The day had been brutal. Maron's training regimen, as promised, showed no mercy despite their underground excursion the previous night. Solaris's muscles ached in places he hadn't known existed as he sank into the comfortable armchair near the fireplace, a plate of Maron's hearty venison stew balanced on his lap.

  "Still alive?" Eli asked, settling onto the adjacent sofa with her own plate.

  "Barely," Solaris admitted, rolling his shoulder with a grimace. "Maron's idea of 'basic conditioning' would qualify as torture under several international conventions."

  "Heard that," Maron called from the kitchen where he was filling another bowl. "World doesn't end gently. Neither does training."

  Eleanor entered the living area, her silver hair catching the firelight as she moved with remarkable grace for her eighty-one years. Despite having participated in modified versions of the day's training exercises, she appeared far less affected than Solaris felt.

  "The trick is knowing when to conserve energy," she advised, settling into her usual chair by the fire. "Something our Sun Sovereign is still learning, apparently."

  "I saw you exercising today," Solaris protested. "You moved like someone half your age..."

  A smile touched Eleanor's lips. "Tai chi for sixty years provides certain advantages. The body remembers what the mind practices."

  Maron returned with his own food and a glass of whiskey, settling into his preferred position—back to the wall, clear sightlines to all entrances. Kira materialized beside him, her form shimmering slightly in the firelight.

  "You promised them a story tonight," Kira reminded Maron.

  "Not me," he corrected. "Eleanor."

  All eyes turned to the elderly woman, who paused mid-bite, her expression shifting from surprise to resignation.

  "I suppose I did," she acknowledged, setting her plate aside. "After last night's revelations, you all deserve to know more about my background."

  Solaris leaned forward, genuinely curious. Eleanor had been forthcoming about her role as the Moon Sovereign, but details about her past remained largely a mystery.

  "How much do you know about black book operations within the intelligence community?" she asked, her piercing blue eyes studying each of them in turn.

  "Classified projects outside normal oversight," Maron responded immediately. "Triple letter agencies running programs even most government officials don't know exist."

  Eleanor nodded. "That's the public understanding. The reality runs deeper." She straightened in her chair, her posture shifting subtly from casual to professional. "For forty-three years, I served as the director of a classified facility codenamed Fort Scorpio. Governmental in structure, perhaps, but operating beyond conventional authority," Eleanor clarified. "My official title was Division Nine Director of Special Research, but in practice, I oversaw one of the most secure containment and research facilities on the planet."

  The firelight danced across her face as she continued, casting her features in alternating light and shadow. Her voice took on a measured cadence, as if reciting information she had kept classified for decades.

  "Fort Scorpio was constructed two thousand feet beneath the Blue Ridge Mountains. A self-contained ecosystem designed for thirty-year sustainability without surface contact. Triple-layered security protocols, quantum-encrypted communications, and containment systems capable of housing... unconventional entities. Many identical facilities existed all over. Texas, Alaska, Antarctica..."

  "Aliensssss," Solaris suggested.

  "Extraterrestrials and metaterrestrials, really. But essentially yes, among other things," Eleanor confirmed, her voice lowering slightly. "That was merely the surface of our operation. We housed crystalline artifacts that defied modern physics—items that seemed to exist partially in our dimension and partially elsewhere. Texts written in languages that predated known civilizations by tens of thousands of years. Technology capable of altering human perception or influencing mass consciousness. UAP materials, advanced technology, frequency projectors, voice-to-skull devices, complex gang-stalking systems—items, inventions, and protocols that would make Havana Syndrome feel like R&R by comparison."

  Maron's expression remained professional, though his eyes narrowed slightly. "Oversight?"

  "That's the interesting part," Eleanor replied. "Officially, three different agencies believed they maintained supervisory authority. In reality, Fort Scorpio answered to an oversight committee with no official designation—individuals selected from various government, military, and scientific sectors who understood the true nature of what we were studying." She paused, fingers tapping a slow rhythm against the arm of her chair. "But the true focus of my personal research was far more specialized, and far more dangerous."

  "Which was?" Maron asked, his professional curiosity evident.

  "The cyclical nature of human civilization," Eleanor replied, her gaze distant as if seeing through time itself. "I began noticing patterns in our collected artifacts—recurring motifs, architectural similarities, technological principles that appeared across supposedly unconnected ancient cultures."

  She rose from her chair, moving to stand before the fireplace. The flames cast her shadow long against the far wall, the silhouette seeming to shift independently of her movements. Everyone was too absorbed in the story to notice.

  "I dedicated decades to mapping these patterns, correlating archaeological anomalies with astronomical cycles. What emerged was extraordinary—evidence suggesting human civilization reaches similar peaks of advancement approximately every 26,000 years, correlating precisely with the precession of the equinoxes."

  "The Phoenix Ascension cycle," Eli noted quietly, nodding.

  "Though I didn't call it that then," Eleanor acknowledged. "My superiors labeled it 'Meta-Cyclo-Civilizational Theory' and classified it beyond top secret. They understood the implications—that we weren't the first advanced civilization on Earth, nor would we be the last. That we weren’t products of evolution, but designed to be this way."

  "What kind of evidence did you find?" Solaris asked, completely engrossed.

  Eleanor's expression shifted, her professional demeanor giving way to something almost reverential. "Fragments, mostly. A seamless metallic sphere, perfectly balanced despite being hollow, discovered beneath three miles of Antarctic ice, containing what appeared to be star charts from 26,000 years ago. Architectural blueprints etched onto indestructible crystalline tablets showing energy systems we've only recently begun to theorize. A partial machine recovered from the bottom of the Baltic Sea that demonstrated principles of quantum entanglement despite predating modern physics by millennia."

  She returned to her seat, her movements measured. "But the most compelling evidence came from the entities."

  "Entities?" Solaris echoed.

  "Beings not native to our third dimensional plane," Eleanor clarified. "Some captured during UAP recoveries, others discovered in ancient containment systems around the world. We learned to communicate with several of them, and their accounts corroborated my theory—civilizations rise, reach their peak, and then experience catastrophic collapse with remarkable consistency." Eleanor’s expression shifted. "But that's where my research became... problematic for my ‘superiors,’" Eleanor replied, a ghost of a smile touching her lips. "The evidence increasingly suggested intervention—deliberate manipulation of human development followed by calculated destruction once certain thresholds were reached."

  "The Anunnaki," Eli said softly.

  Eleanor nodded. "Though again, we didn't use that term. My department referred to them as 'Exodimensional Control Entities.' The entities we communicated with called them by various names, but the descriptions remained consistent—beings operating from outside conventional dimensional constraints, capable of leading human consciousness and development on both individual and collective levels."

  "How did you keep this research going without getting shut down?" Solaris asked.

  "Institutional inertia and plausible deniability," Eleanor answered with a dry laugh. "I presented the least controversial findings to my supervisors while maintaining separate records of the more volatile discoveries. Officials would visit Fort Scorpio quarterly, nod approvingly at our sanitized presentations, and leave convinced our work primarily focused on technological acquisition and reverse engineering. Just a bunch of obtuse men in suits with private islands and yachts." She paused, her expression clouding slightly. "My true breakthrough came in 2012, when we recovered an artifact from beneath the Gulf of Mexico—a geometric construct containing what appeared to be a complete historical record spanning multiple civilizational cycles. The information was encoded in a crystalline matrix that responded to specific brainwave patterns."

  "You interfaced with it," Solaris realized.

  "Yes," Eleanor confirmed, her voice growing softer. "The experience was... transformative. For seventy-two hours, my consciousness was… somewhere far away. I perceived civilizational patterns across hundreds of thousands of years—not just on Earth but across multiple star systems. I saw the interconnections, the deliberate interventions, the calculated harvesting of human energy and potential." She looked directly at Solaris, her eyes suddenly piercing. "I saw eleven Sovereigns, though I didn't understand what you were then. Eleven distinct energy signatures reappearing throughout history, always at pivotal moments, always present somewhere on the planet during the final days before collapse. I didn’t know it until later that the twelfth was me. And we were so close last time…"

  The room fell silent save for the crackling fire. Eleanor took a slow breath before continuing.

  "When I emerged from the interface, I documented everything I could remember—hundreds of pages of notes, diagrams, equations. I created a specialized department within Fort Scorpio dedicated to decoding and verifying my findings. We called it Project Ouroboros."

  "What happened to the research?" Eli asked.

  "Hidden throughout various secure locations," Eleanor replied. "Compartmentalized to protect against single-point compromise. I spent more than a decade preparing for what the artifact had shown me—the next cycle, which would begin with a global phenomenon unlike anything recorded in modern history."

  "The sky fracturing," Solaris murmured.

  "Precisely," Eleanor nodded. "But despite all my preparation, I never truly believed I would live to see it. I thought my work would guide future generations after my passing." She leaned back in her chair, her expression shifting to something almost wistful. "And then it actually happened. The day the sky tore open above major cities worldwide, I was two thousand feet underground, reviewing archived materials. Our sensors detected the disturbance, but given our location, we experienced no direct effects. Reports flooded our communications systems—descriptions of phenomenal light displays, dimensional tears, strange zones appearing and disappearing."

  "What did you do?" Solaris asked.

  "What any scientist would do," Eleanor replied with a slight smile. "I compared the reports against my predictions. The correlation was exact—down to the specific locations of initial manifestations. Everything Project Ouroboros had anticipated was unfolding in real time."

  Her expression darkened slightly. "But then something unexpected happened. About a month or so after the initial manifestation, a phenomenon penetrated Fort Scorpio itself—a brilliantly light blue bubble that descended through solid rock, through our security systems, through every level of our facility until it encompassed the entire compound."

  If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  "A Revelation Zone," Eli identified. "They're incredibly rare manifestations that appear over locations containing secrets or hidden knowledge that needs to be disclosed."

  Eleanor nodded. "The Zone bathed everything in revealing light—not just physical illumination but something that penetrated deeper, exposing truths we had deliberately hidden or unconsciously ignored. It revealed connections between seemingly unrelated research projects, exposed manipulations in our organizational structure, and—most disturbingly—showed how certain entities had subtly influenced our work for decades."

  She fell silent for a moment, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. When she spoke again, her voice had lost its professional detachment, becoming quiet and deeply personal.

  "The revelations weren't just institutional—they were deeply personal. I saw my own complicity in systems of control while believing I was preserving knowledge. I saw how my research, despite its accurate predictions, had been channeled into technologies that supported the very forces I thought I was documenting objectively."

  "It’s okay. We’ve all been there. But what happened when the zone disappeared?" Solaris asked gently.

  Eleanor gave Solaris a kind wink. "The Zone didn’t disappear. Instead, it gave us all a choice," Eleanor replied simply. "For many, it was the decision to leave—to be released from contracts, oaths, or confinements that no longer served their highest purpose. For others, it was the choice to remember what they had been forced or chosen to forget."

  She looked directly at Solaris, her blue eyes holding his gaze. "For me, it was the choice to acknowledge my true role in this cosmic cycle—not merely as an observer and chronicler, but as an active participant with responsibilities I had not yet recognized."

  "The Moon Sovereign," Eli supplied softly.

  "Yes," Eleanor confirmed. "Though I didn't understand that terminology then. I only knew that something fundamental had shifted within me—a connection to cosmic memories beyond my current lifetime, an awareness of purpose that transcended my scientific training." She fell silent, shifting in her chair. "The choice I made within the Zone resulted in my instantaneous relocation," Eleanor continued. "One moment I stood in my office, the next I found myself at Maron's front door, as if the universe itself had determined where I needed to be for what would come next."

  Maron nodded confirmation. "No vehicle, no approach pattern, just... appeared."

  "That's when I realized something else had changed," Eleanor added, her voice dropping slightly. "When I attempted to explain certain aspects of Fort Scorpio, I physically couldn't speak the words. As if some force prevented the information from being disclosed."

  As she said this, the shadows behind her deepened unnaturally. The room temperature seemed to drop several degrees despite the cheerfully burning fire.

  "Eleanor," Eli said quietly, "behind you."

  The elderly woman didn't turn, her expression suggesting she already knew what was materializing. "It appears whenever I approach certain topics. Its name is Shalke, apparently. Read it from the tome it’s holding."

  From the densest shadows emerged a towering figure—a skeletal form standing well over six feet tall, covered in brown robes that concealed its entire body, head, and arms except for its hands. Where its face should have been, there was only a black void that seemed to absorb rather than reflect the firelight. In its bony hands, it held an enormous tome and what appeared to be a feather pen, constantly writing even as it stood motionless.

  "Your shadow aspect," Solaris realized, remembering his own journey with Alice.

  "Yes," Eleanor confirmed calmly, seemingly unperturbed by the skeletal figure now looming behind her. "Shalke emerged shortly after my arrival here. It appears to be a manifestation of the knowledge I'm not permitted to share—or perhaps a keeper of secrets that require protection until the proper time. Honestly, I do not really know."

  Maron had shifted to alert readiness, though he hadn't drawn a weapon. "Can it talk?"

  "Not directly," Eleanor replied. "It doesn't speak, and it only moves when I move. The book it carries appears to contain writing, but others see nothing but blank pages."

  Eli studied the entity with scholarly interest rather than fear. "You can read it?"

  "Sometimes," Eleanor admitted. "If I focus my attention on the pages, I can perceive information—fragments of my research, details about entities we contained, coordinates to facilities around the world. But if I attempt to speak what I've read aloud..." She demonstrated by opening her mouth, only to find no sound emerging despite clear effort.

  "Woah," Eli murmured. "A knowledge repository that selectively reveals itself to its bearer. Almost like a living information quarantine."

  Shalke remained motionless behind Eleanor, its skeletal hands continuing their endless writing, the feather pen never seeming to require additional ink.

  "Have you tried connecting with it?" Solaris asked.

  "Easier said than done, Solaris," Eleanor replied thoughtfully. "Unlike your shadow aspect, Shalke doesn't seem to operate autonomously. It functions more as a... recorder or preserver than an independent entity. Perhaps connection will become possible as events progress. I do not know as of yet."

  The conversation paused as they all contemplated the skeletal figure. The fire crackled in the silence, its light seemingly unable to penetrate the void where Shalke's face should have been.

  "It's giving grim reaper," Solaris uttered.

  "It's giving grim reaper," Eli agreed.

  "What about the Antarctic?" Maron asked suddenly, his tactical mind honing in on Eleanor's earlier mention. "You said Fort Scorpio was in the Blue Ridge Mountains, but referenced something in Antarctica."

  Eleanor's expression tightened almost imperceptibly. "There are multiple facilities. The Antarctic installation houses..." She stopped, her mouth continuing to move but no sound emerging. Behind her, Shalke's pen moved more rapidly across the pages of its enormous tome.

  "There is something inside me that won't allow me to reveal it," she acknowledged after several attempts.

  Eleanor continued sharing what elements of her past she could while Shalke maintained its silent vigil behind her. She described the extensive archives they'd accumulated—photographs of impossible archaeological sites later destroyed or buried by orders of various governments connected to the greater religious sphere, frequencies recorded from objects that communicated across dimensional boundaries, mathematical formulas that seemed to predict cosmic events with unsettling accuracy.

  "My most significant personal discovery," she revealed, leaning forward slightly, "was the connection between lunar cycles and human consciousness. We documented measurable changes in collective awareness during specific lunar phases, particularly during celestial alignments that occur only once every few centuries."

  "That's why you're the Moon Sovereign," Eli observed.

  Eleanor nodded. "Though I didn't understand the significance then. I merely recognized patterns—how certain researchers became more intuitive during specific lunar phases, how contained entities responded differently depending on the moon's position, how my own insights seemed to flow more readily during the full moon."

  She gestured toward the window, where moonlight silhouetted the pine trees surrounding Maron's compound. "The moon isn't merely a satellite—it's a fundamental component in Earth's consciousness ecosystem. It regulates more than ocean tides; it influences the rhythms of the mind." Her voice dropped to almost a whisper. "And it isn't natural."

  "What are you talkin’ about?" Maron asked, leaning forward.

  "Our research conclusively proved what some have theorized for decades—the moon did not form naturally from Earth as conventional science claims. It was deliberately positioned there by the Anunnaki as a kind of satellite spaceship." Eleanor's eyes took on a distant quality. "It's hollow, with specific internal chambers housing numerous entities working under Anunnaki direction. They use it as a monitoring station, a consciousness influencer, and sometimes as a—" She stopped abruptly, her mouth making no sound. Behind her, Shalke's pen moved frantically across its pages.

  Eleanor cleared her throat, composure returning. "I apologize. I am limited again."

  "You developed technology based on these principles?" Solaris guessed, redirecting the conversation.

  "Yes," Eleanor confirmed, her expression suddenly guarded. "Devices designed to enhance or suppress these natural cycles." She attempted to continue but found herself unable to speak further on the topic. Behind her, Shalke's writing accelerated noticeably.

  "So many secrets," Eli observed quietly. "It must be a tremendous burden."

  "Knowledge always is," Eleanor replied, a lifetime of responsibility evident in her voice. "Especially knowledge that contradicts everything humanity believes about their own capabilities and their own history."

  As the conversation continued, Eleanor shared insights about the connection between cosmic cycles and human development—how civilizations seemed to follow predictable patterns of growth, innovation, and decline, and how these patterns correlated with astronomical movements on scales most historians never considered.

  "The precession of the equinoxes takes approximately 26,000 years to complete a full cycle," she explained. "During this period, the solar system completes its rotation around the galaxy, creating different 'cosmic ages' often referenced in ancient texts. You may have heard of the Yuga Cycles. We are leaving the Kali Yuga right now. And the Convergence might be just what is needed to finally enter the next stage. What modern science dismisses as primitive astronomy and astrology actually represents sophisticated understanding of these cycles and their effects on consciousness."

  "And your research proved these connections?" Maron asked, his practical mind seeking evidence rather than theory.

  "Beyond reasonable doubt," Eleanor confirmed. "We documented correlations between archaeological anomalies and stellar alignments, between unexplained technological artifacts and specific points in the precessional cycle. The pattern was unmistakable once we had sufficient data."

  The fire burned lower as their conversation continued into the night. Eleanor described classified expeditions to remote archaeological sites—places where conventional historians refused to acknowledge evidence contradicting established timelines.

  "There are ruins beneath the Antarctic ice that would rewrite history books," she revealed. "Structures showing advanced architectural principles, preserved by the cold and ice. We recovered artifacts demonstrating metallurgical techniques supposedly impossible for that time period—perfect alloys created with precision that would challenge modern foundries. And don’t get me started on the hoax of the current energy crisis. Energy is everywhere! Free energy was once a staple for thousands of years before it was purposefully occulted." Eleanor blinked a few times. "Many know, but knowledge is compartmentalized, controlled, and distributed on a need-to-know basis. People are assassinated, drugged, or hidden before they could ever expose the truth. Archaeologists find anomalous evidence and report it to superiors. Superiors send it to specialized departments. These departments deliver sanitized conclusions that maintain conventional narratives while the actual artifacts disappear into facilities like Fort Scorpio, the Vatican Archives, museums, the list goes on."

  "Keeping humanity in the dark, like usual." Eli observed.

  "Maintaining system stability," Eleanor countered, though her tone suggested personal conflict about this justification. "At least, that was always the rationale. A dirty, twisted rationale. The truth is more complex—a mixture of concerns about social disruption, institutional inertia, and deliberate suppression by those who benefit from limited human awareness."

  As they contemplated these revelations, their thoughtful silence was suddenly shattered by an insistent beeping from the security console near the kitchen. Maron rose immediately, moving with practiced efficiency to check the monitors. Shalke automatically disappeared, returning to Eleanor's shadow.

  "Proximity alert," he announced, tension evident in his voice. "Eastern perimeter."

  The beeping intensified as he studied the display, his expression shifting from concern to alarm. "Multiple signatures at the main gate."

  Everyone gathered around the security monitors. The footage showed three young figures—two supporting a third between them. Their clothing was torn and bloodstained, faces etched with exhaustion and fear.

  "The Tokyo trio," Eleanor identified immediately.

  But Maron's attention had locked onto something else in the background of the video feed—a fourth figure, unnaturally tall and moving with an unpredictable rhythm, pursuing the three young people. As the camera angle shifted, they could clearly see one of the Japanese youths—a young man with disciplined posture, who had been supported between the other two despite his obvious fatigue—wielding what appeared to be a longsword made of crimson fire, now desperately fighting to keep the tall pursuer at bay.

  "What the hell is that?" Maron demanded, his entire body tensing as he immediately began checking his weapons.

  On screen, a young woman with distinctive artistic clothing stumbled forward, landing on the ground, her eyes wide with terror as she shouted in broken English: "Help! Please help! Anyone! Sentinel follow us!"

  Behind her, the third member of their group—another young woman with a rather androgynous appearance—clung to her companion on the ground, visibly shaking with fear.

  The young man with the fire sword shouted something in Japanese, 'Kibou wo suteru na,' before switching to halting English: "If anyone is there! Please!"

  Maron's face hardened into a mask of controlled fury. "Sentinels on my property," he growled, already moving toward the weapons cabinet. "Not happening."

  Solaris stood perfectly still for a heartbeat, his eyes meeting Eli's in silent communication. When he turned to Maron, his expression carried a cold anger unlike anything they'd seen from him recently.

  "Maron," he said with unsettling calm, "forgive me."

  Before Maron could respond, black sclera flooded Solaris's eyes as his shadow jacket materialized around his torso. The air around him seemed to bend inward.

  "Solaris, wait—" Maron started, but his words met empty air.

  Solaris had vanished. Eli followed an instant later, golden light briefly illuminating her form before she too disappeared.

  "DAMN IT!" Maron shouted, slamming his fist against the wall. "WAIT FOR BACKUP!"

  Maron turned to Eleanor, his movements precise despite his obvious anger. "Stay here. Kira, watch her." He grabbed a tactical rifle from the cabinet, checking it with practiced efficiency. "Lock everything down after I leave."

  Kira materialized more fully, her translucent form gaining substance as she nodded her agreement.

  "Be careful," Eleanor warned. "Sentinels are specifically designed to counter their Sovereign counterparts. This one will be exceptionally dangerous."

  "So am I," Maron replied grimly, already heading for the door.

  Outside, Maron sprinted toward his ATV, cursing under his breath. "Goddamn amateurs," he muttered, starting the vehicle with a savage twist of the key.

  The ATV's electric motor engaged with a high-pitched whine as he accelerated toward the eastern perimeter, tactical training superseding his anger as he calculated response scenarios. His compound, his responsibility—and now both an active threat and three wounded Sovereigns converging at his gate.

  The night had suddenly transformed from occulted disclosure to deadly confrontation. The Sentinels had found them—which meant the gap between theory and survival had just collapsed to zero.

  Maron gunned the ATV's engine, racing into darkness toward the eastern perimeter where fire clashed against shadow, and the Convergence faced its first direct challenge on his territory. And absolutely nobody messed with Maron Black's territory.