Caingrad was a beautiful city, especially compared to those in the Empire. Still, Benjamin only had eyes for one thing. From the moment they left the caravan in a station inside the city, he could not control himself and kept pestering Layla. Are those ruins? What about that building? That was the funny thing with the buildings left by the Ancient People, some of them seemed to never fall into disrepair, no matter how long people ignored them and left them to the mercy of the elements. It was almost as if they repaired themselves. Layla sighed, slightly annoyed at this new behavior.

“I must say, I didn't expect you to be quite so fascinated by old ruins like these... Not like they look like ruins though. As I've said, they're dangerous, more often than not. Where's your fear when we need it? Are you okay with just dying underground, with nobody ever knowing about what happened to you?”

Benjamin stopped to ponder. It's not to say that he wasn't afraid at all, it was just that this time it felt like he might be able to obtain something so great, so important. He didn't mind at all risking his life for more knowledge on the Ancient People, it was such a different situation from being suddenly assaulted in the desert by a huge monster, or having to talk with some that could kill you any time they wanted.

“The risk is worth it. In the first place, learning more about the Ancient people is one of the most important reason why I have come to the Wildlands. Doing so is pretty taboo in the Empire, even though we use a lot of technology that originated with the Ancient people...”

His eyes were quite resolute, like nobody would be able to persuade him of changing his mind. Layla put a palm in her face, looking like she gave up on the situation. After sighing once again, she took a deep breath and calmed herself.

“Okay. I get it, you really want to do this. So, let's do it like this: We will just enter a random ruin of your choice, we will walk around and when we eventually find a corpse, you will agree with me that exploring ruins is a terrible idea, then we can leave. How about that?”

Benjamin was quite surprised by her boldness.

“Huh, just enter, without any preparation or talking with someone who has done this kind of thing before? That seems pretty courageous and dangerous to me. Are you sure?”

If you could inflict pain by staring at people, Layla's stare might have left Benjamin writhing on the ground, almost unable to breathe.

“Now you're saying sensible things? What the heck? You're the one acting all crazy and obsessed, like you just want to go explore and look around one of those right now!”

Benjamin stroked his chin as he nodded.

“Well, that is true, if possible, I'd really like to take a look at the inside of ruins of the Ancient People, like right now. I'm so excited...”

Layla rolled her eyes.

“Ugh, I swear... If I get killed and you survive, I'm going to haunt you for the rest of your life.”

Benjamin replied without really thinking.

“Well, I wouldn't really mind getting haunted by you.”

Both of them froze as he said that. Hearts beating like crazy. Layla broke the ensuing silence first.

“What did you say?”

Benjamin looked away.

“Nothing.”

Oh fuck. He had said something with a lot of implicit meaning didn't he? Maybe she didn't hear it clearly. He decided to just go with acting like he didn't say anything.

“Oh, no, no, no. You can't back out of having said something like that, you know? Do you mind repeating it for me?”

He very much minded it.

“I'm sorry, I have no idea what you might be talking about, miss. I don't recall saying anything in the last few seconds, so I can't really... repeat it.”

He didn't say anything. He didn't say anything. No meaning to it.

“Well, that's too bad then, I guess, I was feeling like perhaps exploring a few ruins might be somewhat fun if a certain phrase was repeated. I suppose maybe we should just go find a hotel and ignore the ruins then...”

What? But she had just accepted... Ugh. Separating from her be a very bad idea. If she refused to accompany him, then he would have no choice but t not go explore ruins... He let go of his dignity and pride.

“Come on... You said you would go with me... We would explore some ruins, maybe find a corpse, probably learn something new! Where's you adventurous spirit? Please?”

She just shrugged.

“I don't know, maybe if I just heard those words again, I might just find it.”

Fine! She said she would do it if he said it, so... He did it. The rest of his pride wasn't worth not having the chance of learning more about the Ancient people.

“I wouldn't mind getting haunted by you if you get killed...”

Maybe if he even added more words she would be even happier?

Less than an hour later, the both of them found themselves in front of a square, mostly metal building. It was very small, the size of a cabin, but there was no way it could be anything but one of many ruins left by the Ancient People.

“Oh! This is so great! Never thought I'd see one of those unsealed! Every time I saw one of those back home I wondered what use were these small buildings without any entrances. But to think that they actually should have had a door like this...”

It was simple and almost welcoming. Next to a metal sliding door was a single button. It looked like a simple elevator that you might find anywhere. For her part, Layla looked like she have already regretted her decision.

“You know, this might be too dangerous after all. You sure this is a good idea at all? I swear I really, really will haunt you if I die. I'm not kidding, you know?” Benjamin ignored his friend. At that point, he only had one thing in his mind. Without a hint of hesitation, he pressed the button. With no immediate feedback, he was almost disappointed. “Look, nothing happened, we should probably just go away, maybe it's broken, you know?”

Broken? There was no way. It wasn't much, but Benjamin studied as much about the Ancient People as he had been allowed. It's not like everything they had built was indestructible. However, the buildings that survived these more than thousand years of neglect had something special about them. Of that, there was no doubt. He somehow doubted that any them simply broke down. As if to illustrate his thought, the elevator arrived and the metal door slid open.

“See? Not broken! Come on. I'm sure there are awesome things to discover inside!”

He pulled the still hesitant Layla inside. Without mirrors or any kind of decorations, the elevator was quite plain. Its panel had only two buttons, presumably one for the surface and the other for whatever facility it led to. Shortly after they entered, the doors closed, then after Benjamin pressed the lower button, the elevator started moving.

“Ugh... Why are we here, what if this stops and breaks down midway? We could be stuck here and die for a stupid reason...”

Even if they did die, it wouldn't be for a stupid reason! Also, Benjamin wondered if there were no elevators in the Wildlands. Layla was way too nervous. It couldn't be. The scale might not be to the size of some buildings in the Empire, but even a casual glance around Caingrad had shown him that the Mutants of the Wildlands also built pretty big stuff. Maybe Layla just wasn't good with elevators?

“You know, I've been wondering, but are you bad with elevators?”

Layla's angry and teary expression told him that perhaps he shouldn't have asked that. Before he realized, she was hugging one of his arms like a scared child.

“Shut up, I have no problem with them... But, at least, don't let go of me, okay? Please.”

He just silently let her hold his arm. Almost unconsciously, he started petting her head to console her. She didn't say anything, but her expression softened considerably. Soon enough, the elevator stopped and the door opened again.

“Here we are, don't worry, I'm sure nothing bad is going to happen.”

They were inside a mostly concrete structure. A single corridor led into someplace else. On the ceiling were various lights that illuminated the place, as well as various grates for air circulation. On the walls there were various points with metal doors or windows, but nothing to interact with that might serve to open them. Layla looked at them quite suspiciously, almost as if she expected them to open at any time, releasing something that would attack them.

“This place is quite creepy...”

Personally, Benjamin disagreed, but didn't say anything. He was quite accustomed to this kind of architecture, it was quite common to see places like this in the Empire. It almost ultimately made this much more disappointing than he thought. It was like walking from a lecture hall to another. Although he must admit it was smaller, so slightly more claustrophobic than usual.

Eventually they came to the end of the corridor, where they found a blank screen and a panel with a hand marking on it, almost as if inviting one to put their palm on it. Before Layla could say anything, he did just that. For a moment, nothing happened, then Benjamin felt as if something pricked him, so he violently pulled his hand back. He saw a small needle, red with a small amount of his blood receding into the panel.

“Ouch. What the hell was that?”

But before he could say anything else, a female voice came from the blank screen, which suddenly turned on, showing a strange symbol and words below it. Department of sanitation. Healthy, now and forever.

“Human DNA confirmed. Initiating Apocalypse Protocol.”

The screen then changed. It now showed a strange 3D map. Still, what interested Benjamin the most were the words the computer just used. Apocalypse Protocol sounded quite ominous, but it's not the area they were in was going to explode or anything like that, or so he hoped.

“Apocalypse Protocol? What do you mean?”

A woman's smiling face appeared on the screen. He had read about it. It seemed like the Ancient People liked creating avatars for the AI's they used. That was likely the case with this one.

“The Apocalypse Protocol is present in every facility important for day-to-day sustenance, advanced critical research, biological preservation, general culture and knowledge storage as well as military production. Due to the possibility of social breakdown, as human presence in any of these facilities dwindle, more and more automatic systems come online in order to maintain these facilities and guarantee a level of material wealth for humans even if society completely collapses. Authorization and entry protocols also become more and more lax as the probability rises that all previous authorized personnel of any such facilities are all deceased.”

The woman AI in the screen explained it all in a calm manner. Smiling all the while, like a well trained guide at a touristic place. It spoke like society collapsing was an every day thing.

“Wow, I gotta give you that. This looks impressively well functioning for a place that has been abandoned for probably more than a thousand years.”

Layla took a few steps forward and started examining the screen. The smiling woman AI stared at her. Then a strange thing detached from above the screen. A camera? And approached Layla's face. The woman AI spoke in the same calm manner.

“Presence of uncatalogued being detected. Considering the possibility of it being a threat to the continuation of the human species, I will now deploy security. Dear survivor, please, stand by as security does its job. Calm down, you are safe now.”

Then a sound of opening doors echoed in the entire place as every single metal door and window on the corridor's walls opened to allow very threatening-looking robots into the corridor. With no hesitation, Benjamin put himself between the robots and Layla. Some of them were bipedal, walking with a strange jaunt, showing weapons from a variety of places, while others were airborne, with many small rotors keeping them airborne.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! What are those things?”