The corridors were long, dark, and stinky. There was a thick coating
of slime along the walls and bugs were crawling in it. The stench
was somewhat similar to a rotten egg and it was strong enough to knock
you over when it came in waves. The walls were lit very slightly by a light
glow that seemed to be coming from no where. We walked slowly because there
was about a 3cm deep layer of oil and water on the ground which was being
constantly drained into gutters along the sides of the wall. It was fairly
narrow, but the three of us managed to walk side by side together. After
about five minutes or so, the corridor split in two. Alex opened the map
again and checked it. It indicated a split, but one of the corridors wasn't
mapped.
"Let's take the one that's charted. Or we may get lost." suggested
Alex.
"But look!" I cried. "There's another corridor that circles all
the way around this opening. It can't be very big, whatever's down there."
"We shouldn't take any chances" Alex said.
"Fine, whatever you say." I grumbled. We took off down the charted
tunnel, toward one of the three staircases. We arrived there, only to find
it missing. There was a door, but it was quite high up on the wall. The
stairs were no where to be seen. We set off down another hallway in search
of another stairway. The next one was intact, but the door was barred shut.
There was no hope of opening it. Cursing and muttering, we finally found
the third stairway. It was impossible to climb. Slime was running down
the stairs, and had corroded it away to nothing but a slide. A slide covered
in slime. Not only that, but the slime was coming from beneath the door.
There was probably much more on the other side.
"Okay," I said. "Obviously our only other option is the uncharted
corridor."
"It's too much of a risk!" Alex retorted.
"Are you kidding!" I shouted. "That's what life's all about!"
Both guys whined, but then followed me as I cautiously crept
down the hall. It rose upwards a bit, and went from an oily drainage tunnel
to a dirt hallway. After a few minutes I asked Alex how much longer this
hall should be. He told me the end wasn't far off. Frederick seemed to
be doing fine with this whole idea of walking, until he screamed and he
fell down flat on his back.
"Fred, are you all right?" I asked.
"Oie!" he whispered.
I laughed in spite of myself. I helped him up and tried to brush
the dirt off his back. "You klutz!"
"Oh Man!" interrupted Alex. "Do you guys hear that!"
We stopped to listen. There was nothing, but all of a sudden
we heard a loud cry. A growling was coming from down the hall.
"Wh-who's there?" shouted Alex. The growling stopped.
"We come in peace," yelled Frederick.
"C'mon, let's go find out what that is!" said Alex.
"Are you nuts?" I asked. "Don't you watch horror movies?"
"What's a movie?" demanded Alex.
"Forget it," I said. "But the point is, we should not go down
a dark, stinky, unidentified corridor, especially if there's growling coming
from inside it!"
"Why not?" asked the guys.
"Fine! If you're so thickheaded that you don't see why it's such
a stupid idea, then I'll go down there myself to prove it to you and when
I don't dome back, I'll yell ‘I told you so!' from my grave!"
With that I marched off down the hall.
"Bunch of idiots," I muttered to myself, "think they can just
run off down any old hall and be perfectly safe! Geez!" My thoughts were
interrupted when I walked straight into a wall. "Ugh!" I screamed, as I
wiped the slime off my face. "Disgusting!"
"Try living in it." said a voice from next to me.
"Yaah!" I screamed.
"Ahh!" the voice screamed back.
"Oh my God" I yelled, and ran back down the hall.
"No! Wait, dammit! Wait!"
I stopped running.
"Cripes I don't believe this!" the voice yelled. "My first chance
in five years to be free of this cell, and the fool who can help me runs
off like some scared little chicken! Damn." And that was followed by more
loud growling noises, and big thumps and bangs. I slowly walked back toward
the end of the hall. There was a cell down there, to the left. I crept
up to the bars and peered in. There was a girl in there, with dark brown
hair, not too tall, but very muscular. She was shouting and cursing as
she heaved herself against the wall, bashing it with her shoulder. Then
she grabbed a pipe and started hitting the cell bars with it. It was then
that she noticed me.