Cath

The Cradle

595 looked up at the massive lizard, towering over all the apes on the platform. “Great! I’ll sleep better at night now. How many of you are there?” Meanwhile, she quickly crossed over to the smirking bald man and shook his hand. “Facilitator?” She asked, reading the title he’d beamed to her from his eyes. “Hello, Agent.” The man responded.

“What are you doing here? This is my site!” 595 snapped at her counterpart via implant.

”We thought you could use a little help. Your most recent reports have been troubling.” The man replied, a smug smile on his chops.

”You know I work alone.”

”It seems that right now, you’re working with the whole of Outremer, and Rothia, Agent.”

595 let go of his hand.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. Thanks for getting them here safely - I hear you had some trouble. Don’t worry, you’re in safe hands now.” The man smiled, surreptitiously wiping his own hand on the thigh of his uniform.

“Thank you, Datius.” Freyr replied to Rareth as well. “We’ll use whatever help we can get.” She arrived at the pair of researchers, who exchanged a friendly greeting with everyone before handing out data-pads.

The Vault’s infrastructure operated on a closed circuit, with even the CRD HQ in Babel having significant delays and checks applied to any information flowing out of it. Now that they had access to the network, Freyr could feel the urgency of their situation even more keenly.

The Object had ramped up its efforts to break through from the staging box into the Cradle’s enclosure. Technicians were keeping it locked down for now, but the fact that it had made inroads at all was worrying. The Vault was supposed to be impregnable, from the inside and out.

Still looking down at her pad, Freyr started dishing out orders. “We need to give it something to use that energy on. Is Marae at the Vault? Send her the dummy receiver we created from the codex. That should buy us some time.”

The Cradle

“Well, when you put it like that, maybe we deserve everything we get. Whatever that might be!” Apalkov chuckled heartily. He carried on chatting about what this reunion of the Cradle and the object they’d found might mean. Freyr just chewed one of her nails nervously, staring into space. Ordinarily, she would have argued the Cradle’s corner out of instinct. Now, she didn’t know what to believe - all she wanted right now was to extract her family from this situation in one piece, and then run a trillion miles.

Their sphere glided over the first couple of concentric circles, before swooping down alongside a platform in the open Mono terminal. Rows of similar orbs waited to leave on multiple different tracks outside the main terminal building. Blue sparks flew in an adjacent yard as spidery droids repaired vessels and other equipment.

Freyr leaned forward to get a better look at the people waiting for them. Rareth stood out like a sore thumb, next to the mess of Humans. She was pleased to see two of her senior researchers next to the Datius, armed with data-pads for them to get caught up from. Freyr vaguely recognised one of the CraSec people, though she couldn’t recall where from. Apart from that, there was one well-built, bald man in a black uniform and about a dozen CraSec soldiers and suited spooks, all armed to the teeth.

"Here we are! Make sure you've got everything, and follow me." 595 ordered, eyeing up one person on the platform in particular as the doors opened.

The Cradle

Their sphere powered along the rails towards a massive set of blast doors which molded around the rails at a narrow spot. Automated cannons tracked their approach. It looked like they were going to crash, but at the last possible moment the blast doors shot open and they swooshed through. Some nervous laughter washed over the front of the carriage.

“I don’t think so. None that made it into the public record, anyway.” Freyr shook her head, carrying on the conversation. “There have always been rumours though…” Dr Apalkov leaned across her to talk to Vreta, his breath smelling vaguely of boiled cabbage. Freyr leaned back and away from him. “Like why the first colonists chose Outremer, when we’d been allotted a much closer, more viable planet in the first place. They must have noticed something.”

Six months ago, Freyr would’ve scoffed at this kind of conspiracy theory, but now she wasn’t so sure. “Yes, but that could’ve been the biosphere.” She reasoned. Apalkov shook his head strenuously, leaning back. “Not visible over that distance - not three hundred years ago.”

They passed through another set of blast doors, and then arrived at a security checkpoint outside an even more imposing metal door with an older design. Guards on the platforms either side of the rails questioned 595 while floating droids scanned each person in the sphere. They lingered on Vreta for almost a minute, beeping and honking to each other before eventually giving everyone the green light. It sounded like the guards wanted to take Vreta’s weapon, but 595 eventually smoothed things over before returning to the sphere. Freyr suspected the Agent would secretly be delighted if Vreta made himself look threatening, even if it was by accident. She smirked.

The doors in front of them opened much slower than the rest, with loud mechanisms unlocking within before the viewing beyond became clear. They were heading into the Vault chamber, a brightly lit dome-shaped cave, about a mile high and a few miles in diameter. In the centre of the chamber sat a solid metal cube of Outreman design, a few hundred metres across. The sides were crisscrossed with gantries and viewing rooms, and on top was a baffling array of communications equipment.

Surrounding the cube and taking up most of the floor area was the mythical Vault command complex. Modern now, but with a few elements stretching back to the first few years of Outremer’s colonisation, a geometric town of research buildings and barracks rippled out from the Vault in concentric circles. Freyr spotted ant-like figures moving around below them as they glided into the cave, along with tanks and mounted gun emplacements. “Wow.” Freyr murmured. She’d been here once before, years ago, but the air of wonderment hadn’t worn off.

If Morticia Hates Pastels, am I Wednesday's Perfect Bad Boy?

Welcome to the Guild! I love your train of thought Hope you find what you're looking for.

Song Reference time

I'm not the only one
Who thinks that I'm in over my head
But you keep on stuttering
I guess it's best if you leave
That shit unsaid
Over and over
It's getting harder and harder to ignore

It's a brand new low
And I don't think
I've sunk this far before
Just a brand new low
And I don't think
We can save this anymore

The Cradle

Freyr stared out of the transparent side of the sphere as they plumbed the depths of the tower. Nearer to the spire’s base, the buildings became bigger and more communal, with more elaborate carvings. Freyr remembered reading that these structures were far older - the stratification of the tower had only emerged in the final thousand years this species was around.

Going significantly faster than normal, their sphere reached the bottom of the tower before slowly leveling out. They were no longer headed straight down, but rather through a large horizontal tunnel, with more alien structures all around them. Floor, walls and ceiling. The dual-rail system carefully tiptoed through the middle.

Freyr gazed longingly at the sheer metal bulwarks that closed off causeways to unused parts of the ancient city. For a fleeting moment, escaping into the dark seemed like quite an attractive prospect. She coughed delicately. “They created the proto-harnesses which form the basis of today’s tech. The first colonists found three of them in the Cradle’s chamber, hundreds of years ago. Where they went is a subject of eternal debate.”

“Mama used to tell me they were still alive, hiding in the dead parts of their city.” Dr Apalkov growled. “And that they’d come and take me in my sleep if I didn't eat the food she cooked.”

The Cradle

Despite all the stress of the last few hours, the team stared, awestruck, around them as they walked out of the thick entryway and into the main area. The Tower of Babel was completely hollow, with a yawning expanse over their heads towards the peak and a jet-black abyss below. The deafening quiet was punctured only by the clack of their shoes and claws.

An array of sensors mounted on top of a control room perched off to one side of the hole scanned the group. Freyr briefly looked and saw a technician in a white uniform at the distant controls within the brightly lit cockpit, flanked by two suited spooks with guns. More floodlights came on at that point, and gasps erupted from the group.

The whole interior surface of Babel was pockmarked with ancient alien dwellings, carved from the rock. Little windows looked out onto crumbling stone terraces facing each other around the whole diameter.

Freyr knew that analysis of the dwellings indicated the species which’d inhabited Babylon before them extended to just over a metre, with six legs and wings. Hardly any organic matter had been found to substantiate these creatures, and that only stretched up to a hundred thousand years before Humans arrived.

As they traversed the walkway jutting out over the hole below, Freyr noticed the dual-rail system fondly dubbed the Mono. It burst out of the depths below, with rails carrying on all the way to the top, with a junction stopping at the end of the walkway. As she watched, a giant transparent orb arrived at their station along the subsidiary rails, and the doors unfurled towards them.

595 motioned with her head and the half-dozen suits that still surrounded them got in. The orb closed back up and promptly retreated back down into the depths. Not long after, a second orb appeared, and 595 motioned for the scientists to get in. “Have half your men take the next one.” The Agent ordered Thrace, who nodded and picked them.

595 gestured encouragingly towards the vessel. Freyr and Vreta led the science team in - they were followed by half a dozen CraSec operators and the Agent, which made the space quite tight. Freyr sat down and fastened herself into one of the seats facing outwards, next to Vreta. “Impressive, right? They seemingly built their entire civilisation around the Cradle, just like we have.” Freyr murmured - anything was better than this uneasy silence.

595 gave the control room a thumbs up, and the orb dropped silently away from the platform, taking them into the depths of Babel.

The Cradle

They met back up with 595 and most of the other suits at the chrome security checkpoint guarding access to the Mono. Freyr knew that name was out of date now; they’d replaced the old mono with a dual-rail gimbal system a hundred years ago, but all efforts to change the name had failed. Dr Wetherall never failed to gleefully retell that story after a couple of drinks.

The Agent smiled with a tightly closed mouth, spreading her hands slightly to welcome them, pistol still grasped in one of them. “Safe and sound. Is this everyone?” She asked Thrace. “Some of my team are still in the HQ, to avoid concentrating everyone in one place.” Freyr answered for him, stepping forwards. “They need protection tonight, while we do this.”

595 nodded, then flicked her free hand at one of the suits standing by. “Double security up there - no police.”

“Wilco.” Some of the suits set off along the bright white corridor at a fast walk. 595 watched them go, then grinned at the assembled group. “Alright. Let’s get this party started, shall we? The rails are live all the way downstairs.” The Agent turned and led the way through the checkpoint.

Behind the checkpoint was a cavernous tunnel, half polished metal and half ancient rock. A faint breeze ruffled Freyr’s hair from inside, like the breath of some mountain dragon. She buttoned up her lab coat - it was cold down below.

Song Reference time

I don't even know who I am anymore
Or how to stay calm through the storm
Is it raining harder than before?
There's a sickness up there somewhere
I can feel it seeping through the fucking floors
Rotting me slowly to my core
Sometimes the earth takes control
It holds you tight, never letting go
But you're not choking, until the air you breathe becomes so sweet
That you'd do anything for a taste of a little more
The panic grows. This cycle flows
It's growing loud, and I'm further from home
Am I getting used to this drone?
Enthroned in grey
This feels like being buried in stone
I fall for the same shit every day, but it never gets old
Sometimes the earth takes control
It holds you tight, never letting go
But you're not choking, until the air you breathe becomes so sweet
That you'd do anything for a taste of a little more

The Cradle

“No, I want a chance to study it before this recoupling.” Freyr snapped. She keyed her access code into the console and relayed that directive downstairs. “That door is seven metres thick, with an isolated switch. I think we’re safe for a little while.” They watched the will-o-wisp extending from the side of the Object sniffing at the doors into the Vault.

Freyr was torn now. In theory, she could enter the Cradle from the very lab they were standing in - there was a room full of harnesses just next door. They could get this process underway immediately, rather than risk losing the initiative.

But this could be her only chance to study the Object up close before it joined with the Cradle, and going to the Vault was the best place to do that. The harnesses in there also had some special...features which could come in useful if she was to monitor proceedings from the inside.

In the end, her mind was made up for her, when Thrace boomed: “Coast is clear! Pack your things, those of you who’re heading downstairs. We’re moving out.” Freyr looked up, and noticed most of her team were staring at her, waiting for her orders. She cleared her throat. “Same teams as before. Stay in close contact and stick to the plan, alright? Lets go.”