Chapter 14

Joey tore down the stone steps, sprinting towards the crumbling walkway. Cold horror filled his veins, the image of his two friends falling still fresh in his mind. But he'd barely stepped foot on the walkway before someone caught his arm.

"Joey we can't. We've got to get out of here."

It was Tristan.

"We can't just leave them." He yelled, trying to throw Tristan off.

"I know but I don't think we can do anything for them if we get ourselves killed."

Joey continued to try and throw Tristan off but to no avail. Rocks were still crashing around them, and over the sounds of the collapsing sanctuary there was no screams from their friends. Joey turned to Tristan, his face pale and his eyes wide. Tristan held a similar expression. It was only now that Joey felt the trembles coming from Tristan.

"We have to go."

Joey stared at Tristan from a moment longer before there was a loud crash beside him as a rock landed mere inches from them. Together they turned and ran. Taking the stairs two at a time they re-joined Tea and sprinted up the tunnel. A speck of daylight appeared ahead of them, getting bigger as they ran. They could still hear the sounds of rumbling and crashing around them but there was no time to stop. They had to get out of there. The daylight grew bigger and bigger before a wall of fresh air hit them. Collapsing to the ground the three of them panted hard, all turning to look back at the entrance where a dust cloud was escaping from the tunnel. They could just hear the rumbles coming from the tunnel for a few more long minutes before the sound ceased and the ground around them grew still.

They didn't speak. They couldn't.

Tea was the first to move. She came to rest on her knees, facing the tunnel. Her hands flew to cover her mouth and thick tears fell from her eyes. Her tears intensified and she doubled over in grief, but she made no sound. Behind her Tristan was staring at the tunnel as well, his hands on his head tears threatening to break free but had yet to do so. Joey made to stand, but his knees wobbled, and he fell to the floor. His eyes were locked on the tunnel, tears running fast and free.

They stayed this way for some time, each trying to somehow make sense of what had just happened. Although the sun was high above them and its heat radiated down it did nothing to help the coldness that swept through them. Joey tore his eyes away from the tunnel and smashed his shaking fists into the ground, a cry tearing itself from his throat. He closed his eyes but all he was met with was the images of Atem and Yugi falling. Opening them again he stumbled to his feet, wiping the tears from his face. He took a few steps towards the tunnel before turning to face the other two.

"Come on. We need to go get them."

Tristan immediately got to his feet, tears finally breaking free, but Tea did not move she stared at Joey. She didn't speak but found she didn't have to as Joey knew what she was saying.

"We are their friends, and we will not just leave them in there."

Twin set of tears leaked from her eyes, falling in perfect synchronisation down her face but she stood nodding at him. He was right.

Joey led the way, the tunnel was full of dust but nothing appeared to be moving. Despite this they moved carefully, once again using their phones to illuminate the way. If they were to have any chance at all of finding the missing pair, then the last thing they wanted to do was cause more of the sanctuary to collapse. Perhaps it was because they were being so careful or perhaps it was because of the shock but it took them a fair amount of time to descend into the sanctuary, when they finally came to the stone stairs the room before them was almost completely destroyed. The walkway stretched only a couple of metres from the last step. The crumbled edge and other cracks served as a reminder of what had just happened. It was Joey this time that motioned to the others to wait as he checked if the walkway was stable. He'd just seen two of his friends fall, he would not allow the others to meet the same fate. Remarkably, the walkway seemed to hold his weight, but Joey still did not allow the other two to come any closer. He would not risk it. His eyes fell on the darkness below him. Dark and unforgiving, no matter how hard he stared at it the darkness would not reveal its secrets. No one spoke, they all just stared at the darkness. Waiting to see something or hear something. But they saw and heard nothing, there was no sign of their fallen friends calling out for help. Joey tried yelling, but either their friends did not hear his call, or they could not hear his call. Did that mean… had the worst thing happened?

"There's got to be a way down there." Joey said, turning to the other two.

Tristan carefully stepped down the steps and moved to Joey's side despite the other's protests, looking at the darkness below them.

"Even if there is we need to have a way back up." He said.

Joey nodded, "We should get help. Call Yugi's Gramps, he'll know a way to get down there."

As Tea turned to leave the sanctuary once more to make the call the two boys turned back to the darkness below them. Joey once again tried to call to the other two but there was still no response.

"Joey…" Tristan said, slowly, "What if they're…"

He didn't need to finish that sentence. Joey shook his head furiously.

"They're alive. If anyone could survive a fall like that its those two. After everything they've done together a simple fall is not going to stop them."

Tristan bit his lip, "I hope you're right."

Joey's fists clenched. They were not dead. They couldn't be. He wasn't going to let them be dead.

Footsteps echoed behind them as Tea sprinted back down the tunnel, her phone in her hand and her face pale.

"There's not signal here." She said, "I couldn't get the phone to connect."

Joey scowled, "Well then we run for it."

The other two looked at him.

"We have to get to Gramps and tell him what's happened. The sooner we get there, the sooner we can come back which means the sooner we rescue those two."

"But how are we going to find our way back?" Tea asked, "Atem led us here and even he didn't know where we were going until we got here so how will we know how to come back?"

Joey thought for a moment, that was a good point. However, the solution seemed simple.

"You wait here then." He replied, "Me and Tristan will go get Yugi's Gramps and find you again. Once we got him it will be easy to find you again, we'll get Gramps to bring one of those jeep things they have. It will be quicker coming back and there's no way those two will be able to walk back later."

Tears swelled in Tea's eyes, "You think they're still alive?"

"I know they are. Now, let's go, the longer we stand around chatting the longer those two suffer."

The other two nodded, heading towards the tunnel once again. Joey, however, turned back to the darkness and stared deep into it.

'Don't you two worry, we're coming back for you.' He thought, before turning his back and hurrying after the other two.

They left Tea standing by the tunnel entrance before racing away across the sand. The boys did not speak as they ran, each was trying to remember as much of the surroundings as possible which would make the return trip much easier. Joey could still feel ice in his veins from the events of the day but at the moment he could not allow it to stop him. He had to do everything in his power to save his friends, just as the two of them had done numerous times for him.

When the two boys finally saw the tops of the trailers the sky above them was glowing orange, the day was coming to an end. How long they had they been running? They did not know, pure adrenaline was keeping them going at this point allowing them to keep pushing forwards. Joey sprinted ahead of Tristan, his eyes scanning the trailers and various people wondering around.

"Grandpa!" He yelled. "Has anyone seen Mister Muto?"

The faces of the people around them twisted in concern as the pair of teenagers tore past. But none of them could tell them where Solomon was. They ran further moving towards the canteen tent, Joey was still yelling at the top of his lungs. This time, however, his efforts were rewarded. Solomon emerged from the canteen tent, his face became one of concern when he saw the two of them.

"What's wrong?" He asked, "What's happened?"

The two boys in front of him were visibly out of breath and pale. Their clothes were covered in a mixture of sand and dust. For a moment neither of the boys responded, both doubled over trying to catch their breath. But as Solomon watched them and noted the others weren't following a cold chill swept through him.

"Joey? What's happened? Where are the others?"

Joey straightened up, looking Solomon directly in the eye, "Yugi and Atem. There's been an accident, they've fallen inside this cliff sanctuary thing and we can't get to them."

Solomon's face drained of its colour. For a moment or perhaps a few long moments he merely starred at the teenager, not knowing what to say.

"Please Gramps." Joey implored, "There's no time to waste, we have to rescue them as soon as possible."

Solomon blinked before steeling himself and nodding. He called to Marcus for help and soon enough two jeeps were racing away from the site and in the direction of the sanctuary. The professor was driving the leading jeep with Solomon, Joey, Tristan and Elijah. The other jeep contained a few volunteers and equipment. The professor followed Joey's directions as best he could but the daylight was fading fast now, they had to move fast. As they went Joey and Tristan explained as best they could exactly why they'd gone to the sanctuary. Solomon frowned at the mention of Atem seeing some sort of figure, he recalled Yugi mentioning it to him whilst Atem had been unwell but had thought nothing of it. How wrong they had been. When Joey told them about the booming voice they'd heard he and Marcus exchanged a look.

"Then once that voice had said that the whole place just came crashing down." Joey was saying, "We ran as fast as we could but they were behind us. As they were running across the walkway this huge rock fell and almost hit Yugi but Atem pushed him out the way but they… but… but the walkway collapsed and they went down with it."

There was silence in the jeep apart from the sound of the wind whizzing past them as the jeep moved further into the desert. Solomon closed his eyes, trying to control the emotions churning away inside him. But the question came into his mind, had he lost both of them?

Silence filled the jeep for the longest time before Joey and Tristan both yelled, pointing at something in front of them. In the dying light of the sun they could just make out an entrance set in the cliff face and hanging beside it was a jacket, Tea's jacket. The two boys were out of the jeep before it had properly stopped, making a beeline for the tunnel. Solomon, once the jeep had properly stopped, hurried along in their wake leaving the professor and Elijah to follow. Pulling a torch from his pocket Solomon switched it on and moved into the tunnel. He could hear footsteps ahead of him and he followed as quickly as he could, soon discovering the teenagers stood at the top of some stone steps. Solomon's eyes widen at the sight. In front of him was a destroyed walkway, just as Joey had said. Below them a bottomless pit of darkness. On what little remained of the walkway stood Tea, she was gazing down into the darkness tears spilling from her eyes.

"Have you heard anything?" Joey asked, moving to join her.

Tea shook her head, "There's been no sound." Her eyes found Solomon, "I'm so sorry Solomon."

Solomon was rooted to the spot, taking it all in. His mind couldn't quite process what he was seeing, the reality that two people he cared enormously for had been involved in the collapse had hit him. That they were most likely… mostly likely no longer on this earth. He felt a hand on his shoulder and Marcus carefully stepped round him with Elijah right behind him. The professor moved to the edge of the walkway whilst Elijah moved to Tea's side putting a comforting hand on her shoulder. The professor was now shining his own torch down into the darkness, it was more powerful than the teenager's torches had been. Yet despite its power it still could not reveal just had far the pair had fallen. He turned to Solomon.

"I think this is further down then we first thought." He said, "We can try lowering the ropes we've brought but I suspect we're going to need more if we stand a hope of reaching them."

"But we have to try." Joey insisted, "We've left them down there long enough. We have to get them out now."

"I do understand, but we have to do this properly. Even if they've survived-"

"They did survive."

The professor raised a calming hand, "Even so, if they are alive there's no way they will be walking away from this. We need to make sure that when we reach them we can extract them safely."

Joey was almost trembling, all his emotions were all over the place. The professor smiled reassuringly at him. Moving forwards he set a hand on his shoulder, trying to calm the teenager. Elijah, who was still standing next to Tea looking at Joey.

"Don't worry Joey. We'll get to them, I'm so sorry I wasn't with you all earlier but trust me, I'll get them."

Joey looked at him before nodding slowly. He hated feeling powerless, he wanted to make sure both Yugi and Atem got out of this, but he had to concede that perhaps this was all he could do for the moment. Elijah had moved back to Tea side and said something to her before joining the professor at the edge of the walkway. Tea moved over to Solomon's side, whose gaze seemed locked on the darkness.

"Maybe we should wait outside." She suggested to both him and her two friends.

As much as she hated the idea of not being part of the rescue operation, she knew that there wasn't much more they could now do. After all they'd been involved in the collapse and Solomon hadn't said a word in some time. Once they were rescued both Yugi and Atem would not be happy with them if they'd failed to look after themselves or Solomon just because of them. The two boys let out similar breaths before nodding and helping guide Solomon back up the tunnel out to the waiting jeeps. The other jeep had since arrived and a number of people were hurrying towards the tunnel.

Night was falling fast but they weren't willing to leave. They couldn't. All of them wanting to be here once their friends were rescued, whatever happened they had to be here. Tea and Joey were sat in the jeep, the doors open so they could see communicate with the others although there wasn't any of that happening at the moment. Tristan was pacing up and down, his hands shaking as he processed the day's events. Solomon was stood next to Joey, who was seated in the front passenger seat. Solomon's expression was similar to one Yugi would make when he was thinking something through, which was exactly what he was doing. As his mind worked his eyes widened and he looked up at Joey.

"Joey, what did you say that voice said?" He asked.

Joey blinked, looking at the others before looking at Solomon, "Something about eagles gliding through changing winds or whatever."

Solomon blinked, "It sounds like a prophecy."

Joey exchanged a look with the others, "A prophecy? Of what?"

"I'm not sure but is what you say is right then at this moment, they might be ok."

Tea stood up, "You mean they're not… not dead?"

"Perhaps, I don't know what all this means but for now I think they are alive and we have to find them before anything else happens."

The teenagers looked at each other and nodded. Despite not completely understanding what was happening and why, they would absolutely make sure that they found their two friends and ensure nothing else happened to them.

A fair distance away, on top of a nearby cliff a man sat astride a horse. The man gazed down upon the scene below him. He could see the two vehicles outside the sanctuary entrance and just make out people standing beside one of them. He lifted his head slightly and a sneer made its way across his face. He took in the scene for another long moment before turning his horse and moving away, disappearing into the night.