Chapter 14
Ethan opened his eyes. His first thought was of Diane, and he reached out a hand to find her. She wasn’t there. All he felt under his fingers was sand and stones. That brought him back to full consciousness.
Above him was darkness. To his right was a lot of junk. Where had that come from? Under him, the ground was sandy and cold.
Where am I?
It took him a moment to gather his thoughts and realize what had happened.
He had fallen again, farther into the darkness.
But he was relatively unhurt. Apart from a bump on the head, his ribs, and a gash in his right arm, he was fine.
The gash was bleeding heavily, and Ethan tore off some more of his shirt and wrapped it around the wound.
He pulled it tight, using his teeth on the one end of the fabric, and tied it.
Diane would be proud of his ingenuity, he thought, although she would most likely find something to improve upon. The thought made him smile.
He was lightheaded for a while and sat with his back to a boulder, watching the light coming down from above. It was a diffused glow more than a direct shaft, but it gave him enough illumination to see the debris that had rolled down.
The question was, could he make it back up?
While he was considering his options, a sound broke through his thoughts. It was a dry sound, faint and small, but familiar. Despite that familiarity, it still took him a couple of moments to realize what he was hearing. It was the rasping, coughing breath of another living being.
“Hello?” he ventured cautiously. Every ridiculous scary story he had ever heard came back to him, and he wondered if calling out “hello” was such a wonderful idea. What if there was something not human in the dark?
That is utterly ridiculous, Ethan. Get a hold of yourself!
Honestly, the silly things his mind could conjure. This wasn’t the time to be the little boy with an overactive imagination. This was the time to be the engineer who ran a whole smelter.
“Hello,” he called with more conviction this time.
The coughing sounded a little louder, as though the person was possibly trying to reply but had a mouth full of dust.
Ethan eased himself up, using the boulder to help. His ankle was definitely re-injured. He could feel it throbbing in his boot. He didn’t dare undo the laces for fear he would never be able to do them up again.
He shuffled forward toward the pile of debris, assuming the sound had come from there.
“Hello? Where are you?”
“Over here,” a voice croaked.
It sounded as though it was right in front of him, but he couldn’t see anyone. If only he had light. He could try to light a fire again. That had worked up on the plateau of rock that was a good fifty feet above him. But it had taken a long time.
Well, what else did he really have to do now? He was waiting for rescue.
“Listen,” he said, feeling around for some wood he could work with. “I’m going to try to make a light. I can’t see a thing down here.”
“Okay,” the voice said weakly.
“Ethan! Ethan! Is that you talking down there?” another voice, a much stronger one, called.
“Thomas?” Ethan called. “It’s me!”
“Thank the Lord you’re okay!” Thomas said, sounding relieved. “You are okay, right?”
“A little banged up, but mobile,” Ethan said. In his mind, he saw Diane pursing her lips. He was not all right, and she would chew him out about it later, when he returned to the surface. And he would return to the surface to see the woman he loved, he vowed.
He could hear the relief in Thomas’s voice. “Can you find a way back up? I found a sturdy pole that hasn’t been burned much. I can push it over the edge here if that will help.”
Ethan considered it and then shook his head even though Thomas couldn’t see it. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think Darren is down here and alive. The log could hit him or move things and make this more challenging.”
“Okay, is there anything else I can do to help?”
“Is the fire still burning?”
“Yup. It is.”
“Okay, toss a burning plank down here to me,” Ethan said. It was a long shot that the fall wouldn’t douse the flame entirely, but it was worth a try.
“Okay, just give me a moment,” Thomas called.
Ethan waited.
A couple of moments later, a short length of plank came cascading down the fifty-foot drop.
It landed on the ground by Ethan with a shower of sparks and dust. Quickly, Ethan picked it up and blew on the glowing embers.
The fire bloomed back into life and by its light, Ethan began to search the area he was in.
It was a cave. All around him, in every direction, was a wall of rock. The debris had smashed into it, causing the planks and chunks of stone to line up like a steep, almost sixty-degree ramp. Ethan began to think of possibilities, but first, he needed to find Darren.
After a quick search, he realized that Darren was either under the debris or on the other side of it. Hoping for the best, Ethan began to make his way to the other side.
“What’s going on?” Thomas called down.
From the light streaming in behind Thomas, Ethan could see that his friend was leaning over the side of the ridge. Ethan waved the plank in the air.
“I’m going to look for Darren.”
“I thought he was right there by you,” Thomas said.
“He’s not,” Ethan said. “I think he’s on the other side of the rubble pile.”
“Okay, but be careful,” Thomas said.
Ethan nodded. “Of course.” Thomas’s words were so close to something Diane would say that Ethan’s thoughts gravitated to her again.
He thought of the quiet evenings they had had together, talking by the fire.
How cozy and happy they were. He wanted that again.
He wasn’t ready to give up, and he was willing to bet that Diane wasn’t giving up on him either.
He knew she was up there treating people. Ethan couldn’t imagine her ever sitting on the sidelines doing nothing in an emergency situation. Diane Hart wasn’t that kind of person. She was the kind who would jump into a roiling ocean to save someone. What would she do for him, Ethan wondered.
Isn’t that a scary thought? I’m not sure.
I know she’ll try to help, but she was a little annoyed with me lately, after the Curtis incident.
Although I suspect she has forgiven me for my part in the whole thing.
I just wish I knew if she was as head over heels in love as I am.
I should have asked her or at least brought up the subject before doing something this monumentally stupid.
Berating himself, Ethan made his careful, slow way across the pile of rubble.
The bit right at the base of the incline, where it all hit the cave wall and had become wedged, was quite stable.
Ethan found that he could pick his way over everything, and it wasn’t much more difficult than navigating rocky terrain at the beach.
His ankle protested with every step, but he gritted his teeth and half crawled, half climbed across the rubble.
Soon he reached the other side. The cave floor was sandy and had few rocks or bits of rubble on it. It did have a prone form with a large log pinning him to the ground. It was over his back. Darren was lying on his front, which explained why it sounded like he had a throat full of dust.
“Hi, Darren,” Ethan said, holding the burning plank up so he could see properly.
“Hey,” Darren wheezed. “Think you can get this off me?”
“Give me a moment,” Ethan said, taking it all in.
The thing on top of Darren was a thick, heavy pole that had helped to support the roof in the cavernous smelter.
There were many of those poles that had stood at intervals, making sure the roof wouldn’t come down on them.
One of them was pinning Darren to the ground.
It seemed that most of the pole’s impressive weight was being supported by a large rock on Darren’s right, thank the good Lord, or he might very well be dead.
There was more rubble and debris around him, but Ethan didn’t think it was impacting the situation.
The tricky part would be to move the pole, which was blackened and burnt on one side but not the other, off Darren without bringing down anything else on them.
It was tricky because the burned end of the pole was wedged in the messy tangle of things that had fallen down when the floor caved in.
“Ethan? What’s going on?” Thomas asked. “Should I come down and help you?”
“How are you going to do that with that broken leg of yours?” Ethan called back.
He studied the situation a little longer and then returned to Darren’s head. “Hey there, Darren. Do you think you’d be able to crawl out if I lifted the weight off your back?”
Darren moved his arms and legs. “Nothing’s broken,” he said. “I’m just struggling to breathe with this weight on me.”
“Of course,” Ethan said. “Okay, so with a lever stuck in the spot where the pole and the plank meet the boulder, I can hopefully give you a couple of inches to crawl out.”
“Sounds wonderful,” Darren said and coughed as he choked on the dust of the cave floor.
Ethan looked around for the thickest plank he could find that would fit in the gap he’d found, and then he got ready. It was going to hurt. His ribs, his arm, his ankle, they would all protest at the amount of energy and power he would have to use.
He put the burning plank down, leaning against a rock to give him light, and set to work.
“Okay, here goes,” he said and pushed down on the plank.
Things moved. There was a rasping sound, and Ethan’s whole body protested the force he was using. He felt things lift, heard rushing in his ears. What was that? There was a slithering sound, and then a hand touched his shoulder.
Ethan got a fright and dropped the plank. Things rumbled, and the huge, heavy pole came rolling off the pile of debris toward him.
Moving with speed brought on by fright and adrenaline, Ethan managed to jump over the pole as it slid down and then rolled to a halt, bumping against one of the cave walls.
His ankle gave a painful jolt as he landed, but he was too full of adrenaline to worry.