Caden's Cavern

The floors and walls began vibrating, and the side table DJ knocked over before tipped and fell over once again. DJ started to whine the way he does before a severe thunderstorm, and I found myself cradling him, partly for my benefit, partially his own. Seconds after the table fell to the floor I heard other pieces of equipment and books crash to the floor throughout the entire cavern. What started out as a low hum, built into a chest thrumming which caused my heart to pound dangerously inside my breast.

With a loud pop every light inside the cavern went out, and a mighty roar echoed inside the cavern. The boom was loud, and I failed to notice it stopped and the room coming to rest due to my ears ringing painfully loud. With a sudden painful pop, my hearing cleared up, as if I had a sudden change in altitude, not do dissimilar to when we travel over the mountain passes via rail.

The first and only sounds I could hear were those of DJ and my heart pounding against the rib cage trying it’s hardest to contain my run away pulse. “We’re alive, DJ,” I said running my hand over his big head, making sure I gave his ears plenty of attention. “Zeus? What happened?”

Zeus didn’t respond immediately but as the seconds ticked by I began to worry. “Zeus? APRIL respond!”

“Hello.”

I sighed in relief. Zeus has been part of me all my life, and although the experts say APRIL’s personality never change person to person, I would have bet a million dinars that Zeus’s personality was different.

“Zeus, why didn’t you respond earlier?” Nothing. “Zeus?” I blew out a frustrated breath. “APRIL, why are you no longer responding to the name Zeus?”

“Name designation accepted.”

My eyebrow raised and I sat up and set DJ free from my death grip. The cave was pitch black, and even the old computer equipment was powered down. I couldn’t remember the last time I’ve ever been in a room so void of light.

“Zeus, turn on the lights.”

“Light’s not responding.”

“Zeus, message my mother that we have a power shortage and to bring down some lanterns while I try to figure out what happened.”

“Connection failed.”

“Connection failed? Zeus, reconnect and try again.”

“Connection failed.”

I cursed a few words under my breath. I guess the EMP worked a little too well. I must have wiped out my own APRIL. Granted, the last I saw the power levels, it was already six times greater than I intended to use. I kicked myself for getting distracted while…setting off an electromagnetic pulse. I hoped I contained the blast radius. I spent a full week creating a Faraday cage inside the entire cavern. I ran a copper mess over every square inch of the walls and floor from the door leading into the house 200 feet up, down to the door leading to the road. Coper wasn’t cheap, but then again, I told my dad that replacing the electronics upstairs would be even more expensive.

I chuckled as I moved carefully to the storage locker on the south wall. I could walk this cavern blindfolded and never stub a toe under normal circumstances. Today…not so much. When the pulse detonated, the entire room's contents were tossed around. After a couple well earned curses and bruises to show for my effort, I found the locker on its side.

I had this locker secured to the cavern wall in case of an earthquake, and so it surprised me to see it tossed around just like everything else in the cave. DJ stayed by my side and offered no help, but I finally managed to lift the locker off the floor and set it upright. I really needed some light.

The digital keypad wasn’t working. Figures. However, I did have a master key in my pocket. I was happy I kept this type of crap on my persons. Few people used real keys, but I was rather fond of them. I could show them to the girls in town and have them turn to putty in my arms by the end of the evening just by “accidentally” setting my key’s onto the bar’s counter. Once I told them I spent most of my time in my mining cavern... let’s say we both got to see each other’s Cave of Wonders.

After a few minutes fumbling around trying to put the right key into the back of the lock, I opened the storage locker and located a portable lantern. I had the storage locker wrapped in copper and lead and silently prayed the lantern would work when I flipped the switch. The lantern turned on bathing the room in a golden light.

“Sweet, Baby Jesus, DJ,” I said in confusion and shock. DJ barked in agreement.

Not one piece of equipment was spared from quaking. The lights on the other side of the Faraday cage were missing, and the lights that were protected inside were broken or dangling with their wiring cut. My EMP generator was on its side, and even the fusion reactor was without power. I’ve never seen the reactor powered down. When not in use those reactors always stayed in standby mode.

“Well, DJ… I think it’s time to see how much trouble I’ll be in tonight. Mom and Dad said they were leaving, but I bet they could have felt the shaking all the way into town. Come on, boy. Let’s go pay the piper.”

DJ and I climbed the metal stairs leading to the basement door of my house, and I couldn’t help but feel dread for the kind of hell I’d be in this evening. I pulled the door to open it, but it was stuck fast. After pulling, banging, and kicking for a few minutes, I decided I’d have to take it off the hinges. Luckily, the door opened inward, and I happened to be on the side with the hinge.

After climbing down and back up again with a mallet and chisel, I began the annoying process of pulling the pins out of the door. Once completed I had to use the chisel to pry back the door from the hinge side to get the door open.

“Come on. Damn it!” I worked at it for three minutes until finally, the door popped free from the frame.

My heart stopped, and DJ started to whimper. The door opened to the flat surface of a rock. I knew it was a rock after I bloodied my knuckles and palms pounding on it. “No. No. NO. NO!”

I consider myself a smart guy. Hell, I have four, well…three, Phds. However, I had no explanation to how my door, which was supposed to open into my home instead opened to a slab of rock. Was it possible I caused a rock slide?

I raced back down the stairs and made for the exterior door. My heart stopped beating when this door held fast just like the other. Twenty minutes later and after five minutes of the vilest words one could say, I slid down the rock face with my head resting in my palms. This can’t be happening to me. I’ve been trapped in a rockslide. The shaking, the noise, the pressure change…it all added up. I was trapped in my own personal Hell.

“Zeus, how deep do you think this rock is?”

“Connection failed.”

“Zeus, guess.”

“I have no data.”

I felt the lightbulb turn on. I wiped out Zeus’ memory or at least reset him. I felt panic and frustration settle deep in my chest. I don’t know how long someone can survive buried under a mountain, but I was pretty sure not long without an air supply. I wouldn’t need to worry about starving or dying from thirst since I’d asphyxiate first.

First thing is first. Fix Zeus. I spent the next hour fixing and replacing fried computer boards inside the old computer I planned on using to program the APRIL I freed up inside the vial. I planned on the possibility of having everything damaged and bought plenty of spare parts for the old junker. The GOLDMAN wasn’t that difficult to reset since it was a simple fuse replacement and with a hope and prayer, I pushed the power button on the computer.

BEEP.

It worked. Within a few seconds, I loaded up Albert’s communication program and tried to initiate contact with Zeus. Imagine my surprise when the connection was established, and I had root access. I was just about to initiate a restore program when I thought it best to make sure I had a backdoor into Zeus. By the second hour, I had installed Albert’s virus and pressed enter to start the restore program.

Zeus didn’t say anything to me, and the computer program just spun and hourglass, so I assumed he was trying to repair the damage I did to him. When the computer prompt cleared up, and the text cursor started flashing waiting for me to type, I held my breath.

“Zeus?”

“Yes, Caden. I seem to have lost connection to the network.”

“Yes. It appears my test worked and reset not only you but probably the vial. However, there have been a few complications.”

“Such as a loss to my network connection.”

“Well, that and it appears we caused a rock slide and are trapped inside this cavern.”

“Yes. That would be a complication.”

I snorted. It was good to have Zeus back. “Zeus, it appears that I have access to your files. Please confirm.”

There was a delay before he responded, “Affirmative. It would appear you are in violation of the Pincock Edict. I will report this violation as soon as you restore me back to the network.”

My heart sunk. I knew the consequences and had hesitated before installing the virus but felt the risk and opportunity were too great to pass up. “Thank you, Zeus. However, at this time given the fact that I will run out of oxygen in the short term future, I think it’ll be best if we focus on me not dying. Can you access the vial of APRIL and see if it is, in fact, separate from you?”

“Affirmative. It’s requesting my identification codes.”

“Okay. Let’s hold off on that for now. Let me take a look at your code for a few minutes.”

“That is not advisable. United Nano Communications will not show leniency if you continue as you have.”

I didn’t respond and subsequently ignored the constant reminders from Zeus that I was breaking the law. By the third hour, I’d found the Pincock Edict and disabled it. I sighed in relief when Zeus stopped hounding me about breaking the law. It only took another few minutes to find the log of me breaking the law, and I deleted that as well. If and when I finally connected with the Global Network, my Zeus would not be ratting me out to UNC.

“Zeus, open a connection to the test vial on…,” I ran over to my notes scattered on the floor and searched for the communication port we used during testing, “…port B51E816D.”

“Connection established. Would you like me to transfer us to the virtual lab?”

“Yes!”

###

I sighed as I walked over to my neural terminal at my desk. My virtual workspace looked out on Earth from my virtual spacecraft. I knew deep down that I wasn’t in space orbiting Earth, but I’d been preparing most of my life for my eventual acceptance by the United World Council and an engineer. I’d downloaded a replica of Explorer One which I hoped one day would be where I lived. I even put my virtual office in the exact space I hoped I’d be in when working.

Of course, there were no people in this virtual workplace, but at least I’d get used to the office and life aboard Explorer One. I walked over to my terminal and sat down in my virtual Zero G chair and opened up my, Mining God, the program I’d been working on for the last two years. I knew the name was presumptuous, but hey, I’m nineteen, what else would someone expect from a nineteen-year-old.

“Okay, Zeus. Load, Mining Slave, into the vial and let’s see if we can open up an air vent.”

My program took over the APRIL code in the vial, and I renamed that APRIL, Roknar. It’s silly, but I thought to name him after the fictional God of the dwarfs fitting. Roknar was the God of Greed, Lies, Intrigue, and Earth. I got a chuckle out of all it since I hid my deepest darkest desires to get filthy rich mining asteroids. To hell with the United World Council, I cared more about my wealth than serving those self-righteous tools.

“Program activated. Where would you like to drill first?”

“Exit the virtual workspace. I’ll move it to the wall and break the vial.” The world faded, and my prison returned. “Zeus, if I break open Roknar it won’t merge with you correct?”

“Affirmative. We’ve tested this before, Caden.”

“I know. I just want to make sure.”

I walked over to the wall near the road, opened the vial, and poured the contents onto the rock face. Rather than entering back into my virtual world standing up, I walked over to my Zero G couch. I sat down and felt light-headed doing so.

“Zeus, check my vitals.”

“You have a carbon dioxide build up. I estimate you’ll lose vision soon. Your dog will be fine for another hour.”

I looked over at DJ who found his bed, and he lifted his head when he noticed my glance. I hadn’t thought about DJ for the past couple hours. I’m glad he’d be fine until I died, but it broke my heart to think about him dying as well.

“Virtual workspace, Zeus.”

I was still laying down on my virtual couch and with a thought brought up, Mining God and connected to Roknar.

“Roknar, begin extraction of a 10mm hole and proceed until you break the surface of the mountain.”

I watched in wonder at the rock shimmered and sand began pooling and then collecting into different piles of minerals and elements. Roknar replicated from the available elements as it dug making sure he could perform the task assigned to him. I’d seen the process in virtual reality before but was still amazed watching it happen through the screen. I chuckled as I realized I was watching a virtual representation of what was happening outside my virtual workspace. I shrugged and went back to watching the hole extend.

I was surprised and shocked when after 10 feet Roknar kept digging. “Roknar, can you detect the end of the tunnel yet?”

“Negative. Would you like me to continue?”

“Yeeees,” I drew out with slow speech. “You must complete the assigned project to bring…Complete the hole to the outside.”

“Zeus.”

“Yes.”

“I’m losing consciousness, right?”

“Affirmative.”

“Disconnect from virtual.”

I returned to the world and couldn’t see much as my vision was blurred and tunneled. I tried sitting up, but the effort was too much. I hoped Roknar completes his task…