Chapter 122 - Into the Sewers

  The green light faded, and we emerged into a scene that was entirely different from what I'd expected.

  Last time, the dungeon had been a cavern, with rough natural stone walls, stalactites, and a deep sense of being underground in some ancient cave system. The place we found ourselves this time was nothing like the first.

  We stood in what looked like a sewer tunnel. Not a modern one with concrete and metal gratings, but something older. This looked like the sort of sewer you’d see in a fantasy film, not a real-world place. The walls were made of fitted stone blocks, the kind you'd see in a medieval castle. The ceiling arched overhead, maybe ten feet high, also constructed from those same precisely-cut stones. And running down the center of the tunnel was a channel of dark, murky water that looked and smelled exactly like what you'd expect to find in a sewer.

  "Oh God," Maggie said, her voice muffled behind her gas mask. "The smell."

  “Ugh. Masks on. They’ll block that out.” I yanked mine out and put it over my face. A little of the stink managed to slip into the mask, but it quickly faded away.

  At least there was light. Patches of bioluminescent fungi grew on the walls, casting a dim greenish glow that was just enough to see by. It gave everything a sickly, otherworldly appearance.

  "Stay close," I said, checking that my own mask was secure. "And watch your step. We don't know what's in that water."

  "Cam, I don’t want to go anywhere near that water if I can avoid it. No worries,” Maggie said, staying right behind me as we started forward.

  We stuck to the narrow walkways on either side of the central channel, at first. The stone was slick with moisture and slime, making every step treacherous. I went first, testing the floor before putting my full weight on it, holding one hand back toward Maggie in case she slipped. If I slipped, I could activate Flight and avoid the muck. She didn’t have that sort of protection.

  Everything about this mission made me worried for Maggie. I was super-strong, fast, very difficult to hurt, and I healed quickly. She had none of that going for her. I needed to channel as many crystals her way as I could, to ‘power level’ her some as quickly as possible. Until I could, she’d be far too vulnerable.

  The tunnel twisted and turned, but there were no branches or forks. That much was the same as last time. We knew where we had to go because there was only one path—forward.

  "So," Maggie said after a few minutes of tense silence. "Not to state the obvious, but this really sucks."

  I couldn't help but laugh, though it came out muffled through the mask. "Yeah. It really does. At least the cave had some variety. This endless sewer is something else.”

  "How long do you think it'll take to get through?"

  "Last time took us most of a day," I said. "Maybe longer. We had to fight through a lot of rooms, deal with traps, rest between battles. I figured this would be similar. But now that I’m in here, and everything is so different, I don’t know that we can count on that. We’ll have to take it as it comes and hope for the best.”

  Maggie was quiet for a moment. Then: "Do you think we have that long? Before we...you know."

  I knew what she meant. Before the infection took hold. Before we started transforming. I'd been trying not to think about it, but the ache I felt as the curse spread from the bite was a constant reminder.

  "I don't know," I admitted. "From what we saw, most people take hours. Sometimes longer. We've got time. We just need to move fast."

  "Right. Fast. Through a deadly dungeon full of monsters." She laughed, but there was no humor in it. "Why does nothing in my life ever go the easy way anymore?"

  "Welcome to the post-Event world," I said. "Where everything is horrible and the points don't matter."

  That startled a genuine laugh from her, brief but real. "Did you just make a 'Whose Line Is It Anyway' reference in the middle of a sewer dungeon?"

  "Guilty. My sense of humor gets weird when I'm stressed."

  "I'll take weird humor over screaming panic any day," Maggie said. "Keep the jokes coming if it helps."

  The conversation fell back into silence as we pressed on, but it was a more comfortable silence now, less oppressive. Having someone to talk to made the whole situation feel slightly less nightmarish. After maybe twenty minutes of careful progress, the walkway ended. The channel widened, forcing us to either wade into the muck if we wanted to proceed.

  "We're going to have to get wet," I said, looking at the knee-deep water ahead. "Sorry."

  "It's fine," Maggie said, though her voice suggested it was very much not fine. "Just... stay close, okay? I'm not going to lie, this place is creeping me out."

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  "I'm not going anywhere," I replied. Not like I could, even if I wanted to, but it was more than that. Maggie was a good person. She was risking her life to help me save all of us, and that was no small thing. I wanted to keep her safe.

  Something about the way I said it made her look at me. Even through the gas mask, I could see her expression soften a little around her eyes. "Thanks, Cameron. For letting me help. I know you could probably move faster without me."

  "Maybe," I said. "But I'd also probably get myself killed doing something stupid. You're the one who figured out the liquid nitrogen trick, remember? And your tier eight Heal spell is going to save my butt once we’re fighting monsters. I need you here."

  "Mutual survival pact, then?"

  "Mutual survival pact," I agreed.

  We stepped down into the water together. It was cold and thick, like wading through spoiled soup. Things brushed against my legs that I really didn't want to identify.

  "Okay, this is officially the worst thing I've ever done," Maggie said, her voice tight.

  "Yeah, this is pretty high on my list too," I said. "Though getting swallowed by that fungus knight last time was definitely worse than this.”

  "You got swallowed?"

  "Me and Alex both. The thing's stomach was full of acid. Alex used his Create Water spell to dilute it enough that I could tear us out from the inside,” I said.

  "Yeah, I can see how that would be worse,” Maggie said. Then, quieter, "Is he going to be okay? Alex, I mean. After Marion…?”

  I thought about the cold fury in Alex's eyes when he'd told me to stay away from his people, and the way he'd looked at me like I was somehow responsible for Marion being out there in the first place. That memory hurt more than I wanted to admit, so I pushed it away again for the time being.

  "I don't know," I said honestly. "He's changed, though. Even in just the short time since she turned. I've never seen him like this."

  "Grief does things to people," Maggie said softly. "Makes them into someone they're not. At least for a while."

  “I know a little about that.” My voice was a little sharper than I’d intended. “Sorry, I guess I’m still a little raw there. I lost my girlfriend, that first day.”

  “I remember,” Maggie said, putting a hand on my arm. “Her name was Amanda, right? Emmy used to talk about her a lot. I’m sorry. Loss like that sucks.”

  "You lost people too.” I remembered the lies she’d told Emmy about their parents, back in those early days. It was clear her mother and father had died somewhere in downtown Boston in the days right after the Event.

  "My parents, yeah,” she replied. "They died right after the Event. I don’t know what I would have done, if I hadn’t had my sister to take care of. Emmy needed me. That gave me something to focus on and someone to protect. Maybe Alex just needs time."

  "Maybe," I said, though I wasn't convinced. The look in Alex's eyes had been more than grief. It had been cold, calculating rage. Would that fade with time, or grow? There was no way to tell.

  We waded on in silence for a while. The water level varied. Sometimes the channel was only ankle-deep, and then a little further on it would be up to our thighs. I kept my hands ready to cast Drain Life at a moment's notice. My other ranged spell was Lightning Bolt, and with both of us wading along, that wasn’t a great plan.

  "So what did you guys run into the first time?" Maggie asked, clearly trying to keep the conversation going. "In the cave dungeon?"

  “The first monsters we ran into were these giant puffballs,” I said. “They were mobile mushrooms that exploded with toxic spores when you got too close. That's why the gas masks were so important. There was a big armored fungus creature, too. It was sort of like what a fungus would look like if it was trying to mimic a snail. Hard stone outer shell, soft squishy interior. That’s the one that swallowed Alex and I. Those were tough, but manageable."

  "And the boss at the end?"

  "A big column of fungus that controlled smaller monsters. It was tier ten, so it hit hard. But we took it down. The key is to stay alert. Watch for traps and ambushes. These dungeons are designed to test us."

  "Great," Maggie said. "No pressure or anything."

  "You'll be fine," I said. "You've got a tier eight Heal now. That's huge. And Entangle could be really useful for crowd control. Plus, you're smart. You think things through. That matters more than raw power, sometimes."

  "Cameron Castle, are you trying to give me a pep talk?"

  "Is it working?"

  "A little," she admitted. "Though I'd feel better if we weren't wading through literal sewage while having this conversation."

  "Fair point."

  The tunnel opened into a wider chamber ahead, maybe twenty feet square. The water here was still, dark, reflecting the bioluminescent glow like a mirror. I couldn't see the bottom.

  "Hold up," I said, raising a hand. "Let me check this out first."

  Maggie stopped, staying back near the entrance. "Be careful."

  "Always am," I said, which was becoming my standard lie.

  I moved forward cautiously. The water seemed calm. There was no movement at all, and no obvious threats, but something felt wrong. My instincts were screaming at me to back away, but we couldn’t. We had to go on. There was no choice.

  I took another step forward, testing the depth—

  And suddenly there was no bottom.

  I plunged straight down, water closing over my head. The gas mask flooded immediately, water seeping in around the seals. I was sinking! Panic flared for just a second before instinct took over and I activated Flight.

  The spell surged through me and I shot upward, bursting from the water. I gasped, sputtering, water streaming from my clothes and mask. The mask had leaked but wasn't ruined. The filters were probably compromised, though. I tore it off and shook it out while Flight keeping me hovering just above the surface.

  "Cameron!" Maggie called from the entrance, taking a step forward. "Are you okay?"

  "I'm fine," I called back, still catching my breath. "But it's deep. Really deep. Too deep to wade across, and you definitely don't want to swim in this."

  "I really, really don't," Maggie agreed, eyeing the dark water with disgust. "So what do we do?"

  "I'll fly us both across," I said, moving back toward her. "Just give me a second to—"

  Something wrapped around my ankle.

  I looked down and saw a thick tentacle emerging from the water. It coiled tight around my leg. It was gray-green, covered in slime, and strong as a steel cable.

  "What the—"

  Then another tentacle grabbed my other ankle. They both yanked hard, pulling me back toward the center of the chamber. I tried to use Flight to pull away, but more tentacles were erupting from the water now, five, six, seven of them. They wrapped around my waist, arms, and chest, constricting like pythons.

  "Cameron!" Maggie screamed.

  I opened my mouth to shout back, to tell her to run, to get to safety, but the tentacles pulled me under before I could get the words out. Water flooded my nose and mouth. I couldn't see anything—just darkness and the pale glow of the fungi filtering down from above, getting dimmer as I was dragged deeper.