OK, I know I've been gone for a few more days than I meant. I had a really busy weekend and I apologize that I'm getting this out so late. Thanks to everyone following the story!
JAY'S POV
Jay had barely slept in the past few days. He was constantly looking over his shoulder, and constantly watching where he stepped. He had made an effort to avoid all sidewalks cracks. He hated riding in cars because he couldn't avoid the cracks then.
Ever since he went to that playground, Jay had been utterly freaked out. He still had a doubt drifting around in his mind that he was just crazy, because after all, people falling into the earth was . . . well, crazy.
However, a good part of himself just couldn't get rid of the gut feeling he had. A gut feeling that Cole had gone back to the hole, and that something was down there, and that Cole was too. Jay couldn't explain it, and he knew no one would ever believe him, but after seeing that rope, he knew Cole had had something to do with it.
Jay had returned to the park every day, despite his terror of the place, which was now all manners of creepy. He was returning there now, with a shovel and flashlight in his hand. He walked over to where he'd found the rope that first day. There was a widening pit there now, one which Jay had taken the time to dig.
The hole was maybe the size of a grave at this point, six feet down and a circumference that could fit maybe five people. Jay set his flashlight down on the edge, and with a calming breath he slid down the wall of the pit to the bottom. Dirt rallied around his shoes and his hand was instantly scraped and muddied seeing as he used it to balance himself as he slid down.
At the bottom of the pit, Jay gripped his shovel tightly to begin digging. His hands ached and stung. He'd been digging this for days. His shoulder had knots, and his hands had callouses. He had brought gloves today but they did little to stop the pain of the blisters that had already formed.
Jay drove his shovel into the earth as hard as he could, then once his shovel was imbedded he stomped on the edge of the shovel head thus driving the whole head into the muddy earth. Gripping the shovel tightly, he heaved and uprooted the shovel again. His muscles screamed in protest and he felt some of the blisters of his hands shred.
That's when the first raindrop fell. Jay flung the dirt over his head so it made it out of the pit. A second raindrop fell as Jay drove his shovel in for a second time. The sky darkened and rumbled angrily in the distance. Jay stomped on the shovelhead. Rain began to sprinkle down faster as he threw the second scoop behind him.
In minutes, the rain was coming down relentlessly. The drops were enormous, at least the size of a golf ball. They were close together too, making it seem like someone was pouring a bucket on Jay from above. In moments, his clothes were thoroughly soaked and sticking to his now clammy wet body. His hair which once sat proudly on his head now resembled that of a wet cat's. It was plastered to his forehead dripping more water into his blue eyes. Both of his arms shook in cold and exhaustion as he continued to drive that shovel into what was now a pit of mud.
Jay tossed his head to flick some of the hair out of his face and a stream of water went flying from his head. His whole body was shivering. He felt his hands bleeding under the gloves, some of it was even soaking through and dribbling down the shovels handle. Jay felt hot water suddenly drip down his face. He was crying. Though with the rain one wouldn't be able to tell.
The thunder storm was passing right over him. Another ear shattering roll shook his head. It sounded like someone was firing a canon at him. The earth was declaring war because of him poking around where he shouldn't have.
Breathing heavily, Jay looked up into the darkened sky that looked down on him.
"Come ON!" He taunted the sky, then he screamed at those clouds with frustration. The exhausted was getting to him. He drove the shovel in.
"Like a little rain is gonna scare me away." He muttered, flinging dirt over his shoulder. More thunder.
"Or THUNDER!" He yelled upwards. At his words, a crack of lightning flashed above him from far away. It light up his eyes and face and the surrounding darkness, and then it was gone, leaving him alone again.
"Bring it on!" He yelled. He drove the shovel in.
More thunder exploded the world with noise. He drove the shovel in. Lightning illuminated the ground once more, the rain becoming visible for a mere second. Jay drove the shovel in. Freezing rain battered him in the face. Wind whipped his hair around, causing it to whip into his face. His nerves, cold from the rain, felt a cold sting whenever that happened.
"I'm coming to get you Cole." He whispered to himself. Another strike of lightning lit the world up, then was gone. Jay drove the shovel in one last time. This time however, his shovel drove into the earth and the dirt around where he'd struck crumbled away as well. Jay was now standing at the edge of a very dark, very deep pit into the earth. His shovel finally fell from his hand, and hit the muddy earth with a resounding thud. Jay fell to his knees at the edge of the pit.
"Oh my God." He whispered, as he stared into an abyss. He was right.
"Cole?" Jay whispered, half wondering if he would get a response. He peered into the darkness as lightning struck behind him. Its light lit the pit for a brief second, and Jay's bright blue eyes widened as he took his second to peer down.
The pit went on and on for ages, but for a split second Jay thought he saw a bottom. Because there, with his vision fully strained, Jay saw a different kind of light. It was a tiny pinprick, but it was glowing and orange and it flickered in a familiar way.
Fire. Jay thought, and darkness fell around him once more. Jay didn't have a very long time to think however, because a new rumbling sound, this time from below him, starting to fill his ears.
"What now!" Jay yelled in frustration, as he stood up and tried to keep his balance. He looked down into the pit. It was still just dark. A flash of lightning finally came and Jay looked. The pit walls were moving. More specifically, they were moving back together, like the ground was heeling itself.
"Nonononono!" Jay yelled, grabbing his shovel and bashing at the rapidly heeling earth. WhatdoIDO! Jay thought erratically. In a desperate moment, Jay drove his shovel into the left side of the wall as hard as he could and then in a moment of zero thinking and total dedication and a very high pitched scream, Jay jumped into the abyss. With as he might, he pushed the handle side of the shovel into the right wall. The shovel just kept sliding down, both ends dragging through the pit walls spraying dirt and mud into his eyes and mouth.
"BAD IDEA JAY!" Jay screamed as he slid further into the abyss. Just as he thought he was going to fall to his death, the shovel caught on something and Jay slammed to a stop. The sudden stop jerked on both his hands and his right hand slipped on the smooth handle. His left hand, bleeding and stinging, gripped the handle for dear life. Jay was sure his knuckles were more than white, probably bleached. He probably looked like a skeleton under his glove.
Jay trembled, muscles strained and aching, as he reached up his right hand to grip the shovel with two hands. He looked up to see what the shovel had stopped on. The head part was now resting on what was possibly an enormous bolder or a decent sized stone, Jay couldn't see all of it. The handle part was stopped in a tangle of very thick roots which Jay assumed was from the tree at the park.
Jay knew he wouldn't be able to sit or lay on the shovel, it would surely break under his weight. The only reason it held up now was because his hands were evenly apart, so the weight was all putting pressure on the middle.
Breathing rapidly, and scared as hell, Jay squinted into the surrounding darkness. Water was still dripping on him from the surface and he could still hear the wind and thunder from outside, though it was considerable more isolated in the pit that out there.
Jay continued looking around until he saw something out of the corner of his eye. The rope. Jay thought happily, seeing the frayed white ends of the playground rope that Jay had assumed Cole put together.
"Okay Jay, you can do this." He said, talking out loud to comfort himself. He judged the distance to the rope.
"Totally doable." He said, trying to assure himself. He exhaled slowly then began swinging his body with his legs. His arms were trembling, threatening to give out at any moment. Jay swung faster, trying to gain momentum. Another lightning struck up in the sky way above him and Jay threw himself off the shovel on his swing forward. For a second he was flying in the air. It seemed to be in slow motion as nothing supported him.
Then the moment ended as the rope was in front of him and Jay was grabbing it and squeezing his hands as much as possible. He felt more blisters and callouses get shredded upon the impact. The light from the lightning had now ended. Jay slid a tad bit down the rope, but managed to hang on. Jay swung some more until he managed to grab hold of one of the walls. He quickly tied the rope around his waist in case his arms still decided to give out, and began scaling the wall.
His gloves slipped a lot due to being wet and muddy, and his shoes pushed dirt of the all into the pit below. When he paused to take a breath he wiped hair out of face smearing mud everywhere. He just didn't care at this point. Everything on him had dirt or mud covering it. Jay glanced down with a relieved look.
What he was trying to do had worked, he'd succeeded in stopping to Earth from pushing itself back together. He needed to come back here. He couldn't lose this hole. It was where Cole was. He still felt the earth groaning and shaking, but it was moving back together for now. Jay had bought himself some time. He grinned as his gloved hand reached over the edge of the pit, and dug into the wet ground above. He pulled himself over the edge and back into his personal hole. The rain was finally dying down, now just sprinkling around him. The thunder was loud off in the distance and the lightning was less frequent.
The storm had passed.
For Jay.
KAI'S POV
The boy from earlier waved shyly at the room. He looked nervous, and like he wanted to be anywhere else in the underworld.
Zane had happily introduced him to everyone as Cole. Cole seemed more promising than any of the other surface dwellers that had ended up down here. Most of them died in the first fight, even with Kai trying to help them.
Cole had surprised Kai. He managed to kill a Jai'corio in his first fight. Granted, Kai had told him how to do it, but not everyone could always execute it. Kai didn't greet Cole straight away, so neither did the other champions. The Camosos, or champions, always followed behind him. It was a courtesy since he was the first and strongest champion. Kai regarded Cole.
Cole may have looked terrified, but his eyes were also very aware and he looked strong. Zane had fixed his clothing issue and Cole now wore the traditional champion robes in black. His face was smeared with dirt, and his right hand had a bandage, also courtesy of Zane. His hair was longish and black, it had a layer of sand in it from the arena. The Jai'corio's blood was still on his neck, little dried spatters of black. If Cole didn't wash it off, it would poison his skin, which would most likely kill him.
"He has Jai'corio blood on him." Kai told Zane. Zane nodded to him.
"I will show him to the springs later." He agreed.
"Camosos Cole." Kai finally greeted. "I'm Camosos Kai, congratulations on not dying earlier." Kai said, holding out a hand. Cole swallowed and shook his hand. One by one the other Camosos began to walk over and greet Cole.
"Camosos Nya. I'm Kai's sister." Nya said, shaking the new comer's hand. Cole smiled awkwardly.
"Hey." Cole answered. Nya nodded and resumed her place next to Kai.
"I am Camosi Lloyd." Lloyd said, shaking his hand.
"Camosi?" Cole asked confused.
"I'm not a champion just yet, I still have one more year." Lloyd explained.
"More training?" Cole guessed. Lloyd shook his head.
"It was nothing to do with training. Camosos is a coming of age type thing." Lloyd continued. Cole blinked.
"But what if someone isn't prepared to fight even if they're the right age?" Cole asked confused. Kai frowned.
"It's my job to train Camosi before they fight in the pit, since I'm the leading Camsos." Kai told Cole, putting a hand on the young blonde's shoulder.
"Oh. So does that mean you could sharpen me up before I have to fight again?" Cole asked eagerly.
"You are past your sixteenth year, yes?" Kai asked, brow still furrowed.
"Well yeah, but I've never fought anything before in my life." Cole argued. "Well, except that creepy scorpion thing, but even then you were telling me what to do so I don't even know if I can count that you know and besides that was most fear keeping me alive-" Cole's ramble was interrupted by Zane putting a hand on his shoulder.
"Camosos Kai is not allowed to train anyone but a Camosi. However, it is not monitored how we use our free time. I will train you if you'd like." Zane offered.
"Zane." Kai growled. Zane turned to him.
"Kai he's from the surface. We cannot expect to know all we know. He didn't grow up here. I will teach him." Zane pushed. Kai met Zane's cool gaze for a long moment and then,
"Don't get caught." Kai growled. "Come on Lloyd. We're not finished with your training today." Kai said, leading the young blonde away. However, once in the doorway Kai sent Lloyd to begin setting up to train and remained behind the doorway to hear the conversation.
"Ignore my brother, he's always stingy around new surface dwellers. He'll warm up to you." Nya promised, smiling at Cole. Cole smiled back. Then asked,
"Do they really force people to fight once they're sixteen?"
Now it was Nya's turn to frown.
"Once we're sixteen we should be strong enough to hold our own even without training. And no one forced us to fight. We are the children of the noble families, it's our job to please the Underlord." Nya said as if that much was obvious.
"The . . . Underlord?" Cole asked confused. Zane chimed in.
"The Underlord is our leader, he takes good care of us. We must respect his wishes. Besides, fighting in Glatori Rigari is not that much to ask." Zane explained.
"Not that much t-" Cole stopped his sentence in disbelief.
"A fight to the death is kind of a lot don't you think. "Cole pointed out.
"Don't challenge the Underlord's requests, you'll get us all into trouble." Zane said, suddenly sounding stern. Cole held up his hands in defense.
"Sorry." Cole muttered. "I guess I'm used to different customs as a surface dweller." Cole said uneasily. Nya sighed.
"Don't worry, you'll get used to things around here." Nya told him, patting his shoulder. Kai however, was now uneasy about Cole. He said such bold and dangerous things. If he wasn't careful he would get them into trouble like Zane had said.
"I guess." Cole agreed. Then he added, "So am I allowed to ask why a surface dweller like me is made a Camosos or a champion or something?"
"Remember I told you about the Un'dirians. Well it's their job to find creatures or people that can fight in the pit. They always face off against a Jai'corio. If they win, and they are of age, they become Camosos. If they are not of age, they are made Camosi." Zane explained.
"Wait, I thought they weren't allowed to fight if they weren't old enough?" Cole pointed out.
"No, only the young citizens of the Underlords cities don't fight. If you are an unidentified person, you can always be put in the Glatori Rigari." Zane told him.
"Oh." Cole said slowly. Kai didn't like the way he said 'Oh.'
It was only minutes, but Kai could already tell. Cole's head was filled with dangerous ideas.
Ideas that got you killed.
Okay so there's your next chapter. Hopefully I'll have the next out so much sooner. Please R+R it's super helpful!
Keep Writing Keep Reading, Nova out ;)
