by Drew Wagar
The message cut off again.
Meru, Coran, Mel and Fitch looked at each other in bewilderment.
‘This is Sandra Morino …’
Meru turned the other control and the woman’s voice faded down to a whisper.
‘What in shades was that all about?’ Fitch demanded.
‘The voice of one of our ancestors,’ Coran said in hushed tones. ‘Somehow captured and spoken back to us … Mel, any idea what she is saying?’
Mel shrugged. ‘I don’t understand it. The words are meaningless until she talks of Lacaille darkening, flares, the code of course, then the warning. She was afraid everything would be scorched somehow, it looks like it was …’
‘Those people we found in the cave,’ Meru agreed, ‘But they were underground!’
‘Maybe not far enough,’ Coran said. ‘Lacaille went dark and then everything was scorched.’
‘This doesn’t make sense,’ Meru said. ‘If such a thing happened there would be some records of it, even now. This wasn’t a war. Lacaille has never gone dark. Shouldn’t she be warning us about the witches?’
‘She instructs whoever the message was for to take a warning to all the cities on the map,’ Mel pointed out. ‘Daine included, she had equal thought for all people.’
Coran straightened.
‘This message must be from a time before the war,’ he said. ‘Not our ancestors from the conflict that drove us out, but before then, a time even further back! Mel, make a note of that code, let’s open that door!’
Mel read the numbers out and Coran carefully punched them into the door lock. On the final number, a thick mechanical clunk sounded from somewhere inside the door.
Coran looked around, a grin of satisfaction on his face. The others waited expectantly.
He pulled down the lever, which now had some resistance to its movement. A further clunk echoed around the room. Coran heaved at the wheel which spun freely in his hands and then smoothly took up the load.
‘Amazing this still works after countless rounds,’ Meru whispered from behind him.
‘Our lost legacy,’ Coran replied. ‘We achieved greatness, yet it seems like it was all taken away.’
‘Lain secret all this time,’ Mel said, equally subdued. ‘Without the devices aboard the Mobilis we’d have never known how to open it.’
‘Without your hard work and study into how to their technology worked we’d never even have made it here,’ Coran replied. ‘You’re the one who made this possible, Mel.’
‘Meru figured it out.’
‘Just lucky,’ Meru answered.
Fitch shook his head. ‘Are you going to spend all stretch congratulating yourselves or get on with opening the snuttin’ door?’
The wheel stopped rotating and a series of heavy thumps echoed around them. The door retreated slightly into its frame. Coran took a step back.
The rumblings and grinding noises continued. One particularly loud clank made them all jump and step back again.
Air hissed out under pressure, a blast of mist and fog briefly obscuring the door. They retreated further. It subsided in moments and they watched as the door folded in, turning and reversing into an alcove designed for it in the wall.
A corridor led inwards. As they watched, lights flickered on the ceiling and illuminated a pathway inside.
Coran looked around at Mel, Meru and Fitch.
‘Let’s go.’
Meru looked about him as they slowly proceeded down the corridor. His first impression was that everything was made of metal, the walls, the ceiling, the lights, even the floor he was walking on. The floor wasn’t solid, but an elevated walkway made up of thousands of squares of metal all arranged in a grid. He could see through it down to the rock below … several dozen hands below. He forced himself look ahead, swallowing hard.
The walkway was wide enough for people to pass each other. Meru could hear their footsteps echoing around in the empty space through which they were passing. It seemed to have been hewn from the rocks. However it was done it was finished smooth, there were no rough edges to be seen.
And everything looks new!
He looked about him again. No tarnish, no rust, no signs of wear or tear. Nothing that indicated the place must have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of rounds old.
Like it was abandoned only yesterday …
Fortunately the elevated walkway didn’t last long. They arrived at another door, identical to the one they had just come through, just without the numbered buttons. Coran spun the wheel on the door and was rewarded with a similar procedure. The door opened and folded back before them.
This second doorway led into darkness. They all stepped through, but the only illumination came from their own lightglasses and the glow from the passageway behind. Coran took a step forward. The floor under their feet was solid once more.
They heard his footsteps echo three or four times before fading away.
‘Some sort of cavern?’ Mel whispered.
‘Looks that way,’ Coran replied. ‘Fitch, you got one of your flares handy?’
Fitch unslung the bag he was carrying and rummaged inside, drawing out a thin wooden tube. With a couple of strikes of a sharpstone he lit the end and handed it to Coran. Meru watched as Coran threw it forward as hard as he could.
The flare arced through the air and then hit the ground perhaps two hundred hands ahead of them, sparking erratically before bursting; bright red light splashing out in all directions.
Meru stepped back, his heart hammering in his chest, unable to immediately assimilate what he was seeing.
The cavern was vast, the flare illuminating less than half of it. The ceiling had to be over five hundred hands above them, a huge domed construction supported by girders that dwarfed even the ones used to build the bridge they had seen in Dynesia. They had entered at one side, the other was too far away to be seen.
Ahead of them a series of walkways led to some central enclosure, made of glass panels surrounding what looked to be desks arranged in concentric circles around a large circular table. Around this space were … machines. Some were wheeled vehicles that looked fairly mundane, others sported vast claws and implements for digging or drilling. All were parked neatly, facing inwards, clean and spotless as if arranged as exhibits in a museum.
Meru looked up and staggered as he took in the bulk of a strangely designed machine just to his right. It towered over him, standing on three sets of small wheels on long struts. It had a bulbous nose and a pair of chairs could clearly be seen through large windows, the interior festooned with switches and controls. Its shape was stretched out halfway along its length into two wings, upswept as if poised for a downstroke. Above those was a pair of blades, held aloft by a narrow spar, wider still, sagging slightly under their own weight. It cast a flickering predatory shadow on the wall behind.
A flying machine, it has to be!
The flare guttered and died, leaving them in abrupt and impenetrable darkness once again. Meru resisted the urge to crouch in fear. Knowing those things were out there, yet being unable to see them …
Coran cranked his lightglass brighter and began moving forwards carefully.
He’d taken only a few steps when a reverberating hum rose about them. Coran stopped. Mel and Fitch backed away, moving towards the entrance. Meru joined them.
‘Coran!’ Meru called. ‘Come back! We shouldn’t be here!’
There was a flicker, the rising hum faded out … and then light burst out all around them.
Meru flinched in the glare, it was astonishingly bright. For a moment he couldn’t see anything and flailed around, catching hold of Mel, who was equally bewildered. He clamped his eyes firmly closed, the brightness painful, coloured patches swirling around in his vision. He felt Mel hold him close, felt the tremblings running through her body. Both of them staggered backwards until they fetched up against the interior wall of the cavern.
Meru shielded his eyes with his arm, squinting into the glar
e, trying to see what had happened.
Huge blazing orbs were pouring light into the cavern. As his eyes adjusted, Meru could see they hung from an enormous chandelier, suspended above the cavern, festooned with more lights than he could count. Rings of further illumination poured in from the sides of the cavern. There were even glows from the flooring, marking out bays and walkways in pools of red and blue.
Each machine was now lit by its own series of lights. Meru lowered his arm, still squinting, but able to see clearly now.
‘All right?’ he asked, looking at Mel and letting her go.
‘Yes … I think so.’
Both of them looked around in wonder.
The true size of the cavern could now be distinguished. It was the inside of a dome, a vast space about them, with the massive chandelier hanging above the centre point, suspended from the apex. Squinting into the light, Meru could see that set upon set of lights were arranged upon it, casting their illumination down on the contents of the space, each was far bigger than the lights on the Mobilis. Dozens of vehicles and different types of machinery were arranged around the perimeter, all tidily set in marked bays. Ahead of them part of the cavern was marked with what looked like huge doors. They were enormous, big enough to allow the vehicles to exit.
Meru turned to look at what he took to be a flying machine. It looked less intimidating now, its form softened by the bright white lights above. He reached out a hand to it, feeling cold metal under his fingers. It was painted white and close inspection showed the marks of tiny indentations in the surface where panels had been put together. It was impossibly neat. The windows were curved. He shook his head in bafflement.
Curved panes of glass? How can that be done?
He peered inside, seeing the two seats he’d seen before, some kind of mechanism jutted up just in front of the seats, with a panel containing switches not to dissimilar to those aboard the Mobilis, it was clear that their makers shared much in common.
Meru ran his fingers over the outside hull.
But it’s like new! Not a hint of decay, rust or use. It’s like they were last used yesterday and the owners might come back any moment …
He turned around at that thought, looking about him, but there was no movement other than his companions.
‘Over here!’ Coran yelled.
Coran and Fitch had walked to the centre of the hangar, where the glass partitions rose for several levels above the ground. Meru and Mel followed them across. A huge central table dominated the ground floor. It too was clean and dust free, unblemished and unmarked, it’s surface a deep glassy black. There were chairs set around the edge, made of some strange material. It wasn’t metal, but neither was it wood. Meru touched one, feeling a hard but pliable surface.
He looked at Coran.
‘What is this place?’
A wide flight of stairs led upwards. Coran led the way, finding a series of desks on the level immediately above. Meru was right behind him when he stepped back …
‘Shards!’
Meru peered around him to see what had caused the captain to exclaim out loud, his eyes widening in alarm.
Someone was slumped over one of the desks. For a moment Meru thought they were just asleep, but as the moment passed he realised it was a body.
Cautiously they approached. The body lay across a desk that looked very similar to the device they had listened to aboard the Mobilis. It was wearing what must have been a uniform of some type, perhaps white once, but yellowed and browned with age. Its arm was outstretched across the controls, skeletal but not a skeleton. Long blonde hair was matted and twisted. The remains of a woman from a time long past.
The body was desiccated, dried to a husk, preserved for time unknown in the position she had died.
‘Sandra Morino I presume,’ Coran whispered. ‘She must have stayed behind to warn folks and then …’
‘Died here alone,’ Mel said. ‘No one came to save her.’
‘I wonder who she really was,’ Meru said. ‘Did the others survive elsewhere?’
‘No matter to us now,’ Fitch said. ‘We should figure out …’
‘If she died alone and unmarked then, we could do worse than mark her passing now,’ Coran said, interrupting him. ‘She could be the distant ancestor of any of us, we might never know.’
Fitch muttered something, but didn’t otherwise complain. Meru saw Mel glance gratefully at Coran.
The captain straightened, taking a look around the hangar from the elevated position before looking back at the woman’s body.
‘We commend our sister Sandra to the after,’ Coran began. ‘We never knew her, but we know she sacrificed her life in the performance of her duty, trying to warn others of a disaster about to strike. In her memory we will learn everything we can about this place and do our utmost to honour her achievements and those of our ancestors.’
Meru, Mel and even Fitch acknowledged his words in the customary way. ‘May your light never dim.’
Mel had returned to the Mobilis to retrieve a length of linen. On her return and with some difficulty, Sandra Morino’s body was gently taken from its position, respectfully wrapped and placed carefully to one side. They would take it outside later and commit her to the soil as Amaran custom dictated.
With that sombre duty done the crew returned to the lower level and stopped for food and water, looking at each other without speaking, trying to take in everything. The meal passed in silence before Meru saw Mel get to her feet with a frown.
She was looking at the table carefully. ‘This is the same material we found in the caves on the Scattered Isles,’ she said. ‘Those were all cracked and broken, but this …’
She cautiously touched her fingers against the surface.
As she did so a brief tone sounded. Mel snatched her hand back in surprise as a picture formed on the table near where she had placed her fingers. A picture of a hand; glowing green.
A voice spoke, apparently coming from within the table. It was male, with a soft, smooth, but somehow metallic sounding cadence. The same voice they had heard outside the doorways.
‘Identify for palm print identification please.’
Mel looked up at the others as they gathered around her. Coran shrugged and gestured with his hand.
Mel swallowed and placed her hand palm down on the image.
The image glowed around her fingers, pulsing for a moment before the voice returned.
‘I’m sorry, your file is not on record. Do you have an access code?’
Meru saw series of numbers set in circles appear next to the image of Mel’s hand.
‘Use the code from the door,’ Meru said. Mel touched each number in turn.
‘Emergency code verified,’ the voice said. As it did so dozens of images flashed across the table. The crew of the Mobilis looked around them in astonishment. Some images appeared to be pictures of landscapes, others showed charts measuring who knew what, still more had long columns of text, others numbers, gauges and measures.
All moving! Moving pictures? How is this done …?
‘Last access at this terminal was by Sandra Morino,’ the voice said. ‘Round three four one, pass six, chime four, spell two. Current time is round two three zero five, pass three, chime seven, spell one. Please state your name, rank and designation.’
Mel looked around at the others, her face ashen.
‘Round three four one?’ she echoed, her voice shaking. ‘But that’s …’
Meru had already done the maths in his head. ‘Nearly two thousand rounds ago!’
‘One nine six four rounds have passed since last access,’ the voice added. ‘Please state, your name, rank and designation.’
‘My name is Mel,’ Mel said. ‘I’m the engineer on board the Mobilis, I don’t have a designation …’
‘Please wait, adjusting language gradation.’ There was a brief pause. ‘Gradation complete,’ the voice continued. ‘Welcome, Mel. I detect three other personnel in the vicinity Please
state your names, ranks and designations, if available.’
Coran was about to speak when Fitch interrupted him. ‘You think we should be telling this … whatever it is … our names? We don’t know what it is, or what it can do!’
‘Telling it our names won’t hurt,’ Coran replied. ‘But you have a point …’
He raised his hands and spoke into the air. ‘My name is Coran, Captain of the Mobilis. Who are you?’
‘Welcome Coran. I am a fifth generation computational atmospheric and environmental service facility. I am known colloquially as “Caesar”.’
Meru mouthed the words back to himself, but like most of what they’d heard in the last stretch the words were meaningless.
‘You did ask,’ he said to Coran.
‘What are you?’ Coran asked.
‘I am an automated diagnostic, forensic, reference simulation and decision making aid, providing terraforming support to the colonists of Esurio.’
Coran blinked and looked around at his crew. Fitch laughed.
‘Obviously,’ Mel said, with a faint grin.
‘Colonists?’ Meru asked.
‘Two more identities are required,’ Caesar said. Meru fancied the voice sounded slightly impatient.
‘Meru, timekeeper on the Mobilis,’ he said.
Fitch looked as if he weren’t going to answer until Coran gave him a stern look.
‘Fitch, master at arms, Mobilis,’ Fitch said gruffly.
‘Identities have been recorded and stored,’ Caesar said. ‘You have been granted read-only access to monitoring systems. Would you like a status report?’
Coran nodded. ‘Yes Caesar, give us a … status report.’
The images on the table top slowly faded into the darkness.
‘I apologise that many sensor feeds are unavailable at this time. Uplinks are currently not responding. Diagnosis is underway, please standby.’
A spinning circle appeared before them, slowly changing colour from red to green. It pulsed briefly before a long set of text appeared.
Facility status summary: Poor.
Power: Poor. 23% of Magnetic Induction Panels remain operative.
Comms links: Failed. Not responding, no data.
