hovering over the panel, then slowly pressed against the door. It slid open, creaking under the strain, dust spilling from the edges. A stale, metallic smell hit me, and I had to squint against the sudden brightness that filled the space beyond.
Stepping inside, I found myself in a vast, circular chamber. The walls rose high, disappearing into shadows above. Rows of strange machines lined the walls, their surfaces clean and intact, untouched by time. Screens and consoles covered in complex symbols and strange buttons stretched along the room, blinking with faint, slow pulses. But at the center of the room, illuminated by a shaft of light from above, stood something that made my breath catch.
It was a large, rectangular device, built from some kind of smooth, silver metal. Its surface was pristine, unmarred by the layers of dust that covered everything else. It seemed to hum, a low, resonant sound that filled the room, vibrating through the air. A single screen glowed at the top, words scrolling across it in a language I couldn't understand. But the design was unmistakable, something I'd seen in diagrams and texts that basically told us what to look out for if we were suddenly lost in ancient places, things of interest and importance to the Imperium and the Mechanicus.
A Standard Template Construct.
I took a step closer, eyes wide, barely breathing. And there was no mistaking it. An STC. Intact, here, untouched. Thousands of templates, items, knowledge that had been lost to humanity for eons, waiting here, preserved.
My hand reached out instinctively, fingers hovering over the screen. The hum grew louder, responding to my presence. Text scrolled across the display, the language shifting, twisting, until it settled on a script I could finally read. "Template selection ready. State your request."
I swallowed, my heart pounding. My hand shook slightly as I pressed my palm against the interface, feeling the cold metal under my skin. The screen pulsed, words and symbols shifting rapidly, images flashing by, diagrams of objects, tools, devices I'd never seen before. Each template, each design, more advanced than anything the Mechanicus could recreate, all stored here, forgotten.
The Mechanicus... as I knew them, at least, didn't exist yet.
I scrolled through the list, hardly daring to breathe, each new item more impossible than the last. Food processors, farming equipment, machines to purify water and air. Basic tools, items that had once been commonplace but now seemed like miracles. The list stretched on and on, an archive of human ingenuity preserved from a time long past.
The wonder of it all washed over me, settling like a weight in my chest. Here was knowledge, all the mundane things that had once kept humanity thriving. The tools to build, to grow, to sustain. And it had all been left here, buried beneath the ruins, forgotten by the very people it had once served.
A faint voice echoed in my mind, one of those half-forgotten memories. "Take this with you… the fate of humanity hangs in the balance."
Without another thought, I reached out and placed my hand upon the machine itself and, with a flicker of thought, sent the whole thing into my [Inventory].
AN: Chapter 74 is out on (Pat)reon!