Hongo Ochuka barked orders at the crew. Men scrambled to get tools in place and finish last minute preparations on the tunnel, the boring machine, and the equipment.

Hunter and Tiyana approached Hongo as the preparations wrapped up.

Hunter greeted a little awkwardly with “Habari ya asubuhi Hongo, you are at it early today, bwana.”

Hongo replied with a sarcastic grin, “Mzuri sana, na wewe?”

“Aaaii, sielewi, sielewi, sorry Hongo, but that’s about as far as my kiswahili will take me I’m afraid.” Hunter replied with a shrug.

Hongo assured him. “No worries Mr. Price. Today nothing will go wrong. This I make sure. We are ready to place the support rings, the machine has been tested, we have had good training, and we are strong and ready.”

“Alright then Hongo, we have a lot of faith in you and your crew. While you all board I’d like to make a few spot checks on the drill here.” Tiyana remarked.

She called the shots in virtually every aspect of the enterprise regardless of nominal titles or putative delegations of responsibility.

Hunter, Hongo, and the six-member work crew sat squished together in the cramped space within the walls of the boring machine. The crew consisted of four hardworking Egyptian men who had helped the Prices find the ding as well as a couple of men that Hongo had brought with him from Tanzania. They made small talk as they waited for Tiyana to finish her safety checklist and fire up the big drill. Tiyana, who held a doctorate degree in Chemical Engineering from the National Australian University, received extensive training from the Grabenbohren agents before they lent the machine to the expedition. Tiyana was a master of her craft. She never met a technical problem that she could not solve. Hongo joined her for much of the training and although neither of them had bored a tunnel before, they both felt up to the task.

“Well, I guess we’re as ready as we’ll ever be,” Tiyana said as she climbed up into the machine with the rest of them.

Hongo got on the radio and told the operators to fire up the engine. A deafening roar rose around them as the four-thousand horsepower diesel engine thrummed. The soft rock gave way slowly yet easily under immense hydraulic power. Hunter and Tiyana watched as small bits of rock rolled past them on a conveyer belt to the back of the machine. There, the stationary crew unloaded the rock and transported it out of the underground tunnel system. Tiyana monitored a vast array of dials and meters, making adjustments here and there in order to assure that the machine stuck to its predetermined course. All the while, Hongo and his crew worked to place steel ring supports in the tunnel, ensuring that their newly-bored hole would sustain the dead load and keep from collapse.

Hunter, going stir-crazy from a lack of important work to do, sidled over to Tiyana and yelled above the roar of the equipment, “The rock is weak! We are making good time! I think we will go over a hundred feet today!”

“Yes! We might!” Tiyana shouted over the deafening roar of the drill. She immediately felt friction in her throat. If the conversation went on for long, then she would wake up the next morning to find her voice quite hoarse.

The process moved along without incident throughout the morning. Shenouda brought lunch over from the site headquarters around noon. They slowed down but did not stop working. They took turns placing the supports and ate as they worked. In the late afternoon, the kitchen staff carried over a large pot, plugged in an industrial size hotplate, and made hot chai for everyone. Hunter struggled not to burn his lips on the scalding liquid as he felt his stomach rise up into his chest cavity.

Later on, they all remembered exactly what they were doing when gravity ceased to exist. Tiyana was checking the pressure gages, making sure the hydraulics stayed fully engaged. Hongo was watching a steel support ring slide into place, waiting for it to clear the mark where they would need to begin to guide it. Shenouda was bringing a cup of piping hot chai to one of Hongo’s men.

They took all appropriate precautions, but no one knew that the tunnel that they spent the day boring lay only a few feet above a vast chamber of air. This chamber, built nearly six thousand years ago, brought air from the earth’s surface down through the weak, porous rock and into a vast labyrinth. Unlike the ostentatious pyramids, this immense chamber’s creator had sealed and hid it with the intention of removing it from human history.

The members of the expedition flailed wildly as they lost all sense of direction. Rocks, tools, and bits of machinery assaulted them in a wild freefall. They descended into chaos.

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