by P. J. Hoover
A lump wells up in my throat. “Yeah. I haven’t seen them in a really long time.”
“The cave … it eats people,” she says, I don’t think to be mean, but more to let me know what I’m up against.
“I know,” I say. Research has taught me that. But I’m also going to beat the odds. “I’m going to find them.”
“I hope you do,” Naala says.
I nod but can’t bring myself to say anything else. I take my coffee and wait at a table for Ethan to arrive.
The next day I’m waiting again in the coffee shop for Ethan to show up. He takes forever to get ready, but whatever soap he uses smells amazing, so I keep my complaining to a minimum. Maybe he got it at one of the local spas.
While I wait, I order my coffee and his, black coffee, dark roast. When I head back to the counter to pick up the drinks, I glance outside to see if he’s on his way.
Someone is looking into the coffee shop, staring at me. It’s a man with a hat pulled low over his face, but he turns away the second I see him, so I can’t get a good look at him. I head out of the coffee shop, leaving our drinks on the counter and follow him. He moves between the houses and through the streets for about five minutes, looking back every so often. I duck out of the way so he won’t see me each time, and finally I watch as he goes into Deep Cave Outfitters.
“What are you looking at?”
I spin around. Ethan is right behind me. I’ve been so focused on watching the guy that I didn’t even hear him.
“Some guy,” I say.
“Checking out one of the locals?” Ethan says, winking at me.
I smack his chest. “Not like that. Some guy was watching me. I was just following him.”
“No one’s watching you,” Ethan says.
“He was,” I say. “I’m sure of it.”
“You realize that sounds a little paranoid,” Ethan says.
“Whatever. It’s true. He was watching me.”
“Maybe it’s because you’re so good looking,” Ethan says.
Silence follows.
“I mean, you know, maybe he thinks that,” Ethan says, trying to dig himself out of yet another hole. And maybe that’s the truth. Maybe the guy does think that. Maybe Ethan does, too.
“Yeah, okay,” I say. “Our coffee is back at the shop.”
We head back to the coffee shop, but I take one more glance at Deep Cave Outfitters. There is no sign of the man.
CHAPTER 20
THE NEXT DAY, SCOTT CALLS, LETTING US KNOW THAT OUR STUFF IS IN. We can pick it up today and start our descent tomorrow. The last few days spent poring over artifacts and possibilities drop away from me, and all that matters is the present. This is really going to happen.
When we get to Deep Cave Outfitters, I try everything on, just to make sure it’s all there.
“Everything’s a perfect fit,” Scott says, rolling my sleeping bag tight so that not even cave lice will be able to crawl inside.
“You made the right call,” I say. “And I’m betting you would have been a pretty good guide.”
Scott cocks his head and grins. “Too late to woo me now. I got another gig.” He holds up a green business card with silver lettering and waves it around.
“You got hired?” I say, trying to get a look at the card.
“Just yesterday,” Scott says. “Lots of money. The guy already came outfitted and everything. All I have to do is guide.”
“Who is it?” I ask because all of a sudden all I can think about is the man I saw watching me. He’d come in here. He could have been the one who hired Scott. He could be here for the same reason we are.
“Can’t tell you,” Scott says, tucking the card into his pocket.
“Of course you can,” Ethan says, backing me up. “It’s not like you’re a doctor and this is some patient-client confidentiality thing. You’re going caving.”
“True,” Scott says. “But I’m also getting paid extra to keep my mouth shut.”
Interesting. So whoever is going to Krubera Cave doesn’t want anyone to know.
“Fine,” I say. “Whatever. Did you find anyone to help with our descent?”
Scott nods. “I did. Didn’t you get my text? Two local brothers, Adgur and Daur. I’ve worked with them before. They’ll take good care of you.”
“How do we get in touch with them?” If the cell service wasn’t so spotty, I might have gotten the text. I bought the signal booster, but since it runs on batteries, I want to save it for once we’re in the cave.
“I gave them your number,” Scott says. “They’ll text you today. And don’t worry. They speak English, at least mostly.”
“Mostly?” Ethan says. He’s been trying in the last couple days to learn what he can about the Abkhazian language, but, as he’s bemoaned to me each morning over coffee, very few words are borrowed from other languages so it’s really hard.
“It’s fine,” Scott says. “They know your names. They have lots of rope. And they’re strong.”
I figure that’s the best we can expect. We pack up all our stuff and head out of the shop. But as we’re leaving, I look back over my shoulder. Scott’s holding the green business card and talking on his cell phone, looking our way.
CHAPTER 21
WE TRAVEL BY TRUCK TO A BASE CAMP JUST OUTSIDE THE OPENING TO Krubera Cave. Scott has definitely overestimated their language skills, but Adgur and Daur know enough English to get ideas across. They’re nearly as wide at the shoulders as they are tall, have full beards, and they say that they’ve lowered over one hundred people into the cave before, at least fifty of whom have come back.
I don’t find this last statistic overly comforting, but Adgur and Daur grin and act like it’s a great thing. I’m hoping they’re joking.
Once I’m in my tent, I snuggle inside my sleeping bag and test out the cellular signal booster. It’s a good thing I have it because the signal is super weak otherwise. But the booster works great. I text Lucas a couple quick pictures of the view from up here.
You aren’t kidding. It’s gorgeous, he texts back.
Wish you were here, I text.
Me too, he says.
Next I check in with Uncle Randall. He’s not happy, but he’s resigned to the fact that I’m here.
Take pictures of anything that looks even remotely man-made, he texts.
I promise I will, and then I tell him that I’ll try to check in at least once a day, same as I told Lucas. Then I power off the booster and fall asleep.
Adgur and Daur are up early the next morning, taking down the tent before I’ve finished packing up my sleeping bag.
“Is warm today,” Daur says, grinning as I zip my coat up to the top and pull the knit hat far down over my ears. I can see why men grow beards with weather this cold in June.
“It’s like two degrees above freezing,” I say.
Daur nods. “Yes. Warm. Early in morning, too.”
The early in the morning part gives me hope that it will warm up. That said, Scott made sure we brought thermal everything to prevent hypothermia.
“Who go first?” Adgur says as we stand outside the slit in the ground that he assures me is the opening to Krubera Cave. It’s not even a big slit, just wide enough that I wouldn’t be able to jump across it with a running start.
“Me,” Ethan and I both say at the same time.
“I’m going first,” I say. “No argument.”
“You’re not going first,” Ethan says.
“Of course I am.” I don’t know why we have to waste time with this discussion.
“What if you fall?”
“What if? Are you planning to catch me from a two hundred foot drop? Because if you fall after I’m already down there, I’m moving out of the way so you don’t squash me.”
“Ha ha,” Ethan says. “But I’m going first. End of story.”
After two weeks of getting to know me, would Ethan seriously think I would give in that easily? It is so not the end of the story as Ethan quickly finds out. Of cour
se, I go first.
Adgur and Daur secure the rope to the rappelling rig and then lower me into the earth, guiding the rope and making sure it doesn’t go too fast so I won’t start swinging wildly. The tiny opening above ground hides the truth below: Krubera Cave is like a pit hundreds of feet down to nowhere. I descend slowly, and my eyes acclimate to the new surroundings. The early morning sun shining in from above is enough to light up the walls, which are etched with layers of Earth’s formation, like a geologist’s utopia. I click on my headlamp and they come to life.
Once I’m sure my feet have hit solid rock, not just some temporary ledge, I radio up to let them know I’m stable, and they pull the rope back up.
I move away from my current spot so our supplies won’t come tumbling down on top of me. I force myself not to worry as I wait for them to get hooked on the rope and delivered. It takes twenty solid minutes before they finally arrive, and a small wave of relief flows through me. I now have food, water, tools, and a first aid kit … everything I could possibly need for the Hawkins Expedition. That’s what I’m calling it, in honor of my parents. When I find them, we can laugh about the name, but until then, the Hawkins Expedition it is.
I unhook the supplies and again radio up. Then I wait for Ethan. He takes forever, just like getting ready in the morning. I check my watch at ten minutes. Fifteen. Twenty. There is no reason it should be taking him this long. At thirty minutes I begin to get annoyed. I call from the radio, but there’s no answer. At forty-five minutes, I pull out my cell phone and turn it on, using precious battery power. I’m about to pull out the signal booster when Ethan’s silhouette finally shows up, far above me.
I watch every second of his descent, and when he finally sets his feet on the ground, I grab him in an involuntary hug. I have no idea what comes over me, and I don’t care. I am just so happy that he is here because being alone in this pit in the ground for the last hour has set my every nerve on end. After I hug him, I step back and shove him, hard.
“What took you so long?” I say as anger rushes through me, pushing away the relief.
He unclips himself from the rope and tugs on it three times, letting Adgur and Daur know that it’s okay for them to leave. They’ve done their job, at least for now. They’re supposed to come back and check for us every day at noon after two weeks have gone by. Even if our journey is done before then—which I hope it is—we have enough food to last.
“Sorry. My mom called,” Ethan says. “She got all freaked out and started asking really weird questions.”
Fine. It’s not a lame excuse.
“What kind of questions?” I ask.
He laughs in a completely not funny way. “Okay, I know this is weird, but sometimes my mom says she gets feelings. And I guess she got one because she wanted me to come home. I told her I’d be home in a couple of weeks. And then she said that my dad went on a trip a couple days ago, and she had a really bad feeling about it. I guess that’s why she wanted me to come home.”
Ethan’s dad went on a trip?
“Where did he go?” I ask. He can’t have been the person I’d seen in town. Ethan would have seen him and recognized him.
Ethan shrugs. “I don’t know. He travels a lot for work.”
This is not good.
Okay, I’m getting worked up about nothing. He’s probably just on another business trip. He can’t have been here in Gagra because he wouldn’t have any idea this was the starting point of the journey. We haven’t told anyone. I try to convince myself of this logic because there’s nothing I can do about it now anyway. All I can do is find the Code of Enoch and find my parents.
“Who’s ready to start this show?” Ethan says, and he eyes my backpack.
This is it. The start of my journey. I pull the map from my backpack, sink to the ground next to Ethan, and unroll it. We photocopied the center piece since Ethan still has it and got the whole thing laminated in Gagra since the cave is so wet. The complete map looks back at us. My headlamp is bright, reflecting off the lamination. I dim it so it won’t interfere.
“Where do we go from here?” I ask. Sure, it’s a map, but we’re in a dark cave in the middle of nowhere. We could branch off from the main path now or five days from now.
Ethan shifts his light so it doesn’t reflect either. He doesn’t say anything right away. He’s busy studying the symbols that cover the map.
“Do the directions make more sense now that we’re down here?” I ask, reaching across him to point at the lines and markings that make up the symbols of the map.
Ethan pulls a map of the cave from his pocket and lays it next to the Deluge Segment, adjusting his light so it’s illuminated, too. Then he points to a rock sticking out from the wall, almost like a giant pencil. “I think a lot of these symbols mixed in are supposed to be landmarks. Like this symbol has to represent that rock. I mean, the symbol here says ‘Finger of God’ if you want to be technical, but that rock looks like a finger to me.”
“Agreed.”
“So let’s make that our starting point. Based on that, this next series of symbols and lines is equivalent to this path on the explored cave map.” He points to the topographical map of Krubera Cave, tracing his finger along the path.
“So we follow the main path, checking for landmark symbols on the Deluge map, until the directions change, and then we veer off into the unknown,” I say.
“Exactly. And then each marking that we follow on our map not only tells us which direction to go, but also how long to travel in that direction, how many cross tunnels there might be, what kind of terrain we’ll be crossing.”
“It’s a lot of information,” I say. My head spins at how many symbols there are. How far we need to go. We’re only at the beginning.
“But we have the information. We have the map,” Ethan says.
“I know,” I say. “But it almost seems impossible. Like one wrong turn and we’re lost forever.”
Ethan looks me directly in the eye. “I never pegged you for a quitter, Hannah.”
“I’m not quitting,” I say, though my voice betrays me. Now that we’re here in the cave and the enormity of our journey stretches before us, I worry that I’m like a tiny fish who’s sunk its teeth into a shark and now isn’t sure what to do. What have I gotten myself into?
“Good,” Ethan says. “Because I’d be awfully lonely going without you.”
“Aw, that almost sounds like you care,” I say, trying to shift my mood away from my negative thoughts. There is no turning back now.
“Don’t get carried away,” Ethan says.
We both laugh. Then we pack up the Deluge map, have some water, and set out.
“I feel like we should sing a song,” Ethan says. “Something to start our journey.”
Of the many things I am, I am not a singer. “You don’t want me singing.”
“And you don’t want me singing either,” Ethan says. “But if I get bored enough, then I just might anyway.”
“Challenge on,” I say. “I’ll have to make sure you don’t get bored.”
So I carry the conversation as we navigate the main path in Krubera Cave. There have been enough explorers coming through that there are symbols and spray paint along the walls, telling us which way to go. I’m guessing the spray paint isn’t environmentally friendly, but the need to stick on the right path is important enough to let that slide.
“So this cave,” I say. “You know how deep it is?”
“Explored to almost twenty-two hundred meters,” Ethan says.
“Yes. But have you visualized that?”
He shakes his head which I know because his headlamp moves back and forth ahead of us against the darkness of the cave. We descend steadily, and for all the dangers I’ve heard about the cave, the floor we walk on right now is smooth rock. Of course it’s getting colder with each step. I pull my sleeves farther over my wrists to keep the chill out.
“Imagine this,” I say. “You take the Chrysler building, and you place
the Washington Monument on top of that. Next you put the Empire State Building. Are you still with me?”
“Still with you,” he says.
“Good. Because after that comes the Pyramids. Then the Eiffel Tower, and finally, don’t think you’re done just yet, you take all those and on top of that you stack the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. That’s how tall twenty-two hundred meters is.”
“That’s tall,” Ethan says.
“Yeah, and we’ve walked about one percent of it so far,” I say. Thinking about the facts of it helps keep my mind off of how far we need to go. I can take this ten meters at a time. “Oh, and I forgot to ask, but while we’re walking, if you happen to see any bugs, let me know.”
“What kinds of bugs?” Ethan says, cringing, like the request horrifies him.
“Anything that doesn’t look normal.”
“What’s normal? Cockroaches?”
“Well, yeah,” I say, “but I’m thinking more along the lines of bizarre coloring. Or shapes that don’t remind you of any other bugs you’ve seen.”
“So like bright pink bugs with five hundred legs?”
I laugh. “Not quite. White bugs. Extremely large or extra-long bugs. Bugs with vestigial eyes.”
“What kind of eyes?” Ethan asks.
“Vestigial,” I say. “Eyes that are really small or not really there. Maybe covered by thick exoskeleton. Or only on one side of their head. That kind of thing.”
“Great,” Ethan says. “So what you’re saying is that you think there are giant blind albino bugs that are going to leap on us at night as we’re sleeping.”
I don’t know why it dawns on me in that moment, but it does. Aside from the random text message with Lucas or Uncle Randall, I am going to be talking to no one but Ethan for the next who-knows-how-long. We are going to be sleeping side by side.
“I told you that I don’t like bugs,” he says, distracting me from my thoughts.
“I thought you were kidding.”
“Not kidding,” Ethan says.
“I hear they like guys better,” I say.
“That’s comforting.”
“You could always stay up all night and watch for them,” I say.