Chapter 23: The Mammoth Caves

[August – October 2373 AD – POV Timotheus Mellark]

We had a few days left in District Four, but after the tsunami, there was a lot of chaos around. Fortunately, most buildings had not been damaged, as almost all of them were built on higher ground, and all of the maglev tracks including the main station were also high enough to be safe. According to what we were told, nobody had been killed, and there had only been a few minor injuries.

Nonetheless, people were busy with cleaning up, and with Finnick and his wife being gone on their honeymoon and Britta being involved with and partially in charge of cleanup activities – they wanted to have everything tidied up perfectly when the weddings guests had left and the next group of paying guests were expected – nobody really had time for us.

Although we had originally planned to spend a few days longer, I got an idea and talked to my cousin and the two girls when we had breakfast on the next day:

"Look, it appears that nobody has time to do anything with us, and I wonder if we should not go somewhere else. What about taking the maglev and visiting some other area for a few days?"

"Which area did you have in mind?" Esther asked.

"Well, I don't know, but there are some options, I guess. Are you more interested in beach, mountains, or maybe caves?"

"Hm, we have just had beach, mountains are not so much my thing, but maybe caves? What about you, Rebecka?"

"Yes, me too" Esther's younger sister nodded. "Where would those be? Close to here?"

"No, not really. There are some in Sixteen, but we've got the Mammoth Caves close to the border between Six and Eleven. We can take the train to a city close by and stay in a hotel for a few days, if we want."

"Can we just do it like this?" Rebecka asked with big eyes. "Don't we have to ask for permission?"

"Ask whom? Except for you, we are all adults, and we can go just like that, if your sister agrees."

"Well, unless you two boys are going to elope with us," Esther grinned, "that sounds like a plan. But what about cost?"

"Don't worry about that" my cousin stated. "We will cover that, of course, and we will both be happy to have such two pretty girls with us!"

"Be careful with what you say, or else we might just decide that you are boyfriend material after all!" Esther teased and chuckled.

We laughed and continued to banter and tease each other for a few more minutes, but we were basically in agreement. It was still early in the day, and I quickly booked four tickets on the next maglev. We grabbed our bags and said 'Good Bye' to Britta and her family; she did not say so, but seemed to be a little bit relieved to see us leaving. We emphasized that we fully understood the situation and that we'd find a nice place to spend a few more days of vacation, and one hour later the coast receded behind us.

While we were on the train, I got my tricorder out and showed a few family photos to my cousin and the girls. Of course, some of the more recent ones had Rue on them as well, and I had to explain:

"Oh, yes, indeed, you do not know Rue yet. She kind of dropped on me when I was out hiking in the mountains."

"She dropped on you? How that?"

I told the story and also mentioned that she was staying with us during part of the week sometimes to avoid the school bus. I probably should not have mentioned it, as I realized later, but I did say that I sometimes brought her out to the farm and to her grandparents on the weekend and slept with her in her bed there.

Esther and Rebecka looked at me with big eyes:

"You are allowed to sleep with her? Really?"

"I am one of the very few people she is comfortable with, and she usually suffers from bad nightmares. She does not have any when I am with her, and Ruthie's company is almost as good, as she says."

"So, to summarize," Esther said, "there is this girl, fourteen years old but looks like barely ten, she tolerates only you and very few other people around her, she says that she sleeps best in your arms, and you also like her and being with her?"

"Yep, that's about it, I guess. I have no clue why that is, but when I wake up on the farm on a weekend morning with Rue in my arms, I always have a feeling like I am totally happy and at home, even more so than by being with Ruth. She's like an additional cute sister, I guess, and I am quite happy to help her out and comfort her."

Esther and her sister looked at each other, and they seemed to exchange some nonverbal information and communication which I did not get. That was not the first time, though. I wondered what I might have missed, and I simply hoped that they'd tell me if it was important. When I looked at my cousin, he shrugged his shoulders; apparently he also did not understand what was going on here. Well, girls and their thoughts were a mystery for both of us. To quote an author from the pre-war times:

"A woman's soul is like an open book for me – but written in a language I utterly fail to understand."

We ate lunch on the train, and soon we stopped in District Eleven's capital. Fifteen minutes later the train moved on, and half an hour later we left at a stop close to the border to District Six. We boarded a smaller train to the national park and found ourselves accommodations in a hotel in the evening. We were lucky and got a nice suite with two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and shared living room, and we'd have a look at the caves on the next day.

"Wow!" Esther said when we had a looking at the cave maps at the visitor center in the next morning after breakfast. "This seems to be really huge!"

"Well, that probably was the reason why they call it 'Mammoth Caves', I guess" I offered.

"Very funny, Tim. But seriously, how much of it can we see?"

"I have read that there were many tours offered prior to the Great War, and they had thousands of visitors per day on many parallel tours, but even all of the tours together only scratched the cave system, which is estimated to be more than 700 km long in total. Since the dark times, tourist activities have been minimal, and only a few guides and tours are offered nowadays. Let's look at the schedule."

We looked at the information being offered and booked a five hour 'Great Dripstone Avenue' tour for the next day for all four of us. The rest of day was spent with walking around through the forest and just taking it easy. Here, in a nature reservation area, many animals were less shy than somewhere else, and we could get close to a few roe deer, not quite touching them, but almost. Lots of birds also flew around, and we could approach within a few meters before they finally shied away from us.

After our long nature walk we ended the day with a very nice dinner in the hotel dining room.

The cave tour started in late morning on the next day. After the guide had checked that we were all properly clothed and had a last chance to go to the restrooms, we started to enter via a dry sinkhole, and within a few meters the temperature dropped from something like about 30 degrees outside to not much more than 15 degrees inside. Of course we had read the information sheet and we had light jackets with us. Electric lighting illuminated the path, which was paved for now to provide an easy entrance even for elderly people. Passing various rock formations we soon left the paved 'broadway' and descended further down via narrow and steep stairs. The tour had been advertised as 'strenuous' and 'not suitable for younger children and elderly people', and we soon understood why. My cousin and I were used to caves, of course, and Esther and Rebecka had also seen most of the big caves in the 'Fränkische Schweiz'. However, the cave systems there were mostly smaller ones, or at least those known to more than a few insiders. My cousin had sometimes hinted that their family knew about some large cave systems both in Bavaria and in Panem, but he had not elaborated further, except for mentioning that those were not open for the public.

Anyway, when we are about 50 meters lower than before, based on small labels attached to some of the guardrails, we entered a series of smaller caverns with various dripstones, like the ones in the Sinterguth family cave close to Riesenwald, the one my cousin had visited with his youth group; I had been to that one with him a few years ago, too. It was my first visit here, though, and I had to admit that the dripstones down here were more varied and partially even larger than what I had seen in Bavaria. The guide took his time so that we could admire the view, and fortunately the group was small enough so that everybody could look at everything.

We received some explanations on dripstones in general and how the ones around here had been discovered centuries ago, and some mentioning of the earlier cave explorations was also given. People must have been really brave in the early years to get down so far without electrical lights, but my cousin's ancestors had done something similar in the Sinterguth family cave, although that cave was probably much smaller than the one here.

Half an hour later we left that section and followed a narrow winding passage, followed by another set of stairs leading down. We passed a bridge crossing underground rapids and soon stood on the shore of an underground lake. A small raft waited for us, and when we had boarded, it left the shore and glided along the water, pushed by a current which had us slowly gliding forward. The water was muddy, and it was difficult to see how deep it was, but the guide explained:

"If somebody cares to learn about that, the water depth here is more than ninety..."

There was a break for emphasis, and people's mouths opened in astonishment, when the guide continued:

"...centimeters."

Esther giggled, and I admitted:

"Yep, he got me, too."

The guide explained further:

"In other parts of the caves there also deeper lakes, but they have stronger currents as well, and we do not offer tours to those regions. However, the caves always attract selected small groups of adventurers and cave divers, and there certainly is more to explore. We are certain that the entire cave system is much larger than the part we have been in so far, and it will take many generations to find and map all of it. Some experts believe that connections to adjacent cave systems can be found, and rivers further down underground are waiting for brave people to explore. Meanwhile, we are proud to be able to show off with a small part of what we know, at least, and I believe that it is impressive enough."

Indeed it was impressive, that was for sure. When we had reached the other shore, we followed another passage, and when we were about to pass a series of smaller ponds, the guide stopped and told us:

"Believe it or not, but there is actually life down here. You will probably not see them in the ponds, as they are quite small and there are not many of them, but we have an exhibit further where they are in display. The 'olm', or 'cave salamander', eats, sleeps, and breeds underwater and has fully adapted to a life down here in complete darkness. Or well, it used to be complete darkness before human beings came down with their lights at least."

"How can it find something to feed from down here?" Esther asked.

"Good question, young lady" the guide replied. "Olms feed from small crustacean, like small shrimp like animals, snails and occasional insects. They can survive longer periods of time without feeding at all, if required."

The next cavern had a dimly illuminated large basin on a pedestal, and one could walk all around it. An information panel told us that a few of those olms were in there, together with tiny snails and such, and after some time of searching we could even see one of those cave salamanders.

We were lead through a few more passages and caverns, and the end of the tour the guide said:

"At this time, we offer only a few tours. Panem still recovers from the dark times, and the number of tourists visiting us is very small compared to pre war times. However, we do register an increase from year to year, and we hope that future prosperous times allow more of the population to enjoy the beauty of nature in our country, here in our very own national park and in other areas as well. Have a good day!"

The man was right. More and more people were able to spend some time on a real vacation, while more and more of the routine work was done by machines and robots and while the number of really poor people decreased. A century of democracy was finally showing benefits, not only for a few selected ones like the Capitol inhabitants in earlier Panem, but for all citizens, even those in the districts which had been 'poor districts' earlier. We here in Panem were still behind Central Europe, where democracy had prevailed even through most of the difficult times, but at least were seeing lots of progress.

After another day of idle sightseeing our time was over, and we left the hotel with our bags to walk to the local maglev station. It was time for separation now; my cousin was going to take the girls to Sixteen to change to a flight to Bavaria, whereas I was expected back at work, and I also could not wait to tell my family and Rue about our last two weeks.

Sometimes I thought that it would be nice if my cousin and I could live together and maybe research together. However, as I liked my ranger work and wanted to stay in Appacolia whereas he loved to work with his special professor and wanted to stay in Erlangen, this was unlikely to happen anytime soon. At least we could communicate when ever we wanted. While we still did not have many satellites in earth orbit again, basically just a few very critical ones, like for observing weather, but none for communication and navigation, a few decades ago a special ship had laid two high bandwidth multi fiber underwater communication cables in the Atlantic Ocean, connecting a main coastal city in District Thirteen to the city of Würzburg in Bavaria-Austria. Of course there had been a number of cables on the sea floor in earlier times, but almost all of them were no longer operational after many decades of neglected maintenance during the dark times.

Within Panem, teams had rigged major fiber optic lines along the maglev tracks, so that at least the main cities were connected. From Appacolia, I could even initiate a video chat with my cousin in Erlangen at all times if needed.

A few hours later I arrived at home in Twelve, and as I had told my family which train I was in, I was picked up from the station, this time by Peeta. He beamed when he saw me and asked right away:

"Did you have a nice vacation? How was the wedding? Did you find a nice girl?"

What? Did he really ask that as well? Of course he did; he was my brother, and he did not give up on me. I pretended not to care, but my face betrayed me, and he added:

"So, you spent two weeks with those two pretty Heidecker girls, and you did not hook up with one of them?"

"Peeta, you know as well as I do that they are like sisters to me!"

"Of course I do, dear brother, but your face is always so funny to look at when I tease you like this!"

On this day Peeta went home with me, and when we opened the door, two small human bundles were first to meet us, or more specifically me. Within a second I had not only one, but two little girls hanging from my neck, and I needed to sit down to greet them properly. Judged by the way Ruth and Rue beamed I could have been the proverbial lost son from the Bible who had been out for years and finally found his way home, whereas I had been off for only two weeks.

Peeta smirked, nodded, and just said: "Yep, as usual – Timotheus and his girls."

In the same evening we were all sitting in our big living room, this time with Peeta, and the entire family insisted on a detailed trip report. I had taken quite a few photos and a few short video clips and projected them on the big flat wall screen now, while adding my own comments.

Mother liked the wedding itself most, and she was a little bit unhappy that I had recorded almost none of that. I told her, though:

"Mom, we were wedding guests, and we were not supposed to take pictures all of the time. There was a professional photographer, and once the recordings have been properly edited, all guests will receive a nice summary, so that we can watch that later."

One of Britta՚s friends there had managed to get a decent video clip on the tsunami, and in addition my family had seen something about it in the news, and this was one of the highlights, but it was trumped later one when I showed us in the caves. Being related to the Sinterguth clan, all of us – except Rue and Ruth – had been in quite a few caves before, and we all knew the basics on dripstones. As we had seen there, though, the Mammoth Caves were more impressive than the caves we knew both in Bavaria and in Rainbow Valley, and we were happy to live in a time where such kind of sightseeing was possible. Between the Great War and the final rebellion, the caves had been completely abandoned, and only a few decades ago locals had started to look into them again. In current years, the number of tourists increased steadily, but at least almost all of them used environmentally friendly public transportation rather than individual cars with combustion engines. Both maglevs and conventional trains were driven by electricity, and that was provided mostly by solar power and wind turbines, supplemented by bio gas, hydro power, and a few others. Nuclear fusion had been on the brink of large scale use before the Great War, and only two of those plants were still in operation in Europe; fusion power plants were horrendously expensive to build, and many experts believed that we did not really have a good use for them, with the more local and affordable solar and wind options.

Of course, we had a few photos showing all four of us – the two Heidecker girls, Esther and Rebecka, together with my cousin and myself, and a few of those showed us in close proximity, like having our arms draped around the girls. When Rue saw one of those photos, she looked a little sad, but I did not get why. We had looked happy, and the tour had been a happy time. What had been wrong in her eyes?

[Author's Notes: Lacking a reliable map of Panem and the districts, I thought that Kentucky might be in the border region between districts 6 and 11, but this is mostly guesswork. Please do not hesitate to correct me if you have a better source. In real life, while I visited the Mammoth Caves in 1999, I do not recall too many details, and I allowed myself to be inspired and guided by the description of the 'Grand Avenue Tour' and others as outlined on the web pages related to the park. I do not know if there are actually any 'olms' there, but those animals do exist in some European caves, and I have seen some; feel free to check Wikipedia or other sources for details.

The quote I cited about a woman's soul is from Ephraim Kishon, and I am not sure if I phrased it properly; I only know the German version: 'Die Frauenseele ist für mich ein offenes Buch – geschrieben in einer unverständlichen Sprache'.]