Machine God: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (Final Draft)

Downfall

Male.

Anxious.

And loud.

One digger stormed into our section and flailed his hands like a mad man. Everyone in my perimeter looked up at him, including the soldiers and the superior. He addressed the shouting digger with attitude.

"What the hell is wrong with you? Get back to work."

"The ground gave in...Nathan fell through..."

"Fell through?"

The poor man wasn't able to form one coherent sentence. He pointed toward the adjacent hall and sweated his skin layers off.

"Come, please look. He needs help, now."

The superior followed up together with two guards.

The rest of the diggers motioned to join his lead, but the man in charge didn't like it.

"No, you guys stay. I'll handle this alone."

I was the first to speak up.

"Maybe you do need our help. Let us at least check out what's going on."

The diggers in my group supported my suggestion. The superior found himself outnumbered and didn't look like causing any more friction. Especially not with the end of the shift being so close.

"Fine."

Soldiers and workers left their position and accompanied the superior to the neighboring hall. A bunch of diggers stood around in the middle, near a trash pile. They raised their bewildered faces.

The superior roared again.

"What the hell are you standing around for?"

One of them pointed at the hole in front of them. The rusty ground had in deed given way and collapsed into the level beneath. Down in the rubble below, I recognized Nathan and two other co-diggers buried under piles of concrete rubble. They were still alive but flinched and waved at us with shivering hands. When Ann-Lyze saw her father, she freaked out. Covered her mouth and squeaked.

"Father, no."

The superior held her back with both arms and tried to appease her.

"I'm sorry, but don't worry, we'll help him."

"How?"

Good question.

Three diggers lay below with no way of getting back up, at least not with the tools we possessed. Worse, time was running out—I counted thirty-three minutes till we had to escape the approaching sandstorm.

Under pressure.

The superior licked his lips and pointed to his nearest guard.

"Do you carry a grapple gun?"

"Yes sir."

"Good. Zipline down there and get Nathan back up."

The soldiers halted for a second. With his face shield and the helmet on, I couldn't gauge his expression, but judging from his hesitation, he wasn't pleased about the order. Neither was the superior.

"What, has the dust polluted your ear channels? Get the hell down."

"Sir, we have less than twenty minutes till the storm."

"And you have less than ten seconds before I single-handedly degrade you to compost."

He probably didn't carry the authority to order that—only the committee possessed that power. But the threat worked anyway. The soldier remembered his low rank in the command chain.

"Ay, sir."

He unleashed the cabled dart into the ground, fixed the anchor points and slowly ziplined down to the rubble where the diggers lay buried. Everyone of us watched the soldier attempting his rescue mission. He aimed for Nathan first, told him to wrap his arms around his armor and ziplined back up. Some of the diggers clapped, even Ann-Lyze wiped her eyes and smiled for the first time.

Hope was back, at least for a moment.

Because halfway up, a metallic droning screeched below our boots. Everyone held their breaths and swapped confused glances with each other. Silence settled in, except for the crunching and croaking.

The superior jittered and mumbled out the words.

"What is that?"

My glance fell to the space between my boots. The tiny trash pieces vibrated, a steel plate bent downwards with a caw. That was the sound of a ground giving way.