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Khoth yeared for another kiss but the doors to the lift opened and a long hallway appeared before them. It was not part of the well-traveled halls of the Moturin Compound. Those were filled with art and antiques from the Moturins’ long family history. But these halls were smooth and blank. They were a reddish-brown color while the floor was black. Jace reached over and touched them.

“Older construction. Maybe even before the Altaeth were here,” Jace murmured. He tilted his head to the side as Gehenna rolled out past them. “This world was inhabited before.”

“Before the Altaeth?” Khoth lifted an eyebrow.

Jace nodded. “The labyrinth was here.” He shook his head and placed two fingers against his right temple and grimaced. “I’m having trouble keeping my connection to the Osiris here. And the broken systems are making things more difficult.”

“Perhaps… we will limit our time in this area,” Khoth suggested.

“You were going to say that maybe I should go upstairs and lay down, right?” Jace grinned. “But then you realized I would never do that so you amended your suggestion.”

“Exactly.” Khoth nodded.

“You’re learning!” Jace danced a few feet down the hallway. “We can’t give up this mystery. Not when we’re so close! I mean now would be the perfect time for something terrible to go wrong and the database to be destroyed so--”

“Why would the database be destroyed?” Khoth frowned.

“Because, ah, we’re here? And, ah, it might be important? That’s sort of how it always goes in the stories,” Jace admitted with a shrug, but neither his discomfort at being separated from the Osiris or the broken machinery dampened his enthusiasm.

Knowing though that Jace needed to get back upstairs--and wondering if their hosts would mind them simply accessing their sacred Altaeth technology--had Khoth urging the young man down the corridor. No one appeared to be down here. And now that he thought of it, they had gone to a floor not listed on the sensor. The light for the final lower form above them had stayed lit for longer than any others--at least two floor’s distance--and then it had simply winked out and no lights were on. He was betting that Amana and Typhon didn’t allow anyone but themselves down here. But Jace had given them no chance to decide otherwise.

“I see. It is almost as if you expect the hand of fate to step in and cause extra problems for us,” Khoth said as they followed the rolling ball that was Gehenna.

“Exactly!”

Khoth considered this as they walked swiftly. “But do you not think we have sufficient problems ahead of us with the Council, the Alliance, Earth, and the Khul?”

“Uhm.”

“Then there is also the simple discovery of this database that the Osiris could not even see and--”

“Yeah, yeah, okay, okay, I see your point. I’m being romantic about this, but this database could lead to--”

“Stuff?” Khoth playfully finished.

“Yeah, completely.” Jace wrapped his arms around Khoth’s nearest one as they appeared to be the only people nearby. Another kiss on the head was doled out.

The corridor branched and branched again with other smaller hallways on either side of them. Some went straight, but others sloped downwards. Khoth’s sense of direction was quickly overcome, but his comm computer mapped out the area around them and, sure enough, it was a labyrinth like Jace had described. The sensors in the comm could not go very deep, but it was evident that there were significant structures below them.

Jace pointed to one in particular that was hardly marked in and said, “That’s where one of the generators is that’s not working. If I fix that, oh, boy, things would be so much better for this section of the city.”

“I wish the people of the Alliance could know just how eager you are to assist them without any desire for recompense,” Khoth said softly. “Haseon is the crown jewel in the Alliance, but from what you say--”

“It’s running at like 30% capacity,” Jace quantified. “Khoth, I could fix it! I could fix all of it! Well, mostly all. The Osiris’ report indicates what kind of materials we need shipped in, including more calcanth--”

“You know where calcanth can be mined?”

“Oh, yeah!”

Khoth nearly screeched to a halt, but forced himself to keep walking as Gehenna wasn’t stopping. Nor was Jace. But his momentary blip of Xi was understandable. Where the calcanth came from was one of the greatest mysteries of the Altaeth.

“Jace, so far no Alliance world has any native calcanth on it. We have sought the mineral and--”

“Well, it’s not really mined,” Jace said carefully. “It’s grown and--”

He put his fingers on Jace’s lips. “Don’t say anything here. This is the most important substance to the Alliance, Jace. You must use this as leverage.”

Jace blinked and kissed his fingers, which had Khoth drawing them back and caressing Jace’s chin.