Cave Dwellers

by Randall, Jonathan

  Zaac and Ramira woke up the next day with a fresh zeal. They knew that either today or tomorrow would be the day. After spending a few minutes with Rogue and Siri, they started up the tunnel that was soon to provide their door to freedom.

  It took Zaac a full day of strenuous work to open up an area wide enough for them to crawl through. At the end of the day, the hole was finally sufficient. They both wanted to rush to their freedom, but they couldn’t leave without saying goodbye to Rogue and Siri.

  Returning to the cavern, they spent the night sleeping with the megapetomeinon. The next morning, they said their farewells, giving both birds a huge hug. Zaac and Ramira had tears in their eyes. They did not want to leave them. They had drawn so close the past few months, they could not imagine life without Rogue and Siri.

  “We’ll come back and get you as soon as we can,” Ramira said as she and Zaac departed.

  When they climbed to the ledge, they stopped and turned to look out over the cavern that had been their home. They looked down upon the megapetomeinon and waved before entering their much anticipated liberty.

  Climbing over the pit, they stopped at the small room and grabbed a couple of gold bars and put them in their packs. After they crawled through the hole Zaac had made, he sealed it back up. It would take a bulldozer to move those boulders and one couldn’t fit through the narrow tunnel.

  Within ten minutes, Zaac and Ramira stepped into open air. They saw the wooden doors that had been built but which had fallen away over time. They stood for a moment breathing fresh air and trying to get their bearings.

  The tunnel opened up onto a mountainside that was covered with trees and rhododendron. There was no sign of roads or houses. They started down the mountain looking for a route home.

  It took them forty-five minutes to get to the bottom. There they encountered a stream with a steady supply of water. They crossed it and started looking for signs of life. The landscape was full of rhododendron which they had to walk around. After another hour, they saw an old farm house.

  When they reached it, they found it deserted and falling apart. The only occupants were a couple of squirrels. The driveway had grown up from years of neglect.

  “I wonder who owns this land,” Ramira said as she looked around at collapsed buildings.

  “I don’t know. But it will be interesting to find out. When we get the money from the gold, maybe we can buy it. No one else seems to be using it.”

  The driveway led to a dirt road. The only tracks on it were from ATVs and even those were several weeks old.

  Looking to the left, they could tell that the road ended a short way up the base of the mountain. The only people who used it were hunters or people out with their toys.

  Zaac and Ramira went down the road to their right. They walked more than a mile before they reached another dirt road. This one was apparently much more traveled. It had a power line running down the side, a good sign.

  They looked to the right and to the left, not sure which way to go. After a moment of indecision, they agreed on the right. They had walked another half a mile when Ramira spotted a mail box. This sight quickened their pace to the driveway.

  Their approach brought yapping from the side of the house. There was a pen with several blue tick hounds in it. The barking of the hounds at the intruders did not bring anyone to the door. They walked up the driveway and knocked on the door. No one was home it seemed.

  Going back out the driveway, they walked another ten minutes up the road before they spotted another driveway. The house had several old vehicles in front of it. One of these was a rusted Chevrolet truck that had several different colors on the body. The bed was blue. The left door was a dull brown. The hood and fenders were red. It had a body-lift kit, which increased its height another foot off of the ground, and massive off-road tires. It was a typical southern redneck’s truck. They spotted two ATVs in an open shed.

  Zaac and Ramira went up the driveway and knocked on the door. An elderly woman with grey hair came and opened it.

  “Hi, this is Zaac and my name is Ramira,” Ramira said smiling at the woman. It was so nice to see another human being.

  “Hey. What can I do for you?” the elderly woman replied.

  “Do you have a phone we can use?” Ramira asked. She explained their predicament. “I want to call my parents to let them know that I am alive and to come and get us.”

  “Goodness,” The woman said. “Come right in. The phone is hanging on the wall in the kitchen.”

  The kitchen smelled of fresh baking. Zaac sat at the table, his stomach starting to rumble, while Ramira dialed her parent’s home. No one answered. Next she dialed her father’s cell phone.

  He answered on the third ring. “Hello.”

  Ramira was so glad to hear his voice that tears welled up in her eyes. He had to speak again before she finally responded, “Dad.”

  “Ray! Is that you?” He shouted into the phone overwhelmed with joy.

  “Yes, dad, it’s me.” Tears ran down Ramira’s cheeks.

  “Where are you? What happened to you? Where have you been?” her dad asked. Ramira could feel the many other questions that he wanted to ask just beneath the surface of their conversation.

  “Hold on one second.” She asked the woman where they were, and passed the information on to her Dad.

  “I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

  When she hung up, Zaac asked if he could use the phone to call his parents. With the woman’s permission, he dialed his mother’s cell phone.

  She picked up on the second ring saying, “Hello.”

  “Hey mom. It’s so good to hear your voice.” Zaac was so full of emotion he had trouble speaking.

  “Zaac! Zaac! You’re alive. Thank the Lord,” she shouted. She flooded him with questions.

  “Mom, I’m fine. I’ll answer all of your questions when we get home. Do you think you’ll be able to come and get me?”

  “I sure will. Where are you?”

  He gave the address and directions to his mother.

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  After he hung up, the woman said, “I know you kids are hungry. I just made some fresh biscuits. Would you like a biscuit with some ham or butter and homemade grape jelly?”

  “We would love some,” they answered in unison.

  They were just finishing their biscuits when a car rushed down the dirt road and pulled into the driveway. They heard a knock on the door.

  The woman went to answer with Zaac and Ramira close behind her. It was Ramira’s father. Frank was dressed in his police uniform. He looked concerned and thrilled at the same time, if that’s possible.

  When the woman opened the door, he saw Ramira standing behind her.

  As the word “Ray” was coming out of his mouth, Ramira rushed into his arms saying, “Dad.”

  They held on to each other for what seemed like forever before finally letting go. Frank looked Ramira over from head to toe. He seemed to need reassurance that this really was his daughter and that she was alive and safe.

  Caught up in the moment, Ramira had almost forgotten about Zaac. “Dad, I’d like to introduce you to Zaac. This is the boy that saved my life. Without him, I would probably be dead.” Turning to Zaac, she said, “Zaac, this is my dad.”

  Zaac stepped forward and held out his hand, “Nice to meet you sir.”

  Frank grasped Zaac’s in a firm handshake. “Zaac, it is definitely a pleasure meeting you. If you saved my daughter’s life, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

  Turning back to Ramira, he said, “When you didn’t come home, we went to that spot you like to visit. We found the vehicle and saw the crack in the ground from the earthquake, but no signs of you. We looked everywhere. We issued a bulletin with a major search put out for you. Still we had no word.”

  “That crack in the ground that you saw opened up right under our feet and down we went. We’ve been trapped underground until today.” She thought with a shu
dder of that awful moment.

  “You were buried?” he asked looking confused.

  “Not exactly,” Ramira explained, “There’s a vast network of tunnels beneath this whole area. We were trapped in those tunnels.”

  They were interrupted by another car flying down the road and turning in the driveway. It was both of Zaac’s parents.

  Zaac went out to meet them and his mother rushed to embrace him with tears of joy in her eyes.

  When Zaac finished hugging his mother, he hugged his dad. Ramira and her father stepped out to join them.

  Zaac turned from his parents to introduced Ramira. “Mom, Dad, this is Ramira. She helped save my life. I couldn’t have survived without her.”

  Ramira’s father looked confused about who had saved whom. Zaac’s mother stepped forward holding out her hand, “Nice to meet you.”

  His mother embraced her saying, “Thank you so much for bringing our son back safely.”

  Ramira was not sure how to feel at such a warm greeting, but these were unusual circumstances.

  As the questions were asked, Frank interrupted the discussion with, “Your mother got off work as soon as I called her. She’ll be waiting anxiously at home to see you.”

  Ramira turned to Zaac saying, “I’ve got to go. Let me give you our number so you can call.”

  Ramira borrowed a piece of paper from her dad, writing her number on it.

  Zaac responded taking the piece of paper which she handed to him, “I’ll call you tonight.”

  Both parents watched in surprise as they embraced for the longest time with a parting kiss on the lips that they did not want to end.

  Ramira turned to the elderly woman. “Thank you so much for letting us use your phone and for the biscuits. They were delicious.”

  “I’m glad I could help out.”

  Zaac and his parents got in their car and left while Frank and Ramira got in his car to take her home. The woman waved them off.

  When each arrived home, family, friends and neighbours came to visit. The story of what had happened took most of the day. Everything was told except the part about the megapetomeinon, the large cavern and the gold.

  Ramira did share with her father the fact that they had found a couple of gold bars. Zaac’s parents were left in the dark for the moment for fear of the news hitting the hospital. If anyone there got wind of it, it might as well be announced on CNN.

  She spent the rest of the evening talking to friends on the phone. Their questions were endless. Even given everything that she had experienced, her friends, especially Karlie, were more interested in details about Zaac. They wanted to know all about him, what he looked like, did they kiss, was he a good kisser, and anything else they could lever out of her.

  Her answer to them was that he was everything a girl could want in a guy and more. If she had it to do over again, all the experiences were worth it just to meet him. Zaac was the guy she loved and they were going to get married, even though he did not know it yet.

  These answers only aroused their curiosity. They could not wait to meet him.

  Matt came over to Zaac’s as soon as he got off of work, “Hey dude. It is so good to see you. We thought you were a goner.”

  “I did too. It was quite an ordeal to go through. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t met this girl. With both of us together, we were able to survive.” Zaac went on to describe Ramira to Matt. His face lit up as he talked about her.

  Matt noticed the change in Zaac when he spoke about her. “You are one lucky dude. How many guys could fall into the earth and end up meeting a pretty girl in the process.”

  Zaac called her that night as promised. “How was your welcome home?” he asked.

  “Totally exhausting. How was yours?” She was so glad to hear his voice.

  “The same.” Zaac, in fact, was a little overwhelmed with all of the fuss. “I had to repeat parts of the story over and over. We just got everyone out of the house a few minutes ago.”

  “I know. I thought their questions were never going to end.” Ramira told him about her discussions with her friends. “By the way, all of my friends want to meet you.”

  “What did you say about me?”

  “I told them you were conceited, arrogant and that I could not imagine having to spend another day down there with you.” Pausing a moment to tease him, she added, “No, I told them you were the most wonderful person in the world. The whole ordeal was worth it just to meet you.”

  “Really? You told them I was wonderful?” Realizing all she said, he added, “I feel the same.”

  That comment brought a smile to her face and a warm feeling rushing through her body.

  They talked for another hour, not wanting to end the conversation. Zaac assured her that he would see her first thing in the morning.

  They said their goodbyes and settled in for the night, looking forward to the next day.

  24

  News spread quickly about the reappearances of the pair who had disappeared off the face of the earth.

  The phone rang early the next morning at both residences from local newspapers and the television network wanting to do interviews. As soon as one call ended, the phone rang again.

  Ramira was startled when the doorbell rang instead of the phone. When she opened the door, there stood Zaac with a smile on his face.

  “Good morning. Has your phone been ringing off the hook? Ours sure has,” he said as she let him inside.

  “Yes, ours has too. The first call came around six this morning. Don’t those news people ever sleep?”

  “The early bird gets the worm. In this case, the story.” He grinned. “I know it’s still early, but if your family don’t have any plans for dinner, the place where I worked wants to give both of our families a free meal for dinner. It’s probably a publicity stunt, but who wants to turn down a free pizza buffet?”

  “Not me, that’s for sure. I’ll let them know. I’m sure that my brothers will be all for it.”

  Frank and Laura came into the living room from the kitchen. Ramira introduced Zaac to her mother, “Mom, this is Zaac, the guy I was telling you about.”

  “Hi Zaac, it’s nice to meet you.” Laura shook his hand.

  “Hi Mrs. Stevens. It’s nice to finally meet you too. I’ve heard a lot about your family for the last several months.”

  Looking at her dad, he said, “Mr. Stevens, I noticed your car’s in the driveway. Are you off today?”

  Frank replied, “Laura and I both took the rest of the week off. What did you have in mind?”

  “I was hoping that you would go by the bank with us and help us to get a vault to store what we found. After we do that, I thought you might know of a gold dealer in the city who we could contact to see if we could cash in on it. Would you mind helping us with this?” He had already discussed this plan with Ramira the night before.

  Frank looked at him for a moment with his eyebrows raised. This was a pretty bold young guy asking him these favors having only met the day before. He knew from the way his daughter talked about Zaac yesterday that they shared a unique relationship and that she cared for him much more than she admitted. He liked this guy, the way he was open and sincere in his approach.

  “Sure. I’ll be glad to help. Let me finish my coffee and I’ll be ready to go.” He added, “From the looks of it, you two will be busy this afternoon with the news media.”

  The four of them left to take care of business after the boys went off to school. Laura decided to go with them to make up for lost time with Ramira. They acquired the vault without any problems and got the gold safely stored away.

  The gold dealer was another matter entirely. He was more than happy to buy their gold. He had to first contact his business partners to access the funds to purchase it. Their location was not accustomed to dealing with gold in the amount that the bars were worth.

  He was very acquisitive about their finding of the gold. It got to the point that it became annoying. Frank
cut him off by suggesting that if he were swallowed up by an earthquake, maybe he would get lucky and find a bar of gold. With a shudder of dread, he stopped the questioning.

  With the approval of his partners, the dealer agreed to buy the gold for the going rate of $1900 a troy ounce. The offer was more than acceptable for Zaac and Ramira. When the bars were weighed, they came out to be thirty pounds instead of twenty-seven and a half. They were a little heavier than the standard bars. Each bar was 480 ounces. That made them worth $912,000 each.

  On their way home, Ramira asked her dad, “Dad, will you take us by the place that you picked us up yesterday?”

  “Sure,” he answered glancing up in the rear-view mirror at her, “Any special reason?”

  “I’ll tell you when we get there.”

  When they reached the elderly woman’s house, Ramira directed him past it to the dirt road on the left that led to the old farm house.

  Ramira leaned over the seat looking up the dirt road. “Can you turn up here? The only tracks we saw were from ATVs but it looks like a vehicle can drive on it. There’s an old farmhouse up ahead.”

  Frank turned onto the old dirt road and drove up it very slowly, taking the car in and out of deep ruts. When he spotted the driveway that led to the old farmhouse, he could tell that it had not been used for many years. Turning in, he parked the vehicle.

  After getting out, Ramira pointed up to the mountainside. “We came out around there. Mom, do you think you could find out who owns all of this property? We would like your employer, Jonathan, to represent us and make a purchase. We want to buy this whole mountain including the old farmhouse and the land around it.”

  Laura looked at her in surprise. “Isn’t that a pretty big step for someone your age?”

  “Zaac and I have our reasons. We’re going to buy it together. The ordeal we went through made us grow up pretty quick.” Looking over at Zaac, she could not resist a little jab. “At least it did for me.” Zaac was caught off guard. “Now what is that supposed to mean?”

  She winked.

  “I’m starting to see what you mean,” Ramira’s mother said. “I’ll check into it and let you know.”