Lacey paced nervously, she too was wearing a hard hat, but instead of a CO2 detector she had a canteen around her neck, they had just filled it with fresh ice cold water. The clerk who had rented them these items assured them that it was highly unlikely that they would even require them, but it was always better to be safe than sorry. After the last week Ben and Lacey agreed that with their luck they would be getting full use out of their rentals and they were worth every penny.
They headed toward the cave entrance; Lacey held the cell phone, the screen was no longer the aerial view from the satellite imagery, now it was simply arrows with word commands. As they stepped into the cave opening their headlamps automatically came on and illuminated three narrow tunnels, each forking off into different directions. There were signs above each tunnel, showing a simple outline of the path they took and the distance that the tunnel went underground. There was also skill levels listed on each one. The tunnel in the middle was labeled ‘Beginner’ the one to the left also read ‘Beginner.’ Lacey looked at the screen of the phone, of course the arrow pointed to the right. She looked at the sign, the outline of the tunnel was winding and crooked, it seemed to have several smaller tunnels that branched off out of the sides of it leading in all different directions. She looked at the skill level; of course, it read ‘Warning! Advanced- guide required.’
“Do you think we have to get a guide?” Ben asked nervously.
“I think we’re supposed to.” Lacey said. She looked at Ben, “Well what do you want to do?” She asked, praying that he would say that they could forget the whole thing, or at least go get a guide.
“I say we go for it! We have our GPS…wait can we even get a signal underground?” He paused in thought. Lacey looked at the unit curiously, “Well I guess we’ll find out.” Against her better judgment Lacey began to head down the narrow tunnel. Ben followed close behind. They had been assured that the only bats that lived in the caves were friendly and used to human contact. None of them were venomous, and at this time of day they would all be sleeping. They both prayed that the gift shop clerk was correct.
The ground was bumpy, and rock covered the walls and the floor, the air seemed to get cooler by the second as they advanced further into the tunnel. Lacey looked at the cell phone, the signal was amazingly strong, “sweet, we do have coverage down here! It says one—hundred—seventy—five feet to the right.” She looked in that direction, her light could only reach twenty feet into the distance, the tunnel widened then became narrow, sharp rocks jetted out, just waiting to tear into their flesh, she looked at Ben with more concern.
“It’s okay,” He said shakily. “It’s dark and creepy, but it’s only one—hundred—seventy—five feet, that can’t be that bad!” He needed to convince his aunt that this would all be okay, but who was going to convince him?
“Okay,” Lacey agreed, not wanting to be the party pooper, she continued to advance into the tunnel. They tried to keep a steady pace as they twisted and turned trying to ease through the tunnel, some points were so tight they had to turn sideways to get through; others were so wide they could walk side by side. After a few minutes they came to what appeared to be the ending of the tunnel, they both looked at each other clearly confused. Lacey bent down and noticed that there was a small space that led under the rock wall in front of them. If they lay on their stomachs they could slide underneath, the only problem was that they didn’t know what was on the other side. “I’ll go first.” Lacey said, “If it gets too narrow for me then we will know that we can’t continue on.” She lay on the cold rock floor.
“Wait, that doesn’t make sense.” Ben said. “I should go first, and then if it is too narrow for me, we’ll know.” He lay on the floor next to her and peered under the rock wall. It looked like he would be able to fit; it would be tight, but clearly people had done this before because on the map at the entrance, the cave didn’t end this quickly.
“Are you crazy? I can’t let you go first, what if you get stuck?” Lacey grabbed his arm as he started to slide on his stomach under the rock ceiling.
“Well I’m going, if you get stuck it would be the same problem, I’m smaller than you so let me go first.” He looked at his aunt, “ ‘S gonna be okay.” he said. Lacey was amazed at how grown up Ben seemed. She let go of his arm and watched as he slid under the tight rock ceiling.
Ben was what appeared to be half way through when he announced, “Uh…problem here…my hard hat is stuck, the rim must be too big!” his head was wedged between the rocky ceiling and the cold rock floor.
“Okay, scoot backwards, your head should come out of it. Then once your head is free, twist the hard hat to release it, you’ll have to just push it the rest of the way, unless you want to turn back.” Lacey said. She watched Ben scoot backwards, then he released the hard hat just as she had suggested. Suddenly an ear piercing sound screeched through the air. Ben jerked with fear and slammed his head into the ceiling of the crawl space. The CO2 alarm was going off; Ben panicked and pushed himself through the hole faster. “Is that the alarm?” Lacey yelled over the loud beeping.
“Yeah!” Ben yelled back. “Probably just this tight space, hang on a sec, let me get through then I can check the oxygen level.” His ears were ringing from the obnoxious noise. Lacey’s stomach started flipping even more, anxiety seemed to creep up her spine and her chest felt tight, was this because of a lack of oxygen, or was her mind just playing tricks on her? Ben continued to wiggle through the narrow opening, after about ten feet he could see that the tunnel grew in size again.
“Okay, the tunnel gets big again, I think you will fit through just fine, just take your hat off to start with.” Ben called back to Lacey.
“What about the alarm?”
“Hang on!” Ben yelled. He wiggled the alarm off of his neck and tossed it ahead of him into the large space just a few feet ahead. Within thirty seconds the alarm stopped beeping. “Yeah, it’s just the crawl space, there isn’t enough oxygen in it so you need to hurry through it!” he called back to his aunt.
Lacey took off her hard hat, and then inhaled deeply. She didn’t do well in dark, small spaces; it felt as though the walls were closing in on her. Her chest tightened with fear as she pushed her head under the dense rock. Thoughts of earthquakes ran through her head, if one hit right now she would be dead instantly. If she got stuck, she now knew that there wasn’t enough oxygen in the crawl space to support human life, she determined she was a goner either way. She shook with fear, and then forced her arms to pull her through the tight opening. If she died now at least her obituary would be interesting, she thought.
Ben peeked his head out the other side of the crawl space; the cavern on this side was enormous. Stalagmites rose from the floor from millions of years of mineral build up dripping slowly over time. The ceiling was thirty feet above his head, he could see the stalactites that had formed from the dripping minerals, they looked like brown shiny icicles, hanging down, decorating the vast cavern. He continued to shine his light around, illuminating one wondrous thing after another, he wondered how many people had actually been down here, couldn’t be that many, he felt so lucky to see such a beautiful space.
Lacey continued to wiggle and push her way over the rock floor, she couldn’t lift her stomach at all and the rough rocks felt like they were shredding her clothes. She tried to ignore the pain and focus on the fact that there was only five feet left of this crawl, and then she would be able to stand up again. She could see Ben’s feet move back and forth, the flicker of his light would occasionally drop to the floor. She swore that the rock above her was moving; it felt as though it were pushing down, almost like it would crush her at any moment. She pushed forward, trying to ignore the panic that was overcoming her entire being and finally poked her head out and looked around. A sigh of relief escaped her lungs as she saw the huge space before her, she had made it, she was alive, and she would never have to do that again, except she instantly realized, on the way out. A small flood of pan
ic came over her once again, just the thought of potentially being squished between two enormous rocks made a lump come to her throat.
“Isn’t this amazing, Aunt Lacey?” Ben beamed as he shined his light around the huge cavern. He made circles, trying to ensure that she saw every last inch of this incredible space.
“Yep, pretty crazy huh.” Lacey said, somewhat enthused. Ben looked at her with disappointment, he so wanted her to be in awe with him, but he soon realized that she was fighting a battle within her brain. He had never known his aunt to be afraid. She had always been so crazy and outgoing; ready to try anything, go anywhere on a moment’s notice, but now in this space, he saw how the fear had drained her. She looked empty.
“Well let’s see,” Ben said trying to get back on track. He shined his light to the right side of the cavern; if his sense of direction was intact they should still be moving in this direction. The mouth of a large tunnel was illuminated, the shadows grew and shrunk as Ben’s light moved across them. He was headed toward the tunnel when he saw that Lacey was looking at something different. “What’s up?” he called over to her.
Lacey was standing a foot away from the cavern’s wall; she was touching the stone, trying to make sense of something. Ben walked over to her and saw that on the stone someone had engraved something. It was a drawing, it looked like it may be a replica of the map that was on the original sign at the beginning of the tunnel, but there was something different about this map, it looked as if it had been there for hundreds, maybe thousands of years.
“Do you think this is a petra glyph?” Lacey asked. She continued tracing it with her finger.
“A what?”
“A petra glyph, it’s an ancient drawing done by natives, usually trying to relay an important message.” She looked over to him; he looked back at her blankly.
“Uh, sure it could be, I guess.” He nodded. When he looked at it closer he saw that it did look almost exactly like the original map, except on this drawing one of the lines extended farther than the rest, not like the original, and at the end of that line was a drawing of the sun. The original on the outside of the cave looked similar, but it showed that all the tunnels ended shortly after they began, none of the tunnels on the original stretched as far as this was indicating. “What do you think it means?” Ben asked.
“I think it is the same map from outside, but I think this one is showing another way out.” Lacey pointed at the sun, “that is the only thing that would make sense, right?” Ben nodded, that was a good guess he thought. “So I wonder,” she looked at the drawing again, then turned and looked at the cavern. There were two tunnels taking off from the far wall. “So you think we should take the one on the right?” She asked Ben.
“Yeah, I think so.” he replied.
“Okay, so the one on the right looks like it ends, there are some small tunnels that branch off of it, but they all dead end. The tunnel on the left leads to the branching off of the tunnel that looks like it will lead us to the outside.” She moved her finger along the lines, tracing the pathway that led toward the drawing of the sun.
“Okay, but one problem,” Ben said. “What if that tunnel is blocked now, I mean this could be ancient, it might not lead to the outside anymore.”
“Well, we don’t have to go that way to get out; it will just be nice to know that there are potentially two ways out of this place.” She looked at Ben trying to relieve his concern.
“Okay, I just think we should try to go out the way we came in, ya know ‘cause at least then we know what to expect.” He turned and began walking to the tunnel on the right, Lacey followed him quickly. They weaved around tight corners and under low over hangings of rocks; in the distance they could hear water dripping. Lacey looked at all the walls, hoping she would see another petra glyph. She wondered if anyone else had seen that before, surely one of the guides knew it was there, she told herself. She noticed Ben kneeling down to tie his shoe so she went on ahead, now completely in awe of this space, as she rounded another corner the tunnel forked. As she waited for Ben she looked at the ceiling, she was amazed to see a tunnel take off above her head, with her headlamp shining up into the space above her head it almost looked like a huge skylight. There was no natural light coming in from the top, but she was amazed at how many tubes and tunnels had been created. Ben came up behind her and she motioned for him to look up, he too was amazed but continued down the tunnel that forked off to the right.
The sound of water got louder and louder, it was coming from the other side of the wall to their right, as Ben looked down to the floor he noticed that the wall didn’t connect with the floor, there was a space at the bottom of it. He took his hard hat off and lay down on the tunnel’s floor. He shined his light through the small opening at the base of the rock wall; he could see what appeared to be the base of a waterfall. It was pouring and splashing into a large pool of water. Lacey lay down next to him and peeked under, she couldn’t believe her eyes, how did a waterfall get down here? She wondered.
They stood up and continued walking down the tunnel, as their light from their headlamps illuminated the space ahead of them it appeared that the tunnel stopped. They didn’t think they could be at the end yet, they hadn’t moved far enough. As they approached what appeared to be a dead end they both began to press on the wall that blocked their path, hoping deep down that somehow this was one of those trick walls they had seen in countless movies.
“Maybe there is a special rock we have to press on or something.” Ben said.
“Or maybe something has happened and this path has been blocked, even a small earthquake could have caused enough motion for one of the walls to collapse.” Lacey said as she looked around. “Not that it wouldn’t be totally awesome if this wall did move.” She said with a laugh. She then looked at the ceiling and realized that the path didn’t end, it went up. A large tunnel opened out of the ceiling above their heads. She nudged Ben, and then heard him sigh at the thought of having to climb something. “Oh it’s not that bad.” Lacey said reassuringly.
She grabbed on to a rock that was popping out of the wall and used it to boost herself up, grabbing other small rocks she climbed about seven feet up then saw that the tunnel stretched over above the rock wall that was blocking their path, she shifted her weight then slowly moved over on top of the rock wall. She looked down and saw Ben looking up, his eyes wide with fear. “Okay Ben, did you see how I did it?” She asked. He nodded, took a deep breath then pulled himself onto the same rocks. He concentrated on his aunt who had her arms outstretched, ready to grab him as soon as he was close enough. Once he was high enough he felt her hand on his arm, she steadied him as she pulled him over to the landing on top of the wall. He slid over and sat on the top of the rock wall. He sighed deeply, and then shook the fear from his chest and shoulders. It looked as if the weight of the world had just been lifted from him, Lacey thought.
“Ready?” She asked him. He shook his head; they both stood and realized immediately that the ceiling was much lower as their hard hats cracked against it. Lacey bent down a bit, then turned, a scream started to come out of her mouth, then she quickly slapped her hand across her face to block the noise as she fell back to the ground. Ben was shocked; it took him a second to understand what he was seeing.
In front of them were thousands of little green dots, they appeared to be floating in the air, when the light was shined directly on them, it revealed that there were hundreds, if not thousands of bats hanging from the ceiling. Ben dropped to the ground next to his aunt, who was now in tears. “It’s okay,” he whispered. “We’ll just crawl a little ways until we’re away from them.” He grabbed his aunt’s hand and pulled her along the floor. They peered up every few feet, praying each time the ceiling would be black. They seemed to crawl for ages, then finally the tunnel grew taller, and the eyes slowly disappeared. They stood and both hurried along the path, both were rubbing their arms and scratching their necks, just the sight of the bats had made them itch with f
ear.
The air felt humid and cold, the sound of water splashing grew louder and louder. As they walked the light from their headlamps seemed to glimmer and glisten in the distance. They rounded a corner to the right and entered a huge cavern, both of their jaws dropped in amazement. There was a huge pool of crystal clear water, and a huge waterfall that seemed to come out of the ceiling, poured into it. The entire room was illuminated with an eerie green glow. The waterfall looked like an iridescent green paint, and the pool of water was a magnificent shimmering green oasis. Ben turned his headlamp off, and then motioned to Lacey to do the same. Even without their lights the room was brilliantly lit. They both looked around the cavern in awe and noticed almost simultaneously that near the top of the waterfall, almost thirty feet up, was a rock ledge, it almost glowed, the light was so intensely bright.
“That’s where the light’s coming from.” Ben said eagerly. He looked at Lacey, who was already heading over to the cavern wall. “What are you doing?”
“You know what green is, right Ben?” she asked as she analyzed the wall then tested a few rocks for handholds, finding one that seemed suitable she used all her strength and pulled herself up.
“No, what?” Ben asked.
“It’s the color of money.”
18
Lacey reached up higher and grabbed onto another piece of slippery rock that stuck out of the cave’s wall. She was half way to the top, about fifteen feet up in the air, when the rock she was using as a foothold came dislodged from the wall. Suddenly she was falling and scraping against the side of the rough wall, as she landed she and Ben heard a loud snapping noise come from her leg. She screamed in agony.
Waypoint: Cache Quest Oregon (Waypoint Book Series) Page 11
