Rusted Sky

Dig to live.

It’s all Lynn has ever known: scouring the tunnels and caverns of metal and trash for ancient relics of glass and plastic, then selling them in the Commons to the Technicians for enough platelets to get by another few weeks. The Technicians trade with the Ceiling above. The Ceiling sends down food and supplies. Lynn and her team return to the tunnels. It’s the circle of life.

But life isn’t easy for a Digger. There’s Trappers waiting to grab you and Gangers ready to steal your dig. There’s hounds feeding on whatever poor sap gets lost along the way.

Lynn knows the risks. She does the job. She has a good team behind her. She knows what to do should anything go wrong.

But what happens when everything goes wrong?

What happens when there’s no way out, with the injuries piling up and the food dwindling down as the ravenous hounds grow closer and closer?

And what about the sounds? Lynn’s pa died many years ago; her ma too. Why can she still hear them, their nearly forgotten voices echoing along these abandoned tunnels?

Only one thing is certain: If Lynn and her team can’t dig to live, they will no doubt die down here, trapped for all eternity among the endless remains of things long abandoned.

Rusted Sky is the thrilling, claustrophobic new sci-fi novella from Nicholas Tac Whitcomb.