‘Yeah, you and me both,’ Bergman sighed, looking down the passage that led back to the mine. He clicked his flashlight back on. ‘Come on, let’s get it over and done with.’
They set off back down the long, sloping passage, their flashlight beams illuminating the red-lit walls in shifting ovals of stark whites and greys. Their silhouetted figures dwindled against the lights as they walked, until they were lost to view.
Picture: Crew shuttle in silo
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Clare Foster and Steve Wilson walked in silence down the gentle grade of the main return airway.
It had been half an hour since they had parted from the others at the bottom of the fire stairs, and they were already far out under the crater floor. The airway ran from underneath the accommodation levels, out under the crater to the refinery complex and shuttle silos, a kilometre from the entrance to the mine.
The passage was lit with the familiar emergency lights, and had a rail track laid in the floor to take freight and personnel between the silos and the mine itself.
They had not encountered anything except the occasional piece of debris in their journey. The air that had roared up the airway when the mine had been breached had done so with considerable force, but there had been few items to move. From time to time they came across items that had been ripped from the walls, such as cables and signage, but for the most part the passage was empty. Every few hundred metres, they came across a set of pressure doors set in the rock, all of which stood wide open.
It was cold in the airway; some natural ventilation current blew a slow, chill air up towards them. Clare shivered, and walked faster.
Halfway down the length of the passage, they came across an electric locomotive and a train of empty passenger cars that had come off the rails. The locomotive appeared to have been hauling the train of open-topped cars back up the incline when it had suddenly derailed. There were some mining helmets scattered about the passage, and rust-coloured splashes of dried blood on some of the seats, but no bodies. It was becoming a familiar sight.
They found two mining robots near the derailed train: one had fallen over against a roof support; the other stood motionless, looking down the airway, its eyes dark and unseeing. They poked about among the train, but found nothing of interest, and the robots appeared to be completely dead.
They set off down the airway again.
‘Do you buy this mutiny theory?’ Wilson asked, as they walked.
Clare thought a long time before replying. She had been busy with her own thoughts as she walked, particularly the consequences of the crash on her career.
At last she said: ‘I don’t know. It makes sense – there’s clearly been a gun battle, and the mutineers could have removed the bodies. And there’s air here – someone must have closed the doors again and repressurised the mine.’
She walked on a few paces before continuing. ‘But after that, I’m not so sure. The mutineers must have done it for a reason, some objective. More pay? Going home to Earth early? So where are they, and why didn’t we hear from them after the accident?’
‘Maybe they screwed up somehow, and killed themselves.’
Clare looked dubious.
‘Maybe. But they must have known a lot about the mine to have rigged the depressurisation. It doesn’t sound right that they could make a simple mistake later.’
‘Do you think Matt’s hiding something?’ Wilson asked suddenly.
Clare stopped.
‘
‘Well, don’t you think it’s kind of strange he went straight to the robot, and got it to close the doors. Almost like he
‘But he …’ Clare was about to say that Matt couldn’t possibly have known, then she stopped.
Matt had led them towards the mine entrance as the first place to go after the crash. What had made him power up the robot? It had been an odd thing to do.
She looked at Wilson.
‘I don’t think anyone on this expedition expected to find air in the mine. It was as big a surprise to Matt as to any of us.’ She said the words firmly, but Wilson’s words had ignited a spark of doubt, where there had been none before.
Wilson nodded, but he didn’t meet her eyes.
They started walking again.
‘Have you spoken about this with anyone else?’ Clare asked.
‘I talked it over with Elliott. Why?’
‘And – what did he say?’
‘He said the same thought had occurred to him. I don’t think he trusts Matt.’
‘Look. If we start suspecting each other, it’ll eat away at all of us. Just – let this one drop, okay? I’ll talk to Elliott when we get back.’
‘Sure.’
Clare got the feeling that Wilson wasn’t convinced. They walked on in silence for a while, and despite herself, Clare found her thoughts wandering back to the crash, and the discovery of air in the mine. Had Matt been expecting air there? Could Wilson be right to suspect Matt of knowing something? There was no
The worm of doubt turned in her mind. For the moment, she had no answers, but her face remained thoughtful as she walked.
The red emergency lights came and went, and the featureless walls of the passage went by. Up ahead in the distance, they started to make out some large object in the airway; it was irregular, and nearly filled the passage. As they drew closer, they saw that it was a roof fall; a large pile of broken rock had come away from the roof and one of the walls, partly blocking their way.
Clare approached cautiously. Her instincts told her to keep clear of the gaping hollow of rock above their heads, and she skirted the pile of fallen rock, keeping close to the undamaged wall. Wilson followed.
A thin line of dust trickled down onto the rock pile as they turned back to look at it.
‘I don’t like the look of that,’ Wilson muttered. ‘Looks like it might all fall in at any moment.’
‘Yeah,’ Clare said slowly, wondering what would happen if they became trapped on this side of the roof fall. She cast a last glance up at the roof, before turning back to their descent.
A short way after the roof fall, they came to a fork in the passage. The airway continued straight ahead, on its downward slope to the air blenders beneath the refinery, and a new, narrower passage opened on the right, continuing on the level, and ending in a set of open pressure doors. There had been a sign at the junction, but it had been torn off, and only one edge remained.
Clare consulted a hand-drawn map that Matt had sketched for them.
‘Well, we’re in the right place. The silos are down here.’ She led the way up the right hand fork and through the red-painted frame of the pressure doors.
On the other side, the passage continued, but changed in character as they went along, becoming more like a corridor, with walls that were smoother than the roughly-machined mine passages. Doorways opened on either side as they drew nearer to the silos. It began to look more like the accommodation levels; there were rooms for crew briefings, changing rooms with spacesuit lockers, and power distribution rooms. An empty water cooler lay on
