Lieutenant Junior Grade T’Luni woke up to the darkness of the guest quarters and the sound of her fellow teammates still sleeping peacefully. She stood from her palette and donned her uniform with typical Vulcan efficiency. Carefully and quietly, she set about packing her backpack for the day’s excursion, making sure to bring an extra canteen and a few extra ration bars. She neatly packed away her bedroll and took another ration bar from the crate, eating it unceremoniously while standing, and chasing it with a cup of Vulcan Spiced Tea.

She gathered her pack and stepped out from their quarters into the cool dark air, briefly admiring the luminescent paintings that covered the walls and ceiling again, as it was still before the day cycle had begun. Her walk down towards her rendezvous point was quiet. Only occasionally did she see another person, and anyone she did encounter was busying themselves with preparations for their own days. They smiled and waved, which she returned, but none of them were keen to chat, which she did not mind.

As planned, Seru’nai met her on the floor of the cavern, at another ornately carved arch of polished black stone that marked the doorway to the tunnels that went beyond their settlement. They were holding a lantern at the end of a long, hooked staff. The lantern appeared to be made of some kind of animal hide or other natural fiber, stretched tightly over a wooden frame. It created a translucent barrier that filtered the light and dispersed it, which increased the light’s area of effectiveness without dimming it too severely. Inside this frame was a handful of the glowing amber that was mounted on the walls of the Great Hall.

“Greetings, T’Luni,” Seru’nai said, closing their eyes and bowing their head slightly. “Are you ready?”

“I am,” T’Luni replied. “I have made sure to bring enough nourishment and provisions to remain in the tunnels for an extended period of time.”

“Good,” Seru’nai replied. “Then let us begin.”

They held the lantern out into the mouth of the tunnel, illuminating the first several yards. T’Luni went first, a flashlight in one hand and her tricorder in the other, and Seru’nai went after, holding the lantern aloft over T’Luni’s head and explaining the history as it was shown in the reliefs. These tunnels seemed to lack the overhead lighting of the rest, meaning the lantern and the flashlight would be the only illumination they had.

“It is curious that there are none of the light shafts here,” T’Luni noted as they walked.

“These tunnels will eventually bring you to the Stone,” Seru’nai said from behind her. “When one of the young is ready to become an adult, they walk these paths alone, and in the dark.”

“Fascinating,” T’Luni remarked. “How do the adolescents not become lost?”

“They must have faith that the Stone will show them the way,” Seru’nai answered.

The tunnel narrowed as they went deeper. The quiet rhythm of T’Luni’s boots echoed off the ancient walls as they went, the soft amber light of Seru’nai’s lantern casting deep shadows into the carved reliefs. The air grew colder with every step, and there was a mineral tang in the air that hinted at water somewhere far below.

T’Luni paused for a moment before a panel depicting figures beneath an open sky. The figures were humanoid, and their appearance gave her the impression that they might have been Palrillean ancestors. The relief showed their arms stretched towards the sky, where three triangular silhouettes hung above them like knives.

“Your ancestors used to live on the surface,” she said, more as a statement than a question.

Seru’nai inclined their head. The soft glow along their temples pulsed faintly. “It is said so, in the time before memory. Long ago, before the Elders of our Elders. The sky was unkind to us then.”

T’Luni folded her hands behind her back. “Unkind?”

“The sky brought the Hunters to us,” Seru’nai said, touching the triangular shapes with a reverent dread. “Many perished. Many more were taken.”

They walked on, about another fifty meters, before they came to a tunnel that was so dark, it seemed to swallow the light from both the lantern and the flashlight.

“We should not go that way, T’Luni,” Seru’nai said. Her voice was low.

T’Luni stopped beside her, arching her eyebrow. “May I ask why?”

The look on Seru’nai’s face answered the question.

“You fear this tunnel,” T’Luni said.

Seru’nai shook her head. “No, but I do not remember it, and I have been down here many times. I know not where it goes, or what lies at the end.”

“Do not worry,” T’Luni replied. “My scans show no life forms in this direction. I also have a phaser, and I am proficient in its use. You will come to no harm.”

Seru’nai looked apprehensive, but did not object further when T’Luni turned her flashlight down the tunnel, and then followed the beam deeper. The tunnel was damp and narrow, very different from anything else they had encountered so far. The light did not travel as deep into the darkness, and T’Luni was struck with the feeling that the tunnel was being created as they moved further into it, bringing them to a location that would otherwise be hidden.

They rounded a final corner, and the passage opened into a large, dark cavern. Seru’nai’s lantern light revealed a seemingly impossible sight. A massive ship, its hull an elegant sweep of silver-black alloy, its surface pitted with age but intact. T’Luni scanned it with her tricorder, but the result came back negative.

This ship matches no known configurations in the Starfleet database.

T’Luni felt her pulse quicken despite herself. She stepped forward with caution, like an archaeologist approaching a tomb. “Remarkable,” she whispered.

But Seru’nai’s voice cracked like glass. “No… No, no, this cannot be.”

Her luminescent marking flared with light, betraying a deep, instinctual fear.

T’Luni approached the ship slowly. Symbols were etched into the side; thin, angular lines that intersected at sharp points. She found an open hatch and shone her light inside, but what she saw when she stepped up into the interior of the craft was horrifying.

Pods and alcoves designed for sleeping and work, now long abandoned. But, within them, were the remains of humanoid creatures, which T’Luni presumed were the original inhabitants of the ship. Their bodies were not decayed, but mummified, twisted perversely in death. She scanned the bodies with her tricorder, noting her findings aloud.

“The inhabitants of this ship appear to have died of a combination of malnutrition and dehydration,” she said, walking slowly around the room and scanning every corpse. She bent down and turned one of the bodies so that it faced her. The face had no eyes, and in their place were deep black holes. She stood up from the body and took a reflexive step back.

“Are these the Hunters you spoke about?” She asked Seru’nai, who had stood, still with fear, just inside the ship’s door.

Seru’nai nodded in the affirmative. “It is said in the histories that the Hunters take the eyes of those they take so they could never again see the stars.”

“I do not wish to cause undue alarm,” T’Luni said, “But we must return to the village immediately. I need to inform my Commander of this.”

“I would not be sorry to never lay my eyes upon this again,” Seru’nai answered, already turning to leave.

As T’Luni turned and left the ship, she wondered to herself: If these were the slaves, what became of the masters?