Lost and Found

Chapter 11 - A Trap and an Accident (Whoops)

Surprisingly, amazingly, they made it to the wall. None of the other Umbra had moved. Their blurred faces as Nya ran past seemed to be in shock. Maybe they hadn't known when they had brought in these two children that their master would be freed today.

Nevertheless, as Nya reached the wall she began to see them move, scurrying around, not quite sure what to do. She ran at the wall slipped through the slimy sludge. Her and Pat raced across the dark cavern, shutting their eyes and using their other senses to find the right section of the wall. They ran at the wall and... banged straight into it.

"Ow." 

"Why can't we get through?" said Pat, panicking as he pushed one hand against the rock. By now, the Umbra had slipped through and Nya could see their dark mass, even darker than the black of the lightless cave.

"I have no ide- SHIVER ME TIMBERS!" A giant piece of the rock that made up the wall crashed to the ground a couple of metres away. Nya and Pat stared up as a huge shadowy hand slid back through the hole and the cavern lit up in a dim, reddish flickering light. There was fire in the maze. Nya and Pat glanced back at each other.

"Get out of the way! Idiots, someone grab them!" That was the Shadow Master. There was no time to see if the maze monster would smash away the rest of the wall.

"I can't climb, Nya!" said Pat, indicating his bloody, burnt arm. "Go without me, I'll wait until the rest of it comes down."

"You've got to be kidding me. I'm not leaving you behind, you nincompoop! Come on, I'll give you a piggyback." 

Pat looked at her in exasperation, but Nya stubbornly bent down for him to climb on.  

It was much harder than it looked and Nya slipped and slid as she went. Pat's weight was heavy on her back and she was starting to think they wouldn't make it. But maybe it was the fact that shadow monsters where climbing behind her, gaining ground (it seemed they could not float) or the giant that could smash down the wall at any moment. Maybe it was just the pancakes she'd had for breakfast. But something seemed to be giving her a little superhuman strength today.

The rock started to shake and Nya lost her grip and started to slide. Pat screamed. Her fingers dragged on the rock but she managed to catch a ledge. Breathing heavily she began to climb again. Small landslides of gravel were falling, scraping her already bloody hands.

Nya scrambled to find footings and hand holds. Her limbs felt like they were about to fall off and her back was screaming, but she kept going. She did not look down to see how far the Umbra were behind her.

Grab the rock, find your feet, pull up and do it again, over and over, Nya thought of nothing else. They reached the hole. Pat slid off Nya's back and they looked out. Their faced burned, almost literally. 

It was a mess of rock and flame. The monster, after finally getting some playmates after hundreds of years had obviously not liked the idea of being alone again. Walls of the maze, which stretched out before them, were smashed. Little fires (What were they burning on? thought Nya.) lit up the maze.

And before them, absent-mindlessly kicking at some fallen rocks on the ground, was the shadowy monster.

Nya drew in a breath, and it seemed the monster heard it. It turned it's head and looked straight at them.

Neither Pat nor Nya needed to say anything. They just jumped. The air vibrated as the monster's fist connected with the hole in the wall where they had been standing. But where were they now? Of course they hadn't really been thinking about a landing place when they jumped.

So they landed on the closest flat area. The monster's head. The shadow was surprisingly quite solid, if a little sticky. The shadow creature bellowed in outrage when finding them gone and looked this way and that, which made it quite hard for Nya to find a good grip.

The monster punched and kicked at the wall in a blind rage. Nya looked in horror at the waterfall of rock. 1) Rocks falling from the sky was never a good idea for anyone's head, and now she was on one. 2) That wall falling down would give free entrance to the shadows.

She looked at Pat and could tell he was thinking the same thing.

"If we could just make it to that wall..." said Nya. The top of a yet unsmashed maze wall sat about 20 metres away, an impossible jump from where the monster stood.

"Well we're just going to have to get him to move." said Pat. And he bent down and called into the swirling shadow where the monster's ear should be.

"Oi! Mr Shadow Man! Think you could step over a bit?"

The monster staggered in confusion trying to see the source of the noise. The wall came slightly closer. (You understand this is a dead end, and there wasn't much other space that wasn't covered in rocks to go.)

"A little more, Pat!" called Nya.

Pat leaned over again.

"You know, I'm warming to you mate. I mean, I guy like you can't find it easy making friends."

The monster roared and took a step back the way it came, towards the falling rocks and slowly crumbling wall.

"Dang." Pat tried a different tactic. He called in the giant cave that held the maze, towards the wall they needed to get to. His voice echoed back from that direction.

"You have a big bum, big bum, big bum, big bum...."

Fire lighted once more in the monster's black hole eyes. It lunged towards the wall, and for the second time, Pat and Nya jumped.

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HELLO!

I'm back.

Mwahahhahaha.

Well any promises I made about updating failed so all of my 467 pinkies are now broken. Sorry I didn't update for 3 months, I've been busy. But I've done a long chapter to try and make up for it (1600 words is long to me).

I hope the story makes sense (I keep changing what I want to plot to be).

Comment and Vote and all that stuff,

(I still don't know what voting does but it seems like a good thing so hey why not)

- FranVader