Vault 27

The air inside Vault 27 didn't just feel cold; it felt heavy, like the atmosphere itself was trying to apologize for what I was about to see.

I stepped off the lift, my boots echoing too loudly against the rusted deckplates. According to the Starfinder Society briefing, this sector was supposed to be a simulation of a pre-Gap agrarian colony. Instead, my flashlight cut through a fog of hanging incense to reveal a nightmare carved in wood and bone.

The village of "Aethelgard" looked like it had been turned inside out. Every doorway was framed with woven hex-charms, and the cobblestones were stained with dried, obsidian-colored pigments. These weren't just decorations; they were shackles. Crude, jagged symbols -the kind that make your eyes ache if you stare too long- were scorched into the foreheads of the wooden statues lining the square.

I checked my comm-unit, but the signal was a mess of rhythmic static, like a heartbeat. The villagers weren't clones or robots; they were husks, kneeling in the dirt around a central pyre. They didn't even look up when I approached. They just kept chanting in a language that sounded like grinding teeth, their fingers tracing cursed sigils into the dust over and over again.