Fathom [On Hold]

Chapter Five

Chapter Five: Push

He is awake now.

Or at least, he thinks he is.

His vision is cloudy. He hurts everywhere. A low groan tears itself from his throat and he weaves his fingers through his hair, trying to soothe his raging headache. It doesn't help. Not in the least.

On shaky legs he stands, scratching at the wall behind him for leverage. He blinks a few times to clear his eyes, and finds himself...somewhere. He doesn't recognize a place like this. He doesn't know what this place is supposed to be, doesn't know how the perfectly white walls and floor were created.

Weakly he walks over to where the wall changes to a cutout with a knob protruding from it. He stands up on his tip toes to look out the clear square in the middle. He sees more white. He's never seen this much white.

Cautiously he takes the knob and pulls, but nothing happens. He then discovers that it can turn, and that if he turns and pushes the cutout will open.

He sticks his head out and looks left and right, but doesn't see anyone. Shrugging slightly to himself, he picks a direction and heads that way.

|*|*|

"Asmara, I'm telling you there's nothing there."

"How can you not see that?"

"Because there's nothing to see. Are you hallucinating or something? When was the last time you had something to drink?"

"Jaycen, right there. That big...thing." The thing I am referring to is the far away yet very bright green glow that pokes out from behind the ridge of a mountain in the distance. It started a few hours ago and has since been growing. At first I only caught glimpses of it out of the corner of my eye and convinced myself it was my eyes deceiving me, but now it has grown large enough that I can see it very clearly. That was when I roused Jaycen. Almost punched me square in the face, too. I must have woken him up in the middle of a particularly violent dream. He tends to have those a lot. He murmurs in his sleep frequently, and I don't even think he is aware he does it. I've never mentioned it to him, and I don't plan to either.

"Go to sleep, Asmara. I'll take over," he says, sitting down.

"No."

"Yes. I think you're sleep deprived."

"Screw you!" I huff, getting up and heading back into the cave. I feed the fire and plop down onto the floor. I refuse to sleep. I'm not hallucinating.

"I'm not crazy, you know," I call out to Jaycen.

"Never said you were. Your mind can play tricks on you out here. Trust me, I know," he says back. I've had enough of Jaycen today. I need a break.

For the past week Jaycen's been training me. For what, I'm not exactly sure. When I throw knives I now hit the tree we practice on approximately one out of ten times. It's better than the zero I started out with.

He still kicks my ass in combat though. He's stronger than me, but that all comes from being out here longer than I have. While he was up here for God knows how long I was withering away to nothing underground.

I am still dangerously underweight. Jaycen's even mentioned it a few times, and even though he never says anything, I know he makes my ration of food bigger than his. I'm having trouble gaining it back, because event though I'm eating better now than I was in the tunnels, my food intake is still not anywhere near healthy. A small wild animal and a handful of berries everyday is what makes up my diet.