Chapter 2: First Contact
Rubble. Moss. Dirt and stone.
All grinding beneath his skinless feet.
Sid crouched over a scattered skeleton, hands moving with unnatural speed—far faster than brittle bones should have allowed.
“If I just adjust this…”
He repositioned the femur.
Then the ribs. The clavicle. The radius. The phalanges.
Sid tilted the skull a fraction to the left before leaning back to admire his work.
“And finally… symmetrical.”
The blue glow in his sockets narrowed.
A beat passed.
“Ah.”
He stared at the left arm.
The radius was upside down.
Sid picked up the offending bone and examined it from several angles.
“If only I had some light…”
His thoughts thundered through the labyrinth.
The radius slipped from his fingers and clattered across the stone.
Sid winced.
He left it there and continued deeper into the tunnel.
His feet carried him forward without tiring or slowing. Time became difficult to measure underground. Hours blurred together. Perhaps days.
Yet somehow, he still felt hungry.
Not real hunger. A phantom ache in a stomach that no longer existed.
“I miss food,” he muttered. “My bed…”
He glanced upward.
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“And—”
His jaw dropped.
The tunnel opened onto a cavern vast enough that its ceiling vanished into darkness. Stone pillars rose through the abyss, thick as towers, while distant waterfalls spilled from heights he couldn’t see.
And everywhere, blue crystals glowed from the rock.
Clusters of them climbed the walls, casting pale light across wet stone and turning the cavern into a landscape of blue shadows.
Sid stared.
“What on earth…”
He stepped into the cavern, gaze fixed on the nearest cluster.
“Aha. A light source!”
The thought detonated across the open space.
LIGHT SOURCE.
LIGHT SOURCE.
LIGHT SOURCE.
Each echo returned from somewhere deeper in the cavern.
Sid went still.
“…Right.”
Water dripped somewhere far below.
He marched toward the nearest crystal and poked it.
“This will work.”
Both hands closed around it.
He pulled.
Nothing.
Sid planted one foot against the wall and hauled with his entire body.
The crystal remained perfectly still.
He stopped.
“Right. So that’s not an option.”
His own voice returned from the darkness.
NOT AN OPTION.
NOT AN OPTION.
Sid rested a hand against his jaw, considering the problem.
A sound reached him.
Footsteps.
Distant.
Heavy.
Sid went rigid.
Whatever was making them, it wasn’t walking like a person.
“WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!”
The cavern answered.
WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!
WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!
WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!
Sid covered his face with both hands.
“Oh no.”
The footsteps quickened.
Wet stone trembled beneath his feet.
Something large was charging toward him.
“FUCK. FUCK. FUCK.” His jaw rattled as panic seized him. “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, I NEED TO STOP THINKING!”
Naturally, the cavern announced this too.
Something burst from the darkness.
A massive creature charged on all fours, body low as it tore between the crystal formations. Pale eyes burned above a mouth crowded with jagged teeth, and long claws struck sparks from the stone.
Sid stared.
“Some sort of dinosaur?!”
DINOSAUR.
DINOSAUR.
DINOSAUR.
The creature roared.
Sid ran.
His bare feet skidded across the wet stone as the beast closed the distance behind him. Each impact of its limbs shuddered through the ground and travelled straight up his legs, rattling every joint in his body.
He was not going to outrun it.
A deeply unfair conclusion, considering he no longer possessed muscles capable of getting tired.
The creature was almost on him.
“Is this the end—”
His foot slipped.
Sid crashed sideways across the wet stone just as the creature lunged.
It thundered past him.
A tremendous crunch came from behind.
Then—
Squelch.
Sid lay motionless.
Silence returned to the cavern.
He raised his head.
“…I’m alive?”
Several meters away, the creature hung impaled across a cluster of blue crystals jutting from the cavern wall. One had punched through its chest. Another protruded from its abdomen.
Its limbs twitched.
Dark blood ran down the crystals and pooled across the stone.
Then it went limp.
Sid stared at it.
His jaw opened.
“HAHAHAHAHAHA!”
Manic laughter erupted through the cavern as he clutched his exposed ribs.
HAHAHAHAHAHA.
HAHAHAHAHAHA.
HAHAHAHAHAHA.