126424

The lights in the lab flickered and died. In the sudden darkness, the numbers began to glow with a faint, bioluminescent blue, lifting off the screen like a hologram. They began to rotate, shifting from numbers into a geometric shape—a keyhole.

The digits weren't a time. They were coordinates, refined to a microscopic degree. 126.42.4. 126424

According to the map, the location wasn't on the surface of the planet. It was three hundred miles directly below the tectonic plate they called home. Elias leaned back, his heart hammering against his ribs. There was nothing down there but magma and pressurized silence. The lights in the lab flickered and died

Suddenly, the terminal chirped. A new line of text scrolled across the screen, written in a coding language that hadn't been used in a century: WAKE UP, ELIAS. WE’VE BEEN WAITING FOR THE KEY. The digits weren't a time