The White Singularity: A Choose Your Own Adventure

Chapter 13: The Lost City

Time passes. How much, you don't know.

Something beeps insistently, waking you from what feels like a nap of several years. You mash your eyes several times to remove the cobwebs and stretch carefully in place. Your joints pop. You glance behind you and note that Zell is still deeply asleep. Your first guess is that you have finally reached 50,000 feet, where NESCA would have automatically stopped the ship from descending any further. In that case, all you can do is go back up and wait for the Penance to come up with something. You turn to a small ancillary screen built beside the bed and ask for a depth update.

It reads 20,000 feet.

You're so surprised that you bolt upright, knocking your head against the metal frame of the overhead bunk. Your exclamation of pain and the metallic noise startle your wife, who wakes with a soft cry of alarm.

"What happened?"

"Nothing." You rub your head ruefully and ease out of the bunk. You pull Zell up with you and head unsteadily for the cockpit.

"Look at this." You point to the depth gauge.

She gives a gasp of delight. "Did NESCA figure out a way to leave the hole?"

"She must have. But I don't know how." You don't articulate another concern; if she had managed to liberate you, why did she stop at 20,000 feet? Why didn't she take the ship all the way to the surface so that you could be rescued?

You ask NESCA what happened, and she shows you a map detailing the White Singularity's journey. The both of you stare in disbelief. You haven't left the hole at all. Somehow, the narrow pit had gone down to just below 49,000 feet, then tilted up like a U-bend and started ascending again. Now, you've reached its tail-end, which has opened into a vast, immeasurable space hidden under the crust beside the Mariana Trench.

Taking a deep breath, you switch on your exterior lights to their maximum brightness and open the portholes.

The resulting sight takes your breath away.

You're floating above a massive underwater city, a technologically advanced metropolis teeming with neon lights, its sections divided into aesthetically pleasing geometric shapes and enclosed in transparent material like gigantic inverted fishbowls. Somehow, the graceful architecture strikes you as both ancient and futuristic. The sparkling, crystalline buildings stretch out over possibly thousands of square miles, utterly inaccessible to anyone else in the outside world except for you. 

 You turn on the active sensors for a few seconds, just enough to get a 3-dimensional map of your immediate surroundings. To your amazement, there's air at the very top of the cavern, most probably artificially introduced by the denizens of this mysterious world. There are even floating islands with vegetation scattered across the surface. That means the Singularity is floating under only a few hundred feet of water.

Something huge swims by outside the nearest porthole, and you whip around, eyes wide. You ask for a wide view, and you and Zell just sit back and watch for a while, speechless. The species you see gamboling playfully around the ship are either animals you've never heard of before or animals that have long been considered extinct or mythical. 

There are prehistoric-looking creatures with tusks and three eyes that look like survivors from the Cambrian explosion 500 million years ago fed on steroids; flippered, long-necked reptiles that resemble plesiosaurs; and pods of endangered whales singing to each other so loudly that your walls start to vibrate. Giant clams as big as cottages open and close lazily just outside the city's borders. You spot several with pearls the size of beach balls inside them. A colossal squid that looks several times the largest specimen ever recorded rises from the depths and circles the ship, trailing its tentacles along the hull. Its pupil is larger than the porthole.

"Is that a Kraken?" Zell says faintly. You can only shrug, hoping it doesn't try to eat you. The Singularity wouldn't even constitute a mouthful for this guy. Finally, its curiosity satisfied, the enormous cephalopod swooshes away casually, probably looking for a more substantial meal.

Zell blows out a relieved breath. "Aside from that brief moment when I thought we would end up as lunch, this looks like our idea of paradise."

"Or a plunderer's idea of heaven."

You exchange significant looks. The scientific world would be absolutely thrilled with this place, but it's not like the academics could keep it to themselves. Sooner or later, someone will be able to reverse-engineer or steal your technology, and the poachers, capitalists, and billionaires will descend in droves.

The proximity detector pings, not wails, which tells you that whatever's coming isn't on a collision course.

"A ship's coming," Irene says, pointing out an approaching craft to you. It resembles a dolphin with a glass head and moves just as gracefully. The two of you watch its approach with a twinge of apprehension. If the people here knew what you were just thinking, they would not welcome you warmly. 

If you were in their shoes, you would contrive to keep any outsiders there forever so they could never reveal your secrets to the outside world.  That, or something worse.  They could opt to silence you permanently. 

The mechanical dolphin stops beside your craft. The Singularity shakes momentarily, then goes still. A few seconds later, without any resistance, the escape hatch swings open, and three people climb in.

You and Zell stand up slowly in amazement.

Your visitors appear human. There are two males and one female, but it's the woman that captures your attention.  She is extraordinarily tall and beautiful, with waist-length platinum hair, aquiline features, and azure eyes, clothed in a skin-tight silvery jumpsuit that shows off her splendid figure. Around her head glints a golden coronet festooned with fabulous jewels. She stares at you imperiously, with the aura of a queen. At least she doesn't seem to be holding any weapons, although, for all you know, she could be capable of shooting lightning bolts from her fingers.  The two males, dressed far less strikingly, stand at attention a little behind her like an honor guard.

Now, all you have to do is convince her that you come in peace.