The cave had two sections. The first, vertical, was fifty meters in length, and a river of hot magma fell like a waterfall of red glowing blood. The second, horizontal, was sloped slightly, and a river of hot magma flowed slowly like molten honey downwards draining into the chasm at the end of the rocky corridor.
It was dark. The glow of the red hot river of molten rock danced on the walls of the cave in large blurry patches of light. Once in a while, when tiny droplets of lava jumped out of the fiery fluid just to flash once and cool off in mere two seconds the light flashed in tiny points and small shadows pierced the red-lit walls.
It was hot. Hank climbed the rocky stair right next to the lavafall in the vertical cave. He was heading to the top, where the camp had been. He pulled himself up onto a large stone big enough for him to stand on. Sweat poured down his face as if rain of salt water was falling down on him. Feeling dehydrated he reached for his water bottle. Taste of water was neutral and it washed away at the salt that collected on his lips, yet it brought no relief. It was hot.
It was quiet. The air was heavy with vaporised rock. The soft wind that hit Hank on the face felt like a wall of hot air from a jet engine. A sharp sensation rushed down through the top of his head as if his hair was burning. He knew it was not true. He knew that burning hair felt quite different. The pain would be cold and sharp, not hot and dull. He felt it once. Hank kept on climbing. He knew that up on the top the air would be cooler and it would be easier to breathe.
A small droplet of lava flashed in the air and landed on his left sleeve. His eyes widened. He knew what it meant. The single droplet of molten rock would set his clothes on fire, burn right through the fabric like a knife through whipped cream. Then it would touch his skin and for the mere two seconds needed for it to cool off it would sizzle its way through his flesh, muscle and bone.
He was lucky. The droplet missed his arm leaving a smoking hole in his jacket. Cold sweat poured down his back. In this forsaken place such incidents had happened many times before. He had burned once before. Once he had pulled someone out of the fire. Once he had saved a life. But it didn't help. It didn't make him braver. Cold sweat had still always poured down his back in moments like these.
Breathing heavily Hank wiped off the sweat from his hands and climbed on. He was near the summit now. The temperature was lower here. Although hot air still fumed its way upward through the tight space between the rocks, it escaped out into the sunlit cave entrance some twenty meters away. Right above his head, Hank could see the giant crack from which magma poured and made its way to the heart of the cave bouncing on the rocks and crashing down into a deep pool below. Closer to the top its deadly glow was brighter, more orange. Every once in a while a streak of yellow flashed in the current of the fluid.
The camp was empty. Hank's companions, Harry and Heller, had remained in the bottom section of the cave after sending him for another clean set of glass equipment. Whatever experiments they seemed to be doing, they did not want to be away from the site even for a short period of time. And what was there to research? True, the amount of gold deposits was higher here than anywhere else in the world. But it still had to be laboriously extracted from the chemical compounds it was in contact with. The overall process, even when optimized, would be economically inefficient.
With a tired yawn Hank opened the tent wall and stepped inside the cozy shelter. He then found himself amidst a chaos of books, laptops, entangled cables, test tube racks, portable fridges and sleeping blankets. What had Harry asked him to bring? Scratching his head Hank though that it might be a good idea to clean up this mess now that he is here. But he did not want to be blamed for misplaced or, better yet, missing samples and possessions.
He grabbed one of the test tube racks, the one that looked the cleanest, and headed out. He found then that climbing down was easier than going up eventhough the brittle item he was holding was only letting him use one hand. Maybe he spent too long in this forsaken place constantly scrambling over the rocks, and it no longer mattered to him how slippery, dark, or steep they were. Or maybe he was afraid of heights and his anxiety to climb back down had sharpened his reflexes. Or maybe, for some reason, he simply did not want to leave his companions for too long.
“Took you long enough,” growled Harry without even turning around. How did he see Hank approaching from behind?
Harry turned to face him and smiled. He guessed Hank's thoughts.
“Your footsteps can be heard a mile away, my friend. Didn't your friends ever teach you to sneak up on people when you were in kindergarten?”
“I never went to kindergarten,” said Hank darkly and handed him the test tube rack.
Harry stared at him a moment. It was quiet, even the sizzling of magma in the river nearby seemed to have died.
“I am sorry,” he said.
They didn't speak anymore and just concentrated on their work trying to forget the recent conversation. Yes, Hank had never gone to kindergarten. He hardly went to school either. And how could he? He was four years old when his entire family died in a car crash in Zimbabwe. Ever since he fled from Zimbabwe he had not known peace. He had spent all his teenage life running from one part time job to another trying to raise enough money for his university degree. The solo fighter for his own survival and future.
He had noone. Noone to take care of him and give him a warm dinner and a blanket. Noone was there to read him bedtime stories or attend to his fever in his days of sickness. He was sick a lot. Maybe that was why he wanted to be a doctor. He would later find that a doctrine in a medical school would cost him more than he could ever save in twice his lifetime.
“Oh my god!” exclaimed Heller abruptly emerging from the darkness. “There is ice on these walls.”
He scraped energtically at the surface of the rocks with an old putty knife. He rubbed the blade with his fingers and stared upward.
“I regret to inform you, my friends, but it seems we’ve dug up a good chunk of a glacier.”
Hank and Harry too stared at the ceiling. Only now they noticed that the entire dark surface above their heads glittered with moisture, moisture never before seen in this hot dry place. And it was about to start dripping down onto the cave floor.
“I am afraid this whole place is gonna melt down in a matter of hours,” said Heller softly. But even that softness couldn’t hide the worried tone of his voice. “It was hot enough here already. I don’t think I’ll bear an additional steaming sauna in our vacation package.”
He always called every one of their reseach missions their vacation. This time it might have been due to the scourching heat. Strange it seemed. Hank could never accosiate the paradise land of south tropics with the gloomy darkness of the Firefall cave. The three of them stood silent for a minute.
“You are sure of this?” Harry asked, scratching his nose.
Heller stared him hard in the eye, then slowly turned his gaze to the wall of the cave. He then again looked at Harry.
“There is at least a thousand kilolitres of ice in these walls. In three hours we will be standing knee deep in bath-warm water. An hour later this water will make contact with the magma and turn this entire cave into a steaming hell.”
Dead silence hung in the darkness of the cave for a moment.
“I guess this is it for our little vacation,” said Heller. “Let’s move back up.”
“But what about the nineth compond samples?” Harry protested.
“Yes, I know. But the civilization has lived bad enough without it.”
“Harry is right, though. We are not done yet,” put in Hank.
“The priorities have shifted,” Heller cut him off. “I’m going up. And since more than half of this equipment is mine I’m gonna have to ask you to help me bring it up too,” Harry and Hank didn’t speak. “I’m telling you, if you two stay behind you two will die. Have you ever gotten steam burns?”
Silence hung in the hollow space of the cave, only the river of lava boiled slowly flowing by.
“Look,” Heller sighed. “No, we are not done yet. I know. Don’t worry. I’ll call Steve and make all the arrangements.”
He paused for a second.
“Never liked that son of a bitch anyways,” he said through his teeth.
They lunched right there, on the higher end of the vertical cave, huddled together in front of a small fold-up table and some food bits like children around fire. Heller brought a small iron kettle filled with boiling water. It was heated on the hot rocks by the lava pool. Hank opened a new bag of pistachios and took several pieces of smoked Italian sausage from the thermal pocket inside his jacket. He bit off a piece. It was dry and salty, but it would fill him up well for the next couple of hours.
Harry raised the tea bag out of his cup and tossed it into into the falling river of red hot lava. It fizzed as the moisture boiled within. Then, upon contact with the fiery fluid, the bag exploded in a brilliant flash of white flame. Harry smirked at that sight.
“Hey I like this place,” he suddenly said. “No need keep all your garbage in the dump. No need for them dumps at all. Just like in the bright future, all waste is neutralized.”
“You throw more junk in there, the more its gonna smell like old times Brooklyn in here.”
Heller handed him a bag of pistachios.
“Never liked these nibble-bits,” sighed Harry taking the bag. “Too salty for me.”
Laughing and chewing Harry grabbed a handful of pistachios and launched them into the falling lava with a grand artistic gesture. They caught fire long before coming into contact with the glowing fiery fluid and vanished with a fizz.
“What the hell are you doing?” Hank exclaimed. “You can't just burn our food!”
“Give me that bag,” barked Heller raising his voice.
He tried to yank the bag away from Harry, but the latter held on and the bag was torn in two. Hundreds of nuts, little round nuts, poured onto the rocks at their feet. In the next second Harry and Heller sprang up like two Jacks-in-the-box, the two angry faces one up against the other.
“You idiot!” spat Heller. “How do you think we're gonna walk here now? It was slippery enough already!”
“You're telling me it was me?” Harry protested. “You are the one that ripped that thing!”
“Guys, guys!” Hank too jumped to his feet. “We shouldn't fight. Or else someone is gonna fall for real. Or better yet, all of us.”
Harry was hastily trying to stuff the remaining pistachios in his mouth. But there were too many. Clattering they fell along with the other nuts already on the ground. Something comical was about the line between Heller’s flaming glare and the childish haste with which Harry was stuffing himself.
“Sorry, Hank!” once started Harry couldn’t help stop giggling.
Presently all of them were laughing. It has been too much of a relief to leave this foresaken place behind, to forget it even existed. Awkward it seemed. Three men nearly bending in half, pounding their hands against the hard rocks or using them to hold their shaking bellies, giggling like little girls who managed to make fun of an older teenage boy.
Hank didn't see how it happened. It happened too quickly. Harry's leg suddenly slid forward from under him. Arms dangling he tumbled over the edge of the cliff.
“Augh, shit!” Harry yelled, no, ROARED at the top of his lungs as he vanished in the red-lit darkness.
Terrified Hank stared after him. He saw it all. He saw Harry's tumbling silhouette. He saw Harry flailing his limbs like a madman in hopeless attempts to grab anything solid in his way. All was in vain. Hank stared downward. Hank did not blink. Hot air that rose from the pit of the Firefall slashed mercilessly at the surface of his eyeballs. But he did not blink. He saw the moment when Harry's body caught fire just a split second before it disappeared with a sickening splash under the boiling surface of the magma pool some fifty meters below. The glowing viscous fluid spurred upward in a fountain of orange droplets and whirling smoke. The spot where Harry had just fallen darkened for a moment. Then the brown lumps too vanished as they sank to the bottom of the pool.
Harry did not resurface. But Hank knew that he did not die instantly. The fireproof helmet would carry out its protective function well keeping Harry's brain alive for three agonizing seconds. Three seconds in which he would sense his entire body below the neck dissolving away like a snowflake in a cauldron of boiling water. Then magma would burn its way through the bottom of his skull and immediately roast his brain. Incredible how all those safety devices seemed to have caused more suffering and death than they had saved. Or did this seem only because due to their human nature society has only remembered tragic accidents? Or non-accidents?
“Never liked that son of a bitch,” said Heller.
Hank stared downward. Hank did not blink.
“We are not done yet,” said Heller.
All those that knew this cold tone of his voice would drop everything they carried in their hands and run faster than their legs could carry them, all just to save their dear lives. But none had lived to carry such knowledge. And now Heller wasn't about to lose that line.
Still terrified Hank turned to face him. He turned slowly, for he already knew what he will hear next.
“You too will die,” said Heller.
And he swung his fist in a punch.
Hank had no time to react. He felt numbness in his chin, his head being driven back and then blood rushing up to his nose. He thrust out his arms in a desperate attempt to grab a hold of Heller. Too late. He had lost his balance and was already tumbling over the edge of the cliff trail. His fingers slipped on the dark smooth surface of the rocks. In vain he tried to grab at the thin air. Too late. He was already falling.
Ever since he came to this forsaken place he dreaded nothing. Nothing save this one fall, the fall into the red hot lava. And ever since he came to this forsaken place he put all his strength and will to keep away from the fiery chasm, away from the flaming river, away from the radiant and deathly heat of the Firefall. And ever since he had pulled a child out of the fire, ever since the tongues of flame licked both of their bodies and ever since he had lived his worst nightmare he kept to a single promise he made to himself. He would never fall into the flames again.
And yet he fell. The child who lost his family and became a surgeon. The surgeon who could not complete his degree and became a pharmacist. The pharmacist who still wanted to save lives and became a fireman. The fireman who was afraid of fire and became a geologist. Where was fairness? Once he had pulled a child out of the fire. Once he had saved a life. But it didn't help. His worst nightmare had come true.
(c) 2007, Mikhail Temkine
