Hello again, I made a thing! I have been interested in the Mothership scifi rpg for a while, and I chanced upon a solo scenario for it by Alfred Valley called Thousand Empty Light. This was a revelation to me in a couple of ways – first, although I played roleplaying games for a good couple of decades of my life, I was completely unaware of the concept of playing them solo (beyond a ‘choose your own adventure’ book anyway). Second because it is just so well put together. It’s presented as a company document instructing a “Lamplighter” (that’s you) who has to enter an underwater facility beneath an alien ocean and turn the power back on there – and since this is designed with Mothership in mind of course there’s something horrible down there. On top of that though there are codes to crack, secrets to find, and all sorts of hidden goodies to track down. You can check it out (and buy a copy) from Alfred Valley’s itch.io page and I heartily recommend that you do (I would also recommend the accompanying soundtrack “Sleeping in a Drowning Stone”, which is also available from there and served as excellent background music while I was writing).
The general idea with solo RPGs is that you’re given a framework of a setting to work in, and you explore it by asking questions that have a yes/no answer (e.g. “can I see any tools here” or “does the creature look hostile” etc). Then you roll dice and consult an “Oracle” which is a table that has “no”, “no but…”, “yes but” and “yes…” answers along with some prompts to help you describe the scene – e.g. if you asked “can I see any tools here” and rolled a “yes but” then you may see some but they’re in a locked cabinet that you’d need to break into. And then you fill out what happens to move the story forward and move on to the next situation, and repeat as required. In this specific scenario you’d use the Mothership rpg system to resolve things like skill checks, saves, and combat as well.
Now, I’ll be the first to say I probably didn’t do everything “right” here but then maybe there isn’t really a “right” way beyond just having fun with it, and I certainly did enjoy the experience. First I tried gathering some binary keys from Alfred’s site and the internet in order to tackle some of the binary codebreaking, and one of the prompts there gave me an idea. Then I started playing through and writing it up the thoughts of the lamplighter as a “journal” from the perspective of the character (I ended up writing over 11,000 words, which is the most I’ve written for anything in a very long time so I think I can safely say that I did get into it!). I started off just using the Oracle and taking whatever it said literally so things begin a little strangely, but as I went along I started using it less for the descriptive prompts and more for the yes/no answers, and then by the last couple of sections I had formed a good idea about where everything was going so I pretty much freeformed the rest of it (about halfway through I managed to decode/find all the secrets in the book too so that caused the story to evolve a little differently that I initially intended too). I’m pretty sure one could just use the Oracle as prompts for creative writing in general too. I should also add that this isn’t the only way to play solo RPGs – Mothership is actually intended to be a multiplayer RPG but there are plenty of dedicated solo RPGs out there now (I’ve bought a few of them but haven’t had a chance to look at them yet, but hopefully I’ll write something about those here later).
I think I’ve come up with something good here anyway – so without further ado, here is my playthrough of Thousand Empty Light! Let me know what you think! 🙂
THOUSAND EMPTY LIGHT – a full playthrough
UPB 154 was a grey, bleak, forbidding world coming in on the shuttle, and it’s a gray, bleak, forbidding world now I’m on the “ground” too. I say that in quotes because there is no actual ground here, just a creaking metal platform hammered by the winds and rain and spray of this godforsaken planet. Barring a few barren rocks poking above the surface, the entire planet is covered by a corrosively salty ocean and an unbroken layer of thick grey clouds above that. The wind gusts and howls, the waves crash on the caisson, and the rains lash me mercilessly as I stand on the platform watching the shuttle depart. I hate this place already.
I don’t have my vacc suit with me since the atmosphere is nominally breathable here at least, but I have a backpack with supplies and my trusty toolkit and repair equipment with me. I’m here to “light lamps” and make sure everything is up and running properly, and that’s what I’m going to do. Should be just a straight in and out job, no trouble – and of course I’m going to dismiss the crazy stories that I’ve heard about this place.
I’ve barely been here for a few minutes and the Pneumate robot unit that is supposed to “guide me through the compression process” is already out of action. Pile of junk. It started off across the platform with me to the entrance but went through a patch of something that seems to have completely gummed up its tracks. I just got it to transmit some instructions to my wristpad and left it there, no way am I touching that stuff. It’s some kind of acidic slime that looks like it’s already eating through the plastics and ceramics that the unit is made of, so it’d probably make short work of me. Pretty fast acting too, the unit was only in there for a few seconds before it got stuck.
ENTRANCE: WEST CAISSON
I make it to the Caisson and cycle the entrance airlock and step inside. Once the outer door closes the outside world is reduced to a muffled roar, still doing its best to pound the structure to smithereens. I’m glad to be out of it and at least I’m not getting any wetter now. It’s a manual airlock so once I pull the outer door shut and seal it I have to crank open the inner door. At least there’s red lighting on in here so I don’t have to get the torch out quite yet.
BOOM!
JESUS! As I was working on the inner door something heavy smashed into the outer one from outside, scared the shit out of me! I can still hear the wind and rain out there but there was no warning of that. I cautiously peer out of the porthole in the outer door and… the hell? For a second I still see the Pneumate sitting there forlornly on the platform where I left it and then I blink and it’s gone, and instead I suddenly notice debris around the entrance that looks suspiciously like robot parts, slowly being scattered by the wind. That’s… weird. Must’ve been a freak gust that picked it up and smashed it into the door but it would have to be a pretty strong wind to do that! But what else could it be? And why did I still see it out there for a second when it had already been smashed?
(gain one stress – 3)
Frowning, I turn back to the inner door and open it without incident. The red emergency/standby lighting is on in the room on the other side but I flick a wall switch and it changes to a flickering white fluorescent light. I hear a buzzing start up and machinery start to hum as things start rebooting from standby mode. There’s something providing power up here at least, probably tide or wind?
I enter a small pressurisation chamber connected by a short passageway to the elevator section. Everything is shiny and white in here – at least this part seems to be well maintained. I seal up the door and follow the instructions the hapless Pneumate sent me, entering the codes to start the equalisation process and then sit on the white couch/bed in the chamber. As I sit down the lights flicker and I feel a sudden jerk and almost stumble. Was that the wind? The same force that dashed the robot against the door? A pen that’s resting on a side table with some papers also falls off with a clang on the metal floor too. I heard this area has seismic activity, I guess that must have been a small quake. This place likes throwing surprises at me already!
It’s all quiet after that though, and I figure I may as well look through the papers and see the Letter of Last Resort there, so to pass some time I sign it with that pen they thoughtfully provided (not that I have any loved ones. Who’d have a family in this crazy job?).The display on the exit door says the pressure will take a couple of hours to equalise so I have time to kill – I shoulda brought a book or something. I figure I’ll have a nap while I’m pressurising (my ears and sinuses are not happy but I’ll live). I close my eyes and drift off to sleep with the sound of machinery humming.
I wake up in the dark and the silence. Shit. My wristpad is powered down too, which is strange. I also notice that the temperature has dropped dramatically – it was pretty cozy, even stuffy, in the chamber when I went to sleep but now i can see my breath in front of me (after I fumble around for my torch). My damp outer layers don’t help the situation much either. Maybe the power was from some kind of battery rather than an active generator? I reboot my wristpad at least and it seems OK but what’s really strange is that I can’t access any external files or anything from before I touched down anymore, it’s like they were never there – but its clock says three hours have passed since I started my nap. The display on the outer door is dead but hopefully the equalisation process finished. I turn the handle and fortunately it opens – if it hadn’t finished then it would have been stuck until the pressure equalised and I’d be trapped in here, and that wouldn’t have been good. I gather up my things and (using my flashlight to illuminate the way) I cautiously step into the connecting corridor to the elevator.
I’m not sure if the button to call the elevator will work, but I feel a reassuring shudder and I hear something moving beyond the doors so I guess the power cut doesn’t affect that. I step back a little as the elevator noises get louder and the door silently opens. The elevator car is illuminated with a flickering light and there’s a slight breeze and a brief cloud of fog as significantly warmer air within floods into the connecting chamber. I quickly step in, and the door closes – I press the ‘B’ button on the panel and the lift starts to descend. Out of an abundance of paranoia I start the timer on my wristpad to see how long it takes. As I’m descending I notice the walls are damp – odd.
Almost exactly 200 seconds later the elevator – which had previously been descending at a rather slow but steady, constant pace – suddenly drops the last few metres and stops, causing me to lose my footing. The hell? I wasn’t looking at the dive gauge but I check it now and it says 165 metres! It didn’t seem like we were going fast enough to cover that in 200 seconds. What is going on here? That must be wrong, or I’d be feeling the effects of the additional pressure since I only pressurised up to 70m depth, but I feel fine (I think?). As I’m wondering about this, the elevator doors open and I am hit by a wall of heat and bathed in a red glow.
Oof, it’s like a sauna in here! It’s really humid and it feels like someone changed all the lights to heat lamps – I am instantly sweating! In front of the lift doors is a thin corridor, which wasn’t on the map… as I shine my torch on the walls I try to understand what I’m seeing… then I realise that it’s made of crab shells! They’re piled up to a height of a couple of metres, with a small gap between them just wide enough to step through. I have to take my pack off to squeeze past, and my jacket still gets snagged on a few of the spikier parts but I make it into the open area beyond them. Turning, I see that they’re all just piled up against the elevator doors, but they look like they’ve been deliberately and meticulously arranged that way. I notice that the shells are bleached, and they’re all missing their limbs and claws, with just the empty carapace remaining. There doesn’t seem to be any soft organic matter left so fortunately they don’t stink, but their empty chitinous eyestalks still remain and I get this weird, uncomfortable feeling that they’re watching me as I look around for the environmental controls. I can’t help but shudder – maybe I do have some compression sickness?
(gain one stress – 4)
I find the environment controls on the back wall next to the hyperbaric chamber… but the touchscreen interface has been smashed! Looks like a single heavy blow right in the middle of the panel, the screen is shattered and useless. Dammit. Hmmm, well I am a handyman, and here’s a problem to fix! I take out my tools, unscrew the panel and have a look inside. The innards seem to be mostly intact at least, though it’s hard to see the colours of the wires in the red glow and without a screen it’s pretty much guesswork as to what wires lead to which control. At one point I managed to shut all the lights off (not helpful) but I retrace my steps and bring them back. After about 10 minutes of very sweaty fiddling around I finally trip the right internal switch – the lights brighten and change to a cool blue and I hear what sounds like some fans kicking in. I can feel a cooler breeze starting up so I think I persuaded it to do what I wanted (hopefully it’s not going to turn into a freezer in here now but I guess I won’t be in this holding area for long enough to care).
Now that it’s starting to cool down and the lights are on, I can take a proper look around. First things first – find the MemoComm. It’s another panel on the wall near the entrance to the first section. I listen to the voice of the last Lamplighter who went through here.
Huh.
The crabs are still staring at me. They were scattered around all over the floor according to the report, but now they’re stacked in two neatly ordered piles in front of the elevator. The current state of the place is nothing like what the last LL reported – no mention of the heating or what happened to the environmental panel either. And I was standing in the west part of the room for a good 15 minutes and it seemed sturdy enough to me. Did someone come in between us and fix the place up? I guess he was confused by the different reading on the dive gauge too, though there was some kind of static in the recording and I didn’t catch how far down he thought he was. Didn’t sound long enough to be “ninety five metres” though.
He said the hyperbaric chamber was sealed up in the report… but as I look over to it now, it’s not sealed any more – it’s open! It’s a one person pod with a side-hinged frosted glass door over the front/top, but it’s open about six inches. I can see a shadow through the glass, is there someone in there? I feel strangely drawn to it even though I don’t want to look. My feet feel like lead and the pod seems to grow to fill my view and I feel like I’m suffocating and pounding on the glass from the inside and –
BEEEP! (gain one stress – 5)
Suddenly I’m back. I’m shaking my head to clear the foggy feeling and and I’m gasping for air but I take a minute to get my breath back – I’m still standing by the Memocomm, where I was before. What the hell was that? I look at the hyperbaric pod and now it’s sealed up, but the door looks different now – it’s not even glass, it’s opaque and metal? Cautiously I move over to it and take a closer look. There are no windows in the door, and there’s a panel on the side with screen showing a red padlock with an X over the lock. Despite my misgivings, I make a token effort to press a few buttons and just get an angry buzz as the X flashes at me. Access Denied each time, I guess? Maybe it’s just as well.
Oh yeah, what was that beep that snapped me out of it? I look down and my wristpad is flashing at me. There’s… a message? From where? From who? I open it up. All it says is “ADDITIONAL OBJECTIVE: ESPE SIUAION”. Weird, the text is corrupted. No timestamp, no sender, it’s like the file just appeared on there. Looks like they do make up some words but I’ll figure it out later. Temperature’s still slowly dropping and it’s less stuffy in here now at least. Phew.
I check out the storage lockers but they are indeed still empty. Hm, i don’t see any dust or debris of any kind in them either.
Suddenly a rumbling noise starts up and I realise it’s coming from the Freight Elevator. The instructions were pretty clear about not using it, and I didn’t see it while I was topside – must have been an entrance around the other side of the caisson? Is something coming down? There’s no floor display over the lift entrance, but something’s definitely moving in there and getting closer. Then the sound stops, and I swear I hear a faint groaning from above. I wait a few minutes but it doesn’t restart again. Huh. There’s no button by the freight lift to call it either – or the passenger one, for that matter.
At that point I just have to start chuckling at it all. This is ridiculous, this place must be getting to me. Sure, this job has risks but I’m just being crazy and paranoid here. I always get a bit nervous at the start of jobs because who knows what could happen in places like this, but you just get through it and get on with the job because that’s what you’re here for. Imagination is a bad thing in a situation like this and I shove that back into a box in the furthest recesses of my mind.
I gather my thoughts and record a new MemoComm summary – I mention the robot since they’ll want to know what happened to company property (They’d better not bill me for the damn thing!) but I don’t talk about what i thought I saw in the hyperbaric pod. Then I gather my things, consult the map on my wristpad, and step into the decon corridor to enter the first section.
SECTION 1: THE CONCIERGE
I step into darkness. Of course, that’s what I was expecting since I’m here to turn the lights back on, but the silence always gets me. There’s no background noise, just a kind of oppressive… pressure. I guess I am 165 (or 70?) metres below the surface of a hypersaline corrosive ocean so that might explain it, but it still feels strange here, like there’s a tension in the air. I shine my torch around to get the lie of the land.
It’s much cooler in here at least – cold even – and the oppressive humidity of the holding area is thankfully absent. Decon wasn’t working, by the way – even had some kind of mould or moss growing on some of the walls so that’s not promising – kinda defeats the point of it! I find the MemoComm on this side and check it – still active which is good. Huh (again) – thanks for the warning about the boobytraps (?!), last guy who came through here. Why the hell would anyone build booby-traps down here? WHO would make them for that matter – is there anyone still here? It’s quiet as a tomb in here, though there is the occasional creaking from the outer walls as the water outside tries its best to crush this place like the tin can it is.
I guess I should go check out the storage lockers on the north side first – might find something useful in there. I search through the place and find what looks like an intact vacc suit that is roughly my size on a rack in one of the larger lockers! No helmets though, which is strange. I check it to make sure no crabs (or worse) have taken up residence in it but it seems all clear. I manage to put it on and it’s definitely warmer and gives me some physical protection too which is probably a good idea. They’re more like padded clothing than the huge bulky spacesuits of old, and the gloves are small enough that i can still use small tools and manipulate things effectively. Good find! Maybe I can find a helmet elsewhere. The rest of the lockers are either locked or empty, but I do find an old fashioned radio of all things – one of those wind-up transistor ones with an AM/FM dial. I’m tempted to give it a go but I decide against it – if there is anything down here then I don’t want to attract its attention any more than I already am by shining my torch around all over the place!
I freeze when I hear a faint noise from the other side of the section – sounds like rapid tapping or clicking. Uh oh. I fumble around in my pack and retrieve my hand welder – may not be much but if there’s something in there it should be a decent defence (if it gets close). I could do with a better weapon but ironically the armory is on the side where the noise is coming from. Slowly and carefully I try to sneak around the lockers to get closer to the central corridor – surprisingly I manage to stay quiet. Unfortunately I still have my torch on because i need to see what’s going on and as I sweep the light across the side of the security office I notice two things – one, the door to the office is partially open and two, as my light passes over the window I think I see something moving across a table (I hear the tapping again too). I glimpse a small multilegged creature scuttling along and I remember the briefing notes – a spindle-graft crab! Shit. There might be a few around…
(gain 1 Stress – 6. Incident A: Crab Sighting – 5. Succeeded PANIC check.)
I think for a minute while hiding behind the lockers – I need to see but not be obvious… I hide the torch behind a box and prop it up to point at the ceiling above the entry to the security office, so I can see by the reflected light but the crab can’t see the source of the light. And then I wait. I hear the on and off tapping again (its legs moving over the hard surfaces) over the next few minutes and it seems to get closer to the door… and then the torch falls off its prop with a clang. SHIT. I take my eyes off the door for a few seconds and fumble with the torch to set it up again, and when I look back the creature is out in the corridor, just a few metres away from me! I stay still and quiet as I observe it – I recognise the body from the piles outside the elevator – its body is about a foot across and shaped like a crab’s, with two eyestalks at one end, and the limbs are long, spindly and multi-jointed and two have nasty looking pincers at the end. Looks like a spider crab from earth – it must be about a metre across including the legs! It just seems to be looking around, raising its body up on its legs occasionally for a better look. Then it looks down the corridor towards the cubicles and scuttles off into the darkness.
I listen to the tapping get fainter and breathe a sigh of relief. That could have been unpleasant. I may still have to deal with it later but it’s out of the way for now. I don’t hear anything else from the security office so I dart across to the door and shine my light inside.
I don’t see or hear anything moving in the security section. There are a few office items randomly scattered around the place, probably disturbed by the crab. I think the armory is the room on my right on the map and I’m feeling like I need something better than a hand welder to defend myself from any critters that have taken residence. Cautiously I enter the section, pulling the door to behind me (but not closing it – don’t want to get locked in!).
The door to the side room is closed but fortunately not locked. I open the door and shine the light inside, and it is indeed the armory. I relax a bit and take a look around. I can see guns in racks on the walls – mostly shotguns and rifles, which is weird because why would there be any big guns here at all? We’re stuck in a tin can deep under an alien ocean, I don’t think anyone would want to be firing high powered weaponry here! I’m not sure some kind of hand gun would be better but it’d have a smaller chance of damaging anything important, so I look around some more. There are a few pistols around but I find something much more interesting – looks like a nail gun but more offensive, like it’s actually designed as a weapon rather than as a tool. I grab it and a couple of clips of ammo – I also take a fire axe for good measure, just in case I get up close and personal with anything (or need to break down a door). It’s a bit cumbersome but I’ll manage. I gather my thoughts for a few minutes – then, feeling better prepared to face any dangers here, I head out into the security office again.
(I rest up a bit in a safe place and reduce stress by 7 so I’m pretty relaxed now! Stress = 0)
I take a cursory look at more lockers but there’s nothing too interesting there. The monitors in the security room are of course dead, since there’s no power. As I look around I double-take at a dark gap in the wall – is that… a hole? A tunnel. Shit. Probably how the crab got in, they’re apparently known for burrowing into the facility from the seabed. I look around to find something to block it with – maybe I can drag one of the lockers over to it? I try to drag a small one over but it’s heavier than it looks, and as I struggle with it I over-balance it and it tips over with a loud crash (I just manage to get out of the way in time)! So much for subtlety (and any sense of security), now everything in the facility probably knows I’m here…!
(Gain stress – 1, Incident B: Loud crash – 10)
The locker tipped over in the middle of the room and it’s too heavy to drag over to the tunnel entrance so that option’s out. I think I hear a clattering noise down the tunnel though, that’s not good. I look around for something else to block up the entrance with, but then I notice the locker doors have opened in the impact, spilling some of the contents onto the floor – boxes, ledgers, computer and mechanical parts etc, which is why it was so heavy. I hurriedly come up with a plan –if I can clear most of the debris out of the locker then I can still push the (now much lighter) locker unit over the entrance to cover it up, and then I can put the contents back to weigh it down again. I get enough stuff out of the locker and put my weight into it to drag it into place on its side over the entrance (the tunnel is quieter now but that could mean anything), and then load it up with some of the contents again. I don’t know if that would stop anything getting through but at least it should delay it a bit (and block out the light coming in from this side that could attract any attention) – even with my extra weaponry I really won’t want to be dealing with a crab swarm.
I may have to deal with an individual crab though, as I hear a louder clattering coming from the other side of the wall. Shit, the crab I saw earlier must have heard the ruckus. I hastily attach the torch to my shoulder to provide some hands-free illumination in front of me and get out the nail gun. It seems to be loaded and I flick off the safety and aim it down the room at the entrance door I left ajar. I’m not great with weapons but I do know how to use a nail gun – this is just… on something further away than I’m used to, I guess. I hear its legs clacking as it tries to push the door open (it’s fairly heavy though at least). I move along to the far side of the room, opposite the entrance door and near the Armoury entrance to get a better view (and better shot). As I get there I can see the crab has managed to open the door enough to fit most of its limbs through, and can squeezes it body through. As my light shines on it I can see that its pincers look nasty, and among the clicking of its pointed legs on the floor I can hear it making an unpleasant chittering sound. As it’s squeezing through I line up a shot with the nail gun as the underside of its body is exposed to me.
THUNK THUNK THUNK!
Surprisingly three high velocity nails fire out when I pull the trigger and at least one embeds itself into the crab’s carapace, causing it to screech in pain (uh-oh)! The shock causes it to pull back into the corridor and I hear it running around outside. I take out the fire axe and place it on the waist-high cabinet I’m taking cover behind, ready to grab it if the crab comes back. I see its limbs scrabble at the door again (a little more cautiously?) and I line up another shot, waiting for it to try to squeeze through again. It manages to push the door open a bit more so it’s not as much of a struggle this time, but I get off another shot that hits – more of a glancing blow that tears off a chunk of its carapace but it’s bleeding now. It screeches again but this time it charges into the room! I drop the gun and grab the axe and swing as it runs in and launches itself at me.
CRUNCH!
With a yell I bring the axe down squarely onto its body as it narrowly misses me with its slashing pincers, impaling it on the top of the cabinet with a sickening crunch. Its legs shudder, and then it is still.
(Gain a couple of stress – current total: 3. Incident C – Crab Attack: 4).
I stagger back away from the body, breathing heavily. That was terrifying! I catch my breath and stare at the creature – it’s definitely dead. I hope its screeches didn’t attract anything else (I can’t hear anything at least). It takes a few minutes for me to recover my composure – after which I pull the axe out of its corpse (ugh), retrieve (and check)the nail gun and cautiously peer through the open doorway into the corridor. I think I’ve had enough of the security office now!
I don’t see or hear anything (other than the occasional background creaking… I think it’s clear. I cautiously approach the eastern section, the central part of which should mostly taken up by rows of cubicles according to the map. I remember the warning about “booby traps” too so I’m careful to keep a healthy distance. Shining my torch upwards I see the “forest of rags” hanging from the ceiling that the previous lamplighter mentioned. It looks like… clothing? I see sleeves and legs of overalls up there, all shredded into strips. What the hell. How did it even get up there, there’s no walkways or anything, they just seem to be hanging from the pipes and other protrusions up there. They’re gently swaying too, as if there’s some kind of breeze up there (which is odd, as I don’t hear any fans or anything and the power is out anyway)
I steer clear of the cubicles and head around the northern part of the section where the meeting rooms and executive suites are. I wonder what happened to everyone here. Did they just abandon the facility for some reason some time ago? Did something go wrong here? What were they even doing? I have a dark thought that somehow maybe everyone died down here and they bones still rest here somewhere but I’ve seen no sign of anything like that yet. Seems like everything has been abandoned for a while at least but it mostly looks tidy. I can see into some of the cubicles at least and there are computer monitors and papers and other things there and they look fairly ordered, not as if people just suddenly had to leave in a hurry. The instructions were clear about not reading anything of the documents here and I don’t want to risk being caught in a “booby trap”. The suite and meeting rooms are similarly empty.
I look into the kitchen at the end and pause for a bit. I remember the message on my WristComm and have another look at it… “ADDITIONAL OBJECTIVE: ESPE SIUAION”. I clear out the corrupted letters to make it clearer: “ES–PE SI-U-A-ION”… I think the first word has to be “ESCAPE”… ESCAPE SITUATION? No, I missed a letter…something like that though? Oh. It’s got to be SIMULATION. “ESCAPE SIMULATION”. What the heck does that mean? Wait, is this some kind of test to see if I can get out? Am I trapped in here? Wait, it says it’s an “additional objective”… so it’s a command rather than a statement – so they (whoever that is) want me to “escape from the simulation”? But what’s being simulated? This sure seems like the real deal to me – I tap the counter in the kitchen and it certainly feels solid and real enough to me. Hmm.
The power console is on the wall a few metres away so I decide to get on with my job and turn the lights back on in this section so I’m done – and at least I’ll be able to see and save the flashlight batteries. It’s kinda weird that I even have to do this at all to be honest – you’d think they’d just fix the main generator but then if the place is as abandoned as it looks then why am I even going through these sections and turning everything back on in the first place? I open the cabinet door, reset the fuses and flick the switches and pull the levers to start the backup generator again. The lights flicker back on and I hear fans and machinery starting up again. It’s alive! That should keep it going for a while. I have a few minutes to look around more properly now before the doors to the next section open – but first I check the MemoComm module here and enter my report (and read the previous report too).
Well, that’s disturbing. The Last Guy talked about groaning noises, things reaching through doors, a gigantic crab (!) and scaffold planks but looking around I don’t see or hear any of those at all. The crab I saw was (I presume) a normal sized one, and the tops of the cubicles are bare. Maybe the darkness exaggerated what he thought he saw? I didn’t see a “smashed open locker” in the armory either which is strange. “Project Hellmouth” though? That sounds pretty ominous.
Now the power is back on, I can have a proper look in the kitchen. Huh. Looks like all the trays and eating implements have been taken out of the cupboards and drawers and placed out on counters and tables. Not just thrown everywhere in disarray though – they’re neatly organised and stacked. Everything looks clean too. There are some dried meals but I‘d better not have anything, who knows how old this is. And I’m definitely not opening the refrigerator after it’s been out of power for so long.
I look around at the cubicles and they seem tidy, with computers, cables, keypads, files and papers – the usual. I can’t see any obvious boobytraps. The computers aren’t all turning back on again at least, but I wonder who this is all for since nobody is here? The boardrooms and executive suite are empty – again, all tidy and ordered, no signs of a panic or sudden abandonment.
I go back to the security office and have another look around. The dead crab is still where I left it (good!) – the locker is still blocking the tunnel entrance too. I was wondering about the briefing saying that the security system had been “compromised”. The console seems to have rebooted when the power returned – most of the monitors are black but I don’t know if that’s because the cameras are dead or because they’re in darkness. I almost jump when I see a figure on one of the screens but then I realise it’s just me – I turn to my left and look up and there’s a camera in the corner pointing at me. I chuckle and look back at the screen, and then I freeze. To my right and behind on the screen, the locker is being pushed aside and there are several very large, long crab legs forcing their way out of the tunnel.
(Gain 1 Stress – 4 total now. Succeeded PANIC check, keep it together).
I steel myself, pull out my nail gun and turn around slowly – only to see the locker still covering up the tunnel entrance where I left it, and no sign of anything coming out of the tunnel. I look back at the screen and I am alone, and the locker is against the entrance. What the fuck? Am I losing my mind?!
Maybe this is what they meant by the security system being compromised? But what could do that? Did I just imagine it, like that shadow in the hyperbaric pod earlier? Of course it couldn’t have been real, I would have heard the locker being pushed aside, right? I find the rewind command and view the footage again.
OK there I am, walking up to the console, I can see the locker to the right of me on the far side of the room. Looking around, looking a bit startled as I see myself on one of the screens, looking up at the camera, looking at the screen, freezing, drawing the gun, slowly turning to my right then looking back at the screen and back at the locker… but in this footage the locker never moved throughout all of that and nothing was coming out of the tunnel?! I replay it a couple of times and it’s the same each time (why wouldn’t it be?)… and then I realise that the camera can see the screen that I was looking at, and I can just about make out that there is something moving behind me on that! So what the hell? I could see the tunnel and the crab on the screen from this very camera at that time, but I can’t see them when I replay it now?
(Gain 1 stress – current total: 5. Incident D – Strange visions: 7)
.I turn off the console. This is getting a bit much. I must be seeing things, this has to be due to the pressure equalisation or something, maybe that does something to your head. Warily I walk past the locker (not taking my eyes off it) and back out into the main section and then head back to the kitchen area in a hurry. I don’t want to look at anything else in here, I just want to get into the next section and get this over with. Finally the doors unlock and I can get out of here.
(passed PANIC check).
SECTION 2: THE GARDEN
I step into darkness again. A weird smell hits me that I didn’t expect – wet earth? Like… what was it, patchouli? Petrichor? Musty. Decon connector was the same as before – grimy and unclean. At least I remembered to turned on the torch again before I was lost in the dark. I can hear water dripping, and my torch’s lightbeam is full of motes of… something. I am standing on a metal walkway, I can see a stairwell going down in front of me, and a stairs with a quarter landing going up to a higher level to the left and right. The briefing called this “The Garden”, said it was for… mushroom growing?
Shit. I fumble for my rebreather mask and quickly put it on. Spores! That’s probably what those motes in the light must be – better to be safe than sorry and not breathe them in. I wish I’d found a proper helmet now but this will do, at least the mask covers my mouth and nose. Hopefully I didn’t inhale too many. I cast the light around and it seems to be clear in the immediate vicinity at least. I shine the light over the side of the walkway and see equipment and containers down there in disarray, the floor looks like it’s got a thin layer of water over it (maybe ankle deep?). Could there be a leak or something? I guess if there was a breach this whole thing should be fully flooded by now…
I find the MemoComm and check out Last Guy’s report. Ugh, sounds creepy. I walk up the stairs on the right and shine my light down the walkway at the top and I see what he means – there are rows of mushrooms in waist-level planters all along the sides of the walkway, all tall thin stalks and small round heads. They’re huge, must be about a metre tall! Sounds like it’s easy to lose your bearings in here so I’ll be careful. Looking at the map on the MemoComm I could just stay on this walkway and there’d be similar steps going down to the exit on other side, so maybe I don’t even have to go down to the lower level? Then again I’m not sure where the generator controls are, maybe they’re downstairs. I think it’s supposed to be some kind of science lab down there? Last Guy said it was completely flooded down there but if it was it looks like it’s been mostly drained now. Again it seems someone’s changed things in the time between our visits.
Maybe I should just go downstairs, seems safer than walking around on possibly rickety walkways. Then again, crabs (or worse) could be more likely down there. Screw it, I’ll head down.
So yeah… I’m about ankle deep in water here – fortunately my work boots are waterproof. There seem to be less motes in the air down here which is good. It’s a mess down here. Maybe it could have been flooded at one point and when it was drained everything was left scattered around like this? All I can hear is drip, drip, dripping. I take a deep breath (still wearing my rebreather) and start heading across the lab floor.
There are… things on the tables and counters. Looks like the remains of specimens, some kind of local sealife that was being studied maybe? They look dead but I don’t get too close. They look strange – stretched, misshapen, like their bones are too big for them or grew funny. What do I know what alien life should look like though, maybe I’m just trying to compare them to things I know and they look wrong because of that?
I have a weird feeling, like I’m not alone in here. I stop, and pan my light around. I don’t hear anything except the dripping. I look up at the walkways above me. Wait – is that a light up there? I thought for a split second I saw two red lights up there. I shine my torch up and I just see the underside of the walkways and mushroom planters. I think I’m about halfway across and the only way up is back the way I came and I don’t really want to go check that out. Maybe some device is running on battery power or something.
I get to a wall with a door around the middle of the section. There’s biohazard symbols and signs saying “sample storage” and contamination warnings. Whatever they were looking at here sounds nasty. Looks like I can go around though, I think that’s a better idea than going in. As I’m going around I hear a ‘clinking’ sound above me. I point my light at the sound and see some of the mushrooms up there are swaying, like something’s disturbed them!
(Gain 1 stress – current total: 6)
Screw this. I need to find the generator and turn the power back on and get the hell out of here. As I follow the wall around I can see the stairs going up so I make a beeline for those. The opposite wall looks like cabinets and counters, no sign of the generator controls or MemoComm so those must be upstairs. I definitely feel like I’m being watched now. I shine my light up the stairs and then scan around and up behind me too. Whatever it is, it feels like it’s nearby. I clamber up and see the controls and MemoComm by a door to the next Section at the top. Hurriedly I start cranking up the generator – after a couple of attempts it fires up and the lights come up and I start the door unlocking sequence!
I turn around and it’s just there. Perched on the railing in front of me over the stairs to the lower level is… an owl?! It’s about a foot tall, just staring at me with piercing metallic eyes with red lights as pupils. Jesus. Its silvery claws look nasty too. It’s just… watching me. No, glaring at me. I have a feeling if I do anything sudden then it’s going to try to rip my eyes out.
(fail Fear save, gain two stress – current total: 8)
Come on come on come on… these damn doors need to hurry up and unlock! We stare at eachother for what seems like an eternity. I get the sense that there’s some kind of intelligence there, and it’s angry. Judging me. Outraged that I dared to set foot in its world. Thank god I didn’t go upstairs or I may have had those claws in my face, maybe it only let me get this far because it didn’t care about the lower levels. I should listen to the MemoComm and make a report but screw that, I’ll do it at the entrance to the next Section – if only THESE DAMN DOORS WOULD OPEN.
The click! of the doors unlocking nearly makes me jump out of my skin. The owl shuffles a little at the sound but keeps its eyes locked on me. I fumble behind me for the button on the panel to open the door, and as it opens the owl suddenly spreads its wings wide and shrieks at me – it sounds like the devil himself – and I just flail backwards through the open doorway. As I scramble to close the door from the other side I see the creature flapping exultantly, still screeching hatefully as if it’s the lord of its territory as the door closes. I hear it for a few more seconds through the closed door and then it’s mercifully silent.
I catch my breath and shakily pull out my torch and start heading to the other side of the connector. Why the fuck is there even an owl down here in the first place? Who would bring a bird – a cybernetically enhanced bird, at that – into an underwater facility?! I guess I’m lucky it didn’t actually attack me, those metallic claws looked really nasty. I take a deep breath and head into the next Section – what the hell could be waiting for me in there, I wonder?
(Passed PANIC check at end of Section. fail Fear save, gain two stress – current total: 10)
SECTION 3: THE BULGE
Darkness again. It’s colder in here too. I look around as the door closes behind me and find the MemoComm. Guess I’d better leave a report for the previous area here for the next poor sap, I know it’s not the standard way but Hazmos can sue me, I wasn’t going to make a report while being death-glared by a winged cybernetic horror – hopefully the next guy can get past the owl from Hell!
There is a report from the Last Guy here, so he made it through at least (doesn’t mention the owl though) – it’s not good though. There are people here, but they’re… sick? I remember the briefing said something about the place being unstable and there being “parasitic infestations”. I REALLY wish I had a helmet on now, but I’m gonna leave my rebreather on to be safe.
There’s a small vestibule at the entrance that has a sign on the wall saying this is the habitation module. I peer out of the entrance and see what’s out there, shining my light around. I don’t hear anything at all, it’s quiet as a tomb in here. What I see on this upper level by the entrance looks fairly normal. There’s some debris scattered around – papers, cups, rags – and some of the floor panels are missing. I step out to have a better look.
Wait. I do hear something. Sounds like a low pitched, quiet humming from the central part of this section? It sounds strange. I tread carefully, the floor’s a bit of a mess in places. I don’t see or hear any people, which is weird. Where are they?
I’m at the top of the stairs down to the central mess hall. I see benches but it looks like there’s some kind of pillar in the middle of the room? Looks almost tree-like. The humming is getting louder. It sounds like… voices?
As I approach the middle of the room it all becomes clear. Horrifyingly clear. The humming is coming from the tree – but it’s not a tree, oh no, it’s something far worse…
(failed Sanity check. Gain 2 stress – 12 total now. Fail PANIC check – Memory Loss)
Next thing I know I’m at the MemoComm on the other side of the section, leaving a recording:
“It’s people. It’s everyone here. Flesh and bone all twisted and fused together into a pillar that goes from floor to ceiling. Limbs like branches reaching for the unseen sky near the top. A hundred mouths, all humming and jabbering discordantly… numbers? calculations? Eyes opening and closing everywhere, frantically looking for something. Nothing resembling a human face, everything is all spread out along the pillar – but it was definitely human at some point. Something else intertwined with the pillar of flesh too – black veins everywhere, something glittering pulsating through it. Then some of the eyes saw me. Then it started screaming. All of it.”
I end the recording and slump down to the floor in the darkness by the MemoComm. I don’t know how I got here or how much time has passed. I fumble around beside me and mercifully I find my torch. I have some scrapes on me and my hands and arms are sore, like I’ve been hitting something. Or maybe ran into something. I turn the torch on and I’m in another vestibule, there’s another (different) sign with the habitation module on the wall. Definitely not in the first room again.
I guess I must have just run from that… thing, and found my way here somehow. I can’t hear it anymore. Too many walls in the way, I guess. I get up and close the door into the Section, and lock it. Then I turn the lights back on. Calmly, I open up the control panel for the outer doors and short circuit the lock’s time-delay, because screw waiting here for 10 more minutes. The doors into the connector to the next section open and I leave, and I don’t look back as they close behind me.
(Fail PANIC check – Overconfidence)
SECTION 4: THE CROWN
It sings to me. I don’t understand but it’s discordant and terrifying and it echoes through my whole being, but it’s beautiful and horrifying at the same time. I couldn’t block out the sound if I tried – and I don’t know if I even want to – because it’s coming from inside my head. I spin around the tower of flesh, or maybe it spins before me. I feel myself untethering from reality, rising up towards a blinding white light at the top of the crown of limbs as the tower cries “freedom” in a chorus of once human voices…
I start awake. What the hell? I still see the light before me and for a minute I don’t know where I am – but then I realise it’s my torch, which is on and pointing at me on a table beside where I am lying. I blink and sit up. Where am I? What happened? My head hurts too, like there’s just too much crammed in there. There are a few too many gaps in my memory lately and I don’t like it. My stupid wristpad doesn’t turn on… I have no idea how long I was out.
I grab the torch and cast the light around the room I’m in. There are beds and examination equipment here, I’m lying on the bed of some kind of body scanner. It’s inactive of course, because there’s no power. Kinda dumb of me to just take a nap on the first flat surface I see in a pitch black room where there could be some hostile creature lurking in the dark. Fortunately it seems to be quiet and empty here.
I need to keep it together and gather my wits. I don’t know what happened to me in the last Section or just now, everything is… fragmentary. Did I check the MemoComm when I entered this section? I remember being determined to get through this, like I could take on anything. I guess my body had other ideas though and it just needed to stop and take a break? That dream… or vision… or whatever it was. Did that.. thing… communicate with me somehow when I saw it? Was that a memory of what happened or my brain just trying to process what happened… or something actually happening in real time while I was asleep?
Why do I have to deal with all this crazy stuff anyway? I’m just a guy who turns the power back on, here to do a job, and this is all way above my pay grade. I think for a bit. I’ve never had much ambition, I just do whatever the company tells me to do and I get paid. Usually I just fix stuff so this didn’t seem too out of the ordinary. I know it’s risky sometimes but I think I can handle most things. But this is something else, this all just doesn’t make any sense. I know I’m not the first one they sent down here (but maybe I’ll be the last) – how many people have gone before me? What happened to them? Did any make it out? Did they all die down here? Are they all in that horrible tower? Hazmos must know what’s going on here… or maybe they know SOMETHING is going on but not what exactly? It’s not like they really prepared me much for any of this – just turn on the power and leave a report is all they said. But if there were people down here already… why couldn’t they do that? Last Guy’s report at the start of the previous section said that there were people wandering around, albeit in a bad state. Something clearly must have happened since then to turn them into that… thing, but maybe it’s related to their condition back then? I wonder how long ago it was that Last Guy was even down here.
And to think I was worried about mushroom spores earlier… I still have my rebreather mask on at least so I haven’t been breathing in anything from outside since I entered the “Garden”. I guess I can only hope that whatever transformed those poor people isn’t going to affect me. At this point I don’t even know if I’m going to be able to get out of here, but I’m damn well going to try. Now I think of it, the briefing was pretty vague about getting back out. They did say there was an east caisson but it was out of bounds – so what, they expect me to go back through all of this to get out? Screw that, unless that caisson is literally a pile of twisted wreckage I’m getting out that way. I just need to focus on getting through this, finishing the job and getting out of here in one piece.
(rested – reduce 4 stress. 8 total now.)
As I hop off the scanner bed and leave I look around again, and I can’t help but notice the sheets on one of the beds is covered in dried blood. There’s no sign of a body though. Maybe someone else was down here?
I head out and see the entrance MemoComm in front of me. I listen to the reports – Last Guy made it this far at least. Guess that was his blood on the bed. Who’s “Ari”, what’s a “Fontanelle”? Last Guy sounds like he’s not in a good way, he’s kinda babbling in places.
I think about leaving a report of my own, like I’m supposed to do. I don’t know if there’s anything to be said beyond what I said in the last section though, so I don’t. Is anyone else even going to listen to those things anyway?
I enter the corridor and I realise that there is a glow up ahead. Pale blue, flickering. As I approach I realise it’s water, lit from below by some light source (I thought there was no power?). A… what do they call them? Moon Pool? Oh yeah, they gave it a name didn’t they, that was what “Fontanelle” was referring to. Weird name for it. There’s some kind of large pod – a habitat? – suspended over the middle of the pool, extending into it. As I walk around the habitat I see some kind of dark slick-looking cabling coming out of the pool too, heading towards the east end of the section.
Ugh, the habitat’s a bloody mess. Literally. The porthole is opaque with something on the inside. The hatch is open and there’s just this… dried viscera everywhere. It’s all I can do to keep myself from throwing up. Some poor sap must have been inside and the decompression went catastrophically wrong. Jesus. There’s a small open hatch above it and I can see there’s something in there but I’ll have to get onto the connecting walkway and negotiate all of the… debris everywhere. It’s tricky but I make it across and reach in… some papers and a small plastic box? I grab them and retreat back to the relatively solid floor. I take them over to a console nearby and have a look.
The box is a container for some kind of… tape? A cassette? Who uses those anymore? There’s a note attached to it from a guy called Graham. He is – was, I guess, looking around – a diver. He writes that he is part of a team that were sent to salvage something from a spaceship that is somehow stuck in a tunnel below us? He talks about contamination, and people fusing to the furniture…? The other side of the note is a hand-scrawled report from him telling someone called Xi to get the message out about what’s going on here. I guess they didn’t.
There’s some other papers too. “Internal Report – Classified”. I don’t care and read them anyway, and learn about Project Hellmouth, Fell Stroke, Vault, and “Hard Taffy”. So those Hazmos bastards DID know. And they’ve been monitoring me through some kind of bodycam, have they? Well I’m wearing a vacc suit over my clothing and I don’t have anything obvious on me… and then it clicks. The wristpad! I look closely at it and now I notice a tiny camera hole there. I angrily tear off the wristpad and curse my employers as I throw it at the habitat, where it clangs loudly on the side and sploshes into the water below. Damn thing wasn’t much use anyway, and now they can just look at the fishes or whatever the hell is down there. Suck on that, Hazmos, and screw your reports.
The bell in the secondary pool must still be down there at the buried ship. I guess this Graham guy came up in it to leave this stuff here to get the message out, and then sent the bell back down. I spot the cable winch extending over the smaller pool and I have an idea. I pull out my trusty fire axe and start hacking into the winch supports. I just take all of my rage out on that and by the time I’m done I am screaming at the thing as its mangled remains teeter into the pool and sink like a stone into the water, taking the cable down with it. Whatever is down there can stay down there now.
(Axe therapy – lose 5 stress. Current stress total: 3).
I put the axe away (my arms are sore but it was worth it), and head to the eastern end of the section. The cables snake along the floor from the moonpool and continue around a large obstacle in the corridor. I cast my light around it and I see blades and grinders… a tunnel boring machine! Powered down, it seems. As I recall these things are powered by induction so it’ll come back on when the power returns… which gives me another idea. I find the control panel on the TBM and jam the controls to “drill”, and cut a few key hydraulics in the machinery. Then I head over to the MemoComm by the exit from this section. The cables continue past the borer and disappear under the floor where I guess they continue into the next section. Now I look at them more closely, they look black and oily and… alive? I see something moving inside them towards the next section, glinting in the torchlight. And I know where I’ve seen this before. The Tower.
As I realise this I feel a mental pull, a strange compulsion to follow them, to leave this section right now and enter the next one. I think it… the Tower… wants me to continue for some other purpose. But I need to finish the job here first (not the report, screw that). I open up the door panel again and set it up to unlock the doors when the power comes back. Then I stand back and turn the generators on.
The lights come up and immediately the boring machine starts up, and begins moving forward, slowly accelerating. And that’s all it can do, because I sabotaged the steering and set it to charge straight ahead. I trigger the door unlock and as I step through into the connector and close the doors behind me the machine crashes into the habitat and I see the carnage unfold as sparks fly, machinery explodes ,and the remains of the habitat plunge into the pool. The entire complex shudders as I reach the doors to the next section – I open them and step through into the unknown.
(passed PANIC check).
SECTION 5: THE CREST
I don’t need my torch anymore. There’s a flicking, silvery glow in here, emanating from some kind of structure in the centre of the section. I’m standing on a ring-shaped platform that encircles the rim of this Section, looking across what may as well be a small lake with an island in the middle of it. The water seems to be about a foot deep, and there’s a layer of mist across the surface. The “cables” from the previous section re-emerged at the entrance and dip into the water, heading towards the central island to join with whatever is there.
I don’t know what I expected here to find here. The briefing I had before I came here didn’t say anything about this section other than there being a “High Value Asset” and being forbidden to tell anyone about it. Well I don’t think that really matters now. I hear the structure around me creaking, and some muffled thuds and shudders still continuing as more things explode in the last section. In retrospect, wreaking explosive destruction in a highly pressurised tin can on the bottom of an alien ocean was probably not the greatest of ideas, but whatever they found needs to stay down here and nobody should be able to reach it anymore. I’ve probably seriously threatened the structural integrity of this place now – if that section implodes then the rest of the station will probably follow pretty quickly so I may not have much time left anyway.
I walk around the platform to the other side… and there’s no sign of a connector, doorway, elevator, MemoComm or anything else. Tapping the wall, it looks and sounds exactly like everywhere else, there’s no hollows or secret switches or anything like that. So the “East Caisson” was a lie all along? Just a prop for show, and nobody was ever going to get out that way? Something to keep our hopes up as we deal with whatever horrors this place throws at us? I guess I’m not getting out of here after all, but I think I was kinda resigned to that anyway. I’d curse the company even further but I take some solace in the fact that I’m taking this place with me when I go.
I turn around and look across the mist. Whatever is illuminating the section is coming out of the other side of the structure (I guess I’ve been walking around its ‘back’ side). I continue walking around the platform until I can see it more clearly. It’s…
“Come and see”, whisper a hundred abhuman voices in my mind. It should startle me, but I’ve felt their presence ever since I walked into this room. I step into the water and start walking/wading to the centre.
There’s a mound in the middle of the pool, and as I get closer I can see it’s a structure made of bundles of those “cables” I saw earlier. It’s really half a mound though – and in the vertical face before me is a shimmering, silvery disc, a couple of metres across. Is it a window? A gateway? It looks for all the world like a giant eye, staring at me over the surface of the water. I stop and stand a few metres in front of it, listening to the sound of the ripples my movement made echoing away to silence.
The voices in my head chant, “To everything that might have been, to everything that was, and to everything that still could be”.
The shimmering surface flattens out into a perfect mirror. I see myself, and I look pretty rough. I don’t know how long I’ve been in here, it should just be hours but it feels like days. Then the mirror ripples and starts showing me other images.
I see myself propped up, broken and bloody, leaning against what looks like a stalagmite, nothing but despair in my dead eyes.
I see my corpse in the Garden, mushrooms growing out of every part of exposed skin. From death comes new life.
I see my wasted body shambling around with others in the central section, my head and limbs misshapen, babbling nonsense to nobody who will listen.
I see myself in the flooded “Crown” section, black tentacles pulling me into the darkness of the ocean.
More and more images of my demise flash by – I suffocate, I shoot myself, I drown in the dark, I am devoured by a sea monster, I am crushed as the structure implodes… death upon death upon death. Sometimes it doesn’t look like me but I know it is still me. It always is.
And finally I see my own eyes, fused into the Tower. My own eyes, looking at me looking back at them. But now they know.
The image shatters, and I understand too.
“Escape is at hand!”, the voices cry.
The silvery eye blinks, and I am gone.
—FIN—
(c) Constantine Thomas, 13 Jan 2025.