Gunther's Cavern

by Edward Etzkorn

  “In celebration of that achievement, the Insect Leaders and I would like to provide you with a special treat tonight.”

  He waved his arms in the direction of the catacombs and spoke a few syllables in a range of tones that all but pierced Gunther’s ear drums with their shriek. “Tik song moon ee-e-eee.”

  Four tardigrades, all a little smaller than Teddy, emerged from the catacombs carrying some sort of crockery in their upper-middle arms. They glided across the floor of the cave and set the earthen plates down before the children.

  In the light provided by the glowworms, Gunther had to strain to see what the plates contained, and was stunned to see cave fish. Although their eye sockets, like those of other cave fish, were opaque, they could not have seen anything, anyway. They were dead. Beside each fish sat two knives—not kitchen knives or penknives; more like hobby knives made for whittling wood or trimming flashings from plastic airplane models.

  Gunther reached out and touched a fish. It felt as it looked—cold and slimy. Uncooked. He drew his hand back in disgust.

  A glance around told him the other children shared his repulsion. Were they supposed to eat these things? Wiggling larvae were, at least, warm and familiar.

  Trying to mask his feelings, he looked up at Teddy, to see his flagella still waving with what looked like excitement.

  “Please enjoy your reward,” Teddy said. “One of our group will return when you are done to collect the knives. I’m sorry, but for the protection of us all, there will be a knife count.” With a bow, he followed the shorter tardigrades into the catacombs.

  As soon as the Tardies had disappeared within the grotto, the dining area bustled with movement.

  “We’re supposed to eat this crap?” Rocky VII’s voice sounded above the overall murmurs.

  Sass: “Do we cook it, or eat it like this?”

  “Don’t see no stoves around.”

  “Looks like like this.”

  “They’re afraid we’ll use these knives to attack them? This knife couldn’t cut cow patties.”

  Gunther tried to still the murmurings, afraid the kids’ displeasure would irk the Tardies into producing something worse the next time, or conjuring up some new way of making their lives miserable. “It’s okay,” he said. “Ssh, ssh. Don’t let them see.”

  June joined him in his “shushing” sounds, waving her hands in a calming manner. “Whatever, guys. It doesn’t matter. We’ll deal with it.”

  Rad leaned over and grabbed one of the fish, along with a hobby knife. “Think of it as sushi. Come on, we can all eat sushi.” She began carving the fish—looking, to Gunther, like an experienced sushi chef.

  Van grabbed a fish and knife and, imitating Rad’s movements, began cutting and slicing. Giles followed suit, then Tiff.

  “Sushi,” Tiff said, dragging the vowels out so they sounded soft and relaxing. “Picture it.”

  “Sushi,” several other kids echoed.

  “Sooo-sheee.”

  A few kids laughed. The mood had elevated.

  Then, from somewhere in the rear, came the sound of an open palm slapping rock—once, twice, three times.

  The voice began as a barely-audible moan. It grew into a screech, and then a howl. The cadence of the slapping of palm on rock increased. “I can’t stand it. I can’t stand it! I can’t … freakin’ … stand it!”

  As a unit, the kids turned to look behind them. Billy was standing in front of a rock nearly as tall as he. Gunther had not seen him leave the group. Now that he thought about it, he had not seen Billy among their group at The Sink, either.

  “Get … me … out of here!”

  Several kids jumped to their feet.

  Rocky VII reached him first. “Hey, man. Cool. Chill. Cool.”

  Great social skills, Gunther thought.

  Sass patted Billy’s back and massaged his neck and upper back. “It’s okay, Billy. It’s okay. Just a little longer.”

  Rocky cooed over Billy like a mama pigeon. “Bill, man. Billy …”

  Billy seemed to soften. He let Rocky VII coax him down to the table rock and into a sitting position. Then, without warning, Billy bolted to his feet and screamed in a voice that echoed a hundred times through chambers in many directions. “Aaaahhh …!”

  Gunther focused on the fish.

  Rad carved faster, bending forward so her nose almost touched the slimy flesh.

  Van looked like a seamstress, pulling out unneeded threads, knots—and guts.

  June fluttered like a bee without a flower to land on.

  “Billy, shut your face!” The voice came loud and shrill. From Kara—a Kara Gunther did not know existed. With a voice that sent a shiver down his spine.

  Kara’s voice was followed by Hood’s—deeper, more authoritative, but somehow a shadow of Kara’s. “Shut your face, Billy.”

  The dinner area fell silent.

  The pause was long, but welcome.

  “Sushi is served!” Rad announced with a flourish.

  INTERLUDE 6

  The revving of Zeke’s motorcycle grew more and more insistent. Dicey understood its message, but did not want to accept it. As the sky grew a deeper purple and errant clouds delivered larger and more frequent raindrops, she yielded to the inevitable. The searchers were not going to find the cave entrance today.

  Silent, bedraggled, wet with sweat and rain, the group stood in place, waiting for her to make the decision. She ran her eyes over the faces, half hidden in the trees near the far end of her property, then over the circle of yellow police tape, which now circumscribed an area so broad she could no longer see the rock at its center.

  She dropped the ball of tape she was holding. “Thank you, everybody. We’ll continue tomorrow.”

  With sighs of relief, the group broke rank and, exhausted, began walking toward the spring, where Zeke and his machine awaited. Luisa shivered in her skimpy outfit, more a Mud Princess than Miss Greene County now. Jimmy lifted his feet, caked in mud, like a robot. Spike turned circles as he walked, as if trying to figure where they had gone wrong.

  Energy still shot from Zeke as he motioned the group to gather around. “Now I know where the term ‘Wet Blanket’ came from!” he cackled.

  No one laughed, but several faces smiled as they looked up at him.

  “Okay now—so we had a bad day. So we didn’t find the cave. Does that mean it’s not here? No!!! It just means tomorrow we focus somewhere else!

  “Do you think all Jesus’ days spent in the desert were glorious? Do you think He enjoyed throwing those danged Pharisees out of the temple, making them mad as hornets, and just dying to get back at Him? No way, brothers and sisters!!! Jesus had the same feelings we all do, and then some!”

  The group perked up at his words. Faces looked at one another, hands touched other hands. Some people laughed. The last several circles had taken them in wide arcs through the woods. Several people had twigs in their hair, and their arms and legs were streaked with mud or slashed by branches.

  Revving his engine with the fuel of his emotion, Zeke continued. “I still smell the cave. It’s here—we just missed it. I still think it’s back near that big rock, back where we started.”

  “I think so, too,” a small voice sounded.

  The faces turned toward Kelila. They all knew her voice—high-pitched, squeaky, sweet but a little nuts.

  “Gunther’s been talking to me. He tells me we’re close. We were hot when we started, then warm, but now we’re getting colder.”

  I could have told you that, Dicey thought.

  “Right on, little sister!” Zeke shouted. “Tomorrow—skies permitting—we’ll take up where we left off. Or actually, where we started.” He roared with laughter in appreciation of his own humor.

  He led the way down the hill, with the rest of the rescuers, their fervor partly rekindled, dragging behind. Their voices rose and fell amid the raindrops. The clouds scudded above them, as the sun rushed
to a premature grave, yielding to a crescent moon surrounded by a halo that any saint would have been proud to wear.

  As they neared the bottom of the hill, Dicey spied the tarp that had been set up in the driveway behind her house. The northeast breeze blew scents her way that set her mouth to watering and made her realize how little she’d eaten over the past few days.

  Durrell’s voice was the first she heard from beneath the tarp.

  “Hey, folks! Any luck?”

  The muffled groan that followed provided the answer.

  Cathy’s voice followed. “Figured you could use a good lardo meal once you got back!”

  The group huddled together under the tarp, shaking hands, enfolding one another and the Sheffields in their wet, muddy embrace. The smells of roasted chicken, broiled steak, onion, and garlic formed a cloud around them all, some of them shivering, all of them united in a common purpose.

  Dicey ate enough to compensate for the days and nights of anorexia. So, too, did everyone else, as far as she could tell. She did not know how many cans of beer the Sheffields had brought, but she doubted any remained an hour later. She and Spike, even with arms wrapped around each other, could not make it to the stairs. While someone outside closed their porch door, they passed out together on their living-room sofa.

  As the halo around the moon had promised, the next day dawned dark and stormy. Zeke phoned Dicey first, around 6 AM. “I’m truly sorry, Dicey,” he said. “But my machine just ain’t no good in the rain. If you guys get out there today, check out that rock again. My instinct tells me that’s the spot. Smell it, feel it, talk to it. Let that little girl get close to it. What’s her name?—Kelly comes to mind, but I know that ain’t right.”

  “Kelila,” Dicey said.

  “Kelila. Let her get close and friendly with it. She may be a little nuts, but she’s the one gonna lead you to your kids.”

  Kelila called next, while Dicey was preparing breakfast for herself and Spike and six others—a number she’d decided upon for no special reason.

  One potato, two potato

  Three potato, four—

  Five potato, six potato,

  Six potato, six potato,

  Six potato,

  Six potato …

  And so she’d prepared food for six extra people.

  Kelila could not join them today. Not because of the rain, but because of some collision in a galaxy light years away. Dicey tried arguing, but found at once that she could not win against the power of a whole galaxy.

  Jimmy B called next, then Cal, then Marge.

  Luisa called last. She might be a little late, but she was about to leave, ready to go at it in raincoat and gaiters. Sniffing back tears, Dicey told her the search was off for today.

  Only Cathy showed up, full of sympathy, full of hope.

  And she polished off the breakfast Dicey had prepared for the other six people.

  CHAPTER 17

  Gunther awoke the next morning fingering his eyes, as usual. Nothing about them had changed, as far as he could tell. They did not hurt, and his fingers found no swelling or tenderness.

  He looked up, where the light from the Arachnocampa luminosa revealed the shadow of the cliff behind the sleeping area and the gray arrows of the stalactites far overhead. One of them was playing its Morse code message on its sister stalagmite a meter from his head: Plink … plink … plink. One plink every fifteen seconds. A leaky faucet underground—the only sound he could hear above the rushing of the stream. A million years from now the stalactite and the stalagmite would join as a column. Long after he and his friends had become flakes of dust in the cosmos.

  Turning just enough to evade the pressure of a rock projection under his back, he banished his depressing thoughts and concentrated on the cool wetness of Rad’s hair draped across his neck, and the pleasant weight of Tiff’s arm across his chest. Tiff’s breath warmed a circle on his side.

  Without warning, a stentorian voice shattered the darkness.

  Van’s voice. “Billy’s gone! Oh, God … Billy’s gone!”

  “It’s just the eye thing,” someone said—Rocky VII, Gunther thought.

  “5:18, New Calar surface time,” came Giles’s voice. “Too late in the morning for the eye thing.”

  Sass’s voice cried out, filled with dread. “Billy!”

  No answer.

  Van’s voice followed, even louder. “Billy!”

  Again, no answer.

  An ethereal voice floated from atop the cliff. Teddy’s. “Young ladies and gentlemen, Billy is dead. I’m so sorry. We found him in your midst about three hours ago. Our guard noticed that he was not breathing, and justifiably concluded he had left the world of the living. Apparently, he had a silent heart attack during his sleep. He simply could not handle the stress of the situation. We are so glad none of you have that problem.”

  An instant of silence followed. Then several voices, all speaking together, filled the void.

  “No … !”

  “I don’t believe it!”

  “I want to see his body!”

  “It can’t be!”

  Another period of silence followed.

  Gunther enunciated each word loudly and clearly, so Teddy could not mistake his words. “Kids our age don’t have heart attacks.”

  Hood’s voice followed within a fraction of a second, directed toward him. “Brother G, shut your face, man. You want to be next?”

  Undaunted, Gunther stood and stared up at Teddy. “Teddy, we want to see Billy’s body.”

  Although Teddy foisted the middle parts of his body forward and flapped his tentacles in what looked like anger or distress, in Gunther’s mind he seemed to shrink in stature. “His body will be donated to science,” Teddy said.

  ‘Bull …” Gunther almost said the word, forbidden by his parents since he was a little boy. He was breathing so hard he could not continue.

  June spoke for him. “Crappy,” she said. “I agree with Gunther. We want to see his body.”

  “That is not possible,” Teddy said.

  “We want to see his body,” June said, more forcefully.

  Hood recovered his bravado. “Teddy, my man, we need to see his body.”

  Kara stood and took three steps forward. Her expression combined authority and begging. “Teddy, this is a people thing. We need to see his body. We need closure.”

  For a moment, Teddy fell silent. Then he nodded. His flagella stopped waving. “Closure. I understand. In our society, narts who make waves are eliminated, and no questions are asked. Of course, we feel sorrow for their passing, but it is something they have brought on themselves. But then again, perhaps we have evolved more than you.” He paused a moment, and the flagella around his mouth began waving in a rhythmical way that made him look thoughtful. He continued as if speaking a thought that until now had been unthinkable. “Or perhaps you have evolved more than we.”

  He nodded again, and turned so his right eye focused on Kara. “Okay, young female. Ka-Ra. I understand your need. Please—all of you follow me.”

  The kids looked at each other, eyes wide.

  “Narts?” Hood said to Gunther.

  “Are eliminated?” Gunther said. “A bit different from having a heart attack.”

  The troop followed Teddy into the catacombs, Hood leading the way, Gunther keeping his eyes open for anything he might have missed on his last trip there. Although seeing Billy’s body was the pressing need, he wanted to see what lay beyond the alcove where Teddy had taken him and Hood before. He wanted to see the glowing green masses that he was convinced Teddy had tried to conceal.

  Teddy walked more slowly than usual, turning frequently, as always the perfect trail guide. Still, the kids tripped on unseen projections from the floor or scraped their heads on stalactites in the ceiling. Rocky VII tripped once, cursed, then continued onward without losing his place in the procession. Sass and Van tripped and fell against each other, bu
t did not miss a step.

  “Cover your eyes,” Gunther said as they entered the chamber where the Arachnocampa luminosa glowed as bright as Times Square.

  “Yeah, right, Gunth,” Hood countered. “Hey, watch your head for this …”

  Gunther’s forehead connected with some other projectile hanging from the ceiling.

  “… hanging thingy.”

  Taken by surprise, Gunther stopped and rubbed his forehead. “Thanks, Hood.” He called back to the kids behind him. “Duck, everybody! Stalactite at forehead level!”

  “Ouch!” came Sass’s voice. “Is that what it is?!”

  Several children behind her voiced the same complaint in their turns.

  Gunther’s heart beat faster as Teddy led them past the alcove where he, Teddy, and Hood had met to discuss their trip to the cave entrance. From the alcove, two Tardies turned toward them from beside their beakers and stinking chemicals and waved their flagella back and forth in what Gunther assumed was a greeting.

  Past the alcove, the light from the glowworms all but disappeared. To his right, in a room whose borders he could not see, he caught a glimpse of the glowing green masses. On its far side, lapping hungrily at its banks, flowed the stream, so quiet it barely gave away its speed. Having lost his night vision, he could see nothing of the stream and even less of the green masses than on his previous trip here.

  Teddy stopped so suddenly Hood bumped into him, and Gunther into Hood.

  The ensuing rear-end collision involved the entire group of kids.

  Teddy’s voice sounded genuinely repentant. “I am so sorry, young ladies and gentlemen. We have flagellae to help us navigate our way, but I realize that your bodies are deficient in this most important of assets. I hope you will forgive me.”

  A pause followed. Thankfully, Gunther heard no smart-aleck comments from any of his friends—nor did he wish to make any himself.

  “Kindly gather around,” Teddy said. “June, if you would … The light …”

  A light flicked on, causing Gunther and the rest of his friends to shield their eyes.