The Hollow

By T. W. Fielding

In the distant future earth is running out of food and resources. On the run Rod is forced down into the most dangerous levels of the world .

• Language: English
• Publisher: T. W. Fielding
• Release date: Jul 28, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463046876

T. W. Fielding

T. W. Fielding lives in the northwest ...

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The Hollow

By T. W. Fielding

Published by Three Door Publishing

Copyright © 2018 T. W. Fielding

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Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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Contents

Start

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

About the Author

Other Stories

Books

Find Out More

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The Hollow

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Chapter 1

Rod Swift walked slowly across the pitted surface, his thick-soled heavy mag-boots clomping on the plexi-steel plates. Four cables were attached to magnetic rolling balls so he wouldn't be blown away and one red lifeline cable fastened to a grommet next to the hatch. The wind was down so he could do touch up work, but the white outside suit (a downgrade some said, of an EVA suit) made every move difficult.

Half a mile away was a clear dome about the size of half a soccer ball. Domes stippled into the distance like pimples on a giant blue marble. When the sun shined, the domes multiplied the sunlight and reflected it down chrome tubes to every section of the Hollow. He paused and looked up in violation of regulations. There would be no sunlight today.

Many centuries ago man had been so afraid of meteors hitting and destroying earth, they’d orbited thousands of nuclear missiles to prevent it. Finally, when a swarm of meteors came close, they fired the missiles and deflected the meteors. Everyone cheered and partied until the meteors hit Mercury. They expected, hoped, it was a minor catastrophe for the little planet, nothing to really concern themselves with, but Mercury exploded and everyone feared the worst: more meteors, more sunspots.

However, Mercury disintegrated into a large dust cloud that stayed in orbit between the earth and the sun. At first the dust cloud only blocked sunlight for one month. Then the dust spread and it blocked the sunlight, filtered it, for a quarter of the year. Then half. Then there was more talk and they sent missiles to push the dust into the sun, but when they exploded, the missiles mostly scattered the dust even wider in Mercury’s orbit and it filtered the sunlight for a whole year: Mercury’s Ring it was now called. Some scientists said the dust cloud would eventually fall—spiral—into the sun, but that had been over a thousand years ago. The scientists were long dead and the survivors were still waiting.

Fortunately, long before the Mercury catastrophe man had built domes over many cities and farmlands to protect them from pollution and severe weather. The domes were hurriedly—haphazardly—connected. Five billion lives were lost, but mankind lived. Now all of earth was enclosed by plexi-steel glass plates, painted to make it look as it had centuries ago so the Inner-Worlders wouldn’t be upset when they looked up.

The Inner-Worlders said this Earth was not the real Earth. The Believers thought this was a normal step in Earth’s evolution and wanted to be inside the domed world. The True Believers said the real Earth orbited on the exact other side of the sun from this Hollow Earth. It didn’t matter what the scientists said, or what polits said, they knew as sure as there is a God in heaven, that someday they would travel to this real Earth and many considered their time in this Hollow Earth penance. They believed that anything they did to help their cause was legal and justified. This life was just a temporary stepping stone. Soon they would be going. Amen.

Rod stopped a few plates away from the blue plexi-glass plate. He gazed to the left at what was supposed to be the Olympic Peninsula coastline in 1850 and saw he had to move over. He pulled the lines to the correct coordinates and found where the wind had scoured the paint off. He lifted the paint gun out of the holster and pressed the button on his forearm to inflate the knee pads. He carefully crouched—why you didn’t see many old painters—clumsy in the heavy OSS (OutSide Suit). The computer in the tip of the paint gun sensed what colors and paint to use as he moved his hand over the plexi-glass plates and touched up the landscape; the ocean, the surf and rocky cliffs. The wind had buffed away the paint here again. Why it always peeled away the paint in this section, no one knew. The Believers said it was Karma. The Owlers—inner world advocates—said it was a sign man would live on the surface again. Where the paint was too far gone Rod had to do it the old-fashioned way, he had to paint, which in his opinion he was best at.

By altering the pressure on the buttons on the paint gun he could change the color and texture of the paint. At the school where he had been formally tested and eventually trained to use the paint gun some of the teachers had been jealous of his natural talent—gained from years of painting and drawing at home. They said he had talent, but needed help, their help (and their credit.) He insisted he could do it alone and finally even those who were against him were awed by his dedication. Now they said he was a natural born talent ignoring his many years of hard work. He had worked longer hours, on shifts no one wanted and in places and conditions few could endure. He knew he had more to learn, but there never seemed to be enough time.

With his air brush he redrew the forests and the cliffs and the shore. He was tempted to paint in a freeway or a building, but that was against policy. He would have liked to add a whale or two in the ocean, but that was against policy too. Currently whales were the property of the 3-D painters. At times, he wondered why he worked for an agency where everything he wanted to do was against regulations.

It used to be they had special robots doing the painting, but after the robot revolt they’d had to kill off most of them or face extinction. So now they used only dumb robots to assist.

The emergency klaxon horn rang in his helmet speaker.

Warning, said Ned's reedy voice. Come on in, Rod.

Almost done.

Stop being a perfectionist, Ned told him, his voice slurred. Rod could tell he’d been smoking again.

He finished his touch up job and with the help of the walking stick, stood up. Southward he could just make out the Pacific Coast where the Columbia River came between Oregon and Washington. A year's worth of touchup work to be done. Locations much too far from the hatch for a quick job. Just to the north was the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Vancouver Island and beyond that, what had been British Columbia, Alaska and the Yukon. The amount of work needed there was daunting, overwhelming.

The plates weren’t smooth and flat. Over the centuries they’d become pitted and some had buckled forming slight bumps. Some had even caved in a little. The one world government said there wasn’t enough money in the budget to fix or replace them. They could only patch and paint. When he looked around and saw all the work he had to do, it tired him out.

The klaxon sounded louder in his helmet.

Rod?! Ned said.

I’m coming.

He glanced up at the moon, the green patches of lichen still growing in the deep canyons, still alive centuries after the Moon base had been abandoned.

The wind was increasing as he turned toward the blinking red beacon on the hatch. He had to lean into the wind as he walked back. Leaning into the wind, holding the red umbilical line, he pulled the four magnetic rolling grapples along with him. Sweat dripped down his face. He tapped the side of his helmet; the fans to blow fresh air across his face were not working again.

To the east he saw where the Cascade Range of Mountains had been. Even on a clear day, he could see little more than their flatness in the distance. Today, with the dust rising, he could barely make out the flat area. No mountains. No snow. No ski resorts. Of course, now there was fake snow with floating resorts.

The wind was picking up. Soon he wouldn't be able to survive outside. To the north were little puffs of explosions as tiny meteor fragments hit the surface and disintegrated. The paint was supposed to protect the hull, but only from glancing hits. If there had been an atmosphere the fragments wouldn’t have reached earth, but the upper atmosphere was gone.

The red warning alarm started flashing in the upper left corner of his helmet.

WARNING: breach in right knee area, Elli, the female computer voice said.

Again? he said, looking down at the special new gray duct tape covering his knees.

You have ten seconds to come inside or lose your leg, Elli said in a soft sweet computer voice.

Hurry up! Ned shouted.

I'm coming, he grunted and leaned into the wind.

Nine seconds. Elli liked to count.

He felt the