Forgotten Wonders

Chapter 10: The Puzzle

As Darius and I walked towards the wall, we were silent, only the sounds of the water and footsteps remained in the cave, I glanced at Darius He looks hard to get a complement out of, yet like the person who'd give their own life to protect a complete stranger I looked away, it was getting dark now. After what felt like hours, my feet were extremely sore at this point, when we came to a fork, The fish said right, I remembered, turning right, Darius quickly followed,

"You sure we're going the right way?",

"Yes, I am Darius, the fish said right so we're going right,"

"If you trust the fish that much, then we'll trust the fish," just as he finished speaking, I bumped into something hard,

"Ow!" I exclaimed,

"You alright?" Darius asked, sounding worried,

"I'm fine," I responded, shaking my head side to side to attempt to take the pain, and any dirt on my face, away. The pain quickly subsided, and when it did, I looked around, I couldn't see, it was pretty dark,

"Can you see anything?" Darius asked,

"Just, dark, dark, and more dark," I replied sarcastically, "No I can't see anything except the basic shapes of everything,"

"Better than before we found the glow worm cavern, you can still help figure this out," Darius pointed out,

"You're right," I realized, looking around, I squinted, which helped a little, when I noticed spots on the walls that were darker than the wall, Better chance of helping than anything I've seen so far I thought, walking towards the wall, I set my hand on the spot and felt that my hand go through it, it was a hole in the wall, not a spot on the wall, I noticed there was a large rock in the corner, and stepped towards it,

"Darius, can you come here?" I called out,

"Yeah?" Darius appeared behind me,

"Can you see anything around this rock?" I asked, Darius stepped closer to the rock and kneeled down,

"I think I see a sign, it might be a random piece of wood, but chances are it's a piece of wood," he said as he pressed his body against the rock,

"What," I asked "are you doing?"

"Trying," he took a breath, "To move this rock," Darius grunted as I heard the rock shift,

"It's hollow?" he said confused,

"Hollow?" I echoed,

"It's not a rock, it's fake," he kept pausing as he was talking, possibly to get a breath, "I don't like where this is going. I don't like it one bit," Darius glanced back at me, "We're gonna have to solve a puzzle to get out."

"WHAT?" I shouted, "I've never been good at those," I added quietly,

"Neither have I," Darius paused, "I should have- you know what, never mind," He leaned towards the sign,

"What does it say?"

"It says, 'Find the right pattern to find the way out,'" Darius paused "there's more, but it's smudged so I can't tell what it says." he added

"The next line likely rhymes then, like a riddle,"

"Right" he nodded, picking up a small rock, Darius walked towards a hole in the wall, and put the rock in it, a light blinked on, filling that part of the cave with light. I walked towards the sign, there were blobs of color on it, in a row, Could this be the order?

"Yellow, blue, red?" I thought aloud,

"What?"

"I think that's the pattern," I glanced at the light, it wasn't just a normal light, it was yellow, I quickly walked to a crevice, and stuck my arm in, I felt the back of the crevice, and a light blinked on, it was red, This one's last, I walked towards the one next to it, touching the back, a blue light flicked on, I picked up a rock, and silently threw the rock into the crevice, the light flicked on, and stayed on. I picked up a rock and threw it into the red lights crevice, the light flickered on, then died. Wrong order! I looked helplessly at Darius, who just threw a rock back into the yellow light's crevice, I picked up a rock and tossed it into the blue light crevice, the blue light flicked on, I glanced at the yellow light, which remained on. I excitedly walked over to the red light, picked up a large pebble, set it on the edge of the red crevice, and pushed it in, I heard a thud. The lights blinked twice, then faded off. There was a hiss as the stone wall behind us lifted. As light filled the cavern, I turned around quickly, bringing my hand up to shield my eyes from the sunlight.

"Just great, we've been in that cave for almost a day," Darius said with a snort as he pointed at the setting sun.

"WHAT?!?!" I shouted.