Yves Giraud - Kahnu

“Looks like there’s a small cave or tunnel back here, guys,” he announced through his helmet microphone.

“Really? Can you see where it goes?” asked Dedrick.

“Well, it’s only a few meters wide here, but I think I can fit through. It looks like it widens further in. As for where it goes, I guess there’s only one way to find out.” François turned his helmet lights on and proceeded into the fissure.

“Wait! François? François?” called out Dedrick.

“Yeah. I’m here. Crr— I’m entr rrr—crrk— tunnel. It’s bigger in sss—crrrrrk-ssssssssssssssshhhh…” and the connection went dead.

“François? François?” called out Dedrick again in vain.

“Crap! I hate when he does that.”

“Tendai, give me a boost, will you?”

Already standing by, Tendai secured himself against the rock and the two men locked arms. Dedrick stretched one leg over the wall and lowered himself carefully down the other side.

A few seconds later, he was standing in front of the small tunnel the Frenchman had described. After calling François one more time and receiving no reply, he engaged himself in the narrow passage and disappeared as well.

“Can you see anything?” asked Vera seated behind ARC 2’s dashboard.

“Nope. I can only see a portion of the terrace,” replied Tendai, still standing by the terrace, stretching himself over the rocky outcrop, as far as he could.

“Maybe we should go check on them. It’s already been several minutes.” Vera was addressing everyone. She looked at Sabrina in the other rover through her window.

Ladli still outside with Tendai felt the need to voice her opinion.

“I don’t think going after them is such a good idea, Vera. Dedrick and François are quite resourceful, and I’m sure they’ll be fine. Until we hear from them, we should probably stay put.”

Ladli was right, she knew it, but her daughter’s dad was out there, and she had to summon all her strength to resist running after him. But at least, Chasma was with her. All they could do now was wait. She was too preoccupied to notice it, but the five-year-old girl, seated next to her, was smiling. The big white cloud was talking to her.

Inside the dark tunnel, Dedrick’s suit lights were only showing him enough down the narrow passage to see about a dozen meters in front of him, at best. Slowly making his way through the corridor, he finally reached an enlargement that seemed perfectly geometric. He quickly estimated that the space was probably a perfect cube. The walls of the chamber were smooth and straight. In its center, François, standing silently, was staring at another sphere, buried halfway in the ground. It looked exactly like the one in the cliff outside.

“Wow!”

“Yeah, check it out! Another sphere. And did you see the rest of the room? Look at the walls!”

“I see that. It’s amazing. And look at all those inscriptions. This is incredible!”

“I know.”

The geometric lines and shapes covered the entire inner walls of the space. Not a single square meter had been spared. From ceiling to floor, the intricate designs and long grooves were crisscrossing everywhere. Some deep enough to fit someone’s entire hand in, others barely visible, the curved lines all seemed to start, or end in the center of the room, where the large spherical object met the floor.

After a few minutes scanning the strangely decorated space, Dedrick turned to François.

“I see the tunnel keeps going over there,” pointing beyond the Frenchman.

François agreed with a nod.

“Shall we?”

“After you, Maître,” replied the Russian, with an inviting gesture.

Having two sets of lights instead of one didn’t seem to help whatsoever. It was almost as if some invisible force was keeping them from probing beyond a certain distance ahead. But they were moving forward, nonetheless. A good fifteen minutes had gone by, most of it spent walking downhill, and the two men were still slowly progressing. Moving deeper and deeper into the mountain, they finally noticed something ahead. The path, widening ahead beyond the tunnel, was offering a glance at some vague but apparently large feature beyond. It wasn’t long before they were entering a giant chamber. Their suit lights were too weak to light up clearly the entire place, but they were now able to see much further than they had while in the tunnel. Unlike the previous room, the walls of this new cave did not appear to be decorated with any markings or carvings of any kind, at least as far as they could see. The ceiling towered so high above them that they could not see anything but darkness. It was hard to estimate distances, but the walls stretched several hundred meters before disappearing into the darkness. The floor in front of them sloped down mildly for about a dozen meters before leveling. The two men began walking slowly down the incline until they reached flat ground.

“Now, what do you make of that?” asked François.

The strange oval structure he was pointing at to their left vaguely resembled a partially deflated blimp; a large one. Their lights were too weak to show the massive object in its entirety, but they could tell it was at least the size of a small cruise ship. The uneven bulgy mass was by far the most alien thing they had encountered so far. Like everything in the giant chamber, it was completely covered in a thick layer of dust that made it impossible to tell what it was made of, and aside from its white color, not much else could be seen about it without getting closer. Like a gigantic blob, the “blimp,” resting on the floor of the cave seemed to be waiting for its visitors to approach. Both instantly realized they were staring at Chasma’s Big Cloud.

“The big white cloud in the mountain! Of course, that’s what Chasma was trying to describe,” voiced Dedrick.

They both stared at it for a moment.

“What do you think it is? It looks like a giant cocoon to me. I wonder what’s in it… You think someone’s home?” asked François with a smirk.

“I wouldn’t joke about that. I know so far the whole cave looks like it has been abandoned for quite some time, but I keep thinking about Chasma and that ‘voice’ of hers.”

“Come on, you know how kids are. It’s not unusual to have imaginary friends at that age.”

“Yes, I know, but it’s Chasma we’re talking about. You know it’s not like her to make up stories.”

“True. Well, I guess there’s only one way to find out.”

He walked around Dedrick and headed for the large structure.

Dedrick had to give it to him, if his actions often seemed irresponsible, the French astronaut was rarely scared. He followed his colleague toward the egg-shaped edifice.

By the time he got next to him, François, had already cleared a few square meters of dust on one side of the structure, revealing its off-white surface.

The more they stared at it, the more obvious it became to both men that the strange shaped object, with its large bubble-like protrusions all across its surface, made for a fairly good cloud impersonation. Dedrick, helping François dust off a larger area, suddenly felt the surface give in slightly under the pressure of his gloved hand and stopped. Taking a step back, he shined his light at it again, closer this time, and began to wonder… It almost looked organic to him. He had the feeling he could probably push his arm through its walls if he tried, as if the skin of the object was made of some thick gelatinous material that could flex.

“What is it?” asked François.

“I don’t know, but this thing is not as hard as I first thought. Look.”

He pressed his hand against it once more, to show the Frenchman.