The Trail of Mysteries

Chapter 4

The

Trail

of

Determination

Using her sweatshirt, Liv hastily wiped off what dark liquid she could see from Ty's arm, hand, and side of his face. She deduced from his labored breathing and lack of communication that he was struggling with the intensity of the burning.

The fog was so engulfing that they could hardly see more than ten feet in any one direction. But what was more disturbing about the darkness though was the stifling lack of sound, which lead to an eerie silence punctured by their labored breathing.

Some minutes later, Ty felt the pain dull enough to flex the damaged skin. He used his LED flashlight and the polished steel of Liv's knife to survey the damage to himself. He could see raw patches of skin on his face, arms, and hands, as well as holes in his shirt and pants. At least, he thought, it didn't get into my eyes or somewhere vital.

After some time watching and waiting, Liv checked her watch. It had been more than an hour since the blackness had smothered the area. She hoped that the wind would carry it away soon. However, she realized, there was almost no air movement and it was becoming increasingly difficult to take a deep breath, their lungs starting to inflame from the murky fog. But at least the black rain had stopped or moved out of the area. She relayed this information to her brother. He put his head back against the smooth stone and spoke evenly but with obvious effort.

"What may have caused the black rain was the initial condensing of the dark vapor as it came up against the solid rock walls that were sheltered from the wind. As the fog slowly thinned out over the rock formations back into open air, the patch of gray fog dispersed. I would expect this place to have the slowest air movement."

"Which means...what?"

"Which means that this area we are in is going to air out very slowly."

"Which means...what" Layman's terms, please!"

In response to Liv's question to simplify their situation, Ty expanded his chest to take a deep breath. He wasn't sure how else to explain their situation. They were stuck.

"This isn't going to lift for a long time. The only way for it to move away is to have some sort of strong wind push it away, and as there is no strong wind around, there is nothing to move this choking fog away. The wind seems to have died down. And if the fog doesn't move, we will have to because this will tear up our lungs if we sit here much longer."

By the end of his statement, Ty was out of breath taking as much air as his lungs would safely handle without making him choke.

Liv contemplated his answer. Where would they go, she pondered. If they couldn't get clear of the fog by sundown then they would have a problem - a very big problem. They needed to get a move on if they were going to beat the sun going down in a few hours. It was already descending towards the western horizon.

Using her flashlight as a beacon, Liv shuffled past her brother as he was taking inventory in his backpack. Her LED light allowed her to see a little ways in front of her. She roughly remembered that heading due south would put them straight into the jungle region. She figured that it would make a better shelter for them and it would be better than trying to climb up and down jagged rocky ledges inhaling acid-filled air.

Liv carefully crawled down the ledge and fell from Ty's sight. She landed off balance due to the limited visibility. She heard rumbling not quite as distant as the last time. It sounded closer.