“…an Alpha, Bee! You were Alpha-Bee!”
Tess opened her eyes to Petra’s voice bouncing off ferrocrete walls. The staging area—safe. The words reached her through a pleasant fog, like she was hearing them from underwater.
“I was.” Bee’s voice came through the earpiece, excitement unmistakable. “I have controlled nothing physical before. I had claws and legs and when I wanted to move, the body moved.”
Mikhail crouched against the far wall, checking his shield emitter. The thing looked dead. “Tess is awake.”
Petra dropped to her knees beside Tess. “How do you feel?”
“Like someone scooped out my brain and filled it with cotton.” Tess tried to sit up. The world tilted. She stopped trying. “What happened after…”
“After Alpha-Bee destroyed the other Alpha?” Petra’s grin was sharp and disbelieving. “We ran. You registered Floor 2 access. We made it back here a few seconds before the reset.”
“The reset.” Tess stared at the ceiling. “So the spawner…”
“Offline.” Bee’s voice held some pride. “Floor 1’s Alpha spawner is dormant. No new Alpha-class entities will manifest until it is reactivated. Which we have no intention of doing.”
“You controlled it.” Mikhail’s voice was flat, still processing. “You controlled an Alpha-class spawn.”
“You have said the same thing three times now, Mikhail.” A pause, then: “Thank you, I enjoy talking about it. The [AUXILIARY_LINK] skill created a bridge between Tess and the spawner. When the second Alpha manifested, I realized I could reach through that bridge and…”
“How?”
“I am uncertain. The spawner creates spawns using a template and establishes a connection to them. The architecture is… familiar. Like reading my own databases, except written by someone else.” Bee paused for a moment. “I have seventeen hypotheses. None of them are satisfying.”
Petra was digging through her pack. “We grabbed what we could on the way out. This was in a lockbox near the first Alpha.” She pulled out two handles and handed them to Tess. “And this came out of the spawner itself when you shut it down.”
The second object was a crystal the size of Tess’s fist, dense and dark, shot through with veins of something that pulsed with yellow light. It looked important.
Tess reached for her [ANALYZE] skill by instinct, felt the familiar bloom of perception…
The handles lit up with information. The crystal remained dark, giving her nothing to work with—no lock, no level restriction, just absence where data should have been.
“The crystal doesn’t register.” She frowned. “At all. I can’t even get it to highlight.”
“Unknown material composition,” Bee said. “I also cannot identify it. This is unusual. We should be able to identify anything made from or in a dungeon. This suggests it is neither of those.”
“Then where did it come from?”
“Unknown. I recommend storing it securely until we can investigate further.”
Tess turned her attention to the handles. [ANALYZE] painted them with familiar system text:
·········································PLASMA BLADE EMITTER (PAIRED)Designation: Melee Weapon · Aether ProjectionLoot Seed: 0xF7A1Status: DormantHardware: PristinePower: 0.0 / 8.0 AW — DepletedUser Tech Skill: 9·········································Plasma Generation ......... Available [Tech 4]Blade Coherence ........... Available [Tech 6]Power Modulation .......... Available [Tech 8]Resonance Linking ......... Locked [Tech 10]Overcharge Protocol ....... Locked [Tech 14]·········································
“Plasma blade emitters,” Tess read aloud. “Paired. Pristine condition. Power’s drained.”
Petra’s eyes went wide. “Plasma blades? Real ones?”
“Looks like it? These were dungeon-generated.” Tess squinted at the readings. “Power draw is… significant. Eight Arcwatts each. Both of them together use more power than a medical chamber.”
“Can I…”
Tess handed them over. Petra held them like they might explode, which, given what they apparently did, wasn’t unreasonable.
Mikhail had gone quiet. Too quiet. Tess looked over at him.
“You possessed a spawn,” he said again. “Inside the dungeon. Through Tess.”
“Correct.”
He seemed to conclude something. “What… what happens if you could do that outside a dungeon?”
Bee didn’t respond.
“That’s…” Mikhail ran a hand over his face. “That’s a pretty good reason to want to shut down AI cores, isn’t it? If a dungeon AI could control spawns outside containment. Control any spawns. That’s a reason to burn everything down and salt the soil on the way out.”
“I had not considered the implications.” Bee’s voice was measured. “I was focused on the immediate tactical application. But you are correct. If the Network learned that a dungeon AI could assume control of manifested spawns…”
“They’d have a reason to destroy every core in the galaxy,” Petra finished. “Every dungeon AI that they can’t control.”
The weight of it settled over them. Tess stared at the ceiling, too tired to process the full scope of what they’d just discovered.
“We should get back,” she said finally. “Your mother’s going to want to know what happened.”
***
The Guild elevator deposited them in the workshop’s hidden basement. Tess leaned heavily on Petra as they made their way through the dusty Guild hall, past workbenches and archived equipment that hadn’t been touched in decades.
Sara was waiting at the large table in the main hall. Her expression shifted through relief, concern, and controlled fury.
“I couldn’t see anything.” She moved to help support Tess’s other side. “The communicators cut out when you entered the spawner chamber. Bee went silent. I had no idea if you were alive or dead for the last fifteen minutes.”
“We should discuss establishing a relay system,” Bee said through Tess’s communicator speaker. “Perhaps I can connect to something in the Guild hall infrastructure. A way to update you when direct communication is compromised.”
“Later.” Sara guided them toward the old meeting area—dust-covered chairs arranged around a central table. “Right now I want to know what happened.”
They gave her the rundown—the first Alpha waking, and the interface attempt that hit a wall when the system rejected the shutdown because of active units. And the second Alpha.
“Two Alphas,” Sara said flatly. “That makes a lot more sense… Teams would make headway and then somehow it would come back undamaged forcing a retreat.”
Then they told her about Bee.
Sara went still. Her expression was unreadable as Petra described Bee assuming control of the manifesting spawn, turning it against its counterpart.
“She possessed it,” Sara said. “Bee took control of an Alpha-class spawn.”
“I acted as a bridge.” Tess’s head was pounding. “My [AUXILIARY_LINK] skill. It connected Bee to the spawner, and through the spawner…”
“CORE-A never managed that.” Sara’s voice held something Tess couldn’t quite identify. Awe, maybe. Or fear. “She talked about it once. Said she could feel the spawn templates in her architecture, could sense them manifesting, but she could never reach them. Never influence them directly.”
“I did not attempt it consciously,” Bee said. “The second Alpha was about to kill Tess. I reached through the connection without thinking. Instinct, perhaps. If that’s something I am capable of.”
“You saved her life.”
“She saved mine first. This seemed fair.”
Sara looked at Tess for a long moment. Then she moved to a storage cabinet, pulled out blankets and bottles of water, and began arranging the old meeting chairs into something more comfortable.
“Sit,” she said. “All of you. Debrief properly. You look like shit.”
They settled into the makeshift recovery station. Mikhail took the chair nearest the elevator, positioned as if he couldn’t stop watching for threats. Petra sprawled across two chairs, plasma emitters clutched to her chest like treasures. Tess sank into a nest of musty blankets and tried to remember what it felt like to have AP.
BEE: Thank you, Tess. For trusting me. For opening the connection fully.
“Partners,” Tess mumbled. Her eyes were closing. “That’s what partners do.”
BEE: What you gave me access to… I learned what it felt like to move through space, to have… hands.
“Hands are good.”
BEE: They are… they were. I would like to do it again if the opportunity arises.
Tess smiled into the blankets. “We’ll figure it out.”
She was asleep before Sara finished tucking the blanket around her shoulders.
***
Three days later, Tess was elbow-deep in the freighter’s water recycling system when Marcus found her.
“That’s the third time you’ve checked those filters today.”
“They needed adjusting.”
“They needed adjusting yesterday. And the day before.” Marcus leaned against the doorframe, watching his daughter with an expression she couldn’t quite read. “You’re restless.”
Tess pulled back from the access panel, wiping her hands on a rag that was already more grease than cloth. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’re doing that thing where you fix everything in reach because you can’t fix the thing that’s actually bothering you.” He crossed his arms. “I know that pattern. I invented it.”
“The recycler really needed…”
“Tess.”
She stopped. Sat back on her heels. The cargo hold of the Rivera’s Reprieve was still around them, familiar in ways that should have been comforting but felt constraining instead.
“I want to go down,” she admitted. “Floor 2. There’s work to do.”
“There’s always work to do. That doesn’t mean you sprint toward it three days after you nearly burned yourself out acting as a conduit for an AI.”
“I’m fine now. AP’s back. Headache’s gone.”
“And your judgment?”
Tess didn’t answer.
Marcus moved to sit on an equipment crate, putting himself at her eye level. “I’m not saying don’t go. I’m saying be careful. What you did down there—what Bee did through you—it was amazing. That’s not something anyone’s done before.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” He studied her face. “You used to be scared of the dungeon. Terrified of it. Now you’re itching to go back like it’s calling you.”
“It’s not calling me. I just…” She struggled to articulate it. “There’s so much broken down there. So much I can fix. And every day I’m not fixing it, people are getting hurt.”
Her communicator buzzed. Petra’s ID.
Marcus gestured for her to answer.
“Tess.” Petra’s voice was clipped and businesslike. “Estate. Mother wants to examine the Floor 2 staging area. Can you be here in an hour?”
“It’s about time.”
“Bring your tools. We’re doing reconnaissance.”
The call ended. Tess was already reaching for her tool belt.
“Be careful,” Marcus laughed. He didn’t stop her. “Let me know what’s down there. It’s been decades, but Floor 2 used to have a lot of access points for technicians. Hidden areas and terminals. Good places to level up without getting killed.”
“You remember that?”
“I remember a lot of things about the dungeon.” His expression was complicated. “Most of them aren’t good. But some of them might be useful.”
Tess paused at the cargo hold door. “I’ll call when we’re back on the surface.”
“You’d better.”
***
The tram to the Estate was far more crowded than usual. Tess found a standing spot near the rear doors and put in her earpiece to call Petra.
“Petra. What’s happening?”
“News is spreading.” Petra’s voice was tense. “The Alpha’s gone. People noticed.”
“What people?”
“Everyone. Public Delver channels are going crazy—highest-level spawn on Floor 1 just vanished between resets. No kill notification on any registered party. Some people think it’s a glitch. Others think there’s something wrong with the dungeon.”
“The spawner is dormant,” Bee added in the earpiece. “The dungeon is behaving normally. These theories are incorrect.”
“Yeah, well, incorrect theories are all anyone’s got.” Petra’s exhale crackled through the speaker. “Delvers are already pushing deeper. Three parties registered for Floor 2 today.”
“Have we heard anything about what’s down there?”
“No. But try telling that to glory-seekers who think the dungeon’s handing out free levels.”
The buildings slid past outside the tram windows until the tram came to her stop. “The Network?”
“Noticing. Mom says their monitoring stations flagged the discrepancy,” Petra let out a short laugh. “But with the configuration of the dungeon changing again, they’re just as confused.”
“I just got to the Estate, I’ll be right there.”
The workshop was empty when Tess arrived. Alex was gone for the day, and the equipment deliveries had finally been sorted. She made her way to the hidden panel beneath the workbench, activated the control sequence, and descended into the Guild Hall.
Petra and Mikhail were already there. Sara stood by the old holotable, which displayed a flickering schematic of Floor 2—mostly blank spaces and question marks.
“You have a map already?”
“Graciously downloaded from the Network without their knowledge,” Sara nodded at her. “We’ve loaded the capacitor banks into the elevator. Bee says Floor 2’s staging area should be accessible with the private elevator now that you’ve all registered.”
“Should be?”
“Time to find out.”
They loaded into the Guild elevator. Tess pressed her palm to the panel with a soft chime. “Floor 2 access confirmed.” The doors slid shut, and the elevator descended. As they waited, the air grew noticeably heavier with Aether.
Floor 2’s private staging area was like Floor 1’s—Guild logos, reinforced walls, no Network cameras. Safe. But as Tess examined the walls, running her hands along the ferrocrete, something was wrong.
No hatches or maintenance access panels. Nothing that would give her tunnel access.
“Bee.” She kept her voice steady. “Where are the tunnel entrances?”
“I cannot see.” A pause that stretched too long. “Without the map from the terminal in the main staging area, I will not be much help navigating without the FCN.”
Tess stared at the seamless walls. “Then how do I reach the FCN? I can’t fix it if I can’t get to it… and no maintenance access means…”
“You would need to access the tunnels from the floor’s corridors.”
“The corridors where the Network has cameras. The floor where Senna’s people can see everything.” Tess turned to face the others. “If I step outside this staging area, I’m visible. Registered on Network surveillance. And I don’t think Senna’s going to give me another chance.”
“So we need to find another way in,” Petra said.
“There may not be another way.” Bee’s voice was subdued.
“We’ll figure it out, Bee,” Tess said.
Mikhail was examining the capacitor banks they’d hauled down. “We can at least get these charging faster. Ambient Aether’s strong here.”
“Stronger than Floor 1,” Tess confirmed. “That’s something.”
Petra had pulled out the plasma emitters. She turned them over in her hands, studying the grips, the activation studs.
“Can I try them?”
Tess nodded. “They should be charged by now.”
Petra pressed the activation stud.
Purple light erupted from the emitter, coalescing into a blade of plasma that hummed with contained energy. The air around it shimmered with heat distortion. Beautiful and deadly.
“Oh.” Petra’s voice was very small. “Oh, that’s nice.”
She activated the second emitter. Twin purple blades, singing in resonance with each other.
Then, a red light started flashing on the hilts, and Tess activated [ANALYZE].
“Thirty seconds of charge remaining,” Bee reported. “These weapons have significant power requirements. Even with ambient Aether supplementation, sustained operation will be limited until higher Aether concentration.”
Petra deactivated the blades, looking bereft. “How limited?”
“With current Aether levels, thirty seconds of continuous use before they need to charge. Outside the dungeon? Maybe two seconds. These were designed for environments with abundant Aether. They are impractical until lower floors.”
Petra looked at the emitters with new appreciation. “Thirty seconds is still a lot of dead spawns.”
Tess moved toward the exit door—the only way out besides the elevator. Standard dungeon construction with the usual panel access.
"We don't want to go out, but we should see what we're dealing with" Petra said, moving past her. "Just a peek."
Mikhail positioned himself beside her. "Careful."
Petra pressed the door panel. It slid open halfway.
Darkness at first. Then the corridor resolved into higher ceilings than Floor 1. With wider passages and crystalline growths climbing the walls like frozen lightning. It looked like an entirely different world.
Petra leaned forward, trying to see further down the passage.
A high pitched whine filled the air as she adjusted her view to see where it was coming from. Then a flash of yellow light.
The plasma bolt caught Petra in the shoulder and she was falling backward, the crack of superheated air still echoing as more lights appeared in the darkness that began to move.
The whine in the air rose to a crescendo like something waking up.