Robert Sawyer - Fossil Hunter

Finally, a shout went up. “Over here!”

It echoed badly against the cliff face and had to compete with the sound of crashing waves from the beach below. At last Toroca located the source. Delplas was gesticulating wildly. She was perched at the edge of the visible part of the object, where the blue matenal jutted out of the cliff. Toroca scrambled across the rock to join her, almost tumbling down the embankment in his eagerness to get there.

She was pointing at an inlaid rectangle in the blue material. The rectangle was twice as high as it was wide—or twice as wide as it was high; no one was yet sure which way was up for this vast object. A prominent series of geometric markings appeared in a line embossed across the short dimension of the panel. Beneath it was an incised rectangle where, perhaps, a sign or note had once gone. “It’s a door,” said Delplas.

Toroca was elated. It did indeed look like a door. But his elation is short-lived. “Where are the hinges?” he said.

“I think it’s a sliding door,” said Delplas. Such doors were common on cabinets: two sliding panels could be staggered to cover the entire interior, or both pushed to the same side to leave the other half of the inside exposed.

“Perhaps,” said Toroca. “But how do we slide it aside? There’s no handle.”

Delplas’s face fell, too. “Hmm. That does pose a problem doesn t it?”

“We can’t blast through that material,” said Toroca. He drummed his fingertips on the hard blue surface, so solid, so unrelenting…

Something gave.

Just a little, a slight movement, as he tapped against the incised rectangle in the center of the door panel. There was a hollow behind it. The rectangle wasn’t inlaid in the door material, Rather, it was tacked overtop of it, held in place with the same clever little gray clips that had sealed the two halves of the original hemispherical artifact Toroca had found.

“Help me with this,” said Toroca.

Delplas stood there, not understanding.

“Come here,” snapped Toroca. “Help me open this panel.”

“There’s not enough room for both of us…” she said.

“Don’t worry about that, for God’s sake. It will only take a moment to try. Come here.”

She seemed dazed.

“Here! Come on. You can go hunt afterward, but this will take more than two hands.” At last she moved closer. “Thank you,” said Toroca. “Now, pry your fingerclaws in there, and there. No, like this. That’s right. Now pull.”

“Nothing’s happening, Toroca.”

“Keep trying. Pull!”

“It’s stuck—”

“Pull!”

“My claws are going to tear out—”

But at that moment that panel did pop forward, revealing a rectangular hollow within the door. It was filled with crumbling bits of corroded metal, at least some of which had been iron, or an iron alloy, judging by the orange color.

“Was that a lock of some sort?” asked Delplas.

“Whatever it was,” said Toroca, “it’s rusted away. Maybe it was some sort of recessed handle.”

Toroca placed his fingers on the lip of the depression and, bracing himself against the rocky slope, pulled to the left with all his might. Nothing.

“Maybe it slides the other way,” said Delplas.

Toroca tried pulling to the right. “I think—”

“It didn’t move,” said Delplas.

“I felt it move,” said Toroca. “It shifted, ever so slightly. But it did shift.”

There wasn’t room enough in the indentation for two pairs of hands. Toroca stepped aside and Delplas gave a healthy yank. “Maybe,” she said doubtfully. “Maybe it moved a little.”

Toroca leaned in close, examined the remnants of whatever metal device had been hidden behind the little panel. “Maybe the door’s jammed on the metalwork. Get Greeblo.”

Greeblo was the oldest member of the survey crew, and, therefore, the largest and strongest. Delplas returned with her a short time later.

“It’s seized up,” said Toroca. “Perhaps with your strength…”

Greeblo, about twice Toroca’s bulk, bent in low to examine the mechanism. The lip was fairly thin—no need for thick structures when building out of this fantastic material. “I’ll slice my hand off if I pull with all my strength against that edge,” she said. She fished a calibrated tape out of one of the pockets on her geologist’s sash and made some measurements of the little declivity, the lip, and so on. Then, without a word, she turned to leave.

“Where are you going?” demanded Toroca.

“I’ll be back,” said the oldster.

And she was, about half a daytenth later. She had with her a wooden block, rather hastily carved. Greeblo fitted it over the lip, giving her a decent handhold. She then gestured to Toroca and Delplas to stand well clear. Greeblo dug in her heels and yanked against her handgrip with all her might. The door did shift slightly. She yanked again. Toroca could hear the sound of groaning metal. Another pull. And then a loud snap. Toroca thought for a moment that Greeblo had broken her arm, but no, the snap had come from within the wall of the object. The door panel was shifting slowly, until, at last, at long last, a tiny sliver of darkness appeared along the left edge. Toroca let out a whoop of victory. Greeblo gave one more giant yank. About a handspan worth of darkness was exposed now. Greeblo collapsed, exhausted. “You’ll have to get others to do the rest,” she said.

Toroca did just that. Now that there was a gap down the entire long dimension of the door, he was able to get six hardy Quintaglios to move in and yank in unison. The territorial instinct would be flying high in such close proximity to others, but the anger could be taken out on the physical task at hand.

The door moved. Not quickly, and not far, but it did move, until, at last, it seized up again and no amount of pulling would shift it any farther. It was about halfway open, enough for a Quintaglio of Toroca’s age, and maybe others a few kilodays older, to slip through, but poor Greeblo would never be able to make it.

The sun had already slipped below the top of the cliff—opening the door had taken most of the afternoon. Toroca managed to squeeze sideways into the dark chamber, bending his tail painfully as he did so. The floor was tipped at an angle, but it was still quite acceptable for standing.

“Well?” called Delplas.

“It’s dark in here,” said Toroca, his voice echoing. “I can’t see a thing. Someone get me a lamp, please.”

A few moments later a lit oil lamp was passed through to Toroca. Delplas craned to see in the half-open door. “Well? Well?”

Toroca’s voice, still echoing, was heavy with disappointment. “It’s an empty room. Nothing more than that. Just an empty room. Big enough for maybe two people, assuming they could stand to be this close to each other.”

“There’s no door? No hallway?”

“Nothing, except some grillework on the walls,” said Toroca. “It’s just a cubicle; maybe a closet or storage locker.”

“Nobody,” rumbled Greeblo, “puts closets on the outside of buildings.”

Toroca was quiet for a moment. Then: “You’re right, Greeblo! The far wall isn’t a wall at all; it’s another sliding door, just like the first one.” A pause. “I wonder why anyone would put two doors so close together. It’s got a similar rectangular panel in its center, but this one’s covered with some orange paint and bold markings. This panel’s smaller than the one on the outside; the clips are closer together. I think I can get it off myself. Let me—there, it’s off. So that’s what the metal thing is supposed to look like!”

“Do you want me to come in as well?” asked Delplas.