by Alex Bratton
Racking his brain for answers, Lincoln hesitated to turn on the light, knowing he would be seen long before he saw anything himself. He shuffled on, looking for any glimmer of light.
“There. More air.” A breeze caressed his face, cooling his sweaty forehead. Lincoln shivered. “It’s suddenly much colder. I bet the temperature just dropped twenty degrees.”
The earth rumbled beneath his feet, sending an unsettling vibration through his chest. The shaking increased until his legs wobbled beneath him. Lincoln grabbed the wall for support, dropping both the flashlight and the phone. They clattered to the stone floor, the sound echoing louder than Lincoln thought it should have. As he fumbled in the dark to find them, the sound of running water echoed from somewhere far away.
A moment of panic and then he found the flashlight at his feet. Once he turned it on, relief rushed through him. The phone lay nearby, undamaged. His hand shook as he swept the light around the vast room. Everything looked the same. The dimly illuminated wall to his right was smooth and unbroken. Everywhere else was darkness.
“Don’t know if the camera picked that up,” he said as he picked up the phone, noting the breathless quality to his voice, “but it was definitely a tremor.”
Lincoln walked all the way around what turned out to be a gaping circular room. Arriving at an opening, he saw his own boot print in the dust, confirming that it was the entrance to Corridor B.
“No doors but this one. No panels, no keypads, nothing. I hear water, but I don’t see it or the source of the breeze. So far, this room has offered no explanation for its existence.”
Lincoln sighed and shone the light around one more time. The earth rumbled again, less violently. The sound of running water ceased, and everything fell completely silent once more. Annoyed, Lincoln turned off the video, left the chamber, and returned to the sign to stare at it, wishing for answers.
He climbed back into the cinderblock tunnel toward the mine entrance. Water splashed softly behind him. Lincoln swung around, holding the flashlight high. Nothing was there. The noise had been so faint he really couldn’t be sure he’d heard anything.
“Hello?” he called into the darkness. “Anybody there?”
Water dripped from the ceiling onto the floor, the rippling puddle reflecting his flashlight. The shadows didn’t move. Lincoln had not expected a reply, but the silence comforted him nonetheless. Shaking his head, he turned and walked to the entrance.
Coughing, Mina opened her eyes. She looked up at the sky, blinking through the window into the sunlight. The Boeing had come to rest at a ninety-degree angle. Why the plane was turned on its side, she couldn’t remember.
Slowly, fear replaced her confusion. She remembered. Something had exploded. Was it her plane? Already, smoke clouded the window.
Mina hung cinched at her waist by her seatbelt. When she coughed, it dug deeper into her abdomen, sending a twinge of pain through her body. The two seats next to hers were empty, their blue seatbelts swinging gently in the air toward the middle row.
Directly below, a woman dangled lifelessly from the row of seats with her arm caught between them, her feet pointing toward the far side of the cabin. She swung a little, too, like the seatbelts.
Below the woman’s feet, an orange glow crept along the other side of the plane, near the ground. Smoke was beginning to drift through the cabin. Mina waved it away. It mocked her attempt, sliding through her fingers into her eyes and mouth. The force of her next cough sent more dull aches through her head, and Mina closed her eyes, wishing for nothing except sleep. But an overwhelming desire to free herself gripped her. Without a doubt, if she didn’t get out, she would be trapped.
She groped for the seatbelt release and pulled, tumbling down into the aisle seat of the middle section. New pain shot through her side. As she tried to catch her breath, the plane shuddered and tilted. Mina gripped the armrest, but the floor dropped away, and her fingers slipped. She bounced against the aisle as the plane settled upright with a great crash. More pain.
An overhead bin opened, spewing suitcases and bags around the cabin. Mina covered her head as a heavy bag landed on top of her. She pushed it off and stared upward into the smoke. She couldn’t seem to get enough air into her lungs. The cabin was growing hotter, too. She coughed again and rubbed her eyes against the grit scratching them like sandpaper. Mina’s hand came away with blood, but she didn’t think it was hers because she couldn’t feel a cut anywhere on her head.
She should be doing something, not lying on the floor.
Get out. The thought broke her trance. Smoke. Fire. She couldn’t stay where she was.
As soon as she made up her mind, the funnel of smoke grew thicker, and waves of heat radiated through the cabin. Screams sounded over the roar of the fire. Mina coughed again. Her head swam, and she covered her nose and mouth with her coat. Time to move.
She put her hand on an armrest to pull herself up. Another hand caught her arm in a strong grip. Mina panicked and fought to get away. It released her, and she turned to look. A man slumped over into the aisle from the row behind, still buckled in. Blood covered his face. He looked as if he had used all his strength to grab her arm.
Desperately, knowing her time was limited, Mina found his seatbelt and unclasped it. She tugged the man down into the aisle out of the densest smoke. His body fell onto hers, dead weight. Mina struggled to untangle herself, pushing on his shoulder, but she couldn’t get any leverage. As her situation became clear, the panic rose anew in her throat. She was trapped.
The fire raged now. Its roar intensified, overpowering everything else, drowning out even the screams. Frantic, Mina looked for a break in the seats to her left. The exit would be there somewhere. She had been sitting two rows behind it.
It had to be there. If only she could reach it.
She punched the man’s shoulder to wake him. “Hey!” she yelled. He stirred. “Hey!”
He roused himself then moved off of her, jamming his body against the seats so she could slide out from under him. He rose on all fours, head down toward the floor. A gash just above his eye still bled profusely.
Mina shook his shoulder again as hard as she could. “You can’t stay here!”
You can’t stay here.
The smoke had turned the cabin into a dark, ominous haze. The air was thick with ash.
A strip of something reflected the firelight. Did it mark the exit? Mina reached for it but began coughing so forcefully she had to close her eyes to concentrate on breathing. The choking only grew worse. Could she literally cough up a lung? Because that’s exactly what she felt like was happening. Funny the things that came to mind in a crisis situation. Mina vaguely wondered if she were in shock. She should have cared more about what was happening to her.
While she fought to breathe, the intense heat overcame her. Mina choked, her ribs almost cracking with the force of her cough. Her legs and arms wouldn’t respond like they should have. They felt heavy, burdened. She laid her head on the floor as smoke drifted over the reflective strip.
I can’t stay here.
Mina’s eyelids sagged, seeking relief from the fumes, but her eyes still burned, her lungs too. As her body succumbed to the smoke, her fear mounted. She didn’t want to die like this. She didn’t even know what had happened.
Seats moved. In a surreal, dream-like way, Mina sensed them sinking below her. The sound of metal twisting onto more metal mixed with the roar of the fire. A great rush of air whirled around her, billowing smoke through the cabin and whipping hair into her face. Then, the roaring disappeared, and her hearing went dull.
Once outside the mine, Lincoln made his way back to the convoy. Trees grew in a straight line bordering the old railroad. The rails had long since been removed, leaving an easy path through the woods near the mine. While Lincoln had been in the tunnels, the Army had constructed a temporary camp away from the service road, under the cover of the trees at the mountain’s base. The afternoon sun shone weakly in the pale sky.
Lincoln sighed. He’d been disappointed to learn they would be camping. All Lincoln wanted now was a hot shower and a soft bed. Instead, he would be in a sleeping bag inside a tiny bivouac. No doubt his feet would hang out the end of it.
Corporal Schmidt hurried toward Lincoln. The soldier’s fresh, boyish face contrasted sharply with the large gun at his hip. He’d dogged Lincoln ever since they had left APV, asking questions as soon as Lincoln woke in the dark Humvee. Lincoln shouldn’t have been annoyed, but he was. He was tired, too, ready to find his tent and set it up.
“Schmidt, does my team know that the colonel ordered blackout tonight? No campfires, flashlights, cigs, nothing after twilight.”
“Yes, sir. They know. He’s waiting for you.”
Lincoln sighed. He was in no mood to deal with Nash.
“He was pissed when you went down there without him.”
“Yeah, I figured.” Lincoln checked his phone, hoping for a signal. It was dead. Great. “Be right there.”
A man swore loudly from somewhere in the sea of green tents. Nash. Why did the colonel irritate Lincoln? He barely knew the guy.
Lincoln hurried to the tent anyway. Maybe they had news of Cummings and the experts he was sending. After seeing the mine, Lincoln hoped they would get more guidance about why they were here.
“Surrey!” Nash said when Lincoln arrived at his tent. He held a stack of papers in one hand. “You can’t follow one simple order. I told you to wait to go into that mine!”
“I just went to check it out.”
“You could have run into trouble.”
“I didn’t, though, and you could have had my designated shadow follow me in.”
“By the time Schmidt realized you were gone, we couldn’t. That place is a labyrinth. It’s lucky you took the only map, isn’t it?” Clearly irritated, Nash tossed his papers down onto a camp chair.
“Obviously, I needed it, or you wouldn’t have given it to me,” Lincoln said, his own irritation returning. “Anyway, it was a bust. The only open room was too big to see with just a flashlight. Cummings didn’t tell you anything about it? What are we looking for exactly?”
“We’re awaiting further orders. What’s so important that you risked getting trapped down there to go see?”
Lincoln shrugged, thinking of the video in his pocket.
“From now on,” Nash said hotly, “you do as I say. This is my op. I won’t have anyone die out here simply because they were too stupid to follow the rules. Got it?”
Even though Lincoln was annoyed, he didn’t want to argue. Swallowing his pride, he settled for a curt nod.
Nash walked over to a small table and picked up a black semiautomatic in a plain holster. “Do you know how to use one of these?”
“I do. Is it necessary I have one?”
“It’s not standard procedure, but considering the circumstances, I’d feel better if your team was armed.”
“Expecting trouble?”
“Trouble usually finds you when you’re not expecting it.” He trained his steely eyes on Lincoln. “We should have heard from them by now.”
“Cummings?”
“Anybody.” He paused to let his words sink in.
Lincoln rubbed his eyes, which burned with exhaustion. “What does that have to do with me carrying a gun, sir?”
“We don’t know what’s going to happen.” Nash held out the sidearm.
Lincoln took the gun and clipped it to his belt, moving his phone to the other hip. Great, I’m a gun-toting engineer.
“Have Schmidt review basic safety protocol with you. What about the others?”
Lincoln shook his head. “I don’t think they have much experience with firearms.”
“Just you, then.” Nash crossed the tent, opened the flap, and held it for Lincoln. “Word of advice. Having a gun doesn’t mean you should go off on your own. If you can’t follow orders, you’ll be out.”
Lincoln paused to face Nash. The man’s piercing blue eyes reminded Lincoln of his father but a stronger version of him. Before his father died, he had been frail and weak from the cancer that had attacked his body.
Why was Lincoln thinking of his father right now?
“You need me,” he said to Nash.
Nash frowned. “Maybe.”
Schmidt waited outside the tent. Lincoln had hoped he would remain behind, but the kid followed him back to the base of the tree where Lincoln had piled his gear. He rummaged through the bags, looking for his phone charger. Thankfully, Schmidt seemed through with asking questions for now.
Nash had some nerve. If Lincoln’s team was to help at all, they needed to know everything they could about this place. He was glad he’d had the presence of mind to get the video. But what are we going to do in that mine?
Lincoln tossed his tent at Schmidt. “We need to camp away from Nash.”
“Yes, sir. Thinking of sneaking off again?” Schmidt looked worried.
“Heh. No, but I can already tell that we’ll all get along much better if we keep our distance.” Lincoln was thinking of Nelson. “Hey, and, Schmidt, when you’re finished, I don’t need anything else.”
Schmidt trotted off, eager to please or to get away. Lincoln didn’t care which. His irritation grew by the minute. The ARCHIE facility had provided no clues or help thus far. He wished Cummings had told him exactly what he was supposed to find useful. There was nothing in there to help him write a program to communicate with the aliens.
Having found his charger, Lincoln pulled his brown leather messenger bag across his body and the straps of the Army green duffel and sleeping bags over one shoulder.
“Lincoln!” Alvarez jogged toward him. She wore odd layers to ward off the cold spring air, a plaid sweater over jeans and a beige jacket that flapped out ridiculously beneath the camouflage Army jacket Schmidt had loaned her on the road.
Two soldiers sped through the trees in a lightweight all-terrain vehicle that sounded like a buzz saw. Alvarez paused, waiting for them to pass. As she watched, the ATV sputtered and rolled to a halt fifty yards away.
“Did you find something?” Lincoln asked.
“Check your phone.”
“Can’t. It’s dead. What’s up?”
“I sent you the topographical map, but I have the paper copy.” Alvarez fished an elevation map out of her pocket and handed it to Lincoln. She pulled her jacket closer around her before speaking. “Without the right equipment, it’s hard to tell. We thought something looked odd when we were driving in, so we pulled out the maps while you were in the tunnels. The mountain is shaped like a cone.” Alvarez’s voice rose slightly.
“What?”
“An upside-down cone.”
“How is that possible?”
The two soldiers with the ATV opened the hood. One fiddled with the buttons on his radio.
“Looks like they broke down,” Alvarez said.
“Yeah.”
Lincoln and Alvarez walked over to the other members of the team, who had their gear spread out on rocks under a tree. Carter sketched something in the small leather book he always carried with him while Nelson pulled the battery cover off his laptop.
“What’s wrong with your laptop?” Lincoln asked.
Nelson pulled out the battery. “It died just after I sent you the map.”
“You can charge it with my portable battery. I have it with me.” Lincoln opened his messenger bag.
“No. I had a full battery. Must be something else.”
Alvarez sat down to fish a rock out of her shoe. “I was just telling Lincoln about the map.”
Carter opened the map, spreading it out on the rock for Lincoln. He lit a cigarette from the dwindling pack in his pocket. “If you look at the mountain, starting with the base,” he said, “you’ll see it's a circle. From there, the elevation changes regularly in concentric circles rising to the peak, which is directly over the center.”
Carter handed Lincoln his sketchbook where he’d drawn a three-
dimensional representation that mimicked the elevation map. The mountain did indeed look like a cone.
Lincoln examined the sketch. “Is this accurate? I was only gone a couple of hours.”
“Yeah, about that,” said Carter. “Next time you go exploring, Indiana, you should take your team with you.”
“There wasn’t time to come get you. I just slipped off while Smith wasn’t looking. Oh! I got video, too. I’ll show you if I can get my phone charged.”
“Uh huh,” said Nelson, separating the CPU from the motherboard. He swore. “Circuits are completely fried.”
Carter walked over to peer at Nelson’s laptop. “Huh. What do you think would have caused that?”
“I would’ve taken you with me,” Lincoln continued, “except I was being watched.”
“Relax, Lincoln, we know,” Alvarez said.
“There he is,” Lincoln said, looking over to the edge of camp where Schmidt was watching them.
Nelson smirked. “He’s just a groupie.”
“Or a spy-in-training,” Carter added.
Lincoln flipped through the sketches. “More importantly, why is this mountain shaped like a cone? And is there any way to verify and measure it?”
“Don’t know,” said Alvarez, shaking her head. “We aren’t equipped for that kind of analysis. You’ll have to ask Nash if they can do it, but have we considered it’s for communication? That’s what we’re out here for, right? Maybe ARCHIE built it as some sort of signal conductor.”
“Built the mountain?” Nelson looked up from his dismantled laptop. “Do you hear yourself?”
“Last week, I would have said it was crazy. Today, we have hostile alien towers positioned in every major city across the globe, so it’s not a stretch to assume a lot of impossible things are now possible.”
“Or maybe we’re all going nuts,” Lincoln said. “Hallucinating. Tomorrow morning, I’ll wake up in bed and realize I dreamed the whole thing.”
“The math doesn’t lie,” Alvarez said.