The Time from Before

The Beginning of the Past

Hidden deep in the mountains on a remote island stood a bunker – the heart of a military faction lost to time. Within its reinforced walls lay the dormant remnants of human glory: rows of uniformed soldiers suspended in cryogenic pods, fleets of armored vehicles and aircraft in massive hangars, arsenals of advanced weapons and explosives in locked vaults, archives of classified documents and data in secure servers, and countless other resources awaiting rediscovery.

Millennia had passed since the cataclysm that swept humanity from existence. Yet here remained humanity's legacy, a monument of technological prowess slumbering beneath tons of rock and earth, waiting for a purpose that might never come.

Time, however, proved the most relentless enemy. Over countless centuries, it had methodically eroded the bunker's defenses – bit by bit, year by year. The passing ages brought tsunamis that shook the foundations, seismic activity that cracked the walls, and corrosive atmospheres that ate through metal. Time's unstoppable march had damaged the autonomous systems, rendering them either useless or dangerously unpredictable.

One of these systems was Cv-7, an artificial intelligence that once served as the backbone of the bunker's operations. More than a mere security protocol, Cv-7 had been designed to manage various aspects of the facility and the military faction it housed. But as millennia passed, its capabilities diminished. The weapons it once commanded with precision broke down and became inoperable. Many doors it controlled rusted in their frames or fell from their hinges. Only fragments of the surveillance network and a few electromagnetic locks remained operational, and even these systems flickered between function and failure – a digital mind slowly losing itself to time.

Throughout the facility, lights wavered and died, only to sputter back to life moments later. The failing power grid drew its dwindling energy from a handful of wind turbines on the mountain's surface – corroded silhouettes against the sky, their blades bent and twisted, many missing entirely. Those that remained displayed the scars of time: deep rust, impact craters from projectiles, and strange symbols painted by unknown visitors over the centuries.

The bunker's reactor fared no better. Designed to provide clean power for centuries, its components now strained under the burden of fluctuating power loads from failing batteries. Each surge and brownout pushed the ancient system closer to catastrophic failure.

* Warning, battery levels critical.

This message had flashed across a single functioning monitor for hundreds of years, surrounded by the dark, shattered screens that once displayed vital information. No human eyes had seen these warnings for generations – there were no humans left to see them.

The bunker's final human occupants, after losing contact with their command structure, had made a desperate decision. They stored their remaining personnel in stasis capsules alongside their equipment, hoping that someday, someone would revive them to continue their mission. This hope proved largely futile. Most capsules had failed over time, their life-support systems gradually shutting down. What had been designed as vessels of preservation became instead eternal tombs – high-tech coffins holding the remains of soldiers who died dreaming of a future that would never come.

* Storm detected.

Another automatic message appeared on the monitor. Such warnings had become commonplace since the global war that had transformed Earth's climate into something barely recognizable. Beyond the protective mountains, dark clouds gathered like an invading army, lightning forking between them in jagged patterns while thunder announced their approach with ominous booms.

The world above had changed dramatically in the absence of humanity. Evolution, unceasing in its creativity, had produced new dominant species that now claimed the lands humans once ruled. These beings, though different in form, had followed similar paths of development, even modeling aspects of their civilization after archaeological discoveries of human settlements. Despite their advancement, much of humanity's knowledge – particularly its most destructive technologies – remained lost to them.