by David Webb
The trip would be a long one. According to Salvador, they hadn’t even made it to the Basradur tunnel yet. The caves stretched on much farther than Aniya thought, and the trip seemed even longer as she couldn’t help but dwell on her unfortunate circumstances.
Minutes later, she heard footsteps in the distance, but it didn’t sound like the thundering steps of the Silvers. Nevertheless, Salvador ordered the group to extinguish their lights and remain still.
Soon, they were joined by three men carrying torches, led by Lieutenant Haskill.
“We’re clear,” the lieutenant said. “It’s a mother. A squad waits in the Ravelta tunnel when you’re ready. We’ve already disabled the torches.”
Salvador softened and smiled. “Good. Then our guests will be privileged to see an amazing sight before their departure. I guess we shall be taking the Ravelta tunnel after all.” He turned around. “Don’t bother lighting your torches. We’re almost to the epicenter.”
Lieutenant Haskill led the group for a few minutes until they reached a large cavern about half the size of Refuge. The cave was lit by several torches, revealing dozens of smaller tunnels branching off from this central location.
“This is our epicenter, made from the remains of a nest of moles. It took us a long time to clear this place out.” The lieutenant guided the group through the cavern. “Much like the Lightbringers’ Hub is the core of the Web, this cavern is the center of this network of tunnels. From this point, we can reach most of this quadrant of the Web.”
After a few minutes, they reached one of the tunnels, and Salvador raised a finger to his lips. “From here, we must be very quiet. Keep your lights out.”
They walked into the tunnel and continued on until the light from the epicenter faded. Aniya could make out several torches lining the walls of this tunnel, but they had been extinguished. In the dark, she smelled a faint odor, a putrid one that made her stomach churn.
The group halted, and seconds later, a soft, green glow appeared in Salvador’s hand, just enough to light their way through the tunnels.
“What is that?” Aniya whispered as she peered at the mass in Salvador’s hands and noted that it seemed to be slowly moving. “I’ve been seeing them all over.”
“Earthworms,” Corrin said quietly, “exposed to centuries of radiation. We’ve affectionately come to know them as glowworms. They’re quite handy in the most desperate of situations, and we’ve found that they give off just enough light without giving our positions away.”
Roland poked at the clump of critters. “To the Silvers?”
“Among others,” Lieutenant Haskill said. “You’ve probably never seen them before because they’re neutralized by artificial light, including luminescence from the sky ceilings. But here in the caves, where we use nothing but fire, they thrive and absorb energy from the natural light.”
Salvador held a finger to his lips and turned, leading the group down the tunnel, his figure a dark silhouette against the soft green glow emanating from his hand.
“What is that smell?” Roland plugged his nose. He turned to Aniya, who also covered her nose with her hands.
Though Roland had tried to speak quietly, Salvador hushed him and spoke even lower. “You shall see soon enough.”
But despite Salvador’s quick dismissal of Roland’s comment, the Scourge paused. After a moment, he shook his head, and they continued.
Finally, they approached several other people waiting in the tunnel, most of them with spears in their hands. Two of them carried guns.
Wordlessly, the two groups merged and continued.
The large group continued through the tunnel, led by Salvador and his handful of green light, and followed by the unarmed Aniya and Roland in back.
“I think the boy was onto something,” Aniya heard Lieutenant Haskill whisper to Salvador. “It’s not just the mother. Do you smell that?”
Salvador nodded but said nothing. The Lieutenant turned around, frowning, and whispered something to Corrin.
Aniya sniffed again, and the putrid smell overcame her senses, nearly causing her to retch. But another smell lingered below, a faint one that she couldn’t quite place.
She relegated the smell to the back of her mind, and as a splash came from below, Aniya looked down and noticed that her left foot was immersed in a thin stream of liquid. The Ravelta tunnel, it seemed, was close to an underground river. She took a step to the right and continued.
A few more steps, and the group stopped.
“Let’s wake her up,” Salvador said quietly.
Malcolm stepped out in front and pointed a large rifle down the tunnel. He peered down a sight and fired one shot.
A piercing shriek rang out and echoed through the tunnels. After a moment of silence, a menacing growl came from the tunnel ahead, slowly turning into a deafening roar.
Salvador took a spear from Xander as Lieutenant Haskill raised his voice. “Ready!”
The ground shook beneath Aniya’s feet as the roar intensified.
“Now!”
The group raised their weapons and braced themselves.
A massive creature appeared in the green glow, its eyes narrowed and teeth bared in rage.
Aniya had seen and killed many moles in her time, most of them standing just under a foot tall. But this monster was easily ten times the size of the largest mole she had ever encountered before Brisket. And unlike the smaller ones, this beast had flesh that seemed to be covered in thick, scaly armor, except for a large, soft spot on the animal’s belly. Its eyes were wide open, a tiny red glow in the very middle of its massive, black pupils. But its massive teeth caught Aniya’s attention the most, and her mouth dropped open as they gnashed wildly with every step.
As those with guns fired at the mole, the beast rushed the group and was pierced by dozens of spears, each of them digging deep into the animal’s belly, its seemingly only vulnerable spot. The monster let loose another howl of pain and retreated a few steps, pulling itself free from the spears.
“Again!” Lieutenant Haskill shouted, shoving a new clip into his gun.
The creature dug its hind legs into the ground, preparing another assault.
“Now!”
But this shout didn’t come from the lieutenant.
The group froze as the command echoed from beyond the mole, much farther down the tunnel.
Aniya glanced at Salvador, who dropped the spear and drew a gun from a holster at his side, his eyes wide.
“We’re not alone.”
In the distance, past the mole, another faint glow appeared. It raced toward them, a bright orange light approaching the group faster than the beast had.
Suddenly, the mole burst into flames, a ten-foot, blazing abomination.
The fire continued past the mole and raced past the group as they dove to the side and out of the way. The tunnel, around eight feet wide, now had a two-foot strip of fire running down the middle.
Aniya’s shock broke as Roland grabbed her arm.
“Your foot, Aniya!”
She looked down to see her left pant leg catching fire, the flames beginning to spread up her calf. As she dropped to the ground to extinguish the fire in the dirt, she realized that rather than an underground river, she had been stepping in fuel.
Aniya stood again and was met with a terrifying sight: the mole, still a writhing mass of flesh and flame, seemed to dance in the blaze, kicking out wildly as it screamed with a guttural cry.
Then, from behind the burning monster, came a new threat.
In the distance, white lights flashed on and backlit the giant, fiery mole, casting a dark shadow on the group and shielding them from the blinding light.
The tunnel exploded in noise as several small explosions rang out from further down the tunnel.
Bullets bounced off the mole’s armored epidermis, causing no harm, but the animal shrieked in pain as the fire ate away through its tough outer layer and reached sensitive flesh.
With a roar, the mole
rushed toward the group in a frenzied run, but collapsed after just a few steps and writhed on the cave floor just in front of the group.
Now that the mole lay down in a smoldering heap, the white light burst through and blinded Aniya, and she stumbled backward. She fell to the ground and held her hands in front of her eyes.
“The lights, Salvador!” Corrin knelt by Aniya’s side, placing his body between her and the armed intruders. “The electromagnetic device must be down.”
“Then radio Refuge!” Salvador’s voice came from the group. “If their communications work, so do ours. Lieutenant, get the engineers on the emergency channel and tell them to turn it back on, now!”
A bullet whizzed by Aniya’s ear, and one of Salvador’s men fell in the small strip of flame, his motionless body quickly catching fire.
Corrin stretched his arms wide, blocking Aniya’s body further, but he fell over on top of her with a grunt of pain as blood spurted from his shoulder.
Salvador turned to Aniya and Roland. “You must leave, now! Tamisra, take them to the Basradur tunnel, but go no further. Then, go back to Refuge and rally our troops. Go, now!” He threw his glowworms to the ground, their bodies now black and lifeless.
Roland grabbed Aniya’s hand and pulled her out from underneath Corrin’s body. She offered no resistance, instead running with him as fast as she could, careful not to step into the fire.
Behind them, the gunfire continued, accompanied by screams of pain. A few bullets made their way past the main group, barely missing the fleeing trio.
That is, until Aniya’s hand was suddenly yanked, forcing her to stumble to the tunnel floor, dangerously close to the thin wall of fire. She turned around to see Roland sprawled out on the ground.
“Roland!” Aniya screamed and jumped over the fire to kneel next to her friend.
“Is he okay?” Tamisra knelt next to Aniya, her voice escalating even higher than her normal shrill pitch.
“I don’t know,” Aniya said. “Help me.”
The two girls carefully rolled Roland onto his back.
Roland’s eyes were shut tight, a low moan escaping his pursed lips. He sat up slowly, clutching his left leg. Aniya looked down and saw a steady stream of blood flow from Roland’s calf, slowly coursing off his body and into the nearby fire.
“You’ve gotta go, Aniya. You need to make it to the Hub and get William back.” Roland spoke through clenched teeth. “Promise me you’ll get him back.”
“Come on, pet.” Tamisra pulled at his arm and began to drag him back up. “You’re not done yet.”
Aniya wrapped her right arm around Roland’s other side, forcing him back up again. “Come on, we can make it!”
Roland continued to protest, but the girls hoisted him up and continued on.
They kept moving at a slow pace until Roland suddenly gave way and crumpled to the ground. Another bullet had managed to find his hip.
Roland squirmed in pain. “Gotta keep going, Aniya. Get out while you still can.”
Aniya clutched his hand. “I can’t just leave you!”
“You have to. This is more important than me. Remember,” he said wrily. “That’s the neat thing about not existing. It doesn’t matter as much if you’re dead.”
“Roland, come on. It matters to me.” Aniya fought back tears. “I care.”
“Then make this worth it. Find your brother and Nicholas and bring them home. Trust no one but Kendall. Get her out of here, Tamisra.”
Tamisra nodded. “I’m coming back for you.”
Aniya opened her mouth but was cut short by the sound of more gunfire, louder now.
“We’ve got to go, Aniya.” Tamisra pulled on her arm.
“No. You stay with him.” Aniya pushed her away. “You take care of him. When I come back, he has to be alive. I can’t lose anyone else.”
Tamisra hesitated but nodded. “Take the third tunnel to your right. Don’t come back until someone comes to get you. There may be nothing to come back to.”
“I understand,” Aniya said, standing.
“Go.”
She turned and ran, faster now that she was on her own.
Behind her, more gunfire rang out, and she heard no more from Roland. The tunnel curved before her, and Aniya turned, leaving the fire behind her and running into the darkness, completely and utterly alone.
21
Aniya ran.
She ran through the pitch-black tunnel, not stopping to grab a torch from her pack, even though she could no longer hear gunfire.
She ran through her tears, which now flowed freely and heavily.
She ran with all her might, growing weary in her legs and in her heart.
The darkness surrounding her provided no sight of her destination, so Aniya ran blindly, stretching her arms forward to keep from running into the walls of the tunnel.
Her mind drifted and gave way to her imagination. In the black ahead, Aniya saw Roland’s dead body, riddled with bullets. She pushed the image out of her mind, but it came back a second later, this time showing Tamisra sprawled out on the cave floor next to Roland, their blood mixing on the dirt between their bodies.
With a pained shout, Aniya banished the thoughts from her mind, embracing the dark instead and running even harder.
Finally, through her tears, she saw a tiny glow in the distance.
The epicenter.
With renewed strength, Aniya pumped her legs harder and raced against the fear and anger that brimmed inside her. She pushed aside the faces and focused on only the light.
At last, she came out on the other side of the tunnel and into the cavern of light, and Aniya let her tired legs give way, willingly falling to the ground with reckless abandon. Her mind urged her to get up and run, but she did not hear any noise from the tunnel behind her, at least not over her heaving breath.
After a moment sprawled on the dirt floor, Aniya pushed herself to a seated position and backed up against the opposite wall, still keeping an eye on the tunnel from which she had just emerged.
She only let herself rest until her breathing steadied and some energy returned. If the Silvers made it past the Scourge and his men, their next stop would be the epicenter, where she would be an easy target. But if she were in one of the many tunnels that branched off from this central location, the chances of them finding and catching up to her were very slim.
So as soon as her strength returned, Aniya stood.
“Third tunnel on the right,” she muttered to herself. It made no sense, really. If Ravelta was the closest sector to the Hub and Basradur was the second closest, wouldn’t their tunnels be adjacent? But then again, the tunnels were made by moles. They moved in whatever random direction seemed best at the time.
Knowing she didn’t have much time left before the Lightbringers would catch up, Aniya reached into her rucksack and quickly drank some water and took a bite of mole jerky. As she put her supplies back, she noticed a small pouch tied to the top of her pack.
Aniya took the pouch and opened it to find several glowworms packed together. She took the worms out of the pouch and held them to her face, examining the creatures with fascination. Her skin tickled as their thick bodies slowly intermingled, seemingly content to rest in a stranger’s palms.
After a moment, she put her rucksack back on, leaving the worms in her hand, and headed down the third tunnel to the right.
The way was easier now that she had some light, and it helped that she traveled at a light jog rather than a dead run, allowing her to travel with more care.
She had been jogging for several minutes when she was blinded once again.
The tunnel lit up as bright as day thanks to several flashlights strapped to the heads of men in silver armor, standing not a hundred feet from her.
The Lightbringers had guessed her next move and were waiting for her.
“Now!”
A command echoed from down the tunnel, and Aniya instinctively dropped to the dirt floor as bullets whizzed overhead
. At least she thought they were bullets. As she listened to them hitting the tunnel walls, she realized they were tranquilizer pellets.
Something crunchy tickled her palm, and she looked down to see the blackened corpses of the glowworms clutched in her hand. She let go, and they rolled away and onto the dirt.
This time, the Silvers’ lights were strobing wildly. A tiny spark of hope ignited in Aniya. Refuge must have turned back on the jammer, and it was emitting a signal that interfered with the Lightbringers’ communications and lights. She had a real chance of escaping now, thanks to the added confusion.
She took a deep breath and readied herself. Aniya didn’t know how their guns worked, how long it took to reload them, or if they needed to be reloaded at all, but she knew that if she stuck around much longer, it wouldn’t matter.
The strobe of the lights slowed, and she jumped to her feet, turned, and ran, thankful that the Basradur tunnel had more twists and curves than the tunnel to Ravelta. The flashing light quickly turned to a faint, flickering glow behind her, and she vanished into the darkness.
As she neared the epicenter, Aniya pictured the Silvers emerging from the Ravelta tunnel victorious, holding Roland’s decapitated head in front of her, mocking her as they sedated her and took her away. After all, she had been in the Basradur tunnel long enough that it was a very real possibility.
However, as she stumbled into the epicenter, she was relieved to see that the Silvers had not made it to the cavern yet.
Aniya paused briefly to catch her breath. She tried to focus on her options and not the hopelessness that nagged at her mind. If she went down a tunnel that she thought might be close to the Hub, the Silvers might be there waiting as well. If she moved farther away from the Hub, she knew it would be much harder to find her way to her brother.
But it didn’t seem to matter. The tunnels’ paths seemed to be completely random and could go anywhere. All she knew was that three tunnels to the left was the tunnel to Ravelta, to the Lightbringers, to Roland’s wounded—maybe dead—body.
She didn’t even know which tunnel led back to Refuge. All tunnels were completely dark now. She guessed it was intentionally done by Salvador’s men as a safeguard against intruders, just like when they first captured Aniya and Roland.
