Part Seven: The Cavern

“What…” I begin, my mind racing so rampantly I can barely focus on what I am saying. He steps closer, “How long have you been here?”
“I don’t know.” I manage to say when a loud scream tears from above the crevasse in which we had fallen. He sighs almost calmly and shakes his head saying, “We should move before they come.”“Who?” I ask almost child like. “The shadow soldiers.” He answers, the words sending a fizzy chill down the nape of my already cold spine. “Deeper, I think.” He said turning to face the darkness that the cavern holds further down into the earth, “We can trek along a few miles then try resurface for the city.”“Wait I …” “We don’t have time to stall!” he says in a sternness that almost surprises me if I look at his stature, “They will come down here looking for us.” He continues more calmly, almost reassuringly as he turns his back on me and walking into the darkness. For a moment I am dumbfounded, confused and still desperately clawing at my mind to awaken from this nightmare reality has thrown me into.

The further we stumble into the cavern, the dimmer the light from the surface gets and the silence forebodes a great torment, tearing me between feeling safe and threatened. The warmth the core of this world has is relieving to my skin yet plaguing on my weakness and tiresomeness. The roof of this crack in the soil as well as the ground and other boulders and rock bares a burnt orange, almost redness to it with innocent shades of grey in texture. Roots and other remains dangle dead above us and as we walk side by side, I notice that I am eyeing him up ever so carefully as he is me.

With dark short shaved hair and blue eyes, he comes across almost pure, innocent in a way that I can not believe I have met up with him here in this dark and distorted place. The pair of jeans he wears as well as his sneakers provides prominent proof that he has suffered a great deal in running, falling and hiding in this place and judging by the dull grey jacket he wears that bares slight sprays of blood and soil, he too has survived the masses of dead remains from the passage way. The silence breaks finally when this strangers pace slows to a stop and he looks at me with a grin I can not fathom intention from.

“What?” I ask abruptly, rude and scornfully. His piercing blue eyes look away from mine and he shakes his head with a heavy sigh, “I think we should rest up here for awhile.”“What about those things? Those…soldiers…?” I ask fearfully. “I can’t move anymore. I am tired and by the looks of you, so are you.”I shake my head, no longer capable of denying my frustrations at this place, the smell, the sight, the reality or even this stranger called Cook - “Who the hell are you? What the fuck is this place?”“I am not the bad one here ok?” he answers crudely, “So if you want to keep moving, go. I don’t need you tagging along because new meat just gets themselves dead and puts me in trouble so you decide. But I know I’m low on strength so I need to rest incase I have to save you again or, even more likely, the shadow soldiers come tearing at as.”
His words faintly echo and a thick silence hangs before he turns and heads up the sloped crevasse towards a bush of dead roots hanging, plucking and breaking them down.

As I stand there watching him I am left with even more questions than before, and while the same questions run through my head, the weight of the new ones bare stronger confusion. Who is this stranger? How long has he been here? What does he know and can I trust him? When will I wake up from this?