He had found the entrance on a particularly ordinary day. Nothing strange about it. An average, normal, completely unexciting series of events arranged in a 24 hour period of time, conveniently labeled as “one day” so there was no confusion. He hadn’t thought anything of the discovery, at first: it was a cave, sitting in the woods, untouched by man and hidden by trees. It was covered in moss and there was probably some wildlife in it. “How deep is it?” he wondered. “What lives in this thing?”
To satisfy his curiosity he took a trip back to the room and looked up some information on other caves in the area. He figured it to be a nice distraction from the work he had come to a non-descript eastern European country to do, and would stay to complete for an estimated 3 months. He decided to go deeper and deeper into the cave each day, until he reached the end or an impasse. He wouldn’t ever look up any information about it, preferring to discover information about the thing first person. He had grown tired of hiking, anyway, and could put the overpriced materials he had purchased for this failed hobby to some use.
Day one he ventured back out to the area, but had carelessly forgotten to mark the cave’s location on his map, or make note of any extraodinary land mass near it. After stumbling around for an hour or so, unable to find it, he angrily quit his search and began storming back “home”, to his room, exhausted and dirtied.
Of course, what else should happen besides the cave conveniently popping up on his travel back? He didn’t have a map of the place, but noticed a particularly large tree sitting nearby. It was so tall, in fact, it seemed as if someone had moved a redwood out to this remote area of eastern Europe, and it had managed to survive and continue to grow. Completely out of place it made the perfect spot to look for, and next time he came he’d purchase a map beforehand.
However, when he returned two days later, the cave wasn’t on the map. That was not the problem, however: the whole area wasn’t. Wondering if he’d somehow passed into an unmapped area of the country, he shrugged off his concern, deeming it stupid and wishful thinking and found a spot on the edge of the paper to mark, doing so. He took out his flashlight, pointed it at the entrance and turned it on. Immediately he was greated with several bats, angered by the sudden burst of light trained directly at their sensitive figures, as they flew out of the cave and at him. He ducked and turned around as they flapped off, presumably trying to find another spot to rest.
He shrugged off the attack and trained the light in front of him, surveying the path ahead. He pointed it at the ground, noting the location of several hazards. He pointed it back at the roof, bracing himself in case he found more bats: there were none. He walked ahead with the light in front of him, careful not to trip over the many obstacles in his path. As he walked further he heard a constant, crashing noise; figuring it was rushing water, he continued walking until he reached a fork in the cave. He considered his options and decided to head back to his room, deciding it was a good place to stop for the day.
He made the journey back to his room, becoming more and more exhausted as he did so. The cave exploration seemed to have taken a lot out of him, and by the time he made it back to his hotel room it was late at night and he collapsed on the bed, having not eaten at all that day. When he woke up he had a throbbing headache and no energy; he was filthy, tired, hungry and late. He hurried himself into the shower and apologized profusely to the businessmen he had angered.
When he left the meetings he had no desire to do anything but go back home, to the U.S., wishing he had never accepted the job. Yet something changed his mind and within an hour after the meeting was over he was back at the cave, dressed in suit & tie, venturing back inside with his flashlight.
He worked his way back to the fork and chose the left side. As he progressed further he could tell he was going up an incredibly steep hill. It was completely silent back here; the rushing water had faded and was out of memory. His flashlight bounced off of the walls of the cave, casting the shadows of the natural structures jutting out of the walls, turning this into a haphazard journey.
He continued walking, sucked further and further in. It was completely silent: even his footsteps made no noise. The flashlight faded, his backpack weighed and was dropped off his back, left behind; he didn’t need it.
He continued his journey, further and further into the cave, the silence noise and the darkness light, the unknown the known and-
The sound of a thousand voices, causing him to whip around, tripping over his own feet, unsteady on the unsure cave ground. His flashlight flew out of his hand and he fell backwards. Instead of ground, nothingness: as he plummeted down the cliff, the flashlight smashed against the ground and broke, slowly rolling back downhill to the entrance.
Not a huge fan of the length. Should be longer.
