💾 Archived View for tranarchy.fish › ~autumn › break › tunnels.gmi captured on 2023-09-08 at 16:21:16. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
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the oil lamp was probably a bad idea.
it starts out well enough - the flame is steady, and bright enough to walk by for the first hundred meters or so, illuminating dark brick walls with white paint scrawled over almost every inch. you pace side by side, she offers you her leading elbow to steady you both over the rubble floor and to brace against the weight of the lantern. as the ceiling stoops, you hear the rumble of midnight cars overhead, dulled by a few feet of earth and slick tarmac-- then the light starts acting up.
it starts dimming, slowly but surely, so she raises the wick with a small adjustment to a knob on the base. normal procedure for an oil lamp, presumably. there's a little more soot than usual for a while but the flame is much taller and brighter, and it guides you a little further down the old tunnel. the rain doesn't percolate this deep, but the ground and the bricks are infused with damp --she raises the wick again, more soot-- like some kind of unnatural cave system.
between the shufflings of machines above, the echoes of your footsteps travel down the passage further than the light of the lamp-which-dims-faster-each-time she-does-that-and-the-wick-is-looking-far-too-long-at-this-point-to-be-honest. you remember reading about a man who had learned to echolocate when you were younger, wondering how much deeper you could see if you had practiced that for more than a few hours in the "hmmm, shit" she says.
"is it out of oil?"
"no i refilled it before i left"
you both huddle over the lamp, inspecting the barely-burning wick huddling similarly behind the soot-covered glass.
"lot of soot, huh"
"LOT of soot" she admits. "think i put the wick up too high"
"you think?"
"maybe a little"
a few inches of charred wick sit in the bottom of the burner chamber.
"why did you put the wick up so high"
"idk there's only one knob, how do you go wrong by turning the one knob"
"you're the one who brought the lamp"
"...maybe it got too dry? like maybe the dryness in here?"
"it's not dry in here"
"no i mean the, uh, the oil, like oil-dry"
"but you said you put oil in there"
"i did! maybe it leaked?" she unscrews a small cap on the side of the base. "feel in there, see if you feel much oil"
"ew, no, you feel in there"
"i'm autistic -- the light's dying"
"ugh, fine"
you poke the tip of your index finger into the hole.
"yeah it's full"
"okay. so, it's not leaking. i dunno then"
she screws the cap back on and sets the lamp down on the floor, sinking to sit against the wall of the tunnel. you follow suit, and lean slightly against each other, watching the tiny nub of a flame illuminate four outstretched feet. only the sounds of breathing and the tired wheels of large automobiles, as you idly rub your oily fingertip against your thumb.
"interesting that this stuff kinda smells like olive oil"
"probably because it's olive oil"
"wait, what?" you daub a little on your tongue. "wtf that literally is olive oil"
"yeah, i just told u it was olive oil"
"well fuck, no wonder the lamp didn't work"
"i looked it up! they used to use olive oil in these things!"
"no way, i don't believe you"
"it was between that and whale oil so like,"
"where did you even get this?"
"friend of mine found it in their shed, said it was from the 50s or something"
"they were using whales for oil in the 50s?"
"idk, they did a lot of fucked up stuff in the 50s"
the flame finally snuffs into darkness, providing a sensory relief like a falconer's hood. you sit in silence for a time, the damp of the floor soaking into your butt, and your butt soaking away back into the feelingless floor. the dark is cosy, despite the cold - the warmth of a human body gently huffing against your shoulder, and above you, the whole city lies like a weighted blanket.
eventually you get your phone out for the torch, and you help each other back to your feet. "i can't believe you put olive oil in the fucking [lantern](out.html)".
