Three weeks underground. Sixty-one tablets. Zero answers.
Deia sat on the floor of building seven, surrounded by her work. Tablets stacked in rows. Symbols copied and compared and crossed out and recopied.
She still couldn't read them.
She picked up two tablets. Compared them. Set them down. Picked up two more. Same symbols. Different order.
Nothing.
She grabbed a third tablet. Scanned it. Stopped.
Three symbols. Same arrangement. She'd seen them before. On this tablet. And the one beside it. And the one behind that.
She pulled a fourth. Fifth. Sixth.
The same three symbols. On every single tablet. Hidden in the lines. Repeated. Always the same order.
Deia's hands started shaking.
She copied them onto a fresh tablet. Drew them large.
A circle. A vertical line through it. And below the line, a small mark. Like a root. Like a foot stepping down.
She had seen the circle and line before. On every transition. Every threshold.
