Rise Of The Godking 39 The Plan

The first thing that anyone would be awed by as they approached the humongous tower was the gigantic entrance that rose so tall that even a hundred men standing on each other's shoulders wouldn't be able to reach the top.

Even with its size, it only made up a small portion of the entirety of the thing, so just from that, the immensity of the structure could be understood.

It was a feat of architecture that was almost on the scale of the network of caves that Daneel had seen below the Pit. He almost wondered whether the person responsible for that incredible place could have built this, too, but he discarded the notion as it didn't seem possible that the same powerful individual would embark on two tasks so dissimilar from each other, for two sides that were also completely against each other.

Daneel could never have expected that an even more incredible sight was waiting for him as soon as he entered. The doors were open only a sliver, but even then, there was enough s.p.a.ce for five people to enter abreast. By the time he walked inside, the old man had already disappeared into the depths of the Refinery, so when he took his first step inwards, he had no option but to stop and let his jaw drop.

The entire tower… was hollow.

There were so many details to see that he didn't even know what to study, first. Deciding to start from the top, he craned his neck, and sure enough, he could see the artificial sun slowly revolving far, far above where he stood.

Below it, he could faintly make out two lines that wound around the entire refinery. He followed them with his eyes, round and round and round the walls, and they kept growing in size the lower he reached. Finally, when he found the spot where they began, he raised his eyebrows when he saw that both of them ended right in front of him.

They were like two large, metal roads, each at least a hundred feet wide. People swarmed around the base, loading casks of crystal onto the left one and unloading barrels from the right.

His eyes shone as soon as he saw so much of the coveted substance he was here for in front of him. He had to tear his eyes away from it to look at the rest of the place, and after he finally did so with some effort, he saw that there were platforms all around the walls where the majority of those he had seen exiting the place before were working.

The entire atmosphere was suffused by the sounds of metal being struck, and a rancid smell that he couldn't place. As he watched, the crystals that had been loaded began to move upwards, and at the same time, he also noticed that the barrels that were coming off the other end were being loaded onto the backs of a few grubby individuals who were carrying them out of a different door that lay on the other side of the tower.

A rough shove from somewhere beside him interrupted his thoughts, making him stagger to the side and look around to see the one responsible. A tall man wearing a leather ap.r.o.n was looking at him reproachfully, one hand scratching his jaw where a course beard was growing, and the other still outstretched.

"Stop gawking and get over here. I don't have all day."

He didn't understand the reason behind the rudeness, at first, but when he looked at the place where he had been standing until now, he found a few workers grumbling as they moved inside. Realizing that he had been slowing down the flow of people walking into the refinery, he obliged and strode forward.

With a bored look, the man raised his hands and put them on Daneel's shoulders as soon as he approached, resulting in bewilderment filling his face as he wondered whether he was being hugged.

The bizarre notion left him when the man began to check him. His entire body was searched thoroughly, and he was shoved again after the man nodded.

He found the old man waiting for him in the direction where he was pushed. It seemed that being rough was a way of life for many of the people here, as in front of him, he saw the workers who had entered after he had moved shoving through a group of people who had been heading toward a staircase nearby that led to one of the platforms above.

"The checking is to ensure that you're not bringing anything inside that could affect the workings of the refinery. There's a lot of delicate stuff that can be ruined even if a drop of sweat falls onto it, so this is mandatory every day. Come on. I'll show you all the places I told you about."

For a few hours, Daneel was completely engrossed in his tour of the different parts of the refinery. He had already learned from the old man that the job of those in half the platforms was to break down the crystals using special tools that were made in the layer above theirs. He caught a glimpse of them in one of the platforms; they were shaped like a hammer and chisel much like those found in the Pit, but they glowed faintly, and he also noticed something that had made him lurch to a halt.

They had been surrounded by patterns of dots that looked, at first glance, like those surrounding the crystals.

On closer inspection, though, he had found out that the patterns were definitely different, but he had had no time to study them. Reluctantly, he had moved on, but his thoughts had lingered on what he had seen for quite some time.

By the time the crystals were sent to the sun far above, each piece was supposed to be as small as a grain of sand. No one had any idea exactly what the sun did, then, but the substance that came out after it introduced into it was in the form of a molten liquid. It was so hot tat specialized equipment was required to hold it, and in each platform thereafter, it was treated like a metal from which impurities had to be beaten out. Men and women would use heavy hammers to beat it until its color changed, and at each platform, it would be turned back into a liquid, again, so that the process could repeat.

After they were done, Daneel found himself back where he had started.

The old man turned to leave, but Daneel stopped him and whispered, "Wait outside."

Turning around, he spoke loudly over his shoulder and walked in the direction of a certain staircase.

"I think I saw that the count was wrong at Platform 8-C. I'll check it and be right back!"

The one he had mentioned was near the top. All of them were just large, flat surfaces that somehow jutted out of the circular wall without any additional support beneath. After reaching it, he walked nonchalantly near one of the stations where a team of three were working on the molten liquid crystal coming down from the sun.

All of the platforms were designed so that small, metal channels that shot out from the large one that was below the star ran through them, connecting again to its source at a spot beyond. He had chosen a particular platform that had the molten liquid running through it, but was unmanned.

The Refinery only worked at 70% capacity for reasons Daneel wasn't aware of, but happy about. There was a pocket of empty s.p.a.ce around him, and beyond that, the teams of men and women were hard at work, their eyes completely focused on their individual tasks.

Turning back to the flowing crystal, Daneel shook his head due to what he was about to do. He had prepared all kinds of scenarios in case he was able to find lax teams, but today, all of them seemed careful, so there was no chance that he could steal away what he wanted from their stations.

That…left only option. With a shrug and a sigh, he began, swearing that if anyone wrote a book about him in the future, he would make sure that this incident would stay out of it.

A few seconds later, he was on a different platform with a blush in his cheeks. It was one that dealt with the pre-processing of crystals, and he acted as though he was checking the ledger kept on every platform to account for the work done every day.

Suddenly, a loud sound went up from all around him, and a voice reached the ears of everyone present inside.

"Attention, attention! Impurity detected! Unstable reaction could be imminent! Evacuate, evacuate!"

There was a moment of pin-drop silence, and then…all the workers began scrambling to the staircases.

A few minutes later, Daneel met the old man outside who looked like a thief waiting for his partner so that they could get away.

"Let's go. Let's go!"

Hearing Daneel's hurried whispers, he began to walk in the direction of the exit, but as they overheard a few workers who were talking nearby, Daneel could only blush harder and tighten his hands around the crystals he had stolen away.

"Did any of you get so scared that you peed your pants? I caught a whiff of it while I was leaving our platform…I swear, if it was one of you, you better tell me now as I'll know anyway when we go back!"