[b]Through the rotating fan of the Brobdingnagian ventilation port above[/b], ominous red light streamed downwards and bathed a dark figure walking down a lengthy, suspended catwalk into looking rather malevolent. Gerald, having personally taken Rilyn and Ami away to their obscure fate, now strolled through one of the deepest parts of Purgatory. Steam dissipated from great big plumes unseen through the darkness of the abyss below into a showery mist at the sergeant’s altitude, materializing into droplets of clinging water on the meshed floor that he walked on. The surrounding architecture was industrial and archaic, almost reeking of fantasy, for the platform Gerald walked on was a centerpiece to a massive void of utterly nothing but humid air that stretched between great walls of rusting metal, serving as a bridge between two grim-looking, wheel-operated doors that towered over the height of the average man.

The incessant rumble of whatever arcane technomancy was conducted how many dozens of stories below him vibrated even through the railing of the platform. Every ten seconds or so, there was a distant, high-pitched, mechanical whine. Gerald’s appearance shifted from dark thief to crimson demon as the ventilation fan’s blades blocked light at an interval. Breathing with the help of a gas mask and insulated from the hot environment by his armored suit, his assault rifle was slung over his breast, ready for his right hand to take the grip, angle the weapon, and fire at anything deadly right in front of him. But of course, he knew, that there was no danger here. After all, this was, perhaps, the area just before the most secure part of Purgatory.

This routine patrol, he thought, was a mere formality.

With lightly clanging steps, he reached the door opposite of where he had come from. The mechanism strained against him and he found himself putting actual effort into opening the thing. Politely closing it, he walked ten steps and happened upon a lift. His eyes glanced down at the controls and their panel whose yellow paint was almost all but gone, and he concluded that they would be at home more in a 1960’s Soviet gulag than in the modern world people lived in today. 

He found some amusement in the observation. The juxtaposition of something so ugly-looking and crude to the technological sophistication that occurred almost anywhere else in this whole place was something to ponder about.

Quickly, he pulled one knobbed lever downwards. For three seconds, there was nothing, but then a roar shook from the floor to his feet. Then, with the motor growling, he, in a way, began his descent into Hell.

“This is Blue Actual reporting no hostile contact at level Zeta Zero; beginning descent to level Zeta Minus One, over,” he transmitted.

“Copy, Blue Actual,” came the reply of a feminine voice.

They kept a few vending machines near the engineer’s quarters at Z -1. As he was brought down from the steamy fog to an underground citadel of conical mountains of cement, tubes, radioactive material and wiring, Gerald wondered if they had some coffee.