Understanding

The woman led her companions deeper beneath the earth. The tunnel they followed slanted downward at a shallow angle. It curved slightly to the right. Symbols were on the wall here, as well as alternating stripes of yellow and black. The stripes were angled as if to indicate a direction, the same which the woman and her companions were moving along.

They arrived at an archway. A thick door of lustrous metal attached to stout hinges was open, angled inwards to a chamber which lay beyond it. More sigils, some of which were similar to those which the strangers in red cut into the mortared walls of their constructed edifice, decorated the wall outside of the door.

Beyond the door lay a room.

It was not particularly large. Much of the walls, as well as the floor and ceiling, were plated in reflective metal. Metal husks, some tall and narrow, others short and wide, rested near the room's walls. Flat panes of glossy material hung on one wall above some of the husks. He recalled the very first room and noted this one's similarities to it. The first room had been in much worse shape. The boxy husks in that room above had been worn black, the metal sheets on the walls tarnished. This room was nearly pristine.

The woman and her companions spread out and searched the chamber. Another door lay on the opposite side. This one was shut, but the mechanism to open it was on this side. They found more supplies here in a container. They were more of the powdery, flaky cubes which they had found on the traveler's corpse.

One of the woman's companions bumped something while exploring. A light flashed suddenly on the glossy planes and they lit up, shedding a pale blue glow upon the faces of the woman and her companions. They were startled and raised their weapons defensively, but nothing more happened beyond the screen's surface changing, taking on different hues and colors as images and symbols appeared and then vanished. The three watched the screen with great suspicion as it cycled through a series of iterations. Finally the screen stopped on a single image.

The screen had a number of concentric circles in white upon a solid black surface. The center was dominated by a large sphere of orange. Nearest to the orange sphere was a blue one, which lay upon the innermost of the white circles. Beyond there, upon the remaining white circles traced out on the surface, were five other spheres of varying colors. Each sphere had a series of symbols next to it, some straight and some curved and some a bit of both.

Smaller spheres, solid blobs of white on the black background, were scattered throughout the image. Each of these also had attendant symbols. Most lay near the other, larger circles of different colors. None were near the blue sphere.

He discovered this all felt quite familiar. It was a diagram. He had a role in it. Not directly, but one which touched upon it, like the small white spheres touched tangentially upon the arcs drawn on the screen's surface.

He was to be part of it as well. Separate, in the end, but still connected. He grew aware of what was to be done. He knew why the woman and her companions were to come here. The others of community as well, back far above, shielded by a few ruined scraps of stone and metal from the burning sun locked overhead.

He found focus, at last. He found meaning, finally.