Resonant Abyss

by J. N. Chaney

  Instantly, the chamber went dead silent.

  “I am Lars, the All Powerful, Supreme Galactic Overlord from the Fifth Dimension—”

  “Fifth what?” I asked, practically spitting the words out. But Lars was, apparently, undeterred.

  “And I have sent forth my worthy messengers, Flint and Rachel, to help save you!”

  Several miners sat down, swooning and overcome with awe.

  “Messengers?” I asked in disbelief.

  “Listen to them now!” The lights flickered and the ground trembled. “For the words they bring to you are life and not death! Lars the All Powerful has decreed it!”

  When the lights came back up, the miners were visibly shaking. But all eyes were fixed on me. Several miners bowed low, while other pushed Rachel on stage to join me. She bumped into my side and apologized.

  “How was that?” Lars asked in our comms.

  “Remember the flour bomb?” I asked, recalling the explosion on top of Oragga’s tower.

  “Of course, sir. I am an AI and do not forget anything unless my programming is corrupted or my hardware is damaged, neither of which has transpired since that event.”

  “I think you overdid it.”

  Lars waited to reply, then said, “Well, at least I helped you achieve your goals, and I quote, to ‘help shut them up and reassure them of our ability to help save them.’”

  “He has a point,” Rachel added.

  “Yeah, but I’m going to have to refer to him as Lars the All Powerful from now on.”

  “It’s an unintentional byproduct of the circumstances,” Lars said.

  “Not gonna happen, pal.”

  “Not even once?” Lars asked.

  “Not a chance, pal.”

  Rachel nudged me. “Talk to them, Flint.”

  “I will,” I said, facing the inevitable. “One more thing, Lars.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  “How’d you get the floor to vibrate?”

  “I beg your pardon, sir?”

  “The floors. With your whole gods complex routine. How’d you get them to shake?”

  A momentary silence filled our comms. “That was not my doing. Instead, sensors seem to indicate those tremors originated from very deep within the mine, sir.”

  “The mine? Does it have anything to do with the starship’s drive core?”

  “Not as far as I can tell, though its feedback loop does appear to be escalating as predicted. No, those vibrations are emanating from a point behind the range of our scanners. My apologies, sir.”

  “Flint,” Rachel said. She nodded to the people who were still in a state of shock.

  “Right.” I coughed once and then cleared my throat. “Listen, folks. Like Lars—”

  “The All Powerful,” the AI interpreted.

  I gritted my teeth. “Like Lars—”

  “Fine. Lars the Truly Wondrous Beyond All Your—”

  “Like Lars the All Powerful said, Rachel and I are here to help you escape. But it’s going to take everyone working together for this to work. It means we cooperate, we look out for one another, and we do this as a team. Copy?”

  “I don’t think they know police speak, Flint,” Rachel whispered beside me.

  I cleared my throat again. “You understand?” I saw the majority of the people nod at me. “Good. Rachel is going to help coordinate getting the sick and the elderly out first, but she’ll need the help of those strongest among you. If you’re able to help her, I want you moving over here.” I pointed to a wide space to my left. People were already starting to move. “In a second.” I felt like a schoolteacher with an over-eager class. “Meanwhile, I’m going to need all those who are familiar with weapons over here.” I pointed to another clearing to my right. “If you have experience shooting, even better. If you’re in neither of those two groups, I want you forming a line beginning over there.” I pointed to a location about twenty yards from the main gate. “You’ll wait your turn to exit the barracks when we tell you in groups of thirty-five.”

  “Why thirty-five, Mr. Flint?” someone asked from the crowd.

  “Yeah! What’s Lars the All Powerful’s plan?” asked another.

  “Lars the—?” I shut my mouth and then turned to speak into my shoulder. “Lars, if I ever get my hands on you—”

  “It’s been a pleasure to be of service, sir,” the AI replied.

  “What are we supposed to do?” a third person asked, with several other people vocally encouraging the question.

  “Better give them something,” Rachel replied.

  “We’re going to be using the RTVs to shoot everyone to the surface.”

  “Not shoot,” Rachel said. “Don’t scare them.”

  “To usher everyone to the surface.”

  “Better,” she said.

  “Since we don’t have a lot of time, we’re going to be filling the RTVs with more people than normal, which means you’ll have to squish. But be patient with one another. The ride will only last a few seconds.”

  “A few seconds?” someone asked.

  “Think of it like a thrill park ride.”

  I looked out at the sea of faces. Only a handful of heads nodded in understanding, and the rest just blinked. “Gods, they really are sheltered.”

  “Can you blame them?” Rachel asked.

  “Nope.” I sighed. “Listen, just wait your turn to file into a pod, make room for others, and then hold on. Got it?”

  More nods this time.

  “Good. Lastly, I’m going to need one volunteer with climbing experience for a special errand. But I’m not gonna lie, it’s not the safest thing.”

  A hand went up right in front of me.

  “Okay, thank—” I stopped. It was Monty. “No way, kid. Put your hand down.”

  “Please, Mr. Flint. I can do whatever—”

  “Any other volunteers?” I asked.

  “Let him help, Flint,” Rachel said.

  I spun on her and whispered. “I want someone to carry an explosive to the top of the miner’s secret tunnel they’ve been working on.”

  “Oh,” she said, a look of realization dawning on her face.

  “Exactly. Not Monty.”

  “Mr. Flint, I heard you. I know that tunnel well… been working on it myself over the years. I can get up and back quickly.”

  I glanced down at Monty, then back at Rachel.

  “I say let him do it,” she said. “He wants to help, and right now, we don’t have a lot of options. Plus, I bet he’s faster than anyone else.”

  I took a deep breath. “Fine, kid. But if you die, I’m gonna be so pissed at you.”

  “I won’t die, Mr. Flint.”

  I stared at him for one more beat, hoping I wasn’t damning this kid to the abyss. Then, to the crowd, I ordered, “To your sections!”

  20

  “You still haven’t explained this part of your plan,” Rachel said over my shoulder. I was busy stuffing three of Oragga’s multi-function grenades that Rachel had retrieved from the scanner crates into a backpack for Monty. “And, for the record, I don’t like that you’re giving a kid grenades.”

  “We need a diversion,” I said. I could feel Rachel studying the back of my head.

  “To keep Ozzie’s men away from the top of the pod chute?”

  “Exactly,” I replied. “They’ll be expecting us to use the main elevator or a backdoor, so we need an excuse to keep them focused on one of those for as long as possible. With Lars’ help, we might even be able to split their forces for a while.

  “Monty here is taking the long trip up the shaft that his people have been working on for the last few decades. Then, once he’s to the top…” I patted Monty on the shoulder.

  “Once I’m at the top,” Monty continued, “I place the grenades in a triangle pattern and activate their linked timer system with this.” He pulled a small remote from his pocket.

  “Why not just remote detonate them once he’s clear?” Rachel asked.


  It was Lars’ turn to jump in. “I’m afraid the mine’s density will not allow it, Miss Fontaine.”

  “Gotcha,” she said, nodding. “Just like the comms.”

  “Precisely,” he replied.

  “How much time did he give you to get back down?” Rachel pulled Monty’s hand up to look at the remote’s display. Her face went pale. “Three minutes? Are you crazy, Flint?”

  “Rachel, listen—”

  “That gives me plenty of time,” Monty interjected. “I only need two minutes to—”

  “He needs more time,” Rachel said.

  “He can’t have more time.” My tone was too harsh. But the clock was ticking. “Rachel, listen. None of us have enough time. If Monty says he can get back down in two minutes, we have to trust him. That gives him one minute to spare.”

  “I still don’t like it,” Rachel said, putting her hands on her hips. “But… I trust Monty.”

  “Thanks, Miss Rachel.”

  I zipped up Monty’s backpack and helped him put it on.

  Rachel rubbed her chin. “Hey, Lars.”

  “Yes, Miss Fontaine?” replied the AI.

  “Any chance you could… I don’t know, bring this secret tunnel to the security detail’s attention sooner rather than later? Maybe get some of them positioned outside the would-be exit point say—oh, I don’t know—right around the time the charges break through the last few meters of stone?”

  “Why, Miss Fontaine, that sounds like a delightfully dastardly thing to do.”

  “Dastardly?” I asked Lars, unfamiliar with the word.

  “Yes, sir. Look it up the next time you wish to expand your own lexicon.”

  “Smart ass.”

  “You ready?” Rachel asked Monty, kneeling down and wiping some dust off his overalls. It was an extremely motherly thing to do, and it caught me off guard. Not that I didn’t think Rachel could be a mother. I mean, she had the parts, blah blah blah. I just never envisioned her as mom… mentally. But it was a good look on her. And, in a really strange way, it made her even more attractive to me. Like I need more reasons to be attracted to her.

  Seemingly satisfied, Rachel stood, kissed the top of Monty’s head, and passed him off to me. “You got this, kid,” I said. I put a hand on his shoulder. “Five minutes up, plant the explosives, two minutes down, and one to spare.”

  “I got it, Mr. Flint. Don’t worry about it.”

  “I’m gonna worry, but that’s just part of being an adult, kid.”

  “Just promise me you’ll take care of my mom,” he said, looking over to where several people were lining up the sick.

  “We will, kid. Don’t you worry about her.”

  “That’s part of being a kid,” he replied, then ran toward his mom and give her a kiss goodbye.

  “That’s a damn good kid, right there,” I said.

  “It’s almost as if you like him,” Rachel said, pulling up the MX090 slung under her shoulder.

  “Not nearly as much as I like you with that rifle.”

  Rachel leaned in and kissed me on the cheek. “One of these times, I need that on my lips,” I noted.

  “Post-mission,” she said. “Gotta give you something to stay alive for.”

  “I have plenty of that,” I said, eyeing her up and down.

  “I’m sure you do.”

  “Mr. Flint,” Lars said. “Might I remind you that your window of opportunity to proceed to the ascent chute is diminishing? While no more reinforcements will be coming down from the surface, I cannot control the flow of those who are already subterranean.”

  “Right, pal. I got it.” I winked at Rachel, pulled up my own MX090, then made for the enclave’s exit. As I passed the kid, I yelled, “Monty!”

  He turned from his mom’s cot. “Yes, Mr. Flint?”

  “It’s go time.”

  “See you back at the castle,” the kid said, giving me a salute.

  “Castle?” I looked back at Rachel.

  “It’s old knight stuff,” she said with her hands cupped to her mouth. “It means don’t get killed.”

  Noted.

  “You have precisely twenty-eight seconds to get into the RTV ascent chute,” Lars informed me.

  “So, what you’re saying is that my fat ass needs to pick up the pace,” I replied.

  “Indeed, sir.”

  I sprinted down the corridor toward the port where the long line of RTVs awaited passengers with open doors. Seeing the end of the line, I noticed a large space over the last vehicle—a hole that stretched into blackness far above the pod. I hadn’t noticed it before, but then again, I hadn’t been looking for it either. It was nearly invisible to the naked eye with the way the cavern’s work lights shone down.

  “I see the chute,” I said to Lars.

  “Congratulations, sir.”

  “How much time do I have before—”

  “Hide, sir. Right now.”

  I passed around the far end of the last pod just as six thugs ran around a corner and into view. They’d stowed their electric prods on their backs, brandishing automatic rifles instead.

  “They’re heading for the enclave,” I said in a hushed tone.

  “That’s right, sir. Their standing orders are to secure the miners and prevent any escape. More overseers will be arriving over the next fifteen minutes.”

  “But you have that door locked down, right?”

  “Indeed, sir.”

  “Good. Keep it that way—”

  “Until I give the word,” Rachel said over comms. “And would you get going already, Flint? All this chit chat is making me sick to my stomach.”

  “Pushy, pushy,” I said in a mocking tone. “Alright, Lars. Talk me through this.”

  “According to the schematics, you should see a narrow ascent track inserted in the rock. It should look like a vertical channel with a—”

  “I see it,” I said, running toward the wall hidden in shadow. Sure enough, two metal walls formed a thin channel that stretched up into the darkness.

  “At your feet, you should find a metal grate roughly one meter square. This—”

  “There’s nothing here,” I interrupted.

  “Look more closely, sir. You should see—”

  “I’m telling you, there’s nothing here. All I see is a small rod protruding from the channel down on the ground.”

  “That seems highly unlikely, sir. Why don’t you activate the rail system and bring the platform up. There should be a small recessed control interface to your left.”

  I noticed dingy silver trim around a rectangular control box. I flipped the cover and saw three analogue buttons: two green ones marked Up and Down, and a big red one marked Stop. I pressed the Up button and heard an electric solenoid engage followed by the burst of a motor. That’s when the rod in the channel leaped upward half a meter. I hit Stop.

  “Dammit, Lars!”

  “But, sir, I didn’t do anything.”

  “There’s no platform. Just this godsdammed peg protruding from the channel.”

  There was a momentary pause before Lars replied, “Ah. The platform must have been removed or damaged. Therefore, it seems that your current assessment of there only being a support dowel is correct.”

  “So… you’re telling me I have to ride up on this… this peg?”

  “If you wish to give the vehicles a viable chance of escape, yes. I would send you up the main elevator, of course, but it’s currently surrounded by dozens of angry security guards who are finger raping the call button.”

  Normally, Lars’s attempt at humor would have made me laugh. And, gods, if that wasn’t funny—Rachel was even chuckling over comms. But right now, I was facing the prospect of ascending a gods-knew-how-high chute on the end of a toothpick.

  “Well, this peg is about to finger rape me,” I said, sounding as pissed as I felt, “so can everyone shut up for a second?” I needed to think.

  There was no way I was going to be able to hold on to the rod long enough to get al
l the way up. So that was out. I needed a strap…

  Like the one on my MX090.

  “Sir, might I remind you that you’re running out of time. The starship’s reactor is—”

  “When I need an update on the timeline, I’ll ask, pal.”

  I punched the Up button, and then hit Stop when the peg was just over my head. Then I put both my arms through the strap, bringing the rifle across my chest and under my armpits. I looped the strap over the peg and tested my bodyweight on the makeshift harness. To Oragga’s credit, the weapon didn’t so much as creak. The strap, on the other hand, did.

  “Lars, this may be the stupidest thing I’ve ever done with you,” I said, going on to explain what I’d come up with. But then I remembered the flour bomb on the roof back on Sellion City, and leaping down the elevator shaft, and the dance party we’d created in the cargo bay, and having an entire building slide past me while I dangled on the end of an elevator cable. “On second thought, this is just another day at the office.”

  I punched the Up button.

  The good thing about the chute being shrouded in total darkness was that my fear of heights wasn’t in play. Well, at least as not as much as it would have been had I been able to see everything. All I needed to do was keep myself from looking down where the faint glow of the lower tunnel was getting smaller and fainter by the second.

  I’d been dangling from the peg, racing toward the surface, for more than two minutes. My arms were starting to tremble, and my armpits were going numb. Occasionally, the toes of my boots touched the chute’s stone wall, which kicked my legs out behind me. The first time it happened, I felt the strap jump along the peg a little. I couldn’t see how far it had slipped—it was too dark. But my dark imagination told me it was only a centimeter from sliding off the end.

  “You are arriving at the surface, sir,” Lars said. “The ascent rate should be slowing—”

  The peg started clattering violently as I slowed. The strap moved toward the peg’s end. Afraid that I was about to freefall, I reached up and grabbed the rod with my right hand… and not a moment too soon. Just as my fingers wrapped around the metal shaft, the strap jumped off the end. All my bodyweight jerked down on my aching arm, sending charges of pain through my chest. My entire upper body must have fallen asleep, as it felt like tiny spiders with knives for legs were racing all over my skin.