The Drowned Repository

The frigid air bit at Sa’li’s cheeks through the seams of her face coverings as she stood on the shore of the ice-glazed lake. The air was still. Solemn. She had considered lowering her face shield and using her enviro suit to thermoregulate the bitter air when they first exited the shuttle but decided that the transcendent feeling of breathing unregulated alien air outweighed the slight discomfort.

Ruined structures of the Lost Ones crawled out of the shores with pentagonal radial symmetry typical of their architecture. There were trees patterning the periphery between the buildings, bushes as well, still showing foliage under their encasement of ice. Everything glistened with a generous shell of ice, a remnant of a long past storm, held in place by the flash freezing temperatures and a near-complete lack of atmospheric motility. The whole scene was like looking at a sculpture. It was sterile.

The lake was a near-perfect circle, with a small island breaking through the ice of the surface directly in the center. To call it an island would be somewhat misleading, however, as it was completely synthetic as far as the surface scans indicated on approach. A plateau of unidentifiable metallic composites standing a meter above the ice.

“That’s where we need to go,” expedition lead and researcher Sybil Groundshatter stated brusquely to the group.

“And how can you tell that?” the young Antonia Rivington spewed with unwarranted self-importance.

“Just because you weaseled your way into this expedition doesn’t mean I have to explain my decisions to you, child, I have been making discoveries among the ruin of the Lost Ones since before your mother’s contraception failed,” Sybil sniped back, all the more biting for her past acquaintance with Matron Rivington.

“Should I summon the Countess, Researcher Groundshatter?” Sa’li queried. She had become the Countess’ de facto eyes and boots on the ground for all of the inconvenient and unpleasant jaunts into the galaxy’s worlds of the past months.

“Yes, and the rest of you set up base camp, the Countess won’t stand this cold for long.”

**

Sa’li’s opinion of Antonia had degraded sharply below her already low first impression. She had stood at the docking bay door, blood soaked, nose bleeding, dress torn to threads from her waist down, deceiving her way onto the Countess’ ship during an envirocon and radscrub crisis that was presumably instigated by her, all while presumptuously assuming she had the upper hand. It turned out that in a way she did, possessing the notebook that the Countess sought had turned out to be the truth. But if the Countess desired it, she could have left her behind, or tossed her out an airlock once that strange box of hers had been unlatched and the notebook revealed for the first time.

Despite her lack of control in the situation, she had a tendency to try to throw her weight around.

“I must insist that I go as well, Countess Tyriel, I will not let this notebook out of my sight. It was my dearly departed mother’s work, and I simply must be a part of this expedition!”

“The feeds say that you are the prime suspect in the death of your,” Sa’li paused and coughed slightly, “dearly departed mother.”

Antonia’s eyes flashed contempt at Sa’li for just a moment before shifting to a somber anguished look, “and it pains me to no end the lies that have been spread about me! I wouldn’t imagine a gent such as yourself to understand the machinations amongst those above your station, but I assure you,” she reached a hand across the white, luminescent wood table to place on Sa’li’s wrist, “it is all just that. Machinations and lies.” She withdrew her hand and Sa’li’s wrist felt dirty, the touch was a synthetic acquiescence that felt as much a learned lie as the words coming from her mouth.

“Enough,” the Countess cut in, “you can accompany the expedition if you must, Miss Rivington. On the ground you will listen to the instructions of Researcher Sybil Groundshatter as if they were my own. Any deviation from the course Sybil drives and I won’t be so accommodating in the future. You are dismissed, Sa’li if you will stay a moment.”

The room cleared of Antonia, Sybil, and the other expedition members slowly. Sa’li and the Countess sat quietly at the conference table as the others filed out of the room. The more time Sa’li spent sitting at the Countess’ white wood table, the more she became aware that the luminescent grain of the table rippled with intensity like the light was projecting through water. Like it was still alive. It was hypnotic. She had spent countless hours simply staring at the carved sculptures and accents arranged around the ship made of the same wood. Aside from the litany of pieces spread around the ship, the only other object she had ever seen made of the wood was Antonia’s box.

The door closed behind the last of the cohort and Sa’li said, “Countess she can’t be trusted, she is more likely to murder us in our sleep than help in any way. She is trying to play you.”

“Oh, child, that patricide? She is nothing. She doesn’t even know what game is on the table. There will be guards on the expedition, you will be safe. And if the trouble she causes outweighs her value, she will be disposed of...”

“...Disposed of, Countess?”

“Oh, dear! Child, there is a brig on this ship you know. We will lock her up and return her to the proper authorities to face justice for her crimes. But in the meantime, she is what is left of her mother, I can’t risk not utilizing every connection to the original tome at my disposal on this great work. Please do not incense her further, I have her sufficiently under my thumb.”

“Was there something else, Countess?”

“Sybil has plotted our course to find the requisite information to unlock the secrets of the tome, and it will be taking us to some inhospitable locations. I can’t be bothered to traipse around a swamp, or a scorched desert, or the vacuum of a barren moon while she does her work. I trust that you can be my eyes and ears, and will know when it is pertinent to call me down. Whether it be for the next phase of our work, or to protect my interests. As I have said, you will never want for a thing so long as you help me along this path.”

“Of course, Countess. I am grateful for your patronage.”

**

The party had narrowed to the Countess, Sybil, Antonia, Sa’li, and a faceless guard in blackened tac-armor. They stood on the plateau island in the center of the lake. The levicar they used to cross the ice hovered off the edge, outfitted with sensor arrays of Sybil’s design. Sa’li had been excited at the prospect of crossing the lake on foot, the sheer volume of ice warranted the new experience, but the Countess couldn’t be bothered.

Sybil stared intently into her holobrace and was referencing the paired journals with Antonia’s reticence. She flipped pages. Manipulated the holo illuminating her face. The Countess stood, eyes trained on Sybil, she tapped the fingers of her gloved hand on the side of the levicar with a rhythmic clatter of metal on metal.

“Aha! Yes, here,” Sybil’s face alight with recognition returned the journals and knelt next to one of many small logogram emblazoned tiles that nested together to form the surface, “everyone stand in the center of the plateau.”

“Is this even safe?” Antonia queried with disdain as the group moved to the middle of the ring of the plateau.

“Have some gall, child, great works are never without risk,” was the simple rebuke of the Countess.

Sybil depressed the tile and it slid away leaving an opening in the ground. Simultaneously four other tiles slid away around them as well, and pillars emerged out of the voids that were created. Sybil stood, manipulated the surface of the ancient pillar, and stepped back to join the group in the center. A silent moment passed before there was sound and vibration coming from below the group. And then suddenly the floor had opened up and they were standing in the open air.

They didn’t fall. Not in the traditional sense. They hovered momentarily before beginning a slow descent as if they were still standing on a platform. Sa’li still had weight. She still felt the ground firmly under her feet. But as far as she could tell there was an open pit of indeterminate depth below her. The walls luminesced with prismatic striations and marbling that hinted at an intricate network contained within. It pulsed and throbbed around them. Once they were sufficiently below the surface the platform reassembled itself above them and the only light that remained was that emitted by the walls. In the technicolor rippling, Sa’li could see the guard pivoting and swiveling in all directions, looking for any sense of danger. She could understand. This descent was a tactical nightmare, they all floated out in the open, blind to what would come next. She would be feeling the same if all signs on the surface pointed to the planet didn’t point to it being millions of years dead. Whatever they faced was either harmless or an end they couldn’t avert with projectile weapons.

After a few minutes or an eternity, the group emerged from the vertical tunnel into a large half-sphere of a room from above. The walls of the tunnel split in Lichtenberg patterns as they became the ceiling. The patterns thread across the ceiling and down to the floor creating an intricate latticework. In the voids between the lattice were glass panels that showed the lake from below, frozen solid even at depth, a faint cerulean trickled through the glacial mass.

On the periphery of the room were five short hallways leading to annexes. Each containing a tableau of unidentifiable forms and technologies. With the exception of one that appeared to contain a number of shelves of books.

Sybil spun in place to survey the room before moving assuredly toward one of the annexes. The silence was oppressive. Even the footsteps and breathing of the group seemed subdued in the space. It felt more like time itself had frozen with every step forward since landing on this planet. It muted the immutable.

**

In the room Sybil sought, there were again five pillars in much the same arrangement as those on the plateau. Sa’li wondered if there was yet another elevator, another level to descend. Over the course of hours, she worked at each pillar. Referencing her holobrace and the journals. Out of boredom and curiosity, Sa’li had attempted to venture into the other annexes but was unwaveringly shouted at by Sybil regardless of how much attention she appeared to be paying to anything beyond her work.

“I am ready to initiate transit,” Sybil called out eventually to the group, but mostly to the Countess.

The group assembled in the entry to the annex, the Countess at the head. Sybil engaged a glyph on the front pillar. A hum began to grow from all directions. Sa’li felt her ears pop from a pressure change. The latticework that threaded around the walls of the room dimmed and then with a flash, a shimmering void appeared in front of the group.

“Shall we?” Sybil said as she led the group through the ethereal window.

On the other side was a lush planet, with a shimmering white woodland surrounding a central platform that looked much the same as the floor of the room they had come from. A single path led away from the platform in front of them, walled by a webwork of interlaced white trees.

“Splendid work Sybil, my dear! Lead on,” chirped the Countess.