6. CHAPTER 6 #2
“I am losing her.” I glanced at Asher. His eyes filled with sorrow, as if he felt he was losing her too.
We couldn’t lean forward much on the narrow path without risking a fall.
Finger by finger, she slipped from my grasp.
Within seconds, she fell and disappeared from sight.
Her scream echoed loudly enough to make my ears vibrate.
“Damn it,” Callum roared at the front of the line.
Tears sorrowfully fell down my cheeks. We weren’t close, but she was a part of our squad, and it was my hand that dropped her.
“We have to keep moving, yes that fucking sucked, but we can’t stop.”
We continued marching forward. I pressed my back and the heels of my feet as close to the wall as they could get. We continued moving through this pass. The pass widened up where we could walk regularly, thank the gods for that. We came upon the first cave, thank the gods for that too.
We stuck with our original plan and traveled to the last of the caves, continuing along the narrow, winding pathway.
As we passed by the sixth cave, we saw the fifth squad busy preparing their mats for sleep.
We nodded to them and moved towards the twelfth cave.
We wouldn't know our place in line tomorrow because squads could leave at any time.
Inside our cave, we found a large wooden crate and an open space illuminated by several flickering candles mounted to the wall.
On the large crate, there was a lock with a three-dial combination. Next to it was a rolled-up paper with a ribbon beside it. Selene moved over and opened it.
“I am a three-digit number, my hundreds digit is eight less than my tens digit, my tens digit is five more than my one’s digit. Figure me out and food awaits.” She read to us.
“It is entirely too late to be doing riddles…” I said.
“Zero-eight-three or one-ninety-four,” Ophelia said quietly. She had barely spoken since Nadine fell.
“Not zero-eight-three.” Callum continued to turn the dials on the lock, twisting the last dial in and then a click. He opened the crate. “One-ninety-four, beautiful job Ophelia.”
He threw a sack to each of us, leaving one remaining sack.
The one for Nadine. We all looked at it with sadness, knowing she probably wasn’t alive anymore.
We all sat down and quietly ate. In our sack, there was a peanut butter sandwich, an apple, an orange, a granola bar, some plain crackers, and a can of juice.
“Hey squad, I don’t know about everyone else, but I am going to save my apple and crackers for tomorrow. Who knows what meals we will get tomorrow?” I said.
“Do you actually think they won’t feed us in the morning?” Ophelia looked at me with concern.
“I am not sure, given that our departure time from the cave is our choice, I am guessing probably not,” I said.
“I was going to suggest the same, actually. My brother warned me that I should ration out my food,” Beau added.
“This is really going to suck. We have to remember by the end. We can't get snappy on each other. We will be tired, sore, and hungry by the end of this,” Asher stated.
“We are a strong team, we proved, we can work well with each other during the courses. We have to stick together,” Callum said, like the leader he’d been. “My guess is it’s near two in the morning, we should leave before sunrise, is everyone good with that?”
We all nodded in agreement. Everyone took their rolled mat out of their ruck and laid it on the ground, crawling into it for the few hours we would get.
Before I realized it, Callum was waking all of us.
I was uncertain whether I had dreamed. I still felt extremely exhausted.
We all rose swiftly, rolling our mats and securing them to our packs.
As before, we fell into the same order behind Callum and began climbing the rugged cliff.
I could hear sounds from below. I wondered if we were now in the lead or if someone was ahead of us.
Within a few minutes, Callum was yelling “land mine” at us again.
Damn, I guessed it would be like this the entire way up and down.
Every so often, we dodged land mines or crawled under traps.
We reached a point where we had to crawl up a wall to get onto the higher path.
Luckily, the base of that path had a wider, circular area, which allowed us to help each other .
Once we climbed the steep, winding path, Callum advanced past us, taking the lead with confident strides.
I fell behind him, my calves burning fiercely like they were on fire.
Every step sent sharp aches through my knees, and our journey ahead seemed endless.
My shoulders pulsated painfully from the weight of the heavy rucksack, each movement reminding me of the brutal climb.
BOOM!
I startled so bad, I almost lost my balance. It came from beneath us and shook the mountain. The screams coming from below didn’t sound good. We were all frozen in place.
“Let’s take a moment to gather ourselves for the loss of another cadet, and afterwards we carry on.”
After about a minute, we moved forward and continued up the rugged mountain pass.
We reached a long corridor where the entire wall was lined with dangerous traps, forcing us to crawl a considerable distance.
Just as we were about to stand and walk, we approached another wall to climb.
This one was steeper than the previous, with fewer sturdy stepping stones to use.
My height worked against me, but it never stopped me before. Beau and Asher pushed ahead, offering hands to help the three of us climb. That was when it hit me again—we’d lost someone. One of ours wasn’t with us.
I forced myself upward, careful, steady, stretching as far as I could to haul my body higher.
The top loomed close. I lifted my right leg toward the next stone, toes brushing its edge.
The rock gave under me, crumbling, my foot slipping out from under my weight.
My stomach lurched as the wall bit into my fingers.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
It was only one foot. I hadn’t fallen yet.
I still had this. I adjusted my left foot outward and placed my right toes on it.
Both hands clutched tightly on the jagged ledges in front of me.
I looked down to find a place where I could bring one foot up.
I spotted a more stable rock to my left, so I lifted my left foot and stepped onto it, leaving my right foot hanging for a moment before finding a nearby rock to use.
I pulled my right foot up and reached above me for the next rugged rock, trying to pull myself forward.
Beau reached me and offered his hand, helping me pull myself upward.
Selene chased close, closing the gap, already halfway up. I glanced forward to check the path—and her scream tore through the air.
I snapped my head back. She lay crumpled on the ground, Jeremy pinned beneath her. My chest tightened. Shit. Not good.
“How bad is it?” I shouted down.
“I think she has a dislocated shoulder, which is going to make getting up this harder…” Callum said.
“What about Jeremy?” Beau asked.
“I am fine, my leg will be sore,” he said.
“Any ideas on how we are going to get her up here?” Asher asked.
“Anyone pack a rope?” Beau looked around. “Didn’t think so.”
“Ophelia has the most Healer training. Anyone have an undershirt she can make a sling out of?” I asked. I also received extensive Healer training, as my mom was a Healer, but I was on top of the wall.
“I do.” Asher pulled out a shirt and dropped it.
Ophelia motioned to Callum to hold Selene in place, as she came to her side and did a quick pulling motion with her hand on the top of her shoulder. She got her arm wrapped into place.
“I have an idea… it is probably crazy but it’s the only one I got,” Callum said.
“Um, okay,” Selene said through soft tears.
“I am going to put you on my shoulders and climb. I’ll need you to lean towards the wall and be steady, so we don’t fall backwards. Once we get up enough, they will lift you up,” Callum said.
I certainly hoped this would work, because it definitely wouldn’t end well if it didn’t.
My mind raced through all the ways this could go badly.
He knelt down, and she perched on his shoulders, then leaned forward against the wall, using her uninjured hand to steady herself.
He started to climb with a slow place. Moving his feet one by one, rather than maintaining a wide stance.
He moved his arm up and pulled himself up, and I saw her sway back slightly. I gasped, my stomach dropping .
“Damn it, you need to hold steady and keep the lean forward.”
She caught a rock and hauled herself higher.
He paused, drew a breath, then climbed on until Asher and Beau could reach down and pull her the last stretch.
Once she stood with us, I checked her wrap, tugging to make sure it held, then pressed my fingers to her wrist—pulse steady, strong.
Callum came up right after her. The other four scaled the wall without trouble and joined our line.
The sun bled toward the horizon, shadows stretching long, and my stomach growled loud enough to make my mouth water.
I pulled food from my rugged pack and started eating, sparking a chain reaction as everyone else followed suit.
Each of us had saved something from our sacks the night before.
We kept moving forward, our steps steady and purposeful.
As we walked, we heard a low murmur of voices behind us.
Damn, another squad was catching up. Everyone in our group noticed the squad gaining on us, so we quickened our pace to stay ahead.