The Last Great Adventure (pt. 5)

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In the center of the room, a pillar, easily 30-feet across, provided structural support to the ceiling. The massive, fluted column had no pedestal at its base, but the faintest remnants of their light allowed the two to make out a vaguely-corinthian capital. Neither Teddy nor Wes could believe what they were seeing.

“I’m not imagining that, right?” Teddy asked.

“No. It’s really a pillar. It’s… architecture. How?” Wes stared blankly upwards into the shadows where their electric light couldn’t reach.

“Someone had to have made it. There’s no way it formed naturally!”

The two stood for a few minutes, mostly stammering and asking foolish questions that neither would have been able to answer. Finally they determined there was nothing to do but push on and keep exploring.

The deeper they pressed into the massive chamber, the larger it turned out to be. After walking a few hundred meters, they noticed another large pillar, identical to the first. Overall, the room’s dimensions resembled a corridor, though on a much grander scale. The walls on the left and right seemed mostly natural, though some areas bore marks where rock had been roughly chiseled away.

But the pillars. The pillars couldn’t have been formed by mineral rich water droplets and random chance. After the two friends passed the third, the far side of the hallway came into view. In the center of the wall, two smaller but similarly shaped pillars flanked a large set of metallic double-doors

Each door stood about 5 meters tall and 3 meters wide. Long, arching scrapes extended from the center, suggesting the doors would open outward into the chamber, but only with extreme effort. Teddy approached and placed his hands against one. It was cold to the touch, extremely smooth, and had a soft yellowish glow, like polished brass. There were no knobs, rings, or other places from which it seemed the doors could be pulled upon to force them apart.  

“Welp, I guess this is the end of the line,” Teddy said with a sigh.

“Um, no. No way. We can’t turn back now! We have to find out what’s on the other side of that door.” Shadows danced as Wes gestured with his light.

“I’m not sure if you’re looking at the same doors I am, but those things are huge. They have to weigh a few tons each. How the hell are we supposed to get them open? Did you want me to knock and see who’s home?”

“We can’t give up, man. Look at this place. We’re deep underground in the entryway of a lost city. We have to figure out who made this place and why.” Wes’ voice rose in excitement as he argued.

“Bro, We’ve basically already made one of the most incredible archeological discoveries of the century. Let’s go back and see if we can’t get some kind of… I don’t know. Professional help.”

“Yeah, because I’m sure when the government decides to send in an official expedition they’ll give us clearance to see what they find. There’s no way they’ll just shut out the random highschoolers who stumbled into it.” Sarcasm hung from Wes’ words like stalactites. 

Teddy grew defensive. “What are we supposed to do? I didn’t bring… I don’t know… dynamite. Or whatever the hell it would take to break through these doors. Even if we were going to try and explore this place alone, we don’t have the first clue how to go about something like that!”

“Always the pragmatic.” 

In the dark, Teddy couldn’t see Wes’ face, but he could hear Wes’ eyes rolling though his voice. “Look, I’m sorry Wes. It’s not like I don’t want to keep going. But we also gotta think about getting back. We’re already pushing it.” Teddy glanced at his watch, pressing the button to illuminate the face with a faint blue-green aura. “I’m pretty sure our parents will be expecting us in like, a few hours. It’ll take us at least that long to get back up to the surface.”

Wes thrust his hands into his pocket. He knew Teddy was right, but that didn’t change his plans to pout about it. “Ouch!”

“What?”

“It’s hot!” 

“What is?!” Teddy grew increasingly alarmed.

Wes grabbed a handkerchief from Teddy’s backpack and reached back into his pocket. Gingerly, he pulled out the small glass bead. The thread-of-gold running through the center was glowing faintly, and brightened as Wes held it aloft.

The tiny bead began to vibrate and hum as the golden filament lit up. Wes let go of it, cursing as it transitioned from uncomfortably warm to dangerously hot. The bead hovered in the air and soon began to rotate, a tiny sun.

“Look!” Teddy pointed at the door. A small divot he’d missed before—if it had been there before—glowed too. The glass pearl hummed louder and louder. 

SKREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Both boys shouted in pain and covered their ears again as the splitting screech echoed through the chamber. 

Like a paperclip pulled by a powerful magnet, the bead zipped into the divot, filling it completely. 

The noise cut out and was replaced by a deep rumbling and the clockwork sounds of metal gear teeth spinning in sync.

A hiss like air brakes releasing announced the unsealing of the doors. The scrapes on the floor receded revealing tracks along which the outer edges of the doors traveled. Cold, dry air—the kind that shouldn’t exist in a cave—billowed out and poured over Teddy and Wes. 

They shivered, but not from the chill. The air from beyond carried no whiff of mildew or rocky minerals. It had no hint of guano or dirt. It smelled… sterile and lifeless.

It was the smell of a just-cleaned hospital bed where a loved one recently died.

Teddy and Wes exchanged glances and strode forward to find whatever lay waiting for them beyond the doors.  

As they walked, sconces on either side of them flickered to life with a warm electric glow.

Soon, it became clear that they were strolling along an ancient, subterranean promenade. Every few meters, smaller, human-sized doors, all locked tight, led to innumerable offshoots and additional passageways. Above them, a ceiling of perfect glass prevented any effort to reach the windows that overlooked the street from above. 

Besides the obvious fact that all of this had been constructed by someone—or something—there was no sign of life. Everything the two of them saw seemed empty and void, like a new house waiting for residents to move in and make it a home.