Collapsing

Part eleven of Twelve Stories.

The water rises in the tunnel or cave. All along the direction behind their backs, creeping higher and higher, it gets wetter and wetter.

Courtney clasps her hands to her face. Damp and dark, she wonders how it is she can see the water at all. The earthen cavity affords them seemingly endless space to move forward, their little fire long ago consumed by water.

They reach the foundation of what appears to be a fountain. Grasping at gilded golden railings, they now know they are in a tunnel and not a cave.

Hakon’s hands tremble at the infamous insignias coming into sight upon the walls. He wonders if the journey is just beginning. Kicking all Kafkaesque notions aside, limiting logic more morosely, no other notions remained in mind.

Solid concrete reveals itself underneath the sand, and gradually, there is no sand and only concrete and the sound of Hakon and Courtney’s footfalls reflecting off the walls of the concrete shell they traverse, forced unceasingly forward by the rising water, which seems to be gaining speed, their wet shoes adding an audible weight to their steps, all of which making it very simple for anyone to hear them approaching.