A Most Dangerous Weapon

Chapter 60: Revenge and Heartbeats

We had no idea how many hours had passed since the landslide that trapped me in the mountain with Rowan. It felt like at least over a day and a half, but there was no way to really know.

I couldn't blame the others for how long it was taking them to dig a new tunnel. They would have had to make it much wider to accommodate their broad shoulders as they crawled through to dig, and they probably had to come up with a more sturdy and time consuming way to hold up the tunnel ceiling than branches. They had to make this tunnel last long enough to get a rescue team in and out with, as they might assume, three potentially immobile bodies.

By the time dehydration and hunger started to affect our judgement and senses, a small series of grinding noises began to echo from the side of the cave where the initial tunnel collapsed. Rowan and I were sitting closer to the back of the cave where it was less likely for us to get hit with falling stones during another wave. Upon hearing the noises getting louder, we both stood up on wobbly feet and began to walk towards the sound in the darkness. I grabbed Rowan's uninjured arm with one hand and blindly reached out in front of me with the other.

A hole was formed in the same spot where I fell through into the cave. A careful hand pulls more and more dirt out of the way until he can bring a flame into the darkness. His lantern swings from his out stretched hand, illuminating our faces. Both Rowan and I are looking up to make sure things are stable, fearful that another landslide will commence any minute. When nothing happens despite the continual digging, I breathe a sigh of relief before looking back down on the glowing face of our saviour.

Arlo's face pops through the opening. His eyes dart around frantically as he takes everything in. Once he sees us standing only a few feet away, he too lets out a huge sigh of relief.

"You both okay?"

"Okay enough..." Rowan states as he gestures to his injured shoulder and arm.

Arlo nods before declaring with a mix of joy and parental anger. "Good because I'm going to kill you for this."

I laughed in spite of our current situation. "I figured as much. Sorry dad!"

Rowan smiled and played along, "Sorry dad! We won't do it again."

He shook his head in exasperation. "You two are going to be the death of me, you know that?! Two heart attacks in the span of a few hours! TWO! How stupid can you both be, running into a collapsing mountain and crawling through an unstable tunnel... just stab me through the heart and call it a day!" He pushes some more dirt out of the way and then tumbles into the cave with a thud. Once he's on his feet again, he immediately comes towards us for an inspection. He brings the lantern close to Rowan's arm and scrutinizes my makeshift work. He then checks my limbs for hidden injuries, clearly not trusting me to tell the truth. He finds the various cuts and bruises from earlier. Once he's satisfied that there's nothing life threatening, he begins to look around behind us curiously. "Where's the girl?"

"She didn't make it." I state solemnly.

An expression of sadness flashes across his face as I expected it would; Arlo was a sucker for saving the young and unfortunate. He may not have known Diana very well, but she still reminded him of the children he used to rescue when he was a vigilante.

"Where is her body? We should take it with us for a burial..."

I had originally decided to just let this cave become her tomb, but Arlo seemed so determined to give her more than that. I cocked my head to the side to show him where we left her. He moved quickly to fetch her so we could get out before things went wrong.

A second face popped through the tunnel opening with a lantern of his own. "Everything alright in here?" Theo smiled in his usual flirty way as his sparkling eyes caught sight of me. "Hello, gorgeous! It's been a minute!"