The Cradle. A scientific center built several kilometers from Corvin, it became a historic place where a connection with the Center of Primordial Space was planned. Answers to both asked and unasked questions were supposed to be found. For several years, the Cradle was refined and upgraded. And finally, when the complex was completed and all systems were tested, the scientists of the Third District, under the leadership of Professor Simon Williams, began the experiment. As written in history textbooks studied by children in schools, the experiment failed. Due to unstable energy flows, the Rift Gates, which were the key element of the complex, couldn't close the rift in space and time. When the Archon of the Consolidated Nation gave the order to redirect energy from all districts to the Hall of the Rift Gates, a collapse occurred. It destroyed the entire Third District, millions died that night, and even more lost their loved ones. The collapse left a scar on both reality and the lives of all citizens of the Consolidated Nation.
Due to the anomalies resulting from the clash of two energy streams — the mysterious energy of Primordial Space and the energy reactors on the territory of the Consolidated Nation — the territory of the Third District became an exclusion zone. Years after the collapse, when the Consolidated Nation began to recover from the destruction, a Research Center was created with the goal of studying the anomalies in the exclusion zone. Due to the dangers lurking for travelers and after incidents that led to the deaths of several expedition members, the Third District was declared off-limits for research and visitation. The Research Center was disbanded, and the squads were disbanded. No one could understand what had happened on the night of the collapse or what was now in the epicenter of the catastrophe. No one knew what the ruins of the Cradle research center looked like. No one. Until tonight.
"The Cradle has been restored," Samantha whispered.
"But who and how..." John examined the complex's buildings.
The Cradle resembled the new Fracture complex in the Seventh District. The layout was different, but not by much. Unlike the Fracture Compound, the Cradle lacked most of the laboratories. The Cradle was built only for the launch of the Rift Gates, while Martha Crockford designed her Compound for further research after sending the first four to the Center of Primordial Space. However, both complexes contained living quarters for the scientists. Before the expedition began, Samantha had studied the Cradle's blueprints. Unlike the Fracture Compound, which was shaped like a ring from above, the Cradle was built in the shape of a square, with energy towers located at the corners to receive power from power plants in case the complex's reactor failed or was damaged. Along the inner perimeter were energy nodes to supply power to the Hall of the Rift Gates. The Rift Gates were the central element of the Cradle project, and accordingly, they occupied the central place in the complex's plans.
In the central dome-shaped building, they were located directly above the reactor room, which was buried in a blast-resistant underground facility. Only cables led outside, connecting to the Rift Gates. Professor Simon Williams tried to prevent any deviations from the plan. He also tried to protect the complex and the nearby Corvin from destruction in case of failure. But he couldn't.
"Wait," Amanda raised her hand. "Do you hear that?"
A familiar hum was growing in the distance. It was getting louder, and the source of the sound was approaching.
"A Hawk?" Alexa turned and squinted at the sky. "But who..."
"Down!" Amanda ordered. "Everyone down and hug the ground!"
The Wanderers rushed back down the hill. John leaped over fallen branches and the trunks of charred trees. The unknown Hawk was approaching, possibly the same Hawk that John and Amanda had heard last night at the station.
"Hug the ground!" Amanda commanded again.
The expedition members lay on the dust- and ash-covered ground. The Hawk flew right over them, heading toward the Cradle complex. John breathed deeply, watching Samantha lying nearby. If he had understood anything about what was happening around them until now, his mind was now in turmoil.
"We're lucky," Amanda whispered.
"Why would you say that?" James raised himself slightly, grabbing one of the branches. The branch couldn't support his weight and snapped. He fell back to the ground.
"It's night, so we're hard to spot. If this had been a few hours ago, we would've already been discovered and shot at."
"And why do you think they would've killed us?" Alexa listened as the hum by the Cradle faded until it was completely silent.
"What do you think?" Alexa stood up. "Unknown people restored the Cradle, installed spires everywhere for some unknown purpose, they have Hawks — at least one, maybe more. No one knows about this. Why such secrecy?"
"Maybe it's a Plan B?" James asked. "Why build one complex when you can build two?"
"That would make sense if they had enough alloy to create the Energy Disk for the Fracture Machine. And even then, no one would build a new complex here, in the exclusion zone."
"So what are we going to do?" John followed Amanda, standing up, and the rest of the Wanderers stood up with him.
"At the very least, we need to find out who these people are, and then figure out why they restored the Cradle. Obviously not as a monument." Amanda started climbing back to the top of the hill.
"Wait a second," Samantha paused for a moment, then rushed after Amanda to the top of the hill.
"What's wrong?" Amanda asked, stopping the girl.
"I need to check something," Samantha had already opened the blueprints of the project on her Pulse.
"Got it," the woman pulled a small binocular from her bag and crouched down. "Stay low."
"Understood," Samantha alternated between looking at the Cradle and at her sleeve, then lifting her eyes again.
James, Alexa, and John exchanged glances. It seemed none of them understood what was going on, as if Amanda and Samantha had sensed something that wasn't clear to the others. Nevertheless, they too climbed to the top of the hill and crouched down.
The expedition commander stared at the structures of the complex, where lights were on, then surveyed the perimeter.
"It can't be," Amanda said slowly.
"And what is it?" Alexa stepped closer to her.
"The Last Ones!" the commander replied, turning around.
"Fanatics?" John shifted his gaze to the complex.
"These are the Last Ones." Amanda took a step back. "The symbol of the Last is on the Hawk. The Tree of Life. They have restored the complex."
"It can't be," James shook his head. "The Last Ones are a bunch of fanatics who can at most instill ideas of the Old World in people and push them onto the streets with protests."
"Or they want us to think that," Amanda tucked her visor into her jacket pocket.
"If that's the case, then where do they get so many resources? How did they restore the complex without being noticed? And, more importantly, why haven't they been found before?" Alexa squinted at the lights of the Cradle.
"They were searched for..." Amanda began.
"But they weren't found," James interrupted her.
"They were searched for," Amanda continued, "but there were no traces. And that's understandable. We couldn't find them because we never even thought to look for them in the Third District. The Third District is an exclusion zone, a quarantine zone. We didn't think they would hide here."
"But how did they survive here?" John crossed his arms over his chest. "And even if they restored the complex, why? Where would they get energy? All the power plants were destroyed during the collapse."
"Damn it!" Samantha shouted. Everyone turned around.
"What is it?" Amanda pulled out her visor again and began to scan the perimeter.
"I figured it out," Samantha turned to the others. "Look at the complex."
Everyone approached the Wanderer and began to examine the buildings of the Cradle complex. John, like the others, saw nothing strange. The Cradle complex looked like the Fracture Compound, but nothing more. There were fewer laboratory buildings than in the complex built by Martha Crockford. Despite the devastation around, the complex looked new, just completed. But Amanda had already explained that the Last Ones had restored it. Most likely, they had built it from scratch. Still, John could not see what Samantha saw.
"So what's wrong?" Amanda felt the tension inside her slowly rising. The realization that the complex was restored by fanatics, lunatics, and that no one even noticed such a large structure was built on wasteland. No one noticed the supply of materials. But she knew that Samantha's next words would shatter everything that remained in these empty lands.
"Look at the tower in the center," Samantha pointed with her hand. "It wasn't on the original blueprints of the Cradle. The tower was not there during the collapse. It has just been completed now."
"Why?" Alexa asked quietly.
"Doesn't it remind you of anything?"
"Damn!" Amanda clenched her fist.
"It's the Father!" Samantha answered. "Or rather, an imitation of the Father, the Prime Reservoir, installed over the Fracture Machine."
"I still don't understand," James saw no connection.
"If I'm right, then the tower in the center is an imitation of the Prime Reservoir, which means the goal is the same as that of the Father."
"But in the Fracture project, the Father acts as a receiver of energy from other reservoirs. And here..." John fell silent.
"The Spires!" Amanda turned around. She was staring into the eyes of each Wanderer, realizing that it couldn't get any worse.
"But wait..." Alexa stopped Samantha. "That means the Spires in the desert are reservoirs standing in each district. But there are more of them here, and they are not that big. The Fracture reservoirs also store energy from the power plants and then transfer it to the Father. But there are no power plants here. There's nothing here at all."
"That's what we think," Samantha whispered quietly. "We were wrong. Damn! Damn! Damn!" Samantha clutched her head. Deep in her mind, she saw flashes and sparks. It was as if the truth, hidden from her view, had finally revealed itself.
"What?" A shiver ran down Alexa's spine.
"There's nothing here!" Samantha lowered her hands. "After the collapse, nothing remained here. But that's not true. There are Convergence points here."
"No!" Amanda raised her hand. "That's not the case. It can't be."
"Convergence points are compressed energy from the collapse in one point of space. That's why the Spires were built in places of Convergence points. To draw energy from them..." Samantha turned around. The lights of the Cradle continued to illuminate the nearby area of the complex.
"You mean..." John approached the Wanderer.
"That the Spires will likely emit a pulse that will detonate the Convergence points. The energy of the collapse will be released, and they will absorb it and send it to an imitation of the Father."
"But why do they need that?" John kept shifting his gaze between Samantha and the Cradle.
"And what was it built for?" Samantha spread her hands. "To activate the Rift Gates."
"You mean they restored even the Gates?"
"They didn't restore the Cradle for nothing!" Amanda intervened.
"But why activate the Gates? Last time it led to a collapse," John breathed deeply. His heart was beating faster and faster.
"And I can only assume two possibilities," Samantha sat down on the ground. She could no longer stand. "The first possibility: they are trying to establish a connection with the center of Primordial Space."
"Everyone knows that's impossible," John couldn't hold back. "And why would they do that?"
"What do we actually know about the Center of Primordial Space?"
"We know nothing," John didn't believe what was happening.
"Decades of data didn't reveal even one hundredth of a percent to us."
"Really?" Samantha looked up at the others. "We know that the Center of Primordial Space, however it sounds, is located in the center of Primordial Space. Presumably, it's the first world, the world that holds the answers to all questions. And if there are answers to all questions there, then there's an answer to the question of how to revive the old world."
"But we can't establish a connection with the center."
"We can't," Samantha confirmed. "We couldn't."
"What does that mean?"
"What was the problem? Why did the collapse happen? Because there wasn't enough energy to hold the rift. But now they are using not energy from the stations, but the energy of the collapse. Presumably, they can establish a connection with the Center."
"Damn!" Alexa, who had been listening to Samantha, could no longer stay silent.
"Exactly. According to their plan, they may activate the Rift Gates, the Spires in the wasteland will emit a pulse, and the Convergence points will detonate. The released energy will be absorbed and sent to an imitation of the Father," Samantha turned towards the complex, "but here, this plan falls apart."
"Why?" Amanda leaned in.
"To establish a stable connection with the Center, an incredible amount of energy is required. If we gather the convergence points that will release the energy of the collapse, there will be dozens or even hundreds of times more energy than during the first launch. But a stable energy flow is necessary. Yes, each convergence point holds a huge amount of energy, but it's not uniform. The Imitation of the Father will provide energy to the Gates, but it won't be able to do everything at once. That's why the Reservoirs, charge for a week."
"That's true!" Amanda confirmed. "During the Center's research expeditions, we found that convergence points contain different volumes of energy. Some have more, some have less."
"And the one that exploded in the shopping mall?" James asked.
"One of the smaller ones," Amanda replied.
"So, the problem," Samantha continued, "is that we need to calculate the required volume of energy to launch the Rift Gates, establish the connection, and more importantly, to close the rift. Too much energy will lead to an overload and explosion. An explosion on our side will trigger an explosion of the energy of Primordial Space, resulting in a collapse. A bit less energy, and they won't be able to close the rift, and again... closing the rift will require a powerful explosion... a collapse."
"And what are you getting at?"
"I'm saying that the second option is not launching the Rift Gates to connect with the Center. They are launching the Rift Gates to create a new collapse."
"What?"
"A new collapse that will destroy the Consolidated Nation..."
"And on the ruins of our world, they will revive their own," Alexa added.
"Exactly!" Samantha confirmed. "It's more likely, as our level of technological development is not capable of establishing a connection with the Center of Primordial Space."
"Damn it!" Amanda clenched her fist.
"What do we do now?"
"But there's good news," Samantha smiled ironically. "In any case, they need to launch the Rift Gates, and for that, they need an energy disk. This means it survived the collapse and is now installed in the Gates."
"So we can still activate the Fracture Machine?" John said quietly.
"Moreover," Amanda added, "we have a way home. The Hawk is in the hangar."