Astronomicon: Behemoth

Chapter 6 - Orientation

Within a couple of minutes of trudging along, Megan wanted to call another halt but resisted the urge. Their muscles had not yet had time to recover from years of cryonic sleep and their E.V.A. suits were heavy and made walking awkward. All three of them needed a breather and were beginning to suffer, but Megan pressed on.

She kept the beam of her lamp pointed directly ahead and squinted into the ominous darkness. With no scenery visible around them and the totally featureless floor, she was feeling no sense of progress. She was suffering from the sensation of walking on a treadmill and the entire situation was beginning to feel somewhat surreal.

Her thighs were aching painfully and the rest of her was not much better. The straps which supported her life-support pack dug sorely into her shoulders and she did not know how much longer she could tolerate the growing discomfort.

She raised her left wrist again so she could see the digital display on her lower arm. The oxygen reserve in her pack was still registering well over ninety percent so nothing to worry about there. She went back to concentrating on her lamp beam.

"Can anyone else see that?" she asked.

"What?" asked Meera.

"Ahead of us."

"I think it is!" exclaimed Meera, obviously pleased. "It's a wall!"

Meera and Aron moved up beside Megan and aimed their lamp beams at the same point as Megan's. Even with the extra light, she was having difficulty seeing what was being illuminated. All she could tell was that there was something there.

"It does look like a wall, I think," she conceded. "Let's get closer."

Meera and Aron did not need further encouragement. With lamp beams scanning enthusiastically, they all marched on towards the dark barrier. It became rapidly apparent that the wall was formed in exactly the same fashion as the floor. The bizarrely dull, almost completely non-reflective surface absorbed the vast majority of the light from their lamps but as they got closer they could see it much more clearly.

"It's definitely a wall," said Aron once they were within five metres. He shone his light up the surface.

"Looks like it goes all the way up to the ceiling," commented Meera.

Aron chuckled, then said, "What do we do now?"

"If there's a wall, there should be a door somewhere," said Megan.

"Now that's an assumption I would not bet on," Aron replied. "We don't even know if whoever built this place needs doors."

Megan smiled wryly. "I'm happy with that assumption for now."

Meera, who had walked the closest to the wall, pointed at the base of it. "Look at the way it joins directly to the floor. There's no seam, no join."

Aron shone his lamp where Meera was pointing. He studied it as he moved closer.

"What do you think, Aron?"

"Hard to say, Megan. It's just one continuous surface. To put it simply, the floor simply turns and heads directly up to the ceiling. I suspect that at the top of this wall, it just turns to become the ceiling."

"It's all one piece?"

"That's how it would appear to me," he replied.

"If there's a door, like you said," said Meera. "Which way will it be?"

"That way," replied Aron, pointing to the left.

Megan turned to face that way, seeing nothing different about the wall for as far as she could see. "How on Earth did you come to that conclusion?"