Image by Thomas G. from Pixabay

Nina made sure her mask was in place before descending the stairs. The strange, ribbed texture felt odd under her boot. “What is this place?” she asked as the exploration team looked around the cavernous vault.

“IMI says it was called a subway,” Lindy told the team, checking their AI guide. “Thousands of people used to use underground trains to travel from one point on the island to another.”

“What’s a train?” Janis asked.

“I have no idea. IMI isn’t showing me any pictures.” Lindy frowned. “IMI isn’t saying much more than that either, other than there were some issues with wildlife at times. No explanation there either.”

“What in the name of the nine hells is that?” Brogan shouted, pointing to a three foot long rodent with a tail nearly twice as long as its body. It hissed at the humans and skittered off into the shadows.

“I think we found the wildlife issues,” Nina said breathlessly. “That was fecking huge.”

Lindy prodded their AI guide a little more. “Nope. Not getting anything more. IMI is silent on this place, like she is on so much in the old city.”

“IMI is silent on most things pre-revolution,” Brogan pointed out. “You know that, Lindy.”

“True.” Lindy sighed. “I was hoping for a bit more history and a lot less guesswork. It’s so hard being a historian when there’s no records to follow up on.”

“No joke there,” Nina agreed. “How in the name of the nine hells do they expect us to write about our past if the few records we do have the government refuses to give us access to?”

“We should get some pictures, maybe see if we can find any documents down here.” Brogan looked around. “Though after three hundred years, I’m not holding out hope for that.” The Historiagraphical Research Society team spread out and began searching, looking for any physical signs of their ancestors in this strange place.