The Urimine Effect

by Matthew Fortuna

the hour, and the clouds dissapeared, leaving the sky a dull red as the sun began its descent toward the horizon. It was still cold, but Yin pulled her best effort into forgetting her discomfort. Jerrem, on the other hand, complained loudly whenever he stepped into another mud puddle or slipped on a piece of scrap metal from the war.

  "Don't you think it's kind of crazy that so much was left out here after the war?" Yin finally asked. She'd let Marcus out of her satchel once the rain let up, and he hovered close by.

  "I'm not sure." Jerrem responded.

  "I mean, honestly, it seems like such a waste to leave so much out here to rust when most of it's still useful."

  "Not really." Jerrem said, "Most of the technology is obsolete, and it would take a long time to dig it all up. Most people just assume it isn't worth the effort."

  "I guess."

  "Destination reached." Marcus said.

  "Where is it?" Yin asked.

  "Located beneath the Earth."

  "How far?"

  "Aproximately twelve feet."

  Jerrem whistled."Are you positive this is worth the effort?" He asked.

  "Yes, I'm positive." Yin said. She knew the digging would cause a delay, but she was curious and determined to find out what happened in the research facility. It was like a fixation in her heart, a deep necessity to know what was lying below. Yin's eyes went out of focus as the torrent filler her thoughts.

  "Are you okay?" Jerrem asked, "You look kind of out of it."

  Yin shook her head, "Oh. Sorry, I was just thinking." She began pulling the mud from underneath her, digging herself a few inches deeper.

  Jerrem watched as she slowly made progress, shoring up several feet in a few minutes.

  "Do you want me to go get someone to help?" Jerrem asked. "My dad has a friend with a power digger if you'd like."

  "No." Yin said, heaving another armful of dirt out of the pit. "I'm doing this myself."

  "Sure, okay." Jerrem laid down and kept an intent eye out as Yin worked her way deeper into the harder soil untouched by the sudden rainstorm.

  It took Yin almost half an hour to give up, her body wasted from clawing at the unforgiving dirt deeper down. Jerrem neglected to initiate sympathies when she finally pulled herself from her hole, her brown fur matted with drying mud, and her expression downcast and thoughtful.

  "I think I'll try again tomorrow." She finally said, after a few moments of silence.

  She began walking back the way they came, the mud squelching between her toes. Marcus and Jerrem followed behind without comment, seeing the neccessity of silence on Yin's behalf.

  They stopped only once on the way back to the crashed hovership, to wash what they could from their fur, and drink from a stream that passed close by. Yin wasn't in a hurry to get back. The moon had already come out, and the stars filled the night with their comforting glow, and Yin had nothing but time to waste for the coming day.

  "Thanks for coming out here." Yin said once they'd made it back to the ship. "I apreciate the support."

  "It was nothing." Jerrem said.

  "Thanks anyway." Yin tried to smile, and went back inside. Her new bed was calling her, and she wanted nothing more than to fall asleep.

  Marcus trailed behind, leaving Jerrem alone to gaze out at the warm night sky.

 

  Yin's claws ticked on the metal steps leading back to her room, covering the muffled sounds of kittens whispering in one of the rooms just above her own. She passed it quietly, keeping the pads of her paws pushed firmly into the grating in the floor with each step. She swept down the last flight of stairs, and gently pried open her door. It was still dark inside, illuminated by the soft glow of the holo-projector in the middle of the room. She clicked the door closed behind her and laid down on her bed, closing the curtains, and pulling the covers over her shivering form.

  Marcus set himself down on the surface of the holoprojector, but joined Yin on her pillow when she called for him. Yin turned him off and set him down next to her, holding the orb close to her chest like a comfort object.

  And with nothing more than a fleeting memory of some distant terror, Yin fell asleep, her tired body succumbing to the call.

  The next morning, Yin awoke with a terrible crick in her neck. She wasn't used to the hard surface of the bed, and the pillow wasn't much better. Marcus was still turned off but he'd rolled off the bed during the night.

  Yin flipped her legs over the side, and drew the curtain back. The room was still dark, the windows to the outside having been blocked by the dirt and rock that buried the rest of the ship.

  She'd forgotten to take the satchel off before falling asleep, and it hung around her neck. She took it off and set it down next to her pillow. In a moment of interest, Yin pulled her new synth card out of the bag. It was almost noon, according to the device.

  Yin grabbed her satchel, stuffed both her synth-card and Marcus into it, and ran up to find Jerrem, taking a moment to grab the old food packets from off her floor.

  She found him sitting in the make-shift kitchen again, chewing on a tube of food paste and playing on his computer.

  "What are you doing?" Yin asked.

  Jerrem looked over at her indifferently, some task taking his attention.

  "I'm rebuilding Rome."

  "Rome?" Yin asked.

  "Yeah," Jerrem said, "Someone destroyed it, and now I'm trying to rebuild."

  "What kind of game are you playing?"

  "It's some kind of army command game."

  "Like, you lead an army to take over the world?"

  Jerrem coughed into his paw hesitantly, "Kind of."

  "Well, that's great."

  They both fell into silence.

  "Is there anything to do around here?" Yin asked.

  "Not really." Jerrem answered, "If you really want, you can go exploring down in the ship, most of it is off limits though."

  "Why is that?"

  "Well, there's a lot of dangerous stuff down there, like the old ammo cache which has mostly rusted to pieces. It's kind of a bad idea to explore around that area."

  "Where is it?"

  "Most of the lower levels."

  "Then why did you suggest it?"

  "I don't know. Why are you so bored and unresourceful?"

  Yin 'hmmphed' to herself, "So where did you get this food again?"

  "Across the stream aways."

  "Can I go there instead?"

  "Yeah, sure." He looked up, and paused his game. "You'll see a pathway just to the right of the door outside. Follow it till you reach an airplane with one wing sticking up in the air."

  "Where is the other wing?" Yin asked.

  Jerrem rolled his eyes, "Underground, obviously. And the ship is actually a lot bigger than it looks from outside. For some reason, the wreck is actually composed of two separate machines, one on top, the other beneath. The one below is a lot older, and it's a lot bigger."

  "Can I get inside?"

  "I guess you can."

  "Great." Yin said, unenthusiastically. "Have fun ruining your life."

  Jerrem just waved her away, an evil glint in his eye.

  Yin went back upstairs to the top deck and left the domed cockpit. Much of the mud had dried since last night, leaving dark splotches every couple feet. She put her hand in her satchel and turned Marcus back on. He rose out of the bag and looked around, his eye lenses taking stock of their surroundings.

  "Yin." He asked, "Are you determined to return to the research facilities to try again?"

  "No." Yin said, "I'm going to a different place right now. A crashed ship that Jerrem mentioned."

  "Is he not coming as well?"

  "He's busy at the moment. Playing with the lives of millions in a virtual simulator." Yin said sarcastically.

  "I take it you're annoyed with him."

  "I'm always annoyed with him."

  Yin started walking in the way of the path, "We're supposed to follow this path until we reach a wrecked airplane with a
wing sticking out of the ground."

  "Yin, I'm just a displaced cleaning bot. I follow directions. I don't give opinions."

  "Well that's an odd thing to say." Yin said.

  It took no more than fifteen minutes for Yin and Marcus to see the plane. It was old, rusty, and had taken on a brownish hue. The path ran around the plane on either side, making it a monument in the middle of the road. The grass surrounded it like an overgrown lawn.

  "It seems Jerrem failed to mention the tail of the plane as well as the wing." Marcus said.

  "I'm sure it was just a technicality." Yin answered.

  Yin walked up to it and ran a paw along its flank, getting flecks of rust on her fur. She walked around the body of the plane until she found an open hatch on the other side, the door having been ripped off and cast somewhere into the underbrush off the path.

  Marcus hesitantly followed Yin into the plane. It was dark inside, the only light coming from a few shattered windows above the surface of the ground. The seats were all dirty and old, ripped in places where other scavengers came looking for salvage. A few had were unbolted and missing, taken back to someone's home to provide an extra chair or two for their family. The ground was tilted at an alarming angle, making it necessary for Yin to hop from seat to seat to get down toward the cockpit.

  The attendants quarters weren't much better, having lost everything to the scavengers.

  The door to the cockpit was gone and the windshield at the very tip of the nose was shattered, leading to a black hole, the space just beyond lost in the low light.

  Yin squinted through the almost impenetrable darkness, her eyes working their hardest to adjust to the black pools.

  "Marcus," Yin said, "any chance it'd be safe to climb through the windshield?"

  "Negative." Marcus said, "There is a high probability that you will suffer