Metro Day: 1,095.
Lili's Age: 7 years, 6 months approximately.
Laying in her bed in a deep sleep Lili was in peace, until suddenly a soft small light hit her, as it had for sometime now each and every morning. It was not the sun — she hadn't seen that in years — but the soft, warm glow of her lightstones flaring to life one by one in the ceiling above her head. She had them on a sort of "timer" now, switching off at "night" and on again when it was "morning." It was her own little trick for knowing when the day began in a place where time never changed.
She stretched under her oversized cloak, rubbed her eyes, then did what she always did — began counting the days.
Today she'd decided to count all the way. No skipping, no shortcuts.
"One… two… three… four…"
It was ridiculous, really. Counting all the way to one thousand and ninety-five would take forever. But in the metro, she didn't have anywhere to be or anything she really needed to do. So she counted, stubbornly, whispering numbers into the stale air while the Sergeant that nowadays acted as her sort of stuffed animal companion to keep her company during the nights slept peacefully beside her, snoring gently on their shared wooden bed as he always did.
By the time she finally reached that glorious, enormous number — "one-thousand-ninety-five!" — she punched the air in triumph and let out a loud, satisfied "Yesss, I know big numbers now!"
The Sergeant groaned without opening his eyes. "Lili… for pity's sake, keep it down. I'm sleeping."
At the sound of his voice Lili froze momentarily as she clamped her mouth shut, eyes wide. "Oh sorry…" she whispered, as she then slipped off the bed and put on her not so large military boots once more and got ready for a new day. Nowadays her clothes fit her much better than they did in the past, although that wasn't all that strange as 1095 days was a long time after all and she was after all still growing, although in the height department she wasn't making much progress as she would have liked.
Nonetheless like always she showed a gentle enthusiastic smile as she, like each day padded toward the door of the old convenience store that was now their sleeping quarters, boots crunching softly on the floor as she did so.
And instantly the station outside greeted her with a familiar sight — one that filled her with pride and a small pinch of irritation. The pride was in what they'd built together: the garden glowing under her lightstones, apple trees and vines climbing toward the ceiling, barricades solid and strong, little touches of home here and there.
The irritation came from the men. They were being lazy again.
The three riflemen were slouched in a circle on the platform, playing cards and betting with strawberries from her garden. Rask on the other hand, that big and strong, unstoppable Heavy gunner, that Rask — was sprawled on his back in a patch of white lilies, his huge chest rising and falling in the slow rhythm of deep sleep. Those flowers were the descendants of the single pot she had once carried, now spread all over the station.
The Corporal, as usual, had locked himself away in his little wooden shed, his self-built private room. He'd probably stay in there all day doing whatever it was that men did in private if no one made him come out. She didn't like that much.
The only one doing anything was the Medic — but even he wasn't cooking. He was hunched over his little "alchemist's booth," fussing with jars, boiling pots, and bundles of herbs from her garden. He said he was "testing for medicinal properties," but to her it looked like he just didn't want to make breakfast. Not that there was much to make anymore.
Protein bars had run out long ago, and they were down to the last few dusty cans the soldiers had found while scavenging further in the metro. The only real food came from her garden: apples, strawberries, peas, a few potatoes, and other bits and pieces. Everyone just picked what they wanted straight from the plants now. No cooking, no seasonings — just plain, raw food. It was… boring. And it never quite filled anyone's stomach.
Still, she decided to try and get someone moving. She marched up to Rask and gave his shoulder a shove.
"Come on! Morning exercises! I bet I'll beat you this time in real push-ups."
He cracked one eye open, groaned, and rolled over. "Later."
Frowning, she went to the riflemen next. "Do you want to maybe exercise? Or study? Or we could play hide and seek again? I thought it was fun when we did it last time, right?"
"Not today, little one," Karst muttered without looking up from his hand of cards.
"Yeah," Juno added, flicking a strawberry into the pot in the middle. "We've got a supply run tomorrow. Need to save energy."
She sighed. The Medic looked too busy to bother, and the Corporal… she didn't even want to try with him when he was in one of his quiet moods.
So she turned to the only thing that never said "no" to her: her wall.
It was just one stretch of concrete, but for the past few days she'd been trying to cover it in drawings — memories of the world before the metro, but sadly she wasn't yet all that good at drawing. Today, she decided, she'd really make something that might cheer them all up. Something with colour in it, even if she only had charcoal to work with. Something that might make the walls here in the underground look more lively, like the world outside.
She picked up her charcoal and got to work.
Lili crouched by the wall, the rough concrete cool beneath her knees. She already had the outline of a tree started from a few days ago, but today she wanted to add more — grass, flowers, maybe even the sky.
She pressed the charcoal to the wall and tried to remember exactly how the park used to look. It came to her in little fragments: green leaves shimmering in sunlight, the smell of warm soil, the far-off voices of people she didn't know but felt safe around. But every time she tried to picture the faces, the memory twisted. Smiles became too wide, eyes filled with tears, and she saw the Sad People instead.
Her hand slowed. She skipped over the people entirely, focusing on the things that couldn't look back at her — the trees, the flowers, the shapes of the clouds. The sky was harder. She remembered it as blue, endless, but her charcoal could only give her shades of grey. Still, she could make it look like the sky if she got the shading right.
Footsteps approached behind her. She didn't need to turn to know who it was — the Sergeant walked with a certain weight, slow and deliberate.
"Out of charcoal?" he asked.
She nodded without looking away from her work. "Almost."
A moment later, his hand appeared beside her shoulder, offering a fresh stick. "Here."
"Thank you," she said quietly, taking it. She hesitated, then asked, "Does this look like a tree to you?"
Halvern crouched down beside her, studying the wall like it was a tactical map. "The trunk's too thin," he said finally. "Wind would snap it in two."
She glanced sideways at him. "There's no wind down here."
"Doesn't matter. Draw it like it could stand in a storm."
She thickened the trunk, smudging the charcoal with her fingers. "Do you miss it? The outside?"
"Every day."
"What about the wind?"
He was silent for a heartbeat. "…Especially the wind."
"And the rain?"
That made him smile — just a little, barely enough to crease the corners of his eyes. "The rain most of all. Back then I didn't think much about it. But now…" He shook his head. "Now I'd give a lot to feel it on my face again."
She leaned back from the wall, looking up at the blank expanse above them where the ceiling vanished into shadows. "If we ever get out, I want to see the moon first. Then the sun. Then I'll let it rain."
"Deal," he said.
For a moment, they just stood there together, looking at the half-finished tree. Then Halvern gave her shoulder a gentle pat. "Go on, finish your sky. One day we'll see the real one again. Might as well get the practice in."
She smiled faintly and bent back to her work, the fresh stick of charcoal warm in her fingers.
With care Lili now shaded the branches carefully, letting her mind drift back to the park as she remembered it. There had been benches there, painted a dark green that peeled in the summer heat. She remembered sitting on one with her parents, her legs too short to touch the ground, the cool weight of an ice-cream cone in her hands.
Her father had been holding one too, smiling at her with that easy grin of his. Her mother's laugh had been softer, like she was trying to keep it a secret from everyone except the two of them. They had been young — younger than most parents she'd seen in the metro — and people used to say they were blessed with pure bloodlines, their hair and eyes bright in the way the holy men of the church called "the Emperor's gift."
She wanted to draw them. Right there on the bench, with the tree above and the sky behind.
But when she tried to picture their faces… there was nothing.
No smile. No laugh. No light in their eyes.
Only the last time she'd seen them.
Her father twitching on the ground, his hands clawing at the air. The sound of bones cracking as his legs spasmed. The way his face — his beautiful face — had twisted into something stretched and wet-eyed, the same dreadful grin as the other Sad People. Her mother screaming, running to him, only for the same tremor to take her too.
She remembered the jolt as her father dropped her from his shoulders. The slap of the ground against her palms. The way she had run — just run — without looking back.
Her hand trembled. The charcoal slipped from her fingers.
And then a thought came, sharp and cruel as a blade:
Maybe I could have saved them. Maybe I could have saved everyone.
She didn't remember standing up, but suddenly her knees were pressing into the floor, her hands clenched tight against her chest. The sting in her eyes blurred the wall in front of her.
"I'm sorry… I'm sorry, Mama… Papa…" Her voice broke. "I'm sorry I didn't save you. I'm sorry, I'm sorry…"
Her breathing hitched into sobs. The pain in her chest twisted tighter, rising into her head until it felt like it might split her skull.
"Lili?"
The Sergeant's voice was close now, alarmed, and then his arms were around her, pulling her small, trembling body against him. His beard scratched her temple as he turned his head, calling for the others.
The card game stopped. Chairs scraped the floor.
And then another pain came — sudden, sharp, low in her belly. So sudden that she gasped and clutched at herself.
Her vision swam. The sounds around her became muddled — boots on the floor, someone swearing, the Sergeant's voice louder now.
And then the strength left her legs entirely.
The last thing she felt was the Sergeant's grip tightening to hold her up, his voice cutting through the panic:
"Medic!"
The blackness rushed in before she could hear the answer.
***
Time had long since lost its meaning.
In the world above, there were surely still nights and days, moons and suns, winds and storms. But in the metro, all of that had dissolved into a gray sameness. Here there was only the slow pulse of lightstones dimming and brightening, the rustle of leaves in the artificial Grove, and the endless drip of water collected from condensation trays.
Four full years had passed since they had first locked themselves away in this station. And still, the outside world remained a mystery. Unreachable. Unknowable.
The only clock they had was Lili. For all this time she had kept on counting the days, and making lines into the walls. One for each day, etched carefully into the same stretch of stone, until the marks formed a forest of scratches. Every month she drew a longer line to mark the turning, and every year she circled the final cut to remind them they had survived. Today she had carved another such circle. Day one thousand, four hundred, and sixty.
She remembered Day 1095 as if it were yesterday. The day her body had first changed. The day her bleeding had begun. Back then, she had thought she was dying, fainting in Sergeant Halvern's arms before the Medic had explained what it was. He had told her it was normal, that all girls went through it eventually. But she had gone through it far earlier than expected, and the way the men had exchanged worried looks had frightened her more than the blood itself.
Now, it was just another part of her life. Another thing to endure, like the cold, like the silence. The men had grown used to it as well, though they treated her with an odd distance now, something that Lili thought was respect, or almost like reverence, as if the blood meant something sacred.
They had named their home Sanctuary not long after. It was not large. Just two platforms sealed at both ends with rubble and steel. One lined with the abandoned shops they had turned into sleeping rooms, storerooms, and a latrine. The tracks had long since become her garden, a stretch of black soil and greenery bathed in her lightstones. Even the walls had begun to change, slowly filling with her charcoal sketches of trees, skies, and memories of a world that felt less real with each passing year.
The air outside the blast doors was so cold now that ice had sealed them shut. Even the tunnels beyond the barricades were bitter and dead, filled with silence heavier than screams. The infected had gone into their strange hibernations long ago, curling into shadows in bunkers and shelters, their voices rarely carried down the rails anymore. When they were heard, it was distant — laughter that did not sound human, echoing through miles of black.
The squad no longer tested that silence.
Months ago, the Corporal had taken three men too far down the lines, in a desperate attempt to find more food, maybe even a shortcut to the spaceport. They had come back half-dead — Venn dragging Juno by his harness, Fenn staggering with a broken arm, and Karst blowing the tunnel shut behind them with a satchel charge, sealing whatever had followed.
They had all lived, but the cost lingered. Juno limped now, Fenn's arm never set right, and the Corporal's eyes had grown hollow. Lili had healed their bodies with her light, but nothing she could do reached their minds.
It was that night Sergeant Halvern made his decree: no more scavenging. No more risks. They would wait for rescue, and nothing else.
Since then, Sanctuary had been totally sealed.
They lived on what the garden could provide — apples, peas, herbs, potatoes. Enough to keep them alive, never enough to fill them. Every meal was the same handfuls of fruit and roots, eaten raw and without seasoning. No hot meals, no spices, no feasts. Just survival.
The silence followed.
No laughter. No raised voices. No songs. The Sergeant's orders were strict: no noise that might carry through the tunnels. And the men obeyed, but it wore them down. Their shoulders sagged, their eyes dulled, and even when they spoke, it was with low voices that barely stirred the air.
Lili noticed it most of all in their faces. Thinner now. Rougher. Eyes that looked at nothing.
She realized one day that she had not heard them laugh in years. Not once.
And that scared her more than the monsters beyond the doors.
And so to try and finally bring smiles to their faces and laughter into Sanctuary, she had decided to continue her work of making Sanctuary the most warm and inviting place she could.
With her little piece of charcoal, blackened from one of their long-extinguished fires, she crouched at her wall. The stone felt cold under her fingertips, almost sacred, as if she shouldn't mark it. But her need to remember was stronger. She pressed the charcoal against it and began to draw.
She wanted to capture the world as it once had been — before the silence, and before the Sad People came.
At first like always, the memories refused her, blurred and stubborn, buried under years of fear. She pressed harder, charcoal scratching tentative strokes. Slowly — gently at first — images began to surface.
She was small again, her hand tucked into her mother's warm grip as they rode the metro together. The train had been alive then, alive with people. Every seat filled, voices rising above the steady hum of the rails. She remembered perfumes sharp and sweet, the bitter bite of coffee, the tang of ozone from power lines. People wore colors back then — blues, reds, yellows — not just the endless gray of now.
Her mother had pointed them out one by one, her voice patient and gentle, telling Lili where each stranger might be going, why their work mattered. Lili had always loved to listen and ask many questions about many things, soaking up everything she could about the world around her.
Then the train had stopped at the station near the park, not far from the great spaceport where ships rose and descended like silver birds. She remembered stepping off, her tiny legs working to keep up, and the escalator waiting — an endless staircase that moved all by itself, humming like a lullaby. It had felt like magic, though now she understood it was only wires and power, the things the riflemen had taught her.
Above it had been the glass pavilion. She could still feel that moment: sunlight breaking across her face, bright and warm, the sky stretching endlessly overhead. A breeze had stirred her hair, playful, alive. She had laughed then, unable to stop herself.
The smells returned with aching clarity — blossoms on the air, grass freshly cut, bread baking, butter melting. Children shouting in play. The bell of the ice-cream vendor ringing sharp and bright. And the taste — soft, cold, impossibly sweet. The last ice-cream she ever had.
Her hand froze.
She looked down at her fingers, blackened by charcoal, and then at the wall. She had drawn it all — the metro car, the pavilion, the trees, even the sky. But when she tried to draw her parents sitting there with her, her hand shook. The lines collapsed into nothing.
Their faces would not come.
She closed her eyes, forcing the memory, but horror slipped in instead — eyes brimming with tears, mouths stretched too wide, bones snapping beneath skin. Her mother screaming, her father twitching, and then both smiling with the dead, wet grins of the Sad People.
Her hand shook violently. The charcoal slipped from her grasp, clattering against the stone. Her breath grew ragged, chest heaving.
She realized then it had been years since she had seen even her own reflection. She no longer knew what she looked like — only that her clothes fit better now, her hair was longer, her face felt older. But the details were gone. She could not remember her parents. She could not remember herself.
With trembling hands, she bent down and picked up the charcoal again. Slowly, painfully, she drew figures. A small one in the middle — herself. Two taller ones beside her, faceless, blank. Her parents as she remembered them: present, but lost.
Because in her memory, smiles belonged only to the dead.
And last of all, she drew seven more figures behind them. Tall, faceless shadows. The soldiers. Her new family. Her only family. Standing watch, as they always had, against the horrors pressing in from beyond Sanctuary's walls.
Lili curled her fingers into fists, nails biting into her palms, as she suddenly found herself fighting back tears she refused to let fall.
Then a whisper cut through the thick silence behind her, harsh and sharp. She turned.
The men were gathered again in their circle around the radio as if by some miracle after all these years it would suddenly give them the answers they were looking for. Their faces were drawn, half-lit by the weak green glow of the machine and the flickering of the lightstones above. None of them looked rested. None of them looked hopeful.
The Corporal hunched forward, his broad shoulders bent like a man trying to wring blood from stone. His hands worked furiously at the knobs, cycling through dead frequencies, listening to the same static, the same lifeless hiss. The device spat once, gave a brief stutter of crackle, then dropped back into silence. The green light dimmed again.
Nothing, there was nothing just like always.
The Sergeant stood behind him, arms folded, his face carved into a mask. The others lingered close by with arms crossed, staring hollow-eyed, feet tapping nervously against the floor.
The Corporal finally slammed his fist down on the casing, the sound ringing like a gunshot in the quiet. "I'm telling you, Sarge—there's nothing. Not a beacon, not a signal, not even background chatter. It's all gone. All of it. We're it, just like we have been ever since the fall of Achios Prime. We are the last damned ones left." His voice cracked, desperation leaking through. "And I'm telling you sarge, we can't keep rotting here. We have to move. To the spaceport. If there's even the chance of a ship—"
The Sergeant's jaw flexed, his arms tightening over his chest. "And if there isn't? You'd lead us into the jaws of death on a chance? The tunnels nearly killed you last time."
"At least it would mean doing something!" Venn snapped, standing now, eyes blazing. "What are we waiting for? Rescue? There is no rescue! You know it. You've known it for months. Admit it."
The Sergeant's hand twitched toward his sidearm, not to draw, but as if the weight of it anchored him. His voice came out low, edged with steel. "Careful, Corporal."
The tension stretched, unbearable. Then Halvern's eyes shifted, settling on her.
"Girl," he said, his voice quieter but no less sharp. "What about you? Can you sense anything? Life out there? Movement? Anything at all?"
The charcoal slipped from her hand and fell with a soft clatter. Slowly, Lili lowered herself to the cold stone floor. She pressed her ear against it, shut her eyes, and let herself sink into the silence.
The tunnels had always spoken to her. In their own way, they still did.
At first came the wind—a hollow moan threading through cracks in distant walls, rising and falling like the breath of a dying world. She knew it came from somewhere near the ruins of Achios, where bombardments had torn holes through steel and stone. It was the sound of the surface clawing at the underworld, searching for a way in.
Then came the footsteps. Slow. Shuffling. Aimless. The infected. She heard them as she always did, wandering the black, trapped in their endless, broken loops of movement. She could almost see their twisted faces when she closed her eyes, their hollow voices humming their sick, false songs.
But beyond them…
Nothing.
No thunder of artillery. No vibrations of tanks across the earth. No pulsing heartbeats of cities. No ships screaming through the skies.
Only silence. A silence so deep it seemed to press into her bones, stretching far beyond Sanctuary, beyond the city, beyond the planet itself.
She opened her eyes, trembling, and whispered the truth.
"Only the Sad People waddling around somewhere far away. Other than that there isn't anything else, even the dogs seemed to have gone."
Her words dropped into the circle like a stone into water, and for a moment there was complete silence.
Lili then slowly sat back up, dust clinging to her cheek as she spoke, her voice barely more than a whisper.
"I'm sorry Sarge, but all I can hear is the infected, far down the tunnel towards Achios Prime. But… apart from that, it's quiet. Just wind, which makes me think that there's got to be a large breach down that way."
Instantly then the Corporal's face twisted into a grimace. He slammed a hand against the side of the radio. "See, Sarge? Just like I said—nothing. No signals, no survivors. We're alone. Totally alone. The Imperium's forgotten us. If anyone was going to come, they'd have come long ago. Emperor's Throne, it could be centuries before some bureaucrat even remembers Achios exists, and even longer till someone comes. We can't keep waiting forever."
The men exchanged long, bleak glances. Silent nods passed among them, weighted with shared truth.
The Sergeant's head bowed slightly, his beard hiding his mouth. When he finally spoke, his voice was low, edged with razor steel.
"Oh? And what would you have us do then, Corporal? If the whole planet is indeed lost and we are alone, if no one is coming, what else is left other than waiting here as we have been doing thus far just fine? Do you really want us to make a run for the spaceport and die?"
Venn straightened, shoulders squared, eyes blazing. "No, Sarge. I'm saying we do the only thing we can do. We take our own fates into our own hands, we stop waiting for salvation that isn't coming, and we head to Mikri Poli's spaceport. We find a ship. Take our chances. If that fails, we find another way. But this—" he gestured to the stone walls, the Garden, the meager food "—this isn't living. This is dying by inches."
The Sergeant said nothing. His face was unreadable, his eyes dark and calculating.
But the Corporal pressed on, voice thick with emotion. "We weren't made for this. Humanity wasn't made for this. To rot underground like rats. To live off peas and apples until our bones turn brittle. I want to see the sun again. To breathe air that hasn't been recycled a thousand times by Lili's magic, or eat food that hasn't been grown by the power of magic and our own waste as fertilizer, no offence Lili. I want to believe my wife and children might still be out there, waiting. I want to hear people again. Real voices. I want to feel—" he stopped, swallowing hard, then forced the words out. "I want to feel a woman's touch once more before I grow old and die."
The silence deepened. The other men nodded unconsciously but shifted, eyes sliding away but not far enough. Their faces betrayed the same gnawing hunger, the same unspoken longing for true companionship. Lili didn't understand why, but she felt her skin crawl. Their silence filled the air with something heavy, charged, and uncomfortable, she felt it like a weight against her skin, and it made her feel funny.
The Sergeant's gaze broke the tension—snapping to Lili. His eyes lingered, and then, to everyone's surprise, his lips curled into a slight grin. "Ah, a woman's touch, now that would be nice," he said, voice dark with humor that wasn't funny. "Wouldn't that be something? Shame our little Lili here is still far too small for that."
His grin widened slightly, eliciting low, dry chuckles from the men.
Lili shrank back, her skin prickling uneasily. She didn't fully grasp their words, but their hungry gazes, their strange smiles—it all made her stomach twist into knots.
The Sergeant abruptly clapped his hands, shattering the uncomfortable silence. "Fine," he barked, suddenly decisive. "It's settled then. You're right, Corporal. All of you are right. Sanctuary's kept us alive, but it won't keep us whole. Not forever. We're heading to Mikri Poli spaceport. If there's a ship, we'll take it. If not—we'll deal with it."
The men nodded solemnly, their expressions hardening into determined grimness.
Lili should have felt relief too—an end to the waiting, a chance to see the sky again. But instead she felt dread, deep and twisting, blooming in her chest. She obeyed in silence, taping a glowing stone to her helmet, adjusting her straps, slipping her gas mask into place.
They were leaving Sanctuary.
Back to the surface.
Back to the dead world above.
Thus, nearly immediately preparations then began for the journey to the spaceport. First came food, and so Lili carefully stuffed a handful of peas into her pockets, pressing them deep into the fabric as if their reassuring weight could anchor her courage. Her fingers trembled despite her effort to still them. Next came a few strawberries, their red brightness startling against the gray of her uniform, followed by a small bundle of herbs she thought might help if someone got sick. Finally, with quiet reverence, she plucked two small white flowers from the cluster growing near her cot. She pressed them close to her heart pocket — a prayer in petals, a whisper of hope to carry with her.
Then she reached for the knife.
Once, the blade had seemed comically huge, longer than her forearm and heavier than she could hold steady. Now it fit her hand. She ran her thumb across its dulled steel, tracing the nicks and scratches that told of a dozen sharpenings. The knife had not changed — she had. Sliding it into her belt, she found its weight oddly comforting, like an old friend at her side.
Her military coat came next. It still hung awkwardly on her small frame, sleeves past her wrists, and her trousers had to be cinched tight with a belt or else they would fall, but none of that mattered, the uniform looked cool and it was warm, and it was hers. It was a true soldier's uniform. A symbol that she belonged among them, and something that would surely make her parents proud if they ever saw her now.
Then she fastened her helmet, pulled her mask snug over her face, and tied one of her stones to the side of the helm. The faint bluish glow washed her cheek, warm and steady, a little piece of safety in the dark.
Around her, the men moved with the focus of ritual.
Each soldier strapped lightstones to their helmets. Lili had tuned them herself so that with a thought or a whispered word, the glow could focus into sharp beams like flashlights. As the stones clicked into place, their pale rays cut into the dimness, painting harsh streaks across the walls.
More stones were taped and bound beneath armor plates, pressed to skin where they could heal burns, cuts, or even punctures. No one wanted to waste their miracle-makers in plain view — stealth mattered — so they carried their light in secret, hidden beneath flak and steel. Inspired by them Lili too quickly got to work on taping stones to her body, although she didn't take too many as they were heavy but of course not as heavy as the men's armour and overall gear.
Each man wore a heavy rucksack, supplies rattling within: spare charge packs, ration tins, a few canteens, coils of tape. Most of all ammunition weighed them down, but none complained and merely strapped to their weapons their bayonets. The Heavy tightened the harness across his massive chest, the barrel of his rotary lascannon gleaming faintly in the glow of his helm-light. The thick cable linking weapon to his backpack hummed as he tested it once, the faint crackle of charge echoing like distant thunder.
Then the Sergeant's voice cut through the quiet. "Masks on boy's, it's time to meet destiny."
At those words seven men nodded, and they obeyed in silence, filters clicking as the seals of their masks locked into place. The faint hiss of respirators filled the air. Lili followed suit, tugging her straps until they bit against her cheeks. The Sergeant checked hers himself, his fingers tightening the buckles, his eyes steady on hers for a long second. Then he gave a firm nod.
Together they turned toward the chosen exit — an old maintenance door set into the wall, long hidden beneath barricade and rubble. One by one, they pulled the debris clear. Stones shifted. Metal screeched. The noise, after years of silence, felt loud enough to wake the dead.
At last, the doorway stood revealed: a slab of rusting steel scarred with age and neglect. A faint draft breathed through its seams, carrying the bitter scent of dust and frozen air.
The squad formed up. Rifles clicked to ready, barrels leveled. Rask took his place slightly forward, lascannon held low but primed, the glow of his optics catching the light. The riflemen stacked in, two on either side of the door, muzzles aimed at the black gap they were about to open.
Lili clung close to the Sergeant at the rear, her small form half-hidden behind his broad, armored frame. She could hear her own heartbeat pounding in her ears, louder even than the groaning creak as Karst braced himself and pulled on the steel handle.
The door screamed.
Metal shrieked in protest, echoing down the tunnels beyond, the sound bouncing back at them like the roar of some great beast. Cold air rushed in, smelling of rust and ash, and the void beyond gaped open.
Two rifle beams cut across the dark, slicing through swirling dust motes that drifted like pale ghosts.
For the first time in years, Lili prepared to step into the world beyond Sanctuary, and it's darkness frightened her.