Chapter 52 — The Ship That Never Looks Back

Down Below Deck

The first sealed door appeared after three hours of constant walking through increasingly narrower and darker maintenance corridors, an old faded warning sign still dimly read: "Structurally Unstable Area — No Entry Without Special Permit." Bui Dac Sinh stopped in front of it, pulled out a bunch of old keys from his pocket, chose a rusty one, and inserted it into the mechanical lock below the electronic seal that had long since stopped working.

"The electronic lock broke more than ten years ago, no one bothers to fix it because this area has been completely neglected." He explained, turning the old key with a proficiency that showed it wasn't the first time he'd done this. "But the backup mechanical lock still works, and not many people even remember it exists, let alone have the right key."

The door creaked open, revealing a dark hallway, the air rushing out carried the smell of rusty metal mixed with a musty smell typical of areas without a properly functioning ventilation system for a long time. Khe Lam turned on the flashlight, its light illuminated a long hallway, the walls on both sides were covered with rusty streaks like the scars of time.

"From here on, we're below the main deck level of the Bottom Deck." Bui Dac Sinh said, step in first and lead the way. "This area was built during the ship's early stages, before the founding engineers realized some of the original structures could not withstand the long-term stress of the Ring's constant rotation. They sealed it off, built safer replacement areas on the upper deck, and left the place to fade into oblivion."

"Is it really safe?" Bach Van asked, his voice unable to hide his concern as he looked at the small cracks running along the ceiling of the hallway.

"Safe enough to pass through, if we're careful and don't stay too long in one place." Bui Dac Sinh replied. "But yeah, it's not designed to last forever. That's also part of what makes this an ideal hiding place for those who don't want to be found — not many are bold enough to risk staying for long."

They continued deeper, through abandoned rooms filled with old equipment whose original use was no longer recognizable, through passages where the gravity seemed to be slightly lighter than the main Bottom Deck they had just left, a strange phenomenon that reminded Khe Lam of basic physics lessons on weight distribution along the Ring Ring — this area was probably located in a section of the structure that was slightly off the standard turning radius, creating a small anomaly in the simulated centrifugal force. gravity.

"I never knew areas like this existed." Khe Lam said, looking around as he walked with the eyes of an engineer familiar with the ship's structure but now exploring a completely new part of it. "After eight years of working in the Roots Week, I think I know almost every nook and cranny of the maintenance area."

"This ship is much larger than anyone can fully understand in one lifetime." Bui Dac Sinh spoke, his voice carrying a deep contemplation. "And perhaps that's exactly what the Council relies on — a structure large enough, complex enough, that there will always be hidden corners that no one can control, no matter how hard they try."

After walking a little further, they came to a heavily rusted metal floor, a large hole piercing it, revealing the deep darkness below, where Khe Lam's flashlight was not strong enough to illuminate the bottom.

"Careful." Bui Dac Sinh warned, stopping in time before missing a step. "This is why this area is sealed off. The floor structure in many sections has rotted through decades of lack of maintenance."

Khe Lam knelt at the edge of the hole, carefully observing the remaining structure with a professional eye familiar with assessing the safety of long-term metal. "The floor on the left is still strong, the main supports have not been completely corroded. If we stay close to the wall, following that border, we can get through."

She led the way, step by step, testing the floor's stability before placing her full weight on it, signaling Bach Van and Bui Dac Sinh to follow in her footsteps. There was a tense moment when a small piece of metal under Bach Van's foot made an alarming crackling noise, causing all three of them to freeze for a few seconds, but it endured, and they continued to move through safely, even though everyone's hearts beat much faster after that small incident.

"Where did you learn that skill?" Bach Van asked, when they had passed the dangerous part, his voice was still a little shaky but mixed with admiration.

"Eight years of fixing systems that no one trusted would work." Khe Lam replied, a tired smile flashed across her face. "One learns to read metal like a language, after enough time. It always tells you how much longer it can endure, if you know how to listen."

They stopped for a short rest in a larger room that might have been a sub-control station in the past, dusty old circuit boards still mounted on the walls like relics of a bygone era. Khe Lam sat down, took a sip of water from the bottle he brought, and felt his body begin to tire after many hours of continuously moving through bumpy terrain.

"How much further, sir?" she asked.

"Not far, if your memory serves." Bui Dac Sinh replied, although his voice was a bit uncertain, making Khe Lam a bit worried. "It's been many years since I last came here, child. I can only hope the road is still as I remember it."

Bach Van sat down next to Khe Lam, looking around the old room with both curiosity and fear. "What if we don't find anything, or what if what Mr. Sinh remembers is no longer true?"

"Then we'll find another way." Khe Lam replied, even though she also carried the same worry in her heart. "But I can't go back without trying every possibility, Bach Van. Not after everything we've learned."

They continued their journey after a short break, passing through a hallway so narrow that the three of them had to walk single file, the walls on either side almost touching their shoulders. The air here is much colder, a light breeze blowing from the front signals that a larger space is waiting in the distance.

"Can you feel it?" Bui Dac Sinh said, stopped, took a deep breath. "This air circulation is not natural. Someone is maintaining a manual ventilation system at the front, enough to keep the air from stagnating in an enclosed space."

Khe Lam felt it immediately as he pointed it out, a purposeful rhythm in the air, different from the dead silence of the abandoned corridors they had just passed through. This is not a completely forgotten area. There is someone, or something, still working ahead.

"From here, we need to go slower, more cautiously." Bui Dac Sinh said, his voice lowered to a whisper. "If you're right, we're approaching an inhabited area. They'll notice the stranger's presence before we notice them, almost certainly. Let me go first, and don't do anything sudden."

Khe Lam nodded, her heart beating fast from a mixture of hope, fear, and a strange feeling of stepping across the threshold into a completely different world, hidden for years right under the familiar shell of the ship she thought she understood.

She thought of all she had learned about Origin in her twenty years of life—the lessons about the ship's structure, about the Ring and the Gravity Well, about the three neat layers of society sharing living space in an order that had been established since launch. She had believed she understood the shape of the world she lived in, only to realize, layer by layer, that this ship contained countless spaces that had never been mentioned in any lesson—not just purposefully buried secrets, but actual physical spaces, corridors and rooms that had been erased from all official maps, where entire communities of people could exist that none of the remaining eleven thousand two hundred and forty inhabitants had ever known about.

Bach Van took her hand, and the three of them continued to advance, slowly, cautiously, into the darkness ahead where the artificial wind still whispered evidence of hidden life.