Chapter 3 Underworld
And now for the horror of the story to truly begin, enjoy the read.
When Nick got Joey out of the way of bullet fire, he looked down at his fellow marine. The poor kid was riddled with bullet holes, so many bullet holes that it would be hard to come back from and he had already lost so much blood. This was bad, without a good medical attention, Joey was going to die. Joey grunted with pain and looked up at Nick.
"I'm fucking dying, Nick…" Joey said, blood around his mouth.
"Bullshit man! I know you're hurting, but you're not fucking dying!" Nick tried to reassure the young man.
Joey began coughing, more blood spraying out of his mouth as he did.
"Hold still, calm down! It's a flesh wound. It's a paper cut. Just hold still!" Nick said.
"Liar." Joey said before blood started running out his nose and he went limp.
Nick stared down in shock, Joey was dead. Nick couldn't believe this, Joey had always been more comfortable to be sitting behind a desk, scared to go into battle and dying and now it happened.
"No." Nick whispered as he gently laid the young man on the ground.
Nick looked down and saw Joey's crucifix in his hand. Nick took it and looked before looking back down at Joey's lifeless face.
"Say a prayer, my friend." Nick said sadly.
Suddenly, the ground beneath him and Joey's body stared to rumble. Nick stood up, struggling to keep his balance. A few feet in front of him, a large portion of the ground opened up into a sinkhole. Nick tried to run for safety, but soon enough a the ground beneath his feet opened and the earth swallowed him up.
"Fuck! Jesus!" Nick yelled as he fell into a new world below.
Nick got the wind knocked out of him when he landed. he quickly recovered and coughed as he waved the dust around him away. Nick's earpiece gave off a high-pitched ring as he stood up.
"Ah, shit!" Nick exclaimed as the ring hurt his ear drums.
Nick looked around to see that he had fallen into an underground cavern, partially illuminated from the light pouring down from the hole he had fallen from, 52 feet above him. He looked around to see if anyone had fallen in with him, but nobody had.
"Merwin!? Jason!?" Nick called out, hoping to get a response.
Nick got no response back. Nick was just able to make out what looked like other passages in the dark beyond the light. Nick popped a flare and threw down one of the tunnels and pressed forward, hoping to find his friends. Nick called out for his friends again as he made his way through the underground tunnels.
"Nick!?" came Jason's voice in the distance.
"Jason? I'm close man. I'm coming." Nick shouted back.
"Don't blow your load too fast buddy!" Jason shouted back.
Nick continued forward into the tunnels. He turned the light attached to his rifle on when he got to a point where the flare, he'd thrown no longer illuminated the tunnels. Nick rounded a corner and as he walked forward, suddenly a shape jumped from the right side of the tunnel into another passage. Nick jumped back in startlement when he saw whatever it was. He had caught a quick glance of it, but he was sure that whatever it was, it hadn't looked human.
"You've gotta be fucking kidding me." Nick said to himself.
Nick took a small breath before pushing forward. When he got to where whatever he saw had jumped from, he looked and saw a small tunnel in the wall, it was too small for a human to even squat down in and jump from as fast as whatever he saw just had. Nick suddenly heard a clicking sound to his left and quickly swerved around towards the noise, raising his rifle, ready to shoot if he had, but the clicking stopped. Nick took in another shaky breath and advanced slowly to see what it was. When he entered another dark tunnel, the clicking suddenly started again.
Nick stopped dead in his tracks and squinted into the darkness. Nick was just able to make out a shape of some hunched over creature. Nick took slow, scared, audible breaths as he slowly edged forward half inch by half inch. Suddenly the clicking creature turned it's head around and stared directly at Nick. Nick quickly raised his rifle, about to shoot, but the creature ran off, once again, leaving Nick by himself or at least the marine hoped.
"Pull it together man. Pull it together." Nick thought to himself as he continued forward, rifle raised.
Soon, Nick came into a new area where there was some light pouring through a hole from above ground, which seemed to illuminate what looked like a giant stone hand. Nick rushed forward and jumped down a small ledge as he saw the light. As he was passing the giant stone hand, he noticed something in the corner of his eye. There was something under it. Nick stepped forward and aimed his light to see it was skeletons, human skeletons and they looked like they'd been here for a long, long time.
"Oh shit." Nick exclaimed with fright as he bent down and turned a skull over to see it's front top teeth were missing. "The fuck happened to your teeth, buddy?"
Nick shook his head when he realized he was talking to a skull and walked out from under the giant hand. Another tremor suddenly rumbled through the earth, nearly causing Nick to lose his balance as dust fell around him. A light suddenly shined on Nick, causing him to jump in surprise.
"That you Nick?" said Jason's voice.
Nick was too shaken up from everything that had happened over the last couple minutes to respond and just slowly walked over to Jason. The two marines stood there, staring in wonder at what lay before them. They appeared to be in some long-forgotten ruins from ancient times, probably dating back thousands of years.
"Well ain't that something? Where on God's green earth have we landed?" Jason said.
Nick still didn't say anything and just continued to stare at the ruins.
"We need to get back topside, regroup with the rest of the squad and signal for medivac. This place ain't no weapons silo, but it's sure as fuck crawling with Iraqis." Jason stated.
Jason noticed Nick still hadn't said anything.
"Nick? Sergeant Kay! Pull yourself together. Eyes wide!" Jason said.
Nick looked at Jason, his face full of uneasiness.
"I saw something." Nick said uneasily.
"What do you mean saw something?" Jason asked.
"I mean it wasn't human. In the tunnel." Nick said, shaking his head. "Shoulda never gotten off that helo."
Jason placed his hand on his head as he shook it. He knew Nick hadn't been himself the past few weeks, but now this, this was a whole 'nother level.
"I fucking knew it. I knew you weren't ready for this." Jason said.
"I swear to God-" Nick said defensively, angry that Jason wasn't believing him.
"Do not get God involved in this bullshit! Now I don't wanna hear another fucking word. You pull your shit together right fucking now, before you get us both killed." Jason aggressively commanded.
"You gotta believe me." Nick said.
"No, you believe this, Sergeant. You didn't see shit!" Jason said, thinking Nick was jumping at shadows.
Before this mission started Joey had bad feeling about it and so did Clarice when they arrived and now Nick knew why, he felt it to, but why couldn't Jason.
"Something's not right. I know you can feel it." Nick pushed, trying to make Jason understand.
"The only thing I'm feeling is that I've got my work cut out with you." Jason said dismissively.
Nick grabbed onto Jason's arm and dragged him over to the skeletons he found.
"Look, look right here Jason. These are skeletons. Fucking skeletons." Nick said.
"So, what, they look like they've been here for a good long while to me. I mean this place looks three times older than my fucking dead granddad." Jason reasoned.
"Well, what about this, what do you think of it?" Nick said.
Nick picked up the skull with the missing teeth and showed it to Jason.
"Hey, Yorick, someone really did a number on your teeth. Were they drilled out?" Jason asked the skull while laughing. "The silent type, huh? I can appreciate that."
Nick sighed and shook his head with frustration.
"We need to get out of here right now." Nick stressed.
"Well, that's the first practical thing you've said since we fell down into this shit hole." Jason said.
"Shut up." Nick groaned with annoyance.
Jason took another good look at the ruins, wondering a little bit on what they were.
"You ever seen anything like this? The Hell is this place?" Jason asked.
"Pass. I flunked history at school." Nick said.
Nick saw some stairs leading into a room off to the side and went up them. He entered a small room with nothing but a stone tablet, which depicted a lion eating a man.
"Easy there Simba." Nick joked to himself before going back down the stairs.
Nick suddenly got that uneasy again from looking at that tablet.
"Tell me, you don't feel it?" Nick said, looking towards Nick.
"What Nick? Feel what exactly?" Jason asked.
Nick tried to think of what it was he was feeling, but just couldn't put his finger on it.
"I don't know. Something." Nick said.
"I don't feel shit." Jason said, shaking his head.
"You sure about that?" Nick questioned, still not believing Jason couldn't feel the dread this place seemed to emit.
Nick looked to his left and saw a giant door, thinking it could lead to a way out. Nick tried to open it, but the old thing wouldn't budge.
"This thing is heavier than it looks, give me a hand. I'm gonna need some more muscle." Nick said.
"You skipping gym again?" Jason asked mischievously.
As they began opening the door, Nick thought back to when they got off the helo, how Merwin had looked back to scare Joey.
"You know, Merwin looked back when disembarking the helo." Nick said.
"That he did and if marine superstitions are true than that means we're all in this mess because of him." Jason said, going along with the joke.
"And that means we'll have to kick his ass for getting us into it when we find him." Nick joked.
"Save the ass kicking for when we get back to base. The longer we're down here the more satisfying it'll be to do so." Jason said.
Suddenly, a scream echoed through the tunnels from behind the door.
"That's Merwin." Jason said, recognizing his voice.
Jason and Nick pulled the door the rest of the way open and followed Merwin's screams. They came across him hanging from another sinkhole, entangled in barbed wire.
"Oh no!" Nick gasped, seeing his fellow marine like that.
Clarice was there with him, unharmed and trying to get Merwin down, but she was having difficulty do so.
"Jesus, I'm trying! Will you stop squirming around!" Clarice shouted.
Jason and Nick ran up to help Clarice.
"It's bad. He's bleeding out, we have to cut him down now." Clarice said urgently.
Jason, Nick, and Clarice all took out their combat knifes and began to cut the barbed wires from Merwin's body.
"Hold tight buddy, we got you." Jason assured Merwin.
When they cut the wires and got Merwin to the ground, they took a closer look at his would and putting it mildly, Merwin was not in good condition.
"Oh, he's fucked. He's so fucked!" Jason said as he saw the deep gashes in Merwin's body, which were gushing out tons of blood.
"You don't think I can hear you?" Merwin replied.
"You're gonna pull through, brother. Suck it up." Jason assured Merwin.
"There's morphine in my pack. Grab it!" Nick said.
Jason immediately flipped open Nick's military backpack, digging for a syringe, but couldn't find it.
"Jesus, who the Hell loaded these pack?" Jason said.
"Hurry the Hell up!" Clarice stressed.
"We got this, you keep lookout!" Nick said.
"Lookout? Lookout for what?" Clarice asked.
Nick was about to tell Clarice about the creature he saw earlier in the tunnels, but before he could, some unseen force suddenly pulled Clarice into the darkness without so much as a breath from her. Jason and Nick flinched back seeing this. They heard a clicking sound in the darkness, the same one Nick heard earlier. Jason raised his rifle with the flashlight on, trying to see where Clarice was and what exactly that clicking was coming from.
"What the fuck just happened?" Jason said uneasily.
Jason was now starting to take back what he said earlier about Nick not seeing anything in the tunnels. He didn't know what that unnatural clicking in the darkness was, but he knew that it wasn't the Iraqis.
"Clarice?" Jason called out.
It was then that the noises in the darkness went from an unsettling clicking to bloodcurdling, bone chilling screeching.
"The fuck was that?" Merwin asked.
The screeching was now starting to come from all around them. Jason and Nick grabbed Merwin and dragged him back towards a wall of the cavern.
"The fuck is out there?" Jason exclaimed.
"I don't know and I ain't trying to find out." Nick replied.
As they dragged Merwin towards the cavern wall, Nick looked to see the massive blood trail Merwin was leaving behind as they did.
"Fuck. Fuck! He's bleeding out, we gotta take care of this." Nick said.
Nick set Merwin against the wall and tried to put pressure on the man's wounds as Jason gave them cover.
"How is it? Just give it to me straight!" Merwin asked.
"Not gonna lie man, it's pretty fucking bad." Nick said truthfully.
Jason looked back at Merwin as the marine screamed.
"Whatever's out there, he drawing them down on us!" Jason said.
"He won't hold still! Get the damn morphine in him!" Nick said.
Nick covered Merwin's mouth in attempt to drown out his screams to keep whatever that screeching was from crashing down on them.
"Shut up man. Hold it the fuck in!" Nick demanded.
Jason searched through Nick pack again and found the morphine tube at last, jamming the syringe in Merwin's leg. Jason looked up at Nick, noticing the terrified look on his face and he stared back into the cavern where the screeching was coming from. Nick was so terrified that he didn't realize he was strangling Merwin, trying to keep his screams in.
"Ease off, Man! You're fucking killing him! I need you with me, Nick." Jason said, urgently trying to snap Nick out of it. "Nick, you're killing him!"
Nick seemed to snap out of it and let Merwin go, who soon stopped screaming and appeared to pass out.
"Morphine's kicked in." Nick said.
A shadow suddenly passed to their side and Jason raised his rifle.
"Move out." Jason commanded.
The two marines picked Merwin up, Jason carrying him over his shoulders, and they ran down another tunnel as the screeching creatures or whatever they were chased after them.
Meanwhile, in another cavern, somewhere far off from Jason, Nick, and Merwin, Salim had fallen through the ground, next to a pillar. Salim turned on his radio, trying to establish contact with his team.
"This is Lieutenant Salim Othman to all units. Please respond with your locations. Over." Salim spoke.
"Where are you?" Dar's voice came through, barely audible. "Is this damn thing even working?"
"Captain Dar!? Is that you? I can't hear you. Repeat your message. Over!" Salim replied back, but no response came back.
Salim got up a looked around him, noticing the pillar he had fallen next to.
"Dar, if you can hear me, I'm in a… I don't know, some sort of cave. I'm looking for a way out. Over." Salim spoke in the walkie before moving on.
As he walked through a passageway, Salim couldn't help but think of the plans he had originally planned for the day, a long bath, a little radio, and celebrating his son's birthday.
"But oh, no, no, you had to come knocking on my door. 'The Americans are coming' you said!" Salim said sarcastically to himself. "And now look where we are… whatever the fuck this place is?
Salim, wondering if these were military tunnels, called out to see if anyone was near to where they could hear him, but received no answer. Salim eventually came to another section of the cave, which looked like the ruins of an ancient, thousands year old temple. Salim suddenly heard some gunfire and raised his rifle.
"Is anyone out there? Speak to me." Salim quietly called out.
Still Salim received no answer. Salim looked in front of him and saw the body of an American soldier and a trail of blood behind him. Salim inspected the body and saw that there were no bullet holes on him, but claw marks.
"What Hell visited you, my friend?" Salim wondered to himself.
Salim looked and saw that the blood trail led to some stairs leading down into a lower section of the temple, where down below daylight shone down onto a massive puddle of blood in front of the entrance to some corridor. Salim descended down the stair and as he did, another tremor rippled through the earth, causing Salim to lose his balance and drop his rifle, which fell down the stairs and into a dark crevasse. Salim jumped from the stairs onto the lower level of the ruins. He tried to reach for his smaller side arm so that he still had something to defend himself with,but found it missing from its holster.
"Dammit." Salim cursed, having no idea of when he lost it.
Salim walked towards the large puddle of blood he spotted from the other level. He didn't see a body anywhere, so assumed it must have been from the dead soldier he found. Another tremor rumbled through the earth.
"I hope these tunnels don't cave in on me." Salim commented.
Salim looked down the dark corridor in front of the trail of blood, jumping back in startlement when he heard a strange clicking noise. Salim immediately popped a flare and threw it down the corridor, hoping to spot something down there, but didn't see anything, not even a shadow. Salim took his lighter from his pocket and carefully made his way down the corridor. As he did, he saw Ancient Mesopotamian art on the wall, but they were covered in angry looking claw marks. Salim rounded a corner at the end of the corridor and heard something scurrying off somewhere.
"Hello?" Salim called out, but no answer.
Salim continued down the second hallway, soon coming across a large doorway.
"Zain would love to see this." Salim said, taking a moment to take in the impressiveness of the ancient architecture.
Salim opened the large doors, hearing that clicking sound from earlier on the other side as he did so.
"Who's there." Salim called out again.
Salim saw a fellow Iraqi soldier dead in a patch of daylight shining from above. Salim tried to approach the body to see what it was that killed him, but the body was suddenly pulled into the darkness and a screeching sound took over the clicking sound. Startled, Salim fell onto the ground. He noticed a pistol on the ground and quickly grabbed for it in order to defend himself from whatever this creature was. The soldier's body was thrown back into the light, covered in bloody gashes across his body, like those from something with vicious, deadly claws.
Salim immediately ran back towards the doors from which he had entered and pushed them back shut to keep the screeching creature away.
"Stay with me, Allah." Salim prayed.
The screeching creature banged on the ancient, wooden doors, managing to beat them open. Salim fell to the ground and backed away, looking at the screeching creature. Whatever it was, it was still covered mostly in darkness, but Salim was still able to make out something that looked something similar to that of a large bat. Salim fired his pistol at the creature, which appeared to barely phase it. Salim got up and ran for his life back down the corridor, jumping over downed pillars.
Salim made it back to the lower area of the ruins where the large pool of blood was. He looked around for where to run to next, but there was nowhere else for him to run, he was trapped. Salim turned back to see the creature from earlier standing in the entryway of the hallway where it was slightly more illuminated for him to get a better look. It indeed had wings that looked like that of a bat, but they appeared to be fused to it's forearms, which were humanoid looking with four vicious claws, on it's back it had several long spines that looked like spikes protruding from it and it was just standing there, making that unsettling clicking noise.
"What the Hell are you? What do you want from me!?" Salim shouted at the creature.
The creature stood up on it's hind legs, standing about 8 feet tall and screeched, causing Salim to take a step back in fear of the creature, beginning to think this was God punishing him for his violent actions against the Americans earlier.
"Oh, Allah the merciful. Oh, Allah the protector. Stay with me. Stay with me. Spare me." Salim prayed, hoping for a miracle.
As if answering his prayer, another tremor happened and from above the creature fell a truck and some rubble, crushing it to death as it screeched. Seeing this, Salim burst out laughing with relief.
"It's over. Merciful Allah." Salim said with grateful relief.
"Could this get any worse?" Eric wondered out loud as everything around him was going to shit.
They hadn't found Saddam's chemical weapons silo yet, the Iraqis had attacked them and taken down two helicopters. Eric honestly didn't think things could get any worse. As if to prove Eric wrong, the ground beneath him suddenly started to rumble. Eric assumed it was just a simple earthquake, but it turned out to be much worse as sinkholes started to open up in the ground, swallowing up the marines. This was bad, Eric had to find Rachel and make sure she was safe.
"Rachel! Rachel!" Eric called out as he ran around trying to look for her.
Eric didn't find her however as the ground suddenly opened up beneath him and he fell into the earth like everyone else around him.
"Oh shit!" Eric shouted as he fell before everything suddenly went dark.
However, than everything was bright and sunny. Eric looked down at himself to make sure he was alright, but much to his surprise, he wasn't wearing his field gear, he was wearing a black suit, the same black suit he wore the day he and Rachel got married.
"Eric." said a voice.
Eric immediately looked up to see Rachel standing before him.
"Rachel." Eric breathed out.
Eric tried to reach out and hold onto Rachel and they moved, but they didn't move towards her shoulders like he commanded them to. Eric's arms were moving on their own and when he looked down, he saw that he was slipping a ring onto Rachel's finger while he heard clapping around him.
"Eric." Rachel said again.
Eric looked up at her.
"Eric." Rachel said again, but much to Eric surprise, Rachel's mouth didn't move as she said his name.
"Eric! Eric!"
Eric woke up to find himself in what seemed to be and underground cavern and Rachel was standing above him, looking worried.
"Rachel." Eric coughed as Rachel helped him up.
As she did, a tremor rumbled through the earth, causing dust to fall around them.
"This whole damn place is about to come down." Rachel said as she looked around worried.
"Rachel, are you okay? Are you hurt?" Eric asked in concern.
"I'm good." Rachel assured.
Eric looked to see if anyone else was with them, but it was just him and Rachel.
"Where the Hell are the marines?" Eric exclaimed.
"I don't know. It happened so fast. The ground just swallowed me up. Did you see Sergeant Kay? Kolchek?" Rachel asked.
"Last I saw, they were together." Eric said.
Eric than began to contact Kay or Kolchek or anyone he could reach, but just got static coming out of his radio.
"I already tried. Something's interfering with the signal." Rachel informed.
That was not good to hear. Eric had no idea how far underground he and Rachel had fallen and without radio contact, it would be difficult to find the marines or call for help. He and Rachel would just have to try and get through this on their own and they may not be marines, but they had enough training to pull themselves through this. Eric looked behind him and Rachel and saw a passageway.
"That could be another way out." Eric suggested.
"I don't know." Rachel replied skeptically.
"You know I've got your back Rach. Stay close and you'll be fine." Eric reassured her.
"I'm pretty good at looking after myself Eric." Rachel dismissed.
"It would seem so." Eric replied, knowing full well how Rachel had always relayed on herself in dangerous and stressful situations.
Rachel, quickly went through their equipment, making sure they had all the required climbing gear, carabiners, quickdraws, and rope. As they moved forward, Eric allowed himself a moment to smile at the thought of them climbing together, remembering how they met at the academy during climbing class and became basically joined at the hip and then they were married. It all seemed so long ago, yet it also seemed like it was yesterday. Eric and Rachel came to a hole that they couldn't see the bottom of.
"Well, that's a steep drop to nowhere." Rachel exclaimed.
"We've got rope." Eric replied.
Eric noticed Rachel pulled out a lighter and use it, discovering that there was an airflow. Eric was surprised to see Rachel with a lighter, even before they were married, Rachel never smoked.
"So, when did you start smoking?" Eric asked.
"It's nothing. Just something I picked up back at base." Rachel said.
Eric noticed that Rachel didn't look at him as she said that. He could tell that it meant she was lying, but Eric didn't bother to push for the truth, he had no problem with Rachel smoking if she wanted to. They got their climbing gear ready and descended into the hole, coming into another tunnel.
"This place doesn't look much like a weapon's silo to me." Rachel said.
"If there's nothing down here then why were we attacked?" Eric questioned.
Rachel looked at Eric like he had asked the dumbest question in the world.
"There's a war on. People tend to shoot each other." Rachel said matter-of-factly.
"Oh yeah." Eric said, looking away, realizing how stupid he had sounded.
"Come on, let's move." Rachel said.
Eric and Rachel turned on the lights on their pistols and continued down the tunnel.
"I guess we can classify this as 'quality time.'" Eric joked.
"You and I always did have a different view on 'quality time.'" Rachel said.
"Doesn't this remind you of old time, Rach?" Eric asked.
"You mean the sense of feeling lost?" Rachel asked.
Eric and Rachel came upon a fork in the tunnel. They choose the right path and it led to a dead end. They began to turn back, but as they did, Eric noticed something in the corner of his eye. He looked and saw what appeared to be a slab of stone that had a carving on it. He walked towards it and bent down to get a look at it.
"Eric. Eric. Eric, what are you doing?" Rachel said as she came back, having noticed Eric hadn't followed her back.
"Come take a look at this." Eric said.
Rachel walked over and saw what Eric was looking at. It was a tablet of stone with the image of an ancient warrior shooting another with a bow.
"It appears to be a stone carving made by an ancient civilization." Rachel observed.
Eric grunted as he suddenly gripped his chest, Rachel looking down at him with concern.
"You okay?" she asked.
"Yeah, it's just, I got this cold, sharp pain in my chest suddenly." Eric said, seeming a little uneasy,
"You could have been injured during the fall down here and the adrenaline is wearing off. Do you need to sit down for a while?" Rachel asked in a clinical manner.
Eric shook his head.
"No, I'm good." Eric said, standing back up. "Come on, let's continue forward and find the marines."
Eric and Rachel doubled back and took the left path, leading into some ancient ruins. Eric looked to the wall on his left and saw it had old writing on it, but whatever it said, he had no idea.
"It looks old." Eric said.
"Old? It's ancient. Why that's cuneiform. Sumerian, maybe?" Rachel said, coming up a taking a look at the writing herself. "What is this place?"
"You're quite the expert on history. I didn't realize." Eric commented, never knowing that Rachel knew about ancient cultures.
"Maybe you don't know me as well as you think." Rachel replied.
Eric and Rachel went down some stairs leading out of the room, soon coming to an open door way that had a large hole in the ground with seemingly no way around it. Eric however looked around the door and saw a small ledge they could get around to. Eric and Rachel helped each other swing around to the ledge, a small bit of the floor cracked away, but it was otherwise thankfully stable.
"You've got a certain cool under pressure." Rachel commented.
"After you left, I learned to deal with pressure." Eric said.
Eric and Rachel looked over the room they were in, Eric noticing a broken piece of blue painted wall with more cuneiform writing and what appeared to be a winged man on it.
"What do you think this place is?" Eric asked as he stared at the broken ancient art.
"Hard to say. These carvings look religious. I think we may be in a temple" Rachel assumed by what they had seen so far.
Eric took a few steps away from the wall art, stopping when he stepped on something. He looked down to see he had stepped on some sort of metal figurine. Eric picked it up and looked at it; the figurine was of some humanoid looking creature with a demonic looking face, a gaunt body, what appeared to be bird's feet, and it had four wings.
"It's Pazuzu." Rachel said, noticing the statue.
"Pazu-who?" Eric asked, looking towards Rachel.
"Pazuzu. Do you not watch horror movies?" Rachel asked.
"You should know the answer to that." Eric said, having never been able to fully sit through one or pay attention when Rachel had them watch them.
"It's a Sumerian demon. Something to do with plagues, I think." Rachel explained.
"Plagues and demons, huh? Great." Eric said, setting the figurine back down.
Another tremor ran through the caverns.
"Great, that's all we need." Eric said, thinking that the caverns were going to collapse any second, crushing them or the tremors would cause them to lose their balance and fall down a hole.
Eric and Rachel made their way towards the door that was on the other side of the large hole, hoping it led to a way out.
"Think we can move it?" Eric asked.
"Maybe, but it looks jammed pretty tight." Rachel said.
Eric and Rachel braced their shoulders against the door, but it wouldn't budge. Eric suggested they try pulling it open and they did. The door was slowly beginning to open, sand falling through as they did. Another tremor rumbled through the earth however and it caused the sand and rubble beyond the door to fall towards Rachel. Rachel screamed as the sand and rubble pushed her towards the edge of the hole in the middle of the room.
"Rachel!" Eric shouted.