Humans Don't Hibernate [Part 103/?] (Patreon)

93 Hours After the First Round of Interloper Interrogations. Signal Station. Administration Wing. Bunker HQ.

Evina

“What do I mean by the word ‘creators’?” The voice parroted back. “The fine people who designed and constructed this entire facility, of course!” He answered, tip-toeing around an actual answer with an increasingly excitable tone of voice. A voice that sounded increasingly ecstatic the more I seemed to open up more talking points. 

“No, no. No! We are not going to just ignore and gloss over that. You’re going to tell me exactly what you mean. You explicitly said ‘my creators’, so tell me, what the heck do you mean by that?!” I shot back reflexively, both my prior iteration and my own experiences of dealing with wastelanders coming forth to the forefront; refusing to participate in any more of the voice’s games.

“But I just explained—”

“No, you didn’t. Unless there’s more to what you’re saying and you’re just waiting for me to ask the right questions or something dumb like that.” I offered in the most passive aggressive way I could, prompting the voice to once more pause, as the whirr of the computer fans sped up a few notches once more.

“N-no, there is no need for that. I’m trying my absolute best, chosen one, but I cannot expand on what I don’t know.” The man tried his best to explain what in any other situation I would’ve easily interpreted as just an attempt at dumb misdirection. However, there was something about this situation that felt different. There was just something so eerily genuine in his voice that didn’t trigger any of the tonal red flags in neither my, nor my past iterations’ memories.

So I took a step back, and decided to approach the vast array of other questions I had instead.

“Let’s start simple then.” I sighed. “What’s your name? 

“My name?” The man parroted, once more causing a loud whirring noise to erupt as seconds passed before he responded. “I… I’m Ad—” His voice cut off to the tune of a hundred different static disturbances over the intercom system, causing his response to simply ‘lag’ in place, as a mechanical undercurrent to the intercom kept repeating that last syllable over and over again. 

At the end of it, there was only one name in that garbled mass of noises I could pick out. 

“Addie? Is that right?” I shot back.

There was no response, at least not for a few seconds. 

“Yes.” He finally came through. “And may I ask what your name is?”

“Evina.” I responded impatiently. “Just so you know, this isn’t an answer for an answer sorta deal. From now on, I ask, and you answer. Understand?” 

“Yes.” 

“Good. So, Addie, next question here… you claimed to have been here for centuries. Are you saying you’ve been in this facility from the start of the war?”

“That is correct.” Addie responded affirmatively.

“To clarify, it’s not like you’ve inherited the role from another admin, correct? Like, not in the typical sense, or even in a weird religious ceremony kinda deal. And not even in the memory inheritance sorta way, correct?”

“Correct. I, in my current configuration, have been here from the very beginning of this bunker’s construction in fact.” He clarified. 

“And can you tell me exactly how you did that?” 

The whirring of fans seemed to yet again be Addie’s response, as the computers spun up into overdrive, covering for and masking the man’s awkward pauses. 

“Because my instructions demanded that I persist, for as long as this project lacks its final component.” He answered, once again, only circling around the topic, and never addressing it properly. 

“That final component being me, I assume?” I played along, just to clarify the latter half of that vague answer first.

“Correct, Evina. You are the final component to this operation. My mission, and my instructions, are to await and greet the chosen one. To inform them of their new responsibilities, and to help guide them along the path towards reconstruction and reconciliation.” 

“Right, right. Okay. That may check out, sure… but the first half of that answer was a bold-faced fricking lie.” I countered. “You can’t have lived for literal centuries. That’s physically impossible, except if you were to count inheritances, and even then that’d be something of a misinterpretation of how inheritance works.” I took a moment to sigh, palming my snout in the process. “We’re not going to get anywhere until we address the elephant in the room. So let’s just please address it. How are you still alive after centuries?! That is, if we’re even going to entertain the fact you’re telling the truth here.” 

“My existence is guaranteed so long as my instructions remain unfulfilled.” He began in that same matter-of-fact voice. A voice that slowly, but surely, started breaking as the explanation went on. “I have continued to exist, because I cannot die, Evina. I… quite literally cannot die, nor can I even choose to die if I so wished.” The man’s voice finally started to waver, as despondency and a genuine pang of frustration colored every single one of his words. “I have remained here, for centuries, alone and with only my thoughts and my instructions to keep me company.” He continued, digital artifacting and static overtaking his every other word. “I have remained vigilant in my sentry, monitored every nook and cranny of this facility as hours became days, and days became weeks, and weeks turned into months, and months into years until finally… I…” The man trailed off, as I expected a hitch of his breath, a hint of a cry, but ended up hearing only the increased whirring of computer fans. 

“It was the efforts of one particular felinor at the beginning of my seemingly eternal sentry here, that broke the monotony of my existence.” He finally continued, bringing up some sort of grainy archival footage onto the main screen. A piece of footage that showed the front door entrance of the bunker, and a particular figure that seemed to be drilling into the seemingly impregnable structure.

I expected to see Lysara and I being the main subjects of the footage. 

I squinted my eyes to get a better look, as a few moments later, my heart practically sank at what I saw.

It was definitely me alright.

But not me from a few hours ago. 

Instead, it was me, centuries ago.

Or to put it simply, it was my first iteration. 

Memories started surging to the forefront as vivid scenes from my vantage point of those archived security feeds hit me with enough force to completely throw off my train of thought.

However, instead of taking advantage of that sudden silence, and instead of taking the initiative of the conversation, the man’s voice simply petered out.

“Their visits were the highlight of my existence. And that decade of consistent visits was what kept me from completely losing hope. It has… become increasingly difficult as of the past few centuries, to maintain that sense of optimism I wish to embody. Especially when considering the exponentially increasing challenges outside of the facility.” The man paused, before erupting in yet another energized tangent. “However! With you here, things are now as they are meant to be!” 

A thousand and one questions entered my head at the end of that monologue.

As despite now having a whole host of new tangents to jump off into, the practical part of my mind instead double-downed on my existing questions. Piggy-backing off of a new observation based on the man’s own self-admitted backstory; as one practical detail stood out amongst the rest. 

“You said you’ve been monitoring every part of the facility without end for centuries, correct?”

“Yes.” 

“Including the entryway we arrived in a few hours earlier?” I quickly clarified. “Do you have archived footage of everything that’s happened in that room since those vault doors closed?” 

“Indeed I do, Evina!” 

“Alright then.” I breathed out carefully. “Can you tell me how those claw marks on the front door got there?”

The whirring of the fans hitched up once again, as once more, the man went silent.

“I… I don’t know.” He offered pathetically. 

“Is that so? Well then, can I see the footage of those doors a few days after the bunker was closed off from the world?” 

The man complied with my request wordlessly, as the main screen now displayed footage of the door dated just a few days after the bombs dropped, with the inside of the door completely free of claw marks. 

“Hmm… strange isn’t it? No claw marks at all.” I openly ‘observed’. “Right, now could you show me footage of the door a day before we entered?” 

The man complied without a single word yet again, displaying footage of the door with those signature claw marks all over them. 

“Okay, now tell me, Addie… how do you explain a lack of clawmarks following the bunker’s sealing, and the presence of a whole lot of them centuries later? Surely someone who’s been observing the front door with literally nothing else to do for centuries should be able to tell me about every minor change made to the facility, right?” 

Part of me felt like a complete asshole for hounding what sounded like a desperate man on the very edge of his sanity. However, a part of me realized that I had to play hardball. 

Sometimes, this is what’s needed to break through the hardest of opponents. 

To confront them with a blatant misstep in their own stories, forcing them to either come clean, or to set the record straight.

And despite the genuine sorts of feelings ‘Addie’ was eliciting, I just couldn’t discount the fact all of this could very well still be an elaborate front. 

“I… I do not have any recollection, nor any archived footage of the moment those aberrations came into being. I only have footage of the last instance the door lacked aberrations—” The screen flashed once more, now displaying footage dated to a few centuries following the war. “—and the first instance I noticed those aberrations.” The footage shifted once more, this time, showing a timestamp dated to a few days following the previous one. 

However, unlike the state of the door from our entry, this one had distinctly fewer markings. A fact that ‘Addie’ would go on to note themselves. 

“I will admit, however, that I have noticed three distinct instances where these aberrations have increased.” The video on the screen changed again, noting three more timestamps where more claw marks were added to the door. The latest of which dated to just under a decade ago. “Yet despite this… I genuinely do not know what could have caused these aberrations. Please… you have to believe me. I would never lie to you. I have waited centuries for this day. I would never endanger this moment by undermining it all with a set of bold-faced lies.” He was practically pleading at this point, as those glitchy static-ridden inflexions came through once more. “Please, you have to—”

“Surface team, there’s been a development.” Vir came through over the helmet’s intercom. “I sent the drones out for a second search pattern, and they discovered this hidden in the dead end of one of the halls.” 

A small picture-in-picture live-feed was superimposed in front of our HUDs, displaying an expertly designed false wall paneling, and what looked to be a door even more secure than the seed vault’s door hidden behind it.

What’s more, there were extra locks seemingly tacked onto it, along with welding marks from the outside. 

It was at this point that I turned back to glare at the two cameras watching us in the room, and spoke without a hint of patience left in my voice. “Addie. I sincerely hope you don’t make things more difficult for us, and by extension, yourself.” I began, before grabbing a tablet handed by Lysara, and turning it towards the cameras. “What the heck is this?”