The soft plunk-plunk woke me. The dribble had woven itself in and out of my dreams like a metronome. Before I could open my eyes, waves of nausea assaulted my head; in the troughs between the swells, I tried to make sense of the darkness, counting each plunk-plunk’s tiny echo.
Blind, I crawled, but the rocks below dug into my hands and knees, loose stones biting at my tender flesh. Trembling, I got my feet under me. Putting my hand to the cave wall, I took short and cautious steps into the unknown, gently shuffling through the unseen litter and following my only guide, the ever constant plunk-plunk.
One can be too scared to be afraid; some unspoken instinct holding back the flood of fear kept my growing panic from the light of my conscious mind, but the panic was there. My foot struck something which gave out a sudden, hollow ring, which was quickly swallowed up by the sound of my own, short scream.
With trembling hands, I reached down to feel out the ground in front of me. Rocks, rocks and dust, but I knew I had kicked something. My arms circled in ever widening arcs, my fingers spread out as wide as possible to catch the slightest touch of…metal.
My blind fumbling made a slow study of the object. It slushed when shook, was cold like metal, mostly, but in places smooth as glass. Then I finally happened upon a button and heard the soft, quick clicks of a pilot light.
Light! Stabbing light struck my waiting eyes. Too much. My vision was covered in blotches. Swaying, I put my back against the jagged wall and held the lamp as high as I could as I stared at the floor. Slowly, the blotches cleared and my eyes adjusted.
Below, strewn around my feet, the loose stones resolved into the unmistakably familiar shapes of bones. The remnants littered the floor, disjointed, ribs, femurs, skulls—animal and…
I heard the moaning and looked up.
Fred, suspended, his arms tied up in some dark mess of roots, hung from the ceiling, his beaten face dripping blood.
Tale Told 