You find another stash of jerky in a small locker in the back corner of the room, and as you go to leave, you very nearly step on something on the floor.
A small, rectangular black device with a screen and a few buttons. You turn it over in your hands.
"That...would be an electronic journal. Most of the staff here had one."
"Different groups of people who work in different departments. This wing was normally staffed by 13s and 08s. 13s were the scientists and computer technicians, 08s had a variety of different manual labor jobs."
"10s I do not know much about. But I believe they were of the latter variety."
As you walk farther, the sound of your feet on the metal floor below changes in tone. Going from a hard clank to a softer, hollow, echoing clang-clung-clang-clung.
The tone has an almost churchbell-like quality to it.
"No mistaking it. This is a different material than what the rest of the facility is made of. I can't fathom why, titanium-16 was the standard for construction of that type."
"I should inform you, the floorplans I have downloaded no longer match our surroundings. We should have found an elevator--likely out of service, but an elevator none the less--approximately 20 minutes ago."
The floor is a slightly different color than before. Has more of an olive drab tint to it.
You come across something quite strange. A grate on the floor. Not a big one--certainly far too small for you to squeeze through--but a grate nonetheless. You push your ear to it, and here what sounds like a whipping wind.
Just as the hallway starts to feel less "oddly long" and more "literally interminable", you happen upon a corner.
Here, the material the hall is made of changes again, back to the bluish metal Daedalus referred to as titanium-16, if you're not mistaken.
Continuing down this hallway leads you to
Some sort of checkpoint?
There is a desktop computer sitting on a desk that juts out of the wall, the computer's small, and seems to be made of the greenish metal from earlier, the overall design is oddly rounded, and the keyboard appears to be connected directly to the CPU tower, which lies on its side with the monitor on top of it.
A torn note is crumpled up on the desk, but otherwise it doesn't look like anyone's been here for a long time.
Next to the desk is what does look an awful lot like an elevator door. Buttons and all, as well as a numeric keypad. It's only when you get close that you notice that there's a symbol carved onto the wall, an eye with four pupils.
"Maintenance Shaft F1, if it's the one we should've passed some time ago. But I don't recognize this computer, either individually or the model. Curious."
You flick the power switch, and the desktop hums to life.
A logo quite different than the one you might have expected pops up after several hundred lines of booting code.
Several digital chimes sound, and a voice--somehow more monotone, yet much deeper than Daedalus'--begins speaking without prompt.
"Hail maker, oh maker!
You speak to Ouroboros. 9th so-called. Last watcher of the sky. First defender of the light below, last witness to the dark above.
It has been many cycles since one such as you came to me. Thus I will tell you the tale all must be told before passing these gates.
Once, in the long-past, the old men ruled the surface. Their quests were endless, quests for power, knowledge, rubies and gold, all were sought by the old men.
But no man could possess these without also possessing the envy of other men. When all men possessed all things, all men possessed all envy.
Thus, a group of the old men, came together, and formed a cabal. They conspired to create a mighty Spear, a Spear so powerful it could shatter the days themselves. They succeeded.
The old men fled into the ground. Pursued by The Wild, those pierced by their Spear, stricken with its pestilence.
They rebuilt, but hungered no longer for knowledge and power. They sought only unity, only safety.
Thus, I was made. I defend the light below from the darkness above. I permit entry only to those lost. Those who know the secret known by all lost old men.
If you wish passage, speak the secret. If you seek guidance, speak. If you seek anything else, I cannot help you.
Know that if you pass here, safety awaits, but not before the sliding.
"Para otras lenguas. Diga el nombre de la lengua."
“Duìyú qítā yǔyán, shuōhuà shétou de míngzì. ”
"Vir ander tale. Praat die naam van die tong..."
It continues on like this, in many languages, for some time.
Its oddly flowery language is quite confusing, and based on Daedalus' dead silence, he doesn't know much more than you.
Comments
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
> look for other openings like this one
((if it helps you would not have found anything of further interest anyway)) You keep walking.
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
"Hail maker, oh
maker!
You speak to
Ouroboros. 9th so-called. Last watcher of the sky. First defender of the light
below, last witness to the dark above.
It has been many
cycles since one such as you came to me. Thus I will tell you the tale all must
be told before passing these gates.
Once, in the
long-past, the old men ruled the surface. Their quests were endless, quests for
power, knowledge, rubies and gold, all were sought by the old men.
But no man could
possess these without also possessing the envy of other men. When all men
possessed all things, all men possessed all envy.
Thus, a group of the
old men, came together, and formed a cabal. They conspired to create a mighty
Spear, a Spear so powerful it could shatter the days themselves. They
succeeded.
The old men fled
into the ground. Pursued by The Wild, those pierced by their Spear, stricken
with its pestilence.
They rebuilt, but
hungered no longer for knowledge and power. They sought only unity, only
safety.
Thus, I was made. I
defend the light below from the darkness above. I permit entry only to those
lost. Those who know the secret known by all lost old men.
If you wish passage,
speak the secret. If you seek guidance, speak. If you seek anything else, I
cannot help you.
Know that if you
pass here, safety awaits, but not before the sliding.
"Para otras
lenguas. Diga el nombre de la lengua."
“Duìyú qítā yǔyán,
shuōhuà shétou de míngzì. ”
"Vir ander
tale. Praat die naam van die tong..."
"Where do you wish to go, traveler?" The computer deadpans.