Bound to Ashes [The Altered Sequence: Book 1]

11 • Welcome Home

[Dev]

"Now," Jules says, clapping her dirty hands together. "How do we open it."

"Definitely not that big silver handle," I point out.

"Out of the question," she agrees.

I feel lighter, more energized, from the excitement. I try the handle but there's no give. Ashton comes and joins me, putting one of his legs under him like a coiled spring.

"Three, two—" he says, but the handle pivots to the side like it was holding out on us. We thump hard against the dirt wall behind us. Alessandra and Jules laugh. "Shut up," Ashton says, smiling and brushing dirt off his back. "It was stuck."

The door opens more quickly than the handle did, thankfully. The heavy door falls open after one push, offering a passage in its place. The stairs disappear quickly down the steep incline, a thick layer of untouched dust coating it.

Vinder grabs the edge of the door and measures its thickness with one hand. Almost the span of his fingers. "Damn," he says.

Punk makes to follow us, of course. But Alessandra has other plans. She says, "stay," over and over, holding her hands palm-out at Punk, as if he'll listen. His tongue lolls to the side and he stares at her blankly.

"Why can't he come?" Ashton asks.

"I have no idea what's down there," Alessandra says. "But it's probably not suited for dogs. Even ones like Punk."

"She's right. He'll probably just get in the way." It's one of the only things he's good at, except maybe digging.

Everyone files in and stands in the stairwell. Ashton and I lower the door while pushing Punk out, so it snaps shut before he can stick his muzzle or paw in. For a while we hear his scratching and, faintly, whining. At least he can't get in our way down here.

The corridor, lit by bare yellow bulbs, leads straight down. The lights must be automated. Like the CadTech fences that only ran a current when a warm body was nearby.

When we get down to a level plane, the structure looks a lot like the humans' old base: brushed metal and plain walls. After a few paces, the lights disappear, but thankfully the first room is the control room. Or something. Alessandra, running her hands along the panels, brushes past buttons and switches like braille. It must be too dark for her to see despite the dim lights behind us.

"What are you looking for?" I'm quickly overwhelmed by the amount of buttons and labels.

"Main lobby power," she says. "I remember hanging out with the guys who worked here and that's how they'd close down the living quarters for the night...."

"Here." I lean over her and flip the designated switch.

There's a whirr and down the hall a few light buzz violently, but for the most part, everything seems to be working. They come on like clockwork, as if the facility is just waiting for its owners to come back in the morning.

Alessandra looks over her shoulder and smiles at me in thanks. "Alright," she says. She brushes off some fine grey dust on one of the spinning office chairs. She plops down and crosses her legs and says, "It's been a few years, but I grew up here, so I'll do my best to lead the way. Since we lost all the schematics," she says with a bitter edge to her voice, "we're operating on my memory only."

"I feel better already," Peregrine says, smiling. Alessandra laughs a little.

"Let's get going."

[Alessandra]

I'm really back home. This is really happening.

Everything feels half-familiar. I'm seeing it for the first time in—has it really been eleven years? I can't wait until we get to the parts I know best. The living quarters, the labs, the hallways and the automatic elevators... the 'swoosh' sound is still fresh in my memory. Other sounds trigger my memory. The clank, clank of feet on the metal grates. Through a set of thick metal doors, we reach one of the caverns. It was easier than the official 'sphere' names. Outersphere, innersphere, centersphere. We only just walked into the crust of this mechanical planet. The sound of echoing voices, so small in this chasm of a place, jerk me back to years ago. Mom only let us on the bridges with supervision, the drop is for miles. We'd lean over as much as we could, shouting into the blackness and listening to our voices fall into the black.