Deeper Into the Void (9 page)

Up ahead, the lamp’s light reveals a massive subterranean cavern opening up from the mouth of the passageway that the two are standing in.

As they approach the opening to the cavern ahead, the rushing of the icy wind produces a strange sound as it passes through the small opening to the cavern. Lawrence reaches down to his belt to feel the guideline. He looks down at it to see how much more line he has, the light from his headlamp shines on the line; it appears bright green. Through the entrance, a faint sign of daylight appears from the ceiling of the cavern, revealing the cavern to be dozens of meters high, yet not more than ten meters wide near the entrance.

Long bends over to look at the floor of the cavern directly in front of him, the cavern floor is covered in the same dust that covers the plain above them. The floor is very soft. The two walk carefully as to not sink in too far into the dusty sand.

The walls of the cavern are smooth, like glass in spots, and sharp and jagged in others. The back side of the cavern cannot be seen from where they are standing. Long grabs the lantern from Lawrence, and aims the light as far back into the cavern as he can. The only thing that appears in the distance before him is that the cavern is getting somewhat narrower at the back. After several minutes of traversing the soft sand, a curve in the cavern appears before them.

Walking slowly along the walls of the cavern, Long can now see mineral streaks in the walls of the cavern. He stops and takes a closer look at them, the streaks are indicative of precious metals, magnesium and a variety of other elements which he is interested in. Repeating the same action of filling the sample vials until he is satisfied, Long places them all in his shoulder sample bag. The faint light from above provides a sense of peace and well-being in a cavern, which if it were dark would appear most sinister and unwelcoming.

The cave does not have any stalactites or stalagmites as there is no water erosion working in the rock. Lawrence bends down and scoops up some of the dust from the surface with his hand, and sifts it between his fingers, freeing the dust as it settles slowly back to the floor.

Long looks ahead toward the back side of the cavern; he begins to run forward into the darkness that engulfs the back section of the massive enclosure.

Long eagerly grabs the hammer from his gear bag. The reason for the quick descent into the cavern now becomes quite apparent to Lawrence as he stands behind him with the lamp. The light from the lamp is scattered onto the wall in all colors of the spectrum. Several differently-colored gem stones adorn the wall in front of Long. With the hammer firmly in his hand, Long smashes down on the gems, breaking them free. He rapidly grabs the “samples” that he has collected and places them into his bag. Lawrence joins in the frenzied activity. Long pauses a moment to hold one particularly large sample, the size of his fist, he places it up to his headlamp. The light shines through the stone.

Once again, with the light firmly in hand, the pair travels up the corridor within the cavern. The dimly lit skylight in the cavern provides a subtle perspective of the cavern in front of them.

The two double check their bags to ensure that nothing is going to slip out, and to ensure that the bags won’t get snagged on the way out. After a few jovial steps, they both come to a sudden stop at the same exact instant. The same instant the light filtering down into the cavern through the skylight completely disappears in a single blink of an eye.

Lawrence is holding the bright hand-held lantern and immediately points it upward toward the opening where the light was coming through a moment ago. The ceiling of the cavern seemed to funnel up into the small hole in the ceiling where Lawrence is pointing the light. The spotlight reveals dust as it falls through the small oculus.

This time, Lawrence leads the way through the winding tunnel, up and down, left and right as the tunnel winds. The same spot of ice and the accompanying crevice comes into close view. Lawrence turns back around to look at Long while standing just next to the ice patch and crevice. He points down toward the ground where the ice lay.

After the two finish making their way out of the tunnel system and back up onto the surface, they stand atop the edge, looking back down into the chasm below. Lawrence reaches for the anchor point to retrieve the rope.

The ride back in the large rig is both light and casual, in stark contrast to the ride out. As the rig pulls up in front of the airlock, the sun sets into the Martian plain in the distance to the left of the dome. Both men nearly jump from the rig as it comes to a stop in front of its designated spot next to the airlock. Lawrence runs over to the heavy charging cable, lying in the sand a couple meters from the rig. With a quick scoop of his glove into the sand, he retrieves the plug end of the cable and runs it back over to the charging port on the rig. With a deliberate placement of the plug end, the cable begins to vibrate under the heavy current running through it.

The airlock passage is made with haste by the two. Lawrence has a hard time placing his hand on the control panel inside the airlock to initiate the procedure. His canvas bag over his right shoulder forces him to lean to the left to press his hand on the control; finally, success is the result.

With sample bags in hand, the two walk up behind the dorm building to stash the bags before anyone else has an opportunity to see them.

In the failing light of eve, the pair cannot see what lay in front of them. Long trips on a bag, which was already sitting behind the building in the dust. A canvas bag, similar to those that Lawrence and Long are already holding lay in the dirt; years of abandon have seen the canvas color fade. Both Lawrence and Long remove their helmets to improve their own view of the bag.

More interesting to them than the odd placement of the other bag is what fell out of the bag. An emerald of enormous proportion lay next to the bag on the ground.

While rounding the corner, bringing them back into view from the plaza, they are greeted by the other three. Mendez, Cardiff and Ghent appear to have been discussing something as the others stumble back into plain sight, laughing all the way.