311) The Salvation of Eden, Chapter 75 - The Second Challenge

“Wheeee!” Lenny jumped through the “doorway,” landing on a smooth, stone floor in a grey darkness. She turned around, but nobody else was with her. She was alone.

She couldn’t see the black stone or the doorway from this end. She tried to act nonchalant, although in all honesty she was feeling pretty freaked out. Pretending like she could see everyone just fine, she smiled, and waved them forward to join her. “Sweet place!”

“Dammit, Lenny!” Dominic shouted, watching Lenny wave through the black rectangle. For a moment, everyone looked helplessly at each other.

Grok took charge. “Quick! Before it closes!” She jumped through, and everyone else scrambled after.

They were standing on a surprisingly warm, stone floor, crammed together in a small, natural alcove on the side of a vast cave, so largethat they couldn’t see either end. The opposite wall, directly across from them, was faintly visible, seeming to sparkle across its entire surface. It was dark, but not the pitch blackness one might expect in an underground cavern. The cavern was suffused by an uncountable number of tiny points of light emanating from crystals that seemed to be everywhere, embedded in the rocks. It took a few moments for their eyes to adjust, but as their vision sharpened, the sheer beauty was breath-taking.

Kohra was reminded of the snowflakes against the night sky back at Grok’s cabin, when they had frozen Time. She found herself imagining some vast, empty space full of little points of light that you could fly between. Like distant worlds.

They looked out at the cavern. On the left, the floor was covered with rubble, as though part of the cavern had collapsed some time ago. In front and to the right, the floor was clean, not even dusty, which was strange given that otherwise it looked like it had been abandoned for centuries. The dustless floor continued for as far as they could see to the right, although it looked somehow different, blacker, as it faded into the distant darkness.

Ropes hung from the ceiling in random locations, a few still holding wooden platforms of varying lengths and widths, suspended high over the cavern floor. Several platforms hung askew with their ropes partly broken, and others had clearly crashed to the floor at some point in the past.

The ceiling was jagged and rough, with hundreds, maybe thousands, of stalactites hanging down like a top row of teeth in the mouth of some gigantic monster. Most were small, about the size of a dagger or short-sword, but some were huge, much larger than a person. Strangely (although Dominic was the only one to notice this), there were no corresponding stalagmites on the floor.

While the others were peering into the cavern, Reilly moved to step out onto the main floor.

“STOP!” Dominic hissed, grabbing her and hauling her back.

Reilly started to protest, but he pointed toward the ceiling. She looked up. There sure were a lot of stalactites hanging right above where she had been about to step.

With one finger on his lips, Dominic motioned everyone to step back as much as they could into the alcove. He rummaged in his backpack for a minute, then stood up, holding two pickles. One, he promptly crunched, grinning and making smacking sounds as he chewed. The other, he chucked a short distance into the cavern. No sooner had it hit the ground then a small, dagger-sized stalactite fell, sharp point plummeting downwards, penetrating the pickle perfectly.

Reilly and Kohra both shrieked.

“Look!” Devona gasped, pointing. A soft, slug-like body emerged from the hardened stalactite shell, squishing forward like a snail, enveloping the pickle until it disappeared. Then the stalactite-snail-creature slid slowly toward the alcove, heading straight for them.

Dominic put a finger to his lips. “Shhh, stay quiet and don’t move. I’ve read about these creatures.” He pointed toward the wall near the entrance to the alcove. “I think it’s going there, to climb back up.” He nodded to the ceiling.

Everyone was transfixed.

“How do they know when to drop?” Devona whispered.

“They’re sensitive to vibrations through rocks.”

“Are they gonna eat us?” Reilly wrapped her arms around Melkorn’s legs.

“I don't think they ever attack, except from above,” Dominic replied. “They're pretty simple; I think it's their only hunting strategy.”

“But why do —” she began, but he immediately interrupted.

“Shhhhh, wait, just wait a minute. If we all stay still, it should head back up.”

Sure enough, the snail-actite slid slowly to the wall near the entrance to the alcove, then continued vertically, all the way up to the ceiling. Everybody watched, mesmerized.

“How do they live down here?” Reilly asked. “What do they eat?”

“Maybe Graxia feeds them,” Devona suggested.

“Or they just eat little tiny bugs and stuff?” Kohra offered. “What do snails eat, anyway?”

“Maybe they eat dust.” Lenny pointed out into the cavern. “You see any dust in here?”

“Maybe they eat your face!” Reilly poked Lenny in the ribs.

“Maybe they eat your mom!” Lenny poked her back.

“My mom is a tree!” Reilly raised her voice.

“Maybe they eat trees!” Lenny fired back.

“Shhh!” Devona admonished them both. “We don’t want them to eat US, ok? So shut up!!”

“Which brings us back to our dilemma,” Grok interjected smoothly. “How do we get out of here if we can't step on the floor?”

Devona slapped her forehead. “This is it! This is the first challenge of the Inheritance! Or, I guess the second. Getting in here was the first, of course.” Suddenly, her eyes widened in alarm, and she brought her finger to her lips. “SHE’S in here,” she whispered.

“Well, if she is, then she knows we're here!” Lenny laughed. She waved into the darkness. “Hi Graxia! Nice place you’ve got here!”

Devona and Kohra both tried to clamp their hands over her mouth. Lenny pushed them away, laughing. “Look, if she IS in here, she knows we’re here. Might as well be friendly. Maybe she’s had a change of heart.”

“Lenny, you’re nuts,” Devona scowled.

“SHHH!” Dominic nocked an arrow and peered into the gloom.

“Relax,” Lenny chided. “It’s better she thinks we’re not scared of her.”

Reilly stood off to the side, thoughtfully looking up at the platforms and ropes. “If I was a squirrel...” she said slowly, her eyes darting from platform to platform, “and there were a couple more platforms, I could easily cross this whole section without touching the floor.”

“That's probably what those broken platforms were!” Kohra exclaimed, louder than she'd intended. “This was like an obstacle course!”

Reilly jumped up and down, Dominic quickly clamping his hand on her shoulder. She looked up, annoyed. “What?”

“VIBRATIONS through the floor!” he whispered. “Remember?”

She shrugged, looking for a moment very much like Lenny. “Whatever. You said we’re safe in here.” She pointed up at the ropes and the stalactites. “It’s a climby-thing!”

Dominic nodded, looking both annoyed and pleased at the same time. “Yeah, well it used to be an obstacle course anyway. Maybe to be deemed worthy of the Inheritance, you had to prove that you were skilled enough to navigate the platforms, or else the stalactites would eat you.”

“Nice family,” Devona muttered.

“Only the strong survive!” Lenny chirped.

“It's broken now,” Grok pointed out. “We need another way across.”

They were silent for several minutes.

“How do you think Graxia gets across?” Lenny asked. “I mean, she isn’t here. She must have a way of crossing the floor.” She squinted into the blackness toward the far end of the cave. “The floor looks weird over there.”

“Yeah, like it’s a drop-off or something,” Dominic agreed. “It’s too far away to tell.”

“That’s probably our best bet,” Lenny nodded. “Somewhere over there must be out of the range of the pointy beasties.”

“Maybe she can turn into a bird?” suggested Reilly. “Like me!”

“You can turn into a bird?!!” exclaimed Melkorn, his voice echoing through the gloom.

“No! Maybe SHE can turn into a bird. Not like, a squirrel. Like, I’M a squirrel, Melkorn!” Reilly laughed, as though there was something particularly funny about this that nobody else seemed to understand.

Melkorn looked confused. “You’re a girl, Reilly. Why does everybody keep forgetting what they are around here?” He scratched his head. Then brightened. “Maybe she turns into a flying squirrel!” He grinned from ear to ear, clearly pleased with himself.

Kohra tried to hide her frown. “Whatever she might turn into, she doesn’t seem to be a Connector, or a Druid.”

“True.” Dominic nodded. “She mainly used her Wand. And weapons, of course. Yeah, she’s not a Connector.”

“Whiteling Master Thief, remember? I told you that how long ago?” Lenny interjected smugly.

Grok nodded. “If she was a Connector, she’d have claimed the Inheritance already. She must have bought the barrels to get past this part. Maybe she’s intending to blow the place up and kill them all. Or just cause them all to drop so she can run through or something.”

“Hey Graxia!” Lenny called cheerfully out into the cavern. “Everybody says you're a loser!”

“SHHH!” they all shushed Lenny at once. She rolled her eyes.

“Soooo,” Melkorn said slowly, putting the pieces together in his mind. “Um…so, Graxia needs to use the Flux? To get across?”

“That's right, Melkorn,” Kohra replied.

He grinned. “Then you can get us across!” He was pointing at, at her?

Kohra blushed. “Uhhh, yeah, maybe!” She tried to force a smile, but it looked about as bleak as she felt.

Melkorn’s eyes were shining.

“Shape, Kohra! Do magic-stuff! Stuff Graxia can’t do!”

Kohra found herself nodding, if only not to hurt his feelings. “Yeah! Good idea! We'll just....” She turned to Devona and Lenny, “Do magic-stuff, right?”

“Master blasters!” Melkorn and Reilly sang together.

“SHHH!!!” Devona snapped. They looked sheepish, barely suppressing their giggles, forcefully averting their eyes from each other.

Reilly giggled anyway. She just couldn’t help it.

“SHHHHHHHHHH!!!” Devona glared at them.

Reilly turned away, facing the wall, squeezing her eyes shut.

Lenny whispered to Kohra, “Hey, remember that force-pebble-thingy you were throwing at the snowmen?"

Kohra nodded. “I don’t see what—” but Lenny didn’t let her finish.

“That’s the key!” She slapped herself right in the forehead, hard enough to knock her glasses askew.

“Uh…how?” Kohra asked. She didn’t know where this was going, but she had a sinking feeling.

“Yeah!” Lenny exclaimed again, triumphantly. “Just make it bigger!”

“Huh? Why?”

Lenny was bouncing up and down with excitement. “Come here, Kohra. Stand here. Near  this edge. Right here.” Lenny got her into position, then looked up.

“Now, don’t worry. From where you are standing, nothing can hit you; you’re about five feet at least out of the range of any stalactites.”

Kohra looked doubtful.

“So, you are going to clear a path, using ForceBalls, one right after the other, throwing them in a line forward.”

“WHAT??!!” Kohra raised her voice.

“SHHH!” Devona glared.“Seriously, what is wrong with you all?”

Kohra continued, more quietly. “We’re going to throw ForceBalls along the floor on PURPOSE!? You want to bring the whole ceiling down?”

“No,” Lenny replied coolly. “But Grok got me thinking. If Graxia was intending to bring the whole ceiling down with a huge explosion, maybe we can bring part of the ceiling down. All we need is a clear path, right to the other side. They don’t move very fast. Once you trigger the ones in an area, there has to be a delay before others can slither over and fill in the gap.”

Kohra’s eyes widened as she suddenly understood. “Lenny, that’s actually brilliant.”

“Yeet.”

“But I can’t reliably channel that much of the Flux,” Kohra added, reaching up with one hand to scratch the back of her neck.

There’s no way in the Hells I can do this.

Lenny took hold of her hands. “No no, Kohra, relax. Dev and I are gonna help you. It’ll be kinda like the Arc, only Shaped into ForceBalls.”

“But I can’t handle that much!” Kohra protested again. She looked stubbornly down at the ground.

“You won’t have to,” Lenny assured her. This was exceptionally warm and encouraging for Lenny, Kohra realized. Or she just wanted to talk her into this ridiculous plan.

“I’m gonna give it to you in pulses, and then you can tell me if you want more, less, more quickly, more slowly, whatever, ok? You calibrate me to what you need, and Dev’ll feed me energy. And you, you make ForceBalls and throw them in front of us, one right after the other. Start with big ones, and see if we can get those big suckers up there to fall. Then switch to smaller ones. When it’s clear, we’ll make a run for it. Piece of cake!” She grinned, like this was the best idea ever.

Kohra shook her head, crossing her arms. “No way in Hells.”