The lift slid down in near silence, the brushed-steel walls reflecting the glow from the modern overhead panels. Willow stood with her hands in her pockets, watching the red dots above the door making the letter M as she waited for it to turn into an L. There was no rattle of chains or groan of gears, just the low hum of machinery moving her deeper into Building C's sublevels.
The transition was so smooth that she barely felt the moment the elevator slowed. With a soft chime, the doors parted, spilling a wedge of pale light into a corridor that looked like it belonged to a different decade entirely. She stepped out of the elevator, leaving the shiny brass buttons and spacious interior behind.
The polished steel gave way to stone walls mottled with age, their corners softened by dust. Half the fluorescent strips overhead were dead, leaving uneven pools of light along the tiled floor. The air was cooler here, carrying the faint scent of an old building that needed to be cleaned. Willow stepped out, the sound of her boots echoing back to her. She let her eyes roam, taking in the chipped paint, cracking walls, and dozens of sporadically left carts full of supplies. This truly was just a storage bay.
She started down the hall at an easy pace, brushing past a cart full of laundry that needed to be done. She spotted a row of washers in a side room, which made perfect sense. Some other carts had weapons and materials, things the soldiers carried on them daily. Everything down here made sense and kept the above ground orderly and without the clutter of things like washing machines or old storage shelves full of extra backstock.
She moved past another cart stacked with sealed ration crates, the kind stamped with dates that were still months out. A quick glance into an open doorway revealed shelves lined with spare boots and neatly folded uniforms, all tagged and waiting for distribution.
It was all so ordinary, so functional, that her guard started to dip. This was one of the last places that hadn't been checked yet, but there was no indication that a gathering of warmongers was using this as their base.
Where the hell would they even be meeting at? There is no way they don't talk as a group about plans and movements.
She kept walking, eyes scanning the next row of carts and storage rooms, but it was all the same: maintenance gear, laundry, rations, spare equipment. Nothing with a whiff of secrecy.
Unless they've got a hidden room under the washers, I might be out of luck down here she thought dryly, stepping around a mop bucket left in the middle of the hall.
The next room had a door stuck half-open, and she nudged it wider with her foot. Inside, the air was warm and smelled faintly of clean clothes. A single dryer rumbled somewhere in the back. Someone had left a uniform jacket hanging over a chair, and Willow resisted the urge to check the pockets for some snacks or money.
She backed out, continuing on, letting her pace stay slow. If she looked like she was in a hurry, someone might ask her why. If she moved like she belonged, no one would even glance if they saw her.
Her satchel brushed her side with every step, the weight inside shifting slightly. She kept her clipboard angled outward, occasionally jotting a meaningless squiggle in case anyone passed by. Courier camouflage, as Joren liked to call it. Down here, she felt that camouflage was pretty useless if she got caught.
Another storage room. Another stack of old crates. One of them was labeled Cleaning – Acid, Heavy Duty. She lingered on that for half a second, wondering if it was the kind of acid that melted bones or the kind that stripped rust and paint off of concrete.
The hum of machinery was constant here: dryers, ventilation fans, maybe a water pump somewhere deeper in the corridors. Her boots clicked lightly on smooth concrete, and the sound seemed to travel too far for such narrow halls. Places like this always felt so spacious, but the echoes never let you forget you were alone.
And yet, despite all the signs of life — warm machines, fresh laundry, stocked gear — she hadn't seen a single person down here since stepping off the lift.
It was eerie, really. All this movement implied by the carts and machines, yet no actual people in sight. The lift was operational today, unlike the conversations Bart overheard yesterday implied, so where was everybody?
She moved on, letting her footsteps set a slow, steady rhythm. No sense looking like she was searching for anything because couriers weren't supposed to. They just moved from point A to point B, blending into the crowd.
She passed another stack of folded uniforms in plastic wrap, a cart of mops, and an open doorway full of stacked bunks that smelled faintly of detergent and dust.
"Maybe I should try on one of these uniforms..." She said to herself, a smile starting to form. "I doubt they would mind me taking one of these to blend in a little better."
Her hand hovered over the nearest folded stack, fingertips brushing the plastic. The fabric inside looked crisp and unused, exactly her size, too. She imagined waltzing right through a checkpoint, clipboard in hand, daring someone to call her bluff.
"Yeah… why not," she murmured.
With a quick glance over her shoulder, she peeled the plastic open just enough to slide the uniform free and set it on top of the unopened packs. It smelled faintly of starch, the kind that made fabric hold a perfect shape.
She took off her courier disguise, slipping out of the shirt first as it caught on to her neatly combed ginger hair, still pinned in a tight military bun. She squatted down to unlace her boots, then slipped out of her thin courier pants next. She tucked it all neatly into a stack and slipped it into the satchel. The hallway was still and empty, the hum of ventilation her only audience.
The air felt cold against her bare skin as she shook out the stiffness before stepping into her new pants. They were heavier than her courier clothes, the seams pressing firm lines against the outside of her legs. She ran her hands down the creases on the sides, pulling on them as she tried her best to straighten them out. She slipped each of her pale arms into the jacket, the fabric still holding the crisp folds from its packaging. She fastened each button with deliberate care, slowly and methodically.
She rolled her shoulders, testing the fit, then adjusted the collar until it sat just right. She grabbed the hat off of the pile and put it on, moving it around until it fit tightly on her head, a difficult ask when she had a bun in her hair.
The satchel strap settled diagonally across her chest, the weight of her old disguise now hidden inside. Clipboard in hand, she let out a slow breath. If she kept her head down, no one would question her presence here now that she looked the part.
She had meant to keep moving straight down the main row of storage rooms, but the minutes spent changing had tilted her sense of direction just enough that her path veered off course.
The hallway she chose wasn't on her mental map, it was just on the left of the room she had entered. A cart blocked two thirds of the hallway entrance piled with old air conditioning units. She moved her hips to the side to narrowly avoid hitting the cart as she walked by.
She stepped around it without thinking about her original plan of pathing, boots clicking softly on the smooth concrete. The air here felt cooler, the sound of machinery a little more distant. A few paces in, she realized she hadn't passed this way before.
She wasn't looking for anything in particular, just letting her boots carry her while she kept her clipboard tucked casually against her side.
Her hand drifted to the wall, fingers brushing over that smooth, cracking stone that was natural to this labyrinth of a facility. Some spots were cool to the touch, others faintly warm where pipes must have run just beneath. The air felt still here, the mechanical hum muted like the walls were thicker.
She passed a few more storage doors, all sealed and unlabeled. A stack of empty crates leaned haphazardly against one wall, the kind of clutter she'd been seeing all morning. The smell was a faint blend of oil and dust. It was not unpleasant, but stale, like no one had installed ventilation in this part of the area before.
A little farther on, the wall on her left changed texture. The usual stone gave way to a painted panel, its surface scuffed and chipped with white paint. She let her fingertips trail over it as she walked, feeling the way the paint caught on her skin in small flakes.
The paint here was… softer.
She slowed without meaning to, retracing her steps as she began pressing her thumb into the paint on the ventilation cover. The surface gave under the pressure, and when she pulled her nail away, a thin curl of paint peeled up with it.
She absolutely loved that feeling, the rubbery paint like it was gum. She peeled some more of it off in small chunks, rolling it up into a ball. She pressed her fingernail into the ball, watching it depress the paint stack into what loosely resembled a peach. That gum-like paint slowly began to inflate back to its original shape, which she pushed her finger into once again.
She scraped another strip loose, this one long enough to coil between her fingers. The quiet stretch of hallway made the act feel almost meditative: just her, the faint rasp of peeling paint, and the satisfying give of that strange surface.
It wasn't until she stepped back to admire her handiwork — a small bare patch in the sea of peeling white — that the scale of the panel registered.
Her gaze followed the edges of the panel, grasping the sheer size of it. The thing wasn't just a ventilation cover. It was easily twice her height, and nearly as wide as the hallway itself. This was a wall panel for the world's largest vent.
She tossed the little ball of paint to the floor behind her and stepped closer, running her fingers along the panel's edge. Up close, she could see the faint glow of lights in the distance. One corner had a notch that resembled some sort of handle.
Could this thing actually open?
The panel shifted with a low metallic groan when she pulled. A draft of cooler air breathed through the opening, carrying the scent of dust and something faintly metallic. She widened the gap and slipped inside before she could talk herself out of it.
On the other side, the air felt denser, quieter. The light came in thin, fractured beams from down the hall, illuminating the way as she traversed deeper into the den. She moved slowly, boots scuffing the fine layer of fabric that lined the floor. This hallway was in way better shape then the rest of the parts she saw down here.
Her clipboard felt heavier in her hand as she passed an open doorway into what she had originally assumed was an abandoned maintenance bay.
With all of the lights and fancy trim work, it didn't match the rest of the service level at all. The tables were polished wood, the shelves neatly packed with binders whose labels looked recently put on. A half-played game of cards sat frozen on one corner table, chips stacked neatly beside it as though the players had just stepped out.
She lingered at the doorway, scanning the space. No dust. No cobwebs. It was… maintained?
The thought made her shoulders tense.
Her boots carried her past without breaking stride, deeper into the strange wing. The hallway beyond felt even more insulated, like the air was pressing gently against her skin. The lights here were spaced far apart, each one surrounded by decorative metalwork that didn't belong in a utility corridor.
She passed another room, this one filled with rows of lockers and a long mirror bolted to the far wall. A rack of pressed uniforms stood near the door, every jacket perfectly aligned, tags still hanging from the sleeves.
The sound of her own breathing became louder to her ears the farther she went. The facility's usual hum had vanished entirely, replaced by a kind of low, padded silence. It was unsettling. She rounded another corner and found herself in a wide chamber, lit by a grid of warm ceiling lamps. The floor here was tiled, clean, almost glossy. Two large doors sat at the far end, both unmarked, both the kind that required her to be in the know, which she definitely didn't know.
She stepped toward them, her curiosity outweighing the knot forming in her gut. She was halfway across the room when the sound finally came.
Boots on tile, slow and unhurried.
She froze. Her hand twitched on the clipboard in her hand, clearly startled.
"Hey, who are you?" a voice said from a doorway she walked past only moments ago.