Magic Dirt: The Best of Sean Williams (2 page)

“What was your brother’s name?” he asked.

“Martin Cavell. Do you remember him?”

Carnarvon shook his head, tapping into a terminal. “No, but his records should ... yes. This’ll tell us something.”

I tried to wait while he read the file, but impatience soon got the better of me. “What happened?”

“It seems he took a three-day pass to the upper levels, then chose to continue deeper when the pass expired.” Carnarvon skimmed through the file to the end. “Your brother died on the fifth level.”

“How?”

“The exact details are unknown. There was no body, no witnesses, and no inquiry. Assumption of death is automatic under these circumstances.”

“A pretty large assumption, I would’ve thought.”

“Nevertheless.”

He seemed quite content to leave it there, but ten thousand kilometres of travel prompted me to dig deeper.

“Would it be possible to see the place where he died?”

“Possible, yes, but...” He looked at me oddly. “You don’t know the mines, do you?”

“No. This is my first time here.”

“Nobody’s said anything?”

“I only flew in this afternoon.” It was my turn to look puzzled. “Is there something I should know?”

Carnarvon shook his head slowly. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“So show me. Or have me shown. You don’t have to take me personally—”

“No. I’ll take you. It’s been a while since I went all the way.” He looked around the office, eyes itemising the contents one by one until they finally came back to me. “If you want a Grand Tour, I’ll give you a Grand Tour.”

“Thank you.” His capitulation was both unexpected and total; he made me feel slightly guilty for inconveniencing him. “As soon as I find out what happened to Martin, I’ll be out of your hair, I promise.”

“That could take longer than you think.”

“I’m in no hurry.”

He sighed and called his deputy into the office. “I’m going Down, Carmen,” he told the woman. “You’re in charge until I get back.”

They shook hands gravely and I thought for an instant that she was about to say something. But she didn’t. She just watched as we left the office, her eyes filled with something oddly like grief.

Carnarvon led me to an elevator shaft, handed me a hardhat and a dirty blue overcoat. He looked around the surface level—at the swarming clerks and technicians, at the administration buildings and bulk-transport containers—and shook his head a third time.

“Let’s go,” he said wearily, and hit Down. The cage door closed and the floor fell away.

The Mines of Barnath are the biggest in known space, and rumoured to be inexhaustible. Discovered a century ago, they have turned our previously struggling, pastoral world into a major mineral exporter. The five thousand people—according to the unofficial tourist brochure—who work its seven levels are capable of extracting over a million tonnes of any given ore per month, plus the same again in refined materials, most of which is exported off-world.

Yet, strangely, the mines are completely independent of the rest of the planet, like a distant country or a very large corporation. Visitors are rare, especially to the deeper levels, and the flow of information to the world outside is often restricted, as it was regarding my brother’s fate. But the official policy on the surface is to let the
status quo
remain. The fate of the planet depends on a constant if not large supply of Barnath metal—so while ore comes out of the upper shaft any situation, no matter how unusual, can be tolerated.

Carnarvon, if he was aware of his awesome responsibility, didn’t let it show.

“We don’t get many people here,” he said, pausing to light a cigarette. “Usually from off-planet—those who have heard rumours and want to check for themselves. Most are satisfied with a few pamphlets and a quick tour of the upper levels.”

“What about Martin?”

“He was an exception, like you.”

I nodded, allowing him the point. “What about the other miners, then?”

“A handful—the ones called ‘skimmers’—live nearby. Drifters and no-hopers, usually. They only go as far as the third level, where we do the refining. More permanent miners work the deeper levels. The deepest ones never come Up at all.”

“So some actually
live
down there?”

“Of course. They’re the ones that work best.”

My surprise was mild but genuine. This was a rumour I had heard and dismissed as unlikely. I had never been in a mine before, but the thought of crawling for any length of time along what I imagined to be cramped, poorly-lit tunnels made me feel claustrophobic.

“Why?” I asked.

Carnarvon looked me in the eye, studying my reaction with interest. “Surface people from ‘round here, apart from the skimmers, don’t work below ground because they’re afraid of the mines. They’re scared that if they go inside, they’ll get caught.”

“Gold fever?” I joked.

“No.” There was little humour in Carnarvon’s eyes.
“Caught.”

I waited, but he did not explain further. If he was trying to scare me off, or warn me, it didn’t work. I had come too far to be deterred by vague superstitions.

The cage rattled to a halt. The doors swung open and Carnarvon waved me ahead. “After you.”

I nodded, and entered the mines.

~ * ~

ONE & TWO

The sparsely populated first and second levels are almost identical, and usually regarded as a single unit. These were what greeted the first settlers, when they discovered the mines and sent the first of many expeditions into the depths of the planet. Carved from the bedrock, at five hundred and seven-fifty metres respectively, the two upper levels were found to be empty of ore and life, little more than half-submerged tunnels littered with rubble and dirt. That they had been fashioned by ROTH—Races Other Than Human— was obvious, however. Mankind had not been on Barnath long enough to begin such an ambitious project, let alone subsequently abandon it. Another species had therefore established the mines, emptied them of all valuable minerals and left.

Or so it appeared at first.

When I arrived, new tunnels were being carved by skimmers in a half-hearted attempt to reopen the upper levels. The air was full of dust and the screaming of pneumatic and sonic drills. The weight of the rock above and around me was almost palpable—a feeling compounded by the stifling half-light. Flickering electric arcs swung from carelessly-looped cables draped along the tunnels. It was unexpectedly hot and uncomfortably damp. In some tunnels, it almost seemed to be raining.

Jean Tarquitz, the supervisor of the upper levels, greeted us as Carnarvon showed me around. She was an attractive woman, although filthy, grimed with moisture-streaked dust. When Carnarvon explained that we were heading on a Grand Tour, she looked surprised.

“Why?” she asked, staring at us both with naked curiosity.

“I’ve been topside long enough,” Carnarvon explained, “waiting for an excuse to come back Down.” Even I, who had known him little more than an hour, could tell that his casual words hid a more complex reason. “I thought it was about time.”

“And you?”

“Looking for my brother.”

There was both amusement and pity in her pale orange eyes as she snorted disdainfully and waved us on.

My tour of the first level passed quickly. Tarquitz accompanied us to the second, which had little new to offer, and bade us farewell as we re-entered the shaft to the third. A load of processed ore climbed past us, deafening all those nearby with the sound of labouring machinery.

“The Director has been active in the lower levels,” she said. “I’ve heard rumours—”

“I know,” said Carnarvon wearily. “We’ll be careful.”

“If it comes for you,” she asserted, “it comes regardless of care.”

“I haven’t forgotten.”

“Who’s the Director?” I asked, but Carnarvon merely shook his head and motioned me into the cage.

“Take your time,” said Tarquitz.

“I will,” Carnarvon replied, and the doors closed.

The lift fell, swaying gently from side to side, and although the first two drops had lasted little more than sixty seconds each, this descent took at least ten minutes.

~ * ~

THREE

The third level held the first of many surprises to greet the settlers. Its heart was an enormous chamber as large as five Old Earth cathedrals stacked one on top of the other, criss-crossed by ladders and pipes and startlingly well-lit—a brilliant contrast to the upper levels. Its walls are orange and thickly-veined. The air is full of the rumbling of machinery and echoing explosions. Huge ROTH artifacts, inactive for the most part, cling to the walls and ceiling; some are mounted like stalagmites on the ‘floor’, around which cluster the refineries brought Down a piece at a time by human settlers. Green-clad miners swarm like ants along the walls and walkways, issuing from the myriad tunnels that lead deeper into the earth.

“How many people work here?” I asked, left almost breathless by the sheer scale of the chamber. Too large to be fully comprehended in even a series of glances, it provoked a feeling of vertigo so powerful as to dull the mind.

“On this level, something like six thousand. Most of them in side-cuts rather than the actual core. Your brother was one of them, for a while.”

I shook my head. The figure didn’t make sense. It was larger than that which I’d received earlier regarding the total population of the mine, and there were still four more levels to go—but I chose not to pursue the matter then and there. I supposed that I’d misheard him through the constant noise echoing in the chamber.

I tried to imagine Martin working here, and failed. We had spoken briefly before his departure for the mines, but he had said nothing about intending to seek employment. Just a holiday, he had said, to satisfy his curiosity. What had happened, I wondered, to change his mind?

The lift ends halfway down the chamber.

We stopped there to procure water bottles, to exchange a handful of words with a taciturn attendant, and to admire the view. Huge ore-lifters floated past us—up, full; down, empty. Carnarvon informed me that protocol forbade us taking such a direct route to the base of the third level. Between the midway point of the third level and its rock floor were only ladders.

“Nothing else can truly do this place justice,” he said, and I believed him.

By then I had an inkling that the Grand Tour was far more than a quick circuit of faces and off-cuts—hence Carnarvon’s initial reluctance to take me. I was glad that I had no-one waiting for me above ground.

It took us three hours to reach the base of the chamber and the first of many way-stations. We rested there for an hour or so, meeting a few of the deeper miners—called ‘moles’—who were heading Upwards for a stint in the refineries and, ultimately, the surface. They were uniformly dirty, but only two thirds were pale-skinned. The rest were deeply tanned, which I found strange. All shared a peculiar dullness of stare, a hybrid of world-weariness which I later learned was called ‘miner’s eyes’. As though nothing more could surprise them, they regarded the world with patient, cynical skepticism.

I asked them about my brother, but received only quizzical stares in reply.

“Tourist,” explained Carnarvon patiently. Some laughed openly; others touched my shoulder in sadness, and went to sit elsewhere.

“Why is everyone so ...” I struggled for the word, but couldn’t find it.

“Unconcerned?” suggested Carnarvon, a wry smile twisting his rubbery features. “If they are, it’s because they know something you don’t.”

“Which is?”

“Don’t ask now. You’ll—”

“I know, I know. I’ll find out later.”

His smile broadened. “Exactly.”

When we had rested, Carnarvon showed me some of the machinery that fills the third level. The purpose of the ancient ROTH mechanisms eluded me then, just as it has eluded human researchers for one full century.

Then it was time to enter the Shaft, the central column that plummets downwards through the four remaining levels. The cage was three times as large as the lift by which we had previously descended. Low benches lined two of the walls.

A crowd of miners spilled from the cage, dressed in unfamiliar white uniforms. They stared at us, but said nothing. When they had gone, Carnarvon turned to face me.

“The journey really begins here,” he said, on the threshold of the cage. “If you want to turn back, it’s not too late.”

I shook my head. “I need to know what happened to Martin.”

“Why?” He seemed genuinely unable to understand.

“Because he was important to me,” I said. “Am I in danger?”

“Yes.” His honesty was both dismaying and thrilling. “Everyone who enters the mines is at risk—and the deeper, the more so.”

It was my turn to ask: “Why?”

But Carnarvon, waving me inside, refused to answer.

He stood silently by my side as the cage fell, not meeting my stare. Five minutes passed without a word spoken by either of us. If Carnarvon didn’t want to talk, I wasn’t going to make him.