The interior of the Core didn't look like a laboratory. It looked like a tomb.
As the massive obsidian airlock hissed shut behind the five training mechs, the methane was drained away, replaced by a stale, recycled oxygen that tasted of copper and ozone. Luke and Zane were the first to pop their cockpit hatches, dropping onto the cold, black floor plates.
"Check your Geiger counters," Mira whispered, her voice echoing too loudly in the vaulted chamber. "The background radiation is low, but the bio-signs... they're off the charts."
They moved forward, their flashlights cutting through a thick, hanging mist. The walls weren't made of steel; they were woven from the same black, fibrous material as the Drealius Shards, pulsing with a faint, rhythmic violet light that matched the thrumming in Luke's wrist.
The Harvest Gallery
They turned a corner into a central hub, and Jax let out a choked sound, his flashlight dropping to the floor.
Rows upon rows of translucent, amber-tinted pods lined the walls, stretching up into the darkness of the ceiling. There were thousands of them. Inside each one, suspended in a thick, amniotic version of the black oil, was a human.
"These aren't the New Terra colonists," Sloane breathed, her hand trembling as she wiped the frost from the glass of a nearby pod. "Look at the uniforms. These are United Sol soldiers from the original Siege of Titan."
"They were reported MIA," Zane hissed, his face contorting with rage. "The military told the families they were vaporized in the methane storms. But they've been here... for thirty years."
The Living Battery
Luke walked toward the center of the room, drawn by a hum that only he could hear. There, a massive, crystalline pillar rose from the floor, connected to every pod by a web of black tendrils.
"They aren't just being preserved, Zane," Luke said, his voice hollow. He touched the glass of a pod containing a young woman. Her eyes were closed, but her skin was a map of glowing violet veins. "They're being used as processors. The Prometheus AI isn't code. It's the collective brainpower of a lost generation."
"It's a farm," Mira whispered, her scanner chirping frantically. "The Senator didn't just find the Drealius tech. He's trying to improve it. He's using human intuition to make the Shards faster, smarter... more lethal."
The Ghost in the Glass
Suddenly, a light flickered at the far end of the gallery. A pod, unlike the others, was draped in a United Sol flag—a tattered, scorched piece of fabric.
Zane and Luke ran toward it. Inside, a man sat suspended in the oil. He looked remarkably like their father, but younger—the age he would have been during the first Siege.
"Is that... Dad?" Zane gasped, his hand slamming against the glass.
"No," Luke said, his violet-stained hand pressing against the surface. The oil inside the pod reacted to his touch, swirling in a violent spiral. "Look at the serial number on the suit. It's Corporal Miller. The man Dad mentioned in the Abyss."
The man in the pod suddenly snapped his eyes open. They weren't brown or blue; they were solid, glowing white. He didn't speak, but his mouth moved, and the speakers in the room crackled to life with a thousand overlapping voices.
"...The General... failed... the Harvest... is... inevitable..."
"Who are you?" Luke shouted.
"...We are the foundation... we are the Prometheus... and you, Luke Hampton... are the final piece of the bridge."
The Alarm
Before they could ask another question, the room's lighting shifted from violet to a harsh, blinding red.
"We've been made!" Sloane yelled, looking at her wrist-comm. "A high-frequency burst just left the Core. My father's Iron-Guard is dropping from orbit. They'll be here in twenty minutes."
"We can't leave them like this!" Zane roared, pointing at the pods. "We have to wake them up!"
"If we break the pods now, the shock will kill them," Mira said, her eyes wide with panic. "The oil is the only thing keeping their hearts beating."
Luke looked at the central pillar, then at his own arm. The black threads were reaching for his elbow now, hunger radiating from the mutation. "I can't wake them," Luke said, his voice dropping into that terrifying 'zone' their father used to have. "But I can copy them. I can take their memories, their data... and I can prove what the Senator did."
"Luke, don't!" Zane grabbed his brother's shoulder. "If you plug into that pillar, you might not come back!"
"We're out of time, Zane!" Luke shouted back. "Download the logs! I'll hold the connection! Get back to the mechs!"