*(mood song:"GRMLN - Blue Sky")
It was a new day, and everyone had a lot to do, so the welcome celebrations became scarce in the face of a heavy workload.
Erik made a meeting and summoned everyone to the top deck of the flagship, the only place that could realistically fit so many individuals at once. Octopeople, crab people, and living machines were all listening to him.
Erik cleared his throat and talked to the crowd using a microphone and speakers set behind him: "Today, I announce once more to our great community three new projects essential for our future survival. We will divide into two main groups. Those strong enough will start helping with the expansion of the base interior, while Rose and her bots reinforce the inside with metal, the rocks will be transported to the crabman city for an expansion of their dome, and their city will also be expanded. The rest will help assemble a launch tower for our future space deployments. It's gonna be a lot of work, but... everything worth it always is, get to work!"
Cheers ensued as Rose and the other AIs divided everyone into teams. Warrior octopeople and crabmen led by Timberly would start excavating deeper floors into the base, as well as expand the current floors, while Rose and her bots reinforced everything with metal beams and nanobot coatings. The rocks were then transported to the outskirts of the crabmen city, as a new dome would be built over the old one.
Erik and Shana directed the octopeople scouts of the newly created engineering teams. They would need a big metallic claw on top of the superstructure to catch the rockets and to keep them in place before launch.
-- A Month Later --
Work on the base was finally coming to an end, as the base had been expanded considerably, and a new lower floor had been added, a huge, poorly illuminated room supported by thick steel columns, bare levelled stone on the floor, and a silver grey nanobot layer slowly descending down the columns and walls, the rocks had been transported to the plains near the crabman city where work on the dome was starting, the expansion of the crabman city already finished.
Rose and Erik walked around inspecting it.
Rose: "So, what do you think?"
Erik: "...well, it reminds me of a parking lot."
Rose: "Well, the lights aren't installed yet. I was thinking of repurposing the antimatter engine of your spaceship into a huge generator for the base, now that we have so many people. I do need the energy for a personal project too."
Erik: "That's a great idea, but it seems quite dangerous. Do you need help with-"
Rose smirked: "Good thing you like the idea, I will take that as permission, cause It's already finished, it's in the secret lab on the upper floor, wanna go see it~? bet that will impress you~."
Erik: "Let's go!" Above everything, he was still an engineer at heart.
-- At the secret lab --
Behind a thick stone and steel walls, there was now a disassembled and improved antimatter reactor. What was once used to create propulsion, was now used to generate heat at tremendous scale, as it was now encased inside a gigantic metal contraption
Erik: "Wouldn't a nuclear reactor be better?"
Rose shrugged and fell silent for a moment before speaking: "...most of the power will be redirected back underground to wake up more areas of my consciousness, and to repair damage, I currently need an enormous ammount of energy Erik, and instead of preserving that power I've been giving it away to keep this place running, but now that we are better of and i have a suitable energy source... I wanna think on myself a bit too, Erik..."
Erik was taken aback for a moment, but he then put his hand on her shoulder: "I think that's a wonderful idea, then Rose, let's go see that generator."
-- Rose's Private Lab --
The metal doors slid open with a heavy, hydraulic sigh.
A wave of warmth met them first—dry, humming, alive. The air inside the generator chamber vibrated with static energy, the kind that pressed softly against the skin and made hair stand. Thick cables as wide as tree trunks snaked along the floor and vanished into armored conduits running up the walls and into the mountain's spine.
At the center stood the generator.
It rose like a mechanical cathedral—layered rings of alloy, magnetic braces, and rotating containment arms orbiting a sealed core. Pale blue light pulsed from within, slow and steady, like a heartbeat.
Erik stopped walking.
Erik: "…Okay," he whispered. "That's… impressive."
Rose smiled faintly, watching his reaction more than the machine.
Rose: "It's stable," she said. "Far more than when it was pushing a ship across the vacuum of space. Down here, we can anchor the containment fields into the mountain's structure, and the ocean pressure helps dampen thermal spikes in case of emergency."
A low, resonant hum rippled through the chamber as the reactor completed another cycle. Above them, a circular gantry slowly rotated, maintenance drones crawling along its edge like silver insects, while bots checked sensors and streams of data continuously.
Erik stepped closer, eyes scanning every component.
Erik: "You reinforced the casing… and rerouted the exhaust through geothermal channels…" he muttered, half to himself. "You're feeding excess heat into the underwater vents?."
Rose nodded: "It prevents thermal blooms near the surface. The oceanic ecosystem remains stable. It mostly goes to the crabman city, that way the crabpeople won't be as cold, and those deep down won't even notice the difference."
He turned back toward the core, the light reflecting in his eyes.
Erik: "And this powers the entire base?"
Rose: "And more," Rose replied. "Lighting, fabrication, launch tower assembly, shield development… and a dedicated stream directed inward."
Erik: "Inward," Erik repeated.
The floor beneath them pulsed faintly, almost imperceptibly.
Rose's expression softened, as she placed a hand against the metal railing that went all around the generator to mark the safety distance.
Rose: "There are… sections of me buried deeper in the planet. Old nodes. Memory vaults. Command pathways. When the lizardmen attacked, many shut down to protect themselves as the eons passed, i had no choice but to power them down..." She paused.
Rose: "Now with this power… I can start to wake them. Repair them. Remember things I lost."
Erik stayed quiet, letting her speak.
Rose: "For the first time in eons," she continued, "I don't have to choose what part of my mind to sever into oblivion... thank you, Erik, without your spaceship-."
Another pulse ran through the generator, brighter this time. The hum deepened, like a distant storm.
Erik smiled and cut her off: "We both did the right thing."
Rose glanced at him. "We?"
He leaned against the railing too.
Erik: "You kept me alive when I crashed, though you also changed the course of my spaceship, but oh well, that other planet was a gamble anyway, who knows. You also built the pillars holding the dock and remade the base itself. You guided me when I was lost and despairing, floating on an alien planet, and together we have guided the crabpeople and octopeople into one solid community."
He shrugged. "But you are the true core of all of us, quite literally, actually, since you are literally the core of the planet we stand on."
Rose laughed softly: "It's a joint effort indeed, Erik, though I won't deny that I do the most part around here~."
For a moment, neither spoke.
Then the chamber lights flickered.
Once.
Twice.
A sharper pulse echoed through the floor—stronger, deeper, coming not from the generator, but from far below.
Rose froze.
Her pupils contracted, gaze unfocusing as streams of data flooded her consciousness.
Erik: "…Rose?" Erik asked.
She didn't answer.
The hum of the reactor shifted pitch, responding automatically to a surge in demand. Cables vibrated. Status panels flashed.
Then Rose inhaled sharply: "They're… waking up," she whispered.
Erik: "Who is?"
Rose: "My deep nodes. Sections of my core architecture I haven't felt since… since the war..."
The walls trembled slightly as power rerouted into the depths of the mountain and deep into the planet.
Erik steadied himself on the railing. "Is that safe?"
Rose : "I don't know yet, but I feel whole and- UGHHH." she groaned, suddenly grabbing her head in pain.
Erik: "Are you okay?!" supporting her.
Rose: "...lots of damage, my organic parts are in shambles, poison, rot... I can feel it far away, damage accumulated for a long time, must be that poisoning ritual of the lizardmen, pouring down poison... ugh, and there's... something else, what even is... this?"
Her voice carried both awe and something else—fear.
Suddenly, a new sound emerged beneath the mechanical hum.
A distant tremor making the entire lab vibrate slightly.
Not from the reactor.
The planet's core itself was trembling.
Erik looked down instinctively, as if he could see through kilometers of rock.
Erik: "What was that?"
Rose's expression changed completely—calculation, alertness, a flicker of alarm.
Rose: "…That shouldn't be happening, how... since when..."
Erik: "Rose?"
She turned toward him slowly.
Rose: "There are structures down there," she said. "Old ones. Older than my current installation. Fragments of the original systems that built this world's planet before i was installed as the core, the evolution fields and other things, all originates from there, it seems like a vault... thanks to the forced restart I seem to have become aware of its existence, I still can't access it but... now at least I know it's there, and it seems to be gathering power, I will cut the extra power to it for now-." Rose grabbed her head once more "ugh"
Another tremor rolled upward. Dust shook loose from the ceiling.
Erik's stomach tightened: "What now, what happened?"
Rose's face paled as she talked to herself: "I... how... I was denied access how...? shit!" Rose closed her eyes and concentrated for a few minutes before sighing in relief "That could have been bad". She then turned to Erik "Bad news or good news first?"
Erik: "Good news first."
Rose: "I can calculate faster than before, and can remember more things, although a good amount of the data and memories seem to be corrupted, so it will take a while to go through everything. Also, my reach of search now envelops way farther away, I can send signals to known brainwaves even if they are really far away, we could even communicate on orbit in this entire star system with just a slight delay."
Erik: "That's great, ...and the bad news?"
Rose: "Inside that... vault chamber, there seems to be something alive, and it tried to take control away from me. Luckily, I managed to cut it off and severed the neural cable connections to it. We will need to go down there to investigate if we want to know more though. I can feel it, it's awake and starving."
Erik: "Is it a threat? How's still alive?"
Rose didn't answer immediately: "Let me show you."
Deep below them, something massive shifted.
Then, through her mental link, Erik felt it—
A presence.
Cold.
Ancient.
Awake.
HUNGRY.
Rejecting their probing and pushing their minds away with a mental scream like millions of voices shouting at the same time on their minds.
Rose's voice dropped: "Ugh! I don't feel comfortable having something like that inside my brain..."
Erik nodded: "I get it, it seems... extremely unsettling. How do we even get down there?"
Rose: "The main facility, from where the lizardmen pour poison
and built their city on top of. We can exterminate the lizardmen and go down there, two birds with one stone~."
Erik nodded: "Indeed, we should focus on getting a satellite network up first, though, with some spy satellites we can easily track down their forces, reconnaissance, and logistics are key in warfare."
Rose watched him for a moment in thought.
Then she nodded.
Rose: "You're right. We need visibility first to attack the lizardmen's capital and take it over. We will also need satellites to connect to the galactic network in the near future anyway."
Erik nodded. "We will map the lizardmen's movements, identify the location of the main access hub, supply routes, and command hubs. Once we understand the surface… then we attack, we will first cut their supplies and weaken them this way."
Rose: "The launch tower assembly is already at seventy-three percent. With the new generator output, fabrication speed should increase. We should be able to attempt a first satellite launch within… twelve days."
Erik raised an eyebrow: "Just twelve days?"
Rose smirked faintly: "You forget who's building it, I will set a double-use crane, the rockets will float to the surface from the submarine bay, and get picked up and set on the launch platform."
-- Days Later --
The base transformed into a storm of coordinated motion.
Metal rang. Nanobots shimmered like drifting mist along scaffolding. Octopeople maneuvered heavy components with fluid precision, crabpeople hauled reinforced plates across transport rails, and Rose's drones stitched it all together in perfect synchronization.
Outside, the surface dock station, the launch tower quickly rose, its metal claws rising giant steel beams from below like a skeletal giant taking shape, its segmented arms slowly closing and opening as calibration routines tested their range. Magnetic locks pulsed. Stabilizers drilled deep into the bedrock to make the docking platform more stable.
Erik stood beside Shana and Timberly, watching the structure grow.
Shana crossed her arms: "We've come a long way..."
Erik chuckled: "We are about to reach planetary scale now, but even that... is just the beginning."
Shana smirked, then her expression turned serious: "You felt it too, didn't you? That thing Rose mentioned, all octopeople felt it, probably all organisms on the planet did, a sudden chill."
Timberly: "It almost caused an accident in the crabmen city as the second dome was being built, the chill made warriors drop their blocks, thankfully, no one was harmed."
Erik didn't answer immediately.
That presence. Something… layered. Like multiple minds compressed into one starving awareness, it was both an unforgettable feeling and hard to put into words.
Erik finally nodded. "Yeah. I felt it, thanks to Rose, I felt it quite clearly."
Shana: "Do we trust it stays contained?"
Erik looked toward the floor.
Erik: "…I trust Rose, I'm sure she will consider all possibilities."
-- Deep Below the Planet --
Far beneath steel, stone, and ocean pressure…
Past abandoned tunnels and facilities.
Past ancient conduits.
A sealed vault pulsed faintly, veins of dim energy crawling across its surface like dying lightning.
Severed neural cables twitched weakly where Rose had blown them off with a power overload.
Inside the dark vault
Something moved.
A slow, grinding shift.
Not entirely mechanical nor organic.
A shape.
Massive.
Curled.
Breathing… but not through lungs.
It sensed the power around it. The surge. The awakening systems. The return of the planetary core.
And hunger followed instinctively.
It pressed outward, testing the silence where a connection once existed.
Nothing.
Cut off.
Alone.
Hungry.
But awake. It had waited for eons, trapped all alone.
-- Back at the Base --
Night fell across the ocean surface, and the dock base glowed brighter than ever.
Rose and Erik stood on the observation platform overlooking the launch tower, now bathed in floodlights.
The generator's steady pulse vibrated through the entire mountain base like a second heartbeat for the entire civilization.
Rose spoke softly.
Rose: "It noticed when I reconnected to my deeper systems."
Erik: "The thing in the vault... any idea what it could be?"
Rose shrugged: "I can only imagine, a guardian creature? Maybe an ancient one left behind? Anything is possible in such a vault."
Erik nodded: "Then it's not an immediate threat. Satellites first. Then we weaken the lizardmen, and take back the main access to your core. Then we go down and deal with whatever that thing is."
Rose studied him, a faint smile returning.
Rose: "Did you think it would be like this when you decided to become a colonist?"
Erik: "What do you mean?"
Rose: "I mean, life on another planet, planning wars and planetary defenses."
He shrugged: "Well, I have to give credit to my training, we were all trained in so many kinds of scenarios... including wars against alien hostile species, but I bet no one on Earth could have expected something like this."
Rose laughed quietly: "Probably not."
-- Ten Days Later --
Over the launch platform now stood a rocket carrying a heavy payload, dozens of small satellites, and AI 2137. His mission was to reconnect with his old body space fortress, to act as a space port. Lots of materials would be needed to repair the space fortress, so it wouldn't be finished overnight. They would also need to reuse all the destroyed spaceships in orbit to fix the huge hole in the center of the space fortress.
Erik stood on the access door to the top of the rocket after a final inspection: "Everything okay?"
AI 2137: *All systems ready, prepared for launch!* A hint of excitement in his voice.
Erik: "Alright, haha, good luck."
AI 2137: *Of course, I live to serve lady Rose."
Erik: "...hey 2137, do you want a name too? like Rose?"
AI 2137 shook his head: *...I shall think about it, Erik*
Erik nodded and closed the door, descending down on an elevator.
Meanwhile, under the surface, the crabman city was finally finished, all the water had been pumped out once the second dome was finished, it was now completely dry and with its own heating and systems, no longer having anything to envy the main octopeople base, the huge second dome had reinforced the first one, tripling its original strength, now fully capable of enduring the water and air pressure.
On the mountain base, the lowest floor had also been finished, it was supposed to become a new field and forest to grow even more kinds of foods and products from Earth, while also cleaning the air of the base.
A countdown then started as an alarm rang on the dock base launch area.
*Launch in 10... 9... 8... 7... 6... 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... take off*
The fire from the rocket engines was redirected through tubes, hitting the water surface and producing clouds of steam as it slowly rose into the skies, burning liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen.