HalfWorlder #Wattys2017

Chapter 29-The Aten

It was as I remembered it – down to the little eddies of dust that swirled the air outside the door with the relief of the winged dragon. This time, though, I crossed the threshold with five friends. This time I would be here in person, not the personification of myself in some ethereal dream state, out of time and place, comforting a girl who had known me 2,300 years, but who I barely knew.

The air grew stale and hot as we made our way down the inclined path to the place where the space became so tight and the ceiling so low that we needed to drop to our bellies and crawl through. I poked my head out to tell everyone what was ahead when the vibrations began.

"Oh great." Ryan shook his head. "Something's happening – again."

"To say the least." I remembered the otherworldly cyclone we barely survived outside.

"The last day," Wep said with finality.

The last day, I thought. So, this was it.

The hall we were in had narrowed so much, there was barely room to stand one next to the other. If the walls caved in now, we were in trouble. I faced the narrow shaft we had to climb into. If it caved in while we were in there, this would be our grave.

Amisi steadied herself, and Alexandra's eyes grew large as the vibrations increased in magnitude and a throbbing waaam sound joined the pulsations. This wasn't an earthquake. What was it? But we all knew the answer. It was the Aten. It was the last day. And it was the start of the end of everything.

Wep stood there stoic and strong and not moving, but Seshat was terrified, her face gone sallow. This was completely out of her comfort zone. She was blind for once. We were headed into an unknown future, not a known past. I looked rapid fire around, and then did the only thing left to do. I dropped to my stomach into the shaft and shimmied toward Isis.

"It's holding up," I called head back. "But hurry. I'm not sure how much time we have at this point."

A slapping pounding noise started behind us then. It sounded liege something was following us down into our tunnel, which was all the more motivating. "Come on! This shaft drops out right into Isis' chamber. We are 20 feet away. We can do this."

"Just hurry."

Slap. Slap. Pound.

Something was coming.

Scared though I was, I began the uncomfortable journey forward. It was like crawling through an amplifier. The vibrations here were somehow worse. The humming settled in my bones and teeth to the point where they chattered. This thing was probably going to crumble down on top of us.

"Hurry up," Alexandra shouted from behind me. Her voice rose unsteadily into a near shout, but it was shaking, as much from fear as from the pulsing sensation that rocked through our bodies and the narrow shaft we slid through. Great clumps of dirt fell from the low ceiling too, mingling with tiny roots I had to spit from my mouth, and the air, once stale, now suffocated. I tried to move faster, but there were too many bodies, too little space, and too little time.

The vibrations were only getting worse, quickly too. Much worse. The already small shaft was shrinking around us as dirt came loose. Sweat poured off my body, mixing the soil to something like mud, but my mouth was strangely dry when I tried to swallow down my fear.

I didn't want to die when victory was so close.

I didn't want to be crushed and suffocated, buried under tons of earth with the roots of jungle plants pushed into my nose and mouth like the beginnings of a human flower pot. My heart tripped over itself as it tried to keep up with my imagination, but it wasn't doing a good job. I panted hard with adrenaline and untamed terror.