Haven's City.
A Trauma Tale
The Oli had designed themselves a paradise. The dawn light that shines through the machine standing on the ridge is the light of creation itself. The sun just cutting the horizon is impossibly big, crowned by mountainous cumulus clouds engorged with rose and crimson leading up to the dark crown of the sky. The world is hushed, we are all hushed by the grandeur. The machine's complex interior, visible through its glass shell, glitters with the light of this impossible dawn as it stands knee deep in the tall grass looking down at us.
'I've got a clear shot, Tom.'
Seems Gnarly Joe Pepper isn't overawed by the heavenly dawn.
'Let's see what it wants first, Joe.' I reply returning back to earth, but you should see the sky, you should see the sky.
'Your Pappy must have told you different stories to my Pappy about ungodly machines Tom. That thing takes one step towards us and it'll need a new head.'
Joe can be single minded.
'Can't stop you Joe, but I don't advise it. There may be more.'
'Where the hell did it come from, Tom?'
'Now that is a question. Did you see where it came from Sammy?'
'No, Sheriff, it just turned up.'
'You fall asleep on watch, son?' Sam had been given the zombie watch, the cold dead hours between early morning and the dawn.
'No dammit, I've been awake ALL the time.' Sam snaps back at George 'Wolf-Man' Ridley, my older and disrespectful brother. He rides me just as bad, so you can't say he is an unfair man, just an irritating one.
'How did it appear, Sammy?'
'It just walked up from behind that ridge and then stopped where you see it now.'
'That's the way we came. There's nothing there but bones in the grass.'
'Exactly.'
'Not with you, Tom.'
Joe is frowning over the stock of his big pump-rifle, his eyes fixed on the machine's silhouette.
'Stands to reason. This world is artificial. There's got to be more than meets the eye. The river needs power, the air needs circulating. There have got to be more machines about somewhere.'
'Underground, Tom?'
'That's my guess. Chambers and machinery. Hidden out of sight so as not to spoil the illusion.'
Sam and 'Wolf-man' Ridley are looking at their feet, imagining machines rising out of the earth. Gnarly Joe Pepper hawks and spits into the long grass.
'Gets more like hell every minute.'
'It was built to protect people, Joe.'
'Not people, Oli.'
'It's waiting for something,' said Sammy.
'For what?'
'I think that's up to us. Y'all stay back. Try not to shoot me, Joe.' I said and start up the slope to the machine. I had not gone more than four, maybe five steps and the machine turns its back and begins to walk away.
It's tough to run in tall dense grass, more like wading in water. And I have no idea how my advance will be seen by the machine. Am I attacking or am I following? I am just praying it's smart enough to understand the difference. Its glass head disappears over the ridge and I can hear Chewie rumbling a warning as the wolf-hound stalks the machine, pushing aside the grass like a wake. I am glad the wolf is ahead of me.
I reach the top of the ridge in the dawn light. There's nothing to be seen. The machine has gone. There is no shaft or ramp or other kind of entrance I can see. Chewie is whining at a spot not thirty feet from where I am standing.
I wave the posse forwards and they start off up the ridge in a rush until I motion them to take it slow. I walk down to where Chewie is whining but there is nothing but grass and bones. It's the damnedest thing.
After a quarter of an hour of searching about the spot Joe says,
'I think I've got something.'
The something is a fine line in the soil, easily disturbed. A circle.
'No way in though,' says Joe.
'Hell no! I am NOT going underground.' Sammy swears some.
'Need a smarter deputy, Tom. You are underground son, it's just a question of how deep.'
"You know what I mean, underground with machines.'
'Can't say I disagree with Sam, Joe. I ain't climbing down into no machine vault.' Wolf-Man Ridley agrees. 'And I ain't sending Chewie anywhere I'm not going, so don't ask.'
'Does this mean they can just pop out of the ground anywhere?' asks Sam.
'No, that don't make much sense. But having a hatch near the entrance and near the start of the river does. They will probably be sited at regular intervals, or around significant sites, so we need to keep our eyes open.'
'Your call Sheriff, what do we do?'
'We'll keep to the plan, just keep alert.'
I look at them in turn. George 'Wolf-man' Ridley nods his agreement, as does Sammy.
Joe thinks about it for a while longer then… 'Well come on then, time's a wasting.' and marches back down the slope towards the river shouldering his bull-stopper as he goes.
We make good progress through the woods on the far bank. The undergrowth is light and it's cool under the oak tree canopies even as the sun rises higher in the sky. Then I remember where we are and of course there is no change in the heat from the sun, which is precisely zero, so it's just the psychological effect of the shade.
Chewie picked up on the machine again a couple of hours back, but all it is doing is following us from a distance. Observing. So there is intelligent life in Pellucidar, even if it is mechanical. It doesn't make me feel any easier, and it makes the wolf-hound whine and growl, but there is no sign of any others. Gnarly Joe Pepper's claim it's herding us is probably wrong, but what does a sheepdog do when the sheep are heading in the right direction?
The head of the river has been out of sight for a few hours, and we are between the two massive pillars of rock we saw in the distance when we first arrived. They are spectacular. Mountains with vertical walls, ragged light-grey surfaces reaching up into and then beyond the thin clouds that may be natural and then again may be made by the pillars themselves. My guess is the pillars reach the sky overhead and the clouds are an active disguise. A lot of thought has gone into hiding that this environment is a bunker. Just how long did the Oli plan to live down here? Generations? And are there any still alive, because we are walking through a graveyard.
The skulls and bones are more obvious in the forest. The lack of the long grass makes the skulls easier to see. They are overgrown and covered in moss, but the regularity of the shapes makes them stand out, thousands of spherical rocks. And they are gathered together in formations fanning out. There has been no scavenging to disturb the skeletons. It's as if groups of people just lay down on the floor together and died. We all try to avoid the skulls. Can't help trampling the skeletons some, there are just too many bones. Still seems like sacrilege though. A fearful thing to have to do.
I have decided to give it another day and if we see nothing we will head back and I'll assemble a properly equipped team and return to this tomb. Coot's down here somewhere, as is Space-girl. And I want to lay a few demons to rest. Is there a Bright down here? Are there any other Oli left? I am not sure I can sleep without knowing the answers to those questions. It's my job to keep folk safe.
'There's a city up ahead,' said Joe.
We were civilised once.
That's how the stories all start. We were civilised once and then the evil Oli made war on the Bright and the Bright cleansed the Earth with the sun and we became the Civilised Once. And many were Traumed by the fall.
And now, for the first time in my life, I get to see what civilisation looks like.
It's dusk by the time we reach the outskirts of the city long in shadows and a blood red light. We follow the tributary that forks from the main river into the city on a wide stone path that runs on the river bank. There are streets upon streets high in the sky bridging between tall towers. The towers are high, about a third of the height of the mountain pillars. The forest runs on into the city, creepers hang from the lower streets in curtains. At ground level the pathway is as cracked and overgrown as the road leading from the ramp back at the entrance to Pellucidar.
The city is empty. No skulls or bones here. Just empty streets, the only sound the rustling of tree leaves in the late evening breeze. The entrance to the towers is closed to us by large glass doors, massive things as big as my barn doors. The glass is grey with dust and scored with the rivulets of rainfall. You can see inside where there are seats arranged around tables and I can just make out giant images on the far wall in frames. Not pictures as I understand them but big swirling marks. An empty and silent space.
'So they are all gone?'
'Looks like it, Wolf.'
'What the hell happened here?'
'Beats me that's for sure, and why are there no remains in the city?'
Joe is asking what I am thinking.
'No idea Joe, the whole damn thing is off, beginning to end.'
He waves his arm about. 'All this for nothing. This is an unholy place Tom, we need to head back.'
'In the morning Joe. We'll camp out on the edge.'
'Where's that damn Bot?'
'Still stalking us. Creepy fucking thing.'
'Let's head back to the forest. I'll take first watch.'
'First thing in the morning,’ Joe said, ‘first light.'
Joe isn't asking, but he is right, the sooner we are out of this tomb the better.
The light came on in the tower towards the end of my watch.