Cloud Field

by A M Russell

  ‘You what?’ said Oliver from the back, ‘No one I know.’

  ‘I never met anyone who has actually seen one.’ said Marcia from behind my left ear.

  I sipped the drink, ‘What about you Jared?’

  ‘Well… No. Actually I haven’t…’ he stared at me as if he’d had some sudden realisation, ‘I never met anyone who did either, they just talked about others who‘d seen them… odd that.’

  ‘So let me get it straight,’ I said, ‘None of you have ever seen them. And no one you know has ever seen them.’ There were a few moments where the only sound was the faint hiss of the wind from without.

  ‘He’s right,’ said Jared moving suddenly to put his cup down, ‘We are all just accepting something that no one has ever doubted. But none of us have any proof of it.’

  ‘Didn’t Nikolas see them?’ said Marcia.

  ‘He thought he did. But there was always some doubt about that.’ Jared adjusted the visor above his head, ‘We’ll talk again when we find the tunnels. Time to get going.’

  ‘How far now?’ Oliver took the cups and stashed them.

  ‘About an hour at this speed.’ said Jared, ‘No talking now. Unless it navigational. I need to concentrate.’

  An hour and a half later we had reached a set of lumpy hillocks and tufty bushes. It was the landscape from the imagination of a mad cartoonist. Jared stopped and reversed a little way.

  'Do you see that dip to the left?' he asked.

  Yes, I think so.' I said.

  Jared turned adeptly with the use of full steering lock and neat and delicate reversing. With the Buggy it was like being shaken inside a jelly mould. He'd still managed the equivalent of what would be a nine point turn in the big truck with seven swivels in this thing. I was seriously fed up with this part of the journey. Then we entered a deep cut, just wide enough for our space ship on wheels to glide through with six inches clearance on each side. Jared was humming to himself. He skilfully piloted us along the channel. Oliver and Marcia watched through the side windows. I didn't like the proximity of these translucent ice walls, so I concentrated on the road ahead. The visibility was as good as we were likely to get. I looked at my watch; there was perhaps an hour of daylight left, if that. We could see about six to ten feet in front of us. The freezer chill mist of late afternoon had thicker tendril-like patches to it. I felt this strange uneasiness beginning to gather. It had nothing to do with the quality of Jared’s driving; which as I said before was unsurpassed in skill compared to anyone else on the team. No... This was about nothing definite; as insubstantial as the mist itself. I remembered waking; back at my house at three in the morning. What I had been dreaming I didn't recall, but the crawling uneasy atmosphere of some dream made me lay there for ten minutes until it receded and the room looked stupidly normal. Feeling a bit silly then about hiding under my duvet I climbed out and went to the kitchen. I remembered the hot chocolate and that friendly furniture smell of a good house at night. And this.... It was like that in reverse. The friendly warmth was being infected with a creeping sense of malaise; some twitch, some edge of not quite right; that backing track to the film turning into a minor key. The space between me and Jared seemed huge. He checked the temperature gauge.

  'Every five minutes now! Davey!'

  I twitched, startled. I looked at the gauge. I wrote the figure and noted the time next to it on the small clipboard. We appeared to be going faster. But then I realised it was the closing in of the mist that gave the impression we were driving into it at greater speed. Quite suddenly the narrow channel opened out. Jared brought us to an abrupt stop. The walls which had been curving inwards above our heads now enclosed us completely. There was no mistaking it, we were in the caves.

  Jared checked all the gauges. Marcia and Oliver sorted our packs. Jared, after debating the matter with Oliver, decided to turn the Buggy round. The idea I suppose was that we could cram everyone in from the back. That was on the optimistic supposition that we had three more to squeeze in for the return trip to camp. Actually they would fit quite comfortably. I thought though that Hanson’s ego would need extra space to nurse its bruises. I immediately feel guilty about that thought, and focused hard on securing my wrist fastenings.

  ‘All set?’ Marcia asked.

  ‘Yes.’ I said automatically. Jared and Oliver nodded too.

  We cracked the back door seal. There was a sudden momentary rush of chilled air. Jared grinned at me behind his Mouth piece. ‘Ok; let’s do the quick step gang!’ he said, and bounded out of the Buggy with a crazy enthusiasm. Oliver and Marcia secured the Buggy; which was a euphemism for disabling the ignition so that no one else could use it. They checked our “headlights” and our torches and we then made sure the intercoms worked in our headsets. So far, so good.

  ‘I’m leading.’ said Jared, ‘in half an hour we stop and swap positions. Oliver, you’re in rear position. Marcia, Davey in the middle, scan for side tunnels. Everyone… alert the rest of us straight away if you see…. Or think you see any of the tribes men in these tunnels.’ After this well ordered set of instructions we all took our positions without any further comment. We began to walk at a steady and careful pace down what appeared to be a wide slipway. Jared kept the speed up to a fairly brisk walk. I was glad he did. The gauge I carried was reading 30 degrees below freezing, and seemed to be falling. I wasn’t alarmed by this in itself for the moment, but I did need to find out why we appeared to be descending to a region that was colder than up above. Eventually we stopped. We huddled close and decided what to do next.

  ‘Nikolas said that he took a left fork into this incline. It was fairly narrow. We need to be watching the right side of the tunnel to find it.’ Jared pointed the beam of the torch to the right wall. I caught the gleam of some iridescent substance in the light. On closer inspection it proved to be some mineral deposits in wide horizontal bands.

  ‘It’s very cold down here,’ I said, ’there must be some reason for that. I mean; it’s really cold!’

  ‘It could be something to do with the lake.’ said Oliver.

  ‘We must be underneath it by now,' said Marcia, and pointed her torch upwards. More of the beautiful rainbow-like sheen of the minerals.

  ‘There’s been none of the fungus down here.’ I said.

  ‘Not so far,’ said Jared, ’Keep it in mind though. It might by significant if we do see some.’

  ‘In what way?’ I asked

  ‘Everything needs the right conditions to sustain life. I’m betting that we’ll find fungus nearer to where the people are. It was always found in a sheltered spot, with no wind. This tunnel has a flow of air. That must be coming from somewhere. I’m betting there’s machinery down here somewhere.’

  ‘You’ve no proof of that.’ said Oliver.

  ‘What do you think Davey?’ asked Jared.

  I stared at them all for a moment trying to invent something clever to say. Jared was looking intensely thoughtful. ‘Well…’ I said, ‘something could be refrigerating the air down here to a lower temperature. The thing that’s causing it could be manmade, or a natural phenomenon. But since we already know that there are people of some sort down here... I think it’s likely that this is meant to put off anyone from coming in this way. I mean… most vehicles would conk out before it got much colder. So I’m supposing this is a way of slowing up anyone who wants to invade this, err… lair. I guess they wouldn’t think that anyone would be mad enough to walk down here.’

  ‘I guess not.’ said Marcia, ‘Let’s move.’

  We scanned the right wall with care. Oliver kept glancing behind, back the way we’d come. Jared kept a sweep all round, checking the other wall as well. Five minutes later we stopped.

  ‘Do you think that’s it?’ Marcia sounded doubtful.

  We were looking at a gap in the wall. A mere crack, just large enough for a man of Nikolas’ build to squeeze though if he was careful.

  Jared and Oliver examined the edges and inside. ‘It appears to
be wider in there.’ said Oliver.

  ‘Is it our way in though?’ Marcia was inspecting the floor.

  Jared looked at me. ‘Let’s see how warm it is in there. That will tell us if we’re on the right track.’

  I took off my pack. Marcia stood astride it guarding it in a protective way. She shone her torch into the crack. I began to squeeze through. Jared shone his light at my feet, and Oliver pointed his upwards. My legs slid in easily. I held my breath and pressed my torso through. Then I was stuck.

  Jared stood and eased off my headset just while I got through. I then put it back on.

  ‘Ok?’ It was Jared.

  ‘Yes. I’m fine.’

  ‘What do you see?’ I clicked on my torch and scanned round systematically for clues to the viability of a way in to this legendary underworld. Quite a bit of rubble and rocks, and a small passage that indeed did go down with a wider clearance on all sides it was possible to descend. I looked at the gauge, took a step forward.

  ‘Stay where you are,’ said Jared, ‘Just give me the reading.’

  ‘Minus 30 degrees.’

  ‘Ok. Do you see anything that would indicate an object or a person has passed by this place?’

  ‘I can’t see anything. There’s a lot of rubble round here. And the ground is uneven; it would be very hard to tell if anyone had been in here without going deeper in.’

  ‘No. that’s ok.’ there was a pause. I shone my light up above to the ceiling. A lumpy thing that was. This was like a fault line crack that had opened up because of some shift in the rocks round here. I could see more mineral deposits too.

  ‘I think you should come out now.’ said Jared.

  When I had performed the same tricky operation in reverse and was tweaking the straps on my pack back into the correct firm grip round my shoulders, Jared compared the reading and measured the size of the crack in the wall.

  ‘He couldn’t have come this way. The sled that he brought could not have fitted through here.’

  ‘There was a point to it though?’ I asked.

  ‘Of course,’ said Jared, ‘We now know that something is making the air colder out here. I would also suppose that although that isn’t the way through, we are not far away from the right passage. It was five degrees warmer in there.’

  ‘That’s quite a difference.’ said Marcia.

  ‘And one you’d only notice if you had the right equipment… which might mean that we are a: heading in the right direction; or b: heading for trouble.’

  ‘Well who else would be out here, apart from people with the right equipment?’ said Marcia.

  ‘And that my dear…’ said Jared with a determined upbeat tone, ‘...is the right question.’

  ‘So what are we looking for?’ I said really only for the purpose of breaking apart Jared and Marcia’s eye contact.

  ‘Something a bit bigger than that.’ Jared seemed amused with me as we went on our way again.

  ‘At least two and a half feet wide.’ said Oliver, ‘That would be enough for the sled to be shoved through by Nik. It was too heavy for him to do anything but push or drag it. Well…. Joe thought so. It would have taken two to lift it through a smaller gap.’

  I thought of Aiden but didn’t say anything. Plus I was starting to get hungry. We walked on perhaps another four hundred feet, and there quite unmistakably was the passage we were looking for. Oliver examined the ground, while Marcia and Jared inspected the walls. I stepped inside and took readings. A short distance along, about twenty feet, there was a rise in temperature.

  ‘Jared! Take a look at this.’

  ‘Yes. Just a minute.’ Jared was kneeling down peering at something at floor level.

  ‘What is it?’ I went back towards them.

  ‘Not sure…’ Jared reached into one of his tool pockets, ‘Here hold that light will you.’

  Jared prodded gently with his pocket knife. Oliver held the torch steady. We all bent over trying to make out what Jared had spotted in the dirt of the cave floor. I admired Jared’s powers of observation. It set me wondering what he had been back in the world at home, back there. I realised that I’d never asked him. With a little more difficulty Jared has loosened something out of the dirt. A chain. He dug some more and drew it out. And there it was… swinging in space. There was one of those completely peculiar silences that only occur when everything you can think of saying is something that actually doesn’t need to be said.

  Marcia licked her lips and said in a tight little voice: ‘Who did it belong to?’

  Jared examined it closely, found the catch and slid the two halves against each other. Marcia took hold of it, looked at it wordlessly. She turned away then, dropping it back into Jared’s hand. Jared handed it to me. There was the inscription. As Oliver held the light steady I read the tiny engraved script. It began: “Marcia Anne Ellis; Senior Technician; Deputy Leader; Authority Pass Level 6a...”

  ‘But what does this mean?’ I said, and then when no one answered, ‘It must be some sort of trick… They’re trying to trick us…’

  Jared turned away and went to Marcia who was stood a few feet away with her head bowed and her back to us.

  ‘Why would someone leave this here?’ I asked Oliver, ‘We’ve got to get to the bottom of this!’

  Marcia turned around, her eyes gleaming. Jared had his arm around her shoulders.

  ‘Marcia?’ I said, ‘I….’

  ‘Shut up Milnes!’ Oliver growled.

  Jared stared at me, his eyes were hard. He’d pulled his mask to one side. His mouth was set in a line. He regarded me solidly for a moment or two. I felt that I was shrinking inside. I expected some tongue lashing for being insensitive. But all he said was: ‘Tag it and Bag It.’ to Oliver. I handed it over and in two minutes we were on our way again down the smaller tunnel.

  No one spoke for what seemed the longest time. I was reeling from the inability to comprehend this thing that we had found that seemed as if it has been hidden there so we might pick it up. It seemed that all the stories I had heard about people seeing things, and meeting themselves could in fact occur. There must be some centre of this time slippage. I sensed it was here. I might be an Oik, as Marcia had said to me before; but I was gifted with a ready intellect and an overactive imagination. Both which combined would place me in the realms of absolute brilliance and insight; or complete idiocy, and sometimes each by turns. My mother said that the one person I really needed to communicate with was myself. She was right. All those mental notes I immediately forgot. All those moments of clarity with hot chocolate at 4 am. What did they add up to? She said something else as well: it was along the lines that… intelligence is only a starting point. And that one must see the meaning, before one can see the facts. I pondered on this while we picked our way down the tunnel. Alex; bless him was always talking about stuff like that too. “Imagination is not for the Dim wits.” he was rude and completely politically incorrect… but it was about using the mind you had got rather than just relying on the automatic processes of the brain’s logic gates to work it out for you. Alex was uber smart… he just hated to show it. And I was clever enough at least to know that. “I don’t want a place in history, just get me a decent cup of tea.” was one of his favourites when he’d done something especially startling and brilliant. Perhaps, I mused, they’d put me with him to keep the scary freaks all in one place so they could keep an eye on them.

  We came to a junction. Jared pulled his mask back and sniffed. Marcia held his torch and her own steady while Jared and Oliver examined each entrance carefully. I took the readings again. It was so much warmer it was unreal. Only just below freezing. I unclipped my mask and breathed the outer air of the cave. It had a curious quality to it. A taste almost…

  ‘Put it back on!’ said Jared sharply through the headset. He was holding his mask back in place while Marcia helped him clip it back on. He was trembling. I realised that I felt a little breathless and wobbly.

  ‘Have you got it just on the f
ilter?’ Jared asked.

  ‘Yes… yes I have.’ I was having difficulty focusing on the dial in front of me.

  ‘Just switch it to the tank for ten minutes.’ he said.

  I could see Marcia checking his gauge for him. ‘There’s plenty.’ she said.

  Oliver got my mask clipped back on properly, and switched it over for me. I felt the difference immediately.

  ‘So that’s how they did It.’ said Oliver.

  ‘Did what?’ I asked. Still a little breathily.

  ‘Knocked the others out and kidnapped them.’ said Marcia.

  ‘Nikolas didn’t say anything about it.’ I said.

  ‘That’s because he didn’t know.’ said Jared, ‘he had his mask on all the way. He didn’t take any chances. It’s a good job.’

  ‘If that’s true, how on earth did he get captured in the first place?’ I asked. I was breathing easier now, and things began to make a lot of sense.

  ‘They took their equipment off them.’ said Oliver, that’s probably when they fell unconscious. It was easy to cart them off to a cell.’

  ‘We need to rig the sampler in Oliver’s pack to detect this.’ said Jared.

  ‘I should be possible. But we need time and we need to make camp.’ Oliver pressed his hand to his forehead. I think then we all began to get a sense of how tired we all were. I was thinking how late it must be.

  ‘What time is it?’ asked Marcia as if reading my mind.

  ‘Midnight. Well nearly.’ said Oliver.

  ‘We can’t stay here.’ said Jared, ‘we need to find somewhere that isn’t going to kill us in our sleep.’

  ‘With the gas?’ I asked.