Chapter 5
The sun was bright that morning, Sofia could feel it warming her skin as she huddled under her new red fleece overcoat, her rosy brown cap pulled down close to her eyes. Her left hand was clutching her mothers hand as the two strolled down the street, in her other hand she clutched a tiny brown walnut that her grandfather had given her. He had told her that it was a treasure box and inside was locked a wonderful secret, the gift of life. Her grandfather carefully instructed her to keep it safe until she met her soul mate, then if she gave it to him, he would be hers for all eternity. Even as a little girl she had saved that little nut for three years already, convinced that one day she would meet the boy she was supposed to love.
And then it happened.
Sofia and her mother were on the way to Parcul Turnului near the clock tower in the middle of town. Sofia loved the crooked blue slide, she always thought it made her feel like she was falling when she would try to climb it from the wrong end and slip back to the bottom. Her mother was meeting a few friends for one last luncheon before the family was to leave for their big adventure in America and Sofia’s two favorite cheeses, Telemea and Cascaval were packed neatly in her mothers basket.
Sofia’s mother always packed too much food, but then in that town you always brought a little extra in case you found someone in need, or bump into an old friend at lunch. As they walked Sofia mentally cataloged the names of all of the people who would stop and say good afternoon, everyone did though, it was just that sort of town. Friendly people and an abundance of sharing, you never planned your day, you just let it happen and when it did it usually included at least one life long friend and one complete stranger. The thought made Sofia laugh. Even at this young age she always studied human behavior as though she were a scientist in a laboratory watching a population of study rats.
Today it was a boy that she studied.
‘He’s cute’ she thought as she watched him climb the steps up the slide.
His mother was among the women her mom was there to meet, so she took her time wandering the edges of the playground barely taking her eyes off of him. Why had she never seen him before, their moms clearly knew each other, but she couldn’t recall seeing him anywhere before now. Sofia found herself playing on the slide, climbing up it from the wrong side, just to tumble back to the bottom giggling as she went.
And all the while she was observing how this new boy reacted, every giggle, every smile, every glance in his direction was planned the way a surgeon plans an operation. Finally as her mother was beginning to clean up the leftovers from the picnic lunch her and her friends had enjoyed Sofia took a deep breath and forced herself to say hi.
Sort of…
She ran up to him and tried to introduce herself, but her voice wanted nothing to do with the conversation. After what felt like an eternity she shot out her hand, the one with the walnut in it.
“Here you go.” She blurted, but even as she said it she thought to herself, ‘You are mine…Forever!’
As the last words left her mouth the sky turned bright azure, so bright that she had to shield her eyes and in that instant she was an adult, in the chasm again, dangling from the end of the rope as she watched her soul-mate get battered to death before being sucked into that agonizing blue light the way a vacuum cleaner pulls dust from the floor.
She screamed.
It wasn’t a normal scream, it was the agonizing, gut wrenching kind of scream that you don’t know until you loose the one thing that makes your life worth living.
She sat bolt upright in bed, sweat running down her back as tears poured from her eyes. Today was her first day back at Parallax since the day Victor died and she wasn’t sure if she was ready, especially after that nightmare. It felt so real, it was like loosing him all over again. It was definitely not the way she intended to start today, but she knew she would have to pull herself together and go no matter how much it hurt. She had been living with Sam while she adjusted to life out of the hospital and before bed last night she assured Sam that she would be on site today. She couldn’t let her down, not after Sam had done for her.
Sofia pulled herself forward and rubbed the cuff of her nightshirt against her eyes in attempt to dry them.
‘A cold drink then a long hot shower.’ She thought as she scrubbed her teeth.
She loved the taste of the mint toothpaste and the way her mouth felt when she drank ice cold water right after brushing. She had learned from her psychologist to focus on simple things, just one thing at a time until she felt like she could handle more. Far too often this tool had been the only thing between her and a panic attack, but it was her goto, and this morning that one thing was toothpaste.
“Sofia!” Mark shouted when he saw her step out of her truck. Running over to her he wrapped her in a bear hug and lifted her off the ground as he added, “Welcome to Base Camp.”
“Umm, thank you.” Sofia said stammered, “It’s been a while. Where is my office… er, uh… I mean my tent?”
Mark laughed gently as he guided her by the arm. “We call them field offices these days, and yours is right over there next door to Sam.”
“Probably wanted to keep an eye on me…” Sofia said softly as her eyes dropped to her feet.
“Probably just wants to make sure you have everything you need here.” Mark corrected her. “Look Sof, we all know what you went through, but none of us knows what you are going through. You don’t have to be brave, strong or even sure that you want to be here. You just have to know that we care about you and that you are never alone. K?”
Sofia’s face softened as her stress level decreased, “Thank you Mark. You and Sam are my two best friends, and I am lucky to have you both.”
The door on the tent they stopped at had a white nameplate hung on it with her name emblazoned in bold font, under her name it said ‘Director of Geophysics’
Sofia laughed, “Still wants me on magnetic fields, seismic waves and subsurface imaging eh?”
“Why change what worked if you don’t have to.” Mark put his hand on her shoulder. “Take your time, you got this!”
Sofia opened the door and stepped inside her tent,
and stopped.
The space was larger than she expected, the canvas walls stretched taut over a reinforced frame, humming faintly with climate control that kept the desert heat at bay. A wide central workstation dominated the room—polished, organized, and hers.
Screens lined the far wall, already alive with soft blue light. Live feeds of seismic data scrolled in clean, precise lines, magnetic field readings pulsed in slow, steady waves, and a three-dimensional subsurface model of the site rotated lazily in the center display, waiting for input.
To one side sat a bank of equipment she had only ever seen in grant proposals and conference demonstrations—portable ground-penetrating radar units, high-resolution magnetometers, and a compact seismic array interface, all neatly labeled, calibrated, and ready to deploy.
Her breath caught.
A smaller workstation had been set up near the back, cluttered just enough to feel familiar—sample trays, labeled vials, a digital microscope, and a rugged tablet loaded with analysis software she had spent years wishing she could get her hands on.
Even the details hadn’t been overlooked. A fresh notebook lay open beside her terminal, a pen resting across the page like someone had just stepped away after writing the note underneath, ‘Welcome Back!” with a heart scrolled beside it. A mug—her mug—sat off to the side, filled with pens and markers instead of coffee.
Sofia took a slow step forward, running her fingers lightly across the edge of the main console as if she wasn’t entirely sure it was real.
This wasn’t just a field office.
This was everything she had ever needed… and everything she had lost.
“This is…” Sofia paused as the cost of her dream lab dawned. “How well funded are we?”
Mark laughed, “Well, that is actually something that Sam was going to talk to you about. My father is our sole Underwriter.”
“And that news was supposed to require Sam to break?” She laughed.
“No.” Came Sam’s voice from outside the tent. “But the price tag will.” She added stepping through the door.
“Price tag?” Sofia was genuinely confused. “Donations don’t require a payback.”
“I never said he was donating anything.” Mark held his hand in the air.
“The price tag is…” she started, but she was interrupted.
“Sam, I need you real quick.” A tall slender woman holding three clipboards in one arm and an IPad in the other shuffled through the door. Noticing Sofia in the room she froze, pencil in her mouth as she struggled through introducing herself. “Olivia Mercer, Chief of Media and Communications. You are?”
“Sofia Petrov,” Sofia took control of the room with curt professionalism, “and this is my office. I would ask whom exactly you are, but instead as you have already introduced yourself I’ll ask what, exactly is it that you do?”
“Television.” The woman looked as though it should have been obvious. “That is what we are doing here.”
Sofia’s eyes shot between Sam, Mark and Olivia as she realized that this was the price tag Sam was talking about.
“No…” she shook her head. “No, no, no, no. TV? What on earth? Sam, you authorized it?”
Sam laughed nervously, “Well, I didn’t have much choice. Mr Halvorsen Sr froze out our funding, the board froze our bank accounts and suddenly it was all about making it profitable or finding a new job, and well.” She paused, wrestling with her emotions. “Well I have to find out what happened to Victor.” She said quickly. “For all of us.”
Sofia was silent for a long moment before she cleared her throat and began speaking.
“I know what this means Sam,” she said softly, “I know how much you hate those television docu-series about phony scientist and crazy phenomena bullshit.” She took a somber tone as she finished, “Thank you.”
“Sofia,” Sam said softly, “You’re welcome. We all need this, that is why we are doing all this. That’s why I agreed to TV. We all need to know what happened to Victor. We need to bring his body back and lay him to rest.”
“Not to be that person,” Olivia broke the silence first, “but I need to get an interview with you in front of the new formation real quick so I get Mr. Halvorsen’s Season one advertisement ready. He is being very demanding about having it to him before he leaves the office today. I just don’t want to start this job out by making the boss made on day twenty. You know?”
Sam and Sofia released their hug and Sam looked at Olivia then back at Sofia and whispered, “No, instead you start the job by pissing me off instead…”
Both of them broke out in laughter before Sam turned to face Olivia and said with as much sarcasm as she could manage, “As you wish madam producer!”
“Wait, the new formation?” Sofia’s attention suddenly perked as she realized what was said. “Something new since last time?”
“That’s right!” Mark nearly shouted. “We do have a new development…” He paused, suddenly realizing the significance of where the formation showed up.
“Uhh,” he stammered, “It is a… uh… a thing, um a formation.”
“Oddly enough,” Sofia said patiently, “I had that much figured out. Where is it, what is it, what is it made of, what is it doing wherever it is… You remember, that sciency kinda stuff.” She laughed.
“Well,” Sam cut in, “What our dear Mark is trying to say is that it sprouted from the ground in the precise location where Victor’s office chair used to sit.”
Sofia froze, her sarcasm melting into a mix of excitement and trepidation as she tried to grasp the idea of this thing coincidentally sprouting from the ground, right where Victor used to sit.
“It’s him.” She said softly. “I don’t know how, but I know it’s him.”
“It can’t be, he’s d…” Olivia started but Sam cut her off.
“Let’s apply some scientific method here Sof.” She said softly. “We know what you saw, what we saw. You know I am not one to be the fatalist in any situation, but unless you have supporting evidence for your new hypothesis…”
“I know it’s not possible Samantha.” Sofia snapped.
“Sof…”
“No.” Sofia said firmly. “You are needed in front of this formation and I need to see it. I need to touch it and listen to it and find out what it is…” she paused as if listening to something the rest of them couldn’t hear before finishing. “Or what it thinks it is.”
“Follow me.” Sam’s tone was clinical, cold and factual. She wasn’t calloused, but she had learned how to turn off her emotions in situations that demanded it. And this was one such situation.
She led them down the path and over a long, grated steel catwalk above the now sprawling excavation at the base of the formation more than fifty meters down the hand-dug shaft. Sofia froze the moment she saw the top few feet of it protruding from its hole in the center of the grate, her hand clasped over her mouth as a soft gasp escaped.
“It’s beautiful.” She sighed.
“It is an undocumented phenomena, displaying the characteristics of no known element in our existence.” Sam cut in, her clinical tone a calculated part of her attempt to bring her friend back to the world of science, not science-fiction. “It is a seemingly indestructable crystalline structure that for all we know is still growing,” she paused as she held her compass close to the formation, “and look what it does to my compass.”
“Do you remember that day in the cave?” Sofia asked softly as a tear trickled from the corner of her eye.
“I still see it every time I close my eyes Sof, you know that.”
“I do,” she whispered. “Do you remember our conversation at camp on day two underground?”
Sam closed her eyes reciting it as if reading a script behind her eyelids, “You said you normally like being underground, but this place was like electricity just below the surface.”
“And do you not feel it now?” Sofia took Sam’s hand and placed it on the formation. “Every pulse stronger than the last. Feel that?” She closed her eyes as she leaned in close, “Push, now pull, then push, and pull again, just like when we were there.”
“I remember.” Sam whispered
“I felt it the moment we stepped foot under ground that day,” Sofia let go of Sam and addressed the whole team. “I’m not crazy. I know Victor is dead, I watched him as his neck was snapped, his eyes locked on mine as that grotesque look washed over his face.” She paused to wipe her cheek. “But this is here because of Victor.” She looked around, making eye contact with as many as would. “There are no coincidences in what we do, and this is no coincidence. What is the bearing please?” She asked into her radio.
“Impossible to tell for sure from down here ma’am, but roughly southeast.” A mans voice crackled back. “The formation even has the gyrocompass confused.”
“What have you been doing to plot the formation?” She was looking at Sam.
“Well,” Sam started as she glanced at the ground, “that’s kinda what you’re here for Sof. You designed that…”
“Subsurface Positioning System?” Sofia chimed in as her smile grew. “So wait…” she laughed. “You want me to drag my junior science project from high school out for its first ever real world test?”
“When you put it that way.” Mark laughed.
“Yes!” Sam demanded between giggles.
“You people act like a bunch of high school kids.” Olivia laughed before adding. “In the best way! I just mean you all click, it works.”
“I will run to mom’s and see if she still has it.” Sofia announced.
“I’m coming with you,” Sam interjected, “besides, it’s too long since I’ve seen your mom. I wouldn’t miss your homecoming!”
“Meanwhile,” Mark cut in, “south by southeast is the direction that elbow turns and it’s at a forty-five degree angle. That then runs aproximately forty-eight and one half meters before turning what we think is going to finish as level, but at that point without your equipment we will have no real way of knowing.”
“Wait,” Sofia slowly spun a few times with her elbows at her sides, index fingers pointed out like she was marking direction in her mind. “I remember the chasm as nearly due north according to our LIDAR scans, did something change?”
“No.” Sam said emphatically. “That’s why we need your sub-surface positioning system, because this new formation is going away from whatever that thing in the chasm is, not toward it.”
“Not yet anyway.” Mark reminded her. “It is still twisting and turning down there, for all we know it could lead us around for miles then end right back at that thing.”
“EXACTLY!” Sam blurted.