428: Nowhere of Consequence

Ziggurat #343

"You talk about the people who used to live here with reverence," Lamont accused, "but you treat them with contempt. Who do you think you're fooling?"

"You speak only of bodies," his ghostly counterpart answered. It was cradling its spectral cigarette close to its lips, its arms folded over its torso, as Lamont might do when he was impatient or preoccupied. "Their bodies, having brought them here, long ago fulfilled their purpose. The people in question are still here, very much alive."

"In the chorus," Constance suggested.

"That's right," the specter agreed distractedly. "Or in the cloud of witnesses, to draw from a useful phrase. And some of us are among the attendants."

The lift, having resumed its descent, now come to a stop again. The translucent doors slid open without ceremony to reveal what looked like a circular chamber that was bathed uniformly in a cool blue light. While large, the chamber did not appear to make up the entire circumference of the tower. Visible between thick columns, the walls were lined with constellations of blinking multicolored lights. Everything was connected by catwalks of the same mesh-like material they had seen above the necropolis; a catwalk connected the central column to the outer wall, with branches linking it to the thick columns in-between on either side. Around each of these was a circular platform about six feet wide.

"Follow me, please," the specter ordered, stepping outside the lift.

Constance and Lamont filed after it. Leaving the protective field of the lift, Lamont could see from his helmet's indicator that they were in a cold vacuum. He glanced downward and immediately regretted it. Beneath them was an abyss to which he could see no bottom, just hundreds of levels of pipes and catwalks, telescoping to a vanishing point. "Where are we?" He gulped.

"Nowhere of consequence," the specter answered. "A service junction. Your present limitations require us to transfer to a mode of transportation that will allow you to tolerate higher speeds." It led them a dozen steps to one of the thick columns, which appeared to continue downward the length of the appallingly deep shaft. As they approached it, a door in the column snapped open, revealing an interior similar to that of the lift shuttles they had used higher up in the tower.

"Does this go all the way down to the moon's surface?" Constance asked. She was a few steps ahead of Lamont, and he unconsciously gripped the radio tether that connected them as she leaned without apparent distress over the sheer edge of the catwalk.

"Beneath it," the specter explained. "There is nearly as much of the tower inside the moon as above it."

"God," Lamont gasped, his head spinning at the sheer scale of it.

"Now you're getting the idea," the specter smiled thinly, gesturing beckoningly for them to enter the column.