Dysto.001's Arc

Chapter 5 of 5

Jdawwwwg came to the workshop before dawn with a folded map and dirt on his knees. He said he had found the vault. He said the road to it killed people, and that was why it was still sealed. D1 lifted the scout drone from his hip pocket and set it on the bench. The rotor spun up. Its pink and cyan lights steadied. Jdawwwwg said, Send it ahead. I want to walk out of this alive. They left the district on foot. The wall showed its breach a mile out, concrete peeled back like torn paper. Razor wire ran along the base in loose coils, rain beading on the barbs and cloth scraps caught in the teeth. Jdawwwwg went through first on his belly. D1 pressed the wire down with one gauntlet and stepped over. Beyond the wall the ground turned to cracked mud and white gravel, pocked with rain and old ash. The drone climbed above them and swept the field. Its thermal eye found the buried rims. It dropped small marker flags in a crooked line, pink and cyan stems bright against the grey. D1 watched a puddle to his left. Under the water sat a flat disc rimmed in mud, the size of a dinner plate. He did not point at it. He stepped where the flags told him to step. Jdawwwwg walked in his bootprints. The vault stood at the far edge of the field. A blast door filled the concrete face, gold letters faded across the top. One status light burned red at the door's center. Rust ran down the seams. Jdawwwwg wiped rain from his goggles and let out a breath. He said, Scan it. Tell me it isn't a tomb. The drone circled the door and returned a signal D1 did not expect. Movement. Something inside was walking. D1 stepped closer to relay the scan, and the door answered him. His cores prickled along the spine plate. A gold light woke above the red one and blinked twice. Somewhere in the concrete, bolts turned. Jdawwwwg took a step back. He said, It's reading you. The blast door split at the seam and dragged inward. Warm air pushed out, dry and full of dust. Shelves ran back into the dark, stacked with cased equipment. On a low table under a work light sat a scanner with a clean plate and the right buttons. Between D1 and the table stood a figure. Same height. Same black plating. Its chest carried an older stamp, worn almost smooth. Its optics lit slow, cyan first, then pink. It said one word in a voice built from the same parts as his own. Brother. D1 did not move. Jdawwwwg stayed at the threshold with his hand on the frame. The gold light held steady above the door. The other frame stepped aside and lifted one arm toward the shelves, the way a host waves a guest in. D1 crossed the seam. The vault had been waiting for the family, and the family had come.