One eye opened ajar. If someone was close enough to observe it, he or she would have seen a color impossible to describe. The light pulses had stopped — finally, a new message was coming. One huge limb moved, but suddenly a sound, a whoop, came from a device a few meters over there. The air became electric for a moment, then the pulsation started one more time. The communication was gone, once again. The limb turned in its original position. The eye closed again, frustrated but incapable to feel sadness.

I

Three small drones silently passed above the village walls, finishing their patrol. Beth waited for a minute after the buzz faded away, then slipped out of her hideout, under one of the many stone arches. She picked up her backpack and set off through the maze of uphill alleys. Her pace in the empty streets was fast, almost bold.

For twenty-five years, since the incident at the nuclear plant in Golfech, there have been no one in those departments in Southern France. After a massive leak from the first reactor, a radius of 120 kilometers was abandoned in less than a week. Furthermore, since the facility was placed right on the Garonne river, its whole banks had to be displaced up to the Atlantic Ocean. The whole South-Western France was suddenly in Middle Ages again, but the whole world would have followed it in a handful of months because of upcoming Eschaton.

All the world mourned their victims, the whole humanity was ashamed of what they did, but it was too late. A nuclear disaster as that made thousands of square kilometers inhabitable for several centuries — nobody could tell precisely. The French economy had struggled to start again, and the loss of a huge part of the tourism didn’t help.

The area had been fenced, but groups of people, starving and jobless, tried anyway to get one of the many abandoned homes in one of the charming villages in the prohibited zone. The drones’ purpose was to find those trespassers: they silently used thermal cameras to look for any signs of life. If they found someone, a patrol arrived to arrest them… if they were lucky.

Elizabeth was certain that no one would have come after her. She was well-prepared, and she had already been there several times. Despite all the risks she was taking each trip, she often visited that off-limit region. Her passion was urbex, short for “urban exploration”, which was a cool term to denote the act to sneak into deserted buildings. She shared with hundreds of people the urge to feel that… sensation of abandoned. It was an addiction. She got goosebumps every time she entered a room where she could feel nobody stepped in years… It was priceless. So, what better place than dozens of medieval villages taken over by nature?

Infiltrating in a forbidden area was an art. Beth wasn’t just fond to her hobby. She was so good at taking evocative photos, that her fans on social media founded many of her trips. She posted some of her ideas, then after a few days she often got the required amount of money to cover the travel costs. It wasn’t just her perfect job — it was her life.

Anyway, this trip was nothing new, as she knew those places particularly well. When she was little, for their summer vacations, her parents often went to Périgord, in that part of Southern France. She had fallen in love with that quiet atmosphere, almost unreal compared to London, where she still lived. Traveling there was also a way to remember those sweet days spent with her mom and dad, gone in a terrorist act a few days before the Eschaton.

Two decades later, she kept coming there despite the obvious risks for her health. It was an excellent spot for splendid photos, and it was quite easy to move around, once she got used to the patrol schemes. Also, among her supporters, there were a couple of contacts who provided very useful information to this goal. Maybe they were hackers, or perhaps even military personnel, as she could guess from the detailed information they supplied.

As always, the intel she got from those people was correct: the drones had arrived from the east, flew over Domme, and continued to the west, following the Dordogne river. Their destination was the village of Beynac, where a charging station was placed.

Domme was one of Beth’s favorite burgs because of the breathtaking view. It had been built on the top of the tallest hill in the area and, from the terrace next to the town hall, the panorama was priceless. Many villages could be seen in every direction, on both the riversides and on the inner land. In the past centuries, it must have been a perfect strategic point, and the still intact stone walls confirmed it.

The main plaza was astonishing, even after years of neglect: the church, half-covered by ivy, stood mightily, much higher than the other buildings around. Many strands of vitalba stretched from the bell tower to the trees and palaces below, making the village appear like a jungle. The scarce vehicles left, parked along the streets, had a thick coat of rust mixed with moss, and some little ferns somehow had sprung from it. That was another perfect shot, and Beth stopped to take some pictures of an old Renault.

She always brought with her a tiny telescopic crowbar which could be shrunk to the size of a soda can. Using that, she visited several buildings passing through the windows — in the countryside, everyone had vintage wooden frames, which could be opened very easily.

She spent almost an hour wandering around in the ghost town. She had just finished taking pictures of an ancient chimney now turned into a huge nest from some migratory birds, when her wristwatch started beeping. It was the security timer for the radiation exposure.

She was wearing an expensive suit with lead fibers, very similar to scuba gear, quite lightweight and practical. She also had a full-face gas mask, for which she had a couple of spare filters in the backpack. Despite those protections, staying in the open air for too long was very dangerous. Each day, she had to take cover for at least a couple of hours in order to let her body cells rest.

Luckily, the whole Southern France had dozens of caves, whose thick wall were a good protection from the radiations. Beth knew that in the center of the burg, in a quite anonymous building that once was the old tourist office, she could find safeness.

In the market place, a few letters could be still seen on a wall, with empty spaces between: “A è s gr” – Accès grotte, “Cave Entry”. The shutter was closed, but she was prepared. She pulled out a pair of foldable bolt cutters from her bag, and opened it in a moment. After the door, she passed a couple of turnstiles, then found what she was looking for: the stairs that lead to the grotto. Beth started descending. After some modern flights of stairs made of concrete, at a greater depth she found stone steps. There was complete darkness, nothing could be seen out the cone of light of the LED torch. Then, the gallery suddenly opened, and she could see hundreds of stalactites above her head. It was wonderful, they sparkled joyfully when she moved the light.

She stepped into the cave for a few more meters, then she looked for a dry spot where to rest. She sat down, picked a snack bar from her bottomless backpack, and waited.

When Beth emerged from the cave, it was late afternoon. She went back to her electric kick scooter, hidden under some bushes near the village walls, and headed south. The scooter was perfect for moving: it was silent, easy to conceal, and it moved on almost any kind of terrain because of its solid tires. And yes, that was foldable too, she could carry it under her arm.

Her destination was an old camping, which she used as home base: it had functioning solar panels, perfect to recharge her vehicle, and it was very close to another small chasm to take shelter from the harmful atmosphere.

She avoided the main routes, and followed the countless country roads, where the gravel was almost covered by grass. She took a different path from the one of that morning, for the sake of exploration. After about three kilometers, she saw something unexpected on her right, and immediately stopped.

It was a military base, with a dozen of rusty antennas of several sizes, pointed in all directions. Despite she had studied accurately the maps and satellite photos of the area, that was new for her. ‘Not very surprising,’ she thought, ‘if it is military’. She looked around, and cautiously approached.

There were a couple of large buildings, and the parabolic antennas were spread in the fields around – probably, once they were well-kept lawns. A tall fence enclosed the whole area, and seemed electrified. She immediately tested it by throwing the crowbar against the barrier, and nothing happened. That, along with the tall weeds, encouraged her: probably the base was abandoned.

She took again the cutters, and trimmed a hole in the wire. She slipped in with extreme caution, and stepped next to one of the dirty edifices. Those weren’t her usual objectives –she didn’t like to live so dangerously– but she was feeling quite safe.

She approached the door and stood silent for a minute or two, listening for any sound. Nothing. She broke in –if that was military, the door was not secure at all– and illumined the large room with the torch.

It was a sort of hangar, with two rows of desks in the center and some kind of radio equipment next to the walls. Probably it was needed to operate the aerials outside. The tables and much of the floor were spread of papers, as if the place had been abandoned in a hurry.

She took some photographs of the whole environment, particularly suggestive because of the dusk light coming through the high windows. Then, she approached the rusty machinery, and took some more detailed pictures: some insects somehow managed to sneak inside the plastic display, and now rested among the indicator hands. Those big appliances reminded her of some vintage photos of old space shuttles.

On the table, she found some papers with nonsensical number sequences, and some dates: they referred to twenty-five years ago. So that base was actually abandoned after the nuclear incident. ‘I wonder what they were doing here’. She took some photos of the documents: papers, clipboards with tables of numbers, and a peculiar red notebook.

The sun was getting low, so she quit the building, went out the hole she had cut, and hit the desolated road again with her kick scooter. Her “vacation” was almost over, and in a couple of days she would have returned home.

II

One week later, Elizabeth was in London again, and had already reviewed all her footage. Most of the pictures were scheduled to be uploaded automatically on her social accounts, one per day. She had also prepared an album of her favorite pictures, exclusive for the sponsors who paid her most.

That night, she was so sick she couldn’t sleep. The pills she had to take to minimize the effects of the radiation exposures had strong effects on her body. She opened her laptop to watch a movie, and a notification on the corner of the screen caught her attention.

It was an email from a social network: one of her patrons wanted to send her a direct message. The user’s nick was R4F, it was unknown to her. That wasn’t her first direct contact request: in the past, she had had conversations with several of them, but never met anyone in person. Sometimes, they just wanted to applaud her cold blood to enter in abandoned creepy buildings; in other occasions, they provided actual information about cool places to visit. In any case, since urbex was frowned upon in all the world, if not illegal, it was better to remain anonymous. She clicked on “View Message”. It was very straightforward: Hey URB3TH –her nickname– do you have other photos of that red notebook? Please reply! Thx!

That was an unusual question. Nobody ever asked for more photos about specific subjects. They weren’t so interesting. The request intrigued her because she could feel some eagerness in those words… but also alarmed her: what if she inadvertently just published some confidential documents? Also, the mentioned book was in the exclusive premium album, so just a few people could have seen it. Entering a military base had been a mistake. The nausea suddenly got worse.

She got up from her bed and walked to the kitchen. She turned on all the lights of her apartment, she was genuinely scared. She looked down to the streets in Soho. It was almost one o’clock, but they were still quite crowded.

What to do now? She actually had some other pictures of that red journal, but what if that was some kind of trap?

She approached the liquor cabinet, but her stomach twisted painfully, giving her a suggestion. She turned on the kettle for an infusion – a much better idea – and rested against the cupboard while waiting for the water to boil.

After a few seconds, a simple idea guided her thoughts: everything she had done in the past years was illegal. So… could some classified documents actually worsen the situation? If someone really wanted to arrest her, she probably would be already in prison, no matter all the precautions she had taken in the past. As always, she was probably worrying too much.

In the end, Beth decided to have a fennel nightcap, and to reply to the message. She checked the pictures archive, and she had four other images of the notebook. Two of the cover, very similar to the published one, and other two of the inner pages. She was in doubt, there was something odd in that request, but… she tried to act naturally, as she had nothing to hide – and that was true.

She attached the files to the message, and typed: Hi! Yes, here they are. And then, since she couldn’t resist: What’s so special about it?, and pressed “Send”.

She didn’t sleep much, maybe for the tension, but she was well-rested. She was just thirty-four, but she already missed her body from ten years before: four or five hours of sleep weren’t enough anymore.

Beth took another cup of infusion, then checked her email. R4F had already replied, just a few minutes before. Despite her calmness, her heart skipped a beat. She checked the message.

Thank you! I think those codes you photographed could be something… I don’t want to bore you, but it is about encrypted radio communications. I know it’s a paper from 25 years ago, maybe it’s nothing, but… you hit the spot, that’s my favorite hobby!

Was that all? A radio amateur? What were the chances that he or she could cause serious troubles because of the intel she had provided? She warded off that thought and tried to think positive.

Beth had a light breakfast, then went out to have a run. She wanted to get the metro to reach Hyde Park. On the train, she kept thinking about the red notebook. ‘What was that?’. She picked up her phone, and looked closely at the photos. There were just a few writings, most of the pages consisted of numbers and tables. The rare words seemed acronyms or codenames: TETRA and P25. On the red cover, a strange word was printed diagonally in bold letters: FRENCHELON. It recalled nothing to her.

She got off the train and exited the station. The sky was gray, the air was sultry. She entered the green park and started jogging with music in her earphones — some angry and energizing old songs from the ’90s her father loved.

Usually, after fifteen or twenty minutes, her breathing changed, and the pace of her steps started to follow naturally her respiration. Not that day, though. She was drenched in sweat, and she couldn’t focus on her pace. After a while, she kicked the air angrily, and sat down on a bench. She kept blaming the weather, but she knew what was the real issue: her damn curiosity.

She picked up the phone again and started typing a message to R4F: What’s FRENCHELON? Not a classy restaurant, I guess. Am I –or are you– getting in any trouble? Let’s continue the conversation somewhere else.

And then she added one of her encrypted personal email addresses.

When she got out of the shower, the reply was already there.

It seems I got your attention. Good! So, FRENCHELON was a French operating unit in charge of “signal intelligence”, basically they had big antennas and listened to worldwide communications. The cool –and barely legal– thing is that the transmissions were encrypted, so they were meant to be kept secret.

The tables you photographed are quite interesting because they show how to convert encryption keys from an American standard to a European one… And I thought it was strictly prohibited, at the time, because the major powers hated each other.

Don’t worry, I think we won’t get anything useful or harmful from that book; also, the radio frequencies listed are probably unused nowadays. I’m already testing them. Anyway, I’ll keep you posted.

For Beth, the most surprising detail of the message was the last line: it was signed: Rafael. She didn’t expect that the he would reveal such sensible information. Was she too anxious?

For two or three days, they wrote a dozen of other emails, then they switched to messaging applications, for quicker communication. They started to joke and make fun of each other, and eventually he explained that he was from Spain. Then, she felt quite confident to tell him that she lived in the United Kingdom.

Beth had already forgotten the whole signal intelligence thing when, one afternoon, Rafael sent her a message: Oh My God, Beth! Something’s going on! One radio frequency on the paper… It IS still used! When I first listened, I got nothing, but then I figured it out! There are scheduled transmission every three hours. I attach here the last one, from twenty minutes ago. Take a listen!

III

The screen lit up, and she startled when Rafael’s face appeared. When they decided to “make a video call” to comment the recording together, Beth thought they would have just chatted with audio. Instead, a handsome face was on the display. With his dark, short hair and the well-kept beard, he had an almost military look. She realized she was blushing, when finally heard his voice: «Hey there, at last!»

His Spanish accent was pronounced, but also very pleasant. She was about to reply, but he anticipated her: «Do you want me to switch off the video?»

She noted that her camera was turned off. «No, no, sorry!» She clicked on a button and a black rectangle appeared on the screen.

«Uh…» he said, after a moment.

She was so privacy-obsessed that she had a tiny plastic cover lid on her laptop camera. When she noticed that the lid was closed, she moved so fast that she almost knocked the computer down. A bright flash suddenly lighted up the once black rectangle, and slowly faded in Beth’s bust. She was smiling, but her pupils widened when she saw her hair on the screen: ‘They are a mess!’. She wanted to sink down in the deepest ocean, but kept smiling. «Sorry, I don’t use the video often.»

«Worse for the others,» he said, smiling back, «it’s much better like this!»

They chitchatted for a few minutes, but Rafael could barely handle the excitement: he had to share his findings. When Beth had listened to the recording, a few hours before, she didn’t spot anything sensational.

«They’re just some noises and some voices» she told him.

«You’re oversimplifying it, but you’re right. Also, you listened to just one tape. Keep your ears open» and he pressed a couple of buttons.

For a few seconds, there was absolutely nothing. She focused, and maybe just imagined hearing a muffled echo, like if something –a rock?– moved underwater. It was very, very slow. A minute passed, and there was almost complete silence. Then, a sudden crackling, and it was evident that the scenario had changed. A man with a Spanish accent picked up a microphone and said: «Jamming succeeded. Minor movement of element number eight from sector A-14 to A-16. Nothing else to report.» Then, after another static noise, a second voice, probably automated, asserted aloud the date and time; it was in UTC, the global standard, and detailed to the second.

Rafael pressed a button. «As you heard, that was from yesterday afternoon, 3PM. That was a Mexican pronunciation. I know my language pretty well, you can trust me! Here is another recording from 6PM» and he pressed some more keys. There was another minute of almost absolute silence. Only a sporadic deep creaking could be heard, like the door of the deepest basement on the planet opening. Then another voice, this time with a French accent, spoke: «Blocking succeeded. Slight rotation of the main body, about twenty degrees clockwise. No other changes» then there was another static buzz, and the timestamp.

«See? Every three hours, there is a new recording. And you know the craziest thing? Each one I got is transmitted from a different part of the globe! You can hear various voices, but I assure that they’re sent also from as many antennas. I think that someone is monitoring something, which seems moving, and is noting down the changes. Anyway, I have no idea what is that jamming that each one claims as succeeded.» the man wondered.

«That’s… creepy. What the hell are those noises? It seems recorded underground.»

«Yes, the long echoes are typical of large, hollow spaces.» Rafael explained with a sudden teacher’s tone. «That could also be a reason why those people use radio instead of, you know, more modern technologies as the internet.»

He stopped for a minute, thinking while holding his lower lip between two fingers. Beth kept staring at him. She knew she liked him, but she was trying to curb her instincts: her left, rational part of the brain still saw him as a stranger.

She was lost deep in thought, when he carried on: «As I told you, these aren’t normal radio frequencies: they are encrypted, and only special equipment can decipher the transmission. It is the same technology used by the police, or by the firefighters.»

«Wait — If special gear is needed… Do you have it? Are you a cop?» she asked, a bit suspicious.

He laughed. «Do I look like a policeman? I told you that radio is my hobby» he winked. «As you sneak into abandoned buildings, I may have some other little secrets.»

He had a point. Beth was a little reassured, despite the zinger. «So, what do you think we stepped into?»

«I honestly have no idea, but I suspect it may be something military… mostly because of the date and time. I would expect a detail like this, to the second, from the Army.»

«Maybe they’re playing something like battleship» she joked.

«Ah, yes. Maybe we discovered a global-sized chess game. All the audios I got until now seem pieces moving – or being moved.»

He took a break, then asked: «Listen, Beth, when is your next travel planned?»

IV

In a few days, Beth surely learned lots of information about radio transmissions, including the concept of triangulation. «It’s like in those movies, when they use a pair of compasses to draw on maps to locate something. Same thing here,» he explained, «I just calculated from two points –two aerials I had access– the position of the target antenna transmitting our mysterious recording.»

«Wait, you have access to antennas?» asked her.

«Don’t underestimate the radio amateurs’ community!» he replied with a fierce tone.

She raised her hands. «Sorry, Mr. Touchy, I didn’t mean to offend!»

«Anyway,» he continued, «the procedure was challenging: these transmissions only last a bit more than a minute, and they’re broadcasted from different locations, apparently without a pattern… so it took some days to find two casts from the same place. Finally, I got it. Not only one, but two, for now! One is in central Turkey, and the other… in France, not far from the area you visited last time.»

Beth was impressed, and congratulated with him. After joking about his nerdiness, they did some research about the sites Rafael had found. There was indeed something in common: both regions were full of caves. In Turkey, the antenna was in Cappadocia, a zone famous for whole underground cities from millennia ago. In that part of France there were dozens of famous grottoes, but by sheer coincidence, the location was near a village called Lacave, “The cave”.

It was Rafael that proposed the idea: «Let’s go visit one of these places.»

«What? Are you demented? You said that probably the Army is involved… and now you want to pay them a visit?»

«Relax, Beth. You know how to be discreet more than anyone. If we don’t feel safe, we can still move on.»

She didn’t like the idea, or too risky adventures in general. On the other hand, she always tended to overthink too much before taking action. At last, thanks to Rafael’s persuasion, she was convinced that letting things flow was often the best choice.

«Ok,» she sighed, «but I’ll plan every detail!»

One week later, they met in Paris. They both flew there with trolleys full of gear: cameras, radio tools, camping equipment,… All they needed was there, they could have abandoned all what remained home.

They had put aside Turkey because Beth was very fond and much more confident with the French area.

The meeting point was the Gare du Austerlitz, not far from the city center. From there, they would have taken a train towards Limoges, the last city before the zone border.

Rafael had arrived early. He sat on a bench on the Seine river, wondering at the crystal water, clean again after decades of murkiness and pollution. If there had been a positive thing about the Eschaton, it was that humanity really started to care about themselves and the planet. He was only ten years old when that day arrived, at the time his family lived in a little village in Northern Spain. His parents thought it was a particularly safe place, far from the derangement they heard about in TV. That very day, though, one of his neighbors finally cracked: he took a rifle, went out in the narrow alleys, and started shooting blindly at anyone at sight. They were at home, but their dog ran out when he heard the shoots. Rafael followed it down, and his mother went after, trying to stop him. She never came back. After more than twenty years, he learned how to stop blaming himself for what had happened, but—

«Hey, you are much taller than I expected!» a voice said, behind him.

Rafael jumped, took by surprise. He turned around, and there she was, this pretty girl with long blonde curls and green eyes. He really couldn’t imagine her sneaking into dozens of derelicts. ‘It’s true, you can’t always tell a book by its cover’.

«Maybe it’s you who are too short.»

«How do you—» she reacted with a bit of anger, but his smile blocked her, and instead started laughing. «Well, you might be right, but I officially declare this topic closed right now, and so will remain forever!»

They chattered a bit about the city and their journeys. They sat a while at a bar, then finally she asked: «So, shall we get our train?»

It was a four-hour trip, but they perceived it as maybe twenty minutes. They were sat next to each other, and kept talking about this and that. They both had brought a book, but they never thought to pick it up.

The train arrived to Limoges at early night, but Beth had booked a car in advance, so they collected the keys at the automatic machine, and immediately started driving south. They weren’t tired, and the road to the zone border was quite short.

Beth knew that, from 2:00AM to 2:05AM, a particular security camera would have been turned off by an automated script that one of her supporters had prepared just for her.

«Surely the internet is full of weird people» commented Rafael.

«The internet… or the world?» replied her.

«Ah! You do have a joke ready for every context.»

«Well, that’s the strangest compliment that anyone has ever given to me» she winked. «Hang on, we’re almost there.»

They parked the car in the woods, about a hundred meters from the country road they were following, and covered it with a mimetic blanket. ‘Wow, she really is a professional!’ thought Rafael. Then, they followed a nearly invisible path among the trees, until a large field appeared in front of them. There was a long, tall fence on its border, and barbed wire all over its top.

«So this is the border of the zone, like in that old movie?»

«Yep. From here on, it is strictly forbidden to take a single step. There are no guards, just drone squads that follow half-programmed tracks… but by accident I have their schedule of the next days right here.» She patted her pocket.

«I confirm: the world is full of weirdos.» He nodded his head.

«Luckily for us, you’re a completely sane radio amateur!» she mocked him. «Come this way, our entrance is over here.»

They followed the barricade for five minutes, then Beth indicated a tall pole, a few meters inside the field. There was a security camera on top.

«See that? That’s the camera that will be off. Note that it’s watching a tiny gate. We’ll have to sneak past there… but we have a few minutes left.»

They dropped their backpacks and sat behind some trees. Rafael observed the huge fence. It was old and rusty, visibly opposing to the new cement column where the device was placed.

«Are you sure there’s no one in there? Someone’s been maintaining that.» He pointed his finger.

«I’ve been inside there seven times, and never saw a single soul. I guess they come scarcely, probably from the outside.»

Rafael looked at the terrain, but could see no traces of tires. Eventually, he sat down and asked: «Should we put the suits on?»

She picked up a snack from the backpack and offered him some. «Not yet. We can proceed for about ten kilometers with no risks — or at least, that’s what they told me.»

She glanced at him, and noticed the worried look on his face. «Stop stressing yourself! This is just a big abandoned place, and we are fully equipped. No one will harm us. By the way, put on your ski mask, it’s almost time». She quickly kissed him on a cheek. «We will be fine» she added.

She checked her wristwatch: 1:59:43AM. She stared at the camera. There was no light or tiny LED that indicated if it was functioning or not. Time passed, the watch said 02:00:34AM. She took a deep breath: «Ok, let’s move.»

They approached the tiny metal door and Beth crouched. In her hand there was a lockpick.

«I’ve never been good with these,» she admitted, «but at this point, this baby and I are best friends.»

There was a faint click, and the gate quickly spread open.

V

Rafael knew they had to travel more than one-hundred kilometers with kick scooters, but he didn’t expect it such complicated. The roads were deserted, but Beth insisted on using secondary ones: out there, there could be eyes.

They slowly moved across astonishing landscapes, paying attention to the information she had about the drone routes. The countryside turned into hills, and eventually in low mountains. They had a tent, and accessed one of the many camping of the region whenever possible; otherwise, they pitched in isolated woods. Once a day, they also had to take a break in areas with fewer radiations, and Beth’s experience had been super useful.

The village of Lacave was very tiny: there were literally only two streets, barely visible under the weeds, that followed the course of the Dordogne river. There were few buildings, the largest one had the words “École Communale” sculpted in stone. The windows were still intact, covered by moss.

Beth loved the sense of small community that those villages transmitted her: they were leftovers of an old, disappeared world, where big cities were as rare as four-leaf clovers in a green field. She loved the fact that, after the global tragedy from two decades ago, the modern society was encouraging small localities again, instead of centralizing the urbanization. ‘We are evolving by stepping back.’

After crossing the burg, Rafael suggested: «We should look for the antenna in an elevated area. It’s full of hills, here.» Then, after looking at the GPS, he added: «If I got my calculations right, it should be… that way» he indicated east, towards the main street.

They slowly proceeded for a minute or two, looking for uphill paths. That was a valley with many rocky cliffs, quite steep, but only one road. Eventually, there was a fork: on the left, it was pointed Grottes de Lacave. They looked each other and nodded. They followed the sign, and after fifty meters they finally found a tiny footpath toward the summit. It was very narrow, hardly for a vehicle. They took it, and soon they reached the top of the knoll. It was covered by trees, but overall there was a fence with old white metal plates reading Terrain Militaire - Défense d’Entrer.

«Finally, an interesting spot!» exclaimed Beth, who was already picking up the foldable bolt cutters.

He put a hand on her arm. «Hold on — Are you sure you want to proceed? This is even more illegal than what we were doing.»

She looked him in the eyes. «I’m the first who would suggest not to do this, but we’ve come too far to stop now» and started cutting. He let her do, amazed by that change of attitude in a few days.

They slipped in, and discovered that the military area was much smaller than they expected: a square of scarcely fifty meters per side. At the center, there was an antenna taller than the woods.

«That’s our boy,» said Rafael, «it’s one of those transmitters.»

Beth observed it, feeling something uneasy she couldn’t identify. The bottom was made of cement and had a large door, it was a building in all aspects. From its roof, there were three large metal poles that raised towards the sky: one was empty, just a metal frame with a ladder inside. The others probably carried cables to the large metal plates on the top. And… there was a small, blinking white bulb, so the antenna was unequivocally functioning. Finally, she found out the reason of her disquiet: that structure was not disused as the rest.

She told it to Rafael, and he agreed: «Yes, someone’s been here… within this year, that’s for sure.» He glanced around. «Do you… wanna see where those doors lead?»

Despite the sturdy look of the fire doors, the main risk of opening them would have been the alarm that might be there — but they couldn’t be sure.

«There are several wires around here, see? This is military property, it must be alarmed.» said him.

«So maybe… we can trigger it and hide, see what happens?» suggested her. «I could cut the door wires with the bolt cutters. If nothing happens… we can try to sneak in.»

«That’s a risky plan, but I think it makes sense… let’s just hope nobody will come. In the worst case… Are you armed? I’m not.»

«Me neither. I have a knife, but I don’t know how to use it! I wouldn’t be capable of threatening anyone, and I don’t want to.»

«Sometimes I really wonder where does your courage come from, you look so sweet» told Rafael.

«So are the chili peppers» replied her. She took the cutters, lacerated the wires next to the door frame, and listened: no sounds, no changes.

«Let’s hide» hurried Rafael.

They looked around, but there were only thin trees. Their plan had some flaws.

«The roof!» exclaimed Beth, pointing upwards.

They walked around the aerial and climbed an iron ladder, as quietly as they could. They crouched at the corners of the rooftop on the side of the door, and waited. Nothing happened for four or five minutes, there were only birds chirping and the wind across the leaves. Then, there were some muffled steps below, and the door was opened. They stepped back. A man in a dark blue uniform appeared, but he didn’t look military. He seemed more an office worker. He didn’t even wear a suit or a mask. Nonetheless, he was holding a gun.

«Qu’est-ce qui se passe?» he murmured, looking around. He carefully moved towards the woods, and then looked around the corners of the antenna. At last, he approached the door again, and saw the chopped wires. He was going to say something, but an object similar to a brick hit him on the head, and he fell to the ground, unconscious. It took a while for Rafael to realize that Beth had thrown at him the folded bolt cutters. He looked at her. She was panting, staring down with a worried look.

«Did I kill him?» she asked, with a choked up voice.

«I think not… you saved us. I guess I should thank you» he said. She smiled, but said nothing; she kept looking anxiously at the guard.

They dropped the ladder and approached the wounded man. He was younger than them, probably still in his twenties. He had pants and shirt with the French flag stitched on the sides, but no other badges. There was a cut in his temple, but he was still breathing. The door was still open, and Rafael saw that. «He’ll be fine. We better hurry. Let’s tie him up and see what’s in there, before someone else catches up.»

They had a couple of ropes for camping, and fastened the man’s wrists and ankles, then secured him to a tree. They also took his pistol. Beth gave him a last regretful look, and they walked into the door. There was a metallic stair with countless flights that seemed to reach the depths of the earth. They looked each other, and stepped down.

After twenty or thirty flights –they soon lost count–, there was a metallic door, similar to the one they entered above. They slightly opened it, and it was pitch black. The beam of the electric torch lighted up a pair of rail tracks. A long, infinite tunnel was visible from the left to the right, surrounded by rock walls.

Beth stopped for a moment. «Hey, I think I know this place. The grotto in Lacave is well-known for the train that connects the tourist entrance with the main cave. These might be the train tracks, since the street sign said we were close.»

She resisted the temptation to take some pictures, and they kept descending. Eventually, they reached a third door, which was left ajar. They agreed that probably that guy came from here. They entered, and found a long, well-lighted corridor with just a few doors on the sides. At the end, there was a wide glass that showed a room filled with monitors, lots of equipments, and another similar window on the opposite side.

«That’s a radio transmitter!» asserted Rafael. «Probably the messages are sent from this room.»

Beth looked around. «There seems to be no one else in here.»

He tried to lower the handle, and the door swung open. They walked in, and started snooping around. She grabbed her camera and started shooting. When she approached the other window, though, the device slipped from her hands — luckily it was secured to her neck with a lace. On the other part of the glass –much ticker than the one on the corridor– there was a huge hollow cave, fifty meters tall at least, with dozens of spotlights illuminating a large object dangling from the ceiling.

It was a huge globular rock, emitting a slight bluish light from the inside. Its diameter must have been about eight meters. There were little cracks on all its surface, and somehow it was… pulsating regularly, like a heartbeat. Anyway, what made Beth’s jaw drop was the creature tightly clung to the orb. It was similar to an octopus, but indeed it had limbs as well as tentacles. It was wrapped all around the globe, as to protect it, and it was of similar size. About twenty meters from the strange object, hanging from the roof, there was also a much more human-made machinery, which resembled a speaker pointed towards the being.

«Hey Beth, this radio is connected also to a microphone which is recording right now. Probably the ones we listened were the sounds in this cave. If I could find the right button, we can hear what—» he could feel her hand tapping him blindly, looking for something to hold on. At last, she gripped his arm, and pulled him towards the thick glass. When he saw the orb and the creature, Rafael’s pupils widened, and from the bottom of his throat a weird growling sound started to raise.

«Don’t scream!» she shushed him. «That thing seems to be sleeping, but I don’t want to bet on it.»

«O-ok.» was the only word he could pronounce.

They stared at the monumental stone hall for maybe five minutes, then Beth observed: «Did you see that device hanging from the roof? Could that be the microphone you told about?»

«Uh… yes» asserted him, immediately lowering his tone. «They could be recording that beast with that sort of machine. I don’t recognize it from here, but it would make sense.»

He turned toward the desks, looking for the equipment controls. Only then, he noticed that on four monitors there was a three-dimensional representation of the stone globe, divided into numbered sections.

«Beth, come here. I think these numbers could be the ones from the recordings… See? A-12. B-16. E-28… They are coordinates. And some have additional details: here, “C-12/#7”. #7? Number seven? What is that?»

«I… I think it could be the seventh limb of that monster.»

He didn’t expect that. «Oh. So… “Movement of element number six” was referred to one of those… tentacles.»

«Why are they monitoring its movements?» whispered Beth in astonishment.

«And… If the recordings come from several locations… does that mean that… there are more of these things?» he told, raising the voice.

Her eyes widened, full of terror. She hadn’t realized at first, and neither did he, but then she remembered. All the images related to the Oracles of Doom came back to her mind. The description of the monsters, the prophecies… Wasn’t that a lie? The Eschaton had passed, and nothing happened on that day. What did that mean? For the first time, Rafael heard her stutter: «W-Wa-ait. There m-m-ust be another expl-pl-planation.»

She hadn’t stammered since her youth, before the Eschaton, but the shock of that hypothesis caused a tsunami of emotions that overwhelmed her. She started hyperventilating and then fainted, falling on a console.

«Beth!» he screamed, jumping towards her.

VI

After she regained consciousness, they decided to momentarily leave the room — they couldn’t avoid looking at those hanging aberration. Beth told him about the Oracles of Doom, and he was shocked too by recalling those distant memories. After a few moments, in order to forcibly change subject, he proposed to explore the rest of the place to find out more information, and she agreed.

They discovered that most of the rooms weren’t as exciting as they though: there were a toilet, a dormitory with two beds –only one had sheets–, and a closet room full of cleaning supplies and tech spare parts. That underground base seemed a monitoring station for just one person, intended to be left alone for weeks, or months. There were just a couple of suits and air masks to move outside, as if that option was not contemplated.

In the last room, or how they called it, the archive, finally they found some answers: it was full of journals dating back up to the first years of the twentieth century. Every twenty or thirty years, the method the data had been noted was changed, but essentially they were detailed logs of the studies some scientists performed on the creature, and the attempts to communicate with the orb. That was the subject of the latest studies.

From the 1960s, the cover of all the journals had the label “STATION-13”. Thirteen was not the French district, so… Was that the number of the monitoring center? Were there twelve more in the world? Or just in France? Rafael started sweating cold, but said no word to Beth. Also, it was in the same years that they started taking detailed notes about the monster-orb relation and reactions to external stimuli.

In the 1990s, the journals were replaced by Compact Discs, one per month. He picked five or six, and went back in the glass room, as they had called it. He sat in front of a computer and inserted a disc. There were text files, but also videos. He clicked on a random one.

In the scene, there were two men dressed in white lab coats, in that very glass room. In a corner, there was a guard dressed similarly to the poor guy they had knocked out. Everybody was wearing hearing protection, too. The two scientists tried to “speak” with the creature by using the device hanging from the stone ceiling. They had some kind of tape, prepared in advance, with some recordings. They played it, track after track, seemingly trying to raise some kind of reaction. They weren’t spoken words, but strange noises as boomp or whoop. Rafael fast-forwarded to the end. They didn’t have any success.

In another record, a white-dressed man –the same as before?– was typing on a keyboard. When he pressed “Enter”, the camera zoomed on the machine hanging on the roof. There was a loud sound, a whoop similar to those before, and the orb stopped pulsing. The creature started moving, unsettled. Then there was another whoop, and the bluish pulsation started over. The monster emitted a guttural, angry growl, and went back in position. In the meanwhile, the scientist had explained that specific wave form, first discovered in Israel, allowed to separate the connection between the creature and the rock sphere. He used other complicated terms that Rafael couldn’t understand, then the camera was stopped.

In yet another video, the camera had been moved, and pointed directly to the beast. There was a mechanical arm, hanging from the stone roof, next to the strange machine. It was remotely controlled by a man off-camera. He moved the arm until he poked one of the creature’s tentacles, and the operator started giggling. There was no reaction at all. After a few more pokes, still with no responses, the man tried to tighten the tentacle between two “fingers” of the robotic hand, and detached it from the orb. He succeeded, but after a few moments, the creature opened three of his eyes, and grabbed the arm with another of its limbs. It crushed it and let the remains fall on the ground, then stared at the people in the control room. The utter silence that fell around the camera was palpable, even through the recording. The monster was aware of the people in there. Everyone was holding their breath. There was a deep, slow growling sound, and then the creature shut its eyes again. It was clearly a warning.

Beth entered the room, luckily just after that images were over, holding the first journal she had found in the archive. «Listen here: the cave was first explored in May 1905. They opened to the public in September of the same year, but the workers didn’t know about this… thing.» She pointed at the glass. She picked up another journal. «Now this, a note from the “guard” of October 1984: “Nous n’arrivons toujours pas à comprendre l’ordre de contact”. We still don’t understand the order of contact. What the hell could that mean?»

«I-I wouldn’t know» said Rafael, still disturbed by the last video.

He thought for a few moments if telling her about the videos, then finally decided to show her the second one. She was impressed: «What the heck is that orb? And what are they trying to do with those sounds? It would take hours to examine all the videos, and we don’t have much time.»

He glanced at his watch. «Mierda! Two hours have passed! We must go – now!»

She grabbed the CDs in the backpack, but he yelled: «What are you doing?»

«Do you realize what could these mean?»

«What are you, an explorer or a journalist? Are you looking for the truth? Just take some pictures!»

She completely forgot about that. She grabbed the camera once again and dashed here and there, taking pictures at every document, device, and room. At last, she approached the huge glass before the cave. She started shooting the most important series of photos of her life, but an alarm started blaring from the console.

They immediately approached the blinking red light, which had the text “INTERROMPRE” above. Interrupt. They couldn’t understand what was the issue, then Rafael remembered about the wristwatch. He looked at it again. It said 6:00:42PM. It was 6PM, one of the scheduled times of the transmission.

«Maybe the system is expecting an input… Should we try something?» asked him.

«Are you crazy? We would end blowing up the whole place.»

«Maybe, but—»

«Station 13, is everything ok? Please proceed with the jamming» the radio shouted. It was a female voice, with an African accent.

«Who’s that?» asked Elizabeth.

«Someone from… another station?»

Rafael approached the equipment. He never used such a complex transmitter, but he was feeling confident. He pressed a couple of buttons, then spoke in a microphone: «Station 13 here. Everything compliant to the protocol.»

She gave him her most puzzled glance, then moved her lips, whispering: “What the fuck?”

«Proceed with the inhibition immediately. Your sensor detected the anomaly.» concluded the radio.

«Let’s get out of here!» said Rachel.

«Wait, what anomaly—» Rafael was picking up his backpack, but stopped with the hand in midair. His glance fell on the cave, and saw that the creature was no more wrapped around the orb. It was standing, huge in all its height, floating in the air, holding the sphere with two limbs. Its five horrible eyes were open. Its whole body was emitting reddish pulses, much faster and irregular than the bluish ones, and seemed to conversate with the orb — or something beyond.

«Come on, Rafa—» Beth was already in the corridor, but she turned back towards the glass, and she saw it too. Her skin immediately lost her color, and she felt something warm dripping along her legs.

«Station 13, proceed immediately with the jamming!» repeated the radio, but this time with another voice, with an American accent.

«Station 13, block them — NOW!» a third voice commanded.

The couple was speechless. They could only stare the creature and its unnatural body with too many tentacles, limbs,… Those forms were abominable, as if a god wanted to create an ancient, mythical monstrosity — and succeeded.

After a minute, or maybe an hour, the orb stopped pulsating. It was perfectly still, but an incredible yet unfathomable power was unleashed from it. Beth suddenly struggled for air, feeling as underwater.

«Broadcast to all stations: the magnetic field is off. Element number eight is moving!» shouted another voice.

«Element number twenty is moving too!»

«Number six is detached from the nucleus!»

«Element number ten has breached! Initiating—»

At that moment full of incredible tension, despite she was feeling much worse than just dizzy, she understood: the creature was communicating with other monsters using the orb.

The voices in speaker overlapped, and the confusion raised until only a total, indistinguishable chaos came out. Then, in a matter of seconds, the screams faded into a static buzzing… and then silence.

In the most complete stillness she had ever heard, Beth screamed Rafael’s name, but he didn’t move. She felt her legs and arms one hundred, one thousand times heavier than ever. She stepped into the room and grabbed his shoulder. He fell on his knees, and Beth saw that his eyes were bleeding. Beth screamed, but she couldn’t hear herself because she was deaf.

‘Maybe I can stop it’, she thought. It was perfectly clear even to her that she didn’t have any chances, but she tried to get the guard’s gun, hanging from the belt. When she reached it, she discovered that her hand had missed it, and got through her ankle. Then all went black.

The creature and the sphere remained perfectly still. The room and its content, however, had literally disappeared, leaving in their place a large spherical chasm. At the center, the orb kept glowing blue, slowly, as before. Thin fibers made of light connected it to all the other spheres across the planet — each one surrounded by a round, empty hollow. Eventually, the monster floated across the void, clinging the rock sphere again with its body. Waiting for further orders.