Dr. Elara Voss adjusted the visor of her helmet, the thin glass fogging with her breath as she stared at the jagged silhouette of Kael-9. The planet’s twin suns hung low on the horizon, casting long shadows across the rust-colored dunes. Her boots sank into the fine dust as she stepped off the landing craft, the weight of her pack pressing against her shoulders. The air was thin, sharp with the tang of iron, and every breath felt like swallowing shards of glass. She had spent three years chasing this signal—faint, irregular, and impossible. Now it was gone.
The comms unit on her wrist flickered, static crackling through the speaker. “Elara, do you copy?” The voice was strained, familiar. Captain Renn. His tone was clipped, but she heard the undercurrent of worry. “We lost the signal ten minutes ago. Whatever you’re dealing with, it’s not natural.”
She crouched beside the abandoned drone, its metallic frame scorched and twisted. The drone’s camera lens was shattered, but the data core still pulsed faintly, a blue glow seeping through the cracks. She pulled it free, fingers numb as she pressed it to her chest. The core was warm. Too warm.
“I’m not alone here,” she said, her voice steady despite the chill crawling up her spine. “Something’s alive on this planet.”
The wind howled, carrying with it a low, resonant hum that vibrated in her bones. It wasn’t natural. It wasn’t mechanical. It was… waiting.
—
The cavern opened beneath the dunes, a yawning maw of black stone and bioluminescent veins pulsing with a sickly green light. Elara’s flashlight beam cut through the darkness, revealing walls slick with a viscous fluid that dripped in slow, deliberate arcs. The air here was heavier, thick with the scent of decay and something metallic—like blood.
She stepped carefully, her boots slithering on the damp surface. The data core in her hand throbbed, syncing with the faint hum that had followed her since she entered. It wasn’t a sound; it was a presence. A hunger.
“Elara, we’re losing you,” Renn’s voice crackled. “If this is a trap—”
“It’s not,” she interrupted, her pulse hammering. The walls around her seemed to pulse in time with the core, as if the cave itself was alive. She pressed forward, the beam of her light catching glimpses of something moving in the distance—shapes that dissolved when she focused on them.
A sudden tremor shook the ground, sending a cascade of dust from the ceiling. The hum deepened, resonating in her skull. She stumbled, clutching the core as it burned against her palm. The cave wasn’t just alive; it was remembering.
—
The chamber at the heart of the cavern was vast, its ceiling lost in darkness. Suspended in the air were hundreds of crystalline structures, each one a different shade of green and gold, pulsing in a slow, rhythmic pattern. At the center stood a monolithic spire, its surface etched with symbols that shifted when she looked at them.
Elara approached, her breath shallow. The core in her hand flared, casting jagged shadows across the walls. The symbols on the spire responded, their patterns shifting faster, more frenetically. She reached out, fingers brushing the surface.
A surge of heat flooded her veins, and suddenly she was everywhere at once. She saw the colony—burning, collapsing, people screaming. She saw the spire before it was built, a thing of light and shadow, ancient and unknowable. She saw herself, standing here, but different—older, wiser, broken.
The vision shattered. She stumbled back, gasping. The spire’s glow dimmed, and the hum softened to a whisper.
“Elara?” Renn’s voice was distant now, as if filtered through water. “What did you see?”
She didn’t answer. The core in her hand was cold, lifeless. The spire’s glow had gone dark. Something had changed.
—
The return journey was a blur of dust and shadow. Elara’s boots left no tracks in the fine red sand, as if the planet itself was erasing her existence. The comms unit crackled with static, Renn’s voice growing fainter with each passing second.
She reached the landing craft just as the suns dipped below the horizon, painting the sky in hues of crimson and violet. The drone’s body lay abandoned, its remains scattered like broken bones. She climbed into the cockpit, hands shaking as she powered up the systems.
The data core sat on the console, its surface smooth and unmarked. She stared at it, remembering the visions, the weight of whatever had passed through her. The spire had shown her something—something she wasn’t meant to see.
“Elara,” Renn said, his voice now clear, urgent. “What’s happening? Why did the signal cut out?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she activated the core, watching as it pulsed once, then twice, before going dark. The spire was silent. The planet was still.
But she knew the truth now. Kael-9 wasn’t a dead world. It was a wound, and the thing inside it was waiting—for her, for others, for the next time the stars aligned.
She closed her eyes, the weight of the core in her hand a reminder of what she had seen. The luminous veil had lifted, and beyond it, something vast and unknowable stirred.
