Eighth Fire

by Curtis, Gene

  “They’re attacking the machine. I can’t see anything; they’re blocking the camera. I’ll try backing out.”

  “Just leave it there until they give up on it. I’m pretty sure they can’t hurt it.”

  “Sounds like a plan. I’m going to see if I can see them.”

  “Be careful. If they start for you, head for the water.”

  Mark moved to the opening of the pseudo-scorpion room and held the lantern high. “I see them. They’re all over it and I sense they’re extremely mad.”

  “Mad as hornets you say… Sorry, I couldn’t resist that. It shouldn’t take much longer before they clear.”

  “I don’t know. They’ve formed into a ball and are buzzing like crazy.” He took his binoculars out. “I’m seeing smoke… Okay. They’re starting to clear–

  An intense burning pain began to spread up his left forearm. He dropped the binoculars and the lantern. “AWH! I’ve been stung!”

  “Get to the water! Quick! The others are coming after you! They always swarm where one of them stings a threat.”

  “I dropped the light. It’s broken. I can’t see.”

  “I don’t think it’s broken; they’re almost indestructible. Anyway, try following the wall back.”

  He knew the time it would take to find the lamp might be all the time the rest of the hornets needed to get to him. He groped for the wall, found it and started moving back toward the water, back toward the seesaw trap.

  “AWH!” Another hornet punched fire into his back.

  He picked up the pace and stumbled into the water before he realized he was there and fell in. He thought, Oh well, there goes another headset.

  He knew he had to stay under to keep the hornets from stinging his head but the walls under the surface were smooth, nothing to grab on to. He thought he’d get under Mr. Giancoli’s body. That should keep him under; only the body wasn’t there. Where’s the body? I couldn’t have sunk that quick...unless it disintegrated. Maybe it did sink.

  He started swimming down, feeling the wall as he went. After about ten feet the wall rounded away from him. He followed it around, back up and surfaced in another room.

  The walls, ceiling and floor glowed with a faint blue-green light and he didn’t know which was worse: the stench of this room or the throbbing blaze in his arm and back.

  For the moment he felt relatively safe from the hornets, but had no clue what danger the water or this room held. This room reeked like nothing he had ever smelled. It was almost enough to take his mind off the pain of the hornet stings.

  A voice layered with static came from the headset. “Mark… Mark, can you hear me?”

  “Just barely. I thought I broke this thing.”

  “We switched to a water proof model. Are you all right? Where are you?”

  “I was stung twice, but I’m okay. The pool of water goes under the wall and into another room. The walls, ceiling and floor are glowing.”

  “Ah… I don’t think that’s good. Start using your emergency respirator and stay put until I get back to you.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea either. Mr. Giancoli’s body is gone. I think the water is dangerous.” Mark pulled out the respirator which was nothing more than a plastic facemask designed to let you breathe just the gas from an oxy-cap without letting it mix with the outside air. He also pulled out a penlight.

  “Oh. I thought you knew. We were able to remove the body last night.

  “You must be using a small light. I’m getting a very weak video signal. What can you tell me about the stuff that’s glowing?”

  “It stinks. It’s not very bright.” He touched the end of the penlight to the floor. “And it’s gooey, like syrup.”

  “Can you describe the odor and the color?”

  “The color is a blue-green, more to the blue side I think, and I’ve never smelled anything like this before. I can’t describe it.”

  “Okay, the information I’m getting is there’s a possibility of radiation. Check the radiation exposure badge in your kit.”

  He pulled the badge out. “It’s not registering any exposure.”

  “Good. Have you got anything with you that you can use to collect a sample to bring with you when you come out? Something to keep it from getting contaminated.”

  He dumped the bandages from a zip-lock bag in the rescue kit. “Zip-lock bag okay?”

  “That should do it.”

  He chipped up a few gooey crystals, put them in the bag and headed back.

  The next morning Mrs. Shadowitz briefed Mark. “The analysis of the sample you brought out yesterday is rather interesting. The main mineral is chlorophane, which is heat luminescent. It will actually start to glow just from the heat of your hand.

  “The gooey stuff is a mineral slime formed by a reaction with a mild sulfuric acid. The acid is from the water in the pool and would only be a problem if one were exposed to it for a long time.

  “The danger is in the air. The air contains several sulfur and chlorine compounds as well as mercury. The Life Sciences Lab estimates you would lose consciousness in about ten minutes if you were breathing that air; definitely within fifteen minutes. Death would follow. No one could get to you in time.”

  Mark nodded, “Yes ma’am. I understand.”

  She handed a different kind of lantern toward Mark and rotated its head while she spoke. “There are several filters in this light that will help you explore this room.”

  He took the light, looked at it and put it into Aaron’s Grasp. “I didn’t see any openings in that room. It looked like a dead end.”

  “You didn’t see the opening under the water either.”

  “I see your point.”

  “Mr. Day told me the rest of the legend. A spirit being accompanied and instructed Xocotli in the construction of these traps. This spirit being just happens to have used the same name as an angel of some… notoriety. Raphael is known for understatement, and if that spirit being was in fact Raphael, you need to explore this room carefully. Some things may not be what they appear.”

  The water was still cold even though he was now wearing a suit designed to protect him from the water. He turned the lantern on, sat it down and hopped out of the water. He couldn’t stand on the slimy floor so he just sat there and used the lantern to look around.

  He said to the radio, “I see a small opening on the other side: about fifty yards away. Most of the floor looks like a pool of mercury and the rest of the floor is too slippery to stand on.”

  The voice in the headset said, “Try throwing something like a rock into the pool to see if it really is mercury. If it is mercury it shouldn’t sink but a fraction of an inch.”

  Mark looked around for rocks and didn’t see any. He removed the staff from Aaron’s Grasp and let the crooked end rest on the silver pool. It didn’t look like it sunk at all. “Is the camera picking that up?”

  The radio voice said, “That looks like mercury. You can probably push yourself across with the staff.”

  “How do I know this is the way I’m supposed to go?”

  “We can’t be sure, but it can’t hurt to check it out.”

  After several tries Mark was able to catch the lip of the pool with the staff and then pull himself over to it. He pushed himself out as far as he could and then tried to push off from the bottom of the pool. He couldn’t push the staff more than half its length into the mercury before it bobbed back up, but each try put him a few inches closer to the other side. It took two more oxy-caps before he reached his destination.

  “I’m at the opening. It looks like about ten feet in it is just about closed over with stalactites. I don’t know if I can make it through.”

  The radio voice said, “They look too thick to break by hand. If you have any rope, tie one end off there and go get your climbing hammer. The rope will make it easier to get back.”

  “I’m going to try and squeeze through first. There’s a spot right over there that might work.”

>   Mark stepped back, laid down and rolled on the floor covering his torso with the slippery goo. Back in the opening he was able to squirm through the largest opening.

  He stood, looked around in the large room. Stalactites merged with stalagmites forming large columns throughout the room. A half hour later he had found four openings. “Any suggestions?”

  “You’re probably going to need to explore them all. It’s best to do it systematically.”

  He started walking and said, “I’ll start with the one on the right of where I came in.”

  That opening was an ancient lava tube that came out on the back side of the hornet’s nest.

  “That was easy enough. At least I know I’m on the right track.”

  The next two openings were lava tubes as well, but dropped off steeply about a mile in. The last opening didn’t have a drop-off; it just kept going down at a moderate incline. After about three miles the radio began to fade and he didn’t have any more repeaters with him as he’d left the duffel bags just past the seesaw trap.

  “I think that’s enough for today. I’m coming out.”

  The next morning it took him more than an hour to transfer the contents of two duffel bags through the water into the next room. Aaron’s Grasp couldn’t hold more than a person could normally carry and this limited how much he could force beneath the surface. The meal packs were remarkably buoyant and the most difficult item to transfer to the next room.

  It took another hour to string a rope across the mercury pool and break one of the stalactite columns.

  Mark hung the two duffel bags on the pull cart Mr. Day had given him. Mr. Day said he and his wife played golf on occasion and he used it for pulling their golf bags around. It certainly made hauling two duffel bags around a lot easier.

  After several hours of walking, Mark stopped for lunch. He noticed a thin layer of dust on the floor. He bent, swiped his finger across it and noted the rock surface was much warmer than even the surfaces back in the glowing room. He looked at the dust on his finger, sniffed it and promptly sneezed.

  “I’m seeing dust on the floor. Is that normal?”

  The radio voice said, “It doesn’t make sense for it to be dusty. Cave surfaces are normally damp.”

  “These aren’t. They’re hot and dry.”

  After a brief moment the radio voice said, “The recommendations I’m getting here is that you should put on your mask. It could be anything from volcanic ash to mold spores. There’s no way to tell exactly what it is, but nothing it could be is good to breathe.”

  Mark put the mask on and backtracked a good way past any of sign dust. He ate and resumed following the tunnel. About fifteen minutes later he noticed it was getting harder to breathe.

  “Um…” He wheezed into the mike, “I can’t…” He forced in a breath, “breathe.” He sat on the floor and began rubbing his throat.

  The radio voice said, “Get the epinephrine from your kit…Wait, Mrs. Shadowitz says don’t take any chances, use the healing oil and a fresh oxy-cap.”

  He retrieved the small vial of healing oil from his pocket. After putting a fresh oxy-cap in his mouth he tinked out a drop of oil on his finger and rubbed it on his forehead. Immediately a deep, reassuring peace settled over him and he fell asleep.

  He knew he was dreaming. The man sat cross-legged a couple of feet away and Mark realized he must still be laying down when he looked up into his face. His beard was thicker than Tim’s but his smile was just as pleasant.

  Mark sat up and asked, “Who are you?”

  “I’m Raphael.” A staff that looked just like Mark’s appeared in his hands. “The third button from the bottom releases the sword.” He pushed the button, twisted the metal foot and pulled a thin, double-edged blade from the shaft. The metal handle folded down forming a guard.

  Mark recognized this sword; he had used it to escape Benrah’s forces in a dream he had before coming to The Seventh Mountain. He reached into Aaron’s Grasp for the staff but it wasn’t there.

  Raphael replaced the sword, folded the guard back and gave the foot a twist before handing the staff to Mark. “This sword will serve its purpose in your hand. Guard this secret well.”

  Raphael vanished.

  “Wait! What am I supposed to do with it?”

  Raphael didn’t return and there was no answer.

  It was just under an hour before Mark awoke. He reached into Aaron’s Grasp. It was still there. He took the headset off, laid it on the floor facing the camera toward the wall and removed the staff. He pushed the third button and pulled the sword out. It was just like the one in his dreams.

  He put the tip against the wall and pushed the blade in up to the guard. It took no effort. He sliced a funnel shape. The rock cone slid out and fell to the floor. He held the sword in front of his face and grinned. The sword he had believed to be just a dream fantasy was now in his hand. He replaced the sword and put the headset back on.

  “Mark… Mark, can you hear me? Mark…Mark.”

  “I’m okay. I can breathe now.”

  “You need to start heading back now. We need to check you over.”

  “No, really, I’m okay. I think I’m supposed to go on.”

  “You can continue tomorrow; there’s no need to push yourself.”

  “I’m not pushing myself; I feel great. I’ve got everything I need here and it’s got to be more than ten miles back.”

  “It’s more like fifteen by our calculations and somewhere between one and one and a half miles deep.”

  Mark had no idea he was that deep underground.

  After a pause the radio voice said, “Mrs. Shadowitz says you can continue if you feel up to it. Just be careful.”

  The tunnel continued for several more miles. The armor’s natural air circulation wasn’t working well enough to keep him cool under his clothes now so he stuffed his jeans and shirt into a duffel bag.

  There hadn’t been dust on the floor or walls for some time. He pulled the mask back and smelled the air. “Oh man! Rotten eggs.” He let go of the mask and its elastic band snapped it back to his face.

  “That means you’re likely getting close to a source of something burning with sulfur in it. What’s the temperature now?”

  He retrieved the thermometer. “One hundred and nine.”

  “Turn the light out and see what you can see.”

  It took a few minutes for his eyes to adjust to the dark. “There’s a faint reddish glow ahead.”

  “Probably a lava pit. It might be a good idea to leave your stuff there while you check it out.”

  It was just a half-mile walk to the red glow. It was a lava pit in a large room. He couldn’t see the walls of the room to the right or left, but he estimated the pit itself was only about twenty feet across and the lava was more than a hundred feet down. The pit wasn’t round like he expected, it was more like a crevice in the floor, stretching more than fifty yards to either side. The lava must have been near the top at some point, the edge of the crevice looked crusty and charred.

  He walked to his right and the wall was just beyond the end of the fissure. There was about a foot of rounded crusty ledge between the crevice and the wall. It would be very risky to try to cross. The other side was about the same.

  “Any ideas on how I can get across?”

  The reply on the radio had a lot of static, “A portable truss bridge would be what I would want. Try to touch the other side with the staff. That’ll give us a better idea of exactly how far across it is.”

  The other side was more than eight feet beyond the reach of the staff. He knew he’d have to go back if they made the portable bridge and that wasn’t something he particularly wanted to do. He’d walked more than twenty miles so far and just wanted to get this quest over with, although a good hot meal and a firm mattress would be nice.

  “Any other ideas? That’s a long trek back, uphill. And then back again tomorrow.”

  “Once you’re past this one, there’s just one more to go
. Leave your bags and come on back. It’s best to play it safe.”

  The next morning there was a collapsible ladder with wheels on both ends hanging on the side of the golf cart. Mr. Müeller walked up when Mark walked in.

  “Simple solutions are often the best solutions.” Mr. Müeller pointed to a rope coil in the back of the cart. “The rope will help you get it to where it needs to be. It will function as a cart on the way back to the lava pit. I just couldn’t see making you carry a ladder for twenty miles. You can use the brakes on the front wheels to steer and adjust your speed. Just take the wheels off when you reach your destination,” he pointed at the clamps holding the wheels to the side of the ladder, “extend it and let it fall across the pit. Problem solved.”

  Mark grinned. He was glad he had decided to come back and not risk crossing on the crumbly ledge. “That’s great. Thank you, sir.”

  “Not a problem. Just be careful when you cross. A crispy Mark is not something I enjoy envisioning.”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  Getting the ladder to the lava tube wasn’t as easy as Mr. Müeller made it sound like it would be, but it wasn’t that hard either. The trip back to the lava pit took just under two hours. It would have taken less time if he hadn’t stopped and used the rope to make a seat; sitting on the rungs was just plain uncomfortable.

  The ladder fell across the pit nicely. He made three trips across the makeshift bridge, carefully adjusting his balance on each rung as he carried the duffel bags and pull cart across.

  Another lava tube sloped up away from the pit and the grade was a good bit steeper than the previous tunnel, enough that he had to stop and rest every hour or so. Six hours after he’d passed the lava pit the slope began to level out a little and the tunnel abruptly grew wider and changed from a blackened look to dull gray striations. He noted the wall also looked damp.

  “I don’t know if it means anything but the walls have changed.”

  “We noticed that too. It looks like a different geologic process maybe or additional erosion. Give me a closer look at the wall.”