Quagmire's Gate

by Allan E Petersen

  Hoping for the best, she turned around to face hell. Clearly, the deal she had struck was not working. The floor was quickly falling into the hole and cornering her in a horseshoe shaped trap. The only place she could run, the only solid world left was the wall behind her. Staying put was no longer an option. Panic forced her to turn back to the computer and repeatedly stab the ‘send’ button. Knowing that was all she could do, she conceded defeat and ran to the only place she could, the far corner of the living room. The escape was well timed. Just as she lifted her foot, the floor under her disappeared, as did the computer.

  With her back pressed against the wall, she looked up to see the ceiling crack and light up like a fireworks display. Just a few feet from her, it crashed down and disappeared into the depth of hell. She looked up into the empty sky, up into what she hoped was heaven.

  There was only one option left, only one thing to do. It was something she had not done since the death of her husband. She communicated with God. It was not a plea to save her or even to tell Jeff she forgave him his folly, his refusal to heed her plea not to fly that day. She prayed that whoever sent the message was listening. In the distance, the panorama of tranquil mountains and desert afforded little comfort to impending death. The creeping hole was inches from her toes. The roar of splintering wood and thunder of anti-matter was deafening. She swore she could hear the crunching of savoring teeth.

  She closed her eyes and mumbled her final prayer.

  “Thank you God for the life you have given me. Please look after my daughter who I love so much and please make her understand that missing her father was not a rejection of her, that I miss her equally. Please forgive me for hating you. I forgive you for taking my husband from me. Please God take me to heaven.”

  When something hit her in the face, she opened her eyes to see a dangling rope. A rope? Was this God’s way of lifting souls to heaven? No, she could not believe that the way to heaven was by climbing a rope. Her eyes followed the rope upward and saw her ever-faithful savior had somehow managed to get up there and throw her a lifeline. Raymond yelled down to her,

  “Hurry! It doesn’t look good from up here either.”

  With the help of the rope and Raymond’s struggle to pull, she was able to scamper up beside him. At the top of the wall, Raymond was busy pulling the rest of the rope back up. They needed it to climb down the other side of the wall to safety. As he was pulling it up, Lynda looked at him and smiled. He looked back and blushed at the silent compliment of a brave job well done. She said,

  “Saving the world didn’t work as I had hoped so best you hurry with that rope.”

  With both precariously clinging atop a crumbling wall, Lynda turned from Raymond and looked out toward the distant mountains. From this height, she saw the running dots of Terri and the others getting smaller and smaller. She looked down to the safety of the ground and contemplated jumping but it was too high. As long as Raymond hurried with the rope, there might still be time to get out of this predicament.

  When Raymond finished pulling up the rope, he let out a very concerned gasp. Wondering what else could possibly go wrong, she tore her eyes away from the running Terri and looked to him. His expression was one of hopelessness mixed with sorrow. His painful eyes looked down at his hands and she followed the direction. Anti-matter had run up the rope like a burning fuse racing to the dynamite. She saw that his fingertips were disappearing. With her eyes locked to his, both understood it was a flame that could not be extinguished. There was nothing to cut his arm off with. Judging from Raymond’s overwhelming blank expression, he knew the result of his cruel fate. With their eyes locked, Lynda whispered an inadequate regret,

  “I’m so sorry Raymond.”

  It seemed insufficient. What good are words now? What do you say to a dying man who in the span of only a few minutes had saved your life not once but twice?

  His arm was now gone. He smiled and said,

  “We were a good team weren’t we?”

  She forced a compassionate reply past the lump in her throat.

  “Yes Raymond. You are the bravest man I have ever met.”

  Although his eyes were filled with the horror of an imminent death, he smiled. With the acknowledgement that he was ‘a brave man’, he raised his other arm and five fingers meekly waved goodbye. When that ‘true soul’ smile she had always admired beamed wide, he leaned into the anti-matter stream and fell into it. Lynda did not have the heart to look down and see him scatter into nothing.

  She was quick to understand the cruelty of her situation. This was not the time for mournful thoughts or a quick prayer. If she lived, she made a quick and silent promise to honor his bravery later. Escape was the only thing coming to mind and as it turned out it was very good advice. Without consideration to safety or broken bones, she jumped from the wall and crashed to the ground far below.

  Thank goodness the ground was solid. It was in her fall that she had a quick thought of crashing through a thin crust following Raymond to his fate. Just as she hit the ground, the wall leaned into the anti-matter stream and started to break up. As she struggled to stand, she watched as the wall disappeared faster than a flame blown out on a candle. Only for a brief second she stood there stunned, held prisoner by the horror of the past few minutes. A thought slammed into her. Run you fool! Fast feet obeyed the command.

  Unfortunately too much had happened in the past hour. After only a short distance, exhaustion turned her legs to rubber and she collapsed. She lay on the ground gasping for breath unable to pump in enough air to satisfy demanding lungs. Bolts of pain ran through her spent body. At this point, she was too fatigued to get up and run. With a body drained of energy and a soul already halfway to heaven, there was now room in her body for surrender to death.

  Sitting up and facing what was charging toward her, she looked up into a strangely serene azure sky. She thought of the times she was in her office and bored stiff from nothing to do. She remembered praying for something to happen, anything. With the encroaching death now inches from her feet, it was not the time for her to start laughing, but she did. The contrast struck her funny. She now wished that she could once again be bored to tears.

  Suddenly she felt a jolt under both arms. In one heave, she was abruptly on her feet. Confused, she turned around to see Terri pulling her away from the edge. Recognizing the foolish attempt to save her, Lynda instinctively tried to push Terri away while saying,

  “No honey, no. I can’t move.”

  Already having lost her dad, Terri was not about to lose her mom. However, strength greatly augmented by panic was still not enough to drag an exhausted body to safety. Lynda looked into the determined eyes of her daughter and struggled to say,

  “It’s too late. Run, run!”

  Terri saw that her mother was right. The stampeding death was now only inches from their feet. The thought of leaving her mother to die while she ran away was something she could not reconcile. Now, instead of pulling at her exhausted mom, Terri hugged her tight and prayed. At least now, they would be together, wherever that was going to be.

  Looking down at the advancing hole, waiting for it to happen, Terri heard somebody yell her name. She turned to see Whelan in the distance running as fast as he could toward them. She judged his distance against the speed of the anti-matter and knew he would not reach them in time. She held her mom tighter and closed her eyes.

  She again heard Whelan yelling at her to hurry. Judging from his voice, he was much closer. That was when she realized they should be dead by now. Wiping tears from her eyes, she looked down and saw that somehow the invasion of death had stopped at her shoes. An exhausted Lynda looked to the halted crater and instead of relieved to be alive, she laughed. The danger may have gone but Whelan was not taking any chances. He grabbed both and pulled them away from the precipice.

  All three stood stunned looking into the vast gorge with no bottom. It was surreal to grasp what should be impossible. It was easily two hundred yards acro
ss. All the apartments where gone. All the stores and the streets leading to and from the various buildings were also gone. There was nothing left of the complex above ground or below it. She wondered if the Professor was right. Did it go through the center of the earth? She hoped that a city was not on the other side. Her exhausted mind could not fathom it. The one thing that was clearly real, either by the hand of God or a benevolent fate, the invasion of the anti-matter was over.

  Chapter 32

  After a frantic day of a wild river of emotions running through her, Lynda was not sure how long they stood there staring into the impossible hole of death. Whelan finally tore his eyes away when hearing something behind them. Turning around he saw what he thought was all the staff of Deep Lab 6 coming forward to see the damage. As they got closer and saw the result of tampering with a science not understood, murmurs and sounds of disbelief filled the air.

  Terri and Lynda watched as the stunned crowd gathered at the edge of the crater. While holding hands, something they had not done in a long time, Terri felt something different about her mother. Something suppressed for a very long time had surfaced. It was something she had missed and was glad to feel again. She looked to her mother and said,

  “Mom, I was so scared I thought I lost you.”

  Lynda smiled and said,

  “No honey, we Aussies are too smart to fall into a hole. Besides, somebody had to run back and save the world. It just made sense that it should be an Aussie.”

  They embraced and remained locked together for a long time. Lynda felt her daughter’s love and greatly relished in it. Not since Terri lost her father had she gotten a hug from her daughter. With arms locked around each other, the trauma of the past few hours became nothing more than a fleeting moment all but forgotten.

  When Terri suddenly broke the look between them, Lynda knew right away that something was wrong. Questioning the sudden onslaught of gloom, she put her hand under Terri’s chin and gently forced her head up. With eyes locked, she asked,

  “What is it honey?”

  Lynda heard slow words filled with emotion.

  “When we were all running away from the hole I looked back and saw that you had turned around. I saw you running back and did not know why you were doing something so irresponsible. All this talk back there about another world, another place, I got confused and thought you were running back to be with dad. I was going to run after you but Whelan grabbed me by the arm and pulled me back.”

  Lynda looked to Whelan who was listening and nodding. Terri continued,

  “I thought you had chosen to be with dad and not wanting to be with me. That’s when something inside me yelled out that I hated you.”

  What Terri said next cut into Lynda’s heart as surly as a cold dagger.

  “That day, when dad left to fly his airplane, I was in the kitchen and heard you yell that you hated him.”

  Lynda tried to defend long forgotten words. She shook her head and started to explain, but Terri continued.

  “For all these years I thought I was also supposed to hate dad for leaving us. As hard as I tried to copy your feelings, the more confused I got. I love dad. It just did not feel right to hate him for dying. Ever since then, I hated you for yelling those hateful words at him. I hated that those were the last words he heard you say to him.”

  Again, Lynda tried to explain,

  “No, honey, no. I love your father. Even to this day, I still love and miss him.”

  However, Terri was too intent on releasing years of confusion and did not hear her mother’s defense. She continued,

  “When Whelan pulled me back and heard me yell after you, he said that I didn’t mean that. When I realized that he was right, I in turn suddenly understood your emotion when dad left. I now finally understood how you could yell those things at him but not mean it.”

  After a sniffle, Lynda found the strength to say,

  “It only took a hole through the center of the earth for us to finally understand that we both suffered greatly and dearly miss him.”

  Terri slowly nodded. After a deep gasp to gain control she took mom’s hand and said,

  “I never once thought I would be without a dad. But you know mom, I never blamed dad for going out that day and not coming back.”

  Lynda confessed,

  “Until now, I did. I better understood my feelings about that day now. You are right. It was wrong of me to hate him for leaving and not coming back.”

  During a long hug, Lynda looked to Whelan, who had heard every word. He was smiling, obviously pleased that mother and daughter had reconciled. For a reason that she did not understand, Lynda released Terri and suddenly embraced a startled Whelan. He did not object. For Lynda, it felt good to wrap her arms around a man once again. Too good.

  Suddenly recognizing that she might have acted inappropriately, she started to pull away. She wanted to but Whelan’s grip was too strong. He looked to Terri who was now glowing in the same shade of red as her mother. When he finally released her, she did not step away. Looking to Terri, Whelan asked,

  “I kind of liked that. Is it all right if I hug your mother again?”

  Terri attempted to indicate with both hands to go ahead, give her another one. However, her arms did not work properly, simply fluttering in the breeze. After an embarrassing attempt to voice her consent, all she could manage was a silly nod of approval. Because Lynda was still pressing into him, it was easy to wrap his strong arms around her again. Whelan smiled at Terri and said,

  “There’s a lot of your mom in you isn’t there?”

  As awkward as the first hug felt for Lynda, this one seemed different. The only reason she broke away was because of what Terri said,

  “It’s about time you got close to another man.”

  Chapter 33

  People had gathered in small groups to discuss various reasons for what had happened while others stepped dangerously close to the edge of the abyss. Suddenly a bolt of sizzling electricity crackled through Lynda’s hand and for a brief second it felt like anti-matter had somehow found her after all. It was only Whelan’s hand gently taking hers into his. After what seemed like a very long time of holding hands and just staring across the vastness of the crater, Whelan said,

  “Are you going to finally tell me what you did to stop it?”

  He was surprised at her reply.

  “I didn’t do anything to stop it.”

  Because she was enjoying the physical contact of his hand in hers, she felt that as long as she was talking he would not let go. For that very reason he got the long drawn out version of how everything fell into place upon seeing the little alien girl in the lab. It was then the message on her computer made sense. How Deep Lab 6 came upon the saucer was a mystery to her and she was sure to Whelan as well. She chastised herself for not realizing that there must have been a pilot involved in the recovery of the ship. The female alien was the pilot and whoever she belonged to wanted her back.”

  She then looked at Terri and added,

  “Who wouldn’t want a daughter back into the family?”

  Whelan asked,

  “So you’re telling me whoever sent you that message somehow reversed the effect of the anti-matter in trade for the girl.”

  “Yes and I don’t believe there is much of a mystery about who they are.”

  Whelan turned around to see the Professor was listening to every word. There seemed to be an appeasement about the Professor, a realization that he was sadly and forever trapped in this dimension. The Professor slowly said,

  “Why would it surprise anybody that there might be intelligent life somewhere other than on this planet? Did you not have the proof of it in the craft they came in? Did you suppose it came here all by itself, without a crew or pilot? Are you naive enough to think she was the only alien in the craft?”

  Lynda snapped to Whelan and asked,

  “Was there a crew onboard when you found it?”

  His innocent shrug indicated that she
was right to assume he knew nothing of how the saucer came to Deep Lab 6. She asked,