2041 Sanctuary (Let There Be Light) (17 page)

Peering around at her surroundings, she saw the ground at the base of the tower was only a couple of hundred feet down, well within climbing distance.

Getting to work and feeling more alive than ever, Sarah deployed the winch anchor into the rock face and attached the cable to it.

Meanwhile, Jason attached a zip wire handle to his end of the cable. He then helped Trish mount it from beneath and with a fearful screech and a flailing of legs, she flew across the great void to a waiting Sarah. Jason then went about setting up the Centipede’s winch mechanism – under Sarah’s instruction – before receiving the handle back from Trish, sent via its pulley wheel and tiny inbuilt motor.

With Jason joining them, Sarah consulted Bob’s manual on her visor and entered a sequence of commands. The Centipede crept forward off the ledge and crawled along the winch line much like its namesake.

After the crossing was complete, and having avoided any further heat funnels, the reunited company climbed and abseiled down to the chamber floor below.

Despite her near death experience, Sarah’s plan had worked as she’d hoped. The path ahead was still uncertain, but the obstacle encountered by the Deep Reach team preceding them had been conquered. The method of her choosing, however, had not gone down well with her pals.

‘Do anything like that again,’ Trish said, furious, ‘and we’re no longer friends, do you hear me?’

Jason just glared at her, his expression as powerful as any words.

Undaunted, Sarah felt no remorse; she’d done it for them, after all. She turned her attention to the Centipede, which she lowered down from its position above. ‘I knew you wouldn’t let me go,’ she said, knowing to reveal her true feelings would only incite them further.

‘With good reason,’ Jason said. ‘There could have been another way round.’

‘Not in the time we have to reach that water, there wasn’t.’

Sadly for Sarah, the arguments continued at varying intensities as they journeyed onwards, Trish and Jason unwilling to let her recklessness – as they saw it – go unpunished.

An hour later, with relations frosty, they entered an adjoining chamber, as immense in scale as the first. This one, though, contained a system of intact bridges and walkways that led them a mile down. The architecture glistened under the grey imagery of their visors, mirroring the ceiling high above. Sleek in style, these Anakim marvels cut simple patterns in the air around them, interconnecting with plazas of varying shapes and sizes.

On reaching the far side of this cavernous space their passage was halted by an imposing wall inside an arch that made the Arc de Triomphe look like a postage stamp. Sarah craned her head back to take in the arch’s majesty. Beautifully constructed, the cracked surfaces seemed to glow against the dull shades around it. Unable to contain her curiosity, Sarah, deactivated her visor, which slid up into her helmet. She felt compelled to view the scene with her own eyes.

Under the Centipede’s lights the material shone translucent, the rays refracting into a myriad of colours that sparkled deep into the structure.

Trish and Jason also raised their visors.

‘How do we get past that?’ Jason gestured to the rear of the arch which remained shrouded in darkness a hundred feet away.

Sarah had no idea. Striding forward to investigate, her form cast giant shadows on the barrier to their progress. Like the arch itself, the wall before them gleamed with an ethereal depth, the pool of light from the Centipede’s lights tiny in comparison to its immensity. She removed a glove and ran a hand over the surface, which felt rough to the touch.

‘Did either of you see that?’ Trish said from behind.

Sarah turned, the tone of her friend’s voice indicating tensions between them may have thawed. ‘See what?’

‘I’m not sure, like a ripple?’

‘Moving across the wall?’ Jason said.

Trish nodded. ‘You saw it too?’

‘I’m not sure what I saw.’

‘It happened when you touched it, Sarah. Try again.’

Sarah removed her other glove and placed both palms against the ancient surface. Up close her view was limited. She glanced back. ‘Anything?’

Trish pointed. ‘There!’

‘I see it!’ Jason said, excited.

Sarah lent back to see if she could glimpse the phenomenon.

A distant noise made her snatch her hands away.

‘Why did you do that?’ Trish said, annoyed.

Sarah stood motionless, ears pricked. ‘What the hell was that?’

‘What was what?’

‘That noise, didn’t you hear it?’

‘I heard something,’ Jason said.

Trish looked at him. ‘What are you two talking about?’

Sarah moved away from the wall and lowered her visor. She scanned the way behind them. ‘It sounded like a scream.’

Jason came to stand by her side, also looking out into the darkness before switching to his visor.

A black shape blocked Sarah’s view and she stepped back in alarm.

Trish stood before her, hands on hips. ‘Can you both stop? You’re freaking me out.’

Sarah saw the fear on her friend’s face.

‘It’s probably just the air from that heat plume,’ Sarah said to Jason. She waited a moment longer, listening, but no further sound came. ‘We’re tired and dehydrated; we can’t afford to get paranoid as well. It’s time for our water ration anyway. Let’s take a short break.’

While Trish and Jason stayed by the Centipede, Sarah approached the wall again and brushed her fingertips over the Anakim substrate. She paused and then pressed her hands onto it.

‘It’s doing it again,’ Trish called to her.

‘Stay there longer,’ Jason said.

Sarah held the position and Trish and Jason told her the ripple effect kept repeating itself, without change, every ten seconds. After a couple of minutes passed, and just as she was about to pull away, a prickling sensation ran down her arms and a strange smell, like damp earth and dead flowers, washed over her. The pendant against her skin grew warm and the wall under her hands shifted and turned liquid. Falling forwards, her arms sank into cold distortion. She let out a screech. Unable to stop her advance, she drew in a breath of air and shut her eyes as her face entered the surface. The sound of raised voices sounded far away as the liquid crept over her head. Hands grabbed her, pulling her back. The pendant turned hot, and with a whoosh of air, Sarah found herself standing next to her friends, dry and unharmed. Before them a tunnel had formed, its interior like a funnel of moving water.

‘Are you alright?’ Jason said.

Sarah gave him a nod in reassurance, before turning her attention back to the wall. Together, the three friends stared in stunned silence at the revolving whirlpool before them. Sarah lowered her visor and zoomed in to the end of the tunnel. ‘I can see another chamber on the far side.’

Trish touched the interior, her hand disappearing into the fluid. She withdrew it again, unharmed. ‘You think we should go through?’

‘I’m not going through that,’ Jason said, incredulous, ‘it could go anywhere. Haven’t you heard of parallel dimensions?’

Trish laughed. ‘Don’t be a moron. This isn’t one of your films. Besides,’ she pointed inside the swirling wall, ‘you can see the arch inside, look.’

Trish was right; Sarah could see the structure around them through the inside of the wall, continuing unbroken to the other side.

Jason didn’t look convinced. ‘It could be an illusion or a trick for you all you know.’

‘Sorry, Jas,’ Sarah said, her face set, ‘there’s no time for ifs and buts, this takes us in the direction we want to go. We have to take it before it closes again.’

‘But what if it stops working while we’re inside? We’d be sealed in solid crystal.’

Sarah knew he was right, but she also knew they weren’t in a position to look a gift horse in the mouth. ‘Without water we’re as good as dead anyway, we have no choice.’

Sarah collected the Centipede and drove it into the tunnel, small rivers of translucent wall lapping at its wheels. Hesitant but determined, Sarah followed it inside, the tunnel expanding to her height as she moved. Trish came after, letting out the occasional yelp when the liquid rose too high over her ankles. After what felt like an eternity, but was in actuality only around twenty seconds, Sarah reached the other side and turned round to see Jason had remained where he was.

♦

Jason watched Trish and Sarah exit the other end of the tubular torrent of water. Not normally averse to danger, he eyed the spinning vision with trepidation. When he mentioned the possibility of the tunnel transporting them to another world, he’d been covering for a dread of something far more primal. As a child he’d enjoyed swimming in the cold waters of his native Wales, specifically those found at the Brecon Beacons National Park; a magnet for those seeking some of the most idyllic locations within the British Isles. One summer day, much like any other, he and a friend decided to ignore the warning signs surrounding one of the reservoirs. Swimming and cavorting, the two boys had been caught unawares by a strong underwater current. Dragged out into deep water, Jason had seen his friend disappear beneath the surface, swallowed by the swirling arms of a whirlpool. Although he had made it safely back to shore sometime later, exhausted and in shock, the vision of that day had haunted him ever since. His friend’s body had never been found and as he looked into the tunnel now, his childhood trauma made real, he found himself frozen by fear.

‘Jason, stop arsing about!’ Sarah waved at him to follow.

Something made him turn to face the way they’d come. A breeze blew past him, bringing with it a distant noise. His eyes narrowed. Walking away from the tunnel and ignoring the angry words from Trish and Sarah that came through his helmet, he searched the far reaches of the chamber and its many bridges and walkways.

He saw something move in the distance, but his helmet’s technology was unable to resolve it.

Raising his visor, he could just make out a shimmering light travelling across a bridge, from right to left. The light slowed to a stop at an intersection as if aware it was being watched. After a moment it blinked out.

Jason stood there, his eyes straining to see whatever had disappeared.

A shout from Trish, calling him back, echoed out into the silence. The light returned and surged forward, its course heading straight for him. Faster and faster it came and Jason took a step backwards, and then another, before running headlong back to the Anakim arch.

Chapter Seventeen

‘Piss off, Jason; you’re just trying to scare me.’

‘Think what you like, that’s what I saw.’

‘I thought you heard it?’

‘I heard something.’

‘Bollocks.’ Trish looked at Sarah. ‘Are you buying this crap?’

Sarah didn’t know what to think. Jason had shot out of the passage like a scalded cat, ranting about some kind of light. Before they could go and investigate the newly created tunnel shrank to nothing, leaving behind a solid wall.

‘I saw what I saw,’ Jason said, ‘and I heard what I heard. I’m not seeing things. I’m not hearing things. And don’t blame it on my overactive imagination because of the films I watch, either.’

‘Who said I was going to blame it on that?’ Trish sounded angry. ‘If I was going to blame it on anything, it’d be your stupidity or lack of sleep.’

Sarah zoned out as Trish and Jason argued. According to the Deep Reach map the water they were after couldn’t be too much further, although because this part of Sanctuary had never been mapped, it was hard to tell. Distances in Sanctuary were more than confusing, half a mile could mean a time-eating climb or descent, or quite easily turn into a marathon diversion if the way was blocked.

Feeling weary, Sarah decided they all needed another rest. Forty-five minutes sleep would do everyone some good and might calm growing tensions.

So, at her suggestion, the three friends lay down on the hard surface beneath the arch, the dark of the new chamber seeming as bleak as that of the old. While Sarah felt uneasy about Jason’s sighting, of – whatever it was – she was too tired to dwell on it. No light lurked on this side of the structure and that was good enough for her. As her mother had always told her, ‘
there’s no point worrying about something you can do nothing about
.’ When Sarah had asked what if she could do something about it, her mother had smiled and said, ‘
then there’s even less reason to worry
.’ On that happy thought, Sarah drifted into sleep.

♦

Trish groaned and stirred awake.

Where am I?
she thought and then remembered. She sighed before a tickle of hot air brushed her cheek. Her eyes flickered open to the pitch-black of Sanctuary. The foul breeze came again and a growl made her scrabble for her helmet’s torch. The light blinked on and big, round, bloodshot eyes stared back at her, inches from her face.

She screamed.

♦

Sarah jumped to her feet, Trish’s terrified screeches sending her heart thumping. A light moved in the darkness.

‘What’s going on!?’ Jason’s voice came out of the void.

Sarah switched on her visor to see Trish standing ten feet away, leaning on her knees and gasping for air. Nothing else could be seen apart from the Centipede, and Jason, who crouched on the ground, looking frightened.

Sarah approached Trish and put a hand on her shoulder, making her start. ‘It’s me, what’s wrong?’

Trish shook her head and switched on her own visor. ‘Jesus Christ, Jason!’

‘What? What did I do?’

‘You know fucking well what you did! Scared the living shit out of me!’

‘Eh?’

Trish looked to Sarah. ‘I opened my eyes and there’s this hideous creature lying right next to me, right in my face, staring eyes and filthy breath.’

Sarah put two and two together. ‘Jason’s face made you scream?’

Trish nodded.

Jason stood up. ‘Sometimes I sleep with my eyes open. I don’t do it on purpose.’

‘I always thought you were a freak,’ Trish said, ‘but now I know you are.’