A Compass.

An ancient relic that pointed one forward.

Jazelle looked at the piles of dust scattered about on the floor. Faint sunlight peered through the ceiling-high chamber.

When she first looked at The Orb, she thought it was more complicated than it seemed. There were gaps between each curved armoured surface, with beams of light pulsing beneath. Jazelle sensed it; under the beam of light was a second contraption — it looked like it used a different configuration than the original sphere itself. It was thinner and more delicate. Without Orb telling her, she tapped one of the sides. A ring of light flared, and soon light-based glyphs appeared around the circle's exterior.

Strange…A command centre.

Jazelle had seen command centres of various configurations before. Command centres allowed you to change a machine's configuration from its intended purpose. Usually, they were mechanical. Jazelle modified a few before; they usually had a dial. The dial could twist and turn to loosen, and modify parts. If they were configured completely, the machine could be entirely restructured.

But…This was the first one she found that was digital.

A digital command centre…

She was nervous. Jazelle had never operated one before, but her fingers twitched towards the newfound contraption, as if it were an instrument she was playing. It sang and called out to her. She saw a vision of motherboards, mechanical parts, and heard the humming of machines all echoing and symphonizing in her hand. Her hands moved like a weaver twisting a needle through thread. All fell silent as she traced a shape in mid-air, tapped the light ring, twisted her hand, and from the light ring, pulled out a light projection. It looked like a sword. She pulled it out and widened the ray of light using both hands. It expanded into a screen. A screen with lots of geometrical patterns and lines.

Orb and her mother’s eyes stilled as they looked at Jazelle executing everything like clockwork. The way Jazelle’s hands moved across the motherboard, interacting with every single part of the interface, her eyes scanning every digital blueprint. Jazelle’s hands, outstretched like mechanical claws, grasped and dragged through several digital artifacts. She dragged and swiped through several data clusters, causing them to collide. They collided like crashing airships falling down to earth. As each collided, Orb saw sparks of digital glyphs; they felt almost physical. Jazelle traced each of the motherboard patterns end-to-end, finger lingering, tracing it thoroughly like a valued part of history. As she traced each of the pieces, her finger flowed from one end to the next, fitting together —as if she was playing a game of Tantreez. The duo watched as Jazelle picked up each of the digital artifacts and placed them in mid-air. Soon, all the pieces meshed together, bundling like a giant landmass. Jazelle spun around the digital landmass with her index finger. She noticed there was a red dot blinking in the middle. She zoomed in; the figure almost looked like her. She saw the layers of digital-holographic landmass intersecting. The technology was able to detect that she was underground.

This was a map.

Her fingers moved, zooming in and out. She pinched in her fingers until the landmass could be viewed, and at the bottom-left of the holographic screen, that’s when she noticed it— a green pointer. The green pointer didn’t move much whenever she zoomed in and out. It was specifically pointing towards a certain direction. She tapped on it, figuring it would lead her somewhere. The neon-blue landmass changed to green. The map automatically lit up, overlapping both blue and green projections. What was interesting was where both maps overlapped. It overlapped a section which resembled a huge archway and a tunnel.

“Here,” Jazelle said, pointing, breaking herself out of her trance.

The Orb smiled. “That’s where we should be heading.”

“Looks like it is an underground of some sort,” Jazelle said.

“We’ll meet there,” Orb said.

Jazelle looked at Orb skeptically. “What makes you think I’ll be helping you?”

Orb looked at Jazelle. She saw Jazelle looking intently at the map, studying all its elements. Jazelle was repeatedly stroking her chin, spinning the map around.

Orb smiled. Orb spoke with assurance, “We’ll meet you there.”

Jazelle re-adjusted her cross-legged position on the ground and grabbed her cranberry juice from her bag. She unscrewed the cranberry-juice lid, and it opened with a pop. Sticky juice trickled down her throat in streams. Gulping, she exhaled in satisfaction.

“Sure,” Jazelle said.

Jazelle leaned her head back. Her eyes were coy. She opened her hand and motioned it directly towards her, as if she were a fortune-teller, asking for coins of fortune.

“But make sure you have the coins ready.”

–

It was evening when Lior lifted her eyes from the cartography book. The clock on the wall ticked. Each tick felt as if minutes were streaming by. The dull lamp, hung by a frayed cord in the living room, looked like a bug squeaking, grasping for air. Lior slammed the book with both hands down its centre. Her hands squeezed the book tight like two bookends. The midsection of the book curved and dented, squeezing inward, as if grasping for air. The sound of the second hand of the clock ticked faster, as if it grew more maddening by the minute.

Where is she? She should be back by now.

Lior remembered the moment Jazelle got out of the door, shoulders and back tensed, and her backpack swinging in awkward motion. It almost looked as if something heavy was crammed into that backpack; it awkwardly bulged and was dented in all of the wrong angles.

Lior scoured her memory, recalling events of the day.

Security Patrol.

As she pieced all the pieces in her memory, Lior felt the walls of the kitchen closing in on her. Her palms sweated, moisture trapped between her turtleneck and skin.

The ceiling lamp began to buzz; it buzzed in and out, flickering, unwavering, dying out. A trace of a happy memory crossed her thoughts. Young Jazelle, with a wide-toothed grin, head turned, facing Lior in a barren facility. That memory was shadowed over by a cold realization. Jazelle wandered off in a lonesome, chilly night, stuck between derelict, crammed alleyways, both sides of her face highlighted by red-and-blue flashing lights. Lior’s back stiffened; her leather coat contained no creases. Jazelle knew, and there was no backing out of it now.

As the realization hit her, Lior heard footsteps by the door. Lior heard them all within close proximity. Three people, dragging something heavy with their boots. She heard the clanging and swinging of machinery as they moved. These weren’t ordinary civilians.

They’re here.

Three knocks shot through the door. Fists hammered one after the other. Sound pierced through the door, past its weakened frame, into the living room. Lior had to answer.

“Security!” One called.

Sweat trailed along Lior's neck. Loose wavy strands of hair hung around her back and curved into an arc hanging past her chest. Lior dropped to the ground.

Security heard the sound on the other side of the door. Detective Tru motioned his subordinates to stay back.

“Stay put,” Detective Tru said.

“Hello!” Detective Tru called out.

No response.

Detective Tru looked back, sent a signal to his subordinates, and nodded his head. His subordinates stood beside him with armour and weapons at their disposal. They all took several steps back, then barged forward. One swung their leg back, preparing for a kick. One of the subordinates slammed their leg down, shattering the door into pieces.

All three surrounded the living room. The living room and kitchen were dimly lit, and the walls meant to be covered with stucco were scratched and faded. There, lying face down in the centre of the room, was Lior. The book had fallen face down to her side. Her hair was scattered about, planted on the floor like free-flowing ink. One of the officers immediately rushed over to Lior’s side.

“Miss! Are you alright?”

He ran over to support Lior. Lior’s lips were parted, and her skin was pale. Lior groaned, moving her head side-to-side, and she opened her eyes to look at the officer in front of her.

“A-Ah…Jazelle, is that you?” Lior asked.

Detective Tru paid close attention.

Lior rubbed the back of her head and continued talking. “It’s already so late…where have you been?”

The Officer began speaking. “Miss…We are Security Patrol.”

He supported Lior along her back using his hand and settled her back into the chair.

“Security patrol?”

Lior curled her hands and placed them on her temple, and she squinted her eyes, looking directly at the officer. She widened her eyes, then clasped onto his arm with both of her hands.

“Don’t tell me,” Lior exclaimed. “Did something happen to Jazelle? Please don’t tell me something bad happened to her!”

Lior’s forehead crinkled as her fingers dug deeper into the officer’s arm.

“Has she gotten into trouble? I was just visiting over vacation!”

The officer waved his hand to reassure her.

“It’s just that we have some questions for her.”

“Questions?” Lior said. “I hope it isn’t too bad…”

“It’s just that we have been on the lookout for suspects, and we were hoping she could answer some of our questions…”

“I see…” Lior answered.

Detective Tru studied Lior. Her hair was drawn out in a strewn-out mess as if she had just emerged from a pigsty. Her eyes darted wide, and her mouth hung open like a fish that was hooked on its lip.

Detective Tru disliked museums. He deemed them too neat, orderly, and perfect. The pictures were always contained in a solid, perpendicular frame. Here, it was the opposite. Lior’s leather coat was well-ironed without a single crease, and her turtleneck was wrapped around her like plated armour. To Tru, paintings were meant to be messy. But Lior was neat. A faint scent lingered in this space. It was the smell of rotting iron, burnt smoke, and lingering decay.

Lior looked at the detective, eyes cold, with a cool glint in her eye. She approached him.

“You must be the one in charge here. Please help my sister! I’ll do anything to assist with the investigation!”

Detective Tru stared hard at Lior. Saliva pooled near the corners of his lips. His chest was completely faced towards her. Tru grinned, took a step back, and placed a hand on her shoulder.

She was the one in the video.

Tru smiled. “Sure, we could use any help we can get. We’ll find her ok?”

Lior's eyes stilled, then swept up into half-crescents, her face beamed radiant, and it appeared as if a rosy countenance was returning to her cheeks.

“Thank you so much, I highly appreciate it!” Lior said.

-

Jazelle packed The Orb and held The Compass. She figured out how to detach it from the device. Now, she held a smaller spherical device hidden in the palm of her hand. As she moved, the green cursor pointed in a certain direction. She had arranged to meet with Orb and her mother at the final location the compass had indicated.

When she first looked at the map, she was surprised to find the location on the map was located near the Ruins…and in a part of the Ruins she had not expected. Far beyond the vast expanse of desert plains lay an abandoned railway station. The magnificent structure could still be seen at quite a distance. It was grand, featuring tall window panes that stretched and expanded within the structure.

Jazelle looked at it. In centuries past, she figured the station would’ve serviced hundreds of journeys, but now the building stood there, lonesome, meshed, crumpled into sand, transformed and disintegrated into time. Like the pocket watches she used to fix, the station was something to admire, not to use.

Instead of the main entrance, she stepped through one of the broken glass-ceiling panes. Jazelle was careful to step through the broken crack. It had obviously been ransacked, but the crack seemed as if it been meticulously broken into by a group of people. It was located near the bottom of the window, making it easy for Jazelle to slip in. Jazelle ducked, making sure to avoid the cracked edges of the window glass that could dig into tender parts of her skin. Her boots scratched the floor as she entered.

She entered the third floor of the station. High-up Jazelle could see multiple floors of the station. Iron arches held up the station and intersected over various sections, similar to ancient Victorian structure. Jazelle saw ancient architecture in books; she was surprised the structure had held itself together for so long.

Below, Jazelle saw four empty railways with platforms. Jazelle smelled the dust; it crinkled up her nose. It was night, and Jazelle could feel the chill of the breeze tingling on her skin. As she walked, her steps echoed around the station. Her boots scratched along the tile dividers. If she weren't careful, she would’ve been tempted to use her Astrolab right there, fly on her board throughout the entire facility, and dodge through various obstacles.

That would’ve been fun. Jazelle mused.

She reached the first floor. The indicator came to a halt. Jazelle had walked past the station platforms, but interestingly enough, the indicator was pointing her towards a wall.

On the map, an arch was indicated.

She stood there clueless, lost in thought. Her hands scanned the wall. It was covered in vines, greenery, and various other brambles. Jazelle’s hands knocked on the wall at several different points. She placed her ear close to the cold limestone.

Tink. Tonk. Tink Tonk.

It sounded different. The middle was hollow than the edges.

The entryway was hidden within this wall.

Jazelle paused a bit.

Now, how to open it?

Just as she found it, Jazelle heard footsteps and a squeaky noise coming from behind her.

“Was looking forward to seeing you.”

Jazelle turned around. It was Orb.