Freewriting #2

There was only so much she could do before the weight of it all crushed her. The rocks were pressing down hard on her thin body and she was alone. Everywhere around her, darkness. It was always in the caves and in the silence that she thought she could escape, but now she was pinned down again, a victim of her own foolishness.

Sarah Mills had tried to climb the mountain inside the cave.

Sarah had been exploring the caverns for perhaps miles, like any other time she had gone underground. Most of the caverns were the length of the ceiling and they were no taller than twice her height. At a short five foot two, Sarah Mills was not a tall person,, so she was surprised when the cavern tunnel suddenly opened into a large area where she couldn't even see the ceiling.

If not for the stalactites that came from the ground and rose up to the ceiling, probably acting as large pillars, she might have thought she was walking outside in the deep night. There were no stars of course. There was no light. An experienced spelunker, like Sarah, would know the difference between a cave and the great outdoors on a cloudy night. So obviously it was not the great outdoors. It was just that the endless space gave her that very feeling.

The air in that cavern had a misty green tint to it wherever she shined the flashlight. It was almost like a fog. Sara had wondered where it came from and how healthy it was to breath. Was it some kind of gas deep from the earth? Something that could kill her? Then, in the distance she saw it. The mountain.

Sarah was no expert at rock climbing, but the allure of the thing was irresistible. She wanted to see just how high up the thing went. Although it looked like a mountain, perhaps it somehow joined with the ceiling as a massive stalactite/stalagmite. So she decided to climb.

She must have been climbing for over a half hour. She'd stop at ledges to take a breather, or quickly scan upward to see if she could find a better path. Luckily she didn't need any mountain climbing equipment because she had none of it with her anyway. However, there were places where she could have used it.

Without warning, there was a loud rumbling. Sarah looked upward toward the mountain and the source of the noise. She saw it immediately. Thousands and thousands of rocks, all shapes and sizes, were rushing towards her. A rock slide. Fear gripped her. She needed to be somewhere else. So she ran.

She had always been a good runner. Not great, but good. Even then she saw the rocks getting closer and knew she wouldn't make it. Knowing that seemed to somehow calm her mind for just a moment. It was in that moment that she found a little nook just barely large enough to protect her from the rocks if she slipped in. So slipped in she did.

The rocks slammed down past her just as she was entering the niche. She barely had time to get most of her body in, but her leg hadn't made it all the way in. She had scooted in backwards on her backside and pulled in her right leg just in time, but her left one was hit by a small bowling sized piece of rock. on something for just a second. In any normal circumstance, it would have only taken her a fraction of a second longer to pull her left leg into her chest as well. It would have only been a fraction of a second for her mind to recover from the shock of a bowling ball sized rock bouncing off her leg like a ping pong ball. It was in that second that a rock the size of a room landed on her leg.

Now, she was stuck there and the rock was crushing her leg with perhaps several thousand pounds of stone. At first Sarah couldn't think, the pain was so great. Now, she wondered if she had a leg at all. It was as if there was nothing there.

The rock slide stopped. Sarah tried to move again, to no avail. She was pinned firmly, sitting down in a niche with one leg neatly pulled into her chest and the other extended, lifeless. a rock was just inches away from her face and body.

Perhaps she could dig her way out? She tried to find some small crack that she could dig her fingernails in, but then thought better of it. She couldn't see anything anyway.

It was as if her life flashed in front of her eyes then. All the things left unsaid, all the things left undone. Robert, who would be waiting for her, and would wait forever. James, who could be the best drinking partner a girl could ask for, and Sarah really was quite a drinker. Then there was Janie, her sister, who had just gotten married and had a baby not only two weeks ago.

Sarah was to die alone, in the dark, with so many things left undone and so many things left unsaid.

Hours passed, perhaps longer. Perhaps she slept, she did not know. Briefly, Sarah wondered if hours had passed, or only moments, because how else was she still breathing in such a tiny small space? Wouldn't she have suffocated by this time?

Then she saw the green mist. Or she thought she saw it. No, she was dreaming. There were only rocks in front of her, blocking her path.

When she awoke, she felt water dripping on her face.
"What?" she sat up in surprise, and felt a stabbing pain where her leg used to be.

"We were lucky we found you" a voice said. It was still night and the mist was around her, everywhere. "What on earth possessed you to climb hells mountain?"

Sarah had a splitting headache so she lay back down. She thought she was imagining things. There was someone out here? She was alive? Had it been a dream?

"Am I dead?" she asked.

"Goodness, no." said the same voice.

Did Sarah smell smoke? A fire? Now she knew she was delusional. How could anyone start a fire in the caverns?

"My name's L'ro from the Gilgan clan. You are?" Something that looked like a half man, half horse walked up to her and looked down towards her broken body.

"Eeeeek! I'm going crazy!" Sarah screamed and she tried as best as she could, to get up and away from the centaur. Then she realized that her leg was missing.

"What...where's my leg!" she screamed again.

"Shhhh quiet!" the centaur, L'ro, said. "There are bog hounds around here. The fire won't keep them away if they think there's injured..." then he paused for a moment. A look of sympathy crossed his face. "I'm sorry." his voice softened a little. "We had to amputate your leg. It was infected. But it was completely useless anyway, the rocks had crushed it."

"Oh." As if all this made sense.

Sarah lay back down, giving into the headache. Yes, she must have gone crazy. Perhaps if she went to sleep, she'd wake up again and be back in reality. Or a psych ward. Either way, this reality was not one that she wanted. Sarah Miller, athletic, thin, outgoing woman. Gym frequenter, swimmer, runner. She couldn't imagine being a cripple.