by James Stubbs
I try to pull myself out of the mud but my tired arms keep slipping as my open palms fail to find any traction on the slippery brown soil.
I hear an unmistakable tearing noise and listen to the springy sounds of ligaments snapping and muscle fiber tearing as the monster feeds on the fresh, raw meat. The blood of the fallen creature starts to pour liberally out of it’s countless teeth wounds and soaks the surrounding area in a sickening rich red color. I can feel the warm liquid trickle up my trouser legs and soak my boots through. That motivates me to claw my way to my feet and stand. Kolt has just about made it up too.
This time, to my surprise, he takes my hand to get his balance. The scene unfolding under the shelter of the tree is like a horrific crash. I can’t look away. My inner blood lust stops me from just walking away.
‘Opportunistic…’ he begins and tries to get his words out between hesitant and difficult breaths. ‘predators will quickly…’ he pauses again for another deep, lung filling inhale. ‘gather to try to feed also.’ He finally reaches the end of his sentence. As much as that sprint has taken out of me I know he is right and we definitely need to start making our way out of the area. There will be more of them coming soon.
He points over the river, to where the next tree line encroaches ominously into view, and starts to walk before I find the power to follow him. I gasp one more time, hand on hips to settle my breathing, and eventually follow. My legs are screaming at me for the pain they just endured but I ignore them and make for the tree line. I leap forward a few over exaggerated paces in order to catch up with Kolt who has found some way to quickly compose himself.
He again stands tall, ready and waiting for the next obstacle to throw itself at us, chest puffed out with steady, easing and soothing breaths through his mask.
‘That was really something buddy.’ I bravely reach up and slap him on the back. My open palm makes for a wet noise as it impacts his leather finished apron. I smile.
‘Indeed.’ He glances at me and then pushes past the first branch that leads us once more into the dense jungle.
‘More challenges await in the caves beyond my friend.’ I have to admit to myself that it feels good to be called his friend. I admire him a lot and that is the first time either of us has put our relationship into words. The intense and unforgiving surroundings we find ourselves in cement together a tight bond between us. I can’t believe I was ever afraid of him, or even suspicious of him, and I’m ashamed of myself when I remember that I was at one time or another thinking both of those things.
I reach past my own head and bat away a lone mosquito like bug when I hear it buzzing around my ear. Night has settled in well and truly now and the dark shadows have me jumping at every turn as we pick our way slowly through the dense and deep jungle vegetation.
Kolt seems to know where he is leading us and I have a new found faith in him to not even question his judgment. Even if his poor memory is a little hazy at best. I still have no idea how we plan to get out of this. My friend seems to think we can call the long gone Russian Federation.
I allow my thoughts to wander. I would rather think about Kolt and what he said than pay any attention to the penetrating silence that envelopes me. The darkness wraps it’s arms and legs around us like a demented whore. It throws a dense sheet over us and wraps it around us like a hunting python, constricting the life out of us with every terrified breath that I take.
Kolt believes in what he said. I sensed, now that I force myself to remember his words, conviction and determination in his voice. But how can he be remembering something that has been gone for so long? I try to stop my thought patterns but they run wild, they chill me to the bone and I can’t help but to develop a persistent, and over-reaching, bad feeling about all of this.
Kolt stops suddenly. I nearly walk right into him as my eyes grow weary with tiredness. He can see something but I can’t. He reaches around and grabs me by the wrist. He pulls me forward to stand by his side and points through the shroud of darkness to an even darker pit up ahead.
It faces me like the open jaws of a whale carved into the side of a rock face. No light escapes it’s jagged form and all life seems to be swallowed by the void it represents. Kolt pulls me close and whispers in my ear. His voice sounds muffled and distant. It feels like he is shouting from inside his own mask, but no sound carries to my delicate ears. His rasping tones send more shivers down my spine but I don’t let it show.
‘That is the entrance to the cave system. We need to follow that, it will lead us up into blank snowfields, where we must climb a great height in order to find my crashed ship.’ My heart sinks at the prospect of more hardship to come, especially when I see no end to our ordeal, since Kolt is daydreaming or mentally ill when it comes to his plan. At this point, the though suddenly hits me, I’m just winging it with my blind faith placed squarely on his shoulders.
I try to peer through the darkness as we stand completely still, listening out for anything in the lack of noise around us.
‘We’ll never make it without a light.’ I state categorically. I’m just making excuses. I’m lying to myself that there is any reason for us not to go in. I just don’t want to. Kolt walks away and I don’t bother to follow him. I know he will have some kind of method or some kind of plan, just like he always does, to get us through this.
Sure enough he returns only moments later with a split piece of wood that looks like bamboo. The wood is hollow and forms a pipe shape. He has stuffed some dried mud down half way to block it off, rested dead wood and torn pieces of the bamboo flesh apart to form kindling, which he has stuffed in the top. He reaches under his apron and brandishes his large hunting knife. He also takes out a silver colored block of flint.
I had no idea he had it with him. He starts to strike the flint with the sharp edge of the blade to make it spark. After a few attempts the fire bursts into life and the makeshift torch erupts with dazzling orange light. The flames lick up into the blanket of darkness and smoke immediately starts pouring out, billowing up into the tree cover above. It is refreshing though. To finally be able to see something more than a palm distance away from my face.
The light extends to the start of the cave but no further. I form up behind him and let him take the lead again. He knows where he is going and he has the light. Or so I tell myself. Another excuse. But that’s total bull. This place has me spooked and I’m just hiding behind him like a frightened child.
Chapter 9
The Caves
It takes me a few moments to adjust my eyes to the blackness of the cave. I come out of my hiding behind Kolt. I force myself to. I need to take control and remember what it was that forced me here in the first place. I need to remember how empowered I felt when I kicked the crap out of my boss and I need to remember how to be that guy again.
I step forward and rip the torch from his loose grip. And then I stupidly slip on a wet rock I hadn’t seen.
I go tumbling head over heel and drop the torch onto the soaked ground. Luckily, more by his skill than my good management, Kolt picks it up and dusts it off before it has the chance to get swamped by the water running through the cold and soggy cave. My back hurts again. I’m not fully recovered from the crash, not by any measure, and that fall has done it no good at all. I stand, arch my back to hear it crack, and groan in a feeble attempt to garner any kind of sympathy.
I feel a right idiot. Kolt has, as a testament to the kind of guy I now know him to be, not said a word and has just stepped ahead of me. He could have ripped me to shreds over that. I think I would have done that were I him. I listen hard for the sound of sniggering through his mask filter but it doesn’t come. Maybe he just feels my embarrassment. I already know he has virtually no sense of humor so I really shouldn’t be as surprised as I am.
All I can hear is the incessant and rhythmic dripping of far away water. I waste no time in catching up with Kolt. This place is making me feel cold and afraid again. I can see he has descended down into another
level of the cave complex, only by the fading light of the torch, and my blurred vision can sparsely cut through the lingering mist that seems to have formed out of nowhere. I steady my stance and start making my way over to him.
‘Kolt!’ I shout and the sound echoes. The confined walls of the cave, and some yet to be discovered more open space, bounce every decibel right back at me.
‘Wait up!’ I shout up. The words carry for what feels like forever. I shuffle closer and finally reach a steep downward gradient that I slide down on the backs of my legs to meet him.
I land in a heap at the bottom of a slippery slide. I can’t get any traction on the wet rock, even with my hardened boots on. Kolt hasn’t said anything yet but at least he stopped to wait for me. The mist has blanketed the cave in a thick, relentless, and penetrating veil that I can barely see through. The light from the torch is all we have to guide us. But all that does is light up the mist rather than a path through it.
At least I can stand up properly. And at least I can’t hear any of the dinosaurs in here so I have to hope we are safe from them. Something must call this cave “home”. I just pray it’s nothing big enough to try to eat us.
I can hear water in the distance somewhere. It is flowing slowly down some underground traps and streams. I can hear it trickle slowly, licking the side of the dark rock, and cascading down into some unknown abyss. But I’m fixating on that to hide something else I don’t want to believe.
I’m so sure that I can see shapes and figures moving around in the mist. My eyes are, despite all of my effort to concentrate on anything else, fixed on them. I’m watching them shift in the ever changing fog and light condition. I glance to Kolt to see if he is looking in the same direction. He is. But he either hasn’t seen the figures that wisp around the penetrating mist, has seen them and is not afraid, or they aren’t even there at all.
I watch carefully as one shape, so human to my tired eyes, dances through the dense fog, twirling almost playfully to a soundtrack that I cannot hear. Then it disappears again. Back to the fog from whence it came. I stare into the vacant space the figure used to occupy, so hard that I feel as though my eyes could hone in on every particle of the fog.
I’m sure it must be my tired eyes. I’m sure it’s a trick of the light and the way the bamboo torch is burning. But I can swear I see a face made of mist. A human face. One with scared and lonely eyes, that glance longingly at me, craving to live as I do.
I can feel my tongue swell in the back of my throat as the fear settles in and takes hold of me. I can’t look away. I can feel my breathing deepen with every labored inhale as my throat begins to close with fear.
I feel cold. Not like a snow and ice caused cold, but a chill. Almost like my very blood is running away from my skin with dread of what might be. The face has not gone. Kolt remains focused and still. The chattering of the water running through some unknown cavern and the licking flames are the only noises around. I try to focus on them. I try to take my eyes away and stare at the flame but my gut won’t let me.
The spectral eyes captivate me and I feel the pain I see in them. I need to do something. I need to move, to run, to turn and sprint in terror back the way we came and wait for my fate with the Morris Cooper security force.
I shake my head violently from side to side with my eyes firmly clamped shut. It is a while before I can open them again. A few moments before I dare to. But the specter has gone when I do. There are no more shapes in the mist, no more figures dancing through it, no more fearful eyes piercing me with longing stares.
I sigh, a lot louder than I would have liked to, and wait for my heart to stop thumping inside my ribcage. I blow out the air from my lungs through my tightened lips. I make a funnel out of them and blow away as much of the mist as I can. I can see the effect of it but more mist rolls in to take the place of every volume my lungs manage to move.
But there are no creatures, at least that I have yet been able to see, lurking inside. My companion has still not said anything and I can no longer fight the childish urge to seek comfort from his, hopefully, more mature thoughts.
‘Kolt.’ I whisper so the sound does not bounce so vividly back at us.
‘We need to pass this field of fog.’ He says back, peering through his strained eyes through the dark blanket of mist, studying it and trying to remember which way we need to go. He doesn’t say anything about the eerie figures, which I am certain were nothing but figments of my battered and over active imagination, so I decide to press him further.
‘Did you have any problem passing through the cave before.’ I hide my fear admirably and I don’t think he senses that I’m all messed up. That’s good. I already feel like a child, like the beta male, I can’t do with another slip down the pecking order. For the sake of my own assaulted ego.
‘The caves are disorientating, I think I have a map of them in my mind for us to follow though.’ I assume he means that he has spent the last few moments planning a route while I have been panicking over shapes and shadows that I must have made up. He starts to walk his way down the deep cave system, each step thundering a malicious echo around the cavern, his fire torch flickering and seemingly dying with every passing second. I still can’t help but to keep checking all of the field of view. I check the mist every few seconds for shapes and masses in there but there doesn’t seem to be anything.
‘Ouch!’ I kick a rock since I’m not really watching where I’m going. I need to get my game face back on. I’m tired, upset, stressed and my imagination is playing hell with me.
I follow Kolt a little further, listening contently to the chattering water in some unknown distance, letting my eyes settle to the faint but flickering light, and let my mind waver a little more from the task at hand. I have to forgive myself for not being as “on the ball” as I would like to be. I feel sorry for myself, that much is true, but I need to be less hard on myself right now.
I made my choices back in the mine. I killed six people and beat the hell out of one more. That takes it’s toll. Especially considering I’ve been nothing but a good, law abiding, well behaved and dutiful member of society all of my life. I didn’t think I would ever have it in me to kill people. I kind of wish I could turn the clock back, but I know that I can’t.
Then I fly a rig all the way here with nothing but experience gained in a simulator, crash the damn thing right into the dirt, traverse across a desert, escape the snapping jaws of creatures I though long extinct, climbed a precarious vine up a slippery rock face, nearly drowned in a babbling river since I messed up and jumped in, only to start seeing ghosts in the thick mist in this claustrophobic and dense cave.
All this while thinking about my inevitable, if that’s the right word, capture at the hands of the Morris-Cooper Mining company. I should really give myself the break I should deserve but I can’t. I’m not even half way through this epic journey I, and Kolt, have embarked upon. I’m tired, we’ve been traipsing through the night and I’ve not really eaten much at all in days.
My legs are starting to burn. I hadn’t even noticed the gradual incline but we must have been walking up hill for some time. I hadn’t even noticed the mist clear but now that I have, I’m glad it’s gone. The images of those figures, and especially that face, are pasted into the back of my mind.
I’m glad I don’t have to think about it anymore. The sound of gushing water has grown more intense in the past few minutes, it sounds like it might be running through the walls to our left and right.
The tunnel has closed in around us and the walls are no longer smooth and water worn. They are jagged and unforgiving to the slightest mistake. I keep catching my shoulder blades on the sides and the rock keeps tearing chunks of my armor away each time. I just grunt in frustration. I’m on auto pilot right now, just watching Kolt step the miles away.
‘Now we have to crawl.’ Kolt says, turns back at me and lowers his arm across his face to demonstrate that the roof is much lower in this section of the cave. I’d forg
otten his eyes. I had thought they might clear in time but they are still bloodshot to the extremities. To the point where there is no white left in there. The flame from the torch is exaggerating the color for sure but it doesn’t stop the sight from being intense and a little disturbing.
Even now, after I have known him for some time, he still scares me. I just nod. I’m too tired to speak.
I’m even glad when I drop to my knees. My thighs are throbbing from the uphill struggle. I know moving through tight spaces will be physically hard but I’m just happy to be lower. Closer to the ground. Kolt moves ahead first. I watch as he pushes his eight foot tall frame through a confined tunnel and disappear, along with our light, into another area of the cave.
I tuck myself into a tight ball, roll my shoulders to face the thinnest direction, and press on. I can only hear my armor scrape against the rough surface of the wall and the force I need to push myself through the thin section of the closed walls surprises me. I don’t even know where I’m pulling the energy from it but I’m definitely glad of it.
The sound wasn’t much at first. There was nothing to separate it from the distant sound of running water. It wasn’t pronounced enough to hear over my armor rubbing against the rock. But slowly it began to pierce my ear drums and fill my head. A scream. I can’t even tell if it’s a man or a woman, but it oozes fear and dread. It’s primal and near deafening. It fills me with fear immediately and I begin to panic as the reality slowly settles in.
I have no way to turn my head. If I push it to the right I just bash my head on the cold rock. I can feel blood trickle down my face as the sharp geology cuts into my fragile, cracked and cold skin. If I try to look around the other way I just jam it against my own shoulder blade.
I can’t tell where the scream is coming from, or if my mind is just playing tricks on me, but I could swear it’s coming from behind me. I start to breathe hard and push harder and tougher against the rock to squeeze through.