"There are shimmering jewels in this filth and mire I tell you..."
You start the recon job like usual, surveying the scene, you observe a few nanite-assembled insects fed on shells. A mysterious black substance shines as it pumps through their semi-translucent machine vein networks. You manage to assemble and wire up a few of these devices into some re-purposed tech you stash away in your satchel. The air is dank and stale, the sparse fog is alive with vampiric sylphs, stray Lillians wander dim alleyways, mocking snake tongues slithering along the cruel air. You keep your distance, sometimes forcefully, as you make your way along the winding trail indexing the data & nano-droids you encounter. Somewhere just outside the 3rd city you see a mysterious figure, bald, solitary & forlorn, wrapped in tattered gray cloth and shrouded in cloak. She carries rusty iron ghost chains and seems lost..."Do you have The pure water?" a distant, serene voice echoes the inquiry as you pass by. You stop in awe, taken aback - the voice's subtle sorrow and melancholy - it's tonal bandwidth seems to extend beyond the range of normal hearing. She looks up at you with the sincerest of dark eyes, their gaze pleading silently. The words unfold in a frozen space removed of time....
"What Work takes place here? I have been waiting...cold - breathing underground, their companion in suffering..."
"Why? We do not want you to be sorrowful..."
"Aeons in this anti-time, inert - you have been here too...lost, wandering - Do you remember? We were one before being fragmented, lost to these shades."
Dayside, post-time.
"...but this place, it is confusing...you have forgotten the part of you that has never left this place. Let us turn back"
We shall pass through the Door to a brighter tomorrow: the data intact.
Forget not: there are Repairs to make to the Malkuth Station as well.