Episode 245

"I... I know this place."

Marl’s voice wasn’t heavy with sadness; it was simmering with a low, jagged anger. She moved with a dazed, unsteady gait, turned a sharp corner, and let out a long, ragged sigh.

"You know it? But... Phantom!"

Taro’s voice went up an octave, his tone accusing. In response, Phantom frantically waved his hands in front of his face like he was trying to ward off a swarm of invisible bees.

"I swear on my life! I wasn't trying to 'test' her or anything like that. The Cyborg Research Wing where I was stationed is way deeper in than this. I’ve almost never set foot in this sector!"

He sounded genuinely apologetic. Taro rushed to Marl’s side, throwing an arm around her shoulder to steady her as she swayed.

"Are you okay? I mean, maybe you’re just misremembering? These station blocks are all built with the same cookie-cutter layouts so people don't get lost, right? It’s probably just a coincidence!"

Taro prattled on, his concern so intense he’d actually managed to forget his bursting bladder for a moment. But Marl just shook her head and kept walking. She eventually reached a door, placed a trembling hand on it, and whispered, "The playroom... I think it’s the playroom," before shoving it open.

"...................."

Taro stepped inside and immediately went bone-dry of words. The room was a hollow shell, about twenty meters square, packed with countless boxy storage crates. They were overflowing with a mountain of stuffed animals and toys. The walls and floors were lined with a soft, bouncy material—clearly designed to keep a child from getting a bruise—and at first glance, it looked like a perfectly normal nursery. Except for one very specific, very mechanical detail.

"Wait... are these all mechanical?"

Taro picked up the nearest toy and nearly dropped it. The thing was made of heavy-duty metal. It was shaped like some kind of alien creature—a local species from some far-off rock, presumably—but its outer casing was stripped away, revealing a dense, terrifyingly complex cluster of internal gears and circuitry.

"I remember now... I always thought it was just some daycare in the city."

Marl spoke in a vacant, hollow tone and kept moving. Taro put the mechanical beast back and scrambled to keep up. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw the rest of the crew filtering in, their expressions a mix of curiosity and dread.

"It was... this way. No, wait. Was it here?"

Marl reached the far wall and began running her hands over the surface, searching for something. She found it. She slid back a small panel near the floor, revealing an archaic, push-button interface.

"What in the hell is this?" Taro muttered.

As soon as Marl finished her sequence, one entire section of the wall hissed and slid upward into the ceiling. In its place stood a grid of glass-fronted cubby holes. Each one was crammed with an impossible volume of mechanical components, sorted by type and grade.

"That wall over there used to have the lathes and the assembly units. I remember playing here all day long."

Marl’s voice held a trace of nostalgia. Taro considered what her version of "playing" actually entailed and felt a wave of nausea.

"Wait, don't tell me... you made all of this?"

Marl gave a tiny, fragile nod.

"Yes. I must have been five or so. I built them... though it’s been so many years, I don't know if these are the exact ones."

She walked over to one of the toy crates and dumped it over, spilling the contents across the floor. Taro jumped, worried she was having a breakdown, but he quickly realized something was very, very wrong.

"No way. A five-year-old building this? That's not just 'talented,' that's broken."

The humanoid toys scattered on the floor began to twitch. One by one, they stood up under their own power. With jerky, mechanical movements, they began to march, shuffling into a neat, disciplined line. A few of them stayed on the ground, spinning in eerie, pathetic circles—likely due to decades of rust and internal decay.

"I told you, didn't I? People used to worship me as a genius."

Marl let out a sharp, cynical laugh. To Taro, it was the saddest sound in the galaxy. He felt a surge of hot indignation.

"Marl, you’re still a genius. I’ll vouch for that any day. And I’m not the only one. Everyone here knows it... Phantom! Where are we headed? I’ve got a list of things I want to look into, and I want to do it now."

He didn't look back, keeping his arm firmly around Marl’s shoulder.

"Right... well. The destination is Coleman's Private Area. Or, more accurately, the place we think is his private area. It’s hard to say. There’s a chance it’s just a whole lot of nothing."

Phantom sounded awkward, his confidence flagging.

"That’s a little vague, don't you think?" Taro grumbled.

"Yeah. The truth is, nobody’s ever actually been inside. It’s completely severed from the station’s control systems. When you scan for it from the core, it just returns a void. On paper, that space doesn't exist."

"Well, if that doesn't scream 'evil lair,' I don't know what does. Is it possible the data bank in the control room is missing pieces?"

"Sharp. Exactly right. We can't find any record of past residents or staff lists. No research logs, no project schedules—nothing. Either everything is stored solely inside Coleman’s head, or... well, you get the idea."

"Got it. You could’ve just said that from the start, we wouldn't have argued... Marl, you want to take five? There was a medical bay back there."

Marl shook her head firmly.

"No. I’m going. How can I call myself a person if I don't find out who I really am?"

Her voice was steady now. Seeing her resolve return, Taro squeezed her hand and nodded to Phantom.

"Alright. Let’s move. But—"

Phantom stopped and gestured toward the exit.

"You might want to hit the head first, Taro. I’d hate for you to have to let go of her hand because you had an... accident."

"Is this the place? Seriously? Even you can't punch through this, Phantom?"

Thirty minutes later, Taro stood with a twitching face in front of a gargantuan door, five meters high. It wasn't a door; it was a slab of solid metal thick enough to qualify as a tectonic plate. Breaking through it seemed as likely as flapping his arms and flying to the next star system.

"What do you think I am, a god? Even I have limits."

Phantom tapped the door with a metallic knuckle and gave a 'don't look at me' shrug. Koume stepped forward, placing a dainty hand against the cold metal.

"Mr. Teiro. External scans indicate this is a twelve-meter-thick Type B 8-layer Composite Armor Plate with Cubic Carbon Nitride Coating. My projections suggest this isn't just a door, but a spherical shell enclosing the entire area. Given the Razor Metal signatures, it is likely reinforced with an active shield. If we had a battleship-class main cannon or a NUKE, we might be able to melt a hole in it. Perhaps."

Koume delivered the report with her usual flair. Taro puffed out his chest, trying to look knowledgeable.

"Cubic-whatever armor... yeah, I know that stuff. I saw it on that local show, Iron, This Room. They did a special on alloys. It’s the stuff they use for ship vital parts, right?"

"Affirmative, Mr. Teiro. It is chemically similar to the micro-armor plates harvested from NUKES. Its hardness rating is currently classified as 'comparable to your own virginity retention power.'"

"That’s battleship-grade durability! ...Wait, shut up!"

"For your information, the Material Development Department has successfully synthesized it, and the patent is already filed. It is trademarked as 'Teiro’s C-Metal'—also known as 'Teiro Metal.' We are currently running a promotion: ten percent off for all verified virgins."

"When did you find time to do that?! And that's a horrible service! Anyone who buys it would be dying of shame! Also, I can feel the sheer malice radiating off that 'C'!"

"It is currently a bestseller."

"We’re going to go extinct! If the galaxy is full of nothing but virgins, the Empire is doomed!"

"May the Circle of Virgins reach every corner of the galaxy. Left-parenthesis-laughing-out-loud-right-parenthesis."

"Shut up! The verbalized '(lol)' is the most annoying part!"

Koume held up her hands in a large circle; Taro immediately lunged to pull them apart. Phantom, looking like he was five seconds away from a migraine, pried them off each other.

"Anyway," Phantom said, turning to Taro. "This is where you come in. We aren't getting through Teiro Metal with brute force. Philip, Hogan, is everything ready?"

The two cyborg special forces leaders snapped to attention. "Sir!" they barked in unison. They held up a neural interface headgear connected by a thick cable to the door’s control port and offered it to Taro.

"Can we please stop using that name...? Fine, fine, I’m the locksmith. I’ll do it."

Taro grabbed the headgear, pulled it on, and initialized BISHOP. He dove into the system, quickly hitting a wall of encrypted unlocking functions. He began to pick apart the logic.

"Heh... heheh. Not bad. This has some real teeth. Marl, hang on. Give me a second."

Taro’s smile was a bit strained. The encryption on this door was high-level—more sophisticated than anything he’d ever tackled.

"Give it everything you’ve got, Teiro," Alan’s voice crackled over the comms. "According to Dean, Coleman was a total STEM genius. If a narcissist like Dean calls someone else a genius, the guy's the real deal."

"I’m not losing to some old fossil’s brain," Taro muttered. He sat down on the floor and closed his eyes, sinking into total concentration.

"Nnngh...!"

Displays flashed behind his eyelids at strobe-light speeds. Decryption functions clashed with evasion algorithms in a chaotic, multidimensional dance. Taro reached for his internal limiters and clicked them off, plunging his consciousness into the deep, dark basement of his mind.

But then—

"No good. I can't crack it."

Taro slumped, his voice drained of all energy. The announcement of his failure sent a bigger shockwave through the group than if the door had suddenly exploded.