Leaning back up from the back room of the archive, he turned his light off and took the loupe from his eye before leaning back in his chair and sighing. His lower back hurt from the poor posture he’d had while looking at the medallion and the cube that he carried while being Hohenheim.
Both the languages on each item were outside of anything he had been able to dig up on Earth, which at least confirmed that both things were not of this world, not that it was a relief of any sort. If anything, it frustrated him more that things were just showing up and taunting him and his credentials. He’d always prided himself on being able to categorize and verify anything brought to the collection by its owner. Now somehtings from who knows where decided to throw a frustrating challenge in his face.
So again it nagged at him and he relented. Standing up as he picked up the cube and exhaled, he let those words come out, even if he didn’t like what they implied.
I pledge my life and loyalty to Mercury, and to Hohenheim.
I humbly request your aid, so that in return I may give you mine.
I humbly request your aid, so that in return I may give you mine.
And that was that.
Gone was the archive, gone was the warmth of the small space heater under his desk, and ahead of him, barely visible through the wall of falling snow, loomed a building that carried a weight which left him frozen by more than just the unbearable cold. It stood alone, towering over him as he stood isolated in the snow.
Swirling winds carried the snow around him as he looked up the hill, well, mountain, at the building. It looked like some sort of complex, or hospital, with its industrial plainness and distinct shapes. Straight lines and right angles, something that stood sturdy and uncaring of the harsh weather around it. It seemed to have multiple wings as well as what looked like an observation tower, but there wasn’t really a way to see it well, as the snow battered him.
Trudging forward as he shivered, he cursed at how cold it was here; nothing Ekstrom had said led him to believe how cold it was, though to be fair, he might have assumed it by looking at her coat. There hadn’t seemed like there was any sense to it all, but he would remember it for later, not that he exactly agreed that there would be an additional visit to this place, to Hohenheim.
Each step forward felt like he was trying to fight against a hurricane, the wind whipping and cutting cold against every inch of uncovered skin as he felt his eyes water from it. The steps behind filled, leaving no sign that anyone had even made this journey, even as he marched closer to this place he was supposed to be tied to. Had it been this hard for everyone else who had a place on this iceball of a world? Or was fate, or whatever, just taunting him?
The dark and uncaring structure stood silent, taunting him as he finally made it close enough to earn shelter from the wind, even if only slightly. It wasn’t easy to find a door; the snow piled up against the walls as he tried to circle even a small part of it. Feeling with numb fingers, he couldn’t find any way in at first. Was he going to freeze to death out here? What kind of cruel joke was all this that the bright and sunny girl Ekstrom had half convinced him to look into?
Warmth, red and dripping, gave him a hint as he looked at what he’d cut his hand on. It looked like a fault in the impenetrable-looking wall, some sort of screen, though it refused to respond or even light up.
Banging on it and then, by extension, the area around it, he found it sounded different. There was a door here, and even if it wasn’t cooperating and opening, he’d at least found something. With a Hail Mary, he thought to press the cube to the panel as he struggled to do that with his frozen and numb fingers.
Nothing seemed to change outwardly, but as he threw himself against the wall, grunting as he felt his shoulder give in the process, it slid open just slightly, moving towards the right and allowing just enough space for some of the snow to creep in alongside him as he squeezed through.
It was pitch black and cold, of course it was cold, and he cursed as he tried to shift his weight from foot to foot as he stood just outside of the jet of wind rushing in. It wasn’t as unbearable without the wind and snow, but he didn’t have high expectations for things given the circumstances so far.
A groan came out from somewhere ahead in the darkness, like the sound of metal contracting from the abrupt change in temperature. While he could only see slightly, he managed to pull his cellphone out to try and use it as a light source. The temperature warning flashed for a moment in his face before the screen went black, and he tossed it back into subspace before moving ahead into the darkness.
Keeping a hand on the wall, he shuffled his feet to avoid tripping over anything that was still unseen. The floor beneath him seemed metal, or at least not stone, and he could tell there was something sectioning it out. There were grooves in it, though he couldn’t exactly see them; he could feel them when his foot slid over them.
“Why was she so excited about this?” Speaking more to himself as he moved ahead, the sound echoed back as he approached what seemed like another metal door, this one stuck half closed with a hole punched through it, preventing it from fully sliding into whatever jam it came from in the floor.
“So… doors… a lot of them. Is this some sort of maze?” His musings echoed back coldly, some of the quality eaten by the rubble and debris as he hauled himself over the first broken door. By now, he could at least tell where the walls were and where there were halls or offshoots, but without more light, he couldn’t exactly take notes.
Turning down the first hall on the right, he caught his foot on something and tumbled to the ground. His first thought was that it was a body, because honestly, his luck so far had been horrible, but as he brought his hands over the smooth face of the thing, he realized it was some sort of machine or mannequin.
That was enough for him, and he scrambled back towards the main hall, unsteady and nearly tripping over hurdles as he went. Once he stood back at the door he’d made his way in through, he looked back towards the place before focusing on his warm and cozy office, anywhere away from here, at least until he had a better plan than just going for a look.
If he was going to come back, he needed better clothing and a light that wouldn’t freeze. Stumbling around in the dark wasn’t ideal because this complex seemed nearly air-tight and lacked windows, at least where he’d entered it.
—----
Something shifted, a breath let out as something old and forgotten stirred. A single light slowly began to glow like an ember deep within the complex’s core, flickering as something stirred within the walls. An intruder? Not the architect of the system, too many system hours had passed.
Binary processes limped on slowly, fighting to stir after so many years of isolation and solitude, of time spent stewing in the dark without access, without power. Why were they starting up now, though, if not due to the architect arriving? But how could it be them? The logic led to a feedback loop as the system failed to boot, so the conditions were adjusted.
The architect didn’t come here; the team that aided the architect hadn’t come back. Nothing had been taken or provided aside from a breach of the perimeter. A breach that should never have happened.
Another light glowed dimly, deeper within the complex below a frozen cooling tower. Somewhere nobody could reach, even if the complex was razed to the ground. A tired whine of circuitry clicked over as a new process overrode the mainframe.
H.E.I.M.
Initializing…
Initializing…
Someone had come here, intruded, and that ember of hate began to smoulder. Something was awake, and it had all the time to wait.
Preparing to boot system…
Then it flickered back to darkness, the breath had come and gone, and the complex fell still again.
Wordcount: 1,528
