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“She’s not talking about the passageways for the mine. She’s talking about the mountain passageways that are below it,” Sam explained as Joel scowled at her. “Sis, getting the road rebuilt would be great but are you really qualified to make that determination?”
“You’re kidding right?” Hillary said glancing around the table. “They don’t know?”
“Know what?” Cord asked.
“Paige holds a degree in structural engineering, geology, physics, and mathematics,” she told them. “If anyone would know if it was safe, it’s Paige. Why do you think she was hired to be the lead on the team over all of us?”
“Never really thought about it,” Bobby answered. “You weren’t going for all of those when you were here.”
“No, but I had a bit of extra time on my hands once I was away from here and it turns out that you don’t have to take all the classes to get the degrees, I took CLEP tests to earn the credits without having to sit through the boring lectures,” Paige admitted. “I also have a minor in chemistry and English. And if we’re pulling it all out…I have certifications in basically everything else related to emergency response issues, first aid, search and rescue, scuba diving…”
“You’ve been busy,” Jerry said.
“I have, so can I get on with this?” Paige inquired, smiling inwardly as they agreed. “From what I’ve seen and have found from the valley is interesting. And I have an idea that will not only get the old lines back open but allow for additional ones to be reached easier.”
“Sure Sis,” Sam laughed, “and I’m going to wear a dress when you get married.”
“Don’t make promises or bets you can’t keep Sam,” she warned as she clicked the mouse again and brought up the plans, she’d created over the last two weeks. “As you can see, this is what used to be the valley, and as most of you know there are several passageways underneath that gives us an estimate of what’s hidden down there.”
“Your plan is to put HQ where the valley used to be?” Cord asked in surprise.
“No, this is a new lab actually, with access to lines that are down there and from which you can expand out for miles. It will also help if a cave-in ever happens again because there will be two main shafts to get down or up.”
“A lab?” Joel asked. “Why do we need a lab at the mines?”
“Because of what I found in the passageway underneath Regal Bluff,” she stated pulling out a small box that held slides and samples.
“What is that?” Cord questioned as she slid it down between them.
“What does it look like?” she replied.
“Holy Christ…is that lithium?” Joel inquired.
“Got it on the first try even,” she teased with a smile.
“Where’d you find this?” Sam asked.
“Underneath Regal Bluff, but I’m not the first person to come across it. I also found these down there,” she stated showing them the photos of the extra slides. “I sent them to Travis to be fingerprinted and guess whose prints are all over them?”
“Gus Stanton’s?” Joel stated.
“Ding, ding, ding…it makes sense now. If line nine was expanded further towards the bluff we’d eventually come across this and they wanted to ensure that didn’t happen, only he doesn’t know the mountain like I do and didn’t know about the series of passageways that leads down there from the outside.”
“You’re telling us that Gus Stanton snuck down into the mine and purposely went looking for this?” Cord asked in disbelief. “How would he even find it?”
“A lucky break I’d say…he somehow got from nine into the passageways that eventually led up to the main area where this was. I’ve been going over the maps and there’s more of it I know,” Paige told them.
“Another of those gut feelings?” Jesse teased.
“Don’t mock them Jesse, they’ve saved your butt how many times?” Moose asked sending her a smile.
“Let’s just say I feel it in my gut and the maps show me.”
“You’re telling us that we have a lithium vein running underneath the mountain?” Sam stated.
“Something like that…look that’s a long way away from what we should be focusing on right now. For now, the biggest issue is getting everyone back down into the mine to continue regular operations,” she said clicking the mouse again. “This is my estimation of how long that’ll take. Going from just the main entrance and re-clearing all the lines is going to take too long, you’re likely to end up bankrupt before that happens. Which is what I’d say Davidson was aiming for, a way to steal the mine from you.”
“Damn son of a…” Cord muttered, and Paige laughed.
