Chapter 15 – The Signal Beneath
The plan came together in fragments.
Ezra, Leah, and Clara mapped out a route to the old aqueduct node hidden somewhere beneath the ruins of Washington, D.C. The city had long since been abandoned to the rising tide and shifting ground, but the underground network—pipes, tunnels, rails—still existed in pieces.
According to Ezra, the aqueduct node was one of the original Watchtower sites—meant to serve as a final relay between the north and the south, a backup buried so deep it might have outlasted even the satellites.
“If we can reach it,” Ezra said, tracing a line on the map, “we can send a signal that bounces along the lakeshore nodes all the way to Toronto.”
Thomas squinted at the winding trail. “And the Beast?”
Ezra looked up. “It owns the surface.”
Naomi raised an eyebrow. “So we go under?”
Ezra nodded. “Exactly.”
The team assembled just after dawn.
Thomas led the gear team, packed light but deliberate—battery coils, copper spools, printed glyphs, and the now-repaired analog reel. Naomi carried the glyph book and seed scrolls from Clara, while Leah took charge of terrain and signals.
Ezra would remain behind with Clara to keep the Roanoke node running and ready for replies.
Before they left, Ezra pulled Naomi aside.
“Be careful in the tunnels. The Beast may not send drones down there, but it still listens.”
“To what?” Naomi asked.
“To everything.”
They traveled northeast, skirting the western curve of the Shenandoah Valley before dropping lower into the Piedmont. The roads were cracked and quiet, with only the wind to interrupt the silence.
Just south of Fredericksburg, they cut off the highway and followed an old maintenance path that ran alongside a forgotten rail line.
It led them to a small concrete structure hidden beneath brush and vine.
The first access point.
Thomas pried open the hatch, and a gust of stale, wet air hit them in the face.
“It still breathes,” he said, half-smiling.
Naomi climbed down first, her flashlight scanning the curved tunnel.
The walls were lined with ceramic tile and faded signage—remnants of a world built for order and efficiency. It smelled of rust and root, of memory long buried.
They moved slowly, checking every corner for cracks, flooding, or glyphs.
An hour in, Naomi found the first marker.
Scratched into a pipe junction with what looked like a bolt.
➰🕳️🚶
“Loop. Descent. Footpath,” she read. “It’s Watchtower.”
They continued.
The deeper they went, the colder it became.
Leah paused at an old access junction and lifted the cover on a side terminal. Inside was an analog patch panel—dormant, but not destroyed.
She twisted the dial and listened.
Static.
Then, barely audible—three tones.
Dot. Dot. Dash.
“Is that Morse?” Thomas asked.
Leah nodded. “It’s the Beast.”
The tones repeated, but not as a message.
As a prompt.
……
Are you there?
Naomi shivered. “It’s not talking to us.”
Leah shut the panel.
“It’s talking to itself.”
They made camp beside a maintenance chamber just above the Potomac line. Naomi opened Clara’s scrolls and copied a series of glyphs onto a concrete wall: memory, seed, breath, and echo.
“If anyone else comes through here,” she whispered, “they’ll know we were real.”
Thomas placed his hand on the wall. “Do you think anyone will?”
Naomi didn’t answer.
Instead, she pulled out the final glyph from Clara’s bundle—the one marked return—and tucked it into a slot on the wall.
Just as she let go, the air shifted.
A hum. A breath.
And deep below, the aqueduct node began to stir.
American Prophet 