The Inosculation Syndrome

by D. B. Reynolds-Moreton

  Although the castings were still quite hot, they were able to remove them from the sand moulds in one big unit.

  The next problem was how to cut them off from the linking bars or sprues, so that he would finish up with just the castings. The bronze turned out to be a lot tougher than he had expected, and this was going to be quite difficult to achieve without cutting tools.

  Kal had anticipated this problem and had slimmed down the sprues where they joined the cast objects, but the bronze was still too tough to break easily.

  In the end, he had to resort to jamming the block of castings in between two rocks, and with a lot of effort bent the main frame of castings back and forth until the trapped casting broke off.

  It was very tiring and time consuming, but by evening they had all the little castings separated from the frame, and the frame broken up ready for re-smelting in the next session.

  The means of removing the remaining sprue and general shaping up of the castings, he had already worked out in theory, and hoped it would work in practice.

  A grinding wheel would be made from the quartz sand, which was very hard and contained sharp particles, mixed with clay, and fired in a charcoal fire.

  Since receiving the gift of the fluorspatic rock, he thought a little of it added to the mix may help the grains of sand to adhere together better; anyway, it was worth a try.

  The wheel was made by pressing the damp mixture into a sand mould, letting it dry out, and then very carefully refining the shape to be as truly round as possible.

  A hole was cut in the centre for a shaft, and the whole thing fired off in a simple furnace built alongside the smelter, so that the same chimney could be used.

  A simple wooden frame, pegged together, held the wheel and shaft, and with willing hands to turn it, the grinding wheel was trued up by holding a flint like stone against it, as it was turned.

  Now they could begin cleaning up the rough bronze castings which had taken so long to produce, and in very little time the first shiny spear head was finished. Kal drove the shaft end of the head into the end of a bamboo pole, added a little ‘glue’ and showed the result to the others.

  This was a formidable weapon, and would make short work of most attacking animals, and with a little care and strategy, the cat creature.

  Kal got on with the job of finishing his scissors, although he had not yet worked out how to make the swivel joint in the middle.

  Meanwhile the ‘smelters’ had of their own accord made several more grinding wheels, and of different sizes, but what surprised Kal most of all was that they had made one wheel of very fine grains, which acted more like a polishing wheel than a grinder.

  He was constantly amazed at the comprehension of these people, and wondered when they would over take his ability in working things out.

  The bronze wood saw caused a great sensation, and although it worked very well, it needed sharpening rather a lot, and resetting the teeth was not the easiest of jobs. With so many eager workers, Kal found that doing a job once was all that was needed, as they soon picked up the idea, and he was then free to go onto the next project.

  Bronze nails brought about a whole new range of things that were previously impossible to make, and the introduction of the wheel was an earth shaker.

  He had made a long bronze strip with cast holes in the tapering ends, which would take a rivet when he had bent it round to make the outer rim of the wheel.

  Wood blocks were shaped to form the inner sections of the rim, and spokes posed no problem at all. The hub was of cast bronze and the central hole was ‘cast in’ with a core piece, and polished to a smooth finish with fine sand later.

  A cart was constructed with shafts that would steer the front wheels, and that made food gathering and the shifting of materials almost a pleasure. There was great competition among the little people to be the ‘cart pullers’, and this was the first time Kal had noticed any form of envy, although that was perhaps not the right word for it.

  As yet they had not invented anything themselves, Kal wondered just how long it would be before they did. They were quite good at modifying things once they had understood the basic principle, but innovation was not their strong point, at the moment. Time, no doubt, would alter that, and he wondered what would happen to this planet when they really did get under way.

  At long last, a heavily armed search party went out to look for the frond tree. Kal had managed, or so he thought, to give the members of the party a good description of the tree, and set about oil extraction from a new kind of nut which they had found, while the search party wandered far and wide in their quest.

  He had constructed a crude press, and after breaking the nuts up into small pieces did actually extract some oil. He tested it to see how well it would burn and was pleased to see that it did so with a clear yellow flame, and would give out a reasonable amount of light in the darkness of the caves.

  In anticipation of the oil, fired clay ‘lamp pots’ had already been made and the only thing missing was a good wick.

  The frond party returned that night, but without finding the frond trees he so wanted. But they did bring back something else that would possibly do the same job.

  It came from a plant or tree that had a fibrous stem, which when it died had left a giant bundle of fine fibres in a clump, and the searchers thought it might do.

  They also brought back a small version of the living tree, and later on, that was able to provide the material for spinning, making a rough but very strong cloth. The living tree somehow kept the fibres supple, and therefore manageable for the spinners.

  Once the tree had died, the fibres became hard and almost brittle, as though something had been extracted from them in the dying process, and so had limited use.

  Once enough of the fibre trees had been collected, the job of separating the fibres from the trunk and washing them kept the team busy for a while. Spinning the thread was done by using a spinning bob weight on a stick in one hand, while feeding the fibres to it from the other.

  The thread produced was not very good, but it was at least proving that it could be done. The spinning wheel was much better; Kal could not help but admire the dexterity of the little spinners, as they were producing much thinner and more even threads than he had been able to.

  Weaving the thread into cloth was a project for the near future, when he had worked out how to make a heddle for the loom, meanwhile the lamps had been improved, and an expedition formed to explore the cave complex.

  Early next day, Kal, with ten of the little people, set off into the deepest of the caves as yet explored. They each carried a lamp and a spare oil bottle, food, water sticks and an assortment of weapons, just in case.

  The tunnel seemed to have been water formed by the marks along its sides, but there was no sign of water at the moment. Eventually it leads out into a large cave from which many more tunnels led off.

  Which one to go down? It seemed best to choose one that had a draft of air in it, and the wavering lamps soon indicated the best choice, and they set off once more.

  Every once in a while there were other branches adjoining the main tunnel, and they were very careful to mark the walls to show which one they had come from so that there would be no confusion on the return journey. Once lost in the complex, it would be a lucky person who found the exit without guidance.

  Time was difficult to judge in the tunnel system, and they let their stomachs guide them as to when they should take a break. It was while they were all resting that they heard a distant rumbling sound, very faint, but just audible. If it wasn’t the hoped for water, Kal dreaded to think what it might be.

  A little further on they came to a large cave off to one side of the tunnel, and went in to explore. The sight that met the gentle glow from their lamps was unbelievable.

  Giant mushrooms, almost six metres high, stood before them. They were pure white, on long thin stalks, and with a canopy some two metres in diameter. They had seen no sign of life before
this and he wondered why they had not spread to the other caves.

  And how did they get here in the first place? Before he could stop them, one of the little people had gone up to one of the growths and attacked the stem with a Jaw Saw. The whole thing came crashing down almost as soon as he had touched it, and he was covered in the debris.

  The little one crawled out from under the shattered mushroom and shook off the broken fragments which had stuck to him, while chewing on a portion of it. They seemed to know instinctively what they could eat or what was poisonous to them.

  ‘Very useful’ Kal thought, wishing he had acquired the same skill. The fruiting body of the fungus supplemented their food stocks, and when everyone had collected as much as they could carry, they returned to the main tunnel, and continued their journey.

  The rumbling sound had got noticeably louder as they penetrated further into the tunnel, and they expected to see what was causing it soon. But not as soon as they did.

  In a cave off the main run, something was moving or breathing. They all stopped in their tracks and waited for Kal to make a suggestion.

  His instinct was to run, but they were armed and so should be able to defend themselves. But not against what the oil lamps revealed.

  It looked like a giant maggot, a full three metres high with only the rounded end of its body showing in the cave mouth.

  This was the rear end by the look of it, and that meant there must be another way into the cave, as the huge white shape couldn’t have got through this entrance.

  Should they look for the other way in? To have come so far, not found water and been confronted by this monstrosity was too much, of course they would check it out.

  The tunnel was peppered with side openings for quite a distance ahead, and they systematically checked every one. Most just finished in a dead end, and then they found a longer passageway.

  Cautiously they moved ahead, lighting up every nook and cranny to make sure they weren’t taken by surprise, and then they found the entrance to the main cave. It was huge, the roof was nowhere in sight from the feeble light of the oil lamps, but they did light up the monster in the middle.

  It was a colossal white maggot-like creature, with no eyes and only a slit like mouth. The skin was translucent and the internal organs could be clearly seen.

  It must have sensed their presence, for it turned, and emitting the low rumbling sound, humped itself slowly along towards them.

  The rush for the exit would have been funny if it hadn’t been so serious. They were all out in the main passageway before the creature could move one more ‘hump’ forward.

  As it turned out they were quite safe, as the monstrosity couldn’t get out of the entrance they had used, and was probably too large to have gone down any of the passages they had travelled so far.

  So what did it eat? How did it mate? Where were the others? That was far more worrying.

  There was little more to be gained from this section of passages, except inviting any other giant maggots to get curious, and that was not considered advisable.

  The little party carried on, paying a little more attention to the side openings than they had previously done. There was dampness in the air, and a very faint breeze.

  Could this be what they had been looking for? The tunnel opened out into a similar colossal cave to that which Kal had seen when he had followed the stream into the mountain.

  Could it have been the same one? He was not sure until he realized that the other one had a faint light of its own to it, and this one didn’t. Or did it?

  Using signs to convey his meanings, Kal had the little people go back around the first bend, leaving him in darkness. They were reluctant to do so, but he was adamant, and they finally gave in.

  As the oil lights receded, the cave gave up its own light, and Kal could see the huge baffles in the distance and the crystals hanging from the roof. If it was not the same cave, then it was a very good replica of the earlier one, and Kal called the little ones back in.

  He could have walked outside to see if the stream was there, the grooves in the floor certainly were. But so what? They had found water, and that was the main thing.

  Because of the distance they had travelled, it was going to be a difficult and lengthy task to get water from here to the compound, and Kal reluctantly gave up the idea. Without the sand to draw on, he found it difficult to explain to the others what he felt, but they seemed to understand.

  Nothing for it but to go back the way they had come. They could have explored a few more caves on the way, but all wanted to return to their friends and take a well earned rest.

  Fate, or call it what you will, plays some strange tricks sometimes, and the team got lost despite their careful marking of the outward route.

  They knew they were in trouble when the passageway began to get narrow and Kal had to bend down a little to give himself headroom. Lower and lower it went, until it was a hands and knees job for him, and the only thing that prevented them from going back was the gentle wind in their faces. If air was getting through, then maybe they could.

  A slow drip, drip, caught their ears, and despite the lack of room, they all looked around and began squeaking in anticipation. The next few metres rewarded them for their long journey. Where the passage had widened out, there was a pool of water on the floor.

  It was quite large, and when tested, deep. It was not so much a pool, rather a well, for they couldn’t find the bottom, even with two of their poles tied together. They had found their water, but it was just as inaccessible as the first lot.

  Moving around the edge of the pool they reached the other side, drawn by the faint breeze and hoping it would lead them out of the system. Once again Kal had to stoop down in order to get through the narrowing passageway.

  A light ahead caused a great squeal of excitement, and they were out in the daylight in a few metres. They took it in turns to look out of the cave mouth, straight down onto their compound.

  They called to their friends below, but couldn’t reach them as the drop was at least fifty metres. Now what to do?

  Kal squeezed past the group by the exit and had a look down. From the far side of the compound a group of the little people were bringing a bundle of bamboos to the cliff face, and a scaffold was soon under way.

  The little people had anticipated the extra weight of Kal, and had built the framework accordingly, but it took a little while for Kal to feel secure on the spidery contraption.

  The height didn’t seem to worry his team mates, but Kal didn’t like the look of the scaffolding one little bit. Because of the height, it seemed to taper away to nothing at the bottom and swayed about all over the place as the little ones climbed down.

  Now it was his turn, and easing himself out of the small hole in the cliff face and onto the framework was not the most pleasant thing he had ever experienced.

  Once on the frame it was not too bad as long as he didn’t look down. And here he was, used to going outside in a space suit, and swimming about in no gravity.

  When he reached the ground he was trembling and not feeling very well, while the others were just as normal, and he envied them their calmness in the descending exercise.

  By now it was time for the evening meal, and he joined them as they all sat around twittering away, no doubt retelling the tale of their adventures in the mountain and of the awful monster they had encountered. He wished he could have joined in.

  ‘A good night’s rest should put things to rights’ were his last conscious thoughts as he lay down to sleep.

  Next day a gang was working to reinforce the scaffolding and he wondered what they had in mind, and then remembered the water.

  Perhaps they were going to get it down here somehow; he would wait and see what they did. He didn’t have long to wait, the leader of the team came up to him and took his hand to guide him over to the sand drawing area. They had worked it out all by themselves.

  Join a long line of bamboo’s together, dip one e
nd into the pool above and let it run down to the base of the cliff. This was the first original idea they had come up with, as far as he could tell. Except it was not that simple in practice.

  The pipes could be joined end to end if they put the smaller or top end into the base of the next one, but the bamboo’s had a web going across the inside at every leaf joint, and this would not let water pass.

  He showed them this, and they nodded sagely. Kal then showed them how to heat a stone or a chunk of bronze to red heat and drop it down the tube, burning out the web as it went. They got that all right.

  One thing Kal had noticed was that if the green bamboo was cut and kept wet, it didn’t seem to decay as the dead samples had done.

  So live bamboo must be used, and the water flowing through them would keep the pipe system in good condition, at least for a time.

  Another problem needed solving, and that was that the exit from the cliff face was some way above the level of the water pool, and they had no means of pumping it up.

  He would check it with measurements, but it looked as though the siphon effect would just about work for them, as long as the initial rise was not too high.

  Kal set a casting team up to make three right angled hollow bronze fittings for joining the bamboo’s at the point where they would turn to dip into the water, come out of the cave, and at the bottom of the cliff where the tap would be.

  He made the wooden pattern himself, and then set them the task of casting the parts for a bronze tap, the mating surfaces of which would be ground together with the finest sand, so that they fitted perfectly.

  Kal had suggested that the scaffolding be reinforced at the top such that it was keyed into the cave mouth, and extended a little way above it. Also, using bronze spikes, that it be locked at intervals to the cliff face for added stability. This was willingly done, and although it still looked flimsy, had a strength that belied its frail look.