Obscure Protocols

Chapter 4: The Descent

The rusted iron stairs plunged into the bowels of Neo-Strasbourg like a severed artery. Each step groaned beneath Pavel's bare feet, corroded metal weakened by decades of acid rain dripping down from the upper levels.

The air thickened as he descended, laden with a complex stench—decaying synthetic flesh, overheated server oils, crystallized despair. The walls bore the scars of a bygone era: tags in a distorted Alsatian dialect, binary graffiti, plasma bullet marks carved out like black tumors.

Sixty-seven steps to level zero. Sixty-seven paces toward a world where morality had dissolved in toxic fumes.

The Untergrund sprawled before him—a cathedral of decay turned upside down. Flickering neon signs blinked in cybernetic Morse code, casting shadows over hunched silhouettes that populated this kingdom. Here, darkness was a religion, the nurturing mother hiding forbidden mutations and transformations.

Pavel walked along Fleischgasse, the main artery of this labyrinth. The storefronts lined up like toothless mouths: stim bars selling artificial memories, brothels where mecha-shaped bodies offered algorithmic pleasures, clinics where the last scraps of humanity were traded for enhanced functions.

Eyes turned to him—but out of respect. His unmodified skin, his natural eyes made him a sacred relic in this gallery of cybernetic horrors.

A sputtering sign read: Zur Letzten Hoffnung—To the Last Hope. An ironic name in this geography of resignation. Pavel pushed the door open, and the smell of synthetic beer enveloped him like a hospital blanket.

Inside breathed a kind of sophisticated desolation. Humanoid entities hunched over wobbly tables, artificial beauty brushing against biomechanical horror. A man with sculpted features sipped neurotransmitters, his eyeballs floating in amber liquid, connected by filaments pulsing under his skin like digital veins.

In a corner, a woman revealed a chest made of synthetic glass. Her biomechanical organs were macabre works of art: a titanium heart beating to a relentless algorithm, steel lungs expanding in mechanical rhythm. Her breasts—spheres of bioluminescent crystal—contained blood plasma spiraling in mesmerizing patterns.

Pavel moved among these reinvented bodies, his natural flesh a stark contrast to the surrounding cybernetic architecture. Conversation was a luxury—most communicated through neural impulses, information packets transiting via implanted networks.

An androgynous creature brushed past him. Its angelic face, chiseled by perfection algorithms, masked a patchwork skin of flesh and bio-integrated polymers. Mercury veins ran beneath its artificial dermis, forming shifting patterns like alien calligraphy.

"Daten... Daten für Brot..." it whispered, its voice modulated by reconstructed vocal cords, giving each syllable a metallic resonance. Data for bread. The subsistence economy of the Untergrund.

At the back of the room, an alcove housed Metallmutter—the Mother of Metal. A former engineer, she had orchestrated her transformation into a post-human work of art. Her body was a cathedral of chrome and flesh, her head a titanium dome with iridescent reflections, her eyes scanners constantly analyzing the environment.

Translucent tubes snaked along her neck, carrying colored fluids pulsing in rhythm with an artificial metabolism. Her arms—wonders of biomechanical engineering—combined surgical steel with synthetic skin of unsettling perfection.

"Pavel..." Her voice was a fusion of vocal synthesis and organic breath. "The Master of Screens sent you for something."

It wasn't a question. In the Untergrund, intentions were read in neural patterns, decoded by the implants parasitizing every thought. The Eternal Voice spoke through its creations, orchestrating their movements from the digital upper spheres.