by Ky Tyrand
Around the next bend it became apparent that the scope of this place was much greater than Ki’ara ever could have imagined.
“Whoa,” she said, stopping in the middle of the path.
Noting that the cavern opened wide just ahead, the others peered around Ki’ara. What they saw was not at all what they were expecting…
The group found themselves overlooking what appeared to be a huge valley, the scale of which was completely unfathomable.
Steep rocky hillsides sloped down on both sides, separated in the middle by a treacherous canyon with vertical cliff-face walls, not unlike the near-bottomless crevasses that carved through the jungle floor far above.
But this place was deep underground. And yet it felt like they were still on the surface. The air seemed fresher here than in the tunnels behind them.
And there was light. Plenty of it.
While caves were normally shrouded blackness, Ki’ara and her friends had no trouble seeing all the way across the gigantic cavity.
All wondering the same thing, everyone looked to the ceiling.
The “sky”, which would be blue or gray outdoors, scintillated with patches of colorful light. The clumps of radiance came from shafts of quartz crystals that protruded from the ceiling and walls at odd angles – some long, some short – all glowing brilliantly in a place that should be darker than a moonless night. The groupings were irregular in size, shape, luminosity, and color; scattered throughout the unfathomably vast cavern in a way that lit most of this underground world to a point that was at least as bright as a cloudy day on the surface.
The reflection and refraction of prismatic light made it intense in places, while soft and hazy in others. Likewise, the mix of colored minerals – some purple and pink, others teal and yellow, even a few that were orange and red – all affected how the light was cast. Although, considering the spectrum of colors, the light appeared surprisingly white in most places.
And there was enough of it to support life.
Small streams and waterfalls trickled down the rocks in various places, meandering their way through the expansive valley until they met up in pools or cascaded into the central crevasse. And near the water were bushes and trees, areas rich with colorful foliage.
Ki’ara remembered how surprised she had been to find things growing inside Sirona’s lair. But it was nothing compared to this.
Blocked by rocky outcroppings on both sides of them, the group couldn’t tell how far the valley went in either direction, but there were certainly areas of this gargantuan cavern that were outside their field of view.
Petch was making a continuous, low-pitched groan as he took everything in, before suddenly pointing. “Look!”
The others followed his finger to an area on the far hillside, where there was an unmistakable grouping of what appeared to be intelligently-made structures. From their position across the canyon, it looked like it might be some sort of village.
Expelled breath carried Ki’ara’s wonder, “What is this place?”
From beside her, she heard To’mas answer, “Welcome to the Underworld.”
7
Fascinated by what they had discovered, everyone was excited to continue on their way.
Unfortunately, the path led right back into another narrow tunnel, blocking the view of the vast underground world. They were back in the darkness, relying on Ki’ara’s Niksuru at the front, and Je’nna’s penlight at the rear, to see their way through.
Ki’ara wished the others all had Grav-Regulators like she did. With them, they could shoot across the strange valley and explore. A place like this must have a million things to discover. But her mother’s memories led her back into the tunnels, so she forced her curiosity aside and diligently followed.
The main route was easy enough to stay on, and that seemed to be the direction she was being led, so Ki’ara set aside the floating triangle in hopes of gaining some ground and getting back out to the open valley.
Just as anxious to get out of the tunnels, the others hastily followed, making quick work of it until Petch pointed out that Ki’ara hadn’t checked the memory box in a while.
The Princess stopped and acknowledged that the boy was probably right. And it was a good thing she did, for when Ki’ara placed her finger upon the Inuwuru, her mother’s memory brought her to the very place they stood.
Her eyes looked ahead to a narrowing in the tunnel, and made their way to the ceiling, before turning away.
Something was up there.
Ki’ara couldn’t say exactly what it was, but she sensed the danger. It was a trap, and she had nearly led her friends straight into it.
Instead of following the main path, the Angel veered off and zigzagged through a patch of pillars, where stalactites and stalagmites had joined to form columns between the ceiling and floor. The route led to a narrow passage that would have been completely hidden to anyone unaware of its existence.
Pulling her finger away from the metal triangle, Ki’ara was relieved to find that the others had stopped behind her. If any of them had decided to venture ahead while she tinkered with the memory device, it could have been catastrophic.
Though she couldn’t say for certain what it was, there was a trap waiting for them ahead; it was set, and ready to be triggered.
Ki’ara warned them and turned her band of adventurers off the main trail and through the maze of columns. The passage at the far end led to another chamber, this one showing signs of civilization. There were etchings on the walls, similar to those she found at the entrance to Sirona’s lair.
And the floor in this cavern had stone tiles. Though they weren’t tightly fitted, the pieces were certainly manmade; roughly cut in various geometrical shapes, with wide, sandy grout lines in-between.
“Be careful,” she warned, as the others followed her into the room. “There could be traps.”
Her finger went back to the metal box, which she had attached to her forearm using her Mu’turi. She watched as her mother moved quickly across the room, eyeing her feet with every other step. Ki’ara found herself walking along with the Angel as she stepped from tile to tile. Her eyes glanced down to her feet again as she neared the end of the chamber.
Why does she keep looking down, wondered Ki’ara, as her mother placed her foot on the final square tile before the passage narrowed.
The square tile.
Ki’ara felt her heart jump as she lurched back to reality and shouted, “Wait!”
Her eyes dropped to her feet, and the square tile under her. She carefully turned, while her mind spun at the speed of light, making everything feel like it was moving in slow motion.
The Princess immediately spotted the trail of square tiles, amidst a myriad of other geometrical shapes which covered the remainder of the floor. Her friends were in a line behind her, all standing on the square tiles… except for To’mas, who stood on a pentagon-shaped tile beside her.
“What is it?” he asked, following Ki’ara’s eyes to his feet. The man flinched as he felt the ground sink beneath his weight.
Before anyone could respond, the bottom dropped out of the chamber.
8
The floor of sand and stone was suddenly falling, and To’mas was going with it.
With barely an instant to react, Ki’ara had already lunged, giving her just enough time to catch his sleeves and squeeze for a grip as his weight pulled her downward. She tumbled off the square tile – which somehow remained in place without any floor around it – and fell into the darkness with To’mas.
With what she hoped was a strong enough grasp, the Princess opened her Grav-Regulator. Though Ki’ara knew she wouldn’t be able to lift the man, she was certain the G.R. would at least slow their descent.
She was wrong.
Je’nna nearly lost her breath as she watched the sand and stones drop from around her with a loud hiss and a rumble, taking Ki’ara and To’mas along with them. The noise was deafening as the chamber echoed with sounds of
rocks and rubble grinding and banging together as everything plunged into the shadows. Soon enough, the violent clamor dissipated, replaced by the sound of water running somewhere in the darkness beneath them.
All that was left after the floor had fallen was a line of square tiles, which were now columns of rock poking up from an empty void. The tops of the pillars formed a bridge across the chamber, while the bottoms disappeared into the blackness below.
Je’nna’s vertigo kicked into full-swing as the light from Ki’ara’s Niksuru vanished into a foggy cloud of dust and rubble. She had no idea how far the Princess had fallen, or if her friend’s G.R. had saved her. It was all Je’nna could do to maintain her own footing as her vision spun round and round, while she struggled to maintain her balance.
The girl looked up to see Petch ahead of her, waving his arms in frantic circles as his prosthetic feet balanced precariously atop a single square column.
Je’nna fought the urge to vomit as the dizzying effects of having nothing around her but a bottomless drop prevented her from breathing. She forced herself to the next step as the boy continued to wiggle about. Each platform was just large enough for a single person to stand on, but Je’nna couldn’t reach Petch as he leaned away from her.
One of his prosthetic feet lifted from the tile as he began to topple, making way for Je’nna to step from her perch and put one foot next to his.
Her hand closed around his belt, and she pulled.
In an awkward dance that nearly tripped them both up, Petch’s foot replanted an instant after Je’nna’s toes slipped out and returned to her own tile.
Their free hands waved about as the pair struggled for balance. But when their flailing arms bumped one another, Je’nna’s penlight – now the only source of light in the room – was knocked from her grasp.
The life ending drop faded away as her light vanished into the abyss, leaving them in complete blackness.
Protect the Inuwuru.
The thought came to Ki’ara only an instant before she was engulfed by a torrent of water. She had flipped the box shut and did her best to bind it tight to her arm, but suddenly found herself tumbling head over heels through a violent rush; scooped up by some kind of underground river.
Ki’ara had instinctively closed her helmet as she fell, but she still felt the bumps of being jostled from side to side and couldn’t wager a guess as to which way was up. Everything was a blur, moving too fast to make sense of.
She’d lost track of To’mas, but was sure that he was ahead of her, somewhere in this wash of whitewater.
Surrounded by bubbles and froth – glowing blue from the light of her Niksuru – it was impossible for Ki’ara to get her bearings.
A memory flashed to mind of a moment so terrifying she’d forced it from her thoughts until this very instant, and now there was no escaping it: being held under by the current, unable to make sense of which way was up amidst a cyclone of tiny bubbles. Ki’ara remembered feeling so helpless and desperate… and now it was happening all over again.
Landry, the very boy who had dragged her off the dam and into the churning water, was also the one who pulled her to safety. But he wasn’t there this time. There would be no rescue by anyone but herself.
Even through her armor, Ki’ara could tell that the chute channeling her was smooth and slippery; carved from rock after centuries of erosion. As she shot along with the current, it seemed like nothing would slow her down…
But she was terribly mistaken.
The Princess hit something in her path. It didn’t hurt, not with her armor. At first, she even wondered if it was To’mas. But she could tell that it was solid and heavy, hard and flat.
Not a person, a rock; a tile from the floor above.
It moved with her for a bit, washing down the chute alongside her legs. But, after a particularly sharp curve, the chunk turned sideways and somehow lodged itself in the narrow slide, halting in Ki’ara’s path, and stopping her along with it.
The Princess slid partway under the obstruction, scraping the sides of her torso as she was abruptly wedged into place. Were it not for the combat armor, her body would be a mess. But her mere presence prevented any chance of the oval-shaped stone breaking free. Her torso locked it firmly in place.
Almost instantly, another tile slammed into her from above. And then another. Things were piling up, and Ki’ara was at the bottom of the jamb.
To make matters worse, her mask was filling with water.
9
With darkness surrounding them, their situation almost didn’t feel real. The two of them could be standing in an open field with their eyes closed, ready to run and play and explore. It would be easy to convince themselves that a step in any direction other than forward or back wouldn’t be the last step they ever made. Or that losing their balance wouldn’t cost them their lives.
Unfortunately, that was not the case.
Petch’s heavy breathing reminded Je’nna to do the same.
“Calm,” she muttered out loud, more to herself than to the boy. Her head felt like it was going to explode from the blood her pounding heart was shooting through her. “Don’t. Move.” These words were for Petch, as she herself was already frozen in place.
“Okay,” whispered the boy. “Ki’ara…”
“She’ll be fine,” Je’nna lied. “She has armor and a G.R.”
With a simple thought Je’nna closed her helmet, lighting up her view with the Night Vision tech in her visor.
Shaded in green, Petch appeared with his back turned to her as she maintained a firm grip on his belt. His arms were out to the sides like he was either walking a tightrope or being held up at gunpoint. There was nothing but a deadly fall on either side of him, and not a single thing to hang onto but the dark air itself.
Je’nna could tell that the boy was doing his best to hold still. But his legs were wobbling, and she could feel his back trembling against her knuckles. If Petch flinched too suddenly, they would surely both go over.
“Stay calm,” said Je’nna.
“I’m trying,” whimpered Petch.
Je’nna blew out a breath and confessed, “I wasn’t talking to you.”
Her words were enough to send the boy’s arms waving frantically about.
“Hold still!” ordered Je’nna. “You’re doing fine. Just… take a breath.” The truth was, she was impressed at how stable Petch was, considering the circumstances. It was hard enough to maintain balance in the dark with feet to feel the floor and make subconscious adjustments. Je’nna knew this from her training, and the instructors who made her practice fighting skills in the dark to improve her technique. Feeling the movements was much different than seeing them, they would tell her. And they were right.
But Je’nna was certain that it would be ten times as hard without feet.
“Just… hang-on,” she told him, trying to keep her cool. “I’ve got a plan.”
Surrounded by nothing but blackness on every side, Petch did as he was told.
One at a time, Je’nna lifted her feet, allowing the Land-Mag disks she’d procured from the Wolf Room to flip from her ankles to her soles. As she touched them to the square platform, she could feel the inter-dimensional technology adjust to the frequency of the stone, locking her in place. The security of that feeling was enough to cause her to expel another breath. “Okay,” she whispered, while separating her feet as much as she could for stability. “You need to turn around. Slowly. To the left.”
With several sharp breaths and an attempt to stop shaking, Petch began to pivot while Je’nna kept a close eye on his footing.
“Yes,” she told him. “Just like that. Now… hold out your left hand.”
His hand lifted. He tried to keep it still.
“Good,” said Je’nna. “I’m going to let go of your belt and take your hand, okay?”
“Ye… Yeah.”
Petch wobbled as Je’nna quickly switched her grip, catching his hand and giving it a firm squeeze.
The boy continued shuffling on the spot, while holding his arm out in front of him.
“A little more.” Je’nna took his right hand the moment she could reach it. “Okay, good. Now, take a step toward me.”
Wishing she had eyes in the back of her head, Je’nna put her foot back, feeling for the stone behind her while balancing on one leg. She leaned back when she found it, making room for the boy’s oncoming foot. “Bigger step, BIGGER STEP!” she warned him.
Breathe, she reminded herself.
The boy’s prosthetic foot landed where it was supposed to, right beside her boot.
“Perfect,” she told him. “Next leg.”
Petch brought his other leg forward as Je’nna lifted her foot to make way for him. “Nice.”
It was working. But they’d only gone one step.
“Again,” said Je’nna. “Exactly the same.”
The following step was easier. She kept just as close an eye on the placement of his prosthetic feet but didn’t need to call out any instructions. The only thing she told him was, “Perfect,” when he was standing on the next stone.
Two down.
“Breathe.” This reminder she said out loud.
Afraid to look back, Je’nna tried to remember how many steps they’d taken into the chamber. It couldn’t have been many. She didn’t think they were more than a third of the way into the room when the floor had dropped out.
Curiosity won out after the next step. Careful not to look down, Je’nna cautiously glanced over her shoulder to see how many stones were remaining.
There was a man standing behind her, silently watching as the pair struggled to survive their predicament.
10
