The Glittering Dark

Caleb tried to curl into a foetal position in the absolute darkness, but a sharp object prodded him, forcing him to roll to his knees. A guttural voice barked what sounded like an order to him in a language that he could not understand. The words sounded angry.

"Dnats dna thgif namuh!" the voice repeated.

Several more sharp objects thrust at him in a random series of jabs, though none broke his skin. He heard a rumble of deep voices in laughter, surrounding him. Caleb could not count how many of the creatures blocked his path to freedom... assuming he could find the doorway through which he had been brought into this dark Hell hole.

The objects prodding him pushed him upwards, forcing him to stand. He staggered onto first one foot then the other. Still the weapons stabbed his flesh, but not as hard now. Caleb got the impression that they were only meant to taunt him at the present rather than to nudge him in any particular direction.

The laughter continued in random bursts between grunts from his tormenters. Caleb tried to remember what had happened, as well as the route that had brought him here. He had been walking in the early morning mist, near the castle, and had discovered a strange opening to a place underground. It was a place made by men, perhaps in a time when more people could read. Posters lined the walls showing other places above ground that resembled parts of the city, before it had been ruined in the cataclysm so many generations ago.

Some of the walls in corridors had been lined with tiles and Caleb found steps that led even deeper underground. A musty smell grew stronger the further that he traveled. He had found it all very strange and had stopped at the top of a long descent where metal steps of an awkward, jagged design led deeper... much deeper. He had felt afraid then. Some instinct stopped him from going any further on his own. The pungent smell, stronger in the abandoned underground rooms, seemed wrong somehow, as if the very air around him vibrated with movement of something unseen in the darkness at the bottom of the long stairs.

He had thought that perhaps he should get some of the men together to explore further and had turned to walk back out into the morning light, when suddenly two roughly man-shaped creatures silently blocked his way. The dim light that penetrated the underground passages was just enough to determine that whatever stood before him, they were not human. They stood the height of a man, but their features were contorted and ugly, and they had large, pointed ears. A glint of green reflected from the skin of one when he moved and Caleb quickly determined that the creatures both had a dark green skin. Then he turned and found that two more of them had appeared from the long, deep stairs behind him. They had carried long, pointed staves, and Caleb assumed that those were what were poking him in the dark now.

His memory was unclear from the point when he had first seen the creatures. He had felt his entire body prickling, as if it would explode with unexpended energy, but his thoughts of bolting out of there had been expunged when the creatures attacked and grabbed him, then went running impossibly fast down the deep metal stairs into the unknown pit of darkness below. All four of the creatures carried him in what felt like a practiced formation. Caleb remembered that the ground had seemed flat when they reached the bottom of the stairs and his impression was that they were still in man-made territory. There had been almost no light, but the slightest glow from above was just enough to make out shapes and a smoothly cut tunnel at the end of the platform. The creatures had jumped off the platform and run into the tunnel, then quickly turned into some sort of side passage.