Chapter 11

The Shaft rose through the mountain’s heart, open to the Substructure cavern below before vanishing into the stone above. The guide rails of Cargo Elevator One ran up its center, thick as support columns. Counterweight housings, cable trunks, and maintenance ladders filled the space between the cargo well and the rock. In wider sections, grated platforms circled the well in complete rings. Where the mountain wall hugged the Shaft, the platforms ran only partway round.

The climb was going more slowly than he had expected. Each ladder ended at a different point around the Shaft, forcing Raelin to follow the service strip past housings and cable trunks before he could continue upward. He tested each new ladder before trusting his weight to it. With his headlamp off and his OmniLink display dark, the red glow gave him enough light to climb but no measure of the time passing.

His shoulders had settled into a dull ache, and the pack pulled him backward whenever he reached for a higher rung. The rungs had been worn smooth by decades of maintenance workers’ hands. At the next full ring, his hand slid off the platform rail before his fingers could close. He caught it on the second try, hauled himself onto the grating, and stayed on one knee.

Raelin moved clear of the ladder opening and sat with his back against a cable housing. He eased the pack from his shoulders and set it between his boots. A tremor moved through his forearms once he let his hands rest. He spread his fingers against his thighs and waited for the shaking to ease.

Once his hands steadied, Raelin opened the pack and took out a ration block and his flask. The block broke into chalky crumbs against his tongue. He worked through it in small bites, taking a sip when his mouth grew too dry to swallow. When he finished, he capped the flask and looked past the inner rail into the open Shaft.

Distance had reduced the Stockpile to a pale smear, Old Freight to a few dim lamps, and the Grime Pit to a black hollow against the stone. Raelin searched the Old Freight lights for their home, but at this distance, all the details blurred together.

Raelin stowed the flask and settled the pack on his shoulders. Above him, dim red service strips marked the platforms one after another. He followed them upward until they disappeared into the Shaft’s opening in the cavern ceiling, then lowered his gaze to the first rung and resumed the climb.

Several platforms later, a low vibration passed through the ladder beneath Raelin’s hands and boots. He held his position and listened. The Shaft’s steady hum deepened, and somewhere below, cables began to whine against their guides.

Far below, white work lights appeared as Cargo Elevator One rose through an opening at the top of the dome on the cavern floor. Its open deck climbed within the central guide rails, sealed containers secured in rows across it. The ladder’s vibration remained steady as the deck passed, and displaced air rushed upward around him. The lights and cable noise continued upward toward the cavern ceiling.

The cable whine and rumble receded. A scrape sounded against a rung above him. Raelin looked up. A maintenance worker was halfway down the ladder above the next full ring, a white headlamp beam moving over the rock beside the rungs.

Raelin matched his climb to the worker’s descent, timing each movement to a scrape or knock from above. The worker remained well above the platform as the red-lit edge rose past Raelin’s shoulders. The lower ladder opened onto the ring a quarter-turn from where the upper ladder met it. A cable housing projected from the mountain wall between them, its access door facing the upper ladder. Raelin waited for the next scrape, then hauled himself through and crouched behind the housing, opposite the access door. The worker stepped onto the ring on the other side.

Raelin made himself as small as he could behind it, knees drawn in and one hand held against the pack to keep it from moving. White light swept across the grating near his boots and stopped. On the other side of the housing, a latch clicked and an access door scraped open. Tools clinked faintly against metal inside the casing while the worker mumbled something Raelin could not make out. Then the access door closed and the latch clicked into place.

The worker came around the housing toward the lower ladder. Raelin pressed himself against the casing. The beam slid across the grating less than a pace from his boots, but the worker passed without turning. A boot scraped against a rung, then again from lower down. Raelin remained still as the sound repeated farther below, until he could no longer separate it from the Shaft’s hum.

Raelin eased his head past the edge of the housing. The ring was empty. At the lower ladder opening, he found a small white light far below, moving down another ladder. Only then did he cross to the upper ladder and resume the climb.

Two platforms later, the ladder ended at a narrow landing against the Shaft wall. A faded sign on the metal door read INTERIOR ACCESS. Raelin pressed his ear to it. A steady mechanical roar came through the metal and swallowed every other sound.

Raelin turned the handle and eased the door inward. The roar swelled through the opening. Equipment housings crowded both sides of a narrow room cut into the mountain, leaving a grated aisle to a second door at the far end. Low red lamps lit the floor, and the air smelled of machine oil and warm metal. Raelin entered and drew the first door shut.

He crossed to the second door and opened it a finger’s width. Beyond, a ladder rose through a narrow service shaft. Caged red lamps marked the landings, while steel mesh screened off the elevator’s counterweight channel. He watched the ladder and landings for movement, then widened the gap enough to step through.

Raelin pulled the door closed behind him and took the ladder upward. At the first landing, he climbed through a square opening in the grating and stepped onto a ledge barely deep enough to turn around. The route he had memorized showed a maintenance door here. Its old frame was still visible in the wall, but a cleaner steel plate now sealed the opening, with a narrow access hatch set into its center. Raelin studied the badge reader beside the hatch. His tools might bypass it, but the attempt could trigger an alert. Above him, the ladder continued to another landing. He left the hatch untouched and climbed.

At the top of the ladder, a landing stretched from the mountain wall to the mesh enclosing the counterweight channel. A metal maintenance door stood beside the opening. The faded sign above it read SECTOR 7-C: AUTHORIZED MAINTENANCE ONLY. Raelin breathed out slowly. The name matched the next destination he had pieced together from the route fragments. The door had no badge reader, only a heavy latch.

Raelin stepped to the mesh and looked down. Beyond the counterweight rails, circle after circle of red service light marked the Shaft below, each smaller and dimmer than the last until they disappeared into darkness. Each circle had left its own ache in his muscles. He stole a few moments to stretch there, keeping both the door and the ladder opening in view until the tightness eased.

Raelin lowered the heavy latch. It moved smoothly, drawing the bolt back with a muted click. He opened the door a handspan. Pale blue light spilled through the gap, overpowering the red glow across the landing and forcing him to narrow his eyes. Beyond, bright ceiling strips ran down an empty maintenance corridor. Smooth composite covered the floor, and pipes followed the walls in straight runs held by matching brackets. After watching the corridor for movement, Raelin slipped inside and eased the door shut behind him until the latch settled. The last red light vanished beneath it, leaving only the faint vibration of the Shaft under his boots.