Sunshine Passage

Cooper Smith

Waxy and folded till its creases tore, the poster claimed, “Expedition of the Ages! A Gate from West to East and Beyond! Future Discovery of the Millennium!” Its offerings for recruitment included wealthy pay, recognition, and renown across the world. The wrinkles on the paper looked like crow’s feet on an old man’s papery skin. Old men had done too much already down here. Clayton couldn’t help but shred the lies in his gloved hands, the oil-stained leather smudging much of the print as it was destroyed in his grasp. Drawing in a lungful of crowded air, he lurched onward to the only thing keeping him paid and alive, the Borehead. It had been four years since the inception of this journey to the unknown, 1910, and there had already been numerous deaths, accidents, protests, and displays of authoritarian power. 

Death was the reason for Clayton Cratchet even being here—he was a replacement for the senior enginemaster. Joining had been far easier than trying to leave. Between the monitored sleep shifts, lottery work leave, and guarded surface lifts, Clayton thought it best to escape by giving them results. Clayton’s predecessor left only the necessities for his duties, or so the tunnel bosses told Clayton, enough to know the machine and the basics of expedition life. He walked along the wooden path and canvas quarters where he met with Ivo. 

“Mr. Cratchet, a word please, before we begin the day’s operations.” Tunnel Boss wasn’t quite accurate to describe Ivo Oster’s position, but Borehead Executive Officer was too respectable for his style of dictation. 

“What can I do for you, sir? I’ve got a wall of bedrock that can outwait all of us and our grandchildren.” Clayton spoke respectfully but with backhanded urgency. 

“Understandable, Cratchet, but this matter requires our careful attention and the cooperation of all departments. It could be another ‘Atlantic Accident’ we have to contend with.”

It was after Ivo’s words that Clayton’s boots began to fill with sweat. Sweeping aside the canvas doorway, the two men proceeded to fill the last two spots at a large mahogany table covered with ashtrays, a map of the underground, and enough scotch whiskey to kill Winston Churchill. Another man clad in a dark khaki uniform spoke up from the head of the table, almost slamming down his glass, nearly drained of its whiskey. 

“Gentlemen, all you distinguished department and section heads, I appreciate your time. We have yet again found ourselves upon the cusp of greatness!” This statement had previously graced the ears of most men at the table, save a few replacements like Clayton. Both times when the Expedition Conductor had addressed these moments, he spoke both assuringly of their success and nothing about the work left. To Clayton and the rest of those who weren’t officers or supervisors, Silas Franklin couldn’t seem to spare honesty in the expedition’s budget or schedule. 

“To you here, you represent the finest men along for the journey, you who manage our hard-working laborers, Mr. Oster.” Ivo gave only a nod and swished his drink in his mouth when acknowledged by Franklin. It seemed his gentleness was only with officers. “Those who carry our logistics, I salute you as well.” Several men to Clayton’s left gave a unified cheer before Franklin moved down the hierarchy. About eleven others were given lackluster honor or their first acknowledgments before the thanks finally rounded to Clayton standing opposite Franklin. “Mr. Cratchet, we owe two years of earth-breaking to you. Thank you, son.” Raising his calloused, gray-stained hand, Franklin signaled for the meeting to proceed and, Clayton hoped, conclude as fast as possible. “Remember today, men, we break through! Reach for the Gate, and the Beyond will be ours!” With Franklin’s final words, most men broke off to commute to their workstations and offices.

The flap of the tent’s doorway seemed to lull Clayton deeper into his mind while his clomping boots drove him closer to the tunnel’s head, closer to the inanimate being that understood him. Familiar faces passed him by; even ones enclosed in nozzled masks were recognizable to him. Cooks, supply workers, mechanics, and every other company thug he knew, but it became difficult to learn about others when the expedition had a policy of no fraternization, a policy incited by one of the laborers’ protests Clayton’s first year on. Those who weren’t killed for insubordination were lucky; those who got to keep their pay and assignments were the privileged ones among the protestors who survived the scouring. Even remembering the truckloads of dead and injured made Clayton’s eyes go wild with paranoia behind his goggles. Did anyone think he was unruly? Who was closest to him that might rat him out for bogus inefficiency reports? The tunnel did this to him and every other man and woman trapped in there with the company’s boots on their throats. It had been so long since Clayton could remember what summer smelled like. He couldn’t remember what season it was. Fresh air had long been taken from him, and now the musk of the exhausted workers’ tent was grossly familiar. To see the clouds, even a storm cloud, would be worth more than this damn Gate. 

Even remembering the truckloads of dead and injured made Clayton’s eyes go wild with paranoia behind his goggles.

“You’re late, Mr. Cratchet. Daydreaming on your walk to the front?” An efficiency enforcer shouldered his rifle before slapping Clayton on the back, launching him awkwardly forward, where he conked his helmet on a wooden support. “We can only afford so many slackers, Cratchet. We certainly can’t afford to lose our earth breaker.” 

Clayton caressed his head smashed inside the turtle shell helmet before responding, “Too damned right, best get her cracking on.” He spoke but honestly didn’t care whether the man listened or was crushed by a falling rock.

It was eighteen steps to the cabin of his one true coworker, the Grantworth DT-11 Boring Drill. Climbing the steps, he took a break from watching over the machine’s maintenance and reached out to the wall that stood before both of them. Clayton was told this would be the densest rock these two would be drilling through. “A combination of highly condensed igneous and metamorphic rock that could heavily damage the drill if pushed too far.” That’s the warning that the researchers from Yale and Oxford gave the department heads. If this expedition was doomed like Clayton and many of the other poorer workers believed, then he would damn sure see it to the end if it meant sunshine on his coal-streaked face. The last clangs of his boots on blackened steel meant he was able to look into its eyes, the spider-webbed protective windows of the cabin. Both reinforced with a shield of steel fencing and iron plates that could retract for easier, but more dangerous, viewing, they peered into Clayton’s goggles, and he could almost hear it speaking to him again. 

“I’ll help you, Clayton. The sun can be ours again.” 

“I know you will. You always do, Grant.” Clayton blew out hot air and began flicking on spotlights. “Now, let’s get on cracking. We’ve got all of them looking to us for progress.” He spat one last disgusting glob of tobacco out the window of the cabin before slamming the safety latch on the door and pushing the ignition lever down to the floor. CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK, then BOOM! The spark of the drill’s massive engine finally exploded to life, silencing all other work in the tunnel for a moment. A cacophony of terrible metal shrieking, churning, and deafening rumbles filled the tunnel for miles. That was just what it was like in that earthen void, like having a mob of school children armed with their mother’s pots and pans hound you, but this time for hours on end. On approach to the wall’s obsidian surface, now bleached with work lights, the screaming intensified as first point contact initiated. An invasive metal weapon penetrating the stone womb of the world, it both worried Clayton and snatched his attention from all other distractions. 

Countless meters, gauges, and flickering warning lights filled the cabin view, but, in truth, all Clayton could seriously rely on was the blaring sound crushing the cabin. It was all he could use to accurately feel the pressure on Grant, to know when it was too much for him or too slow for management. Clayton already had his right hand on the call box button and his left hand over his ear when the regular notice from Operations came in, always on time. 

“Cratchet! All reads well from out here! Coal and gas are filling your veins above nominal! We hope to hear some stone fall soon! Good luck!” Ivo’s voice barely registered through the call box for Clayton to hear, but he assumed all was fine, considering he wasn’t engulfed in flames. He lifted his gloved finger off the call button and pressed green next to it. “O.K.” is what the rest would see from outside the drill. His teeth never stopped chattering even when the drill was out of operation. 

The initial sixty meters finally gave as it seemed the hardest of the rock was beginning to waver. A loud alarm blared in Clayton’s cabin; at the same time, a sickly yellow light flashed above his head, signaling rockfall. Clayton firmly pressed the furthest left pedal down, and the iron shields began to close in on the windows to protect the expensive operator and even more expensive glass. Yet before the shields clanged together, CRASH! A huge slab of rock crashed down onto the top shield, caving in its middle. Clayton would have given more of a yelp or fearful shout, but he’d already defecated by the time he landed back in his seat. One more repair for the logistics department’s piles of lists. The call light flicked on again and he pressed the answer button.

A loud alarm blared in Clayton’s cabin; at the same time, a sickly yellow light flashed above his head…

“Good God, Cratchet, are you all right?! That one looks to have come from the ceiling! Our section heads report casualties in the front two camps! Ease off on it, but press forward! Predictions say we could be close by the week’s end!” The light switched off as Ivo hung up before Clayton even lifted off the button. 

“God damned geologists couldn’t predict that, could they? Poor souls.” Clayton pulled back on the shield pedal, but before the top fully retracted, the bent shield locked in place, blocking his upper view. 

“Wonderful. Well, Grant, we’ve got more to go and less time to go on. Don’t fail me now, chum.” A few of the gauges had climbed above safe, but it was either waste time and effort calling Ivo or keep boring through. Clayton already knew the verdict before Operations could have even said it. 

Clayton could picture the carnage outside. Two separate towers of rock had simultaneously dislodged from the wall as Clayton drilled in earlier. Either management hadn’t told the section leaders that he’d be boring through the densest rock in four years, or they hadn’t told their workers to relocate sites. Even past the front division, miles back, surface lifts would have been backed up with the dead from the previous week’s accident and today’s injured or dying. Their screams and stenches seemed to suffocate in those lifts as they made their way up and onto the administrative fleet above, closely monitoring the expedition’s progress. From what Clayton had overheard from upper management, they didn’t even know how many had died already. Ships laden with papers, secretaries shuffling the paper, and their bosses reading the paper now had the opportunity to see the cost of progress. This was the second time this month.

Being under the Atlantic seemed to remind Clayton of what stories said happened to old Atlantis in the books his mother, God keep her soul safe, had read to him. She wept dearly after he told her of taking the position in the expedition. He could hear her shouting at him in the back of his mind as he shifted some of the drill’s gears. She warned him of what she heard about most exploring people nowadays, that they stopped coming back from these “short” journeys. He’d only finished his studies at Brown before joining. The recruiters were elated to hear that more Americans decided to come along for the journey of a lifetime. When asked if he feared the ocean, Clayton said he’d grown up sailing it, never before did he expect to be trapped under it. 

The grinding and shrieking of the metal on rock suddenly lightened a little. It had only been one hundred meters further on, and that was just supposed to be a minor break in pressure on the rock, according to the geological report. It felt like summer to Clayton all at once. This time, it was unpleasant and foreboding. A wave of heat began to fill the cabin like the sun had just been placed outside the door. Stripping his gloves first, helmet second, goggles and jacket next, he could feel sweat begin to pour out like spring rain. 

“Grant, what is this? Need me to pull off, or are you just feeling balmy all of a sudden?” Clayton spoke out to the drill but its answer only further scared him. 

“The sun will be ours again.” 

For a third time, the call light sprung to life, and Clayton’s finger nearly slipped off it from the sweat dripping down his fingertips. 

“I’m sure you feel it too, Mr. Cratchet! This heat has the section heads suggesting a geothermal system nearby! A little hot water never dampened our spirits though. Push on and Godspeed!” This time, Ivo was a little slow on hanging up, and from what Clayton could hear, it sounded like more shouting was coming from the camps. Two green lights from the drill and operations continued, albeit more hesitantly. They had gone only five more meters by the time the cabin light began to slowly fill with orange warning light. Assumedly, Clayton pressed on the shield pedal again but was surprised by a call. 

“GET OUT OF THERE! IT’S A FLOW! LAVA FLOW!” 

Before Clayton lifted off the call button, his head turned left to look out the side of the cabin. Orange light now blinded his eyes as the heat began to make his vision shimmer and the metal of the shields glow. A massive spout of molten red rock poured from the ceiling above the drill and even began running down the funnel shape of the bent window shield. Clayton’s shaking hands barely managed to unbuckle his seat belt before the front cabin windows began to warp from the lava. Still trapped inside Grant, Clayton wrenched the safety latch open, causing him to fall out onto the steel walkway surrounding the cabin, burning his uncovered hands as he laid on them. Straightening up, he rushed over to the access ladder, its steel shape beginning to fold from the orange glory. His slip on the ladder bubbled up a scream out of his throat while he fell ten feet onto the left side tracks. Rising out of his daze, he looked back to the camps, which were now catching fire and blocked by a new river of yellow, red, and orange. 

Clayton screamed out, “GRANT, GRANT, WHAT DO I DO?!” He quickly spied what looked to be a crevice forming on the wall they were drilling, yet untouched by the lava. Dropping down from Grant’s giant iron treads, Clayton’s legs threw him over to the hole as he began pushing himself to uncertain safety. Clayton heard his voice again as he looked back at Grant, slowly melting. 

“Don’t worry, Clayton, go on. I’ll catch up and we’ll feel the sunshine once more.”

It took a lot of panicked squeezing and wheezing of exhaustive breaths, but when Clayton spilled out on the other side of the wall, he curled up in a ball for a few minutes. It felt like he had been pulling himself through for hours. It still felt hot but not like the sweltering heat from before. The cavern was so quiet and even darker. He’d never felt scared of the dark before, but now the silence and pain frightened him more than anything. Unfurling from his ball, Clayton opened his eyes more, detecting a faint glow on the wall that surrounded him. It was blue and white; a sheen like starlight glimmered off the cavern wall so tall he couldn’t see the ceiling. He turned about, still clutching his side from what he assumed was a broken arm, now exasperated by the trek through the rock womb. A glow more heavenly and benevolent blinded most of his vision as he looked out into the distance of the vast dark cavern. 

Approaching the light, Clayton was no longer blinded by its glow, but it was as bright as the strongest moonlight he’d ever seen. Blue, white, and awesome. Two pillars met with another column horizontally forming The Gate. Clayton had heard the hushed murmurs through camps that the companies’ heads really believed there was a door to the East, maybe even beyond, buried in the Earth. The arch was as tall as any building he had seen at home and was carved with many lines crawling intricately up the structure. He had stayed standing there for what felt like ten minutes before he heard him again. 

“Let’s go, Clayton. The sunshine, the wind, the grass. It’s all waiting for us. We’ve worked so hard. You’ve worked so hard. Let’s crack on and live.” 

“You’re sure about this, Grant? I’m awfully tired, and I don’t know how I should get back.” 

“Of course I’m sure. Damned good I’d be if I weren’t. Go on, Clayton.” 

“I… I’ll sure try, Grant. Just make sure it doesn’t hurt anymore, will you?” 

“I will, Clayton. It’s gonna be onward and upward from here on out.”

The burns on his hands felt at ease, his arm seemed a little lighter, and his head wasn’t throbbing anymore. Clayton reached his hands out to touch The Gate, and when they passed through, it blinded him. It felt good to feel the sun again, even if it felt odd.

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