The Far Side (18 page)

Kris grimaced.  “We found one that we think was a vacuum, and another that was very warm, more than 140 degrees Fahrenheit.  We also found one that evidently opened in solid rock.  On top of that, while the water wasn’t deep, it still came in pretty fast, but we’ve got a switch now where Andie can cut off the machine almost at once -- and Linda is working on more instrumentation that will do the same thing -- the trick will be deciding what all we might face.”

“It sounds like progress, even if it doesn’t look like it to you.”

“I guess,” she replied.

The next morning, they were all at Andie’s house early.  “I’ve checked Shorty’s apparatus, and I can’t find anything wrong with it.  I’ve checked this machine as well, and it’s in good shape.  Which isn’t to say there might not be something I missed.  I’m reasonably confident I can build a replacement, even if this one breaks.  I have enough parts now to build a couple from scratch, and it would only take a day or so. I’d start with the fusor chamber and then the vacuum pump, so I could parallel some of the work while the chamber is being pumped down to vacuum.

“There are seven of us who’ll do the work.  Ezra, you’re on the cutoff switch on the machine. while the rest of us will make a human chain to pass things through the Far Side door.  Kris will be on this side, at the door, and I’ll be on the other side.  We’ll need two others on this side and three on the Far Side with me.

“It’s my thought that we could swap after the food goes through with someone getting stuck with me on the other side.  You all can decide how you want to do it.  Personally, I think the risk in minimal -- but that’s just me.”

Linda volunteered to be on the Far Side with Andie, and so did Shorty and Lin Xi, so Kris got Art and Kit to help her.  The machine was turned on after the pallet of food had been moved into the hallway, and at once they were moving things.

It went, Kris thought, smoothly.  The first thing they’d done was pass the empty wooden pallet through for a place to put the rations on the other side and then they started passing the cases of rations.  There were only forty-eight cases on the pallet, and they moved them quickly, taking twenty minutes or so.

Then they brought in the water containers.  Again, the pallet went first, but Andie had them stacking only one layer of the plastic containers on the pallet and another layer on top of the cases of emergency rations.  It took a little longer, but not much.

They spent another ten minutes moving a half dozen boxes with things like lanterns, tents, sleeping bags, cooking gear and the like, and then the machine was shut down, and they all went into the dining room where Andie had pizza ordered in.

In the afternoon, Kris went with Art and Kit to Art’s sound stage, while Andie and Linda went with Lin Xi.  After two hours, Andie came over and looked at what Art was doing.

After a few minutes, Andie spoke up.  “You have to know, I’m not your biggest fan, Art.”

“So what?  For a chance to work on this, I’ll grin and bear it.”

“Yeah, well, the problem is the benchmarks set by the others.  The other day, Shorty put his together in a day, and it was more complicated, at least a little, installation than this one.  Lin Xi is much further along as well.”

“Not everyone works at the same pace,” Kit told her, trying, Kris thought, to defend his friend.

“Yeah, fine.  But not half as fast, which is what Art’s doing.”

“I’m being careful,” Art said, his voice nasty.  “If I go faster, I could screw up.”

“So, screw up,” Andie came right back.  “I’ve screwed up.  Big deal.  We fix it and go on.”  She turned to Kris.  “I wasn’t going to use Abe; he’s been working with Shorty who is checking things on Fox Two.  Abe can come over and give you guys a hand.  He helped Shorty get his up and running.”

“I’m fine,” Art told her.  “I don’t need any more help.  Whoever it is would only be in the way.  I’m not going to rush this -- I want to understand what it is that I’m doing.  This isn’t an erector set.”

Kris could tell from the set of Andie’s jaw that she was furious.  Still, Andie surprised her, by shaking her head, turning and walking away.  The look of satisfaction on Art’s face made Kris angry.

“She might not care,” Kris said bluntly, “but I do.  I can hire and fire as well.  Ask Kit.  If you don’t speed it up the rest of the day, you’ll be gone tomorrow.”

The two men spent a few minutes talking together and Art did improve, albeit not much.

That evening, she and Andie discussed Art.  “He’s a flaming asshole,” Andie declared.

“So, you don’t like him and I don’t like him.  We can either defer the second power machine or let one of the others take over.”

“Yeah, except the bastard knows too much now,” Andie told her.  “I don’t trust the fucker as far as I can throw him.”

“Violating the NDA would end his career,” Kris pointed out.

“Yeah, but still... what’s that saying my old man is so fond of -- ‘Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.’”

“Eew!” Kris said with a laugh that Andie joined in.

“Run along home, Kris.  We’ll see what tomorrow will bring.  Tomorrow morning, you and Ezra can do a little exploring.  I’ll come by later and he and I can go.”

“A couple of days ago, I’d have worried about the risks.  Right now our progress is so slow that it resembles inaction.  God, it’ll be good to be over there again.”

“Well, as long as we don’t move the machine, I think it will always go to the same place.  I’ve marked it in the concrete with a series of alignment drill holes in the corners of the plywood, drilled into the concrete slab of the foundation.  I want to stay safe, but at the same time, I’m getting frustrated not doing anything now for more than a week.”

“Yeah,” Kris agreed.  “So, more exploration!  Great!”

Chapter 7 :: Things Happens

Kris woke on Wednesday morning feeling better than she’d felt for days.  She dashed through her usual morning routine, taking the time to dress more warmly than a typical LA June day would require.

Her dad smiled at her when she sat down to breakfast.  “You look chipper this morning.”

“We’re going back to explore the cave today.  Ezra and I.  Later, it will be Andie’s and Linda’s turn.”

He nodded.  “You are going to be careful, right?”

Kris realized that no matter what he said about letting her do what she wanted, he was concerned.  Was it really such a bad thing?  “Dad, Andie has complete plans now for the fusor.  One more is done and has been tested, assembled by another person.  Another is nearly done and then there’s the tortoise’s.  Still, even that one should be done today.

“We have agreed that, much as we’d like to be together in this, it’s not a good idea just now.  So one of us will always be here, when the other is away.  When we are exploring, we’ll always have weapons.  We moved a whole bunch of food and water over there yesterday, plus some other emergency supplies as well, and today we’re going to take some ropes, ladders, a half dozen flashlights and bunches of extra batteries.

“As Andie says, we want to be alive to enjoy the fruits of her work.”

He smiled.  “I know, I know.  I’m hovering -- it just comes naturally when you’re a parent.  Let me know how it turns out.”

“I’ll have the HD camera along and will be running more footage as we go.  Right now, the tape from the XL-2 is a exciting only if you put it into context.  Even then it’s a little dull.” 

Kris reached Andie’s house early to find her friend in the last stages of preparation as well.  “Linda and I are going to see about more instrumentation for Shorty’s Fox Two machine.  We’ll make sure Lin Xi is coming along.  I’m sorely tempted to pull Art off his machine and see if he can get a start on some theory.  Linda was saying last night she is making zero progress.  Maybe, if we still don’t have a clue, we can have a skull session Saturday morning with all of us and just kick wild-ass ideas around.”

Kit and Ezra showed up a few minutes later, Kit being the designated stay-behind for Kris and Ezra.  The machine was running in short order, and then Kris and Kit carried the additional gear into the cave in four quick trips.

When they were done, just as they were ready to explore, Kit spoke up.  “I’m about finished with the radio repeaters.  I’ll have them ready this afternoon.  It’s going to be Andie and Linda, with Shorty back?”

“Yes,” Andie told him.  “Kris will be at Poppa One with Lin Xi and checking on Art and Poppa Two.  Ezra is going to be here with Shorty.”

“Sounds like a plan!” Kit said lightly.  “When you are ready to go through, Andie, I’ll have the repeater here and we can set it up.  I got a few extra pieces of coax, because I’m sure as I can be, we’re going to forget to pull it a few times before we shut down.”

“Not if we’re careful,” Andie told him.

Andie grinned at Kris.  “You have to know, I’m going to want to hear a blow-by-blow report as soon as you’re back.”

“Sure, Andie.”

Kris and Ezra went through and it was like it was old hat.  There was none of the nervousness she’d felt other times.  Then it got interesting.

Ezra had a rifle of his own slung over his shoulder, and he had a pistol holstered under his shoulder like Kris had.  He wasn’t carrying a backpack, but he did have a hundred-foot extension cord in his hand.  Kris was carrying the camera in her hands, a pistol in a shoulder holster, and a twenty-pound pack on her back.  They reached the first large chamber, and she mated the camera with the light bar and plugged it in.  It lit right up and she added some more footage of the large chamber to their stock.

She had the laser range finder and copies of Andie’s latest map in her pack, and they went unerringly towards the deepest tunnel that Andie had noted before.  The tunnel was the first thing she’d seen in the cave that didn’t look natural.

The tunnel floor was reasonably level, and the walls appeared to have been widened in a few places.  They entered the next large chamber and Ezra whistled.  “Jackpot!”

Kris was skeptical about a trash heap being a jackpot, but there was a lot more evidence of inhabitation.  There were piles of what appeared to be junk at various places.  There was a thick patina of dust on everything, and it was Ezra who noticed something first.

“No cobwebs,” he said with a laugh.

“Oh, what a shame!” Kris laughed with him.

Ezra was digging through one of the heaps of debris, while Kris kept the camera running as he pawed through it.  He stopped and pulled something out of the mass.  Kris lifted an eyebrow.  It was a sword hilt, she was sure, with a blade that had been broken off so that there was a three- or four-inch stub.

Ezra lifted it up and held it up to the light.  “This is odd,” he said.

“What’s odd?”

“It fits my hand.  There are ridges like there would be on a sword hilt and these fit my fingers well.  Either this is Earth or we’re facing aliens who have grippers a lot like our hands.”

“Andie will be gravely disappointed if this is the basement of some museum.”

Ezra looked around.  “I don’t think this is someone’s basement.”  He stopped for a second and peered off at an angle.

“How much cord
do you have left?” he asked Kris.

“Maybe ten feet,” she told him.

“Come this way,” he told her and moved a couple of steps.  She didn’t get more than five when she felt the cord tug.  She didn’t want to pull on it too hard, so she promptly stopped.

“Turn off the camera and the light,” he told her.

Reluctantly she did as he requested.  She got out her flashlight, but he had his own on.  “Just wait a minute with the light off okay?  Don’t look at mine.”

It wasn’t really scary, because he left his flashlight on, but he put his hand over the lens, mostly covering it.

He stood still for an eternity.  “Yes!  Now that’s more like it!” he said out of nowhere.

Kris looked around and realized that ahead of them was a patch of diffuse light.  “Come with me,” Ezra told her.  “Watch your step.  I’m going to keep the light dim.”

Kris put the camera down and followed Ezra when he took a half dozen steps forward.  Kris could see a large rock off to one side of a passage, and the light was coming from the passage that led off to the left.  It wasn’t the glaring blaze of sunlight, it was muted, but still, it was definitely sunlight.  Ezra moved a few more steps, and Kris could see a passage that led forward.  About a hundred feet away there was a bend to the left, and the light was coming from there.

Ezra chortled.  “There is light at the end of the tunnel!”

“Ezra,” Kris told him.  “I know you’d give anything to walk down there and peek around the corner.  But this is Andie’s.  She deserves this.”

He chuckled.  “And you see me rushing to the light?  I know, Kris.  God, this is so incredible!  It doesn’t matter where we are -- we’re not where we were before.  And I know Andie was concerned
that none of those places we went to yesterday were definitively off Earth. I don’t think either one of us believes that this is Earth.”

Kris suddenly laughed and he looked at her.  “I just figured out a definitive way to tell for absolute sure.  Andie has a bathroom scale next to her shower.  We weigh ourselves just before we come here, then again, just after we arrive.  There is almost no way two different planets would have the same surface gravity.”

“I don’t feel lighter or heavier than before,” he cautioned.

“I don’t either, but a scale will notice a couple of pounds difference that we might not be able to detect ourselves.”

“Yeah, that’s a good experiment,” Ezra told Kris.

He waved back towards the heaps of junk.  “That stuff has been there at least a couple of dozen years, I’d say.  Most of it is bits and pieces of dried leather harness, broken bits of this and that.  A midden heap more suited to the Middle Ages than the Twenty-first Century.  This is the real thing, Kris.  We’re the greatest adventurers since Columbus set sail in 1492!  Lewis and Clark were pikers!”

Kris nodded.  “Well, we should go back soon.  Sure, I know we’ve been here a half hour and that we’d planned on an hour.  I’d like to spend a little time mapping this room, so we won’t show up looking like we went for the gold and ignored everything else.”

“No problem, Kris,” he told.  “I’m game.”

She turned her back to Ezra and he pulled out the range finder and she used her clipboard, and Kris took a number of readings of various dimensions, including how far it was to the tunnel dogleg.

She spent about fifteen minutes making notes and adding her sketches to Andie’s map before she picked up the camera and light bar.  She took some shots of the tunnel entrance.  With a sigh she looked at Ezra when she finished.

“I hate the thought of this, but it’s stupid to be lugging this camera back and forth.  I’m just going to turn it off and...”

The light bar went off.

A second later, Ezra had his flashlight on.  “I swear I didn’t touch it,” Kris told him.  “I was going to, but...”

“Yeah.  Leave it here; we need to hustle back to the door.”

“Let me get the tape,” Kris said, trying not to give in to the gibbering fear she felt.

“Quick!”

Kris hit the release and put the tape in her shirt pocket, then closed the tape deck, and lowered the camera to the ground.  She’d know soon enough if she forgot to load a tape the next time.  She tried to tell herself that Kit had probably just stumbled over the extension cord.

They moved at a trot back to the first chamber and then slowed to get through the narrow passage.  Ezra was in the lead and when he got close to the door he cursed.  “No door!”

He rushed heedless of the low roof, and cursed again.  “Kris!  Gimme some light!”

Kris emerged into the larger tunnel and saw he was kneeling over a form prone on the floor.  She held the light on her friend Andie, and Ezra was slicing something that bound her wrists.

He undid a gag, and then worked on something binding her feet.

“Andie?” Kris asked when Andie’s mouth was free, “what happened?”

Andie held up a single finger.  Ezra helped her to her feet and they both looked at Andie who had stayed quiet.

“Sorry,” Andie told them eventually.  “I’m still counting to ten million, trying to calm down a little.

“I am so going to kill the fuckers!  Those fuckers are going to wish they were never born!  When I get done with those assholes, their own mothers won’t recognize the remains!”

“Andie,” Ezra said patiently, “please.”

“That fucker Kit, I never did trust the futher mucker.  Art -- a flaming fucking asshole if there ever was one!

“I finally made up my mind to take Art off the fusor construction and had Shorty come over to Poppa Two and take over from the sorry mother fucker.  Linda said she had about twenty minutes left to finish what she was doing, so I told Lin to help Shorty and that Linda should come to the house when she was ready, and I would see if I could get Art working on theory.

“I brought Art here.  I should have known the fucker had something planned; he didn’t say anything at all on the ride over.  We walked into my bedroom and Kit, the asshole, was sitting at my computer instead of standing by in the closet.

“I yelled at the sorry fucker and went into the closet to make sure everything was okay.  The door was there and solid, and I turned back to let him have a piece of my mind.  The son of a bitch grabbed me and put me in a bear hug.  He dragged me into the bedroom and that fucker Art used some sort of ties like the cops use on my hands.

“Kit pushed me down the bed and I was yelling and cussing and struggling, but the next thing I knew, my ankles were secured.  Then the fucker cut up a pair of my jeans and wrapped one of the legs around my mouth, then Art fucking duct-taped it!  They picked me up and hustled me back into the closet, and pushed me through the door.  A few seconds later, I was in the fucking dark, because they had fucking turned it off.”

“You said Linda would be coming in a half hour?” Ezra asked.

“Yeah.  Christ!  She’s going to be walking into a fucking trap!  If they hurt her...”  Andie’s voice dropped away and Kris had to smile.  So, that was the way it was.  Good for Andie and Linda!

Ezra’s voice was tight with anger too.  “Well, we’ll be careful and ready, okay?  If the door opens, I’ll be through it a second later.  And I will apply some serious whup-ass on those two.  Even if they get the drop on Linda, there’s Shorty and Lin, your parents... even Abe, at the studio.  We’re not going to be forgotten.”

They sat in a semi-circle around where the door should have been.  “When it opens,” Ezra told them, “let me go first.  I’ll be going like a bat out of hell.  There’s no telling what they’ll try, so don’t try to come out unless I stick my head through and tell you to.  It doesn’t bear thinking about what would happen if you were half-way through when it cuts off.”