Ch. 10 The Rime Below

Niroth's affirmative response echoed over the comms as he retrieved another of those small disk-shaped devices from his vest. Activating it, he synced its feed with his visor's display and mentally directed it to join Joran and the others. Soon enough, the additional sentry made its way down to join the team.

As the sentry arrived, Joran, Demo, and Pathfinder emerged from the rooms, reuniting in the corridor once more.

The newly arrived sentry silently merged its feed with the others, granting the team access to its perspective. Joran's voice came over the comms, clear and focused. Scout the T-junction up ahead. Make sure our backs are covered." Niroth, controlling the sentry, did as commanded.

As the sentry moved along the corridor, it reached the T junction. It first looked to the right, revealing a short hallway that culminated in a single closed door at the very end. Then, it turned its gaze to the left, where the hallway stretched further and curved right, with no apparent doors lining the walls leading to the turn.

Joran's voice cut through the comms once more. "Proceed down that left hallway. Let's find out where it leads." The sentry glided down the corridor, rounding the corner as it continued its exploration. Niroth's visor abruptly lit up with warning signals as the sentry's feed revealed a collapsed section of the hallway ahead. Exposed explosion residue marked the site of the collapse, and two of the alien corpses lay beneath the rubble. The ominous signature of the mold appeared on the bodies, the black masses growing on them. Swiftly, Niroth shared the alert with the team downstairs.

Joran's response was swift and decisive. "Confirmed." He relayed the new information to the rest of the team. "Seems like we only have one more room to go, unless we want to clear that collapse. Regardless, we have to destroy those two corpses."

With purpose, Joran ordered the team to form up and led Demo and Pathfinder down the left hallway. As they approached the fallen corpses, Pathfinder and Joran readied their weapons, and Niroth maneuvered the sentry away. Their shots punctured through the corpses, disintegrating them systematically. One of the corpses attempted to rise, but Joran's swift response incapacitated it. The two thrashers worked in harmony, vaporizing the remains entirely.

Meanwhile, Demo remained vigilant, keeping watch on their rear and focused on the large metal door at the far end of the hallway.

Joran's voice spoke up. "Alright, I think that's enough. Let's get to that last room." The trio wasted no time, swiftly advancing to the other end of the hallway, where a large, featureless metal door stood. As they approached it, they couldn't help but notice the absence of a handle. Instead, a pad on the wall boasted buttons and symbols. Joran gestured towards the pad and said, "Pathfinder, try and crack it."

Pathfinder responded promptly, kneeling down to access the pad. With a swift motion, she pulled out a cable that resembled a living entity, with its writhing wires attaching themselves to the pad. The Indeocrom breacher, a device of intricate design, was brought into action. Its internal wires stretched out, probing for access points within the device's rudimentary circuitry. Pathfinder's visor reflected the progress, connecting to the Alphermeric codex for translation assistance. The symbology on the pad was deciphered to be numerical, conveying the digits 0 to 9. This newfound knowledge emboldened Pathfinder as she guided the Indeocrom to brute-force its way through. The symbols raced across the pad at an impossible speed, processing inputs and rejections in mere fractions of seconds. After a mere 14 seconds, the pad emitted a green light, signifying the Indeocrom's successful guess of the correct combination.

The heavy metal door obediently opened, revealing a small room beyond. Joran and Demo instinctively aimed their weapons at the door's movement, ready for any potential threat. Pathfinder, her dry sarcasm evident, chimed in. "Well, I got it." As she started to disconnect the Indeocrom from the pad, her visor alerted her to an unexpected development. A crossing attempt had been made and thwarted. Perplexed, she delved into her suit's event log, discovering that the moment she had opened the door, a packet had been sent and subsequently denied by her suit's systems.

Pathfinder's voice carried a note of concern as she relayed her discovery to the commander. "Hey Commander, something in this place's system reacted to my breach. It tried to send me something, but my suit blocked it outright."

Joran's response held a hint of recognition. "It might be the same thing that opened the hatch for us back up top; keep your suit walls up; that's for everyone."

Still focused on the new room that had opened, Joran gestured for the thrashers to proceed inside and clear it. The team moved with practiced precision, quickly securing the room. In this newly revealed space, they found another metal door similar to the one they had encountered previously, accompanied by a solitary red button. The room's configuration was rectangular and narrow, with peculiar fixtures built into the ceiling. Niroth's sentry entered alongside them, scanning the room diligently and detecting no signs of mold.

Joran directed their attention to the red button and spoke. "Press it. Let's see if it opens this door." Pathfinder complied, although a touch of hesitancy colored her actions. In the blink of an eye, the entry door slammed shut with a resounding clang, while the fixtures above initiated the release of a liquid substance onto the thrashers. Reacting swiftly, the team readied their weapons, training them on both the door and the fixtures.

Demo's voice cut through the tension as he questioned the nature of the substance. "What is this stuff?"

Niroth, reacting quicker, conducted a rapid scan to analyze the composition of the liquid. The chemical compounds' details appeared on his visor, prompting him to immediately share his findings over the comms. "It's a mixture of ethanol and water—a disinfectant?"

Before anyone could respond to his analysis, the door adjacent to the pressed button emitted a sharp screech as it swung open. The thrashers pivoted, focusing their attention on the source of the noise.

On the other side of the door, an immediate drop in temperature sent a shiver through the thrashers. Before them, a stark white tent-like structure extended, its form extending into a tunnel-like hallway. The material seemed to shield them from the cold, metal-like surface of the structure connecting the door.

Proceeding through the tunnel, they entered a room marked by its numerous consoles, yet this one was distinctively different. The room was entirely encased in plastic, a translucent barrier separating them from whatever lay beyond. With weapons poised, they cautiously stepped forward, scanning the plastic-enclosed area. The room was devoid of life, but an unsettling chill seeped into their bones as they ventured deeper. The temperature continued to plummet, reaching subzero levels. Their suits reacted in kind, warming up to maintain body temperature.

At the opposite end of the tented area, another tunnel-like hallway beckoned, leading to an exit flap. Despite the opaque nature of the tent's walls, the thrashers could still discern a faint glow of light filtering through. Unspoken signals passed between the team members, and with a silent nod from Joran, they advanced toward the exit.

Pushing through the flap, the thrashers emerged into a sprawling, otherworldly scene. Before them stretched a colossal glacial cave, its icy expanse extending down 50 meters lower as a metal path had been bolted into the ice floors. The cave's walls glittered with an ethereal luminosity, casting an eerie and captivating glow across the icy walls.

As the thrashers cautiously advanced to the edge of the metal path, they were greeted by the sight of a series of metal stairs that descended the sheer drop into the depths of the glacial cave. These stairs were securely bolted into the ice-encrusted walls, providing a precarious yet tangible path downward. Overhead, lights had been strategically affixed to the cave's ceiling, casting a steady, artificial illumination into the otherwise dark expanse below.

As their gaze traveled downward, their fascination was drawn to a remarkable sight. Nestled within the depths of the glacial cave, partially excavated from the ice, lay an ancient stone structure. Its weathered exterior hinted at the passage of countless years, its construction did not fit any of the known construction patterns or styles observed so far on Paradisium G-148. Adjacent to the stone structure, a metal building stood juxtaposed against the antiquity, as if bridging the gap between two pasts.

Joran's puzzled voice cut through the awe that had settled over the thrashers, his curiosity evident as he vocalized their collective thoughts. "What is this?"

Niroth, always quick to analyze, chimed in with an observation. "Looks like some kind of excavation site?"

Niroth's words, said aloud, caused all three of the historians to stop what they were doing and look up at him. They reacted with a burst of animated curiosity. Recognizing their intrigue, Niroth promptly shared his sentry's feed, prompting an eruption of excited speculation and conjecture from the historians as they attempted to piece together the puzzle that lay before them.

With the historians still engaged in their discussions and speculations upstairs, Pathfinder quickly thought she had accessed the communications channel. Confirming her suspicion, she spoke. "Commander, I've pinpointed the source of the signal. It's originating from that metal building down there."

Joran's response was quick. "Alright, let's finish this job." Taking the lead, he began to navigate the precarious ice-covered steps, leading the way downward into the gaping chasm below. The rest of the team followed closely behind.

Niroth directed his sentry to glide over the edge of the cliff, smoothly descending down the chasm to the bottom of the stairs. The scene that unfolded before the sentry's sensors was eerie and unsettling. Four lifeless bodies lay sprawled at the base of the metal stairs, each clad in orange full-body plastic suits. The sentry's scanners confirmed the absence of any mold signature on the corpses. However, the bodies bore numerous stab wounds, indicating a violent demise. Niroth transmitted this information to the team through their communication channel.

"Something killed these ones down here, be on guard," Niroth's voice cautioned over the comms. The team members below acknowledged his warning with a series of acknowledgment pings, their senses heightened as they continued their descent.

After a cautious descent, navigating the treacherous stairs, the small team eventually reached the bottom of the chasm. The vast expanse of the glacial cave stretched out around them, an otherworldly landscape of ice and shadows.

In the ambient glow of the glacial cave, the stone ruin and its solitary metal counterpart cast faint shadows over the team of thrashers as they readied themselves to advance.