Aftermath - Ann Aguirre [93]
I ascend first. Vel says it’s so he can catch me, but if it were me, I’d want someone else to test the integrity of the structure. He’s like me in that respect. I don’t argue because I’m dying to see what’s up there, and tired of sleeping on the hard ground. At least this place has a roof, and it appears to be mostly intact. Not that it’s rained since we’ve been here.
With care, I manage to scramble over the broken lip of the wall and into the tilting floor. The bot is waiting for us patiently, as if it has no concept of time. Most likely, it doesn’t, or at least, not in the same way that we do. It knows time has passed, but it’s irrelevant to something that can keep going for thousands of turns. While I wonder how that’s even possible, Vel resumes his discussion with it.
At the conclusion, it takes us through two solid double doors, which it unseals as it goes. Air hisses out as if it hasn’t been opened for a long, long time. Behind Vel, I enter a vault of some kind, filled with unfamiliar technology. Panels with rows of colored lights, silver coils twined around a flat disc with notched edges.
“Can you use any of this to repair our gear?”
“Perhaps,” he answers. “Or to replace it.”
Devices whir to life in our presence, and the bot circles the room, performing what I take to be maintenance. I’m already bored, in addition to tired, beyond filthy, and hungry, so I sit down on the pristine floor while Vel communes with the machines. At some point, I doze off because the next thing I know, he’s waking me.
“There are terabytes of data here, Sirantha, a treasure trove of immense and unbelievable proportions.”
“Did you fix your handheld?” While I’m happy that we’ve discovered the mother lode of Maker data, I must focus on practical concerns first.
“I did.”
“Learn anything about the bot?”
“It is ten thousand turns old.”
That leaves me wide-eyed in astonishment. “How?”
“It is self-maintaining, self-sustaining. Its power core appears to be solar-powered, and it can generate replacement parts here.”
“Which is how you fixed your tech?”
“Precisely.”
“I don’t suppose there’s a kitchen-mate.” Damn, I’m hungry.
“Not here, but I have not explored the whole complex by any means.”
“There’s more?”
“The vault has a back egress, accessible only from within. I believe we have only discovered the tip of their marvels.”
“Why is it helping us?”
“It is programmed to assist friendly sentients and to share knowledge with those who possess the wherewithal to ask for it.”
“The Makers figured if anyone showed up and was able to ask, they should be served.” I ponder that, pushing to my feet. “But what happened to them? Where are they now?”
“From the best of what I have been able to decipher with the bot’s help, there was a cataclysmic event. Global weather patterns were disrupted, solar flares went wild, and only a few ships made it off the homeworld.”
Chills ripple through me. “This is the Maker homeworld?”
They might’ve called themselves the Sha-Fen, but that means nothing to me. I imagine a handful of vessels setting out from here, and seeding their technology along the way. Nobody else in the galaxy knows this.
CHAPTER 29
The bot unlocks the door for us at the back of the vault. It swings open, a seamless exit, and I never would’ve known it was there.
After talking to the machine a little more, Vel turns to me. “It will not accompany us. Its task is to guard this room, not explore what lies beyond.”
That bodes well. Still, he cracks a torch-tube, and we set off into the darkness. There are no artificial lights here. This appears to be an underground tunnel, not dissimilar to the one Dace led us through. If there was some cataclysmic event, there may have been a time when the surface of this planet wasn’t safe to travel on. The Makers would’ve gotten in the habit of building