Moira had agreed to the arrangement, but it came with a condition. Of course she was to have the last word. Before either of them could pursue what they actually wanted, Ashe would have to prove she could be trusted. And Moira had chosen to test that by sending her into Lethon, toward a place nobody in Railen had willingly approached in years. And she would send Cral with her.
The Dripper, they called it. That's where Moira would send Ashe. A place somewhere deep within the ruins where HSM concentrations were said to be so high that traces of it lingered directly in the air itself. Railen had once depended on it, back when deaths were common and emergents still turned into drifts with frightening regularity. But over time, the drift activity surrounding the area quickly became too dense and too risky until emergents stopped appearing altogether. So priorities changed. Eventually the place stopped being as important as it once was. It became the sort of thing people knew about and nothing more. A name associated with death, or with scavengers desperate enough to loot the ruins despite the cost.
But now it had become relevant again. The corruption in Ashe's body was too severe, and too unpredictable. Based on past experience, the risks ranged from sudden bursts of unstable and destructive energy, similar to what had already occurred near the market area back in Railen, to complete drift transformation, which would end both her and anyone around her almost immediately. And this came from cases where corruption was much lower than what Ashe was showing. The HSM from the seeds she had used so far might have bought her time, but that eighty-four percent wasn't something Moira was willing to gamble on. She wouldn't risk the lives of her men and she had no intention of using Railen's own resources on this either. The concentration at the Dripper was the only option she was willing to consider. Whether it would actually work, neither of them knew.
Ashe stood at the edge of a broken platform where Railen's outermost structures came closest, and she looked out at what lay ahead. There was a drop ahead where the floor had collapsed, leaving behind a boundary of broken stone between the two places.
Cral appeared beside her not long after.
Moira had explained that it knew how to track drifts, that it had the skills to provide at least some measure of safety on her behalf, though there were no guarantees. If things went wrong, she would still be left to fend for herself.
Ashe had agreed to all of it because Lethon interested her. The past interested her. It was too present, too obvious, and yet nobody seemed capable of explaining any of it. It felt like something imprinted deep inside her, a need to understand that she couldn't ignore, regardless of the cost.
Cral moved with its usual silent elegance and stopped once they stood nearly shoulder to shoulder. Whether it was studying the space ahead or simply waiting for her to be ready, Ashe couldn't tell. There was something about it that felt tied to Lethon's mystery itself. Perhaps because it belonged to this broken world. A remnant of older times that refused to speak of any of it. She found herself wondering about the nature of its relationship with Moira. What history existed between them. But one thing at a time, she thought.
A tone then sounded just behind her ear, followed immediately by a voice.
"Ashe, can you hear us?"
The communicator was a small, flat disc the size of a thumbnail, pressed into the skin just behind her right ear before she left. It bonded through a small mechanism and once in place it became nearly invisible, transmitting sound directly through bone conduction. She had been told it also functioned as a locator, allowing Moira's team to track her position as she moved through the ruins.
Connor was on the same line, at Ashe's insistence. Here they were, three people, each carrying secrets of their own and misaligned motivations, yet connected through the same shared frequency. Herself, Moira and Connor.
"I can hear you," Ashe replied. "We're going in now."
She looked at Cral, then back at the open space ahead.
"I really hope your friend is as reliable as it is indifferent," she said into the line.
There was a brief pause, and then Moira's voice came back somewhat amused. "There's none more reliable. It's the humans you want to be wary of."
Cral went first, showing no restraint, as if it had walked this path many times in the past and knew exactly what to expect from this place. Ashe, who didn't share that same certainty, followed close behind, matching its pace step by step.
The towering buildings quickly swallowed them both as they moved across the broken stone pavement. Though it was still daylight, the incredible monumental height of the structures and the vegetation covering their surfaces absorbed most of the light before it could reach that far below.
"This is what we call Lethon's Outer Ring," a voice came through the comms, unfamiliar to Ashe but likely someone from Moira's team who knew the ruins well. "There's little drift activity this close to the edge, but stay aware of your surroundings. We don't map this place very accurately anymore."
Ashe kept moving, her attention spread across the space around her as she tried to remain aware of every movement and sound.
After what felt like four minutes of walking, one of the buildings ahead caught her attention. Its entrance had collapsed, leaving the lower facade open and the interior fully visible from the street. Ashe slowed as she approached, then stopped altogether.
Cral noticed immediately and halted a few steps ahead before turning its head toward her with an unusual kind of patience. Almost like a parent allowing a curious child time to examine something unfamiliar.
She stepped slowly toward the opening, studying every visible corner from where she stood. High ceilings. Channels running through the walls similar to the ones she had seen back at the facility, likely traces of some old wiring system that no longer functioned.
But among all those strange and unfamiliar elements, Ashe noticed something that felt eerily recognizable. A cup resting on a bent surface. Then, not far from it, the broken remains of a chair. Then what looked like pieces of furniture, perhaps a wardrobe, its doors still open with strips of dusty fabric coming out from within and disappearing into the branches of a plant that had overgrown through the broken wall.
These were the first traces of anything truly human she had encountered, and the moment carried an unexpected weight. In a way Ashe couldn't fully explain, it felt as though Lethon itself had revealed something to her, something more meaningful than anything the people she had met so far ever had. She reached out and lightly brushed her fingers across the dusty surface of the wardrobe while taking in everything else around her.
"Ashe."
She then recognized Connor's voice through the communicator.
"The longer you stay there, the longer you're exposed. Keep that in mind."
She straightened, almost reluctant to leave.
"Right," she replied softly.