The planet is dead, though that was ever the case. Inasmuch as a planet can be alive, molten cores stirring a magnetic field around a husk of rock, though we call it dead for its lack of organic life. So in landing there, perhaps we breathed some temporary living into it. But by all other metrics, it is dead.
The scars of life had yet to fade. Most of the surface structures were shallow and functional. The complexity and intricacy of the primary habitat for the long-dead residents of this place is found below the ground, below the reach of the vicious dust storms that whip snapping electricity across the expansive plains. Delicate equipment doesn’t last long, but there is evidence that the inhabitants utilised the electric dust storms in some way, perhaps for power. There are metal disks, rusted and blasted, lying around the surface which might fit the broken antennae we have found scattered across the valley. They may have been in the midst of their industrial age when whatever befell them took place. That might have something to do with the pit.
Except for a few storage silos and industrial areas, none of the subterranean structures discovered thus far have gone below a hundred metres above the surface. Likewise, none of the surface structures are more than two metres high. Except for one, that pips both records.
An eerily church-like structure, provisionally called the temple, sits several miles from the primary settlement. Around it are a few surface-level living spaces, sheltering more extensive ones below it, which may have supported the Temple structure in some capacity. The Temple itself sits between the high walls of a canyon, accessible only from the southern route. Its exterior walls are as unremarkable as the other surface structures, made from the same sandstone bricks, coated with a burnt orange mud that has dried solid. Evidently, not many of the inhabitants spent much time looking at the structures from the outside.
The inside is different. All along the walls, faded pictographs form what might be an allegory of their religious or cultural beliefs, inlaid with gold that all flows towards a golden apse at the back of the structure. When the sunlight strikes the gold through the three large, empty windows, during the daylight hours, the apse becomes a space of dazzling brightness. It is as difficult to see your own hand in front of your face as it is in the darkest caves. A contrast then, for what lies below the apse.
The pit. The floor simply ends, no low wall or rail to guard it, and dips down into a pit that matches the circumference of the apse. Its depth is indeterminate. Drones go so far down, they threaten to lose signal, so we have to recall them. The lowest they’ve gone so far is twenty-six kilometres and that is most certainly not the end of it. The pit remains uniform for as long as we have seen, maintaining its circumference and direction. Its smooth sides suggest some skill and advanced techniques were employed in its construction. Or destruction, however you want to look at it.
Why it was built is open to speculation. Industry? Unless there is some key component, like a thermal trap or ore feed, that has been removed, it is hard to imagine what material purpose that pit had. More likely it has some cultural or religious significance, hence the use of gold and the size of the temple. How it was built is a more puzzling question. It runs against all other evidence that the inhabitants that built the temple and the surrounding structures had the knowhow to construct the pit. Even we would struggle to make something so laser-accurate and long if we ever had cause to. Which leads to the most disturbing question; who?
It strange that, as pioneers of science, even we are susceptible to a little superstition. For when it came to the discussion of where to pitch camp while we took samples and recorded measurements of the temple and surrounding structures, we unanimously elected to camp outside the canyon perimeter, despite the unnecessary and long walk it takes us to get there each morning. An idea about what the pit is, why it exists and what, if anything, it had to do with the disappearance of the inhabitants, has latched itself to all our minds.
For me, I can’t help but imagine that, as night falls, something crawls out of it.
Paddy Dobson
5th December 2020