Downward

Tigger warning: Death, Religion.

Archie laid on his stomach with only a single headlamp to cut through the absolute darkness surrounding him. The smooth stone underneath his body was damp, the cold seeped through his polyester layers of skin-tight caving gear and bit at his flesh. A ceiling of the same black rock pressed down against his shoulders. There was barely a foot between the two layers of bedrock. He inched forward. Dragging himself through the tight crevice buried under the earth, he used all his strength. His muscles burned with the effort. Struggling to keep his breaths under control, Archie forced himself to focus. The hot air, dust and silence would not break him. Every rise of his chest filled the precious space that he had available to move and so staying calm was vital to making any progress. Resisting the oppression he felt pressing in on all sides was his only thought.

The shaking white light of his torch bounced across the walls but was consumed by a darkness just ahead, which was a good sign. It meant the crawl space was opening out to a larger area. He just had to keep going.

Maybe bringing a partner wouldn’t have been the worst idea. A distraction right now would be welcome.

He had regretted entering the contest alone almost immediately after beginning. Safety wasn’t a concern because there were so many people traversing through the cave system that day, so if he got into any trouble he wouldn’t have been alone for very long. He had failed to consider the moral support having someone with you provided though and was paying the price for his bravado.

Come on Archie. You’ve made it through worse trails than this. Just a little further…

He pushed forward another inch, his fingers and toes clawing his body weight between the immovable sides of the tunnel. Another push and his fingertips crested an edge; he could bend them over into an open space where the air felt cooler and less stagnant. 

Finally!

Relaxing his neck, he let out a sigh of relief that blew a cloud of dust up into his face.

Dammit.

Blinded, he paused to suck in a deep breath and then tried to blink the grit free. Every attempted slap of his eyelids resulted in a shot of pain to both irises. His elbows were not able to bend to get his hands to his face and the dirt wouldn’t shift on its own. There was nothing for it, he would have to get clear first. Archie braced his toes against the stone and hauled himself forward another fraction...then stopped dead. The pressure against his shoulders and chest held firm. He wrenched again and didn’t move at all. 

Stuck. Blind. Alone.

Stay calm. Stay calm. STAY calm. STAY CALM!

He wriggled on the spot, trying to find a gap. Pushed a little more. Nothing. He shook again. Then again until he lost his cool and started thrashing around in place, uncontrolled and in complete desperation to move anywhere. He began gulping in breaths but couldn’t get any air. Blind he started scraping his face on the stone, he needed the pain in his eyes to stop. He needed to see.

“HELP! Oh GOD, someone PLEASE! HELP! GOD HELP ME! GET ME OUT!”

His flapping hands grazed something warm. Then the other did the same. Until they connected again and he recognised the soft palms of another person, who after a few attempts lined up their fingers and was able to grip hold of both of his hands. He clamped down. Hard.

“Push when I pull you! Ready? GO!” A feminine voice resounded off the walls of the crawl space.

Archie pushed with everything he had. The pain in his wrists and shoulders was evidence of the force his mystery saviour was using. For a moment he didn’t move and that panic gripped his heart once more, threatening to collapse his chest inward. Then all at once he slid forward, all resistance gone and fell into an open cavern bundling on top of another living being.

His rescuer pushed him off and as he rolled onto his side he broke into maniacal laughter, rubbing his eyes raw with his knuckles.

“Oh thank God!” He said “I thought I was done for”

“God had nothing to do with it” The voice said. Definitely female. “I pulled you out of there. You’re welcome by the way”

“Thank you. Thank you. I’m sorry. I was panicking, I got grit in my eyes, you see and I couldn’t clear it” He said, still unable to open them.

“Here, tilt your head back” she said.

Archie did as he was told and felt the sweet release of water against his face. Blinking away the liquid his sight returned and out of the blur resolved a young, slight framed woman dressed in red and black. She had on a bandanna to keep her long red curls from her face and was…barefoot. 

“That’s so much better. Thank you, I mean it. My name is Archie” He said holding out a hand. She didn’t take it but replied instead,

“Abbie. No sweat! You didn’t belong stuck in there!”

She pushed her water bottle back into a holster at her waist and looked around the cavern, illuminating it with her own head torch that blinded him all over again every time she pointed it his direction. He followed her light with his own, seeing a space no more than three strides across and a ceiling only just reaching above their heads. On the opposite side from where he had emerged were four different exits.

“Where’s the marker?” He asked

“There isn’t one.”

“What do you mean? There should be a marker at every junction to highlight the course.” He said, jumping his light between all the openings.

“I don’t know, do you see one?” She asked, helplessness bleeding from her tone and her torch snapping into his eyes looking for an answer.

“No…well which passage did you come from? That would rule one out.” Archie asked, raising his hands against the light.

She didn’t look at any of the openings and simply said to the ground,

“Oh…down below.”

“Down below? What does that mean?”

She laughed and through the giggles said “From hell obviously. I’m a demon come to drag you back with me”

“Heh…yeah…good one” Archie replied. People made strange jokes in tense situations. “Look. You’re obviously a pro, I never seen anyone run the course barefoot before…do you know the way out? Mind if I stick with you for the rest of the way?”

She took the strap from her head and set the torch upright on the ground, flooding the natural room with the artificial LED’s and casting shadows on every surface. He saw her then as more than a dim silhouette, her athletic body and beauty mesmerising him briefly before he refocused on the task at hand.

“Yeah, I know where we need to go” She said, a broad and encompassing smile spreading across her face. “Can’t be going anywhere with someone I don't know and can’t trust though. Tell me about yourself Archie? Who are you exactly?”

Perplexed by such a large question, Archie stuttered and glanced around at the rocks littering the corners of the circular cave.

“Come on now” she said, perching against one of those rocks “If anyone knows who you are, I’d have thought it’d be you?”

“Yeah of course, I just, er, don’t know where to start” He rubbed the back of his neck and produced a fake grin. “I’m married, got a daughter too. So you know, I guess that makes me pretty solid right?”

“Right?” She imitated.

“I work in finance. I do very well for myself actually if I’m honest but you know the office job…it can be pretty sedentary. That’s why I’m here, pushing myself. I took up caving awhile ago and love it! What happened just now was a first, I’m usually very good under pressure, never freaked out like that before.”

“Hmmm, okay” She said, standing and walking over to the narrow tunnel Archie had been yanked from. She ran her fingers over the edges and then said at almost a whisper “Got any secrets?”

“Who doesn’t”

 “Okay, well…ever done anything you’re truly ashamed of?”

“Like what?” He asked, still standing in the same spot.

“Oh I don’t know, are you a gambler? Must be if you work in finance.”

“Sure I guess, I’ve done a few casinos with the guys before. Won big once too!”

“Nice” She said. “Never lost?”

“Well, losings part of the deal. You learn that in my game. As long as you keep playing though things always come around. He said, puffing his chest high, confidence brimming from his stance.

“What about the ultimate gamble…ever cheated on that wife of yours?”

He smiled then and wandered the few paces to where she stood, stopping a little too close to her and keeping his eyes fixed on hers. A trick he’d learned to appear powerful to women.

“Depends.” He said. “Who’s offering?”

She giggled and moved past him to the other side of the tiny under ground enclosure.

“Alright, one more question and then I’ll decide if we go on together, sound good?”

“Sure” He said, examining her more greedily as their conversation went on.

“Do you believe?”

He scrunched his face up and looked at her with confusion.

“Believe? You mean in religion, God? No of course not.”

“Hm, funny. You were screaming for God to help you when you thought you were stuck in there. Then you thanked him when you were free. Now you don’t believe?”

“It was just an expression…” Archie said, losing interest fast. “Look, if you know the way out of here, we really should get moving. The course is long and I’d like to get back.”

Abbie stood up on her toes, stretching and plastering that giant smile on her face again.

“Okay! It’s been an easy decision to make anyway. You can come with me! I’ll get you where you need to go!”

“Great” Archie said “You won’t regret it, you can trust me”

It was her turn to look confused then, cocking her head to one side.

“Oh I can’t trust you at all. No, you lied in every answer to my questions. You have SO many secrets Archie…” She said stepping closer, her body casting a giant black shadow on the wall. “I know you gambled big on the small business account…and lost. All those families are going to be closing their ventures and out on the street, their children suffering with hungry bellies…because of you. Then you blamed it on the junior, poor guy will never work in the industry again. It was his dream you know.” She did a pirouette then, arms pointed in the air and everything. “I also know you’ve slept with three other women since you made those vows to your wife in the grandest church you could find. She doesn’t have a clue does she Archie. She thinks the world of you. You know that and you even tried to hit on me, down here of all places!”

He began to stutter a retort to this woman’s accusations but managed only a single phrase,

“Who the hell are you?”

Abbie giggled and ran a full circle around the cavern.

“Do you know that’s the first question you’ve asked me that hasn’t been self serving? Although I guess you could argue, given the circumstances now, that asking about me is still for your own benefit. Anyway, I told you who I am. I’m Abbie. Abaddon if you like and I’m from hell. Get it right. I told you all this earlier. I don’t lie or keep secrets. Not like you.”

“What is this!?” Archie yelled “This is no time or place for a prank! Freaking people out when they’re down here is dangerous! It’s not funny!”

“No you’re right. Its not funny” Abbie said, cocking her head to one side and gazing into the distance. “OH! We almost forgot the last question. Another lie. You do believe in God…just only when it serves your own needs it seems. You keep that little secret buried real deep. Ashamed to have faith are we?”

Archie flashed his head torch around the room, looking for a way out of this insanity. When he didn’t find it, he faced her again,

“What do you want? Money? You can have as much as you like to keep your mouth shut”

Abbie tipped back her head as far as it would go, opened her mouth a little wider than seemed possible and belted a roaring laugh that seem to echo from every direction. She snapped her head back down in an instant, cutting her amusement off dead.

“I don’t want money! I want your soul silly.”

“Look, just tell me the way out and I’ll get out of here. You won’t see me ever again, whoever you are.” Archie said, his feet shifting and sweat beginning to bead on his forehead.

Abbie ran over to the wall with the four exits then and stood in the centre of them, arms out stretched.

“SURPRISE! They are all the right one! They all go to the same place, so you were never in any danger of going the wrong way Archie. Hee hee!”

“Wait, what…?” Archie said, shaking his head.

“Yeah they all head downward. If you’d admitted your failings and repented I could have sent you back up, but as it was…I mean you didn’t even think to set your head torch down like I did, you just kept shining that thing in my eyes without caring. You’re a real piece of work Archie.”

“I still don’t know what this is…” He said “Maybe you’re crazy or this is some kind of set up, but either way I just need to get out of here. Plus, its ridiculous! I’d have to be dead to be sent to hell and I’m right here, you’re little game doesn’t even make sense!”

Abbie skipped back across the cavern again, sending little stones shooting across the floor until she was staring down the gap Archie had come from.

“Come take a look” She whispered.

With no other option, Archie walked over and looked down the tunnel. There he saw illuminated in the white light, his own face. Grey with open, lifeless eyes, slack jawed and vacant. His own dead body.

“Yeah…heart attacks will do that to ya when you’re stuck in a hole a mile underground” Abbie giggled.

Archie stumbled backwards, falling and landing with his back to one of the four exits. Head in hands he sobbed and whispered prayers for God to save him.

“Too late for that!” Abbie laughed. “You made this so easy Archie. I only had to ask a bare handful of questions and the decision was made. We didn’t even get to the way you look at your teenage daughters friends or the way you treated your parents! Maybe if you’d even just once looked at another person like a human being, shown one ounce of empathy we could have negotiated, but nope! Downward it is!”

She stood back, pressed the heel of her dirty foot into chest and pushed him backward into the open tunnel. She waved and giggled as he fell through the chute and into the abyss below.