Doomsday Minus One

by Andrew Dorn

  “Thank you again, Captain, for your hospitality,” Emmeline said.

  “We seldom get passengers but when we do, we like to splurge.” Ballard said. He slid open a plastic cooler, like those people took on picnics or to the beach, and pulled out a water bottle. “There is no galley on this bird, but we have food stored in the back and beverages which we keep up front. Care for some water or soft drink?”

  “Water will be fine, thank you.”

  Ballard handed her the bottle. “If you are hungry, just open the locker on your right,” he jerked his head backwards. “And you’ll find snacks, muffins, even microwaveable dinners.”

  “Thank you, Captain.”

  Emmeline retreated into the passenger area, found the locker and picked an apple from a plastic bin filled with assorted fruits. She had been hungry for hours, the butter croissant she had devoured en route to the airport, insufficient in sustaining her for the long flight.

  Biting into the crunchy apple, she was at once transported back to those early autumn days when as a kid she would go, accompanied by her parents, to the orchards and pluck the fruit right out of the tree. It was always magical to her, how nature had evolved to let such magic to occur. Earth’s biome was a marvelous system, unique, perhaps, in the entire Universe. It made her curious about how it all worked, spurring her to go to school to study the magic beneath it all.

  And she had not been disappointed.

  Biology had been in her veins for as long as she could remember. From high school to university, she had never wanted to be anything else but a Biologist. The path had been natural for her to take. With the support of caring parents, her mom was a nurse and her dad a mechanical engineer, she had breezed through her studies without hiccups and graduated with honor from University of Toronto.

  “Emmeline, you might want to see this.”

  The Starwind was flying low over a carpet of pine trees, its verdant greenness unrivalled in scope, filling out the view all the way to the horizon. There was a ragged line making its way amid the endless trees, disappearing from the view as the craft crossed over the ancient mountains dotting the landscape.

  So that’s the road I would have used.

  Emmeline realized how difficult the drive to the mine would have been. The road, if one could call it that, was used by big trucks and its winding path over and around the hills meant only experienced drivers need apply. Risks of damaging a wheel in one of the countless potholes were real enough, and when you found yourself 100 kilometers from anything resembling a village, things could go south real quick.

  The low clouds had turned into a flotilla of bloated cotton balls as they approached the mine, and droplets of rain spattered against the windows of the flight deck.

  “There’s our destination,” Ballard said.

  At first, Emmeline could not distinguish the layout of the mine but as the trees ceded to low bushes then to a wide tract of intermittent shrubs, she noticed the low buildings encircling a much larger one, which she figured was where operations took place.

  She recognized the habitat modules from her stint with the USGS, but these seemed even more battered than usual. Gould had not specified how long her mission would last, but she reckoned only a few days would be necessary to get to the bottom of the problem.

  The Starwind flew over the modules and towards a space cleared out for her arrival. The landing plateau, though bordered by trees, was large enough to accommodate her, and a small team of men was at the ready, prepping the guy wires, which would hold down the lighter-than-air craft for the duration of her stay.

  “What would happen, Captain...,” Emmeline began, curious despite herself. She still had those vivid images of an airship, ancient compared to this one, but similar, bursting apart in flames, its hull ravaged by an inferno while passengers jumped to escape death.

  “If we had a problem like the Hindenburg?” Ballard finished.

  Emmeline nodded.

  “The Starwind was built with safety in mind and using materials not even dreamed of at the time of the Hindenburg. The hull is made of Vectran, high strength fibers spun from liquid crystal polymer, similar to Kevlar, and reinforced with carbon fiber to give it an overall rigidity way beyond the aluminum structure of its ancient brethren.” His eyes turned a darker shade of blue as he peered out at the clearing. “The Hindenburg used hydrogen instead of helium because there was a US ban of the gas. The disaster might have been avoided if helium had been used.”

  “It’s too bad people still have the notion airships aren’t safe because of that incident,” Emmeline said, locking eyes with the captain.

  “Yes, it is. These ships are safe and can be useful for a variety of tasks. An example: in February, we brought much needed medicine and supplies to Yellowknife communities, cut off when the ice roads were closed because of an unseasonal winter.”

  “You don’t have to convince me, captain,” Emmeline said with a smile. “As I said earlier, I love your ship!”

  Ballard returned the smile.

  “Sorry about the rant. I can be testy when discussing the merits of airships.”

  “Captain, we are go to land,” Penney said, indicating a flashing green icon in the center of the display.

  “Ok, then. Let’s park this bird.”

  The Starwind’s engine nacelles pivoted 90 degrees, and the craft slowed to a crawl.

  “We have a side cross wind of 1.7 knots, Captain,” Penney said, craning his head to look at the approaching ground.

  “Perfect, this will be easy as pie.”

  The huge craft descended in the clearing, the buzz of its engines getting louder as the craft hovered and positioned itself.

  From her vantage point on the flight deck, Emmeline watched with interest as the pilots eased the giant craft lower and lower, the line of trees in the distance becoming an artificial horizon as the ship went down. There was a soft chime as the engines were shut down, followed by the muffled sound of the outside world.

  “Welcome to Wachibou,” Ballard said, unbuckling his seat belt.

  “We’ve landed?” Emmeline said, astonished by the absence of vibration or noise from the contact with the ground.

  “Yes, kinda. We are hovering a meter off the ground. I’m afraid you will have to use a good old ladder to reach terra firma.”

  Emmeline stared at Ballard with uncertainty, wondering if the pilot was pulling her leg but when he opened the side hatch and unfurled the rope ladder, she realized the Starwind was still in the air, the underside of the freight container about an arm’s length away from the ground.

  “Ladies first,” Ballard said, as he held the hatch open for her.

  Good thing I’m not wearing high heels.

  Emmeline grabbed the first rung of the ladder and a minute later was standing underneath the looming behemoth.

  “Ms. Brochu?” A man sporting an LTI-branded baseball cap thrust his hand out. “I’m Frank Curtis, manager of this operation.”

  Emmeline shook hands with the man.

  “Did you have a good flight?”

  Emmeline looked up to the two men waving at her from the windows of the flight deck.

  She waved back with a big grin.

  “The best.”

  5 First Steps

  “OK GUYS, WE are good to go. You can start up the drill,” Simon Macomber said.

  “Understood,” Gerry replied.

  The engineer made sure the drilling pattern marked on the surface was in order and, satisfied, raised his thumb. Arturo Vazquez, a short but stocky experienced miner from Mexico, flipped a switch and powered up the machine. The work needed experience and accuracy and Vazquez was Wachibou’s most skillful operator. The three men were standing at the deep end of level 16; where the anomaly had been discovered.

  Margaret Gould had suspended operations until the irregularity was dealt with. The plan called for them to chip away the rock and prepare the site for further analysis. Simon had requested new equipment, which Gould promise
d would arrive with the next resupply.

  In the meantime, Frank Curtis would provide assistance and perform much-needed maintenance of the machinery, a task put aside during the last hectic months of exploitation.

  “Take it slow, mi amigo,” Gerry said.

  Arturo nodded. Adjusting out of habit his hardhat and safety glasses, he hefted the air drill from its dock and walked out to the wall bathed in the harsh glow of the work lamps. He positioned the drill to the hard surface and pressed a button. The machine burrowed a hole the size of an orange into the rock as smoothly as a heat-conducting spoon into ice cream. Soon the grid Gerry had drawn began to look like swiss cheese under Arturo’s precise handling. The fragments of rock, which fell to the ground in compact heaps, were scooped up by two low riding and battered machines, called SAD’s. The Smart Autonomous Dumpsters worked as a team, hauling the debris out of the tunnel and up to the surface where a SmartDozer stood by to bulldoze the gravel in a corner of the mine’s vast lot.

  Simon tapped Gerry on the shoulder and gestured he wished to talk. The noise from the drill made conversation impossible, and both men withdrew to the locker area, 20 meters away.

  “Everything ok?” Simon asked.

  “Yes,” Gerry answered, removing his helmet.

  “I want to be informed if you face any problems.”

  “No problem.” He cleared his throat. “Huh, can I ask you a question?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Does it bother you Management got someone else to deal with this thing?”

  Simon shook his head. “No.” Gould had appointed a special Scientific Adviser, someone named Brochu, to assist and oversee the operation. “In fact, I think we need all the brainpower we can have at our disposal.”

  “How so?”

  “Well... I still have no idea what this anomaly is, and it disturbs me, to tell the truth.”

  He mopped his forehead with the cuff of his shirt. It was close to suffocating in the cramped tunnel. He had such a hard time with the heat, always had. He glanced at Gerry with envy: the guy didn’t even break a sweat.

  “I need you to be careful with this. Don’t rush. We need to carve away the rock like a dentist does with cavities. We have to be attentive and we don’t want accidents. Once Brochu gets here, then we’ll work with her to figure out an approach to get a proper sample. Understood?”

  Gerry picked up his hat. “Got you.”

  He watched him leave. Gerry was a smart man and would do his best to keep everything in line. Simon turned on his heels and made his way to the Maintenance shed. With Curtis’ help, he had cleaned out a corner and converted it into a makeshift office. It was way more cramped than the main room at the surface but he needed to be closer to the action, just in case something showed up that required his attention. Besides, he was sure Brochu would approve the idea, if she didn’t mind the heat or the lack of creature comforts.

  He slumped into an old office chair and took out a timeworn Moleskin notebook. Grabbing a pen from a cup adorned with a long-faded logo of the Montreal Canadiens, he wrote:

  Monday, Sept 23, 7:56 AM. Precise drilling is under way. Vazquez operator. Patterson supervisor.

  He would take notes from this point on. Writing stuff down was a safe way to cover all bases.

  Stifling a yawn, he poured himself another cup of java. He had slept little for the last few days and he felt hung over even though he hadn’t had a drink since... Victoria’s smiling eyes flashed in his mind. If she would still be here, he thought, she would have cheered him up with her infectious spirit.

  Damn you, tumor.

  He shoved aside the train of thoughts, the one he had ridden before, the one whose final station was a place he wished never to revisit again.

  There was stuff to do.

  First on the list was Gould’s request for a complete report. She wanted it ASAP, and he was happy to oblige. It required reviewing the full data set once more, a pain in the butt and a time sink, but a good idea nonetheless. He needed to become the de facto expert if he wanted to be involved at the highest level. Something in his gut was urging him to action, to find out what this abnormality was about. He hoped he wasn’t already obsessed by it but judging by the dubious quality of his sleep, he doubted it.

  “Open,” Simon said.

  The computer sprung to life and a live video feed of Arturo working the drill popped on the display. Frank and Sterling Farrow, the mine’s technician, had installed cameras at the work site where the core samples would be drawn, and even though Simon felt like he was a participant in Big Brother, he understood their necessity. “We need to keep an eye on the unknown, right?” Frank had declared with a shrug.

  He moved the video to the lower right of the screen and got to work with the report. An hour later, having written four pages of dense material, he paused and pushed back his chair. His neck was stiff, and he was dead-tired. He yawned with deliberate exaggeration then rubbed his eyes for a full minute.

  “I need a break.”

  He hauled out a broken armchair from the discarded junk at the back of the shed, angled it next to his own and stretched out his legs to their full extent. Leaning back, he closed his eyes and a minute later went out like a light.

  He dreamed of Victoria as he often did when he was stressed out. Here she was in all her fragile beauty, a vivid keepsake in the wallet of his mind. She was in pain, a pain deep inside her, as deep as the disease in her bones. She was being killed from within and there was nothing he could do about it. She was so weak, a pale ghost of her former self... but she never complained, never gave in to despair. She was dying, yes, but to Simon, even death could not break her spirit and she was still so, so, beautiful. He could lose himself in her pale green eyes, so mesmerizing, even as the horrid pain glazed them over. She had whispered a few words right before... words he would remember as long as he lived, etched into his soul for eternity.

  “Mr. Macomber?”

  Simon stirred in the armchair. There was an interference he couldn’t make out. He tried to concentrate on Victoria’s pale face, those delicate lips, the way she smiled...

  “Mr. Macomber?” A voice said at his ear.

  Simon opened his eyes half-way, still befuddled by his dream. He looked up and saw ice green eyes, a delicate nose and a sensual mouth framed by an elegant asymmetrical cut of jet black hair. A face full of humanity, a face he liked at once.

  “Victoria?” He mumbled, half-awake.

  “I’m Emmeline Brochu,” the voice said.

  6 Smell of Trouble

  EMMELINE BROCHU? WHAT? She’s already here?

  Simon jolted awake, awareness bubbling up from the depths of consciousness. He sprung from the chair like a wind-up toy, got snagged in one arm and flopping like a madman, got to his feet. Emmeline watched the acrobatics with interest, the corner of her delicate mouth rising upward.

  “Ms. Brochu! Shit! Huh, I mean, welcome,” he blurted out.

  “Thank you and please call me Emmeline,” she said with her best smile.

  He took a step forward, and they shook hands. She noted he was tense and looked distracted for a reason.

  “Is everything ok?”

  “Yes, yes. No worries. You startled me that’s all.” Simon reached for a mug. “I didn’t realize you had already arrived.”

  “I got in a few hours ago. Mr. Curtis got me settled in, then gave me a helmet, some work overalls, a tad too large, and sent me down here. A very efficient man, I must admit.”

  Simon nodded in acknowledgement. “Although I’m surprised he didn’t accompany you down.”

  “Oh, he had an urgent phone conference but said he would join us later.”

  Simon took a sip of the coffee, grimaced because it tasted like dishwasher liquid then realized with a start he had not offered some to Emmeline.

  “Where are my manners,” he said with a nervous stutter. “I’m sorry, huh, Emmeline, do you want coffee?”

  She took note of his eagerness on u
sing her first name. It was obvious the man wanted to start their relationship on the right foot.

  “No thanks, I don’t drink coffee. Do you have tea? Earl Grey by any chance?”

  Simon looked around the shed and realized it was a complete mess.

  She must think I’m an absolute slob.

  “Sorry, no. Few tea drinkers here, I’m afraid,” he said.

  “No problem,” she stared straight at him. “How are things progressing with the drilling?”

  He was taken aback by her abrupt shift to being all business but he rolled with it since it was the only thing he could do. It was way too late for a positive first impression, his first 7 seconds were already blown. He always had that problem with people, it seemed.

  He sat down at the desk and woke up the computer.

  “We have started drilling around the edge of where the anomaly is thought to be located and for the moment have not come upon any problems,” Simon said, indicating his computer. “As you can see for yourself.”

  Emmeline sidled over next to him and looked at the screen. The discreet scent of her perfume wafted towards him and he couldn’t help but appreciate the fragrance. With a slight frown, she pointed a finger to the display.

  “What is that?”

  Simon stared at Emmeline for a fraction of a second that seemed to last forever. She was a striking woman and there was a je ne sais quoi about her he found very appealing.

  “Huh, what?” he managed, feeling dumb again.

  “There,” she said with her finger still aimed at the screen.