(work in progress)
There is always a lot of talk when we don't know what to do, and this was no exception. The technocrats talked and so too the officials and the scientists. It was all talk; sound that clouded minds and betrayed the terror and hopelessness of all those who were paid to do more than talk. In spite of this very same drama being played out many times throughout the known history of the universe, no one had dared to contemplate this possibility, much less make contingencies. There were minerals in difficult places and nets full of edible marine life, and of course there was the concern over money. You can't eat or sell a contingency when there is work to be done. The men with lives to lose didn't have the luxury to worry and those who could chose not to; after all, Port Chayney could muster enough of a fleet to evacuate the technocrats and the officials and the scientists. If a few miners or fishermen had to die that was rather unfortunate, but to the technocrats and the officials and the scientists it was an acceptable bargain. Now there was no Port Chayney and no fleet. There was nothing left but talk, a great deal of talk.
No one could come for three months. A two-way trip would take six. That would be too long to wait. Worse, no one was scheduled to arrive for almost a year. A passenger ship was supposed to begin its run on the First of August; it was an old surplus liner with enough cargo space for a load of exotic seafood. Her captain would have her loaded while his eccentric thrill-seeking passengers hunted or fished or just set their feet on this distant blue marble. What actually awaited them would come as a complete surprise. It would appear that this time - the sixth trip to 70 Ophiuchi for the Rosette - she would find a bleeding world, its native land dwellers licking their wounds and its colonists all locked in the silence of death.
Rick was as sick as the others of all the talk, perhaps even more so, though he saw no use in expressing his displeasure. It would only add to the noise. Desperation had brought them all here and now disgust would soon force him away. He had had enough. When Rick stood up from the long bench big Tim Olsen grabbed the radio case on his utility belt. Tim looked up, wanting to speak to his friend and fellow miner of the last ten years. What he saw in Rick's face discouraged him, and he released his grasp as he turned his head back to the talkers.
No one seemed to notice, or at least no one protested when Rick slipped outside of the mess hall. For the first time since their mandatory assembly he could hear the whirring of the air purifiers over the useless chatter of the self-described experts. The darkness outside was deep, with barely a sliver of orange in the direction of the local sun, 70 Ophiuchi A. To the south a deep red stain lined the horizon; otherwise it was the blackest sky Rick had ever seen. He looked at his watch and was dismayed to discover that he'd wasted two hours with the talkers. It was already early afternoon.
Rick was sure he could smell it. A gust from the south confirmed his suspicion. He coughed once, and wondered if this was how he'd die. Rich tapped his sore left foot, allowing the respirator attached to his belt to bounce off of his leg. Rick looked back at the dark red smear and the ominous blackness. A stronger breeze brought more smell and a few gray blossoms from a Carpus tree. It may have been ash, he wasn't sure.
Even before he came - or more accurately, was forced to come - to 70 Ophiuchi Ab, Rick knew he'd hate the place. Reality bore out his prophesy. The local sun could be annoying, even harsh at times. It rained often, usually an omnipresent drizzle that kept up for days on end. Hurricanes though not especially common in the southwest did occasionally make landfall, and some were real killers. But nothing compared with the events of the last two months. Although it caught them all by surprise and Rick was no exception, something always told him that he didn't belong on this hateful world, that none of them did. There was always a whisper, a curse on the breeze; it was in the bites of myriad arthropods and the poisonous gas that crept through cracks in the mine floors. The curse had been patient and now it would claim the lot of them. Although the native land dwellers would suffer they would survive. The water creatures would have an easier time of it. Though many natives would die, even among the oceans, Ophiuchian life would survive the cataclysm. Not so the immigrants; rumor was, twelve thousand had already perished at Cape Banneker. That cataclysm was unrelated to the even greater horrors of the south. That 's what the scientists said, though Rick believed it all part of the same hushed curse. The technocrats and the officials and the scientists would have vehemently disagreed, but for all their knowledge and conviction they had been wrong about the coming paroxysm and who could say they were right this time. They could offer nothing but talk against the coming tragedy.
Under the best of circumstances it was unhealthy to breathe the air of 70 Ophiuchi Ab for long periods, and now with ash and gas coming from the south - and possibly from the east - it was unwise to leave one's respirator dangling from a belt. Rick was not known as a risk-taker but it hardly mattered anymore. He made no effort to unhook the strap from his belt's c-clip. He wouldn't be waiting in line for a barrier garment either. Escape was the only real option, and without extraordinary luck none of them could get out of harm's way. Some might have tried the Magothy Road but Rick knew better; in the best of times it was a winding weed-choked morass, and no doubt something would steal even that vain hope. The wind surged in the trees to the south and although he was only three meters from the egress he barely heard the door open. It was Tim, all 120 kilograms of him, not a one of them fat. He didn't say a word and he told Rick more than all the talkers combined. Rick was right to be pessimistic. The Magothy Road had been cut. The terrors of the east were repeating themselves in the west; independently, of course. Though Rick didn't yet know what had happened to the road he knew from the change in Tim's expression, which had been one of the last with a flicker of optimism, that the road was no longer an option. The talkers would call this latest disaster another coincidence. They seemed to derive an imbecilic comfort from clinging to proclamations without significance.
Rick turned back to watching the red smudge. At length he spoke, once the wind came and went and the two men cleared their throats.
"Anybody say what's for dinner?" Rick's steel-gray eyes kept sharp on the red. It probably hadn't grown in the last ten minutes but it sure seemed that way.
Tim must not have expected the question and it took several seconds for him to respond. "No, nobody mentioned it. Maybe...Hell, probably those bags of shit."
Rick shook his head. A flake came from the dark skies, floated through the feeble light of the lamp above the door and alighted on the plastic rail that led to the stairs. This one at least was a bloom.
"They waste all our fuckin' time and don't think about feedin' us?" Rick sighed, then spit over the rail. "Figures."
Tim must have thought the blooms were ash. One landed in Rick's short red hair and it sent Tim into a conniption of swatting. Rick just leaned on the rail. When Tim was done he spoke.
"Just blossoms, Tim. Ash isn't here yet."
"The smell's coming faster. I noticed a little, how 'bout you Ricky?"
"Yeah." Rick spit again, this time more air than saliva.
Rick was a bit surprised that they didn't try to force him back into the hall. He really didn't care, except that the thought of their faces when he told them where to go was a momentary source of amusement.
The wind picked up a little again but this time there was no noxious taint to the air. Tim mentioned it.
"Wind must have shifted. I didn't notice any smell that time. " Tim wasn't sure if it was the right time to ask, or if there was a right time for that matter. What was the point of holding back? If he wanted an answer, he figured, he'd better ask now.
"Ricky," Tim was the only one on 70 Ophiuchi Ab who ever called Rick by that diminutive name, "you saw it, down Rainbow Wells. What the hell's really goin' on?"
Rick kept leaning on the plastic rail. He was silent for a bit. The talkers never told them exactly what had happened, either in the south or the east, and Rick assumed they lied or kept silent about the west as well. He was right of course. They all had a right to know.
"The planet's opened up."
Had Tim not known Rick for the last ten years he'd have been incredulous. He was not. If Rick had said the planet turned square Tim would not have doubted his friend's conviction.
"They'd have left us, wouldn't they?", Tim asked. Tim was now leaning on the rail, staring at the red smudge.
"Yeah." Rick got a wry smile on his face. "There'd be some song about us, our sacrifice. Those assholes wouldn't listen to it, but it'd be there." He looked over at Tim, the smile still on his face. "You know, they'd be heroes in the movie."
Tim laughed. Rick turned back to the red stain. He chortled and continued, "They got a surprise ending when Port Chayney went up. Now instead of a movie they'll get a special on that channel with all the disaster shows."
Tim couldn't help but laugh a second time; this one lasted a lot longer. It was born of frustration and rising anger. Rick joined in. Except Rick didn't really feel much anger toward the hapless bureaucrats. They would reap their reward in the end; nothing he could do to them could match that. As the brief laughter faded to smiles, Rick looked back toward the red, and then over to his right. There was a motor pool across the road. Bathed in the light of a photocell lamp it was full of lorries and tractors. Among the manicured and utterly unreliable DLM's was an elderly Humboldt Road Boss. Humboldt was the triumph of truck manufacture; this example was certainly at least one hundred years old yet could still outperform the others. "Too bad we didn't have any of those at Accra," Rick thought to himself. Humboldt was no more, gone with the men and the civilization that gave it birth; the colonies they built were following their path into oblivion. 70 Ophiuchi Ab was next.
Rick was pondering the lorries he'd seen and those he'd driven, trying to decide which was he preferred above all others - he'd never driven a Humboldt before - and his game made the red smear go away. An outburst from inside the hall brought it back. Someone erupted in anger; the voice was soon joined by others, and eventually a chorus arose. Rick didn't really care what had happened. Tim, however, strained to hear.
"Think we should go back in?"
The question annoyed Rick but he could forgive his friend. It wasn't any major transgression. "No," he said, "maybe if I was spoilin' for a fight but I'm too damn tired for that shit." It was true; though it wasn't the only reason he didn't seek a tussle. There was something much more important on his mind; it had been there all along, and the red smear was vastly preferable to the cackling of the terrified experts in the mess hall. The red smear was honest and patient. It left one unmolested to attempt some desperate gambit, or perhaps to make peace with God; and if circumstances were truly hopeless it would kill and be done with it. It wouldn't offer useless suggestions and irrelevant information. it wouldn't break the silence with worthless talk.
He said it in typical nonchalant manner. It was his way, and had been all his life. Very little provoked Rick to reveal his passions.
"'Bout 400 clicks due north there's this mountain called the Shelly Anticline. There used to be a small town near the base, Haskinville I think, that's what a sign said anyway. I was up that way three-four years ago."
Tim wasn't sure why Rick brought it up, though he hoped it was the foundation of some incredible plan. "I heard of it, never been there. Off Oneida Road, some old trail isn't it?"
"Yeah. We took the company's Pig. Haskinville's just a dirt track now," said Rick.
"What's up, Ricky?" Tim asked point-blank.
"Bickerstaff said they sounded out a shitload of caves in that hill."
"Have you seen them?" Tim had travelled quite a distance and was arriving at wit's end.
Rick looked hard into Tim's hazel eyes. "No. But I'd rather die up on that mountain than holed up with these pricks."
Tim looked back at the door to the mess hall, then at the red smudge. "I don't know, Ricky." Tim spoke more to himself than to his friend. Something in his mind cast a stronger shadow of doubt. "No, it won't work. Cape Banneker's gone, Rick. How do you know Oneida isn't cut like Magothy?"
"I don't. Honestly I don't care. I'm not sticking around here, Tim. I'm fed up with all the bullshit talk. If we're going to have any chance we better head for that hill. The lowland's going to be nothin' but poison soon." Rick's mind was set; likely it had been for some time.
Tim was silent. He wanted to believe his friend. He looked back at the door. He could barely hear talking on the other side. The door might open to more frustration, more bunkum. He looked back to Rick. His gaze caught the red smudge. It seemed reflected in Rick's burning eyes and pale face. Tim had descended into the bowels of this accursed planet, facing deadly vapors and poisonous Dipteropods and one of the very few extraterrestrial viruses known to infect Homo sapiens. He was no coward when he felt the urge to survive. It might be hopeless, but he didn't want to surrender. Rick wasn't surrendering. In Tim's mind he was just wrong. He managed the faint smile that usually means farewell, and went back to the talkers.
Rick was out in the parking lot when the door opened. He didn't look at the crowd for at least twenty seconds. The technocrats and the officials and the scientists would be first to emerge, followed by the less-vital. Once he was sure that the men who didn't matter to him were beyond the egress, Rick looked upon the exiting miners. Tim was near the front and, due to his size, impossible to miss. He looked into Tim's eyes from across the lot. Tim stopped cold. The moment had arrived; Rick was not pleased to have delayed but he held out hope for his friend, at least for him. Rick crossed the road to the motor pool. The gate was unlocked; it wouldn't have mattered, as Rick had access with his keycard; in addition to mining, the men of Padki Mining drove product to Port Chayney. Rick did not stop nor did he hesitate. He climbed into the Humboldt and closed the driver's side door. Then, without pause, he reached over and opened the passenger door. He looked at Tim. Then he motioned for his friend to come.
The crowd, led by the talkers, began its pilgrimage down Proxmire Road toward Becker. The red stain flanked them to the left. They would not complete the journey on foot. The headlights of buses, no doubt commandeered at some earlier point from Becker Transit, bounced along the Rugged Klick as the final stretch of Proxmire - Royer highway was known. It was clear that the talkers hoped to find refuge at Becker on the southwest coast. Apparently they believed that the block-fault mountains at Quanah Heights would halt or at least divert the fire from the south. Realizing this, Rick felt an even greater desire for Tim to abandon the funeral procession. No doubt the talkers would scoff at Rick's plan; they had never toiled in the earth, never read its sky or listened to its whispers. Every instinct in Rick's mind, body and soul rejected the trip to Becker. He prayed so would Tim's.
In his years at Padki, Rick didn’t make many friends. Most guys engaged in the only approved form of interaction for men of their kind, and took to belittling each other at every opportunity. This never appealed to Rick and led to his trademark aloofness. Some even called him an outsider. There had been three exceptions though. Greg Shirley was the first; an old-timer who’d been a miner way back on Earth and who was forced to come to 70 Ophiuchi relatively late in life. He taught Rich what he knew and it would eventually save the younger man’s life several times. Shirley wasn’t like any of the others in that brotherhood meant a great deal to him. He never tore another miner down, though he had no fear in resorting to his fists if the need arose. One day when Rick was delivering a load to Chayney Greg Shirley disappeared. The administrators said he had been sent back home to Earth. Rick did not believe them. He never did discover the real answer, though Shirley’s sudden departure taught Rick another valuable lesson. He could never afford to trust the bureaucrats.
Not long after Shirley left, Kevin Rundle came in to Padki by way of Alpha Centauri. Rundle, a young man ill-suited for the hard life forced upon him, could not be faulted for a lack of trying. In many ways he became the hardest worker on Padki’s roster. Inexperience and a fierce desire to prove his relentless tormentors wrong hurled the eighteen-year-old down the path of pain and misery, yet in his rather brief time on 70 Ophiuchi he never forsook his dream of returning to the green fields of Alpha. Rick really didn’t want to get close to this probably doomed man and when it happened he knew he’d regret it; still, he took it upon himself to direct Rundle as much as he could in the ways of survival. Rick also noticed a change in one of the other miners, a hitherto indistinguishable member of the annoying crowd named Tim Olsen. Tim began laying off the torment and started volunteering to be Rundle’s partner. Perhaps a little of Shirley had rubbed off on him as well. Rick, who before his friendship with Shirley as well as after his friend’s disappearance would take his lunch and supper alone, noticed Rundle’s increasing presence at his lonely little table, and he did not object. Rick would talk about the sights he’d seen on 70 Ophiuchi, and Rundle would describe the beauty of the garden planet around Alpha Centauri B. For the first time since he had come to 70 Ophiuchi, Rick could see beyond Padki and and the hydrogen sulfide alarms and he enjoyed it to no end.
It was about the time that Rick started to feel hope for Kevin Rundle that the curse of 70 Ophiuchi took him away. The last few days Rundle had been paired with Tim Olsen, who likewise appreciated the young man’s dreams and optimism and had begun to join him and Rick at the lunch table. Tim however was not certified to train on the CM88 continuous miner and Padki wanted Kevin Rundle to be a certified operator. The administrators stuck him with one of their trainers, a man long on theoretical experience but short on the kind that really mattered, particularly in a mining environment as dangerous as the one at Padki. If the trainer had been content to follow Track 5 down to 140 Left the day would have been uneventful; but he was not content to show Rundle the banalities of standard buggy operation. The trainer, a Mr. Feruzi, quite probably out of a desire to flaunt what his superiors called expertise, deviated from Track 5 and entered 133 Right. The administrators knew 133 Right to be a trouble spot and no doubt Mr. Feruzi knew this as well; the miners considered it the most dangerous active tunnel at Padki Number 4.
No one knows exactly what Feruzi tried to demonstrate to his pupil, or if Kevin Rundle was even on his mind when he entered 133 Right. It is known that hydrogen sulfide gas was heavy that day and once afternoon shift left there was no mining scheduled for 133 until the next morning, upon completion of a routine safety check. The red warning light for gas emission was lit at the entrance to 133 Right and post-accident analysis determined that both men were wearing respiratory protection before Feruzi drove down to the far reaches of the tunnel. Since he was wearing a breathing apparatus, Mr. Feruzi must have known that gas was heavy in 133 and the status report included in his training briefs forbade any travel down 133 Right. He chose to ignore the hazards and entered the closed section.
The percentage of hydrogen sulfide in the air at 133 Right was not only lethally poisonous, it was well within the flammability limits of that potentially explosive gas. The incident investigator surmised that Feruzi may have cut into the seam face at the far end of 133 Right and this might have precipitated a lethal spark. The miners did not trust the findings; although Padki’s equipment was supposedly explosion-proof and properly grounded, most of their rolling stock came from Guizhou Heavy Industries. Guizhou was notorious for mechanical and safety systems failures. Of course Padki would never officially acknowledge these problems. The wealth and power of Beijing precluded any mention. Instead, Padki took to secretly modifying most of their vehicles before putting them into service. Motor 401 had passed initial trials and was not among those modified.
Rick did not hear the explosion, which was confined to section 133 Right. He was close enough to possibly have heard a muffled thud but was busy running Motor 315 at the time. It was only when an incident alarm sounded on his helmet radio that he realized something was amiss.
For a long time after Rundle’s death Rick and Tim sat quiet at their forlorn table, nary a word shared between them. Tim never did return to the raucous band he used to dine with. Rick was glad for it, even though it did not outwardly show. His anger had grown to dangerous levels and there was no longer an outlet for escape from dismal realities. This soon led Rick of all persons to break the silence. At first it was a recollection or observation of what reminded him of his former home. He had been forced to depart there over a decade previous. It was colder than Alpha and there was less blue sky and fewer girls, pretty or otherwise. Before the loss of Rundle, Rick never spoke to anyone of his home, and aside from two or three times with Tim he would not again.
Tim hailed from the tidally-locked planet around Lacaille 9352. He too had come under orders – it seemed every miner did – and doubted he’d ever see that amazing planet again. He spoke of the huge forests of dark green trees, almost black, and the swarming of four-eye locusts so thick that no millimeter of leaf could be seen beneath their mating masses. Then they’d be gone, off to lay eggs and die, without having eaten a bite. At Centerpoint noon lasted forever; near Honfleur Cross only stars lit the eternal night. It was an alien world, excepting its atmosphere it was completely unlike Earth, yet Tim spoke of it lovingly, longingly, a child sick for home and a man who knew he’d never go back.
The fading natural light made the artificial ones harsher. The waiting seemed interminable. Tim would not beckon to Rick, even if he believed that his friend was about to make a disastrous mistake. Once Rick was in the cab of the Humboldt there would be no prying him out. Rick was like that and Tim knew him better than anyone alive. Perhaps Tim did believe this to be a terrible mistake; perhaps that was why he stared at Rick for so long. He knew it wouldn’t matter in the end. Rick would be going his own way. Meanwhile Rick’s hopes were fading. He let his right arm fall to the seat. The wind kicked up and blew a few blossoms into the cab. Rick could see Tim’s face clearly while the throng faded into inconsequentiality. It was the look he had the day after Rundle died.
Rick looked away but did not turn his face. He leaned over and closed the passenger door. Tim turned back to the crowd and joined the procession down the Rugged Klick. The others didn’t exist anymore. They were shadows on the canvas. There was just Shirley, Rundle and Olsen, and they were going away.
Rick broke his near-trance. He started the Humboldt. The small fusion reactor went on-line and the engine awoke. Filtering systems came to life and in an instant the air became pleasant. Rick shifted the lorry into first gear and eased on the clutch. Humboldt, known for supreme reliability, was also famous for power and on both accounts did not disappoint the driver. The mighty truck started for the open gate and the dusty highways beyond.
(15 Mar 2009)
