Rachael falls into the sea and the force of Elma's blow breaks her nose, her body drowns into the wetness of the waters. She struggles to remain conscious as her mind dwindles and her vision fights between maintaining a clear view and falling into a blurred state.
She is losing herself as her grip on consciousness begins to slip. A bright light appears before her eyes and a voice calls out to her. She can't hear the words but she knows the voice, Gabriel's voice.
The light envelops her and she finds herself swallowed into a refreshing air and an encompassing darkness.
It takes about twenty minutes before Rachael opens her eyes clearly to see the world around her moving fast like a speeding car. The wind blows hard and fast against her body, it is a bit surprising because the breeze comes from below as she tries to get her bearings around the place.
Shock and fear grip her as she now sees her situation. She screams as she falls through a thick darkness with what seems to be an unending pit. The cold fills her chest and her tears dry up against the pull of gravity.
She is several feet above the ground but don't know how high, only that when she lands she is definitely going to die from such a fall.
This could be the last of Rachael McQueen.
She falls through a thick bush of leaves and feels little stems prick and tear her skin. Until she falls on a thick branch; she groans and coughs as blood spills from her mouth and she feels a rib break.
Tiny little thorns leave cut marks on her body.
It is still pretty dark but she can make out a big tree that stretches from left to right in the midst of an empty space. She can't find the trees body and assumes she may be on the branch of a very big tree, the biggest she may have ever seen in real life.
She struggles to stand and she sees more clearly, it is a bunch of thick branches that seem to form a sort of bridge. A bridge between what?
She starts to walk to one side of the bridge of branches where it meets the edge and soon she gets a clearer picture; the bridge is connected to what looks like a mountain with tree parts sticking out from different caves in the mountain.
She is stuck between two huge mountains close together but the bottom still seems endless.
She tries to make a way to the end of the bridge when she hears a large thud on the bridge. Someone else has fallen on the bridge it seems.
More people fall from the darkness above and land on the tree, she turns and watches with hope that it may be one of her friends but this hope is crumbled when she sees an unfamiliar face.
"You are the sphinx's friend, come here" a man snarls and runs toward her, tripping twice on the now shaky bridge.
Rachael runs as she realizes that it must be one of the possessed people from the ship. She struggles to run as the pain in her torso intensifies, she runs with all that she has but luck flees from her.
Her left leg falls into a space between the branches and the snarls of the demon gets louder, "You will lead us to him," one of the possessed beings say as they chase after her.
There are eight in number and the only thing that slows them down is the strange floors of the bridge filled with holes and stabbing branches.
They pause when they hear a loud cry, much like a bird but with a sinister feeling behind it.
Something long and fast breaks through the bridge and destroys it, letting its victims fall into the endless pit below. Rachael screams as the bridge swings her downward and lands on the side of the mountain.
Part of the bridge hangs on, giving her some time to free herself before it completely breaks loose.
Her hair falls downward and her eyes see three more possessed beings hanging on the bridge and climbing towards her. She is upside-down but her eyes catch a glimpse of a red light falling downwards before she forces herself up and begins to free her leg.
"You won't escape us," one of the possessed says but she doesn't care, right now she is alone. No Samuel, no Elma and no Amanda. She has to survive on her own with the human strength she has.
She manages to free herself and begins to climb up but one of the possessed is already too close. He grabs her right leg and she screams; suddenly a large scaly tentacle smacks the possessed, squashing it against the mountain wall.
The tip of the tentacle spreads open like a tulip and sucks on the possessed, leaving a dismembered hand on Rachael's ankle.
The tentacle seems bigger than even the bridge and its black scale smell of dirt and rot.
Rachael whimpers as her heart races like a cheetah, she hastens her climb as she shakes off the hand on her ankle. The tentacle drops down with half of the hanging bridge while Rachael climbs up the rest of it as it still hangs to the edges of the mountain.
The bridge begins to creak loudly as its last legs connected to the mountain is about to break. Rachael sees this and knows she won't make it to the top so she moves sideways, hoping to cling to the mountain walls before it is too late.
She doesn't miss her chance as the bridge finally collapses she latches onto the stony walls and takes half a minute to catch her breath.
When they warned her about the dangers that may lie ahead of their journey, she never expected this. She never thought she would find herself in such a predicament with no where to run and no one to help.
Down here, in the darkness, she is utterly alone. Well not exactly since everything else is most likely trying to kill her.
The cold breeze kisses the tips of her fingers and her lips dry up with shivers; a loud smack against the mountain catches her attention and she hastens her climb when she hears a loud cry.
Whatever monster lives down the mountain is picking from those who are stuck here, one by one. She doesn't plan on staying to find out if she will be one of the victims.
The only way to escape this may be to climb to the top, Rachael looks up and peers into the darkness; there is no end to the length of the mountain walls.
And there is no assurance that climbing down the mountain is much better than going up.
Rachael continues her climb up the shadowy mountain with the melody of the cold winds blowing at her ears and eyes blinking in hope of seeing some light in the bosom of the pitch black that fills every corner of this place.
Her feet slips off and she almost falls but her hands grip the wall firmly and a groan of frustration escape her lips.
She gasp and breathes with no option than the option to keep going, if she wants to live.
She goes on for a few minutes and silence soon fills the place again. It is almost peaceful but Rachael won't settle under the little quiet that prevails. Little creeping sounds begin to vibrate through the walls as she climbs. Her hands turn red and they are cold and stiff; she grabs a huge chunk of rock and draws herself up onto the doorway of a cave.
Finally, a place where one can catch their breath.
She groans as the pain in her ribs kick, she raises her shirt to find a reddish swelling at the side of her torso.
"Wait a minute. The recovery tunic that Samuel bought me," she remembers and searches her pockets but finds nothing. "Fuck," she recalls that something red fell when the tentacle broke the bridge and she realizes that it must have been the tunic, turns out that her luck isn't getting any better.
And it will only get worse; hisses come from the cave and Rachael moves to one edge as she peers into the dark cave. Something is coming, will she be able to handle it?
A slimy tentacle blasts through the opening of the cave and dashes forward, missing Rachael by a few inches. It moves left and right as if to search for its next meal but Rachael, who is sitting at the edge of the doorway, seems to be invincible to its presence.
The tentacle retreats into the cave with little hisses behind its tip.
Rachael doesn't waste time, the moment the tentacle retreats into the cave she gets back on her feet and retreats to the walls of the mountain to continue the terrible climb that awaits.