Trace still wasn’t able to get Deckard’s attention, so for the moment, he carefully unplugged the data prism and placed it in the desk drawer. It would be waiting for him when he finished with whatever he was currently doing.

  In the meantime, he wanted to focus on the pages from the bunker, and why a gene-oriented corporation was interested in them. Had they initially been their focus or something they grabbed due to opportunity? The only way to know was to read them, and the only way to do that was to finally find a working cursive add-on.

  This was an area where a full-size desk computer proved to be more capable than simply accessing the net through his NetConnect.

  It took some deep-diving and following over a dozen bad links plus even more infected sites before finally finding what he needed. Then once he managed to finally find the add-on, Trace spent some more time running a series of scans on it to make sure it was safe for use. Only after he felt as though he had done his due diligence did he transfer the file to his NetConnect and install it.

  With the add-on in place, the cursive words suddenly began to make some sense. It still took a modicum of effort on his part, as the add-on wasn’t perfect. All it did was help to translate the words, however, it didn’t automatically recognize everything, as the original author’s handwriting wasn’t exactly the best either.

  In his vision, each line on the page was blown up to an extreme degree. Hovering above each associated word was the translated version.

  What he learned was that the pages were old. Well, that had always been sort of obvious due to their decrepit nature. Now that he was able to read what they said, he understood just how old they actually were. They were related to the construction of the underfloors.

  ‘Governor Talbot sent out the first of the rations today. Everyone who works on the tunnels for the new underground bomb shelters will get new rations every day. The extent of the tunnels they have planned to dig beneath the city is impressive to the least and ambitious to put it lightly.’

  That was the first entry on the page. The next entry was dated several weeks later.

  ‘I believed the original tunnel plans to be ambitious that this would be a project still ongoing when the next World War arrived. I was wrong. The boring machines they have us using are nothing less than the beasts created by the Steel Goddess. The sheer scale which we have accomplished in the last few weeks is incredible. There have been a lot of accidents, of course, and making sure everything is level is nearly impossible. That said, making thousands of miles of tunnels over a thousand meters beneath the city doesn’t seem quite as daunting as before.’

  The next few entries talked about the special resins they initially used on the walls before coating them with concrete. Honestly, most of the first couple of pages were like that. The information was interesting, especially seeing as how the unnamed author was journaling the construction of the underfloors. He wasn’t seeing anything that would have interested a corporation like Gene Bellua. Not unless they had some interest in the underfloors, which he had to admit was a distinct possibility.

  Ever since the pit had opened in the old store outside the city, it seemed as though everyone’s interest in the underfloors had been renewed. Or rather, it was more likely that it had always been there. The emergence of the pit had forced it into the general awareness of the city, reminding them that its existence wasn’t a simple urban legend.

  The last page of what had clearly been someone’s journal changed Trace’s thoughts on the matter. There were either pages missing, or the author had taken a multi-year break from writing.

  ‘They lied to us. No, I shouldn’t say that. Maybe the old governor actually did have good intentions. It’s all these fragging corporations that have been taking over the city. It wasn’t this bad a few years ago. New Denver used to be a free city. I’m not sure how many of those are left.’

  The next couple of entries were rants directed at old corporations Trace had either never heard of or who had long since fallen from power. It was the final two; the ones belonging to the page, that likely would have been on top of the pile at the time that drew his attention.

  ‘The war has begun to creep closer to us, and the water has started to change. Word has it that one of the Asian countries released a chemical agent into the ocean. The corpo squints have been blathering on the news-verts about how it either mutated or latched onto something already there. Blah, blah, blah, they don’t know the actual cause either. All it means is that the water everywhere is ruined, and it is spreading. The water for my bunker comes from a well several hundred feet deep. A year ago, it was the cleanest water I ever tasted. Now, I’m starting to get hints of something else along with a weird smell. I didn’t even know that was possible with underground aquifers.’

  Then there was the last entry.

  ‘I discovered why the corporations didn’t let anyone use the tunnel system for the purpose it was designed for. For the last couple of years everyone who came into the city asking for refuge, all those people that were never seen again… They were brought down there, which is fine, there is more than enough room, no need to let it all go to waste. The problem is a couple of the corporations decided to use that area to experiment with people. They wanted to replicate what the Steel Goddess had accomplished with the aberrations. I was down there looking around yesterday; I wanted to see how everything had held up since we constructed the tunnels and rooms. What I saw- It terrified me. I’ll be closing off all the public access points to the underground tunnels if it’s the last thing I do. The corporate-slot whistlers succeeded, and I’ve never seen more dead bodies all piled in one place before. May the Steel Goddess help us if those things ever escape.’

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  Trace leaned back in his chair and breathed out heavily. He had already known most of this, or at least the rumors. Basic rumors and confirmation were two entirely different things, not to mention the additional details that he had only now discovered.

  It was useful information, but those corpo agents must have been hoping that the other pages would contain even more information.

  He saved the translated pages into an encrypted file and then sent it as an attachment to Stick-Point, Ko, Monroe, and Pushman.

  If nothing else, he had a feeling that this information would create some problems for the corporations and that was plenty for him.

  Trace read through the pages again, while he went upstairs and moved everything onto the elevator. With all the new items, he would finally be able to start making progress on a number of projects that had been placed by the wayside.

  There was something in the entries that was not quite bothering him, but sort of causing his mind to itch. He couldn’t figure out what it was and subsequently was being forced to reread everything again and again. After the third reading, he narrowed it down to the middle pages, an area that specifically focused on the end of the bunker project.

  ‘All the boring drills are being sold off one by one as their sections become completed. Supposedly other cities or towns throughout the nearby states. Although, I believe a couple of the local corporations have bought them as well. I passed one exiting the highway toward Parker the other day on my way home after work. Those were fun machines. The job certainly lasted long enough, but there are still parts that I’ll miss. It was dangerous though; my crushed foot and missing hand can attest to that.’

  Trace thought back to the skeleton he had found in the bunker. At the time, he hadn’t thought anything of it, but now he realized there had been something odd about it. There had been no cyberware with the skeleton. Admittedly, he hadn’t looked super close at it, but he couldn’t recall seeing any surgery scars on the bones either. Not to mention, it had possessed all its limbs.

  Whoever the skeleton belonged to; it hadn’t been the author of the journal. They had also been a purist… probably one of the first belonging to the new movement. It was an idea that had originated in part due to a group of people called the Amish, who supposedly still existed on the far side of the irradiated zone.

  It was back when cyberware was first becoming popular as a form of prosthetic, or simply a way to enhance yourself. People began to see those who did that as less human, while they were pure. Eventually, a movement began, and the moniker was born.

  After the Third World War, it just sort of died out for a while due to necessity. No one got out of war without an injury of some kind, even the civilians. Eventually, it started up again, giving people without a cause, something to hold on to. For the most part, they were harmless people who kept to themselves and lived their lives. They might call other people names, but they weren’t violent, they simply didn’t want to become part machine themselves.

  They were like Hannah. She had lived her entire life among people, and mostly been fine, if somewhat disrespectful to Ko, and likely others. However, everything had fallen apart when she had become part of what she either hated or feared. Who knew why people joined certain movements like that?

  He suddenly wanted to know what had happened to the original owner of the bunker. There were too many unknowns, and sadly, no way to learn the truth.

  None of that truly mattered though, it was a different part of the entry that had truly sparked his attention.

  It was the mention of corporations buying the boring machines, along with one of them being seen exiting toward Parker.

  That likely meant there was an underground complex somewhere in that area. However, it wasn’t guaranteed, as the roads could also be taken all the way to the state border and beyond. However, there were easier roads to get to many of those destinations if you started from Denver. Nothing was guaranteed, but it did limit the number of possible options overall.

  Thinking that hard wasn’t needed, as he already had a prime candidate in mind. The filtration buildings that had been built next to the reservoir.

  It was a perfect location for a corporation that wanted to create its own access point to the underground bunker. Parker was close to Denver, but not extremely so. With the boring machines, they would have had to put in some work, but eventually, they would have achieved a nice backdoor entrance for all those experiments.

  There was no evidence to go along with it, just a personal theory born from a general distrust of corporations.

  The more he thought about it, the more he liked the general idea. Unfortunately, it also had a few glaringly obvious holes. The largest of which was the pit itself and how they had all reacted to its presence.

  The corporations were attempting to go back down into the underfloors. That likely meant the author had not only been successful in destroying all the public access points, but something had also happened to the majority of theirs as well.

  No, he shook his head as the elevator started its descent. The old openings at DIA were probably still good, so they could have just used those, even if it would have been somewhat visible.

  Still, either the monsters below could have used that tunnel to emerge instead of wasting time digging the pit, or the corpos could have used it. That meant it either didn’t exist or had never been finished.

  With a groan of annoyance, Trace flopped back down in front of his computer and began to do some research. He wasn’t going to ignore other possible locations, but he wanted to know more about the reservoir and the filtration going on there, just in case.

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