Enter Abyss

Chapter 9; A light in the darkness.

Eventually, Archer remembered that he'd had the good sense to bring a light with him and he flicked it on, much to the relief of Pip and Cogs.

Taking a look around, Archer noted the rock formations all around them, but they interested him little. No, what he found absolutely fascinating were the carvings on the stone walls; they were written in a language that was similar to Maufarian, but only if you took into consideration that the dialect was very different-- almost as if you were speaking it with the back of your throat. The symbols too were odd and appeared to be like the runes on the door of the cathedral back in the citidel. They were difficult to read, yet not undeciferable and Archer began to look at them with interest.

"Amazing!" he said aloud, his voice echoing off the shaft-like space around him. "These runes seem to be telling a story of some kind."

"What sort of story?" Cogs asked sleepily.

"Mostly about people falling to their death."

"Oh, lovely." the boy's voice was laced with sarcasm, "I don't know if you've noticed, Archer, but we happen to be falling further down in this blasted hole--"

"It's more of an endless abyss, actually."

"--and we have no food, water, or anything useful except that light of yours. So forgive me if I'm not going head over heels over some old bit of rock."

Archer sighed; was Cogs always this unreasonable? These were ancient runes, for Threndas' sake! Not many had the chance to read runes like this in their lifetime and here Cogs was, complaining about it.

Turning back to the stone, he read as fast as he could while their ballon continued to drift downward. "Would it interest you to know that there is no mention of a giant monster waiting to eat us?"

"Oh, good. Now we can just let slow starvation do the trick."

Archer laughed airily, "Don't be absurd! We'll die from lack of water first, you know."

"I'm starting to wish you had stayed up in the citidel."

Suddenly, both boys heard Pip stir from where she had been napping. "Oy, what's going on?" she then seemed to realize where she was and gave Archer a wide-eyed look. "I'm hungry."

"I know. You muttered the word 'potatoes' over and over again while you napped. It nearly drove me mad." To be sure, Archer was beginning to regret not bringing food with them. He HAD always been a spur-of-the-moment sort of person, but perhaps that was not the best thing to be when one was going on an adventure.

It was a shame that one could not simply invent food the way they invented machines, but that was simply a way of life. Still, Archer wondered how they were going to survive down here. Did things grow in the Abyss? Could they find food? He looked over at Pip again, who appeared to be chewing on her belt strap in the place of actual food, and sighed once more. This certaintly was not going to be easy.

But their situation changed entirely when their ballon suddenly rocked wildly, tossing them about and sending them crashing into one another. Archer felt his head knock against Pip's knee and a sharp stab of pain spiked through his skull. All around him was choas and he could feel every crash and bump as their balloon scraped against the stone wall before sliding down a dirt ledge and coming to rest at the bottom of the Abyss.

Sitting up, his head still aching badly, Archer attempted at lightening the mood. "See now," he remarked brightly, "That wasn't so bad."

Cogs' moan answered him and he thought he heard Pip mutter at him to shut up. Either way, they were still alive. So far.