Mystery Noir

Down Below Part 9

A small voice in the back of my head kept saying. "You don't have to go. You're not search and rescue, you already did more than anyone else." It was on an endless track that whispered above the roaring in my ears as I stared at the crack in the rocks while trying to compress my pack and add rifle magazines, food and water and first aid supplies at the same time.

I force myself to breathe slowly, though it took me several moments before I realized Penny was crouching beside me, one hand on my forearm. "Maureen and I can go on our own."

"No." I shook my head and took another bolstering breath, forcing myself to stand. I knew that the smile I forced on my face wasn't convincing, but I slung the rifle they had given me and carried my bag to the entrance.

"Sun goes down in four hours. You go in for forty-five minutes, mark where you were and turn back. Leave supplies in case Bonnie comes through." Matt said stiffly, the corners of his mouth white from clenching his jaw.

I couldn't imagine how frustrating it would be, to be held back at this junction, and to agree to us possibly leaving his wife and daughter behind for another night. I don't know if I could have agreed to the plan, despite the logic, if it had been me.

I didn't know if I agreed with it now.

Not that I wanted to be in those caves in front of me, but turning back after finally getting a break? What difference would night make down where we were? I frowned in thought and pulled out my phone. I ignored the myriad of texts from Enzo and Ver and merely sent them a message with my location and the plan. Then I turned my phone off, telling myself it was to save battery power and not to avoid the inevitable firestorm of anger from the two idiots.

I didn't owe those two anything. But, at the same time, if something went wrong, they would know exactly where to look. And I for some reason, I didn't hesitate in trusting them above the group I was with. A thousand conspiracy theories went through my mind, and despite the likelihood that it was monsters, I still wondered if part of this missing person's case was human caused.

My eyes searched over the rock face, looking not for scratches, but for bullet holes, just as readily as I had looked for other boot prints than Bonnies once Penny had picked them out, leading to the crack. They were faint and I had not noticed them until she had pointed them out, but we could see that a person Bonnie's size had run toward the cave entrance.

As far as Penny as I could tell, the rockslide happened after that, but neither one of us had seen any other sign of people around. Still, my suspicions were enough that I looked at the group that would be waiting for us for a long several moments, even as Mo started into the cave entrance. It was a tight fit, the clatter of a rifle on rocks and the brush of fabric being pushed between them was as plentiful as the grunts as she moved.

Even Laura, the medic, who was the fittest woman I had ever met, had too much muscle mass to come with us.

Turning to the group once more, I pushed back against the time limit. I raised a brow as I looked between Matt and Rick. "If I find something..."

"It's not about your safety down there." Rick offered a shake of his head while Matt just looked pained. "Those things, they could surround us in the dark. It's about the survival of the group. We don't know how many of them there are, and even with the other team coming out in a couple hours, we would be sitting ducks. Remember. They can tunnel."

"Right." I had forgotten about that.

It was Penny's theory, based on the mythos of the Caddaja and the fact that the houses all had solid cement foundations. I shuddered, thinking again about the horror movie of subterranean worm things that could tunnel up and snatch you from the desert.

I turned to the cave entrance and realized Penny was slipping out of sight, turning and forcing myself to follow her. I pressed myself through the cracks, and felt Penny's hand brush mine, pulling me onward as I squirmed through the rocks that felt like they were closing in on me.

Then the next thing I remembered was standing in a larger tunnel, feeling a draft of cool damp air, seeing two headlamps projecting light onto walls that sparkled with a deep red colour. I blinked a couple times, feeling my heart racing as I turned around, seeing a glow stick sitting on the ground in front of a barely visible crack in the stone wall, several hundred feet behind me.

I even had my headlamp on, backpack on my back and rifle held loosely in my hands, though I had no idea how I had gotten there. Shuddering at how badly I had been in 'condition black' I reached up to angle my light down so as to not shine in the other two women's eyes and hurried to catch up.

"What was that song you were humming?" Penny asked when I stepped up beside her and pulled out my flashlight, shining a stronger beam ahead of us as we walked through the tunnel only a foot behind Mo.

The ceiling brushed our heads, and there were times that it narrowed to make us walk single file or even turn sideways, but compared to the entrance, it seemed to be massive. And I told myself that it was still too narrow for any Caddaja to traverse down easily.

It took me nearly ten minutes to remember what Penny had said and realized Mo had not answered her. I looked to my partner and cleared my throat. "Were you asking me that?"

"Yeah... you were humming a song, sounded like a... nursery song or lullaby or something." Mo murmured from ahead of us, not looking back.

Both Penny and I were moving at her speed, both in urgency to cover as much distance as possible, as well as a fear of letting anyone get too far separated. We had all seen enough scary movies to know that you didn't split up.

Not in a place like this. Not when you were in monster territory.

"I have no idea." I mumbled as I flushed in embarrassment and glad that it was too dark for them to see me.

Before I could even fathom how to explain myself, I heard a digging sound of moving rocks and an echoing clicking noise. Without me needing to hiss a warning to the other two, we all shifted to the side of the tunnel and turned off our lights, huddling in crouches as we saw a darkness shifting not far in front of us. There was the sound of claws against rocks and the flash of eye-shine.

My eyes had not adjusted to the pitch black enough to discern how close the creature was, or if it was in the tunnel with us, and I could barely hear anything over the hammering of my heart.

We were frozen there, in a stalemate of fear for long seconds that felt like expansive eternities. I turned to look behind us, trying to force my eyes to see back that way, though we had travelled far enough that I could not see the light of the glow stick.

Then my blood chilled.

Echoing over the rocks, I heard the small whimper of a child.

The creature in front of us roared and there was the sound of a large body rushing away from us, rocks tumbling in its wake. Echoes of more monstrous shrieks and roars drowned out my hearing and I struggled to think of a game plan.

"We have to go after them." I offered softly, hearing the tremor in my own voice.

A small voice at the back of my head told me that we didn't have to. That no one would know.

But Mo and Penny stood with me, all three of us shaking ourselves and I heard the small clicks of the headlamps. We switched them to red, then Mo nodded to the two of us and we followed her lead, out of our small, safe tunnel and into a massive cavern that our lights could not penetrate.

There could be thousands of eyes watching us, or none. But still we moved toward the sounds of roaring.

A brave person may die only one death, but a coward didn't get ripped apart in a cave, where no one could hear them scream. . .