Arno and Elise: Cave Divers
"How deep do you think this cave goes?" Elise asked, peering over the mouth of the chasm. Her harness ropes quivering as Arno tied them to a stalagmite jutting out of the floor. "No idea. We'll soon find out won't we?" He said as he gave a last jerk on her ropes that sent her stumbling back. "HEY! You did that on purpose!" she cried, rubbing her hip where the harness cut through her tank top. A chuckle sounded behind her and bounced off the stone ceiling, filling the chamber with echoes. Arno walked towards her as she turned around, one eyebrow cheekily raised as he watched her. Elise settled into position. Hanging the heels of her booted feet off the end of the ledge, she sent tiny rocks and dust drifting like confetti into the drop. She flipped her headlamp on, blinding him in the process. "Ow. Watch it!" he said scrunching his eyes up against the glare. Elise poked her tongue out at him "payback's a bitch isn't it?" he said nothing.
"Are you ready?" he asked as he took up the slack on the belay line.
"No." Elise replied and launched herself into the darkness that was waiting to engulf her. She abseiled down the rock face, her headlight beam illuminating only a few metres around her. Swinging in an arc as she let out rope and watched as her feet pushed against the damp rock making a soft skriiiisht noise. "How's it going down there?" his voice called down from far above her. Elise tipped her head back, staring up at the pinprick of light that was Arno's headlamp "not far now, maybe 10 metres or so? There's some water down the bottom here, I can't tell the depth"
His nervous chuckle filtered down to her "well that's probably a good thing…"
"What?! Why?" she asked, suspicion lancing through her voice. Elise could hear him shuffling his feet above her, knowing there was something he really didn't want to tell her. "Uh... because the securing point for your ropes isn't quite so… secure." Elise took a deep breath trying to squash down the panic that rose in her chest. "Okay. Tell me about it"
"Um, the rock of the stalagmite is crumbling under the chaffing of the ropes aaaaand it looks like it's about to snap."
"That's just great" Elise huffed. Next time she was going to tie the ropes. "okay, I don't feel like falling from 10 metres up so let's just do this quickly and try to get me close enough to the water that I don't break something when I hit it." She said and rappelled as fast as she could down the side of the chasm, using her bodyweight and leg muscles to her advantage. "It's going!" a shout from above made her look up. Elise watched as the ropes went slack and managed a strangled "oh, no" before physics took over her body and she plummeted into the freezing water.
Elise stood up in the waist high water, goose bumps rising in the absence of the icy murk. Arnos' head appeared over the lip of the opening "are you okay?" he called down. "Do I LOOK okay to you?" Elise cried indignantly, flinging water droplets from her fingers and unpeeling her long hair from where it was plastered to her cheeks. "Well, it could be worse" he offered. "Says the one not soaked through with freezing cave water" Elise glared up at him.