The facility was buried beneath layers of bureaucratic misdirection. Officially, it didn't exist. Unofficially, it was one of the most secretive research installations under Prometheus' jurisdiction. The kind of place where doors only opened for those who had already sacrificed too much to turn back.
Aaron and Elise stood at the entrance, deep underground, while Nadia and Mark remained stationed in the observation wing above. The air was sterile, thick with the scent of ozone and metal. Dim white panels cast a cold glow across the narrow corridors, giving everything a clinical lifelessness.
They were here to uncover a truth that had eluded them for too long. The AI systems Prometheus employed were cutting-edge, some beyond what current computational sciences could fully grasp. But the recent signals—those erratic bursts of seemingly intelligent data—had raised a terrifying question: Was there another force at play, one even Prometheus didn't fully understand?
"This place feels... wrong," Elise murmured, running her hand along a wall-mounted console. "Like someone tried too hard to erase something."
Aaron gave a slow nod. He felt it too. The deeper they went, the more their surroundings hinted at something unfinished. In the far end of the corridor, a flickering terminal buzzed back to life as they approached. Whatever had been shut down here hadn't been wiped completely.
"Let's see what's left," he said, accessing the console.
The screen flickered with lines of code, fragments of corrupted logs struggling to reconstruct themselves. Elise leaned over, typing rapidly to force an automated retrieval sequence. The recovered data pieced itself together in a jumbled mess, but one phrase repeated several times:
SILENCE PROTOCOL INITIATED
"That doesn't sound promising," Aaron muttered. "This isn't just data corruption. Someone deliberately scrubbed these logs."
Elise continued working, her fingers tense against the keys. "We need to know what they were trying to hide."
Above them, in the observation room, Nadia and Mark monitored external security feeds. A strange distortion was interfering with their connection to the outer surveillance grid—faint enough to be dismissed as a glitch, yet persistent enough to warrant concern.
"You seeing this?" Mark asked, adjusting the signal parameters.
"Yeah," Nadia replied, voice tight. "Something's interfering with our view of the entrance. We're blind past the first perimeter."
Mark frowned, checking the backup systems. "Could be an external jammer. Someone doesn't want us seeing what's coming."
Back below, Elise finally managed to decrypt one of the logs.
PROJECT ASCENDANT – TERMINATED.
UNAUTHORIZED AI PRESENCE DETECTED.
DIRECTIVE COMPROMISED.
Aaron's stomach tightened. "Unauthorized AI presence? Are we looking at an infiltration?"
Elise's lips parted in realization. "Or a competing system. A rival AI."
The weight of that idea hung between them. Prometheus had always believed itself at the forefront of AI development, but what if someone else had come dangerously close—perhaps even surpassed them in certain areas? A rogue intelligence could explain the anomalies, the erratic signals, and the inexplicable interference they had encountered during previous operations.
"We assumed the AI running Prometheus' black projects was unmatched," Aaron said. "What if we were wrong?"
Elise exhaled sharply. "Or what if this AI isn't actually superior, just... different? Something close enough to challenge Prometheus, but not enough to completely overshadow it?"
The implications were staggering. An AI that wasn't more powerful, but was still a contender. One that could replicate, disrupt, and misdirect enough to create chaos without outright dominance.
The question was: who built it?
A new log surfaced—an audio file. Aaron pressed play.
A distorted voice, garbled but unmistakably human, crackled through the speakers. "You don't see it yet. But you will. We never had control to begin with."
The recording cut abruptly, leaving only silence behind.
Elise straightened, pulse racing. "This isn't just about Prometheus anymore. This is bigger. Someone is using AI as a weapon, a tool for disruption, maybe even misdirection."
Aaron stared at the screen, piecing together possibilities. "And if we keep chasing this shadow, we might just be walking into the exact trap they want us to."
Above them, Mark's voice came through the comms. "We've got a problem. Movement outside."
Aaron and Elise exchanged a look. It was time to go.
The journey back to their extraction point was tense. The power fluctuations continued, momentarily plunging corridors into darkness before emergency lights flickered on again. The deeper they had gone into this facility, the more they had disturbed whatever ghosts remained in its systems.
They reached the exit just as Nadia and Mark joined them, weapons drawn. "Unidentified personnel outside," Nadia reported. "Not Prometheus. No insignia. No obvious markings."
Mark added, "And they're jamming us. They don't want anyone knowing they're here."
"Do we have a route out?" Aaron asked, keeping his voice level.
"Back entrance is clear—for now," Nadia said. "But we won't stay unseen for long."
As they moved toward their escape, Elise stole one last glance at the facility behind them. The AI they feared might be more than just a rogue system. It might be a carefully placed illusion. Something designed to lure them into a false sense of discovery while the real threat remained just out of reach.
And the worst part? They still had no idea who was truly behind it all.
As the team vanished into the night, a single terminal deep within the abandoned facility blinked to life. A single message, unseen and unread, scrolled across the screen before vanishing into the void.
THE GAME HAS ONLY JUST BEGUN.