The Lost ( A Sequel To The Forgotten )

The Second Code

After the celebration, we come to our senses. We've just discovered a secret tunnel! Of course we're going to go down it.

"Wrive, you should go first," Rolly says. "You were the one to solve the code." I feel excited and nervous at once. What if there's something dangerous down there? Wait, no. Whoever wrote the code wants us to live. Still a bit nervous, I look down the hole. There's a ladder leading down. At the bottom, there's a creaky wooden ceiling to block my view. I take a deep breath and begin down the ladder.

It's dark and chilly in the secret tunnel. From the bottom, there's some kind of light. I slowly descend the rungs, and they feel frail in my hands. But that's just because they're old. So, so old... I stop thinking about that. And as soon as I do, a rung breaks under my hand. I yell in surprise and fear as my hands clutch at empty air. I'm falling backward, and my friends are yelling, and Wham! My head slams into the wood and a split second later, I crash to the ground. Black spots swarm my vision. A searing pain blasts into my head.

"Wrive!" Cass cries, landing next to me in a crouch. "Are you okay?"

"No," I moan. "But I'll live." Cass sighs in relief.

"He's okay, guys," Cass calls. "He's- oh gosh, he's bleeding!" I moan again. Cass' hand goes to my hair, searching for the injury, and I blush, embarrassed.

"Oh, oh no, make it stop!" Cass says, sounding scared.

"It's fine, Cass," I tell her weakly. "It's just a cut..." I can feel where the cut is. Where my head hit, and where the most pain is. Cass' hand jerks away, and I touch my head gingerly. There's a nasty lump, and a cut to top it off. A small trickle of blood dribbles through my hair, making it feel sticky. I moan again as a flash of pain hits. By now, everyone is around me. Rolly, who's been elected our official doctor, steps forward.

"Ahem. May I examine the injury?"

"Sure," I moan. His hand enters my hair, and he feels around.

"Ah, here we are..." He parts a spot of my hair. "Yeah, that's going to hurt for a while. But there's nothing broken, and the cut isn't serious." Everyone sighs in relief.

I lie here, panting with pain, while everyone else stays close and explores. They inform me that there's a hall at the bottom of the ladder, where we are now. It's made out of stone. Cass, who seems spooked down here, confesses that she thinks she sees eyes through the cracks in the stone. That makes me spooked, too, even though there's solid stone behind those cracks.

After a while, the pain has reached a dull throb, and I'm in walking condition. We gather our courage and advance through the tunnel. Light is provided by a few glowing rocks scattered around. The tunnel is around 50 yards long, and we get through it fairly quickly. At the end of the tunnel, there's a turn. We peer around the corner, afraid at what we might see. But a safe scene welcomes us. There's a room with plenty of glowing rocks, and a table. On the table is a bowl, filled with liquid. And in the liquid, there's a note! We rush forward to read it. Cass gets to it first and reads aloud:

"Congratulations on making it this far. I knew you would. I just went through a nice event myself. Broke out of... Eh, never mind. You probably just want to explore, and get out of this smelly cave. Heh. Anyway, the code last time was difficult, but you'll find this one even harder. So here it is.
I'm large, I'm small. I'm round, I'm not. I'm one, I'm many. I'm hollow, I'm filled. I'm heavy, I'm light.
I suggest you explore to solve this one. Good luck!" There's a moment of silence.

"Water?" Rolly tries.

"Maybe," Person says doubtfully. "But is water hollow and filled?"

"It can be," Rolly says. We all nod, since no one has a better answer.

"But what about water?" Tarna asks. "What do we do with it?"

"How should I know?" Rolly shrugs. After a while more, we exit the secret tunnel. Rolly will come back later to copy the puzzling riddle. For now, we need to think about it.

Water is our only guess, and what we do with it, we have no clue. So Tarna, as always, takes control.

"Okay, people. Just because we have a new riddle doesn't mean we can stop doing the regular activities! Rolly, grab some paper from the stone building and copy the new riddle." Rolly nods and runs off, and Tarna continues. "Shawn, you'll come with me to find more berries."

"Yay!" Shawn cheers, and runs off without Tarna. She sighs.

"Wrive and Cass, you find good sticks and branches to build the base." Cass salutes and marches away, and I laugh and follow. We explore the woods, finding good wood to build with. Once we return to the base, we start piling sticks up. Ray approaches us.

"You been gone. Were you making the puzzle un-puzzled?" Cass and I laugh.

"Yeah, we were solving the riddle," I reply. Cass and I begin selecting sticks and making them into the beginning of a wall.

"But... Dark-y W is hurt!"

"Yeah, I banged my head in a tunnel," I tell him.

"Tunnel?" he asks, confused. "But Jump-y C doesn't like the below."

"What?" I ask. "Oh, you mean she doesn't like being underground?"

"Mm-hm," Ray nods. I shrug, but now I'm curious.

"Why don't you like being underground, Cass?" I ask, sticking a log into the ground.

"I dunno," she replies. "It's just dark, and enclosed, and at any moment the ceiling could come down. Any moment!"

"Yeah, but-"

"That's unreasonable. Hey, a tree fell on me, and I'm fine!" Ray exclaims. We both turn in surprise.

"Ray! You sound like... like you again!" Ray's eyes cross for a moment, and then he blinks.

"Who ate the purple one again?" he asks. I sigh.

"It's alright," Cass comforts me. "That just showed that he's almost himself again. He'll be fine soon, and when he is-"

"Dr. Tootles will color the zombie!" Ray finishes. Cass laughs.

"Exactly."

*Years before*

The man broke out of his prison in the night. His enemies tried to find him, but he was nowhere to be found. Eventually, the man moved back into his stone house on the hill. He checked on the two all-important things. And life returned to normal. He saw things in the future, he wrote, he explored. Except, one thing wasn't right. Sleep never came easily, because the thing that wasn't right, that thing was on his mind. And every day, the thing was on his mind. And he didn't realize, though he was an extremely clever man, he didn't ever realize. He went about his business, and the thing was on his mind, and he saw and wrote, but he didn't realize. Not until later. But later was too late, and he knew it. Too late, much too late.