The descent burned silent.
No flare. No chatter. Just the Vanta Strain cutting atmosphere like a blade through flesh, its exterior shields running cold and its hull matte-black against the stratosphere. They called it a dig site, but from orbit it looked more like a scar — a deep gash in the rocky crust of a forgotten world that hadn't seen daylight in millennia.
Rourke stood behind the pilot, one hand gripping the overhead bar as the ship tilted into final approach.
Below, the terrain stretched in jagged veins — black rock pulsing faintly with geothermal veins like the planet bled fire beneath its skin.
"Touchdown in two minutes," said Arden, her voice clipped and calm.
"Any sign of Union presence?" Rourke asked.
"None. But I'm reading residual power signatures in the lower ravine. Big ones. Could be mining drills. Could be worse."
Rourke's jaw tensed. "Keep the engines hot."
Behind him, the small crew gathered at the staging platform. Four of them — lean, lethal, scarred by work that never went clean. They weren't soldiers, not anymore. But they knew how to move, how to shoot, and more importantly, how to shut up.
Khelra snapped the magazine into her rifle with a clean click. "Can't believe they called this a salvage run. Feels more like a ghost hunt."
"We're not here for ghosts," Rourke said without looking back. "We're here for what they buried."
---
They dropped fast.
Grav harnesses buckled. Ramp lowered. The moment the hatch hissed open, the air hit them — thick, hot, heavy with metallic tang like scorched wiring and something older. Something mineral. Something dead.
The ravine opened like a wound beneath them — walls of jagged obsidian and shattered scaffold metal reaching into a massive crevice lined with abandoned support structures. Massive drill pylons lay half-collapsed, their power cores still pulsing with faint orange light.
"This place wasn't abandoned," said Vocht, the crew's tech. His goggles clicked with scanning overlays. "It was evacuated. Fast."
Rourke crouched beside a scorched helmet embedded in the rock — Union-standard.
He said nothing.
---
Twenty minutes in, they'd moved deep into the trench. The place had clearly been mined, but not for ore. The excavation patterns were too precise — like they were trying to uncover something, not extract it.
The team moved in a five-point spread, rifles up, eyes sharp. They passed shattered crates, biofilters choked with ash, and claw marks scorched into stone that didn't match any known equipment.
"Movement," Khelra said sharply, pausing at a collapsed gantry. "North corridor. Something big."
"Eyes up," Rourke said. "We hold tight. Let it pass."
But it didn't.
The ground trembled — just enough to feel through boot soles. Then came the sound: a low hum, like deep machinery… or a heartbeat.
Then silence.
Rourke motioned forward, rifle tight against his shoulder. They moved in.
---
They found the first body thirty meters in.
Union suit. Chestplate caved in from inside. Helmet cracked, visor shattered. No blood.
Just dust.
Rourke crouched. His glove hovered near the body — not touching. Just reading. Thermal decay suggested the death was recent. Within the last 72 hours.
Which made no sense.
The Union manifest said this site was declared sealed two months ago.
"Commander," Vocht said, voice lower now, rougher. "This site's registry doesn't match Union logs. The data's been scrubbed — overwritten with false coordinates."
Rourke didn't look surprised. "Of course it has."
"Why?"
"Because whatever we're standing on wasn't meant to be found."
---
The tunnel narrowed.
The walls closed in — ancient stone layered over strange alloy, etched with inhuman geometric patterns. Not language. Not decoration.
Design.
Not built for people.
Lights flickered across the carved metal as they passed — responding faintly to proximity. Reacting.
Rourke slowed.
Ahead, a vault door stood partially open — thick enough to withstand a ship strike, but split down the center like something had forced it apart. Beyond it, only darkness.
He turned to his crew.
"We breach on my mark. Tight formation. Eyes sharp. No hesitation."
They nodded.
He stepped through first.
---
The room beyond wasn't empty.
It was alive.
Not with movement, but presence — like the air itself resisted them. The chamber pulsed with dull red light, cycling through cracks in the floor. In the center stood a monolith — dark, smooth, etched with unknown symbols that pulsed like veins.
Khelra's hand hovered over her rifle. "What in hell is this?"
Vocht's scanner shorted out. Sparks flickered.
"No signals," he muttered. "No comms. It's blocking everything."
Rourke approached the monolith.
The moment he stepped within two meters, it spoke.
Not in words.
Not in sound.
Just memory.
A flicker.
A child's scream.
A sky painted in flame.
A ship's hull closing behind marching feet.
Rourke flinched. Just slightly.
Then he composed himself.
And drew his pistol.
---
That's when the walls shifted.
With a low grind of stone and energy, the chamber lit up — symbols along the walls blazing red. Behind them, the shadows moved.
"Khelra," Rourke said sharply. "Back-to-back."
Figures emerged from the walls — not alive, not dead. Armored suits, powered by something ancient, faces hidden behind blackened glass. Weapons in hand.
None of them blinked.
They moved like they remembered.
The first shot rang out — not from them.
From Rourke.
And then the chamber exploded into motion.