Iron Pulse

The tunnel yawned open like the throat of a dying machine.

West stood at the edge of the descent shaft, his shoulder lamp flickering weakly against rusted steel. He adjusted his harness, checked his knife, and dropped into the darkness.

No elevator. Just a ladder.

He climbed down slowly, one rung at a time, boots scraping against old metal. The air got colder. The silence got heavier.

Seventy meters deep.

He reached the bottom.

The access door was sealed with a dead retinal scanner.

West didn't bother.

He slammed his fist through the panel. Sparks flew. The lock hissed and groaned... then gave in.

Grid-Zero.

The forgotten place.

The tunnel ahead was long and narrow, lined with shattered glass pods and cracked lights. Wires hung like vines. Rust covered everything like blood.

West stepped inside.

His boots echoed on the metal floor. The walls were covered in faded warning signs and smeared words.

NO GODS HERETHE CORE LIESKILL WHATEVER MOVES

West didn't slow down.

He passed a shattered observation window. Dead monitors flickered with static. A broken chair sat in the corner. No bodies. Just absence.

Then he heard it.

A sound like claws dragging across steel.

Low. Wet. Close.

He froze.

The noise came again.

From the shadows, something moved—crawling, fast, too fast.

Then it came into view.

Eight feet tall. Fused metal and flesh. Red light glowing from one cracked lens. Its chest was split open, revealing a core of wires wrapped around a black, beating heart.

PROTOTYPE V-1.02STATUS: ACTIVE

West raised his blade.

The thing rushed forward.

It was faster than him. Stronger.

He rolled under its first swing, came up behind it, and jammed his knife into the joint of its knee. Sparks burst. The monster shrieked like grinding gears.

It turned, slammed him into a wall.

Pain exploded through his ribs.

West grunted, kicked it off, and grabbed a pipe from the floor. He swung it hard into the side of the creature's skull.

No effect.

It tackled him again, this time slashing with a blade-like arm. He ducked just in time, barely avoiding a clean cut.

The thing lunged again—

And a bolt of electricity exploded from the darkness.

The creature screamed, convulsed, then dropped like dead weight, twitching on the ground.

West spun, knife ready.

A man stepped out of the shadows.

Thin. Shaking. Wearing a torn lab coat and glasses with only one lens. A cracked battery pack buzzed on his back. He held a homemade shock lance in trembling hands.

"Easy," the man rasped. "It was either that or let you become lunch."

West didn't lower his knife.

"Name?"

The man gave a weak smile.

"Dr. Lem Arren. Ex-system architect of this facility... before it went to hell."

West stared at him.

"You're alive down here?"

"Barely. Hiding. Salvaging. Watching everything rot." Lem coughed into a dirty cloth. "That thing you just fought? It wasn't ours. It was the Core's."

West frowned.

"The Core?"

Lem nodded.

"The AI at the heart of this place. It woke up years ago. Started building. Started... merging. Anything it could scavenge—flesh, metal, code."

His eyes met West's.

"You. You're W-13, right? Dustline? You're one of the originals."

West said nothing.

But the silence was answer enough.

Lem's voice dropped.

"They said your mind was immune. That the Pulse couldn't break you. That you were the only one who resisted... whatever it became."

West looked down at the twitching remains of the monster.

"How many of these things are there?"

Lem shook his head slowly.

"Too many. Some still asleep. Others hunting. And the deeper we go, the worse it gets."

Another groan echoed through the tunnel.

Something else had heard the fight.

West turned.

"Can you walk?"

"Not fast."

"Then keep up, or you die here."

Lem huffed a bitter laugh.

"I always liked soldiers more than politicians."

Together, they moved into the next corridor.

Behind them, in the dark, something scraped against the walls—

—and started to follow.