White resumed my tutoring but eventually we fell from the subject of security. We spent the remainder of the morning just talking about ourselves. I told White about my fishing experience when I had been up here for training with Black and he suggested that we go back to the lake and do some real fishing with the right equipment. I got a light lunch together as he retrieved the poles and other fishing tackle from the cellar.
Black had been my first instructor with the company and his training started out as a type of boot camp and ended as a form of survival training. At one point I was left alone in the woods with no food and practically no ideas. I had to fend for myself and got the notion to eat fish when my rabbit traps weren’t working. It was then, that I discovered the rush when a fish hit on your line, and it was amazing. Since then I had aspirations of learning more about fishing and of course participating in the sport itself.
The rest of the day was spent sitting on the shore of the lake, fishing. I only had experience fishing in the creek that meandered around here, and with makeshift equipment. In spite of that, I did manage to catch a fish with my homemade tackle.
White caught the majority of the fish because for some reason I kept losing them when they hit on my worm. I pulled when I felt a tug but White said I was pulling too soon. I guess I needed to give them a chance to get the hook in their mouths.
At the end of the day we had nine fish that were “keepers.” I had caught only three of them but I had fun doing it.
“We should get back.”
“Oh, alright.” We reeled in, packed up, and then headed back to the cabin. Over the past hour or so I had expected to see the men surface in the lake. They hadn’t and I was actually a bit worried. Cave diving was more than moderately dangerous.
“When do you think everyone will be back?” I asked as we walked.
“I imagine they’ve been back for some time,” White shrugged.
“I didn’t see them. Did they come ashore somewhere else?”
“Uh, I’m betting they will be going in again tomorrow. We’ll go with them.” He had a big grin and that told me there was something I didn’t know. I knew well enough that I wouldn’t be told about it, I would be shown, so I remained quiet the rest of the way to the cabin.
Sure enough, when we walked into the cabin it was full of men of every color.
“Been fishing I see,” Brown said as he came to take the fish away. “We were just talking about what we were going to have for dinner.”
The night went on in a casual fashion, no one mentioning anything about the trip to the cave or making any comments about White and I being alone all day. Brown cooked the meal of fish and I was reminded of how much I didn’t care for the flavor of trout. White rounded me up after dinner and he and I got back to our studies.
The next morning I was the first up, beating Black for the first time since I had gotten here. I got the coffee started and had my first cup alone. Black eventually joined me, followed by Blue and down the line one man at a time.
“So, are Grey and White coming with us today?” Blue asked as he cooked breakfast.
Black spoke up. “I think Grey should for certain. She’s only been to the big room from the water. What White does is up to him.”
“Yeah, I’m coming along. It’s been a while and it’s great exercise.”
“Tell me about it, I’m actually sore this morning,” Green cut in.
The men went on to talk about the day’s plans while we ate our breakfast. Afterwards Red recruited me to help him get some food ready. With that finished I was sent off to my room to “dress appropriately.” I was told that tennis shoes with a grip and warm clothes that wouldn’t hinder me were the appropriate attire. My wardrobe was limited to mostly that exact type of clothing so it didn’t take me long to throw on the ensemble. When I came out of my room everyone was ready to head out. I was shuffled down into the cellar and was amazed to see that it hadn’t changed since the little building had stood over it. I was handed a hard hat with a lamp attached to the front of it and a set of knee and elbow pads. Everyone’s equipment was caked in a reddish mud except mine.
Everyone put their protective gear on and then we all entered the walk-in freezer. White handed me a scuba tank and fins and had his own equipment slung over his shoulder. I noticed no one else had any water equipment. I was thoroughly confused until Black removed the back panel and revealed a small hole in the rock. It was cold in the freezer but I noticed a breeze coming from the hole. It was warmer than the overall temperature of the freezer, but only by a few degrees.
“Everyone ready?” Black asked. There was no mention of not being ready so he added, “I’ll go first and Alex, you’ll follow me so I can help you with your equipment if you need me to.” He turned and entered the small hole.
“Put your tank in ahead of you and push it along,” White said.
I hefted the tank to the entrance and pushed it in and followed after it. Once I got my entire body into the hole I didn’t understand how any of the other men could get through here, with the exception of Mr. Green.
White had switched on my headlamp before I crawled in here and I could see Blacks feet and legs right in front of me. We were crawling through a tunnel like area with tiny cracks leading off into the distance on either side. Small animals may have had a choice at what direction to take but there was only one way for me to push my equipment and pull my body along.
“This goes on for a few hundred feet like this, but then it opens up considerably,” Black’s voice was muffled.
I heard the sound of metal on rock and assumed White was coming in behind me. Black was slow moving in this cramped area and it didn’t take me but a couple of minutes to catch him.
The crawl through the tunnel took a minimum of ten minutes and we reached an area where Black dropped down out of my view. I could still see his light ahead so I pushed and crawled a little faster. Soon I heard Black say,
“Push the tank out slowly and I’ll grab it for you.” I did as I was told and soon it dropped away from my hands. Following my gear I dropped into a slightly larger room. I could see some distance on either side of me but the room was only tall enough for me to roll over if I had wanted to. I inched past Black and turned my head and body to see what was going on behind me. White’s tank emerged from the small hole and Black took it and set it gently on the floor next to mine. White then pulled himself through the opening. Black pushed my tank to me and said, “Let’s move.”
He continued to lead us through the rough terrain. The floor consisted of sharp rocks but there was an obvious path that we followed. It looked as if they had lined it with dirt to pad the way. Despite the close quarters, it was an amazing sight. The ceiling and floors all around us were lined with small knobby crystals. They weren’t shiny like you would expect because as White explained to me as we crawled about, they were coated with minerals, but there were small patches of them that were clean of the film.
There were many different oddities throughout and I got a crash course in cave formations. The reoccurring theme was water and mineral deposits and I was fascinated. If I had only known how interesting all this stuff was, I would have become a spelunker long ago. I recalled having these same feelings when Black had led me in through the water opening, however the type of cave was completely different. What I had seen before had been mind-boggling huge and this was the miniature version.
“So, what do you think?” I heard Brown’s voice come up from behind me.
“I love it!”
“I thought girls didn’t like getting dirty,” he yelled up to me.
“Yeah, keep it up Brown.” I had stopped moving forward and turned my head to accentuate my point.
I heard a quiet snickering behind me and just shook my head and continued on. I was beginning to feel more like just one of the guys with every passing moment. This had the feeling of some sort of initiation, but I think I had been in the initiation stage since I had arrived at White and Associates
and this somehow seemed to be the last stage. This was the first time I had done anything other than sit and talk about a job with all the men present. It looked as if the men had finally come to accept me, one at a time.
We continued on in the cramped space until we reached a spot where the floor pushed up into the ceiling. We must have to go around this, I thought. Black stopped and waited for all the men to catch up.
“This is the dome,” he explained, like it made all the sense in the world. “Give me a second to get up inside then push yours and White’s gear up to me. Then follow a few seconds later and push the gear down to me on the other side. The air flow through the dome is limited so we need to do this as quickly as we can.”
“Why don’t we just go around?”
“This is a more comfortable crawl. Don’t worry, it replenishes, it just takes a bit longer for some reason.” He turned and disappeared behind the lower ceiling.
“Ready,” he called out and I pushed my tank toward the arched floor and started to push it up. I was able to stand here. The ceiling had transformed into a wall behind me and the floor had become a wall in front of me. They both arched over and looked as if they would fit perfectly together if the ceiling were to ever collapse. Black had grabbed the tank and White’s tank had moved to my feet. I reached down, with some difficulty, and pulled it up so Black could reach it.
The room was large enough for me to climb into and sit straight up next to Black, but he didn’t sit long and slid down the other side face first on his stomach. He didn’t stand on the other side as I had done because it would have been impossible for him to bend his body to get back out. I lowered the tanks to his waiting hands then he disappeared. I followed his lead and slid out face first. I found myself in a place that looked almost identical to the other side of the dome.
“Not much further now,” Black said and led me away to give the men room to gather.
“Remind me not to go last through there again,” Red said as he appeared, somewhat blue-faced.
As we moved along I noticed the ceiling and floor were not as close and getting further apart. The walls to either side of me were getting closer however. The cave changed rapidly after that. Soon we were crawling on our hands and knees and just as quickly we were all walking hunched over. I was the first that was able to stand to my full height. The cave changed even quicker once we were all able to stand. The walls closed in and the ceiling disappeared. There were short stints where we had to inch our way through tight spots, walking sideways. It was at one of these spots that Black stopped again.
“Ok, we’re about to step out onto a ledge. Be careful because it’s a long drop.” He stepped out of the crack and I saw him move off to the left.
I stepped out and saw that he wasn’t kidding! I got a dizzy feeling looking over the edge. I looked to where Black was and the ledge widened considerably as I moved in his direction. We were in a huge room with gigantic formations resembling the room Black had led me to so many months ago.
“We’re going to have to lower the gear. I’ll go first and untie it when it reaches the bottom.” I looked over the edge and saw the ropes leading down into the darkness.
“So, is this the room we were in before?” I could hear the sounds of water echoing off the walls.
“Yep, but we’re still a fair distance from the water.” The men were gathering behind us along the ledge.
Black lit a flare and dropped it off the edge. The glow fell fast down the face of the cliff we were standing on. It looked to be about a fifty-foot drop.
It didn’t take Black long to reach the bottom and thanks to the flare we could see when he made it. The rope was pulled back up and White started to lower the equipment. Easy enough, I guess. I had thought I was going to have to lower my own equipment.
“You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” Red asked insinuating the repelling we were about to do.
“Yes. Even before I joined the company,” I assured him.
“Your turn.”
All of us made it down without incident. Red asked if anyone wanted any of the food we had put together before we left, but everyone declined.
We had been on our feet for some time now, but it was a relief not to have the walls closing in on us anymore. The men had each found themselves a place to sit but I was still exploring the area.
“Here,” Black handed me a glow stick. “It distorts the color a bit but it allows you to see more. Don’t be long, we’ll be ready to head out soon.”
I held the stick above my head so it didn’t interfere with my vision and began my exploration. I found the area that I had started to climb up when Black and I had entered from the water entrance. It was steep and I knew it would be a trying hike to get down with the scuba gear. There had been little pools of water throughout the cave but it was much wetter in here. I found a few spots of mud that were deep and soupy. I was more careful where I stepped after that. I didn’t want to have to explain why I might be covered from head to toe in mud.
I had been walking steadily away from the opposite wall and still wasn’t getting any picture of how big the room was. I figured it was probably time to make the walk back to the awaiting men.
I had been thinking about how easily it would be to get lost inside a cave. I was confused and had a few questions I wanted to ask when I reached the glowing circle of men.
“Ha, look who’s decided to join us.” Brown noticed me walking back toward them first. The echo was large and the voices in the darkness seemed like an intrusion.
I reached the bright circle enveloped by total darkness and took a seat on the cold floor.
“Found a mud puddle, I see.” Green pointed out my leg.
“Yeah. Hey, I have a question. I’ve been thinking… the entrance in the cellar is probably less than twenty feet higher than the water entrance. So how was it that we were able to repel a cliff at least fifty feet high?”
“We climbed on an unnoticeable incline for the majority of the trip,” White answered. “When we get back I’ll show you the map.”
Red stood and asked, “Are we ready to head back?”
I grabbed my gear and we all walked in the direction I had just explored. We walked past the deep mud puddles and continued on past where I had turned to return to the circle of men. Shortly after that we all turned and walked down a gentle slope toward where I thought the water should be.
I was proven right and before long we were in familiar territory. The men’s scuba gear was stacked nicely near the water’s edge, right where they had left it the day before. The underground lake looked like a pane of glass, it was so calm.
One by one we jumped into the cold water. It was a bit of a shock to me and I began to shiver almost immediately. It was cold inside the cave but I hadn’t really noticed because I was so enthused with it all. Now that I was in the black water I realized how cold I was.
The swim out of the cave seemed to last forever and I was having trouble keeping my mouthpiece in place because of the shivering. The cold hadn’t been all that I hadn’t noticed. I was extremely tired too. I was swimming with my clothes on, not a wetsuit and the wet clothes were much heavier than a suit would have been and not nearly as insulated. All I could think of was getting back to the cabin and getting warm and some sleep.
We swam on and on and eventually we were at the tunnel-like entrance that led back to the part of the lake that was above ground. We all had to take our tanks off and push them in front of us to get out. By now, my shivering had stopped but I still felt cold.
Finally we surfaced and I had to really push myself to swim the final distance to shore. It was beginning to get dark and the men were shadowy figures waiting for me.
“Are you coming?” Brown hollered across the lake. I picked up the pace and reached the shore exhausted. I stood up and stumbled but caught myself before I ended up face first on the ground. My legs were shaking and Black offered to carry my gear back to the cabin. I gladly accepted his offer. It was
a huge relief to give up the tank even if it wasn’t as heavy as it had been before I used up some of the air.
“Tired?” Green asked.
“Exhausted would be a better term, and cold.”
“Lets all get back,” Blue said.
When we reached the cabin I had an urge to go right to bed but Blue said, “Get out of those wet clothes and come see me.”
I grabbed a towel and went to change into dry clothes. I had to fight to get undressed but the dry clothes were obviously more comfortable. I sat on the edge of the bed and toyed with the idea of just laying down for a minute until I heard Blue yelling for me.
“Do you need some help up there?”
“I’m coming, hold your horses,” I hollered back. I think I had dozed off sitting up. I got up and started for the stairs but Blue was coming up them.
“I said I was on my way.”
“Just stand still.” He put his hand up the back of my shirt. His hand felt hot and I squirmed away.
“What are you doing?”
“Come downstairs and sit on the couch.” He started down and kept looking back to make sure I was following.
“Brown, grab me a thermometer and someone heat some water in the coffee pot.”
I wasn’t the only one who looked confused but we followed our orders without question. I found my way to the couch and Blue sat next to me with the thermometer Brown had handed to him as he walked past.
“I need to take your temperature,” Blue said as he put it in my mouth. “You have some symptoms of hypothermia.”
As soon as he said “hypothermia” the men surrounded the couch.
“Do you feel cold?” I nodded my head yes.
“Would you say you are overly tired?” Again a yes nod and I tried to explain that it was hard to push that tank around all day but he told me to shut my mouth because of the thermometer. He looked around and told everyone to go find something to do. He needed a cup of hot water and some blankets, and then he asked Green how he felt.
Shades of Grey: Book Two of the Alexis Stanton Chronicles Page 12