The Girl Who Found the Sun

by Matthew S. Cox

  However… turbines. She’d wanted to see them in person for years.

  Going to topside might kill me, but… staying down here could kill me, too. Dad survived. If no one fixes that windmill, we’re all going to die anyway.

  “But… it’s forbidden,” said Raven, amazingly not sounding worried.

  “That’s true. I’ve already explained the situation to Noah. He’s given permission for someone to go check on the turbines and come right back.” Ben rested both hands on her shoulders. “We’re not asking you to take crazy risks. If your mask isn’t enough, if anything feels wrong, turn around and come right back inside. This isn’t an emergency… yet.”

  She looked down. People before the Great Death didn’t think it was an emergency when the insects started dying off.

  “Okay, sure. No problem.” said Raven. “I’ll do it.”

  Lark coughed. “What? Are you serious?”

  Ben’s hesitant air gave way to relief. “I wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t important. Again, don’t do anything risky.”

  “Going outside is already risky,” said Lark, almost shouting. “Are you serious? We haven’t had hazard suits since the Saints. And she’s basically a baby.”

  Raven winced internally. Over a century ago—no one remembered exactly when—a group of eight techs suited up and went topside to fix a major failure of the power turbines. Exactly what happened up there remained a mystery beyond two known facts: the team got the turbines working again, and they never came back inside. Legend grew over the years, and the eight men and women who gave their lives to keep the power on had become known as the Saints. The more superstitious among the residents sometimes claimed their ghosts watched over the Arc to this day.

  “Did you ask me because of my father, or did everyone else really refuse to go?”

  Ben laughed. “Yeah… they think they’ll disintegrate as soon as fresh air hits them.”

  “There’s no such thing as fresh air.” Lark grabbed Raven like she tried to hold her back from getting into a brawl. “Don’t do it!”

  She squirmed around to look at the woman. “My dad went out and back multiple times and never melted. Noah wouldn’t give permission if he didn’t think it reasonable to do. And… I’m pretty sure we’re already getting some exposure to outside air in here.”

  “What?” Lark gawked at her.

  “How do you figure that?” Ben furrowed his brow.

  Raven pointed at the access panel leading to the wire conduit. “Water at the L-bend. It had to be from rain since it’s not building up. That means the break is near the surface. If rainwater got in, outside air is getting in.”

  “Oh, shit.” Lark shivered. “If she’s right, we have to fix that!”

  Ben held a hand up at her. “Hang on. This is just her theory. When you’re out there, if it’s not too crazy, check on the seal, too?”

  She shivered, dread and excitement in equal measure thrumming along her veins. “Will do. When do you want me to do this?”

  “Was hoping for as soon as possible.”

  “Like, now?” She blinked.

  “Basically.” He cringe-smiled. “If you’re up for it.”

  This could be incredibly stupid, but I’ll never get this chance again. “All right. Let me go grab my mask.”

  Lark sank back into her seat, tears gathering in her eyes. “Don’t go. She’s still just a baby.”

  “I’ll be back in a little while. Please, trust me. I wouldn’t go if I didn’t think it was safe or possible.” Raven slung her satchel over her shoulder then patted herself down, checking she’d remembered all her tools. “Isn’t the security team going to freak out if I try to go outside? And, level one’s locked down. How am I supposed to get out there?”

  “They know we need to send a tech out and, I, uhh, already told them it would probably be you.” Ben chuckled. “Noah thought so, too. There’s another way out via an old elevator shaft. It’s not widely known. By the main security station down the hall from Noah’s office.”

  “The silver door.” She blinked. “That’s not a closet, is it?”

  “No…” Ben couldn’t hold eye contact with her. “Your father went out that way, too.”

  They think I’m just like Dad. Maybe I am. It could be stupid, but… She gazed up at the filthy concrete ceiling again. The Arc isn’t a shelter anymore. It’s a tomb.

  5

  Obligations

  Big problems always start off as small ones people think can wait until later. – Ellis Wilder.

  Raven walked to her room, forces in her mind pushing and pulling at her the whole way there. Eagerness to fulfill her longstanding wish to see topside, to touch the actual turbines, tried to make her run while worry held her back to a deliberate stride. Even though her father survived several visits to the surface, she couldn’t help but wonder if everyone else in the Arc being terrified of the outside world had merit. Their fears had to be founded in some truth. How could so many people all firmly believe something—and be wrong?

  Except for the kids, everyone knew her father. They had to be aware he’d been outside and didn’t drop dead right away, if they didn’t brush him off as delusional. Admittedly, she’d worried he might have been crazy, too, before her conversation with the doc. Preston absolutely would not have hesitated to suggest her father had imagined it if that’s what he truly thought of the situation. The man didn’t have any sort of social filter. It baffled her to consider her father’s apparent proof didn’t change any of their minds. Hell, Lark practically fainted at the idea of being asked to go outside.

  Grr. It doesn’t make sense that they’re all wrong, but I think they are.

  She hurried into her quarters, plucked her filter mask from a shelf, and put it on. The masks didn’t see a lot of use, which hopefully meant the membranes would protect her despite everything being centuries old. Stuff didn’t last forever, even if it sat on shelves most of the time. Her rational side warned that the filter masks all had to be useless, but wearing it reassured her like talking to the ghosts of the Saints reassured some people.

  Raven prepared herself the same way her father used to before his expeditions. After securing the mask, she put on protective goggles, then wrapped a long strip of cloth around her head and face for extra protection. Finally, gloves. Before she went outside, she’d pull the hood up, so only a little bit of skin between her eyes where the goggles didn’t cover would be exposed to the world.

  Her father spoke of traveling for several days sometimes, and he’d come back. The turbine field wasn’t that far away. She’d technically been there multiple times, but underground. Despite the danger of the toxic atmosphere, the idea of walking upright to the turbines instead of dragging herself down a narrow tunnel sounded far more appealing.

  Should I tell Tins before I go out? She snugged the gloves tighter purely to keep her hands occupied. Her daughter had been two the last time her father went outside and didn’t remember him at all. The girl’s reaction to her mother going outside could be anything from a complete terrified freak-out to a blasé ‘oh, okay.’ She chuckled to herself at the faces Tinsley made whenever someone told a scary story. For such a small kid, her daughter was fearless. Raven worried her reaction would be begging to go outside, too.

  Nah. Better to tell her after. She faced the door. I’m not really scared. If I was, I’d definitely talk to her before going out there.

  The primary entrance up on level one hadn’t been opened in centuries. As far as anyone knew, the giant door closed a long time ago behind the initial group of people to take shelter here and remained shut ever since. It didn’t help that the top level had been declared a forbidden zone. Permission to go outside didn’t include permission to go up there. Even if she did reach the primary entrance, it probably wouldn’t even work. According to the engineering plans, the giant door consisted of two armored slabs, each roughly ten tons. The electric motors responsible for moving them apart would surely be dead after sitting idle
so long. It did have a backup mechanical system involving counterweights, but using that would open it permanently. If she was wrong about the outside world, activating the mechanical failsafe would doom everyone in the Arc.

  Not knowing how her father could’ve possibly opened that door or gotten into level one had been one of the reasons she suspected he might have been delusional. But… Ben mentioned a secondary exit. That, though surprising, made her father’s adventures sound more plausible. The schematics she’d spent years studying didn’t show any other ways out of the Arc. What did he mean by ‘old elevator shaft’?

  Years ago, a few elevators in the central core ran between the six levels. None went to the surface, however. If some other elevator existed off the plans, it, too, probably no longer worked. That meant she’d end up dealing with a 110-foot climb up a metal ladder, similar to going up inside the vertical portion of the wire conduit. Perhaps the Saints, long ago, had taken this way out. The stories weren’t too clear on the timing, but she had a fair degree of certainty that the Saints had gone topside before level one became off limits.

  Noah’s not going to let me go to the big door, and I can’t even open it.

  She exited her room and turned left, crossed the middle of the Arc, and walked all the way to the end of the administrative hall. The last door on the left before the one she mistook as a closet contained the headquarters of the security team, and the jail cells. They reminded her of the police she’d read about in several novels, except they didn’t have guns. Mostly, they broke up fights or investigated if someone accused another person of stealing. Supposedly, they’d even dealt with a murder or two or crimes like rape… though nothing that serious had happened in years.

  While that should have reassured her, it had the opposite effect. It suggested everyone knew, or at least suspected, the Arc was on its last legs. Humans tended to help each other when facing mutual danger. People had been nervous enough for at least the past ten years not to commit any serious crimes. Also, given that the entire population of the arc numbered 183 people, five of them under thirteen, everyone more or less knew everyone. It would be impossible to get away with anything. Maybe some people did have the inclination to cause trouble, but held back for fear they’d certainly get caught.

  As soon as she walked past their office heading for the door at the end, a handful of security officers rushed out into the hallway.

  “Hey,” called Jose, a fortyish guy who had a little premature grey in his otherwise black hair. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  She turned to face him, lifting her goggles off her eyes. “I’ve been sent to check on a turbine.”

  Tyrone, perhaps the beefiest, tallest man in the entire Arc, winced. Ann, a soft-spoken redhead, stared at her the way one might regard a little girl about to be thrown into a volcano as a sacrifice when powerless to save her.

  “Oh, Raven.” Jose grimaced, giving her a ‘better you than me’ look. “You sure about that, hon?”

  “Someone’s gotta do it and I don’t see anyone else lining up for the job.” She grinned, not that they could see it under her mask. “Seriously, though. It’s cool. It’s not as bad out there as everyone thinks.”

  The officers chuckled nervously.

  “How do you know that?” asked Ann.

  Hope, mostly. And I’m sure the wire conduit is full of outside air. No way the seals are intact after this long. And Dad. “Educated calculation.”

  “Don’t go making yourself into a saint,” said Jose.

  “Not planning on staying out there forever. Just long enough to fix the power. Turbine fourteen stopped generating. If it stays down too long, the others will overload and probably burn out. Someone needs to get it running again so we don’t run out of air.”

  The security team exchanged nods and murmurs of worry for her safety. Tyrone and another, older, guy everyone called French didn’t sound happy that she had permission to go outside, but couldn’t overrule Noah. Leaving them to their discussion, Raven re-seated her goggles and walked to the ‘closet’ at the end of the hallway. It didn’t look like the sort of door that belonged on an elevator, being a fairly standard steel one with a single knob. That confused her since Ben mentioned elevator, and the schematics showed nothing existing beyond the end of any of the primary hallways.

  She tried to open it, but found it locked.

  Jose walked up to her. “Key might help.”

  “You guys lock the elevator?”

  He smiled. “Elevator?”

  “This is supposed to be an elevator shaft.”

  “Oh. Yeah, umm. The elevator shaft is at the far end. This door leads to an emergency evacuation passage. We started keeping it secure after an incident.”

  Raven furrowed her brows. The Arc schematics did not show an emergency escape passage anywhere. Wouldn’t something like that be taught to every resident, so they knew what to do in the event of a disaster? Who in their right mind would want to keep it secret, much less locked?

  “Gonna close the door behind you, but not lock it.”

  “What incident?” asked Raven.

  “Ehh… about five years ago, some fool ran down there and went topside. Left the hatch open.” Jose bowed his head, shaking it as well. “Better ways to end it all than running out there, especially leaving the damn door open as a screw you to everyone else.”

  What if he got out there and didn’t die? She took a deep breath, fidgety with anticipation. It would feel like escaping a cage. The only reason he’d come back is for food… if there’s none out there.

  Breathable air sounded great, but it didn’t seem likely there would be anything to eat topside. Vegetables humans used for nutrition wouldn’t grow spontaneously. Disappointment that the man had most likely been nuts and ended up dead sent a sigh out her nostrils. She didn’t let that thought stop her, and stepped into the doorway.

  Light from the outer hall reached a short distance past her, illuminating a few yards of plain concrete hallway like every other corridor in the Arc. Jose leaned in the doorway and flipped a switch on the left, activating a series of LED bricks down the middle of the ceiling. Plain walls stretched so far into the distance she couldn’t see the end. The total lack of any branching passages or doors made this hallway stand out as beyond weird. One thin pipe running along the left ceiling corner probably carried electrical cabling.

  “Wow… it’s so long.” She looked back and forth from the hallway to Jose.

  He laughed. “Not the first time a girl’s said that to me.”

  Tyrone’s deep laughter resonated in the corridor behind him.

  Ann rolled her eyes.

  Raven ignored the remark. “This isn’t on the schematic. Why would an escape passage be kept secret?”

  “No idea. I don’t make those decisions,” replied Jose, his voice echoing into the empty corridor. “Go on then. I need to close this door to keep the bad stuff out. It shouldn’t be locked when you come back, but if whoever’s stuck watching this door has to run to the can, might be. Just wait a few minutes.”

  “Right… okay.” She waved at him and started the long walk.

  The none-too-soft thud of the door closing behind her didn’t really feel like she’d been kicked out. It didn’t exactly reassure her either. Anxiety prickled at the underside of her stomach, worsening with each step. Her father must have taken this corridor to the exit the last day he’d been in the Arc. Being here, alone, the only one brave enough to attempt going topside, made her feel as though she’d become her father.

  What was he thinking about when he left for the last time?

  Not far from the door, a steel plate on the left covered what appeared to be the opening of a maintenance crawlspace. She glanced back at the door, which Jose had already closed. Not being watched heightened her curiosity. Quiet as she could be, Raven tugged the plate back enough to peer past it. Sure enough, a four-foot-square crawlway led about fifteen feet in before cornering to the left, heading back toward the
Arc. She moved the plate aside, rested it against the wall, and scurried into the passage. Its primary purpose appeared to be a pathway for the power wires feeding the hallway lights, though dry standpipes for water and sewage also hung on the side wall.

  ‘Escape tunnel?’ More like incomplete expansion. No wonder it’s not on the schematics.

  Did that mean at some point in the past, the population of the Arc exceeded its capacity? They would have started off building that long corridor, then branched sideways to make rooms. But… what made them stop with only the hallway finished? Some long-ago disaster? Her throat dried out at the thought the population dropped drastically from several thousand to several hundred in a short period of time rather than the gradual loss she’d assumed occurred.

  Or, maybe an ambitious head administrator started building an expansion for predicted population growth that never happened. Whatever the reason for the supposed escape tunnel, it didn’t matter. Finding out the truth wouldn’t change the situation she and everyone else in the Arc faced now. She did, however, creep back along the maintenance conduit until she realized where she was. In the years since she started working as a tech, she’d crawled right past this opening multiple times but never bothered going down there since it looked empty.

  Hmm. Odd that they lock the hallway door but didn’t try to block this off.

  With a shrug, she turned around and hurried back to the corridor, taking a moment to replace the steel plate as she’d found it. Satisfied no one would notice she’d checked out a ‘secret passage,’ she continued.