12 Miles Below

Umir realized he was dead.

They all were. There was no chance of survival.

The rest of the expedition were going through their own five stages, most still stuck in denial for now. But Umir knew from the moment he saw the ruins. The others would soon reach the same conclusion.

They were Retainers after all. Dying is a risk they knowingly take every time they step outside the clan home.

“Three gods preserve us…” His expedition lead whispered at his side, shock fading into horror as he watched. A younger man, full of ambition that one. On the path to promotion again and again. In a way, the old scavenger felt a morbid sense of pity for the boy. He’d worked so hard and now there was nobody left to acknowledge him. What was all his struggle for? Soon he’d be frozen and dead like the rest of them.

Even in the sub-zero temperature of the surface, the massive newly made canyon before them still had embers of red at the sides. Glowing twisted shapes melting into themselves, running down like blotchy tears against the fresh cut walls. He didn’t need to be a Reacher to realize what that was. Melted metal. Still liquid even in the face of the harsh sky and sun. Quickly growing sluggish now, coagulating back from bright red to dim silver again.

The sound earlier had been deafening. The sight itself was something that he’d never forget for however few days his life would last.

“We’ve sinned against the gods.” Another said behind him, dropping on his knees, still in shock. Then he started screaming out curses. “It’s all that bastard’s fault! I knew his gifts were poison, I said it again and again! Stolen from the heavens and now they’ve come to take it all back! The clan lord doomed us! Our souls are forfeit! We’re doomed, doomed, the gods spit on our graves!” The man was growing hysterical already, violent now. A few other scavengers were trying to hold him down before he could hurt anyone or himself. Most of them were still in shock, only moving on reaction and training.

Within the ice caverns here, there were a lot of places for someone to bash their suits against. Or if he took a few more steps forward to the entrance, he’d slip and fall down the open cliff. Usually the tech Reachers made was resilient, but a scavenger could never be too careful. And the cold was always seeking a way in.

Now, if something happened to his suit, there’d be nobody to fix it.

“We need to make our way back!” Another voice shouted, “There could be survivors! We have to help them!”

More hushed that outcry, making it clear the crew was not about to go out and try to pull anything from the wreckage left. Shock was wearing off, and people were now thinking about the future.

Umir agreed with them. It was a grim thought, but a real one: Nobody could have survived such a strike. Even the outskirts of the clan colony had warped and deformed against the heat. If the initial heatwave inside those confined halls hadn’t killed, the freeze that would pounce on the compromised structures and slide inside to gnaw on the survivors would finish the job. The cold, after all, was always seeking any way in.

This was reality. The clan was gone. Wiped out. Even if there had been survivors, it would take half a day to hike through the snow and get back to the colony. By then, there’d be nothing to do except sing for the bodies.

All that was left of their colony was the blasted canyon, and deformed structures slipping down the side, the metal cooling off. For the first time in his life, he saw mist out on the surface. Not for long of course. The previously vaporized snow froze again in midair and began to coat the ground anew, shapes and outlines growing clear as the cloud turned back to ice. At the very center of the canyon, where the most damage had happened, everything was already freezing over again.

Even against the power of the gods themselves, the cold did not care, resuming its chokehold on the world as if the prior events had been nothing more than a nuisance.

“Ahileen, my dear,” He said with a numb voice. “Are you recording this?”

The girl behind him nodded, “Started it as soon as I heard the sound, thinking it was some kind of quake. Was too late to catch the light, but I’m recording now.”

Umir gave a short nod, watching the distant ruins of his home. It looked so close from up high, but the crew all knew the distance was deceiving.

He turned to face the girl fully. Now was not the time to break down. He had to act. “Point the camera to me dear. There we go.” He took a breath. “To whoever is watching this recording, if anyone ever does, my name is Umir, of House Ishnar, in service of clan Adrias, under the rule of clan Lord Makkan. The crew and I here were sen-”

The team lead grabbed Umir by the shoulder, flipping him around face to face. “What are you doing old man? You sound like you’re giving our last will and testimony. We’re not dead, the gods smite our colony, but we’ve been spared.”

Of all people, Umir hadn’t expected the lead himself to still be stuck this far in denial. The reality had already reached the rest of the crew. And the boy was smart, he had to be to have become an expedition lead this early in his career.

Even the hysterical one had calmed down and was now curled up in a ball. Retainers were prepared for death at all times, they were trained from birth to be hardy. Expeditions always had a death toll, though simple surveys outings like this one had been considered fairly safe. Of course, nobody expected to die like this. Betrayed by the gods.

But someone had to say the obvious out loud. May as well be him.

“We’re stranded, sir.” He said, and the small tunnel grew quiet. “You saw what happened. We all did. Our home is gone. And all the airspeeders with it. Nearest colony is four days, on one of those moving at top speed across the wastes. It would take months, maybe even a year to make it on foot. Even if we had the energy to keep the suits and evo-tents working across all of that, our gear isn’t going to survive the wear and tear, if we don’t starve to death on the way there. There’s no one coming for us. The gods eliminated everything, and the cold will bury the rest. We’re already dead. And nobody out there will ever know what happened to us.”

The hysterical one started blabbering again. Umir’s words must have hit him too close to the heart. “It’s all the clan lord’s fault! The gods punish those who trespass on their domain! Those things he did, it was clearly heresy! I called it when I saw it, but nobody listened to me then! We’re doomed men and women, I tell you all, doomed to die and have our souls tortured for eternity!” The rant rapidly devolved into obscenities, curses and ramblings. A truly shameful display for a caste that held such pride on not breaking down exactly like this.

Umir couldn't completely write off the man's gripes. The clan lord certainly hadn't been popular or much loved, not like his father before him. But the line of succession had been clear, and the old clan lord had no other sons or daughters to contest the claim. Despite the rather... disturbing way the old clan lord had died in his sickbed, with his son taking command the very next hour.

The lead wasn’t as convinced, jabbing a finger at the broken scavenger. “Someone shut him up. We’re not dead yet. Not until we breath our last. So I’ll have none of that talk here! Am I clear?” He waited for anyone to argue with him. Silence. “I said we weren’t dead yet, and I meant it. There’s still one thing we can do to survive.”

“You want to travel underground.” Umir guessed.

The lead answered back with a flick of a hand over his mask, sign for a smile. That would be a yes then.

“And the machines you’ll find there? How do you expect to survive them?” Umir asked.

“I’ll take the threat of the machines any day over the inevitability of the freeze.” The lead said. “One force, we at least have a chance. The other, we can’t even punch it. I’ll happily choose death fighting a machine than freezing out in the wastes.” He straightened up, looking down the ice walls to where their supplies were still littered around. “Crew! At attention! Gather up, take what we can, leave everything that’s not worthwhile behind! We’ve got at least four days before the suits start running out of power, we find a way down underground from here and we’ll have a chance to survive. Get moving or get dying!”

The words kindled a spark in the morbid ground around him. People began moving around, tossing measuring tools and expedition gear on the ground, while packing up rations and shelter gear. They’d reached these ice caves on foot so they had come with gear for long distance travel. They could do this.

Umir reckoned they really did have a chance of finding a crack into the underground. Desperation had its own gravity and power. And the boy had talent as a leader. He didn’t know if that would be enough to contend against the mythical machines that plagued the underground but at least they would all die as proper Retainers, fighting to the end. And so would he. As the oldest among the surviving crew it was his duty to give the next generation the best chance forward. He had sworn the vows.

He reached out a hand again to Ahileen, turning her around so he faced the camera. “I still need to finish this recording.” He said to her. “It’s important. Probably the single most important thing I can do with my life now. We need to leave a message behind.”

She nodded, lifting the body camera up to catch him completely.

“Our expedition arrived into these caves on foot.” Umir continued, while the rest of the crew was too distracted with packing up. “Before we could begin to update the map of the tunnels here, a bright blue pillar of light appeared roughly a half mile before the colony and moved across it. Wherever the light touched, the ground broke and melted. It moved across the ground and cut the colony in half in a heartbeat. Like a slice of an occult knife on the ground. Most of us didn't see it. Explosions overtook the rest of the colony after. I estimate the beam diameter at a quarter mile from what I saw of the wreckage. Whatever this was, it left nothing alive.”

Umir continued talking for a few more minutes, giving as much detail as he could as if he were reporting to a superior. Every bit while his mind was fresh and the event seared into his eyes. He couldn’t afford to let a single detail escape.

Once done, he extended a hand out, and Ahileen unclasped the camera, handing it over. She hadn’t ended the recording just yet, the red light still twinkling at him.

Behind, Umir could hear the lead stalk up. “Not packing up? Were you deaf? I gave an order.”

The old scavenger turned to the man, drawing himself up. “Respectfully, there is something else I need to do."

The man seemed outright confused, so Umir drew the camera out in front. “You will likely survive this, sir. But if you do not, if the machines cut your lives short, who will live to sing our song? Someone has to know, to be warned of this. To know what happened to our clan.”

The young lead had always been a clever one with politics. Umir could see the man’s mask tilt down with calculation, before reaching the conclusion. “You’re not coming with us, are you?” He asked. There was no hostility. He’d understood and already adapted.

“Someone needs to make sure this recording can be found. While you take your chances underground, I’ll do the same above. In my own way.”

“You think you can find a way to preserve that recording? Confident enough to pay your life on it?”

Umir shrugged. “Have four full days to come up with the best way to do that. It will have to do.”

"You won't make it out of this alive old man." The lead said. "Even if you finish your task in a day, we'll be long gone. You'll be traveling underground alone."

"I don't plan to go anywhere underground." Umir said, giving the hand sign for a somber smile. "I swore a vow and I will honor it today. Perhaps tomorrow or the day after, it will be your turn, in your own way."

The lead nodded, returning the typical hand sign. Then he grabbed and shook Umir's shoulder, once. No words were needed.

The scavengers in the tunnel quickly packed their last, turned and marched down the tunnel. All of them focused on survival. Ahileen was the last to leave, giving him one final hug and farewell.

He was alone now.

“When sacrifice calls…” He whispered, turning around to face the white wastes beyond the cave entrance, watching the ruins of his life.

There was still work to be done before he could rest.

He raised the camera up in his gloved hand. Such a small fragile thing. He’d likely need to scavenge out parts to build some kind of protection for it. Plenty of that around him, the crew were leaving all kinds of tools and unneeded supplies behind. And the clan home now had tons of raw materials, with no one left to yell at him for theft.

There were a lot of ways that old tech had been preserved, even after spending centuries untouched on the surface. In his long years as a scavenger, he’d seen every possible manner nature had come up with by sheer chance.

Often times it had seemed outright deliberate to him, as if the hand of the gods had nudged all the right things to collapse in all the right ways as to leave the treasures perfectly intact, sometimes looking more like outright art. Now he’d follow the examples by deliberate choice, and leave enough traces for someone to notice.

It may take centuries, but his recording will survive. He would make sure of it.

A gloved hand reached the camera controls and flicked the instrument off.

Next chapter - Another headache

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