Daniel might have sensed how long it had been, depending on factors I mostly didn’t know.

I looked down the hall ahead of us. The lights didn’t help much, but with our suits’ sensors, everyone would be able to see what I did. The hall went on as far as I could see, but it wasn’t straight.

It curved enough that the small changes of its path made it impossible to see anything in the hall except for the distant glow coming from the ceiling.

“Hey,” I said, addressing everyone via my comm, “it looks like Rook’s people either were here or are here and I can’t tell more from these… bootprints. It also looks like they might have used a different entrance. So we have no idea how many it is.”

I shared my pictures of the bootprints with the rest of the group.

“You know what?” Cassie floated over to look at the trail, “I’m going to see if Mr. Sparkles can check for security camera footage.”

Assuming there were security cameras, that wouldn’t be a bad idea.

Through her facemask, I could see Cassie blink and shake her head, “Turns out, yes, there are security cameras, but the gun’s not authorized to see them and the base’s AI wasn’t very nice about it.”

“Nice?” Jaclyn eyed her, “From the gun’s point of view? Your gun? The gun that revels in insulting people’s ancestry and burning things to cinders?”

Cassie shrugged, “I know, but there are appropriate forms of address based on seniority and gene line before you start insulting each other and the AI skipped all of them and went straight to the insulting—which is an insult in itself.”

“Gene line?” I peered down the hallway and checked my suit’s sensors in case the AI had mobilized the base’s defenses.

“The gene line of a device’s creator. The Abominators were partial or full clones of each other. After a certain point, they completely stopped reproducing naturally and ranked themselves based on similarity to a specific ideal individual’s DNA except they didn’t use DNA and the specific individual changed over time and by what faction of Abominator you were in… You can do a deep dive into your implants for more, but I’ve been hearing all of it from Mr. Sparkles’ side.

“He wants to teach the AI a lesson, but,” her head tilted toward the gun and her voice grew louder as if talking to a misbehaving child, “we won’t because… That’s. Not. The. Mission.”

She shook her head, “Be glad you can’t hear him.”

Jaclyn nodded, “I have heard him. I’m not arguing, but about the AI he talked to. Did it sound like it was sending out the troops?”

Cassie tilted her head, staring down the hallway, “I asked. Mr. Sparkles says that it didn’t say so, but why would it warn us? If it does, it’ll be trying for a surprise.”

Though I hadn’t realized she’d been gone, Rachel faded back into view, “I flew ahead a little bit. I’m not seeing any attackers.”

“Given the place’s age,” I said, “it might be that its defenses don’t work or maybe Rook took them out. We know he’s been here.”

Marcus glanced at the tracks, “That might not be good, but it might save us some time.”

“Yeah,” I said, “if we’re going forward regardless, we should get moving.”

“Exactly,” Jaclyn stepped inside the hallway without triggering any kind of response, “let’s get this done.”

We all floated forward, passing through the curving passage—which was not the only strange thing about it. It split off in literally, all directions at random points throughout the walk.

Holes sloped downward alongside the passage, some up, others down or sideways, and still more twisted in a new direction even in the short distance we could see.

Given that the Abominators were shapeshifters, it made sense. Part of me wanted to ask Marcus if he felt anything, given that his DNA included sections that were at the least “inspired by” theirs, but I didn’t. He’d say something.

Still, the hallways twists and turns did not feel right. Worse, they made weird echoes for my sensors, specifically the sonic-based sensors because there was an atmosphere. My suit described it as “Earth-like” in elements and composition but also noted impurities that it could not recognize.

We didn’t even discuss taking our helmets off. I had it take samples. I could analyze them at home.

We found the first group of bodies around a sloping corner of the wall—which like every other piece of the wall wasn’t flat. Ridges, piping, and sharp, flat finger-like pieces of ceramic jutted out with no pattern I could see.

The bodies, though? They’d been cut to pieces and worse, I knew them—sort of. They were True, all of them with Tara’s face, the male or female version, all of them wearing Rook’s armor.

I didn’t love that development as logical as it might be. It made for harder fights in our future.

I also didn’t love looking at the bodies. Whatever was going on with the atmosphere, it didn’t include enough water. Intentional or not, the bodies had dried out, resembling unwrapped mummies, their shrunken, leathery skin making my stomach roll.

Whatever had done this had punctured their armor with no issue. Knowing that Rook copied both my grandfather’s and my technology when he had the chance, I wondered which version of ceramic he was using.