Once Malcolm regained his senses he tried taking stock of his situation. His body was completely pinned between soft, warm flesh. One of his arms was pointing skyward, while the other was jammed at an awkward angle to his side. He tried shifting his mass, but the backpack was snagged on something. Warm, moist air rose from the depths.
Trapped.
TRAPPED!
He began to hyperventilate. He coughed.
His lungs were constricted.
The air was foul.
He coughed again. He tried to scream for help, but he couldn’t find the air.
Such a stupid idea. He was trapped and unable to move. He was going to die.
He felt dizzy.
He began to struggle.
Yet just as another wave of panic was about to crash over him the walls expanded, allowing him to wiggle free and continue slipping down into the abyss. At some point he realized moisture was beginning to soak his clothes, but before he could reach down to touch it with his gloved fingers, the walls constricted around him once more.
This time the tunnel felt tighter, the air hotter, and the claustrophobia far more pressing.
He didn’t even bother screaming…There wasn’t enough oxygen.
Instead he took small, shallow breaths, doing his best not to lose consciousness.
But the walls expanded once again and he continued falling.
Over and over he fell. Over and over the walls would constrict around him briefly before releasing him.
By the time he finally landed, he felt as if he must’ve been close to the Earth’s core. The air was hot and soupy, and the smell of fungal rot was so strong that he had to breathe through is mouth to keep from retching.
He couldn’t see, but he could feel the moist, squishy ground beneath his boots. He removed his backpack and began feeling around for a flashlight, but a flailing bundle of limbs crashed into him from above and he went sprawling across the floor.
“Dude!” Malcolm shouted. His voice was oddly soft, as if the walls were dampening all sounds.
“Sorry.” He heard Jericho sputter.
Crawling on his hands and knees, Malcolm began searching for the spilled contents of his bag. All around him the ground was soft and wet and fleshy, as if he were inside the body of some giant beast…A giant beast ready to digest him…
He didn’t want to think about it.
If he were inside a large creature, then that meant he just willingly fed himself to it.
“It’s so dark in here.” Jericho said.
“I know, and I lost my flashlight.” Malcolm grumbled.
“Hang on, I gotcha…” There was a brief pause, then Jericho said in as loud and imposing a voice as possible “Let there be light!”
The tiny pen light was quite weak, yet the surroundings were so dark that even its faint glow was enough to reveal many details about the cavern. The ceiling was about ten feet high, with walls that sloped downward to meet the floor. The floor itself was higher in the center, with a pair of shallow streams running parallel one another along the walls. Most of Malcolm’s lost items had rolled into one of these streams, which thanks to their depth, meant he was able to reach out and grab his possessions without getting too wet.
“How the hell are we gonna get back up?” Jericho whined, pointing the light heavenward. “How’d those frogs get back up?”
“We’ll figure that out later.” Malcolm said, standing and turning on his own light. “First thing’s first… We find Lori.”
Jericho muttered something, but the muted walls muffled his words and Malcolm got the distinct impression that his friend’s opinion wasn’t one of complete support.
The pair followed the tunnel, letting their lights move this way and that. Initially the tunnel seemed smooth and bare, but as they traveled deeper into the Mycelloid colony small oddities appeared.
There were undulating mounds of purple organic matter, each about the size of an infant, growing near the edges of the streams. They pulsed once every few seconds, and when the boys got close the strange blobs let out a menacing hiss…The pair kept well clear of them.
There were tentacle-like structures that hung down from the ceiling; many were less than a foot long, but some hung all the way down to the floor. Jericho reached out and touched one, and when he did the end opened like a flower and revealed a large, black-irised eye.
There were smaller tunnels running into the walls. The openings of these offshoots slowly shrank, then grew, then shrank…As if they were breathing.
There were large mushrooms, some over two feet in diameter. They grew along the walls, on the ceilings, and some even sprouted from the larger caps.
There were jumbles of what looked like bones. they connected to one another at the joints and formed strange bramble-like structures.
…And there was movement. Every so often Malcolm would glance back and see the figure just beyond the range of his flashlight.
“I think there’s someone following us.” Malcolm whispered.
“Huh?” Jericho whipped his flashlight’s beam back, but the figure had disappeared.
“Can you be a bit more subtle?!” Malcolm hissed.
Jericho turned forward. “I didn’t see anyone.”
“They moved…Just keep facing forward.”
Jericho’s expression was unreadable, but he obeyed.
The pair continued walking. Within minutes the thing once more began following them. At first the mysterious figure kept well away from the two boys, but with each step Malcolm could feel the distance slowly closing.
With every step the distance shrank.
The thing grew closer. Watching them…Stalking them…
Malcolm was afraid to look back. If he confronted the creature, would it attack?
Finally, it grew far too close for him to tolerate. Malcolm whipped his light around and pointed it back the way they came.
“What!?” Jericho exclaimed, jumping as he pointed his light backward as well. “What is it?!”
But nothing was there. The thing Malcolm swore he saw out of the corner of his eye was completely absent.
“I thought I saw…” His heart was beating. He swallowed. “…Nothing.” Malcolm finally answered. Indeed, the tunnels were completely empty.
“Jesus dude, you nearly gave me a heart attack.”
“Sorry.” Malcolm answered hastily before continuing their trek.
But once again the figure followed them. Malcolm ignored it.
Soon the pair heard subtle splashing sounds coming from the streams.
“Look.” Jericho said, pointing his light down toward the sound’s source.
Bathing in the water was a creature that looked as if it were half-spider, half fungus. Oblong bulbs on its back oozed an assortment of colorful fluids that dripped down their bodies and faded away in the stream’s slight current. The thing bobbed and moved in an alien manner…Back and forth. Its limbs looked oddly jointed and its form so strange that Malcolm felt uncomfortable looking at it.
“It’s so fucking gross.” Jericho reared back. “Do you think it’s diseased?”
“I think this whole place is diseased.” Malcolm answered in a steady voice, half hoping to recover some lost courage with the petty insults. It didn’t work. He was still trapped in a living cave miles below the surface of the Earth. He was still unsure where Lori was being stored. The caverns were so massive he didn’t know how they’d defeat the Mycelloids. He wasn’t sure how they’d return to the world above. Disgusting crabs scuttled near them, and a figure might be stalking them. He had too many worries to try and feign bravery.
He felt like lying down and giving up. Nothing had even tried attacking them yet and he was already demoralized…If something did try, he was sure he’d simply surrender and let whatever monster they encountered eat him.
“Come on.” Malcolm said, ushering them forward, doing his best to escape from his own thoughts.
Jericho pulled his light away from the creature and obeyed.
“Do you know where we’re going?” He asked. It wasn’t an accusatory question, yet Malcolm couldn’t help but take slight offense at it.
“Forward.” He said. “And if you don’t like it, you can always turn back.”
Jericho ignored the snappiness and continued pushing forward…Malcolm was grateful.
It felt like they’d walked for miles, and the sights grew increasingly more alien. Bright red vines grew in scraggly mounds near the edge of the streams; so thick in places that they restricted access to the flowing liquid. Body parts grew from the walls. The first ones they encountered were small, like noses and eyes and fingers, but as they continued deeper into the cave, hands and arms and legs emerged from the walls.
“Jesus.” Jericho said, staring at a knot of tangled legs.
Malcolm, barely maintaining his sanity, kept his eyes forward.
The air grew thicker, and Malcolm felt as if his breathing were labored. Every step he took felt both physically and psychologically taxing. He was about to ask Jericho if he thought it was a good idea to continue when they came across a fork in the cave. One cavern wound downward at a steep angle, while the other seemed to be more shallow and pleasant.
“Well?” Jericho asked.
Malcolm whipped his light back and forth. The right tunnel looked far more tempting. It was larger for one, but it also seemed easier to traverse. The left tunnel’s slope was far too extreme…The stream trickling down it became rapid-like. The right tunnel was clear, while webs of those red vines blocked much of the left cavern’s pathway.
The choice seemed simple enough, but he remembered what the Mycelloid had told him about following the spiders.
He pointed his light down at a pair of crabs. They slowly approached the split, then scuttled across the floor until they were in the left stream. The two creatures crawled close to the edge before careening into the darkness.
Malcolm sighed. Of course they’d taken the left path. Of course it couldn’t be easy.
“I think we go left.” He said.
Jericho frowned. “It looks a bit dangerous.”
“Yeah, but clone-Lori told me to follow the spiders.”
“I still say they look like crabs.” Jericho said.
Malcolm shrugged. He turned and carefully tried maneuvering down the steep, slick slope.
“Maybe she was lying.” Jericho suggested.
“Maybe.” Malcolm agreed, and indeed it was a thought that lingered in the back of his head. “But we’ve gotten this far with their advice.”
“Exactly! They managed to lure us down here…Probably to eat us.”
“Like it or not, they’d know how to navigate their tunnels far better than we do.”
Jericho said something else, but Malcolm didn’t give himself time to listen. He crept forward, grabbing some of the hanging vines for support before slowly clamoring down the rugged cave. It was hard to hear anything but rushing water echoing around the abyss, but he saw Jericho’s light above him as its owner followed down the same dangerous path.
The vines were slippery, and some were not securely fastened to the walls. There was a heart-stopping moment when most of the vines in Malcolm’s hand came free from their roots, and the only thing that prevented him from plummeting into the depths of darkness was his flailing arms managing to grasp another bundle of hardier vines.
Whenever they squeezed the vines, a sticky red viscous fluid leaked onto their hands. It smelled of copper, and Malcolm was all but sure it was blood…Like so much else in that alien world, he tried putting it from his mind.
As they climbed, the disembodied hands growing from the walls gently raked their skin. The fungal-grown fingers were soft and smooth, and as they grazed and poked and brushed against the boys, it felt as if they had no bones within them. When Malcolm tried pulling on one, the entire thing broke off in his hand as easily as if he’d plucked a mushroom. It wriggled slightly before going completely still. Disgusted, he tossed it into the darkness.
“This sucks!” Jericho called down. “I don’t know why I agreed to this!”
“Keep going!” Malcolm ordered. “We’re almost there!”
Of course he wasn’t sure how much further they had to go. Every so often he’d point his flashlight downward, but each time he saw darkness.
The spider crabs were their constant companion, walking elegantly down the streams in a way that seemed to defy gravity, but as they descended, there were other creatures. Balls of what looked like wads of Velcro slowly rolled across the ceilings. Jellyfish-like blobs hung suspended in the thick air; each giving off an otherworldly blue glow. The body parts emerging from the walls had also become whole sections of body. Torsos with arms reached out gently for the boys, but they did not grab onto the pair. Legs would wiggle whenever something moved over them, but they did not kick. Heads would look upon them with hollow milky eyes, and their mouths would let out low, guttural moans.
Malcolm kept his eyes focused on the small space of vine-covered wall directly in front of him. It was the least surreal section of the cave, and the easiest for his mind to comprehend. It was fortunate that many of the body parts grew a fair distance away from their descent, but every so often he encountered one just beneath him. Thankfully, it took only a small bit of force to dislodge these with his leg.
After what felt like hours the pair saw something shimmering beneath them, but Malcolm was far too exhausted to say anything about it…He was simply happy to see something change.
The shimmering turned out to be a pool of water. Malcolm didn’t want to get wet, but he was far too weak and exhausted to climb around it. He was too worn out to even inspect the liquid before lowering himself into it. He simply climbed into the murky substance, and Jericho, who appeared every bit as exhausted, wordlessly followed suit. Thankfully it wasn’t deep, only coming up to the boys’ waists, but it was warm and viscous and felt unpleasantly organic.
“Gross!” Jericho exclaimed. “Those crab things are swimming around in here!”
Malcolm, still trying to catch his breath, said nothing. He tried drawing in lungfuls of air, but the humidity was near dew-point, the temperature hot and clammy, and the smell pungent and stale.
“Aren’t…You having trouble…Breathing?”
Jericho stopped trudging water and turned. Most of his features were hidden in darkness, but the faint penlight brought out just enough color to make his expression visible.
“Well yeah, a little…But I’ve stopped drinking and started exercising, and well…I just feel better.”
A cold feeling traveled up Malcolm’s spine. A suspicion overcame him and he suddenly saw his friend in a new light.
“No.” He said in a low voice. “You didn’t…You’re Couldn’t…You’re-You’re one of-”
“Welcome, gentlemen!” Another voice boomed.
Malcolm’s heart leapt to his throat, and the boys whipped their flashlights toward the voice’s source. Standing on the banks of the pool was an older man wearing worn work clothes. His beard was thick and white, while his hair was wispy and thin with a large bald spot that had already conquered most of his scalp.
“Jesus!” Jericho exclaimed, leaping back and almost falling beneath the pool’s surface. “You scared the shit outta me. Who the hell are you?”
The man shrugged. “In life, I guess I was named Dan.”
“In life?” Malcolm panted.
“Oh sure.”
The boys stared at the man; partly in confusion, but mostly in fear.
“Does that mean you’re dead?”
Again the man shrugged. “I suppose so…I guess it depends.”
“What do you mean?” Jericho asked.
The man beckoned them to follow. “Come on…I’ll show ya’.”
Not knowing what else to do, the boys gave each other one last reproachful look before setting off after the stranger.
“If things get bad, I think we can take him.” Jericho whispered.
“But there will certainly be others around.” Malcolm whispered back. He didn’t want to linger on his recent suspicions. He needed any ally he could get.
“There won’t be any need for that.” Old Man Dan said in a warm yet firm tone. “If we wanted to do you in, don’t you think we could have poisoned your food or smothered you in your sleep?”
The pair were left without an argument, so they followed obediently.
“I know you’ve come down here to see your sister,” Old Man Dan said, leading them out of the water and onto an expansive, fleshy landscape. “You think you can rescue her, but some people are beyond help. That’s why I’m the one meeting you here. You see, I’ve been dead for several months.”
The boys were once more taken aback by this, but Old Man Dan continued.
“I should say, my human counterpart has died.” He led them to a nearby wall. Like the rest of the chamber the wall was made of a fleshy substance, yet it was semi-transparent and the faint illumination from the pen lights revealed dark silhouettes embedded within. As if responding to their presence a small hollow opened in the wall, revealing a sullen, sunken face. At first it was hard to tell who they were seeing, but after a few seconds the details solidified and they could tell the hollow face belonged to a much less lively Old Man Dan.
“It was a stroke that got me…That got him.” The Dan-Clone said. “Even with our combined intellect, even with a constant stream of the purest resources, we’re not able to completely stop death.”
The wall closed, once more burying the man’s body in a living tomb.
“There are many like me, Mycelloids whose original human has died. Sometimes we’ll remain on the surface for a time, and sometimes we’ll be summoned down here immediately. It all depends on the will of the hive.”
“Okay, but what’s this got to do with Malcolm’s sister?” Jericho asked.
But Malcolm was pretty sure he knew where the conversation was heading, and as if to answer his unspoken question, another figure stepped out from beyond the light’s halo.
Her details quickly materialized, and Malcolm nearly fell to the floor when he saw her.
His sister…Or at least it looked like his sister, but her body was wrapped in sickly purple tendrils. A mass of fleshy, wet, organic material grew out from her head and connected to the living walls. Her eyes had dark rings around them, and her features looked gaunt.
She looked dead…Undead…A flawed resurrection. There was no mistaking her for his sister, but there were enough subtle changes to her features to make her appear absolutely horrifying.
“No.” He gasped softly.
Lori gave a small smile. “Hello brother.” It was a sad smile, and her voice carried an element of hollow melancholy.
“No, you’re on the surface. You’re up there with mom and dad and everyone else.”
“And I’ll be up there for a bit longer, just long enough to-”
“-I don’t want to hear it!” Malcolm screamed. He covered his ears as tears began filling his eyes. “No! No! You’re not the real you! This is a trick!”
But the voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, as if the walls themselves were speaking directly into his mind.
“The cuts were so deep.” Lori’s voice said. “And my roommate did everything she could. Honestly, no human doctor could’ve done anything to help. Only the Mycelloid colony gave me a chance, and well…” Her arm raised slightly, causing the tendrils wrapped around it to sway slightly. “I’m still alive, but I’ll be forever bound to the colony.”
Malcolm didn’t want to hear it. He began muttering to himself.
“They’re lying. They’re lying.” He turned to Jericho. “You hear me? Don’t believe them! That’s not my sister!”
Jericho’s eyes were locked onto the figure in horror.
“Jericho!”
“What?” He responded, not looking away.
“That’s not my sister!”
“Right…Right dude…Yeah, that couldn’t be her.” His voice was shrill and manic.
Malcolm wasn’t sure why he needed validation. He assumed it would make him feel better.
It did not.
He turned his attention back to the specter of his sister.
“What’s this for? You just want me to give up, right? Is that it? You want to trick me then capture me then replace me!?”
“Please, Malcolm.” Lori said softly.
“You’re trying to trick me!” He tried shouting, but his voice was too swollen with tears and far too wobbly to retain its strength.
Her smile was faded. “No tricks.” She said. “I am now one with the colony. They’re allowing me to live a second life, gifting me the years I tried to throw away, and by slowly consuming me they’re easing me, this version of me, toward a more comfortable end.”
He shook his head.
“They’re eating you!?”
She gave a sullen nod. “The colony feasts on death.”
“But you’re not-…” But his voice trailed off. He knew the truth.
She knew he knew the truth.
She had died. Perhaps she’d been resurrected, but her existence was a shadow. A solid shadow, perhaps, one maintained by the immense and miraculous colony, but a shadow all the same.
He gave a great, heaving sob.
“It’s okay.” She smiled.
He shook his head. “No…It’s not!”
The tendrils supporting her moved slightly so his sister’s body approached, but before she could embrace him, he turned and ran.
He ran back to the pool and began trying to scale the slick sides.
“You’re not her! You’re lying! They can make clones and they made a fake version of you to trick me!” His words had become an incomprehensible mess of accusations and insults, and he wasn’t even fully aware of what he was saying. It was no surprise, then, that he didn’t see old man Dan approach the pool, who waved his hand and conjured clouds of powder that fell from the ceiling.
As the odd substance descended and landed on Malcolm, he felt his mind beginning to grow tired. The pains in his muscles increased substantially before dying away completely, and it soon became difficult to stand.
A trio of faceless bodies stepped from the darkness and grabbed him. One of them placed him on its back, while the other two stood on either side and supported him.
The figures fused around him into a strange abomination before they began to climb.
“What are you…” He murmured.
“Shhhh. It’ll be alright.” Old Man Dan’s voice came from the walls themselves. “You’re experiencing some shock. Our colony wasn’t sure whether we should tell you about Lori or not.”
Lori’s voice cut in. “No matter what, just know that she always loved you. The way her biochemicals responded to your presence was more than enough evidence of that.”
But Malcolm was barely conscious.
He remembered feeling hands, and he remembered hearing rushing water, but without a light he was completely blind.
After an unknown amount of time a light did appear. “You okay up there?” It was Jericho’s voice, but it wasn’t from the walls. It was from behind him…Same with the light.
Malcolm looked up at where the light’s beam terminated. In the dim light he saw a large pipe dripping with water. Flesh grew around it, and a few of the spiders surrounded it as well. The light moved, and he followed it with his eyes. A mass of tentacles, which dangled down and brushed against him. He could smell copper. He tried to lift his arms, but someone was holding onto them.
“Malcolm?” Jericho shouted again. “You alright?”
“Immo.” Was all he managed to blurt out.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” Jericho said at last.
They were ascending rapidly. Something about their trip sparked something in his mind, but he wasn’t sure what it was…Concentration was a difficult game, and he was unable to play it.
There had certainly been something…Something…
There were bodies sticking out of the walls. They looked friendly enough. Some of them held objects. Balls…Buckets…Pieces of trash that might’ve blown into the subterranean world.
There was something…Somthing…
Here and there beams of light disrupted the consistent darkness…Holes from the surface. Not large ones like they’d climbed through, but small ones…Holes the size of a quarter, or a corn kernel, or a grain of sand.
Jericho shouted something about the world being like Swiss Cheese. Malcolm tried to imagine living on a cheese world, but it didn’t make much sense…He’d tasted mud, and it was not that great. Not like cheese.
…But the Mycelloids were able to eat the Earth as if it were cheese. Maybe the colony was the Earth. In his delirium-confused mind he saw the planet as a single super-organism. The animals above would live and die, then feed the giant creature below. Maybe the surface dwellers were cheese, waiting to reach the right age.
“But cheese can poison a person if it goes bad.” He heard himself say.
“What was that?” Jericho called.
Surface dwellers and Mycelloids…All part of the same system. But how could one part of a system fight another part? It was impossible for the Mycelloids to wage war, wasn’t it?
He heard himself answer in a series of slurred syllables. “Not if it fights peacefully.” He mumbled. “Slowly and peacefully…It gives us everything we could ever want.”
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