Stone Men In Water Street

[Brian]

Christianson? he asks, a whole slew of notes you can't read sliding away as you sense his mental focus shifting to greet his guest.  You've been in the mine for a while now.  Is everything alright?

[Bjorn]

We're not sure.  There was something down here, certainly.  We've stumbled across what looks like a smugglers' hideout.  There's a shack down here loaded with drugs and automatic weapons.  The latter might be useful.  At some point, you should send some people to retrieve it.  Be careful about the booby-traps.

But there might still be something down here.  It's hard to say for sure, but we think that, deeper in the mine... I dropped a lantern into the shaft, and both Victor and I saw it vanish without a trace.  We're going to explore more.  I'll try to keep you posted.

[Brian]

Lazarus's thoughts carry a tinge of uncertaintly (it's amazing, when you think about it, how you can pick up these details from written letters), I see.  Well, be careful; the sun will set in an hour or so.

[Bjorn]

You should be careful, too, Bjorn replies.  Just in case whatever's down here decides to go out there.

Have fun.

Letting Lazarus smear back into a smudge, Bjorn looks over at Victor (who he extends the mindboard to, once more), and Nathan.  About an hour to sunset.  Shall we start figuring out how we're going to get down the shaft?

[Brian]

Victor eyes his rope, then eyes yours.  Hmm.  We can see which of these beams are in a good position, and not half-rotted with age.  So saying, he begins examining the support-beams nearest the mine-shaft, prodding them with his hands, and occasionally giving an experimental tug.  He seems pretty satisfied with his findings.

[Bjorn]

Bjorn goes over to help Victor.  Examining the beams himself, he asks, So? What do you think?

[Rezantis]

"Are you guys sure we have a rope long enough for this?  I mean, I didn't see that lantern fall, but you said it was a pretty long way . . ."

[Brian]

I think that this yawning blackness is somewhat frightening.  Hopefully it's merely water.  The beam will hold -- one of us should go down first, and ensure that it's safe, though.  The others will be able to get help should something go wrong.  Victor eyes Rez and frowns.  Can you tie the rope?

There's space around the sides of the beam, so you can secure a rope through it easily enough.  It'd lead down one corner of the roughly square-cut shaft.

[Bjorn]

Let's send something other than one of us down, first, Bjorn writes sardonically.  I would like to find out what it does to rope and metal before I find out what it does to my skin.

As he makes that observation, Bjorn hunts around for a relatively light object that would be easy to tie to one end of the rope.

[Brian]

'Relatively' is a key word here.  You can send down, say, the pick-axe, or a rifle, or maybe a random chunk of wood from a crate that (someone) savaged with a pick-axe.

Or dirt.

There seems to be a lot of dirt lying around.

[Bjorn]

As the pick-axe might be useful, and the gun might be dangerous, Bjorn grabs a medium-sized chunk of wood, and quickly ties it to the rope.  Making sure the other end is secured to the beam, he writes, So.  Shall we see what happens?

Unless anyone objects, Bjorn then starts to lower the piece of wood down into the mine shaft.  When it hits bottom, he runs out of rope, or if he feels anything, he pulls it back up.

[Brian]

Sounds like a plan, Victor agrees.

You let out the rope for a while.  It doesn't take long for the chunk of wood to vanish into the darkness below.  The weight remains steady, until you have perhaps seven meters of slack left, whereupon you think you've hit something.

At this point, you begin pulling the rope back up.  When it reaches the top of the shaft, the chunk of wood appears to be intact.  No signs of abuse.

[Bjorn]

Well, dead wood is safe.   Not much point in lowering a lantern, all things told.  I guess it's my turn.  Try not to let me drop.

Throwing the rope back down in the chasm, Bjorn sheaths Shinmyouken and starts to slide down into the darkness.

[Brian]

Well, this plan is not without flaws.

It starts to get dark a short number of meters down.  And keeps getting darker.  Victor is holding onto the rope higher up, peering down at you and holding the lantern out, but it's not shedding much light.

Personally, Victor sends, I would have sent someone who can see in the dark.

About twenty meters down, it's getting really hard to see, but you're relatively sure you're in front of another mineshaft, this one going roughly to the right of your entrance into the elevator-less elevator shaft.  Beneath you is more darkness.

You start to realize just how cold things are at about this depth, because they're pretty chilly.  Cold air seems to be pouring down the shaft above you, only a trickle of warmer air escaping from what you think is the other mineshaft.

[Bjorn]

That would have been a good plan, Bjorn agrees.  All right.  I think there's a shaft here, though I'm not at the bottom.  Seems safe enough so far, if cold.  I'll stop in this shaft, and you can join me.  Sounds good?

As he's writing this, he puts actions to words, trying to make his way to the mouth of the new passage.