Location: Subterranean Ruins Northern Ice Wastes, Exo-Zone Theta
Time: Two cycles after "The Awakening Signal"
The storm hadn't stopped for days.
Lira Solen trudged through the whiteout, her visor streaked with frost, her breath short in the thin air. Every step felt heavier not from exhaustion, but from what she might find.
The signal Ava left behind had led her here coordinates buried under a kilometer of frozen ruins once known as Directive Station E-9.
"Base, I'm approaching the anomaly field," she said, her voice crackling through the comm.
"Copy that, Solen. Thermal scans still reading void pockets under the surface. No life signs."
She stopped, glancing down at the scanner in her hand. The readings flickered erratic, almost like a heartbeat.
"No life signs?" she murmured. "Then what's pulsing?"
She stepped forward and pressed her glove against the ice. Beneath the surface, faint shapes gleamed metal beams, glass shards, and something else.
A silhouette.
Human.
