The Descent

News Print: The New State

Man Attempts Heroic Feat

On the 17th of October 1908, Alexis Jackson descended 1000 feet into the legendary tunnel located in Anna, New England in hopes of dislodging a monumental stone that was obstructing complete passage. This tunnel, eponymously named Anna’s Tunnel, gapes at a diameter of 6 feet and drives at a depth of 7,900 feet towards the center of the earth.

Developed in 1907, Anna’s Tunnel was a high-priority project purposed by the Old Government to acquire minerals embedded deep within the earth’s crust. As our readers remember, the Old Government was sharply fading in popular support. This project was their desperate (and costliest) attempt to recapture the hearts and minds of the people by demonstrating it was acquiring a newfound taste for progress in science and industry. Nevertheless, the project's failure was an equivalence to the dying party’s death rattle.

Anna’s Tunnel was in development for two months, rushed into production for three, and fully operational for four. Its conception failed to win back popular support but captured the wild, spiritual imaginations of Anna’s local villagers. From the onset, Annan villagers responded to this project with suspicion, resistance, and eventually, violence. Readers may remember seeing such headlines from major news houses: “Locals Call Anna’s Tunnel ‘A Passageway to the Gates of Hell’ ”, “Locals blame Anna’s Tunnel for their short-lived harvest”, “Annan Locals Riot”, “Anna’s Tunnel Up in Flames.” And from tabloid penny presses: “Is Dante’s Seven Circles of Hell Real?”, “Do We Walk on Soil Burying Souls of the Dammed?”, “Annan Villagers Linked to Shaman and Magic”. 

Nine months after its conception, the administration abruptly ended this operation. Scant documentation gives us poor insight into this hasty conclusion. Minerals collected from the excavation have since been lost. Anna’s Tunnel was nonoperational for the remainder of the year. 

Now, in the era of The New State, it is reopened and Anna’s Mining Camp is fully functioning. This is one of the many feats The New State instilled in the first quarter of their term to bring about a new age of progress to our society. They make good on their promise not to discard traditions and relics of the past, but to wield them with the future. 

Now on record as being the first man to successfully reenter Anna's Tunnel and resurface, Alexis Jackson will deliver his acquired specimens to the party, who will keep it under secure….

***

5:55am

On a cold, sunny morning on the 17th of October 1908, George Hanle got down on his knees and prayed like he always does before a risky excavation. Hanle has been a miner for the last twenty years. He began when he turned eighteen and hopped from one camp to another for the next two decades. Wherever work was, he went. 

To keep himself mobile, he kept on himself only three items (the rest could be purchased at the next camp’s commissary): his Bible, his toothbrush, and a worn and torn postcard featuring an image of hot air balloons floating several meters above a manicured lawn in the middle of a cosmopolitan city. The balloons were the size of tomatoes and casted tomato-sized shadows right below their baskets. The photo must have been taken at midday. The pedestrians in the image were dressed up to the nine and women held parasols to shade themselves from the sun. They stood loitering like statues underneath the balloons, clustered in groups. Even as a collective, their size did not compare to those of the balloons. 

The message area on the back was blank. Hanle bought this for himself a long time ago at another camp that was frequented by foreign vendors. Something about seeing manmade objects the size of elephants rise up off the ground towards the sky brought him a feeling of peace. He spent many nights looking at the image before he fell asleep feeling it confided in him that there was a grand force beyond logic and reality, beyond what humans could see, hear, and touch, that made the sublime, invisible forces of nature a reality. 

A variation of this calming feeling simmered in his veins whenever he murmured his morning requests. Hanle was a loosely religious man but habits are habits, and for a man who works a precarious job that he may not return home in one piece from, a prayer in the morning does him some good.

This morning, however, God was completely silent. No matter how hard he prayed, Hanle could not hear or feel a thing. He couldn’t help but feel that for the first time in his life, he felt truly alone. Abandoned was the word that flashed in his mind.

Outside of his tent, men had begun rising out of their cots early. Many wanted to get their breakfast in to watch today’s monumental event.

***

6:16am

Hanle sat at a cafeteria table, looking down at his standard tray of food. The sight of eggs, toast, and beans made his tongue feel thick and dry. He imagined swallowing this food and pictured sand paper slowly coursing its way down his windpipe.

Hanle stood up, exited the cafeteria, and briskly walked towards the west wing of the compound. This area of the camp was filled with mobile offices. One of these offices belonged to Nell Norme, a seismologist, who watched the seismograph every morning as part of the camp’s safety regulation. 

“Hope you got good rest, Hanle,” Dr. Norme said as he watched the long needle on a seismograph waver side to side.

“Brought you some breakfast Dr,” Hanle responded, setting his uneaten tray on an empty table.

Hanel awkwardly hovered by the other end of the room.

“How are the readings?” Hanle asked.

Norme turned, eyebrows furrowed. 

“You’re still clear to make your descent today,” Dr. Norme said, curiously studying Hanle. Hanle was a miner and Dr. Norme was a scientist. They were acquainted as any two men who happen to spend enough time together in the same vicinity would be, but they still had their differences. Major differences. It wasn’t Dr. Norme’s habit to ask Hanle about the pick axes and it was neither Hanle’s to ask Dr. Norme about the waves.

Hanle’s mind was too occupied to register Norme’s odd gaze. His stomach became queasy. This wasn’t the answer he was hoping to hear.

***

6:43am

In a makeshift tent outside of camp grounds, Hanle was fully undressed and stretching his arms out. Dr. Carter Carp, the camp’s contracted physician, was examining Hanle’s physical fitness.

“Breathe in,” Dr. Carp instructed as he held his stethoscope against Hanle’s chest.“Breathe out.” Dr. Carp nodded his head. He pointed a small flashlight at Hanle’s eyes. 

“Normal,” he said, more to himself than to Hanle. He sat down and took some notes in a manila folder before thoughtfully looking up at his patient.

After a moment of hesitation, he asked: “How do you feel about the tunnel?” 

Hanle instinctively thought of expressing the same cookie-cutter enthusiasm his workmates shared, but there was a quality about Dr. Carp - something about the way his eyes examined objects and the introspective, patient way he talked - that made him feel as if Dr. Carp was the exact person he had been unwittingly searching to speak to.

“You don’t have to worry. None of this will go on your record,” Dr. Carp said, shutting the file.

Hanle cleared his throat. “Uncertain, Dr. I have a strange feeling but I don’t know how to describe it.”

Dr. Carp patiently waited and Hanle searched for words. “Is it possible to feel the future?” he asked. “To feel certain that something very bad is going to happen even though nothing’s the matter?”

Dr. Carp thoughtfully took this in. He looked as if he had an answer but turned his gaze down at his shoes.

“I don’t know how much of this I believe,” Dr. Carp said, “but because it’s part of my lineage, I feel I have the responsibility to tell you….to warn you not to go on the descent today.”

A shudder ran through Hanle’s body. “Is that your professional opinion doctor?” he asked quietly.

“No,” Dr. Carp quickly answered. “This is not a medical opinion. It is not based on logic or science. If I were to write a note excusing you from a project of this magnitude, I’d need to provide a proper explanation - and you know how much The Committee demands proper, thorough, detailed explanations- and I could not write this with confidence thinking I could continue my practice afterwards.”

Dr. Carp looked at Hanle. His eyes were wide with curiosity, and a ting of fear.

“I’m an Annan. My parents were alive when we protested the creation of Anna’s Tunnel. My village is a mix. We’re industrially and scientifically advanced enough to stay competitive in our agriculture and textile industries, but we also keep our heads low to the ground. What I mean is, we, or more correctly, my parents’ generation, very much believe in the spiritual side of things. They believed that the reason why our village has been able to thrive, despite the land’s arid conditions, is because we only ask The Land for what we need and take just enough to survive. We never ask for more. 

The digging of the tunnel, they felt, was asking for too much. Sure, it was technically a political maneuver, but whether the intentions of were pure or not, it was still asking The Land for something. And The Land doesn’t play by man’s politics. 

When the mining camp was first erected, there was little concern. If men didn’t scour the earth for iron and nickel, we wouldn’t have the machines we use to plow the fields. But when they wanted to bore a hole into the earth, we knew they were asking for something they didn’t even know they were asking for. What you read in the papers were true. We protested. First, diplomatically, and then, violently. Why do you think your camp is surrounded by chainlink fences? It’s not to keep the desert air out. Besides, there are no other animals besides a few wild coyotes that could easily be scared off. We needed to stop them from digging further into that tunnel. Why? We only had an inkling of an idea. But it was strong enough for us to know it was worth stopping an entire government’s operation. For days, we put down our tools and marched outside the gates. They continued to dig and the deeper they dug, the more villagers gradually trickled away and went back to their business. None of us wanted to be around when the inevitable would happen.

Now, here’s what the papers didn’t report. As soon as the drill hit its third benchmark, bad omens began to take place. Despite the distance between our village and your mining camp, word travels fast. Very fast. Rumors began to circulate that miners who worked on the very drill that bore Anna’s Tunnel began to get sick. The symptoms they had were similar to the seasonal flu, but it came out of nowhere and only infected those had worked the tunnel. The symptoms got worse and the workers lost their appetite. They said the food tasted bland and coarse like sharp sand. They lost sleep. They began to get paranoid. 

No prescribed medication could soothe their ailments. One of our shamans was asked to visit the camp but the Old Government wouldn’t allow it to happen. How would it have looked if a party advocating science brought in a spiritual man to heal their sick? Well, these men continued to waste away. All of their colleagues refused to touch the drill. One morning, a foreman stepped in their tent to count how many lived through the night. He was not prepared for the sight he came to see. One man was deceased but not by natural causes or the illness. Before the foreman arrived, the other men had begun to eat him- alive. That same night, a fire exploded in the tunnel. Your papers will report it was caused by some faulty machinery and a few have been brave enough to suggest my village as arsonists, but we locals knew it was The Land reclaiming itself back from those men and trying to protect us in the process. It was a warning: stay out! Whatever is down there, needs to stay locked in.”

Hanle’s heart raced yet his veins felt like they’d been drained of blood. His body felt cold- the same kind of bone-chilling feeling he used to get as a child when his grandfather told him ghost stories at night by the fire.

“You’re going down there to remove the rock, isn’t that right?” Dr. Carp asked. “Again, I don’t know how much of my people’s lore I believe but I guess I believe enough to share this with you. Since I was a kid, I’ve had a hard time deciding whether I was a man of science or a man of my people. Maybe this is where there is no right answer and each man has to create some imaginary structure for himself and try it out in the world. You’re fit to descend today Hanle. Good luck.”

***

8:37am

Hanle and Jackson stood side by side in a lift as they were being lowered down into the tunnel. Within seconds, they passed the few moments of the tunnel that bathed in sunlight before being submerged in darkness. Dr. Carp’s story replayed itself in Hanle’s mind like an earworm. The queasiness in Hanle’s stomach began to tighten. 

Hanle looked around him. He had burrowed through mountains hundreds of feet deep but this tunnel’s darkness was unlike anything he’d experienced before. This darkness made the world look as if the sun had been turned off like a light switch. It enveloped him- embraced him. Hanle’s arms and neck began to feel as if this darkness had a life force of its own and was sucking him into its abyss.

“And, we’re gone,” Jackson said. Hanle looked up. He was shocked to find that they had traveled so deep within minutes that they could no longer see the tunnel's opening. Jackson’s voice scattered against the rocky walls. Hanle couldn’t see the man who spoke them. All he saw was darkness. It made Jackson’s voice carry a soulless tune to it, one that made Hanle question whether the voice was said by another man or was conjured up in his head.

***

Hanle began to feel weightless. His legs had no sensation in them. It was as if his body lost all its mass and he was floating down towards the center of the earth like a flightless feather- like an angel descending from Heaven. He could feel that his arm was holding on to something sturdy, like a pick-axe, but that too seemed to be held up by the air. The scraping sounds of the pulley’s chain rubbing against more chain diminished in volume. Each time the chains rotated, it sounded farther and farther away.

***

Everything was so loud. A cacophony of wind flooded Hanle’s ears. They were sharp and piercing like blizzards in a winter storm. He covered his ears with hands and began to scream. In the sound of the wind were voices. Voices of men and women screaming with pain and hollering in fear. Underlying the inhuman racket was a deep cackling that sporadically hitched its voice. Hanle tried to remember when the sound came in. To his horror, he couldn't. It seemed as if it was always there to begin with. Over his own screams, he couldn’t hear Jackson calling out to him in the dark, asking what was wrong.

Hanle’s face began to grow hot. His face perspired as if he were standing next to an enormous fire that burned all day and all night. His body felt like it was picked up from an invisible force and spun round and round in circles. He shut his eyes and opened them trying to escape this darkness. He could see nothing yet felt as if the tunnel's walls now stretched miles and miles beyond him. He was in a sea of darkness and there was no escape. Something began to tug on his arm. There seemed to be a faint voice calling for him. He felt the iron weight hanging onto his arm. He held it up and swung it around and around, trying to regain a semblance of an earthly sensation like balance or gravity. The tugging ceased.

***

The lift that lowered Hanle and Jackson was pulled back up prematurely. They had only been descending for an hour before they were hastily pulled out. Both men were rushed to the infirmary.

***

“Tomorrow’s news papers will report only one man, Alexis Jackson, descended Anna’s Tunnel. It will also state that Jackson resurfaced with specimens acquired from the bottom of the tunnel and will be kept under the care of the party. Release no information to reporters about the injuries Jackson sustained during his descent and mention nothing of George Hanle. His name will be lost with his records,” the head of The Committee said.

“And the tunnel?” another committee member asked.

“Seal it.”

***

8:23pm

As print presses churned out tomorrow’s newspapers, George Hanle rested in the infirmary. His eyes were shut but his mind was wide awake. He was too weak to move. He’d contracted the flu and hadn’t no appetite. 

Hanle will spend the next few weeks wasting away. The Committee will neglect him and then discard him for sinking his teeth into Dr. Carp during treatment. Hanle will become another lost statistic like the rest of those who succumbed to the bad omens of Anna’s Tunnel.