Another set of aerial and ground captures replaced the northern map.
Silverpeak filled most of the display.
The first images showed the mountain approaches rather than the city itself. Several slopes had been stripped almost bare, with entire sections of forest missing between exposed rock and blackened ground.
Hans initially assumed he was looking at old mining scars.
The closer images proved otherwise.
Quarries and extraction cuts followed deliberate lines. These did not.
Several mountainsides had simply been torn apart. Rock faces were fractured outward from broad impact zones, with long fields of debris extending into the valleys below. In some places, vegetation had begun returning around the edges. In others, nothing substantial had grown back at all.
Meteorites.
Six months later, parts of Silverpeak were still carrying the marks of the day they fell.
Dianne shifted the display toward the southern corridor.
"Most of the towns between Grefort and Silverpeak still show signs of habitation. We’ve identified several survivor concentrations, but their relationship with one another is unknown."
"And Silverpeak itself?"
"More organized than we expected."
The city appeared across several recordings.
Silverpeak did not occupy one flat basin. Roads, industrial districts and residential areas continued between multiple valleys, mountain shelves and tunnels cut directly through the surrounding terrain. Smoke rose from several sections. Lights remained visible inside parts of the city even during daylight, while vehicles moved through roads that had clearly been kept open rather than abandoned.
The infected were still there.
They were simply nowhere near as dominant on the surface as Hans expected.
"Several concentrations remain around the industrial sectors, tunnels and mountain approaches," Dianne continued. "But large parts of the visible surface are already under survivor control."
Hans watched another vehicle column cross one of the valleys.
"How organized?"
Metler brought forward several recordings.
The northern and southwestern areas showed survivor traffic, working checkpoints and what appeared to be local security formations.
The southern approach was different.
Vehicles moved in organized columns. Defensive positions covered several road entrances, and patrols maintained spacing that looked considerably less improvised than the armed survivor groups Hans had encountered around Grefort.
"That group is the closest match to an organized military force," Metler said. "They control several approaches from the south."
Another image appeared.
Hans leaned forward.
A large installation occupied an open section beyond one of the mountain roads. Several smaller structures surrounded a broad central building, connected through straight utility corridors and prepared vehicle lanes.
Nothing about it looked temporary. Dianne placed an older map beside the reconnaissance image.
The installation was absent.
Hans stared at the comparison.
"How old is that?"
"Pre-Event survey material."
He looked back at the newer image.
The surrounding terrain had suffered enough damage that ordinary construction should have taken months just to clear properly, yet the base sat across it with foundations, utilities and defensive structures already arranged around a complete internal layout.
Hans had seen something like that before. Not physically, but in the form of descriptions and warnings from what Tyrus had dropped months ago and then refused to explain properly.
"The Hands of the Tether..."
Dianne looked toward him.
Hans enlarged the image.
Prepared military infrastructure raised far faster than ordinary construction should allow. The resemblance was difficult to ignore.
"TETHER."
The word left his mouth before anyone else spoke.
Tyrus had mentioned the Hands of the Tether long before Hans understood what DAEDALUS actually was. At the time, Hans had wondered whether the old world had somehow created its own crude version of an RTS construction system.
It seemed that the answer was becoming considerably less theoretical.
"Have they established contact with any of the survivor enclaves in Silverpeak?"
"Not that we can confirm," Dianne said. "The nearest confirmed settlement is several kilometers from the installation. The site itself also appears recent. Only a limited number of vehicles were visible during the reconnaissance passes."
Metler brought forward another capture taken from a different angle.
Most of the activity remained around the central structure and the southern entrance. Several vehicles occupied prepared positions along the perimeter, while another small group had been recorded moving north along the mountain road.
"It looks more like a forward base than a permanent garrison," Metler said.
Hans studied the route.
"And Silverpeak is directly ahead of them."
"Yes, Commander."
That did not prove they intended to take the city. They could have been reinforcing survivors, reopening the road, establishing communications or doing the same thing Golden Eagle had spent months doing around Grefort.
The TETHER structures only made the uncertainty more troublesome.
Hans was not particularly worried about whether his army could fight them. The problem was what fighting them would mean.
If the people inside that installation were surviving Ashington soldiers, they might have spent the past six months protecting civilians and rebuilding whatever parts of the country they could still reach. Starting a war with them because two military forces happened to approach the same city would accomplish nothing.
"This is going to be complicated," Hans said. "Recommendations?"
Brandon answered first.
"We should continue the southern advance, but I wouldn’t approach the installation directly. Secure the next usable logistics junction and establish contact with the surrounding settlements first."
"We need to know who those soldiers answer to, whether they’re already coordinating with Silverpeak and what territory they consider under their protection. Until we know that, our formations should remain outside their defensive perimeter."
Dietrich agreed.
"I’d also keep the heavier armor behind the reconnaissance screen. Close enough to respond if something happens, but not sitting in front of their base when we make first contact."
Rolling Vanguards and armored vehicles toward an unknown military installation while claiming peaceful intentions would send a rather different message.
Metler continued from the Air side.
"The Raptors can maintain observation from outside the installation’s immediate airspace. We can track vehicles entering or leaving the area without flying directly over the base."
"If they have something similar to those western defensive installations?"
"We avoid finding out unnecessarily."
Between the TETHER infrastructure and whatever remained of the old Ashington military, assuming the base lacked anti-air defenses would be stupid.
He looked across the southern operational picture.
"Prepare the southern formations to advance. Secure the route and the next logistics position, but keep the main force away from that installation until we know who we’re dealing with."
Brandon and Dietrich acknowledged the order.
"Diplomacy comes first. If we encounter their troops, identify ourselves and open communications. We’re not firing first."
Hans paused.
"If they open fire, defend yourselves. But don’t turn one bad encounter into a war if you can disengage."
"Understood, Commander."
"Metler, keep watching the base. If they start moving a larger force toward Silverpeak or toward us, I want to know before the ground formations see them."
"Yes, Commander."
An unknown army with an unknown command structure.
And somehow, they possessed technology the old world had gone to considerable trouble to keep hidden. For now, that was enough reason to be careful.
Dianne reduced the Silverpeak picture, but another marker remained along the western bypass.
"One more unresolved item, Commander."
The display expanded around a familiar collection of glass domes—Conservatory Park.
"A route-security patrol revisited the western bypass this morning," Dianne said. "They want approval to establish a small observation post outside the park."
Hans recognized the Central Dome immediately.
Its upper section was still broken open. Vegetation covered much more of the surrounding glass than he remembered, while vines had pushed through sections of the collapsed outer fence and onto the old service road.
"Approve it. Keep the post outside the fence."
"Yes, Commander."
"That sounds like a garrison decision. Why is it in the unresolved brief?"
"Because agents Marcus and Evelyn found the same location in the Directorate material."
"Show me."
The current images moved aside.
Several reconstructed records appeared beside the older Raptor reconnaissance log. Most contained little more than property references, contractor identifiers, shipment entries and cross-case markers recovered from the Directorate modules.
Dianne highlighted one of them.
"A company servicing the Conservatory appears in a restricted biological-procurement chain. The same contractor also appears in medical records connected to classified human-performance work."
"HELIX?"
"Possibly related. The surviving records don’t identify the Conservatory itself as a HELIX laboratory."
Hans continued reading.
Another SAS reference touched the same property. This one had nothing to do with medical research.
"What’s this?"
"Counterintelligence surveillance. A separate field stream was watching activity around the property and its service access."
"For what?"
"The underlying report isn’t in the recovered material."
Dianne enlarged the surviving metadata.
"What Marcus could recover for now shows repeated protected deliveries and restricted access. Central apparently considered the area sensitive enough that the cell was watching for outside interest rather than investigating the activity taking place inside."
Authorized personnel going somewhere classified were not automatically suspects. Someone else trying to follow them was.
Hans looked through the remaining entries.
"Cell Twelve?"
"No. Another reporting stream."
Johannes had driven past the place with him months ago and shown no sign that he recognized it.
Dianne brought the two records together.
"Neither field report linked the other at the time. The Directorate index did."
A final line remained attached to the merged case.
------
PARENT HANDLING — AURORA
------
Hans stared at the word.
"AURORA."
It meant nothing to him.
"Another project?"
"We don’t know. Marcus found the same marker attached to several high-restriction cross-case references. Neither he nor Evelyn recognizes it. Central only appears to have treated the designation as heavily restricted."
"So what does that leave us with?"
"It could be a project, a handling authority or a clearance family. The local cache doesn’t explain it."
Hans returned his attention to the Conservatory.
Months ago, the fog surrounding that section of the bypass had thinned without spreading normally, as though something kept it inside its own boundary. Even the trees around the road looked wrong.
Then there was the Central Dome.
"Raptor One never found the shard."
"No visual confirmation," Dianne said. "The park was still occupied, but the reconnaissance found no visible Hive growth either."
Hans remembered when it was more than enough to leave it alone when half of Grefort was still outside his control.
Things were different now.
"What did today’s patrol find?"
"No entry was attempted. The bypass remains usable, but vegetation has advanced farther through the outer fence and service areas since the archived Raptor pass. The patrol stopped at the perimeter and reported it."
"Keep it that way. Matilda will take her team and Specter Squad. Add Engineers and a medical hazard team. Marcus and Evelyn will go with them."
"What about their leader?"
"Leave him with the Directorate recovery. Marcus can handle the recovered systems and evidence. Evelyn can handle the field side."
"Understood."
Hans looked between the old aerial recording and the newer ground images.
"Outer survey first. They shall document the park before anybody starts opening doors or cutting through structures."
Dianne entered the restriction.
"Preservation priority?"
"Yes. Don’t burn or destroy anything unless it warrants to be."
He pointed toward the damaged Central Dome.
"If they find anything resembling a shard, isolate the area and report it."
"Understood. I’ll prepare the mission package for tomorrow."
"Keep every AURORA reference separate from HELIX and DAEDALUS."
"Will do, Commander."
"Anything else unresolved?"
"Nothing else for nowm Commander."
"Then we’re done here. Dismissed."
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