Termination Shock

Conor and Jules had bunked down on opposite sides of Level Zero. Jules was curled up under a table, Conor had simply leaned back in an office chair and propped his feet up on a desk. On her way up the ladder, she’d passed a human-sized bundle of blankets on Minus One that must have been T.R. They all woke up over the course of about fifteen minutes and took turns using the toilet. They then had what in other circumstances would be called a stand-up meeting, drinking bottles of water and eating energy bars and wishing someone had bothered to install a coffee maker. Above, it seemed perfectly quiet. They decided it would make sense for Jules to ascend nearer to the surface. If he had to come back down in a hurry, he could slide down the ropes. He’d found three of them, each 60 meters long. From Level Zero to the surface was 215 meters. The ropes would cover 180 meters of that, leaving a gap of 35. The idea then was for Jules to climb about 95 meters up from Level Zero, anchor a rope there, and let it dangle. Then he’d climb up another 60 meters and anchor a second rope, hanging to the level where he’d anchored the first. Beyond that, another 60-meter ascent would bring him near the surface, where he could anchor the top rope. He’d keep his harness clipped to that and do some reconnoitering. At the first sign of trouble he could trust his fate to the rope and drop 60 meters below the ground in a few seconds. By transferring to the other ropes he could then get down to a point 35 meters above Level Zero almost as quickly. By that point, hopefully, he’d have enough of a head start on anyone or anything pursuing him that he’d be able to scamper down the ladder before it caught up with him.

Which raised the question: What then? If bad guys with guns were chasing him, then there wasn’t much they could do. But there didn’t seem to be any of those. Only drones. Where might they take shelter from a drone attack?

The answer was obvious: the steel cylinder that occupied the entire five-meter diameter of the shaft below Level Zero, all the way down to Minus Six. There were two access hatches, massive as bank vault doors, cut into the side of it. Saskia had stepped through both of them during her tour last September.

The one at the very bottom, Minus Six, provided access to the part of the cylinder below the piston, known as the combustion chamber, where a natural gas/air mix was ignited to drive the piston upward on a column of fire. The hatch at Minus Four was above the piston, at least when the gun wasn’t operating. It provided access to the so-called pump chamber, normally full of hydrogen, that got pressurized by the piston when it shot upward.

During normal operation, both combustion and pump chambers were hell on earth. But the gun hadn’t fired for almost twelve hours. Cooling water had been circulating that whole time through a jacket surrounding both chambers. They were now down to ambient temperature. They had been purged with plain old atmospheric air to remove all traces of anything flammable or toxic.

They could, in other words, simply open those hatches and step into the combustion chamber or the pump chamber and just hang out there in comfort and safety. If they stayed for too long the air would get stale, but they could always simply open a hatch and let in fresh air. And as a backup plan they had a supply of respirators, each with an air tank.

So after a lot of discussion and talking through of scenarios, they agreed that Jules would go up for a look-see. But as a precaution T.R. and Saskia would station themselves at Minus Six, next to the open hatch. They had pre-stocked the combustion chamber with water, snacks, lights, respirators, and a bucket to pee in. Above, on Minus Four, similar preparations had been made in the pump chamber. Conor would hang out up there. When Jules went topside, he’d be carrying a plastic water bottle. If he saw anything bad, he’d simply drop it down the shaft. A few seconds later it would slam into something near Level Zero and burst open, a signal they could not fail to notice. T.R. and Saskia would immediately take refuge in the combustion chamber. Conor would wait a bit to give Jules a chance to come down the rope, whereupon they’d seal themselves up in the pump chamber.

So after seemingly hours of dithering and preparation, that is how they set it all up.

And after all that it seemed almost anticlimactic when, ten or so minutes after Jules had begun his ascent, the water bottle hurtled down and exploded.