The Western Third — Episode 1

On a bitter cold, snowy morning in the hills of the once great American city of Los Angeles, the men of crew 5 huddle around a small fire burning in a metal trash can outside of a ramshackle convenience store before beginning the 3-mile trek to their assigned work at the Blanchard-Fieldings rare earth mine.  The men smoke cigarettes as they carefully sip coffee from metal cylinders about the size and shape of soup cans.   Their slate-colored work uniforms are covered in dirt and dust,  with the exception of an embroidered bright blue number 5 on each man’s left shoulder.

Conrad Burke–a burly, golden-haired brute of about 30 years–carefully extinguishes his cigarette and tucks the stub into a small pouch attached to his belt.  “Alright, time to go, boys,” he says as he adjusts his belt and begins to walk toward the road.  The other 4 men follow in close tow.   The men walk side by side down the cracked, snow-laden pavement towards the mine.

The Blanchard-Fieldings rare earth mine stands in stark contrast to its surrounding landscape.  Sandwiched between two lush green hills covered in a blanket of soft snow, the 500-foot deep, miles wide crater littered with construction trucks and small buildings, when viewed from above,  appears to be an open wound on the surface of the  Earth.   On the ground inside the open mine, heavy loaders dump tons of rocks, each one teeming with rare earth minerals, into large crushing machines.  Geysers of water spew from turrets attached to enormous tanks of water as large as a small lake in an attempt to tamp down the dust that coats everything.

As the men of crew 5 approach the guard shack at the entrance to the mine site, they don hard hats emblazoned with the number 5.  A fresh-faced young man, not older than 20, steps out of the shack dressed in a clean black uniform, an automatic rifle slung over his right shoulder.  “Morning 5,” he says in a pleasant tone.

“Morning Tate,” Conrad replies coldly.  None of the other men acknowledge the young man’s presence.

Tate gives a disappointed sigh and walks over to a panel on the side of the shack.  He presses a button, and the large, rusty gate begins to slink open to let crew 5 into the mine site.  “Have a good one Conny,” Tate says, giving a slight wave.

“Bye Tate,” Conrad replies.  

On the other side of the gate, there is a white pickup truck with “BFCo” stickers on each door.  Conrad opens the passenger door and slides into the cab.  The rest of the men of crew 5 hop in the bed, and the truck heads down a series of ramps toward the bottom of the mine.

The driver of the pickup, a middle-aged woman with thinning brown hair, smiles at Conrad as she puts the truck in gear and begins the 15-minute drive down the winding pathways to the area where crew 5 will work today.  “G’mornin Conny,” she says in her best imitation of the young guard.

“Nice to see you too, Liv,” Conrad says with a half-hearted snicker and an almost imperceptible grin.

Olivia Walten, assistant to the mine’s foreman, is always a breath of fresh air for Conrad, who otherwise only deals with gruff and unhappy conscripted miners, and the occasional overzealous security guard accusing his men of stealing the minerals they mine.  Today, however, she seems slightly uneasy.  Something about her posture suggests to Conrad that something is amiss.  He decides not to bring it up, but instead, smiles and asks, “What sector are we working today?”

The genial expression disappears from Olivia’s face as she responds, “You’re working 17 again.”  She braces herself for Conrad’s response.

“The black hole again?!” Conrad snorts, his eyebrows furled.  “That’s the third time this month.  How the hell are we supposed to meet our quota?”

Sector 17 is an area of the mine notorious for yielding extremely low quantities of rare earth minerals, and sits in an area with at least a mile in between it and its closest neighboring sector.  The “black hole,” as the miners call it, is normally assigned to junior crews until they’ve earned the trust of management.  Crew 5 has been the most productive crew on site for the last 18 months running.  This month, they are in jeopardy of not meeting their quota for the first time, thanks largely to spending several days mining the black hole.

“I know Con, but Alva says he wants his best guys on 17, and you guys are it,” Olivia replies softly, desperately trying not to get caught in Conrad’s gaze.

“Why the hell does Alva have such a hard-on for 17?  There’s nothing there, Liv!  It’s been combed a dozen times by a dozen crews.” Conrad quickly realizes that his reaction was noticed by the crew, who are unabashedly staring through the back window into the cab of the pickup.  He turns toward them, frowns,  and gives a slight shake of his head.  The crew turn away from the window, obviously understanding what’s being discussed inside the cab.  Conrad turns back to Olivia and inhales sharply, as if he is going to yell, but he catches himself, and calmly asks, “What’s he think we’re gonna find down there?”

“I don’t know.  He’s been out of town for the last week, visiting HQ.  Been virtually unreachable.  Matter of fact, the first time I got a call from him was last night — he wanted to make sure that 5 was working sector 17 this week.”  She winces as if expecting to be physically injured by Conrad’s response.

“The whole week?!  You gotta be shitting me!  Why the hell is he doing this to us?  Do you know what will happen if we don’t meet our quota, Liv?  He’s gonna make an example of us.  His best crew not meeting standards?  That’s no small deal.  He won’t just take away our cigarette rations or withhold our paychecks–he’s gonna cut off our food or medicine.”  Conrad shakes his head vigorously in disgust at the prospect of his family going hungry.

“Sorry, Con,” Olivia replies with the softness of a mother comforting a crying child, “I wish there was something I could do.”

A few minutes later, the truck approaches sector 17.  The tension drops from Conrad’s shoulders, and he lets out a long sigh as the truck slows to a stop near a wooden sign with the number 17 painted on it.  “Sorry for yelling Liv.  See you later.”  He exits the cab without waiting for a response, as the men of crew 5 jump out of the truck bed.  Olivia honks a staccato goodbye, and the truck rambles off.

Conrad walks over to a waiting excavator and fires up the engine.  The rest of the crew heads over to a large green truck that opens up a lot like a carnival ride.  On the truck’s long bed is a huge metal cylinder that begins spinning when one of the men flips a switch on an electrical panel near the front.  The huge, semi-portable device, called a trommel, is used to separate the rare earth elements from other ferrous metals, rocks, and dirt.  Two of the men take positions at the opening to the cylinder, helping to guide the large swaths of earth being dumped by Conrad’s excavator into the opening, while the other two men use large sluices to sift through what comes out the other end, and place any rare earth elements into large plastic drums for transfer to a nearby processing facility.

The men don’t talk while they work, as the trommel noise and the sound of the excavator make it difficult to hear anything but a shout.  Instead, every hour or so, Conrad honks the excavator’s horn, and the men at the ends of the cylinder switch positions.  It keeps the miners from getting too complacent in their duties.

A few hours into the shift, work hits a snag.  The bucket of the excavator hits a large metal object.  Unable to pull it out with the excavator, Conrad honks twice to summon his team.  They come over, shovels in hand.  Conrad hops down from the cab and begins to dig around the object with his team.  Once the surrounding dirt and rocks are clear, he starts up the excavator and digs out the large piece of rusted metal, setting it on the ground near his team.  The mangled, rusted piece of metal appears to be a truck door.  While it is mostly rusted and hardly recognizable, there are small areas where Conrad can clearly see green paint.  Upon further examination, small pieces of sticker still remain on the door panel.  In fact, in the areas where the sticker once was, there is clearly still visible paint–enough for Conrad to make out what the stickers once said: BF 3155.

Conrad, immersed in examining the door, doesn’t notice the white pickup arriving to bring his crew lunch.

“Whatcha got there, Con?  Piece of an old ‘Vette?  Thinking of doing some restoration work?”  Olivia smiles as she steps out of the truck, brown paper bags in her hands.

Conrad stands up with a confused look on his face, and starts towards Olivia.  “You know if BFCo was doing any work in this area before the bombs?”

“Don’t think so,” she says with a quizzical look towards Conrad.  She begins to hand out the paper bags to the men.

“We had any accidents at all in 17?  Lose any equipment?”  Conrad twists his nose and mouth to one side, as he often does when deep in thought.

“Gee, you’d know as good as I would Con, and I can think of anything.  Why?  What is that thing?”

“It’s a piece of BFCo equipment.  A door or something.  Got a serial number and everything.  But judging by all the rust, it’s been here far longer than this mine has.  What should we do with it?”

Olivia shrugs. “Probably just toss it with the rest of the waste.  That’s what it is as far as I’m concerned.  Old garbage.”

Conrad looks at Olivia, then back at the mangled door.  He throws up both his and shrugs his shoulders.  “Chuck, gimme a hand with this.”

A raven-haired young man looks up from his lunch and says “Sure, Boss,” as he sets his sandwich down, and helps Conrad toss the door into a nearby dumpster.

“I guess that’s that.  Thanks for lunch, Liv,” Conrad says as he tears into a turkey sandwich, his mind still fixed on the rusty door.