“It cannot be seen, cannot be felt,
Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt,
It lies behind stars and under hills,
And empty holes it fills,
It comes first and follows after,
Ends life, kills laughter.”
Whitney and Nathan entered the cave, one after the other, propelling down a gradual damp sand embankment. The passageway initially was tight. Inside the cavern the ceiling dramatically ascended. The moonlight from the opening of the cave provided a momentary vision. As they cautiously advanced from the opening of the grotto the children were entirely engulfed in darkness, two blind terrified mice sneaking through a room full of cats. Whitney halted with Nathan behind her. The air was thick and moist and smelled of guano. Unable to determine the height of the cave Whitney listened, her head slightly raised. At first, she was only aware of her heavy breaths. She willed her breathing to become shallow so as not to alert the colony of unseen bats. She struggled to dismiss the desperate nature of this ill-advised rescue mission. In the distant she heard the distinct noise of water as if someone had left a faucet running on the stone floor of the cavern. In the same direction she made out the sound of whimpering. She laid motionless with her face pressed against the cavern floor. She blinked several times attempting to gain some vision, but her effort was futile. The cave remained entirely dark. Nathan, following Whitney’s progress waited silently as well. Whitney concentrated on the noise she heard. At once her heart lifted for she understood that Kyle made the pleading cries. She moved towards the noise. Nathan, dutifully followed. The two children crept deliberately as their chests pressed against the slick soiled surface of the cave’s moist floor. Their elbows acted to pull them forward dragging their still lower limbs. The going was slow and maddening. Bat droppings plopped constantly along the children’s route creating a fiendish reminder of the mass of bats that lurked overhead.
It’s remarkable in the savage grip of such fear that Whitney and Nathan continued to advance guided by Whitney’s cautious pace. The constant cascading water grew louder, muffling the children’s movement as well as directing their pursuit in the total darkness. Whitney had observed that Kyle’s distressing cry was approximated in the recess of the cave where the water poured. She was miserable with each movement in the blackness of this bat latrine. Imagine coexisting with such fear as the children must have, anticipating the inevitable doom that awaited them as they slid along the cave’s floor. Each solitary second amidst such distress was agonizing. Whitney trembled awaiting her anticipated execution. She reasoned that she had done nothing to warrant this predicament except to insist that she sleep over at her cousin’s house. She had heard about the stories of the boys’ antics when they were together, but how could she ever have imagined this situation? She was aware that her resentment fed her growing despair and that these thoughts could only hinder her progress. She was determined more than ever to focus on her sole pursuit, to rescue her cousin.
Whitney stopped, suddenly aware of deep rapid breathing directly in front of her. The sound of the waterfall too was more apparent. Raising her vision she peered above. She was cognizant of a new perception, that brought a margin of relief. A stream of moonlight revealed another small aperture in the cave. She strained to raise her head slightly. She detected an unnatural moving reflection of light bobbing on one of the high walls of the cavern as if someone held a mirror in the sunlight while swaying. Whitney was aghast when she saw the large dark mass on the ceiling. The bats were packed together eerily hanging from the ceiling of the cave. She spotted among the horde an astonishing immense shape whose red eyes appeared like two lasers that seemed to be directed at the object directly in front of her. Her fear ascended as she recognized the beast above was the leader of the calamity of bats, the enormous creature whose size rivaled her own. From its neck was the gold medallion that caused the swaying reflection on the wall, the very colossal bat that she and Nathan had spotted from the safety of the deck. The dreaded confrontation had been revealed, a drumroll of trepidation rumbled in Whitney’s mind. In the darkness she extended her hand. Guided by her approximation to her cousin, Whitney’s hand felt for and covered covered Kyle’s mouth. She whispered, “We’re here.”
Given the unimaginable course of events that had overwhelmed him, one could hardly fault Kyle for the involuntary reaction that he had when he learned that his cousins had found him. Tortured by solitude and repulsed by the taste of bat guano on his lips he bit down on Whitney’s hand. She reacted out of reflex removing her hand from over his mouth. Kyle subsequently squealed a single cry of joy. The noise alerted the bats above like an isolated gun-blast in the still of the night. A swarming cyclone of activity was heard above. The colony of bats was so immense that their combined wings taking flight fanned the damp cave’s air. The camp of bats poured over the children commanded by Zeborg. The three children sprang to their feet holding their defenseless hands against the anticipated onslaught of the winged beasts. Their backs were drenched as they pressed closer against the rushing wall of water. Left with desperation to guide them they turned facing the cascade.
Distress or faith? A philosophical contradistinction. Some claim that one can not exist without the other. Whatever guided the children’s thinking, all at once, they leapt into the wall of water.