Abandoned Uranium Workings

The ledge I fell onto gave me a nasty jolt; I sprained my ankle pretty bad, stumbled and hit my head off a rock. Wow, that hurt. But it stopped me falling to an unnatural death at the hands (well, wings) of a deranged robot turkey, so that's a plus. In fact, I found myself mercifully close to the exit, located rather fortuitously on an upper level out of reach of any poultry-based machinery.

Unfortunately, as I staggered through the portal, I barely had time to sense the remaining traces of long mined out uranium before I started hallucinating.

The manic mining robot I could deal with. Armed penguins, well, ok. Robot turkeys was stretching a point a little. But this next chamber, the old Uranium mine, was utterly beyond belief. In fact, I refuse to elaborate until I've been back and convinced myself I'm not completely crazy.

The Menagerie

Through the next portal, door, or whatever you want to call it, things started to get a bit creepy. Inside the portal, the next chamber was also protected by an old metal gate; a sign attached to this had the word menagerie scratched into it.

I tried the gate. It was locked, but the years in this damp cave had rusted it pretty thoroughly, and a good shove broke the hinges. Inside, it was dark. It had the feeling of the Springfield Cemetery. I kept thinking Spike would appear and quip me to death in that faux-cockney way he has. But he didn't. A green turkey did though.

No, I couldn't believe it either. It was like I had entered some primary-colour nightmare Bernard Matthews might have had. Teenage mutant ninja turkeys. (Wonder how many google searchers that phrase will bring in?)

Firtunately, the green turkey, despite having a cartoon radioactive glow, appeared to be another mindless robot, and didn't give chase immediately when I dodged it to go after the keys. I climbed up the chamber wall using the ledges and platforms - these seemed pretty solid, unlike some I had come across - because I could see one of them hanging from the ceiling. Next to a big, probably killer, spider. Unfortunately I could also here a creepy kind of simulated clucking - more turkey robots.

Once I reached the top, I stayed out of sight until the noise was getting quieter, then followed the turkey, jumping for the keys as I went.

The turkey turned, facing me full on in it's mauvey glory, and started bearing down on me. I started to turn round, but the ledge gave out on me - I had to go on, so I took a run, jumped the turkey, grabbed a key I noticed at the last minute, and just about managed to duck under a nasty looking spider. The ledge was still crumbling, so I had to keep moving - but another of the turkeybots was in front of me. I waited as long as I dared, but the ledge wasn't safe, so I had to keep moving. I jumped the turkey, grabbed the last key, and kept going, hoping for a solid enough ledge for me to catch my breath and plan my next move.

No such luck. I scrabbled further into the corner, desperately trying to grip the cavern wall with my fingers and boots, to no avail. With a slow, deliberate movement, the turkey turned round. Hatred falshed red in its mechanical eyes. It advanced on me as I clung to the disintegrating ledge, it's clanking legs and electronic clucking getting louder.

I closed my eyes, wondering whether the turkey or the drop would kill me.

Then I fell.

What kind of mind...

...fills a hidden mine shaft with penguins?

And I'm not talking chocolate here, I'm talking flightless birds with dinner jackets and a snow fetish.

Let me start at the beginning.

I knew, from when I opened the Stargate-door-thingy, that I could just about get through the gap, but it was a few days before I returned, this time stocked up for a long haul. There was something down there, and I wanted to find out what it was.

Anyway, the next chamber, the one through the Stargate, was some kind of huge walk-in fridge. A cold store of some kind, I suppose (maybe the Ancients actually did keep chocolate in there at one time?). Populated - no, guarded, for these little buggers were armed to the beaks - by penguins. Big penguins, with flak jackets, helmets and SA80s. (No, I didn't get close enough to see if they actually had trigger fingers.)

OK, in fairness I think there were only two of them, but they were as tall as me in my boots and helmet, and a pair of six foot emperor penguins is a scary enough thought without handing them assault rifles.

I didn't hang around. Thankfully, the Stargate's switches were pretty obvious, and although jumping from rusty old conveyor to crumbling ledge in the freezing cold was not easy by any means, the penguins were a bit dim (probably, in retrospect, lower-grade automatons, not real live penguins) and easy enough to outwit. The cold ultimately encouraged me to move fast, and I was through the next gate before I froze or got penguined to death.

The Ancients

Now, this is my theory.

A lost civilization, far in advance of our own, was, at some point in Earth's history, using automatons to mine for raw materials. What kind of civilization it was, or what kind of industry the mine supplied, I have no idea at the moment. Maybe space travel - maybe even time travel! - or some similarly advanced industry, no doubt.

At some point, industry was abandoned. Maybe there was a war; maybe they just all got on their spaceships and flew south for a couple of millennia. I hope I'll be able to figure that out if I go back. But whatever the reason for the collapse of this civilisation, it seems nobody ever told the mine robots to stop working, and even now they're aimlessly going through their mining programmes, even though there's nothing left to mine...

I will go back.

I will explore further.

I will discover the truth.

Surbiton SG-1

Well, I plucked up the courage to go back down there today. I took the keys with me, and had another poke around.

Robo-miner was still chuntering about overhead somewhere when I found the keyholes - thankfully, having dodged it last time, I didn't have to tangle with that thing again.

But - and this is where it gets really wierd, so bear with me - honestly, it was like something out of SG-1. I'm talking chevrons, irises, the whole Stargate bit. Now, I'm no Daniel Jackson, but I've seen many a lost civilization on TV, and I'll be darned if that's not exactly what's lurking under Surbiton. That would explain a lot, now I come to think of it...

Anyway, this Stargate thing. It took a little trial-and-error, but eventually (while keeping an ear out for manic mining robots, and squinting into the dark) I got these four keys into four keyholes I'd spotted in a kind of rusty metal panel in a corner of the chamber, and the whole thing started to glow, lit up like some kind of control console thingy.

I played with a few of the controls - I mean, who wouldn't, faced with a bunch of technology way in advance of anything Microsoft have got their hands on - until I (well, I presume it was me) actually opened a doorway. It made the most awful, tortured groaning, this huge, rusty metal slab trundling aside, before it finally got stuck.

Central Cavern

So, I went back down Surbiton way, to the forgotten mine-shaft, laden with torch, batteries and provisions.

I made my way to the bottom of the shaft, where I found an entrance. 'Central Cavern', apparently.

I could definitely hear machinery, so I had a look around. It all happened quite quickly - I was pretty scared - but, basically, I saw something - a key, it turns out - and when I went to grab it, I noticed this... manic mining robot. Just chuntering back and forth, it was, it probably cleared the cavern out donkeys ago. Still, gave me a fright... Nearly as much of a fright as I got when I jump over the bloody thing, find myself landed on this conveyor belt gizmo, and nearly get tipped down a big hole. I guess it must have been where the chuntering robot dumped whatever it was mining to get carted away.

Thankfully, I'm pretty spritely, and I was quick enough on me feet to jump the hole. Figured I may as well explore a bit more, since I found myself in a new part of this Central Cavern doodad. Well, I was curious, wasn't I? Never mind the crumbling floor, even though it nearly tipped me back out on top of that bloody robot...

I had to look round. Found a few more of them keys, too. Four or five, there was. Keyholes to match, too, but I didn't try them. That bloody robot was enough excitement for today, so I pocketed the keys and came home. There's another day tomorrow.

Shaft

I finally went back. I put it off for a while, nerves I guess, but last night, after dark, I made my way to Oakhill Park - a small, wooded parkland area near Surbiton General Hospital.

Using the Sense, I found a narrow hole - it had probably been mistaken for a rabbit hole, or an urban fox's den - which would lead me to a deeper, larger cavity. The abandoned mine shaft.

The shaft is well hidden, and quite hard to reach - I wouldn't have ventured into that part of the park had I not sensed the opening - so covering my tracks and protecting the hole from discovery was not difficult. Last night I went, pick in hand, to widen the hole enough for me enter the shaft itself.

That done, I secreted my picks and spades inside the entrance and headed for home, my Sense still probing, and still receiving conflicting, confusing, snippets of what awaits me underground. I could hear something too - not just sense it, but actually hear it, such that anyone passing could, if they cared to explore this dark and secluded spot. It was machinery of some kind, still moving somewhere underground.