Chapter 57: How to NOT get in home after a long night in a manhole (1)
The sound of metal scraping stone was already behind us, but the stench was still everywhere.
Organic mud, rot compacted over decades, mixed with some kind of soaked grease that clung even to your thoughts.
The tunnel was low enough to force our shoulders into a hunch, and too narrow to allow for any comfortable breath.
The porous walls dripped with moisture like the sweat of some subterranean monster. Every inch forward was a battle between reason and the instinct to run — to nowhere.
Crawling demands humility.
But here... it demanded surrender.
Thalia was behind me, muttering under her breath, coughing every so often, the sound muffled by a scarf she improvised with her own shirt.
"If we die here, I just want to make it clear... you’re still the one to blame," she murmured, her voice nearly swallowed by the tunnel’s damp echo.
"If we die here, Thalia, no one will be left to write the final version of this story. So... technically, your accusation won’t make the record."
She grunted something between disgust and nausea.
I kept crawling.