http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photo-of-the-day/frozen-lake-ice-crack/

Nothing broke the Blank Flats. Since the third Operator General purchased the massive swath of land between the Bas and the Dost rivers, nothing had been found. No one knew what ancient geological event had formed the vastness of almost-flat, almost-reflective stone. Everyone knew that it stretched for hundreds of miles between the rivers.

Everyone knew the Blank Flats were a homogenous, stony wasteland because Operator Surveyors were assigned tours of duty to map it. And they dutifully had, one pair after another, for decades. The official map was thought to be about two-thirds of the way up, having started at the delta where the Bas spilled into the Southern Sea. All that time and surveyors had found, every day, every month, every year, the same thing. Stone, unbroken in every direction.

“What the hell is that?” Wolfe said. He was driving the electric land-barge when he noticed something in the distance. He’d been on the job for eight months, and not once had something appeared in the distance besides the occasional rainstorm.

“Stone,” Berg answered from the canopy on the barge.

“It’s… not?” Wolfe said, unsure.

“Rain then.”

“No, it’s on the ground.”

“Where else would rain go?”

Wolfe opened his mouth to retort, but he was too distracted. He clicked a few extra MPHs into the barge. They’d be on it soon enough, whatever it was.

When the barge came close enough, Wolfe let out a string of creative curses. Not necessarily because he was angry or upset. He felt the moment deserved some impactful description. The barge eased to a stop, and he leapt from the driver’s compartment.

“You gotta pee?” Berg asked, still prone under the canopy.

“There’s a crack.”

“Number 2, then,” Berg said. “Though there are nicer ways to say it than, ‘There’s a crack.’”

“No, you incredible doofus,” Wolfe snapped. “In the ground. The Flats are not as Blank as we’ve been led to believe.”

“What are you talking about?” Finally, with a great effort, Berg pulled his formerly athletic, now resolutely thick, frame into a sitting position. He looked out from the canopy and saw the crack.

It ran almost perfectly east and west, as far as they could see in either direction. It wavered, enough to clearly be natural, but it kept its general direction without fail.

“What the hell is that?”

Wolfe shook his head. “About twenty minutes late there, champ.”

Berg thumped to the stone. His high-friction soles squeaked loudly as he trudged the few steps from the barge to the crack. It didn’t appear overly deep, just a foot or two down.

“Not so Blank after all,” the big man said.

“Already made that joke.”

“Gimme a break,” Berg said. “I was snoozing.”

“Looks natural.” Wolfe ran his fingers over the edges, pointed left and right. “It’s not manmade. Or, not directly, anyway.”

Berg nodded. “Well I’ll be… Which direction is it going, you think?” Wolfe shrugged. “Well what’s it going toward?”

“I don’t know, but that’s not what worries me.” Wolfe tapped the solid stone on their side of the crack. “This is ancient stone, unbroken anywhere else, at least as far as we know. Something fierce had to happen to break it so cleanly and for such a stretch.

“So my thing is, what could do something like that? I don’t care where it’s going,” Wolfe said, gravely. “I’m scared as hell of where it’s coming from.”