Face crumbled in a devastation Jake had never witnessed, Henry poured flame across the ceiling and walls. “Cal!” Burning gremlins fell around them until any remaining had skittered away. The air was heavy with smoke and the smell of charred flesh.
Jake dropped to his stomach and peered over the edge, his light flickering over the bumpy walls. “Dad! Dad! He’s okay, he’s right there!” Please be okay, please be okay. Cal lay on a thin ledge, sideways, one arm dangling downward. He was so still, obviously unconscious. He was only about ten feet down. “Cal!”
“Jake, stop. Don’t wake him up.” Henry had come up beside him, was breathing hard. “God.” He ran a shaky hand over his chin. “If he wakes and starts flailing…he’ll fall. Okay, okay. One of us has to get down there right now, before…” Henry was up and running across the cave, stepping over burnt and still glowing gremlins, to get the duffle.
Jake was up and ready, grabbing at the rope. “I’ll do it.”
Henry’s brows lowered, the same way Cal’s did when he didn’t like something.
“There’s no way I’ll be able to pull both you and Cal up,” Jake reasoned. Of course he wasn’t sure his dad could pull him and his brother up either, but they’d worry about that later. Right now he had to get down there and keep Cal from shifting in his sleep and…Jake swallowed, desperately wanting visual confirmation that that hadn’t happened while they were getting the rope.
Not wasting another moment, Henry shoved part of the rope into Jake’s hands and then began tying one end around his own waist. “He’s not that far down so tie yourself in the middle of the rope. Leave enough length to secure around Cal once you get down there. Around each leg and looped around your waist—like a climber’s chair—you remember how to do that?”
“Yeah Dad.” He made a loop around one leg, then knotted it so it wouldn’t slip tight and cut off his circulation.
“Once you get down there, use the remainder of the rope and tie it around your brother the same way,” he explained again, a telling sign of his father’s worry. “Okay? You got this?”
“I got it. Don’t worry. I won’t let him fall.”
Henry gripped Jake’s arm. “I know you won’t.”
They each hurried to get their parts of the rope tied properly. When they were ready, Henry ran over to Jake’s “tonsil” wall that split the tunnel in two. He went through one side and emerged out the other side, trailing the rope around the rock and came back to Jake. “Ready?”
Jake nodded, knowing that as his dad walked slowly back toward the tonsil stone, the rope would wind back around, making him lower. Normally he’d hesitate before stepping off a ledge, but Cal was down there. Cal could fall. Without a second thought, Jake stepped backwards, planting the soles of his boots against the wall. And watched his dad take a step at the same time he took a step downward. Soon he was past the lip and staring at the wall of the tunnel.
His shoulder throbbed where the damn beastie had bitten him, but he moved through it anyway. He could worry about that later.
He walked down along the side of where Cal lay as his dad let the rope out, until he was even with his brother. Too afraid to call out to his dad to stop in case his yell inadvertently woke Cal, he kicked off the wall, making the rope slap at the top of the hole, hoping his dad got the message.
As the rope swung out, Jake took advantage and jerked it sideways so when he came back against the wall he was right in front of Cal.
His descent immediately stopped. Message received.