The Deepcombers

Chapter Thirty Two

Lon set his end on the floor and Mel gently lowered the wooden poles down into the darkness. There was an odd echo as the legs struck the stone and the posts rippled the surface of what appeared to be a shallow puddle.

The sea drover was the first to descend. He climbed down with a torch in one hand and he splashed into the ankle-deep stank at the bottom. He could see he was in a long wide stone corridor. The passage reminded him of the underground river channels and it made him remember the slime in that cistern. Those tunnels also had smooth sides too and the same chalky atmosphere, but this thoroughfare was larger and stinkier. A pervasive stench like moldy cheese filled the air.

"Slugs." Melcart sniffed the air as he came down the ladder, "...it's what a snail farm smells like."

Lon lowered the torch to check his toes and was relieved to find the water free of any lifeforms. All the same, the liquid covered his feet and made him really uncomfortable. These flimsy sandals were exactly the wrong footwear for this excursion and he longed for his pilfered boots. He didn't enjoy wet feet. Now these wood and leather sandals would be soggy for the rest of their journey. It would probably ruin them too. Melcart had sturdy boots and yet he choose to remain standing on the bottom rung above the pond as he re-checked the map.

"Can we move out of this puddle?" 

"Sure. Take the bottom." the dark-haired navigator pocketed the scroll and raised his hands to catch the top. Lon wasn't aware they were taking the ladder, but he complied. The wet end dripped even more of the slimy cave juice on his pants as he tucked it under his arm.

Lon was the leader now, a trail blazer. He had a well-built torch in his left hand and four more on his back. They were deepcombing, splashing into the darkness on the second level of the map, just his childhood heroes had done in the broadsheets.

"Straight on." Melcart said. He adjusted his end of the ladder under his arm.

The pair plodded forward in tandem and penetrated through the cobweb curtained corridor. Lon watched live spiders flee his fire as he plowed through the shrouds. The ground beneath his feet dried and alternated between sandy stone and pebble-filled depressions. The sides were bare stone and smooth like they'd been created by water, centuries earlier. Overhead, a bumpy ceiling and the occasional stalactite spiked down but nothing lengthy broke their stride. The queer sound of water drops echoing in a stone cistern caressed their ears as they traipsed through the silky tunnels. The spiders were huge and that meant there were flies nearby and of course he could smell why.

They soon came to giant clam-shell shaped cavern about thirty feet in diameter. Overhead was a ridged ceiling. Under their feet was an exceptionally smooth floor which sloped upwards to meet the jagged roof. There were two exits on the far side of this hollow and paths to each. The first thing Lon noticed was how the bottom of the place was so smooth compared to the rough ridges overhead and how the stone underfoot glistened and reflected their torchlight. The second thing he spotted was the garbage. Ahead was a tall pile of moldy matter and the smell was nauseating. He wished he had fingers available to pinch-off his nose. The slop must get dropped here from somewhere above and indeed there was a sliver of daylight shafting down which brightened the dreary pocket and lit the air thick with buzzing flies.

Beyond the pungent pile of refuse, the cave was portioned off into short pens with sticks woven into fences. The short stalls were no more than eight-inches tall on both sides of a center aisle. It didn't make a whole lot of sense until Lon looked down and saw dozens of fist-sized blue snails with tiny yellow antenna. He set the ladder down to better study the creatures under his torch. They were gastropods, invertebrates, but these ugly organisms were ten times larger than the garden variety he knew back in Dundae. The slimy bugs were about six inches long and three inches wide. They had greenish blue spotted bodies and yellow antennae on top of their heads. The sight of these disgusting creatures and the pervasive stench of the room made Lon gag, but he couldn't look away. There were over a dozen in each pen and they feasted on moldy vegetables, melon rinds and animal dung.