Arthur Clarke - Rama Revealed

“And don’t do anything aggressive,” Nicole added.

“Grab Nikki and run like hell,” Max said with a wink.

Nothing unusual happened while they climbed down the spikes. Just as they had years earlier, the lights at the next lower level always turned on when anyone descending approached an unlit area. All five of the explorers were on the subway platform in less than an hour. “Now we’ll find out if those mysterious vehicles are still operating,” Richard said.

In the center of the circular platform there was a smaller hole, also round and with metal spikes protruding from its sides, that descended deeper into the darkness. On opposite ends of the platform, ninety degrees away to the left and right from where the five of them were standing, two dark tunnels were cut into the rock and metal. One of the tunnels was large, five or six meters from top to bottom, while the opposite tunnel was almost exactly an order of magnitude smaller. When Richard approached to within twenty degrees of the large tunnel, it suddenly became illuminated and its interior could be clearly seen. The tunnel looked like a large sewer pipe back on Earth.

The rest of the exploration party hurried over beside Richard as soon as the first whooshing sound was heard coming from the tunnel. Less than a minute later a subway sped around a distant corner and headed rapidly toward them, stopping with its front end a meter or so shy of where the spiked corridor continued to descend.

The inside of the subway was also illuminated. There were no seats, but there were vertical rods from the ceiling to the floor, scattered in the car in seemingly random fashion. The door slid open about fifteen seconds after the subway arrived. On the opposite side of the platform an identical vehicle, exactly one-tenth as large, pulled up and stopped no more than five seconds later.

Even though Max, Patrick, and Eponine had all heard stories about the two ghost subways many times, actually seeing the vehicles left all three of them full of apprehension. “Are you really serious, my friend?” Max said to Richard after the two men quickly examined the outside of the larger subway. “Do you really intend to board that damn thing if we find no other way out?”

Richard nodded.

“But it could go anywhere,” Max said. “We don’t have the foggiest fucking idea what it is, or who built it, or what the hell it’s doing here. And once we’re on board, we’re completely helpless.”

“That’s right,” Richard said. He smiled wanly. “Max, you have an excellent grasp of our situation.”

Max shook his head. “Well, we’d better find something down in this damn hole, because I don’t know if Eponine and I—”

“All right,” Patrick said, approaching the other two men. “I guess it’s time for the next phase of this operation. Come on, Max, are you ready for some more spike climbing?”

Richard did not have any of his clever robots to place in the smaller subway. He did, however, have in his possession a miniature camera with a crude mobility system that he hoped would weigh enough to activate the smaller subway. “Under any circumstances,” he told the others, “the small tunnel does not provide a possible exit for us. I just want to determine for myself if anything significant has changed during these years. Besides, there does not seem to be any reason, at least not yet, for more than two of us to descend any farther.”

While Max and Patrick were climbing slowly down the additional spikes and Richard was absorbed with a final checkout of his mobile camera, Nicole and Eponine strolled around the platform. “How’s it going, farmer?” Eponine said to Max on the radio.

“Fine so far,” he replied. “But we’re only about ten meters below you. These spikes are not as close together as the ones above, so we’re being more cautious.”

“Your relationship with Max must have really blossomed while I was in prison,” Nicole commented a few moments later.

“Yes, it did,” Eponine replied easily. “Quite frankly, it surprised me. I didn’t think a man was capable of having a serious affair with someone who… you know… but I underestimated Max. He is really an unusual person. Underneath that brusque, macho exterior…”

Eponine stopped. Nicole was smiling broadly. “I don’t think Max really fools anybody-at least not those who know him. The tough, foul-mouthed Max is an act, developed for some reason, probably self-protection, back on that farm in Arkansas.”

The two women were silent for several seconds. “But I don’t think I have ever given him full credit either,” Nicole added. “It is a tribute to him that he adores you so completely even though you two have never been able to really—”

“Oh, Nicole,” Eponine said, suddenly emotional. “Don’t think I haven’t wanted to, haven’t dreamed about it. And Dr. Turner has told us many times that the odds are very small that Max would contract RV-41 if we used protection. But ‘very small’ is not good enough for me. What if somehow, some way, I passed to Max this horrible scourge that is killing me? How could I ever forgive myself for condemning the man I love to death?”

Tears filled Eponine’s eyes. “We are intimate, of course,” she said. “In our own safe way… And Max has never

once complained. But I can tell from his eyes that he misses—”

“All right, now,” they heard Max say on the radio. “We can see the bottom. It looks like a normal floor, maybe five more meters below us. There are two tunnels leading away, one the size of the smaller tunnel up at your level, and another that is really tiny. We’re going on down for a closer inspection.”

The time had come for the explorers to enter the subway. Richard’s mobile camera had not found anything substantively new and there was definitely no exit the humans could use on the only level below them in the lair. Richard and Patrick finished a private conversation in which they reviewed, in detail, what the young man was going to do when he returned to the others. Then they rejoined Max, Nicole, and Eponine, and the five of them walked slowly around the platform to the waiting subway.

Eponine had butterflies in her stomach. She remembered a similar feeling, when she was fourteen, just before her first one-woman art exhibit opened at her orphanage in Limoges. She took a deep breath.

“I don’t mind saying it,” Eponine said. “I’m scared.”

“Shit,” said Max, “that’s an understatement… Say, Richard, how do we know this thing is not going to hurtle over that cliff you told us about, with us inside?”

Richard smiled but didn’t reply. They reached the side of the subway. “All right,” he said, “since we don’t know exactly how this thing is activated, we want to be very careful. We will all enter more or less simultaneously. That will preclude the possibility that the doors will close and the subway will take off when we are not all yet on board.”

Nobody said anything for almost a minute. They lined up four abreast, Max and Eponine on the side closest to the tunnel. “Now I’m going to count,” Richard said. “When I say three, we’ll all step on together.”

“May I close my eyes?” Max asked with a grin. “That made it easier for me on roller coasters when I was a little boy.”

“If you like,” Nicole answered.

They stepped into the subway and each of them grabbed a vertical rod. Nothing happened. Patrick stood staring at them on the other side of the open door. “Maybe it’s waiting for Patrick,” Richard said quietly.

“I don’t know,” Max mumbled, “but if this fucking train doesn’t move in a few seconds, I’m going to jump off.”

The door closed slowly only moments after Max’s comment. There was time for two breaths each before the subway lurched into motion, accelerating rapidly into the illuminated tunnel.