Myth of Empra

"Say Hannah do you know the Myth of Empra?"
"No? Should I?" Hannah asked doubtfully."

~

Hannah was thinking about what the old man had told her. What was it two? or three? years ago now. She hadn't really been listening to his story back then to be honest, it had been a late evening and her brain was already sleeping. But here she was, on an air sloop from Babington Castle Aerodrome, Air Spear, BC-AS. On paper heading to Reamingworth Air Base, but they would make an unscheduled stop at the bank in Reamingsworth. She had half bribed and half scared the commanding Lieutenant in complying. Hannah was looking out over the city, a sea of lights glew below her while the sloop was passing trough clouds from chimneys and steam vents. In her pocket she clutched the key.

Immediately after landing their sloop was surrounded by the Imperial Bank's Guard. Black cloaked figures, whom were barely visible among the night time shadows that covered the top of the building. Hannah stepped out of the sloop alone, they had previously agreed the crew would stay onboard, not that they wanted to come the bank scared them a bit.

Before she get two steps away from the Air Spear, or she could speak, the black figure of the guard had stepped forward and a knife was pointing her way. "Get back onboard and fly away."
"I'm expected." Hannah lied nervously, in the tongue of the hill tribe the guards came from. The guard's men's response was instant, the knife now rested on Hannah's neck. It had been decades since Hannah had spoken the language, but she was very sure she had the right words. "Where did you learn our sacred language, plains girl." The guard man said in the common tongue, and 'plains girl' was their favoured insult from someone not from their hill tribe but from the lower flat lands.

"My mother taught me." Hannah answered again in their language. But Hannah was indeed taught by her mother, but had not evolved her skills in the language after that or actually talked with someone else in the language. She didn't say mother like an adult would, but she said mamma, and with the complex nature of the language she used, the way she grammatically conjugated the word mamma, she told her mothers' status.

The knife dropped. "Follow me miss" The guard's men said (In the common tongue).

~

Hannah was brought to the main hall of the bank building, with bankers working behind the counters along most of the walls. She walked up to a random booth. The guard's man still shadowed her. "I wish to access a fault." The banker didn't even look up when he spoke, "Number and key." Hannah reached in her pocket and placed the key on the little tray on the desk the banker had pointed at. "Thirty five C".
The banker basically froze. He looked at the key, looked at Hannah, looked at the Guard's man behind her, All while his face went from white to red to white and back to natural. And then he pressed a button on his desk. A steam whistle sounded somewhere else in the building.

Hannah stood awkwardly while the banker said nothing, did nothing, and just stared at the key after he had pushed the button. "Anything wrong?" Hannah asked. The banker didn't answer nor acknowledge she was there.

A bit later another banker in a fancier suit showed up, probably a higher ranking banker Hannah thought. "You rang?" The new banker asked the banker behind the desk, sounding very annoyed. "The miss wishes to access a fault." The banker behind the desk pointed to the key. The new fancy suit banker frowned. "Which fault?"

Hannah was taken to another room. The fancier banker was pulling leavers to what Hannah recognised as a steam catalogue, rows of books where rolling by. "I don't think those files are here."The fancy banker murmured to himself. "Please wait here while I get Pete." Hannah shrugged.

Pete appeared to be a very very old man. Who walked with a cane, a cane that looked so fragile that it was a wonder it could support the weight he was putting on it. "35-C? I've never been to any fault below the 2000 level, and I've been here a while, I started as a little boy you know. But I remember old man Alexander talk about them when I was here as an apprentice. I think the books are in my office which was his old office you know." And so Hannah, fancy suit banker, and the guardsman followed the shuffling Pete down the hall to his office. His office turned out to be something that resembled a cave build out of books, and piles and piles of loose papers spread around. But there wasn't anything wrong with Pete's brain. He quickly pointed to the book he needed, and the fancy suit banker retrieved it from the wall, luckily without endangering the structural integrity of the book cave.

Hannah could read on the cover 'Fault access records 20-A to 100-E'. Pete was carefully flipping trough the book, while he was balancing it on top of his cane, as the desk was to full with other stuff. Until he found what he needed, "35-C is owned by the 'X Ygho Family, and was last accessed in the year .... 1055. Are you related?" Hannah was astonished by the date, no single person had been in that fault in 1645 years? "I don't know my families history that far back I'm afraid." Hannah said avoiding to answer the question. "Well if you have the key, you can get access." Pete stated. Hannah held up her key, a simple round bar with three pins to tumble the lock, and the logo of the Imperial Bank as a bow, with the number 35-C engraved on it.

~

The group was standing in the elevator, steam was hissing trough the pipes around them, as they were ascending into the deep. Pete looked at the guard that was still with them. "Why are you here actually?" "To protect the lady." He stated plainly. But Hannah now understood that this was not the normal way of how things went in the bank. Pete just shrugged. Hannah was curious why the guard called her a lady though, she wasn't wearing her Air Corps uniform, nor any other mark. She was as plains clothes as she could, for this specific visit.

The lift came to a screeching halt. "This is as far as the elevator goes, I've never been this far down." The fancy suit banker said. "And yet, we have to go further" Pete added. The tunnels they passed trough were dark and cold, carved out of solid rock, Pete and the fancy suit banker had brought lanterns, and in their bundles of light Hannah saw doors, to what she assumed faults, left and right, most dusted over, cob webs everywhere, these had been closed for a long time. Some had big locks, some small. The numbers where in the high 2000's though.

Pete rattled with the large key ring he brought, handing it to fancy suit. "We have to go in here. I think." Pete was shining his lantern on another door. Which had a plaque that read 'Down to faults 20-1000'. It was locked, bolted and barred. From their side. Where they preventing something from coming out? Or from going in? Hannah wondered. But also, again the 20 number there caught her attention. What about the faults numbered 1 to 19? Where were those? And also the numbering didn't make sense to her. Wouldn't the low numbers lay closer to the surface, and every time the bank expanded new tunnels were dug downwards, the numbers go up?

Behind the door fancy suit just opened lay a spiralling staircase, down. So down the group went. Slowly, Pete had some trouble with the stairs, his cane tapping every step before his legs followed. They passed several doors, Pete shone his lantern on each one, to read the plaque's. And finally stopped when 20-30 was on the door. This one again, was locked, barred and bolted in away that signalled something was kept in, rather then kept out. Hannah was worried now.

The tunnels, behind this door were dark, darker then where the came from it appeared, it appeared to be eating the light away. But that didn't make sense. There wasn't a single corridor, but there were side tunnels for each number. Tunnel 35 had faults A, B and the group stopped at C. But the tunnel moved on. How far? Hannah couldn't see.

Fault 35-C wasn't anything fancy, just a steel door in a rock face like all the others they had passed. It had three locks though. One was opened by a similar key as Hannah had, the key owned by the bank, Hannah's key opened another. The third lock however, required a letter code. "Do you have the password" Pete asked. Hannah was at loss. She hadn't expected that. Cracked her brain. "Try; X Ygho." Was all Hannah could think off. Pete fiddled with the lock, it remained closed. "Nope not it, you only get three tries, two left." "close" Hannah guessed. Pete tried. "No, one change left, and then I have to ask our guard to remove you." Hannah was nervous now, it couldn't be that right? Well there was nothing else to try: "Empra" Pete looked at her as if she was crazy. He didn't say anything though and tried the code, the lock clicked open. "Your fault miss." Pete pushed the door open slightly, and stepped back, handing Hannah his lantern.

~

Hannah pushed open the door, aiming the light bundle of the lantern inside. Not knowing at all what to expect. The fault room was bigger then she expected, the light hit the far wall first. She pointed the light left and right, empty walls. But when she dropped the light to look at the floor, her heart stopped. The myth was true.

On the floor sat a person, a young woman, long blonde hair reaching the floor. Her legs crossed under a white dress, hands in her lap. Her head was tilted down. "Hello Empra" Hannah said. Her head shot up, eyes wide open. "Who dares to wake me." The voice was as clear as silver bells.

"HOW DID YOU GET IN HERE?!" It was fancy suit banker who shouted. The woman looked over to him. Hannah felt more then just a gaze fall of herself. "I've been here ever since the Emperor closed that door. What year is it, is he dead yet?" A few moments of silence where everyone looked at each other. "It's the year two-thousand and seven hundred. According to the Bank records that door has been closed for sixteen hundred and forty five years. Have you been here the whole time? Also there's no Emperors anymore." Hannah said.

"Good riddence. I was meditating. So why are you here, Hannah Wright?"
Hannah hadn't giver her name to the guard nor the bankers.