NOVEL WEB Falling Petals All the Way Down
It all started with a plink. Three thousand seven hundred and thirty meters below the Sorissian permafrost atop the Kimotah Branch Mines, the sound of a single droplet echoed throughout the tunnels.
Then, miraculously, the constant clanking and groaning of the overhang harvest factories stopped. It was as if even the steel fortresses were shocked. A silent veil crept over the entire facility, muffling the clinking of picks, the shouting of colliers, and the thumping of the Pioneer-Mineheads. Then, everything came down.
The northern tunnels were the first to collapse, swallowing two thousand miners in the blink of an eye. The impact swept tremendous gusts of wind throughout the rest of the mines, blowing so violently it flung carts off their rails.
Then came the rumbling. Deep, strangled vibrations reverberated across the rest of the mines, tearing cracks in the walls, like the groans of a dormant titan awakened from its ancient slumber. The world shook as huge pieces of broken ice hurtled down from above, crushing those who had escaped into the open space beside the service lifts.
Willard had been descending from the entrance platform with his workcrew's packed meals when the impact hit. The transport elevator had halted, dangling itself three-quarters the way between the entry port and the mining grounds. Then it had started swinging violently, threatening to snap its support cables. Eventually, it did. Hunks of ice smashed across the lift's roof as it pulled it down to the ground with them.
The collision had thrown him against the lift's glass panes, and he heard the sickly crack of snapped bones. But soon he couldn't hear anything, as his screams, along with the wails and the screeching of iron outside, were drowned out by the sound of falling ice on the elevator walls, until the entire box was entirely buried under. The lights had gone out a few seconds later, and Willard was left alone, whimpering in the dark.
In under two minutes, Sorissu Continent's proudest capital goods manufacturing facility had been wiped out.