by Chris Angus
“Whatever they tell me. I’m a chemist. We’ve been analyzing the ancient remains of bones and artifacts. We study the flora of the Laki region. Some . . . interesting things, really, but I don’t know why they want these things looked at. I suspect they’re searching for new products to sell.” He shrugged.
Ryan considered the man. He didn’t believe for a minute that he knew so little about what was going on here. His eyes wandered around the lab and came to rest on a series of large containers.
“What are those?” he asked, gesturing with the pistol.
“They contain a new substance I’ve been asked to study. It’s a kind of fungus.”
“A fungus? What’s so special about that?”
“It came from Laki . . . beneath the volcano actually.”
“Listen to me,” Ryan said slowly. “I don’t believe you’re telling me the truth.” He directed the gun back on the man and pulled back the trigger. It made a satisfying click.
“Sweet Jesus!” the man cried. “Don’t shoot me. What do you want to know?”
“What’s the real purpose of your investigations here? I’ll give you one chance to get it right. Because I already know the answer.”
“All right, all right! Just don’t point that thing at me, okay? They believe there’s something about Laki that may prolong life. The bones are from ancient people found on the volcano. They clearly lived much longer than normal and in better health. I’m supposed to find out why.”
“Right answer. Now tell me what part Senator Graham plays in this.”
“The senator’s a fanatic about the possibility of extended life. He’s in his seventies and wants to live a lot longer. He was the one who arranged the financing to create this place. The Iranians had lots of money, but they couldn’t build something like this. It would have been too conspicuous. Senator Graham had the power to get it done. And he’s been damned impatient. He wants results yesterday.”
Ryan’s thoughts whirled at the implications. Sam had told him her father was a health nut, interested in longevity. Small wonder he’d latch onto something like this. And it explained why he wanted to get Sam out of the country. He knew what was happening and why she was in real danger. But it wasn’t enough to get him to stop looking for his Holy Grail.
“So what’s the point of the fungus?” he asked.
“We discovered it several months ago. We found spores initially on the mushrooms that gather around the vent openings. Then we found more samples underground and began to wonder if we were looking at the filaments of a founding fungus.”
“A what?”
“The filaments of a founding fungus can grow over thousands of acres and live for thousands of years. No one really knows how long they can live. The fungus spawns genetically identical mushrooms above ground. Such hyphal masses can become some of the largest and most ancient organisms on Earth.”
“What’s hyphal?”
“It refers to any of the threadlike filaments that form the mycelium of a fungus.”
Ryan didn’t know what mycelium was either, but he didn’t want to go too far down this road. None of it sounded good.
“You’re saying such a fungus is a single living organism?”
“Yes, it’s been proven through DNA typing. Fungi break things down, cause decomposition. They latch onto a food source and release enzymes to break the substance into a mask of sugars and amino acids, which the fungi then absorb through the membranes of their filamentous hyphae. Some fungi are simple, even unicellular, but others sprout elaborate fruiting bodies packed with billions of microscopic spores.”
“The ones you say can cover thousands of acres,” said Ryan.
“Yes.
“I still don’t see what all of this has to do with the longevity effects you’ve been studying.”
“We still don’t know what causes that. It’s why we’ve been studying everything, from the gases released by the volcano to the mushrooms and the ancient bones.” The man stared into the barrel of Ryan’s gun. “I . . . I have a theory about the fungus, though.”
Ryan raised an eyebrow.
“This fungus may be very old, as I said. It may not have come from here originally. Spores can float in on the wind. I think the one we’re studying causes hallucinations in people, maybe other effects as well.”
“And what’s your theory?”
“I have no proof. But since I’ve been working closely with the fungus, I’ve sensed . . .” He stopped.
“Go on!”
“I’ve told no one about this. You’ll think I’m foolish.”
“You don’t need to worry about what I think of you. Only about this.” He gestured with the pistol.
“I . . . I think the fungus may be . . . intelligent.”
Ryan stared at him. “What?”
“It’s something I feel. A presence. Almost like it communicates with me through my mind, by giving me thoughts in the form of hallucinations.”
He wondered if the man was hallucinating right now. “How old did you say it might be?”
“There’s no way to know. It could be the oldest living thing on earth. Certainly old enough to have had time to evolve intelligence like man.”
***
“What was that?”
Jon Gudnasson stood rooted to the cold stone floor of the passageway, his legs spread wide, as if balancing himself on a trampoline. A severe shudder had passed through the earth.
“Felt like an earthquake,” said Kraus, who held their sole flashlight. “You’re the geologist. What do you think?”
Jon looked uncertain. Coming from the American Midwest, he’d never felt one before.
He’d followed the two Germans deep into the earth, hardly paying attention to where they were heading, his mind filled with fantasies about a new job and moneymaking potential. Now, he realized, he had no idea where they were. They’d taken many different branches, always, it seemed, heading deeper, as Hans, the older man, rambled on about the interesting passageways and how his father was partly responsible for creating this incredible sub world.
“We should get out of here,” Jon said. “If that was an earthquake, there could be a danger of some of these vent tubes collapsing. And there are likely to be aftershocks.” He waited expectantly for Hans to agree and lead the way out.
Instead, the German said, “I’m not sure which way to go.”
Jon stared at him in disbelief. But the words barely had time to register before they felt another movement in the ground, this one preceded by what sounded like distant thunder.
“That sounded more like an explosion,” said Kraus. “Look!” He pointed the light down the passage. Silt drifted down from the roof of the tunnel, followed almost immediately by a loud rushing sound.
“What was that?” said Jon.
“Sounds like rushing water.”
Suddenly, a section of the tunnel floor behind them simply collapsed, disappearing into a vast maw in the earth, taking young Ernst with it.
“Ernst!” Hans cried, pointing the light into the hole that had opened up right at their feet.
But the German was gone, swept away, leaving them staring at a deep hole at the bottom of which, just where the light dissipated, they could see water rushing away out of sight.
Hans continued to stare in disbelief at the opening that had taken his friend, but Jon was already pushing him away from the gaping hole.
“We’ve got to get away from here!” he said. “The rest of this floor could collapse any moment.”
They stumbled down the passage, the sound of rushing water and Ernst’s abbreviated cry echoing in their ears. Only after both men were exhausted did they finally stop.
“Listen,” said Kraus. He turned the light off and they listened in the dark to horrible sounds. It was as if the very rocks were speaking to them, a frightening collection of groaning and cracking, splitting rocks and fluids percolating away somewhere.
“This whole place sounds like it’s coming apar
t at the seams,” said Jon. “The earthquake or whatever it was has destabilized the substructure.”
The two men stared at each other in the dim light. “What should we do?” asked Kraus, deferring to the other man’s scientific knowledge of the region.
But Jon had no idea. He was so overcome with fear he could barely think. “There’s nothing to do but keep going,” he said. “We can’t go back, that much is certain.”
They continued on for another hour, blindly taking one branching passageway after another, with no idea where they were going. Eventually, their light began to fade.
“We’re losing the light,” Kraus said, his voice filled with resignation.
“Christ, what are we going to do down here without a light?” Jon almost whimpered. Then, as if to laugh at them, the light went out completely.
The blackness and silence were interrupted only by the sound of their breathing and by the occasional moaning of indefinable subterranean movements.
Jon heard Kraus grunt as he sank to the tunnel floor. “My father warned me about the dangers of this place. He said it was a honeycomb of passageways overlaying sunken vats of lava, glacial meltwaters, and something else . . . something far worse. It was what killed so many of my father’s men, and it’s what took away poor Ernst. I’m convinced of it.” He shuddered. “He may have been the luckiest of us. At least he died quickly.”
Jon fought back his growing sense of panic. “What are you saying? What could be worse than what’s happened? We need to keep moving. We can’t just sit here.”
“You are right, my friend. We must continue on in the darkness. Though I think it will do little good. Just let me rest a bit longer. I’m not in such good shape anymore.”
Reluctantly, Gudnasson sank to the ground next to him. They could still feel tremors coming through the earth. It was terrifying to feel the solid ground move beneath them in the blackness, as though they were perched on the back of some great beast.
“We must rely on our maker now,” said Kraus solemnly.
“I’m a geologist . . . and an atheist,” said Jon. “I don’t believe in a maker, or that anyone looks out for us in this world except ourselves.”
“I’m sorry for you, then,” said Kraus. “But no doubt you are a good scientist. My father was also such a man. He too was a nonbeliever, though this place may have begun to change him on that score.”
“What are you talking about?” Jon asked. The conversation seemed surreal given their surroundings, but talking was better than listening to the strange sounds coming from the blackness all around them.
“I will tell you a story,” said Kraus. “I think there’s no longer any need for you to sign a confidentiality agreement, do you?”
Jon felt the other man smile in the darkness.
“I’m a Catholic and a representative of the hierarchy of the German church. It is the church that purchased subterranean rights to the land in this place. It is the church that sent me here.”
Jon stared at him in incomprehension. Despite his fears of their predicament, Kraus’s soothing tone had a calming effect.
“There are unnatural things about this place,” he went on. “My father told me about some of them. One of his associates was a man named Müller. Karl Müller. He’d been one of the Führer’s physicians before becoming a bishop. Hitler had great confidence in Müller and sent him to Iceland to investigate the strange events my father reported. It was not until after the war that my father learned how influential Müller really was.”
“What do you mean?” asked Jon.
“He wasn’t just a member of the church, but an important representative of the Conference of German Bishops, very highly placed. At the same time, he was also working for Hitler. The Führer and the church had a difficult relationship. Catholics were forbidden to join the Nazi Party, you know, under threat of excommunication. But many Catholics supported Hitler, while others openly resisted the Reich. In 1941, the Nazis began to dissolve the monasteries and abbeys. But Hitler feared the increasing protests of the Catholic population, who made up a third of Germany’s people. So at Müller’s urging, he halted the effort.
“In return, when the time came, Müller helped the Führer gain funding for his Icelandic research and investigations through the church. All of this . . .” Kraus waved a hand, though Jon couldn’t see it, “was funded by the German Catholic church.”
Jon found himself listening in fascination to the incredible tale coming out of the blackness.
“In the waning days of the war,” Kraus went on, “Hitler had few remaining resources. Without the backing of the church, he could not have financed my father’s work.”
“Why on Earth would the church care about ventholes in Iceland, for god’s sake?” asked Jon.
“Because Müller had convinced the Führer that the secret to eternal, or at least greatly extended, life could be found here. And he used the same argument to persuade the church that this presented a real threat to them. My father’s men had experienced what they called an ‘invigorating’ health effect. Hitler was convinced he’d found some sort of Holy Grail that would guarantee the success of his “master race.” The church was not so sanguine. The bishops were shaken by the idea that some force other than God might ultimately control such a thing. They wanted to disprove the notion and were willing to finance Hitler’s investigations in order to uphold the tenets of the church.”
Jon’s voice expressed bewilderment. “And what did they find out?” he asked.
Kraus shrugged. “My father thought there was something . . . some force . . . beneath the earth on Laki. Perhaps something spiritual. He found things below ground that no one had ever seen before. And his men, while experiencing the revitalizing effects of the underground, were at the same time overcome by paranoia, hallucination, and even madness. They refused to continue to work. . . .”
Kraus stopped abruptly. “I can see you,” he said.
Jon realized he could also dimly see their surroundings. They stared down the passageway. Something seemed to be moving along the walls, twisting and turning and . . . glowing . . . as though phosphorescent.
“What the hell is that?” asked Jon in a whisper.
Both men stood, staring dumfounded as the approaching tentacles moved toward them like expanding blood vessels, sprouting branches and weaving a pattern along the cavern walls. The tentacles reached them and passed them by, continuing on into the darkness.
“I don’t know what in the name of the Holy Virgin that is,” said Kraus. “My father never mentioned such a thing to me. But whatever it is, it’s allowing us to see. Let’s use the light while it lasts.”
They began to move down the corridor. The tentacles grew denser as they went, providing more light but also seeming to fill more of the passage. When they came to a branch vent, the entrance was completely blocked by a thick, interwoven web of the strange substance. Time and again they came to branching passageways and each time, they were given only one possible avenue to continue.
“It’s as if these . . . things . . . are herding us,” said Jon.
“Yes,” Kraus replied. “And you notice also that each time there is a choice, we are forced to take the channel that goes lower. I fear we’ll never find our way out as long as we’re descending into this strange place.”
But they had little choice. The tentacles lit their path, but where were they taking them?
***
Sam checked her headlamp. The Sergeant in charge of the police unit, Fridrik Stefansson, looked young and a bit unsure of what Sam’s authority was. She recognized his uncertainty.
“I’m just here to offer advice, Sergeant,” she said. “I think we’re all going to be on unfamiliar ground.”
“Yes, Ma’am,” he replied. “Commissioner Dagursson said I was in charge with regard to police matters but that your experience should be taken into account on all matters related to the terrain.” He lowered his voice and said, “I’ve never been on Laki, so I
intend to lean on you, Ms. Graham.”
“I’ll do my best,” she replied. “But you can start by calling me Sam. Everyone else seems to.”
Stefansson’s men carried handguns and flashlights. They’d found Gudnasson’s Jeep along with two other vehicles at the Laki parking lot, but there was no sign of Jon.
“We’ve got a lot of ground to cover, Sergeant,” said Sam. “That’s underground. I suggest we divide into two groups of half a dozen each. You and I should probably stay together. Do you have someone you trust to lead the other group?”
He nodded and called, “Jonsson, you’ll lead six men. Miss Graham will tell you which vent to begin with. Stay in contact via radiophone. You find anyone or anything unusual, call me straight away.”
“Yes sir!”
Stefansson handed a radio to Sam. “We’ll keep in contact with these,” he said. “They’re the very best we have and should work even underground, depending on how far our groups become separated.”
She nodded, took the device, and put it in her small waist pack. Then she looked at Jonsson, a strapping fellow with straw-colored hair. “Be careful,” she warned. “After the explosions, we can’t be sure what will happen down below.” She pointed across the barren volcano. “You and your men can begin in that vent opening over there. Do you see it?”
It was hard to pick out the opening against the tortured landscape. Everything blended together in an array of brown and black rock. But after a moment, following her finger, Jonsson saw the opening and nodded.
She turned back to Stefansson and the others, motioned with her light, and proceeded underground.
Both parties carried cans of phosphorescent spray paint, which they would use to mark any branching vents or passageways. She didn’t want anyone getting hopelessly lost, necessitating still another search party.
The men seemed relaxed, almost jovial, talking to one another. It was clear they didn’t have much idea what to expect. To them, it was just one more search party for lost tourists. Their careless attitude made Sam uncomfortable. But she saw little point in trying to scare them at this juncture with talk of collapsing tunnels, washouts, and lava eruptions. Instead, she settled for a brief warning.