Adrift 3: Rising (Adrift Series)

Copyright © 2016 by K.R. Griffiths

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Cover design by K.R. Griffiths & Chantelle Marie Edwards

Table of contents

Also by K.R. Griffiths

Adrift series

Adrift

Adrift 2: Sundown

Wildfire Chronicles series:

Panic

Shock

Psychosis

Mutation

Trauma

Reaction

Other novels:

Survivor: A horror thriller

Last Resort

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Northwest Wyoming, USA, 1992

The mouth of the cave was unassuming, little more than a stifled yawn in the earth, and, for a while, the space beyond it appeared equally underwhelming. Only when they stumbled across the fissure did Steve Kendrick begin to suspect that the journey to Yellowstone could turn out to be something truly special.

The cave system was new; undiscovered country. The mouth had been revealed by a flash flood the previous year, and the Wyoming rancher who owned the land had done no more than point a flashlight inside before fencing it off to protect his cattle. One of Steve’s old university buddies had worked the rancher’s fields through the summer, and had casually mentioned the discovery of the new cave system over some reunion beers. Nobody had been inside, he’d said, and he’d had Steve’s full attention immediately. There were a lot of good spots for spelunking around Yellowstone: taking a week off work and getting away from the hustle of New York for a camping trip was a good idea, even if this new cave turned out to be a dud.

And at first,
dud
was exactly how the newly-revealed cave had appeared. It was deep, but for a while—before the fissure appeared—it was just that one cavern. Large, sure, and impressive for anyone who
hadn't
spent several years burrowing into the ground across America at every opportunity, but it was nothing for someone as experienced as Steve to write home about.

Before
the fissure appeared.

If Steve had known what the fissure would lead to, and just how unique the system truly was, he would have dropped his equipment on the spot and fled. He would have found the rancher on whose land he had trespassed and begged him to seal the cave entrance up with something far sturdier than two-by-fours and chicken wire. He would have got himself as far away from Wyoming as possible, and he would never have returned.

But he didn’t know.

“Steve, you cool, bro?” Dusty’s voice floated down the shaft. He was about thirty yards above, rappelling down slowly on his own line. Steve craned his neck. He could just about make out Dusty’s silhouette, framed against the swivelling light from his headlamp.

“Frosty, you?”

“Ice, ice, baby.”

Steve snorted a laugh, and returned his focus to his own drop, easing up the tension on his descender and sliding down another few feet smoothly.

His little brother could be a primo dork, but he had always shared Steve’s appetite for adventure. Dusty generally preferred his thrills to be more immediate: bungees; parachutes, fast-moving vehicles. Short, sharp shocks were his thing, but when Steve had suggested mapping a cave system that was apparently uncharted, Dusty’s response had been typical.
Where do I sign, bro?

Remembering Dusty’s unchecked excitement, Steve smiled into the darkness beyond his headlamp’s cone of light. The two brothers hadn’t found much time to spend together since Dusty took a job in San Diego, and the trip to Yellowstone would have been fun no matter what they found, but discovering the fissure made it potentially great. To think, they had nearly missed it, nestling in the shadows, almost entirely obscured by a rocky outcrop. Hidden, almost as if the land didn’t want it to be found.

The fissure turned out to be the entrance to a narrow corridor which had led them west for a little over fifty yards and which was tight enough that even Steve, who was rope-thin, had to suck in his gut a couple of times. Just when he thought they might have to turn back, the fissure had suddenly opened, spitting the brothers out into a low, wide chamber.

And in the centre of that chamber, Steve saw the hole.

The
true
entrance.

As his light had first revealed it, the sight of the hole had made Steve’s knees weaken. This wasn't some shallow pit; it was a fucking
abyss
. When he leaned over and dropped a small rock into it, he counted to five before he heard the sharp rap of it hitting the bottom. Three hundred feet, at least.

They began to descend.

One shaft led to another.

This time, when Steve dropped a rock, he counted to
seven
. The farther they went, the bigger the network of caverns seemed to get. Steve and Dusty hadn't stumbled onto just any old cave system: this was the mother lode.

About halfway down the second shaft, it started to dawn on Steve that they didn't have the equipment or the supplies for an extended dive like this one. They would need to go back up to ground level before long; stock up and return to map the entire system before some other bastards beat them to it. The place would be named for them, and it was gigantic: they had already been travelling down into the earth for almost four hours all told, and it still felt like they had barely scratched the surface. One of the most impressive systems in Yellowstone, and its discovery belonged to the Kendrick brothers.
Lewis and Clark, eat your damn hearts out.

“How much farther, you figure?” Dusty’s voice floated down.

Steve locked his descender and dropped his chin, pointing the light from his headlamp downward. They were in the heart of the abyss now, dropping straight down. Steve had reluctantly passed by several openings that he was certain led out into other, branching caverns, maybe even other shafts. There would be time to explore those later. Right now, he wanted to see how deep their current course would take them.

“I think I see the bottom!”

“Good, this harness is starting to fuse to my nutsack!”

Steve laughed and opened up the descender, dropping a little too fast and too far, almost cackling as adrenaline flooded through him. His boots crunched into the ground at the bottom of the shaft, the jarring impact rolling up through his body deliciously. He let out an explosive gasp. Stars danced across his vision.

Damn
, he thought.
I love this shit
.

Rubbing his knees, he stood upright, unclipped his harness from the line, and peered around. A fresh burst of energy exploded in his gut. At the bottom, the main shaft gave birth to a cavern that looked big enough to house a goddamn
747
. When he swept his light around it, the darkness ate the beam hungrily.

He couldn’t see the wall in any direction.

Jesus, this place is huge
.

“You gotta see this, Dust! Holy shit, man. This place is gonna make us famous!”

Somewhere above Steve, Dusty whooped.

Smiling, Steve pulled out a flask from a holster on his hip and tilted it to his lips, chugging back a long swallow of warm water, grimacing as the flask ran dry. Down in the shadows it was getting hot; oppressively so. The air down here hadn't moved much in years. Decades. The thought both thrilled and disappointed him: they hadn’t brought enough water with them, not nearly. Steve had a couple more bottles of water in his backpack, but he’d need that just to get back up to the surface. They’d have to turn back pretty soon.

He sat heavily, taking the weight off his aching legs, and waited for Dusty to complete his descent.

Just as Steve had, Dusty dropped from a little too high, but landed far more gracefully, spreading his arms wide and clicking his heels together like some preening Olympic gymnast.

“Five-point-seven for the landing,” Steve said with a laugh.

Dusty pouted.

“Harsh, bro.”

“You lost points for having that goofy look on your face.”

Dusty opened his mouth to protest, but Steve raised a hand to silence him.

“Judge’s decision is final.”

Dusty guffawed sarcastically, and twisted his neck left and right, sweeping the cavern with his own light. He let out a long, low whistle. “Whoa. You believe the
size
of this place?”

Steve held up his flask, tilting it up and watching a single drop of water spill out.

“Too big,” he said, shaking his head ruefully and twisting the cap back onto the flask. “We need to get more supplies. Maybe, come back with sleeping bags, spend the night here. I have a feeling this cavern isn’t the end of it. Not even close.”

Dusty looked crestfallen.

“Turn back already?”

He stuck out his bottom lip. Steve couldn’t help but laugh, but he shook his head nonetheless.

“Gotta be sensible about this, Dust. This place is plenty big enough to get lost in. If we run out of water and we can’t get back…” he shrugged. “I’d prefer that they name this place after us because we discovered it, not because we’re the idiots who died down here.”

“
Kendrick’s Rest
,” Dusty said. “I dunno, I kinda think it has a ring to it.”

Steve arched a dubious eyebrow.

Smiling, Dusty pulled out his own flask, took a drink, and nodded. He was an adrenaline junkie, but they had both been raised by a father who knew a thing or two about exploring.
Failure to prepare is preparing to fail
. Both brothers had that old cliché drilled into them from the moment they had been taken on their first hike. It had kept them safe ever since, and it would again: they had prepared for a small cave or two, not a sprawling metropolis of shadows. They could fetch what they needed, get some rest, come back tomorrow armed for an extensive trip. The cave would still be there, waiting.

Dusty opened his mouth to say something more, but cocked his head for a moment, his brow creasing.

“You hear that?”

Steve listened intently. He was still breathing heavily from the descent, his heart still thumping with excitement, but once he focused, he heard it.

Somewhere nearby.

The sound of running water.

Dusty whooped again.

“Might not have to turn back just yet, bro.”

Steve grinned. Dusty’s enthusiasm was infectious as smallpox, but he was also right. With a supply of fresh water, they could maybe eke out another hour or two in the caves. The climb back to the surface would be punishing, but as long as they had hydration, they could afford to rest their muscles a while in the dark before beginning the arduous ascent. He nodded to himself, satisfied. An underground river could be a godsend. If the system was as big as he suspected, it would be the perfect place to set up camp when they returned for a longer expedition tomorrow.

“Can you tell where it’s coming from?” he said.

Dusty took a few steps left and right, his expression puzzled.

“Hard to say. It’s close, though.”

He began to walk away, a little too quickly.

“Careful, Dust. Eyes on your feet.”

Dusty slowed a little, nodding. Perhaps he had just conjured the same mental image as Steve: walking off an unseen cliff, tumbling down an underground waterfall. Snapping bones and perforated flesh. It paid to be cautious.

“Here,” Dusty said. “This way.”

Steve hauled himself to his feet and shrugged off his backpack. Reaching inside, he pulled out a glow stick and snapped it, dropping it on the ground beneath the entrance to the shaft that would lead them back to the surface. It cast a pale green glow over a five-yard radius: nowhere near bright enough to illuminate the massive cavern, but an adequate beacon to guide them back to the shaft.

He followed in Dusty’s footsteps, and it quickly became apparent that his little brother was moving in the right direction. With each yard gained, the sound of trickling water grew a little louder. After about forty yards, he saw that Dusty had come to a stop, and was staring down toward his feet. Steve moved to stand alongside him, adding the light from his headlamp to Dusty’s.

Illuminating the river.

It was wide, and strangely slow-moving. If it hadn’t been for the giveaway sound of running water, Steve might even have thought it was a lake. Even when his headlamp connected with the surface, the water looked so dark, so
thick
somehow, that it appeared to be stagnant.

Yet it
was
moving. Oozing, almost.

A shudder ran through Steve.

Looking at the water made him feel unbalanced in a way he couldn't quite put his finger on; out of kilter somehow. Like listening to an off-key melody being played a beat too fast. Yet he couldn't take his eyes off it. The water didn't just
look
black in the gloom, it
was
black. Like oil.

Holy shit, did we find a river of oil?

The strange motion of the river was hypnotic. Mesmerising.

Dropping to his haunches, Steve reached out to touch it.

“Steve, wait. There's something wrong with it.”

“What do you mean?” Steve shook his head. Dusty was crazy. The black river was the most oddly beautiful thing he had ever seen.

“I don't know, bro. It just...feels wrong.”

Steve shot a curious glance at his little brother. Beneath the layer of grime and sweat on his face, Dusty was frowning. He looked like he was searching for a memory that had slipped just beyond his reach.