Author's Note: That's right! Another chapter! I don't completely suck at updating! Oh, and, though it might seem insignificant, a few changes to note: there's another conversation w/ Jack Shannon in chap. 4, there's more added to the legend later in that chapter, and the type of gun the soldiers carry in chap. 5 was changed. Keep that in mind!

Indiana Jones and the Spirits of Avalon

By Clansman Sam

Chapter 6: Out of the Dark

Thorpe's men, originally the picture of gruff masculinity with their assorted weaponry, began to back away from the opening, eyes wide as dinner plates. Indy's grin widened. These guys might've known twenty different ways to kill somebody, but right now they were completely out of their element.

Canning, however, didn't appear to have the same concerns. "No time for pats on the back, Jones, time is of the essence." He strolled over to the wall, wrenched a torch from its holder, and produced a box of matches. Indy didn't bother to ask why they were on such a tight schedule. Canning would just snap at him, or try to subtly tell him that he was a dunce.

The Brit struck a match and lit the top, then shoved the torch into Indy's face. "You're the expert," he said sourly. "You go first."

Indy took it, then turned to the perilous staircase. Vivian fell in behind them, and they began the descent. It was dangerous, all right; no banister, and one misstep put you right off the edge. The young Jones walked slowly but assuredly, holding the flame up high. Every step put them farther into the icy darkness, and soon enough the only light came from the torch. The air was thick with must. Indy shivered and continued down.

His booted foot crunched as it came into contact with the stone. One foot in front of the other. His eyes were focused intently on the steps before him, only two of which were visible. It was impossible to tell how far the drop was, but Indy didn't want to find out. It seemed like everyone had the same feeling; no sound came from any of the party, save for the mumbled prayers of one of Thorpe's regiment, positioned right behind Vivian—

Suddenly there was a crack, stone separating from stone, and the man's prayers turned into a scream of terror. Indy had just enough time to look behind him; the man was tumbling forward, and Vivian screamed as he knocked into her. They both flew to the left, propelled into the gap. Indy reacted immediately. Sliding onto his back, he threw his hands out, grasping for Vivian. He found her hand, and held onto it even when the slick sweat threatened to separate them. And there was still screaming, long and uninterrupted until a wet thump stopped it abruptly.

Canning wrapped his arms around Indy and pulled him up, he and Vivian collapsing onto the stairs. The British archaeologist gazed over the edge, breathing heavily. "I'd say that's about a hundred feet, give or take," he muttered in an attempt at a calm tone.

Indy glanced back, amazed at the man's heartlessness, but Canning refused to catch his eye. He looked instead at Vivian, still trembling slightly but controlling herself. "You okay?" he asked.

"I- I will be," she answered, then swallowed hard and stood back up. "Let's keep going."

He nodded. Canning lit a match, a thoroughly meager light source, and they kept going. Slowly, ever so slowly, Indy's mind still on the dead soldier that Canning had so callously dismissed. Who were these people? And how had he allowed himself to walk straight into the unknown with gun-toting mystery men at his back?

He didn't have much time to ponder, for soon the staircase came to an end. A tunnel stretched forward ceaselessly, lined with unlit torches. He grabbed one, and Canning lit his and got one for himself. They began to walk, Indy holding his torch to the rough rock walls, which seemed to be painted with hieroglyph-like symbols. An unsheathed sword, a jagged line that Indy thought represented water, and, on a flat line below the roughly drawn surface of the water, something like sunbeams, emanating from the bottom. Indy had some idea of what the symbols meant, but, with one shifty look at Canning, he decided that telling the coldly unfeeling Brit about everything wasn't such a great idea. Instead he picked up the pace, aware that the other members of the party were getting ahead.

The tunnel was long and unlit, the only beams being cast by Indy and Canning's torches. But Canning, at point, had a beam coming from his torch that could almost reach the equally dark end of the tunnel. Stalactites hung down low enough to be in view, and Indy's stomach suddenly lurched with the thought that the end of the tunnel might be the end of the road.

"Bloody hell," Canning murmured, peering down from the edge of the tunnel. His fears confirmed, Indy rushed to the end and looked downwards. The beam of his torch extended for perhaps ten feet, enough for him to see that it was another pit, this one extending unknowably deep and around forty feet wide. Indy leaned out from the edge and dropped his torch, a rough but effective way of gauging depth.

Their eyes followed the orange light as it dropped silently through the air. But about forty feet down, still in sight, its descent was halted by a stone outcropping, smooth enough that it looked manmade. And, in the center it, there was what appeared to be some sort of a lever...

Indy looked back at the group that had crowded around the edge, then at Canning. The Brit was smirking at him, a rope around his shoulder that he had obtained from one of the soldiers.

"Me first," Indy sighed. "Right."

The assemblage backed up, and Canning tied one end of the rope to a sturdy torch holder. He then pulled out some slack, handed it over to Indy, and grabbed up the rest of the slack, gripping it firmly. Indy wrapped the thick rope around his waist. His eyes met for a brief moment with Vivian's. She looked greatly concerned, but Indy winked at her. Then he nodded to Canning and hopped backwards into the musty air.

X

Twenty feet down, rappelling became methodical. The rock crunched under his boots as he swung into it, Canning giving him slack as he went. Swing, crunch, swing, crunch. Indy stole a glance down. The glowing light was getting nearer with every swing. It was by mere luck that the torch had landed on the outcropping, and that it had kept burning. But Indy tried to get that thought out of his mind; luck was something that ran out. And if and when that happened, he was up the creek without a paddle. No, dammit, he had to rely on something else, something that would keep going. He had to rely on sheer willpower to get him to the end of the tunnel. Or, in this case, the source of the torchlight.

Swing, crunch, swing, crunch... "Slack!" Indy yelled. He had reached the top of an overhang, bulging like some vertical boulder on the face of the cliff. He rappelled down, hanging out dangerously far into the empty space. Then the overhang tapered off back into the rock face. Indy's next swing put him in midair, his legs bicycling uselessly, his body hanging ten feet out from the flat rock. The outcropping was only about six feet down. He called again for slack, and soon enough he was parallel to the torch lit stopping point. But he was still about five feet out from it. He'd have to detach himself from the rope and swing onto it.

Indy pulled his jacket sleeve up onto his hand and wrapped the rope around it twice. Making sure of the grip, he began to undo the knot he'd put in to secure it to his waist. Finally it began to come out. Gritting his teeth, he pulled it loose.

Gravity took him without hesitation. He lurched downward, his arm popping as he jolted to a halt. Indy ignored the pain, instead grabbing the rope with his free hand and unwrapping the other one so it wouldn't catch when he let go.

"What the hell's going on down there?" Canning yelled from the top.

"I'm too far out to drop onto it," Indy bellowed. "I detached myself from the rope... I have to swing in!"

"Jesus Christ," Canning said, just loud enough for him to hear. "You Americans and your obsession with death..."

Indy didn't answer. Instead he swung out hard, kicking his legs for more effect. He got close to the edge, swayed back, then careened forward again. Closer, closer... the rope reached its height. Indy let go.

The motion carried him toward the edge, but he was dropping fast. It suddenly didn't seem like he'd make it, but he threw his arms out and got his upper body onto the outcropping. Indy grunted and pulled himself up. And there he was. He smiled despite himself. He'd made it, and death obsession be damned. "I got it!" he hollered.

Canning's face appeared over the lip of the tunnel. "Defying all logic..." he sneered. "Pull the lever, then, Jones, don't be stupid!"

Indy swallowed his anger and yanked down on the lever. Immediately the rock above him cracked, the fissure snaking down halfway to the outcropping. Then the rock came alive, groaning open much like the opening to the staircase. Only this time a thin stone bridge slid out of the gap. It ground to a halt at the other end of the crevasse.

"All right, Dr. Jones!" Thorpe yelled, glancing over the crevasse. "Get back to the rope, and we'll pull you up!"

Right, Indy thought. Easy... The rope was only, well, five feet away. He cracked his neck and backed up against the rock wall. Three, two, one- he kicked off the wall and sprinted forward, feet barely touching the ground. Closer, closer... He threw himself off the edge, flying into the air. The momentum carried him only so far, though, and after three feet he was dropping fast. He clawed air, his hands groping for the rope, and finally his hands clenched around the bottom of it. His hands burned, but Indy began up, hand over hand. "Okay! Pull!"

And they started to pull, however slowly. Soon enough he at the top, beads of perspiration on his brow. Thorpe inspected him from above. "Good work," he said. "But we haven't the time."

Indy pulled himself up. As the other men got themselves together, Vivian rushed over. "Are you all right?" she asked, seeming genuinely distressed.

Indy made an attempt at a roguish grin. "All in a day's work, hon," he said, sliding his hands around her waist. She moved in closer, her emotions all but impossible to read. She seemed happy to be with him, but what else.

He wasn't allowed much time to ruminate. Canning hollered out that it was time to go, and he turned to the rock bridge. Vivian pulled him down to her with the pretense of a peck on the cheek, but as her lips touched his skin she whispered, "Be ready." Then she pulled away.

Indy didn't respond, but as the party started across the bridge, his hand went down to the holstered Webley, pulling back the hammer with a near inaudible click.

X

They progressed quickly, considering the fact that one of the party had already plummeted to their death. For the first time, Canning hadn't insisted Indy be at the head of the line, but now he wished he was leading. The soldier in front of him was shaking like a leaf, and a morbidly afraid person with an automatic weapon was, in his opinion, not a good thing. But, for some reason, he wasn't at all scared. His heart was racing, but for some reason, he felt ready. Ready for what, he didn't know, but that somehow didn't seem like an issue.

The bridge came to an end. Indy stepped off and looked at what was next.

A staircase. Another goddamn staircase. But this one spiraled upwards, enclosed by mildewed brick walls. He looked over at Canning, who nodded at him. "Upwards and onwards," the Brit muttered. He had taken out a Browning 9mm, and he was holding it like he knew what he was doing. It unnerved Indy a little, but the calm, prepared air that had come over him remained. He fell in behind Canning, and they started up.

The Excalibur hieroglyphs were on these walls, too, and he examined them in passing by the dim light of Canning's torch. Two halves of a sword, broken... from the bout between Pellinor and Arthur, maybe. The broken halves were far apart, and in the middle of them was a repeat of the other symbols. The lake, with a glowing light at the bottom. Committing the images to memory, he continued up the damp steps. Oddly enough, though, the staircase was getting brighter, as though another light source was being added to the torch. And after a few more upward spirals, the source was revealed; a shattered paned glass window. Which meant that...

"We're in the bloody tower!" Canning shouted in frustration. "That's where this whole thing leads to, the top of the tower! I should've dynamited the bloody thing, and saved us all the trouble!" He growled and kept going, stopping on the top landing. There before them was a door, one which led to the top of the tower and the end of their hellish experience in the bowels of the abbey. But Canning made no move towards it. Instead he looked at the objects in front of it with disgust.

Indy followed his gaze. There were at least four skeletons there, lying in pieces on the ground. Blackened blood stained the brick walls. What had happened to the people there? And how the hell were they going to get in?

They all stood stock-still, eyeing the door. The handle was brass, and all one had to do was pull on it. Indy raised an eyebrow. "That's how they died..." he said. "They pulled the door open, and it activated something."

"However," Canning said, "that still leaves the problem of us opening the door without suffering the same fate."

Indy looked sideways at him. "Unless..." He pulled the bullwhip from his belt loop, cracked it over his head, and snapped it outwards. It wrapped around the handle. He let out a short breath and pulled back.

There was a grinding sound, and a rounded blade dislodged from the left wall. It swung across the length of the room, glinting menacingly in the torchlight, and receded back into its starting position. Indy stepped forward slowly. "So... if it's activated by opening the door, and it's already open, then by all rights..." He stepped across the threshold.

The blade stayed where it was. Indy couldn't help a smug look back at Canning as the rest of them came through. Then he turned back, led the party up a small set of stone steps, through an arched doorway, and they were there. Indy took it all in. There was another door on the far right. The warm lighting from the large paned glass window, which spanned the top half of the back wall, fell on the sparse furnishings, among them a wooden bench and a few tapestries. And, in the center of the room, an altar, adorned with red felt and on top of which...

He ran to the altar. It was one half of a sword, the blade coming up only about five inches before it ended in a jagged edge. The hilt was gleamed in the warm light, jewels studding its surface. His heart began to race. Arthur's first sword... it couldn't be...

Vivian was behind him, shocked at the discovery. She eyed it without speaking, as if to do so would be almost sacrilegious. But she brought her hand up, her finger tracing the hilt, and as she did so her eyes narrowed. "Indy," she whispered, "feel this." He put his own hand on the same spot, aware that Canning and the rest of them were watching from behind. All along the surface there were indentations, invisible to the naked eye. "Canning, look at this... There are words here. If I could get some dye, I could bring them to light."

"Thanks for the suggestion, Jones." Canning's voice came from right behind him. And even as he turned to see, Indy realized that he was far too close, that Vivian was struggling against Thorpe's grip in the corner of his vision--

Canning kicked him viscously in the back of the legs. He dropped to his knees, the sword sliding across the floor. One of the soldiers immediately grabbed hold of his hands and twisting them behind his back. "And thank you," the Brit continued, "for getting me thus far. But I think I can take it from here." The click of a hammer resonated in his ear. "Look on the bright side," he sneered. "You'll get to see your friend Brody, for he's soon to follow!"