by C. J. Waller
The cove that we landed in is really small. It took us a good half hour to get everyone up the cliff side – it's not so much that it's steep, but more dark and everyone’s on edge. Once we’re up, we get a better view of what we’re dealing with.
Apart from the small stretch of beach that we came from, all we can see is water.
It’s weird. I can’t describe it. It’s like looking out over the ocean at night, but there’s no horizon; no stars; no clouds. Just water and blackness. For a moment, I feel like I’m floating, suspended above the blackness with nothing but rippling light as my companion. Then I hear a splash, and I’m brought back down to earth.
“Would you look at that,” Fi breathes beside me.
Just on the edge of our torch light, a huge hump breaks the surface. It’s too dim to make out any details. It looks like a massive, smooth boulder has just breached and then sunk back down beneath the rippling surface.
“Well, I think that confirms it breathes air,” Brendan says. “Means it still could be some kind of whale...”
“Still could be some kind of pliosaur,” Janos says.
We all glance away. Everyone apart from Marcus, who just stares at Janos like he’s some kind of mad man. No one wants to admit that whatever it is might be the relic from some ancient past, because admitting that kind of puts you somewhere on a par with people who think they’ve been abducted by aliens and that Essex is crawling with lions, but Marcus seems to take Janos’s rather flippant comment way too personally.
“Would you shut the hell up about fucking pliosaurs,” he says, his teeth gritted, his lips a thin line. “It’s not a fucking pliosaur – in order for it to be a fucking pliosaur, there would need to be a surviving population down here – one that’s managed to sustain its numbers over a hundred million years. And whilst I am not doubting that sea is vast, it isn’t that fucking vast. So Shut. Up.”
“And you think a whale is more of a viable option?” Janos counters. “How do you think it got down here? Washed down with the rain? We are three miles underground. Whatever it is, it has evolved down here. That there is anything huge at all in the water is a goddamned miracle.”
“He’s right,” Brendan says. “Whatever that thing is, there will be a sustained breeding population, which means it evolved down here. It is a goddamned miracle. Some cave fish get pretty big, but nothing like this. So, in a way, it doesn’t matter if it is a whale or some kind of ancient marine reptile or something no one has ever even thought of before – the bottom line is, it shouldn’t be here. But it is.”
“And it’s hunting us,” I whisper.
Now it’s their turn to stare at me. I have no idea why I said that out loud. It’s been something that’s been playing on my mind for a while.
Why is it still here? Why won’t it leave?
Because of us.
Because it’s eaten humans before, and it knows we’re easy prey.
“Bullshit,” Marcus says. “By your own logic, that’s a crock. If it’s been down here for 200 millions years plus, then it hasn’t come across humans before.”
“Apart from the other team.” I say. Inside my head, I’m railing at myself – shut up! I can’t believe you just said that! And judging by Fi’s sharp intake of breath, I have just dared to speak the unspeakable. But I’m right. I know I am. Otherwise, where are they?
I can tell Marcus is torn, because he doesn’t jump down my throat. Instead, he stares moodily over the water, biting the edge of his thumb.
“Whatever,” Fi says, breaking the silence. “It doesn’t matter. We still have the rest of this… whatever it is to explore. You never know, there might be a way back that doesn’t involve swimming.”
Even I, with my meagre experience and knowledge of caves, can tell she’s clutching at straws.
* * *
We spend about an hour following the coast. It’s not really a coast, but we don’t really know what else to call it, so that’ll have to do. With each step it’s becoming clearer that this is some kind of island, a huge outcrop of rock that stands guard to what I keep persisting to think of as a harbour, like a mini Isle of Wight, minus the tourists and ice cream.
In a strange way, I’m grateful for the glow of the bacteria. I have no idea what genus it is, and the light it sheds (if you can call it that) doesn’t really illuminate as much as enhance the shadows, but at least it means it isn’t pitch black down here. Every now and again, I hear the rippling of water as the thing surfaces, but none of us catches sight of it again. Still, I can’t shake off the feeling it’s watching us, waiting.
Once we establish that this is indeed an island, we move inland. There are no plants here, not even algae. Once you get away from the water’s edge, the rock is as dry and bare as bone. It makes sense. There is no sunlight, so how could anything survive? By the water, though, it’s a different matter. As well as the ever-present glowing bacteria, there are clumps of huge molluscs that resemble malformed mussels, and thin fronds of some kind of algae extend from the rocks to create a strange parody of seaweed. Brendan even spies little crabs scuttling around, and Janos pointed out a primitive-looking fish to me, no longer than my finger and as pale as a ghost. Once I get my eye in, there’s more to be found – spiky black echinoderms crawl through forests of blobby anenomes, which in turn are accompanied by the weirdest looking shrimps – all feelers and claws – I’ve ever seen. For so long we’ve lived under the illusion that there’s nothing but mineral beneath our feet, but this place proves that once life is established, it will find a way. All of a sudden, all those mad books about a Hollow Earth and Jules Verne’s idea of an ecosystem at the centre of the planet don’t seem quite so far-fetched. I feel humbled and a little frightened in the face of it all. We think we’re so important, that we are the keepers of the keys, but in reality, we’re nothing more than children stumbling around in the dark, flicking switches and trampling on ants' nests just to see what might happen.
Fi's leading us now. Funny, since Nik disappeared, no one has really mentioned him, even though he was kind of our unspoken leader. Out of all of us, he’d had by far the most experience in dealing with new cave systems and his cautious manner meant it felt only natural for him to take the lead. I’d always thought his second in command was Janos, but he seems reluctant to step up and fill the vacant role. Instead, he spends most of his time skulking at the back. So Fi stepped up. I’m glad she did. Her military background means she’s efficient, if a little brusque, and best of all, she doesn’t take any of Marcus’s shit.
Marcus. Now there’s one who goes to show you don’t really know someone until you’re stranded three miles underground on an ancient island whilst something predatory may or may not be circling it in the water, waiting for you to go for a paddle. He’s always been a bit of a prick, but I’d put him down as one of those Marmite people – you know, you either love him or hate him, but he’s effectively harmless. Now I know he’s anything but harmless. In fact, I would say he’s downright dangerous.
“What the hell are we playing at?” he says for about the seventeenth time. “We need to get off the island, not go further into it.”
I hear Fi sigh, but she says nothing. It’s Brendan who tries to placate him this time, telling him we’re just having a look, that look, which we need to know exactly what we’re up against so we can make an informed decision as what to do next-
That’s about as far as he got before Marcus blows up again, swearing, calling us all stupid fuckers, what the fuck are we playing at, there’s no point to this, we’re just making busy work in an attempt at not facing up to reality and accepting that we are well and truly screwed.
And you know what? If he wasn’t being a total asshole about it all, I’d probably be agreeing with him. But just as wandering around this lump of rock is futile, so is screaming about it. So I shut up, grit my teeth and press on.
***
“Holy shit…”
As usual, Fi’s up ahead. We’ve been clamb
ering up the side of a rock face for a good quarter of an hour. It’s not high, just difficult. The limestone has given way to a patch of fissile shale, making climbing a treacherous joy. Climbers don’t usually bother with shale. It's too much like hard work, and you’re just as likely to come away with a handful of rock dust and splinters as a firm handhold, but we don’t have much of a choice. Either we get over this, or we head back. And no-one feels like heading back, because there's nothing to head back to.
It isn’t the shale that caused Fi to swear, though. Both Brendan and Marcus are caught short when they reach the top – Janos had to catch Brendan’s heel before he toppled backwards – but once I’m up there, I can see why.
I’m not sure how to begin describing it, but it isn’t natural, that’s one thing I am sure of.
I can’t exactly say how big it is due to the quality (or lack of quality) of the light. But standing here, I guess it’s easily a hundred feet tall, if not more. A perfectly circular column, constructed from a gleaming pale rock. At least I think it’s rock. Maybe. The closer we get, the less sure I am.
“What the fuck is that?” Marcus breathes, all former irritation at our predicament lost.
I can’t answer him. My mouth is dry, and my tongue feels about five sizes too big. Instead, I shake my head and shrug.
“Some kind of crystal?” Brendan asks.
Again, all I can do is shrug. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I get the sneaking suspicion it’s unlike anything anyone has seen before.
We approach slowly, as if the column is somehow going to wake up and swallow us whole. And in a weird way, it does. As we creep closer, I notice a dark splodge at its base. I pause, squinting, but my eyes stubbornly refuse to focus. I go to mention this to the others, but they have all continued on.
“Hey, wait up,” I say. Fi gives me one of those half-quizzical, half annoyed looks that parents often give their kids when they know they should be paying attention to what their darlings are doing, but aren’t really all that interested. I realise that her attitude just about sums up my place here. I’m not a survivalist, not a caver - I’m just a stupid rock-monkey in her eyes, the drummer of the scientific world, brought a long way because the oil company insisted. Anger prickles at me. If they're all so experienced, then why haven't they noticed the splodge?
“I said, hang on.” I quickstep up to them, forcing my way next to Fi, determined to make her listen to me.
“What is it?” Her tone is clipped, which raises my hackles even further.
“Since none of you experts have mentioned it – anyone else notice anything odd about that column?” I'm sorry, but I’m not handing it to her on a plate.
“What, apart from the fact that it’s fucking weird?” Marcus says from behind us.
“No… look closer. Near the base.”
We peer into the gloom. It’s Fi’s turn to shrug.
“A patch of shadow? Nothing usual about that, Meg – the light’s not exactly great here.”
“I think it’s an opening.”
There. I’ve said it.
“She’s right,” Janos says, after a heavy pause. “Now I look at it carefully, it seems too regular to be just a patch of shadow.”
“An opening? Like a crack?” Brendan says.
“Of course it's a crack,” Marcus says. “What else would it be? A door?” He lets out a bark of laughter, and I suddenly feel foolish. Why did I let my stupid prideful paranoia get in the way? I should have just shut up, put up and let them discover it themselves.
Whatever it is.
“Well, opening or not, standing here isn’t getting us anywhere,” Fi says, like a true leader. Again. It’s beginning to wind me up a little bit, actually. Can’t hang around here. Standing here won’t get us anywhere. We need to move out. Listen to me, I know best. That’s all she knows. That’s all she understands-
Wait a minute. Just… wait a sec. Where is all of this coming from? For some reason, what was once just a mild annoyance is now something I’d quite like to hurt people over. Which is ridiculous. I spare Marcus a glance. He’s muttering under his breath, his mouth moving like he’s got something stuck in his teeth. Maybe his sudden change in demeanour is understandable. Maybe it isn’t him at all.
Maybe it’s this place.
They talk about cabin fever, and deep sea narcosis – maybe this is the caving equivalent? We’re three miles down, after all; who knows how the physical stresses we’re under might affect us? And that's without everything that has happened to us. A shiver trickles down my spine, and the desire to get away from this place hits hard. I look back to the column, and the feeling intensifies. It’s perfectly round and perfectly straight, apart from the patch of darkness at its base. If it’s a natural formation, it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen or heard of before. We creep closer.
“That isn’t right,” Janos says, and I can only agree with him. Marcus and Brendan stop. Even Fi takes a step back.
I was reluctant to say what I thought the splodge was before, just in case I was wrong. Because things like that shouldn’t exist three miles under the surface of the Earth, in a cave that has been cut off from the surface for around a hundred and sixty million years. But we’re close enough now to see the truth, and there’s no denying it.
It's a door.
Not a door in the sense of a front door, but a definite cut in the surface of the column that is covered by a darker material. It has shapes carved into it. Actual shapes, like you might find in an ancient tomb or something.
“All right. Okay. What the fuck?” Marcus says. “I thought this cave had only just been discovered? As in, ‘untouched by human hands’? Then why is there a fucking inscribed door down here?”
None of us can answer his rather eloquently put question, because none of us have a clue.
“Maybe it’s… it’s an artefact, or something,” Fi says. “You know, a natural formation that just happens to look like it was created by someth… one.”
I can’t help but notice the correction, and the way the others look at her. Scary thing is, I think what she was going to say is more accurate. Something, not someone.
Something.
To my surprise, Brendan is the first to approach the door. I always put him down as a bit of a natural, well, not a coward, but definitely more cautious than the likes of Fi or Marcus. Now, roles are reversed. The adrenaline junkies, those seekers of the ultimate highs, are hanging back, their eyes goggling, their hands shaking as Brendan reaches up to touch the darker stone of the door. My breath catches in my throat, curtailing any attempt at telling him not to. He pauses, his fingertips just hovering over its surface. I jump when something touches my lips, and feel foolish when I realise it’s my own hand.
“It doesn’t look natural to me,” Brendan whispers. He turns. “Meg?”
All eyes are on me. In a way, this is why I am here. I’m the geologist, after all.
I wander over on legs made of elastic to stand beside him. He’s breathing hard, and little droplets of sweat stand from his brow. He’s afraid, and he has every right to be, because when you're this close, it’s plain the door isn’t natural.
Sometimes, nature mimics humanity. For years, a bunch of scratches on a rock in Norway was thought to be one of the earliest forms of runic writing. People spent years trying to decipher them, to work out what our ancient ancestors thought so important that it had to be written down. That is, until someone realised they were just scratches all along.
There’s no mistaking this. Nature may mimic humanity in many ways, but it doesn’t draw perfectly symmetrical designs into an iron-hard rock I can’t identify.
“Who built it?” Brendan murmurs.
“I don’t know,” I say. “I’m not an archaeologist. They didn’t think we’d need one down here.” I spare him a look before my attention is dragged back to the swirling designs. “I guess they were wrong.”
“That’s one way of putting it.”
His hand
is hovering just above the door's surface. I hear him swallow. Then, before I can stop him, he touches it.
As soon as his fingertips touch the rock, my ears pop. Brendan freezes for a split second, his fingers all but fused to the door, and then drops his hand. He blinks.
“What was that?”
The question makes us both jump.
“Dunno,” Brendan says, turning around. The others are crowded around us, each face a picture of concern.
“Felt like a… a… drop in pressure, or something,” I say.
“Yeah,” Fi says, and scratches her nose.
“Uh, guys…” Marcus says. “Where’s the door?”
What does he mean, where’s the door? I look around, back to where Brendan touched the stone… but Marcus is right. It’s not there any more. Instead, a gaping black hole stands.
A way in.
“Did… anyone hear anything move?” Marcus asks. We all shake our heads. My mouth feels sticky and I’m finding it hard to swallow.
Whatever is going on here has just got about a hundred times weirder.
Marcus steps up and inspects the portal. He’s frowning, and I don’t blame him.
“There’s nothing. Nothing at all.” He runs a hand over his buzz cut. “Jesus, man – what’s going on here? Doors just don’t fucking disappear like that!”
“Heh, why not? Considering we shouldn't be finding doors in places where humans have never been,” Brendan says.
We all stare at him. He has said the unspeakable.
“Oh, come on, guys! We’re all thinking it. It’s about time we admitted it. This isn’t right. It’s an established fact that the last time this cave complex was connected with the surface was during the Cretaceous at the very latest, so why are there doors down here? This is clearly something constructed… so who built it? It can’t be humankind… and so what’s left?”
“No – don’t be stupid-“ Fi starts.
“Why is it stupid, Fi” Brendan continues. There’s a fire in his voice now, and it scares me a bit. Who knew? Looks like Brendan might be one of those 'was God an astronaut' types.