The heavy thump of the mag-locks engaging echoed finality in the sudden, heavy darkness of the maintenance junction. Outside, the muffled scraping and hissing of the Glitch-Wraiths against the thick steel door served as a terrifying reminder that 'safe' was a highly relative term. My heart hammered against my ribs, each beat echoing the dull throb in my skull.
"Lights!" Anya snapped, her voice tight but controlled, already moving deeper into the pitch blackness.
A moment later, with a hesitant flicker and the buzz of protesting old capacitors, rows of overhead fluorescent tubes sputtered to life. They cast a harsh, flickering, greenish-white light across the interior, revealing not a cramped closet like my server room haven, but a surprisingly large, cavernous space.
It was clearly built for function, not comfort. The floor was bare, oil-stained concrete, littered with discarded tools, empty ration packs far older than the ones Anya carried, and rusted metal shavings. Thick bundles of pipes and conduits snaked across the high ceiling and down the walls, feeding into massive, silent machinery that hulked in the corners – water pumps, air filtration units, power transformers, all coated in decades of grime and looking decidedly inactive. A faint smell of ozone lingered, stronger than in the tunnels, mixed with the ever-present damp concrete and mildew, plus an underlying hint of something acrid, like old battery acid.
A metal catwalk ran along one wall, leading to secondary control panels higher up. Below it, a heavy workbench cluttered with more ancient, rusted tools stood against the wall near the door control panel Anya must have overridden remotely.
Overall, it felt… derelict but solid. A forgotten pocket of industrial functionality left to decay. Less immediately hostile than the tunnels, but radiating a quiet sense of neglect and potential malfunction.
"Secure?" I asked, my voice still rough, leaning against the cool concrete wall just inside the door, trying to catch my breath without inhaling too much questionable air.
Anya was already examining the internal door control panel, running a diagnostic scanner over it. The device beeped with gloom. "Mag-locks are holding at eighty percent charge. Door integrity… compromised after my… enthusiastic entrance, but it'll hold against scratching." She shot me a wry look. "Probably wouldn't stop a determined assault from something with actual breaching capability, though. We bought time, not invulnerability." She turned her attention back to the panel. "Main power grid down here is offline, obviously. Running internal systems off auxiliary batteries. Looks like they have about twelve hours of life left, judging by the discharge rate."
Twelve hours. A deadline, then.
Leo had slumped onto an overturned crate near the workbench, running a shaky hand through his hair. He looked utterly spent, the terror of the Wraith encounter leaving him pale and trembling slightly. "Those… things," he stammered. "What were they?"
"Glitch-Wraiths," Anya confirmed grimly, fiddling with the panel settings, likely reinforcing the lock commands. "Nasty pieces of work. Part residual human echo, part corrupted data, part pure environmental spite, from what I gather. Fast, silent when they want to be, drawn to energy signatures and strong emotions. That sonic resonator disrupts their cohesion, usually. Doesn't kill them." She frowned. "Never seen them hunt in coordinated packs like that before. Or be that aggressive this close to the surface levels. Something's stirring them up."
My mind briefly flashed back to the SOS signal from Quadrant 7G. Was there a connection? Was some larger disturbance radiating outwards, affecting even the deep Undercroft? Or was it just another delightful coincidence in our increasingly complicated lives? The thought process felt sluggish, like wading through cognitive quicksand. Trying to analyze deeper implications right now was pointless, my brain simply wasn't up to the task. Survival first. Analysis… eventually. Maybe.
"Alright," Anya straightened up from the panel. "We're locked in. They're locked out. For now." She surveyed the junction. "First order: Check your gear, count your ammo," she unconsciously patted her sidearm, "tend to any immediate injuries." Her gaze lingered on me again. "Which includes mental ones, Debugger. You need to recover. Whatever those Wraiths were, I have a feeling they won't be the last welcoming committee we meet down here."
She was right. Pushing myself further wasn't just risky, it was stupid. If another crisis hit, I needed to be capable of more than just identifying problems I couldn't fix. "Yeah," I conceded, pushing myself off the wall. "Rest. Water. Maybe some non-radioactive food, if such a thing exists?"
Anya gestured towards her pack, leaning against the workbench. "Got standard-issue nutrient paste, guaranteed to taste like vaguely salty cardboard. And filtered water. Help yourself." She started moving towards the hulking machinery in the corner, pulling out a more sophisticated scanner. "I need to check these old power conduits. See if there's any residual charge we can tap to supplement the batteries, or if trying just risks blowing the whole junction offline."
I gratefully snagged a water flask and a nutrient paste tube from her pack. The water was clean, blessedly cool, easing the dryness in my throat. The nutrient paste tube was depressingly familiar military-grade grey. Squeezing some onto my finger, I tasted it tentatively. Vaguely salty cardboard was a remarkably accurate description. Grimly, I started forcing it down. Calories were calories, even if they tasted like recycled packaging material.
Leo seemed content to just sit on his crate, taking slow sips from his own water bottle, eyes still wide as he stared at the heavy steel door. The encounter had clearly shaken him to the core.
I found a relatively clean patch of floor near the workbench, slid down the wall, and leaned my head back against the cool concrete. Closed my eyes. Not sleeping, just… trying to let my brain defragment. The throbbing headache eased slightly with the hydration and the grim necessity of the nutrient paste. My SP indicator still flashed ERROR, the number stubbornly refusing to climb above 1. Recovery wasn't going to be instantaneous. It felt like my mental 'RAM' had been completely overwritten and needed a slow, painstaking rebuild.
The only sounds were Anya's quiet movements as she worked on the machinery, the faint hum of her scanner, Leo's soft breathing, and the muffled, rhythmic scrape… scrape… hiss… from outside the steel door. The Wraiths weren't giving up. They were waiting.
Time stretched, measured in the flickering of the overhead lights and the distant, imagined dripping of water. I focused on breathing, trying to push down the lingering fear and the cognitive static. Tried to access [Perceive Glitch] gently, just testing the waters. Instantly felt a sharp spike of pain behind my eyes, like touching a live wire. Retreated immediately. Nope. Still offline. Recovery required actual rest, not impatient poking.
Maybe ten minutes passed. Maybe thirty. Time felt fluid, unreliable down here.
Suddenly, Anya swore softly from across the room. "Well, shit."
My eyes snapped open. Leo jumped. "What? What is it? Are they getting in?"
"No, door's fine," Anya said, frustration clear in her voice. She held up her scanner, pointing towards one of the massive, silent transformer units. "Power conduits are shot. Completely corroded. Trying to draw power would be like plugging into a fireworks factory." She sighed, running a hand through her hair again. "So, twelve hours on the batteries it is. Max. And that's just for basic life support and keeping the door locked. No recharging the rig's main cells."
Twelve hours. Not enough time to fully recover. Not enough time to effect major repairs on the Probability Drive, even if I could help. Just enough time to be trapped in here until the power failed and the door unlocked itself, delivering us gift-wrapped to the patient horrors outside.
Unless…
Anya followed my gaze towards the large, silent water pump machinery dominating another corner. Thick pipes led into and out of it, disappearing into the concrete floor and walls.
"Don't even think about it," she said sternly. "That's the old reservoir overflow pump system. Hasn't been active in decades. Probably seized solid. And even if it wasn't, the outflow tunnels likely lead deeper into unmapped, flooded sections. Trading hungry Wraiths for drowning in Glitch-infested sludge isn't an upgrade."
She had a point. Still, a potential alternative route, however unlikely, felt marginally better than just waiting for the batteries to die.
The scraping outside the door intensified momentarily, then fell silent again. Were they trying different tactics? Or just… listening?
We were in a concrete box, low on power, with nightmare creatures waiting outside, my primary skillset crippled, and our only potential escape route likely led to drowning or worse.
The URE, ever helpful, offered a notification:
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[New Quest Suggestion (Low Priority?): Find A Better Hiding Spot.]
Potential Reward: [Delayed Demise]
Warning: Current Location Stability Rating: Degrading due to External Entity Pressure.
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Degrading stability. Great. Just freaking great. The box wasn't even guaranteed to remain a box.
Anya saw the flicker of the URE interface in my eyes. "System giving you helpful advice?" she asked drily.
"Suggests finding a better hiding spot," I replied, forcing down the nutrient paste. "Also notes location stability is 'degrading due to external entity pressure'. Which I assume means those things scratching at the door are literally stressing the reality of this room."
Anya's expression hardened. "Yeah. Wraiths can do that. Corrode reality locally if they focus." She looked around the junction, her gaze sharp and assessing again. "Twelve hours just became a very optimistic estimate."
Our temporary oasis was already starting to feel like a slowly collapsing trap.