“And now I have to use my arm…”
Zahra sighed and unbuckled her grappling hook. Eyeing one of the two posts, she flicked her wrist to open the blades, but it didn’t open all the way. Zahra held up the device and inspected it. One of the blade arms was slightly bent. She recalled bouncing off the walls of the underwater tube and deduced that it had been damaged then.
“Great...”
She tried again, using more force this time to open it. With an ear-piercing shriek, all four blades popped into place. She gazed out over the gap and began to spin it like she had aboveground. Half a dozen rotations later, she released it, allowing the cord to unravel. It bypassed the post and clanged to the ground on the other side. Using both arms, Zahra pulled the hook to her left and worked behind the support. She put all her weight behind it and dug the blades in as deep as she could. Zahra relaxed and slowly rotated her bad arm, feeling injured muscles throb.
In the aura of her light, Zahra noticed that the wound was now bleeding worse. The more she exerted herself, the worse it was going to get.
And it was about to get much worse.
She stepped up to the edge of the gap and pointed her light straight down. The bottom was nowhere in sight. Zahra nervously swallowed and glanced up and down between the support post and the drop. She didn’t want to go through with it, but she didn’t have a choice. There was nothing behind her besides the pool. This was the only way.
She sat and gripped the cord tight. Slipping the palm-sized light into her mouth, she held it in place with her teeth. Zahra slowly lowered herself off the edge and dropped, trying her hardest to keep the swing to the other side slow and easy. It worked. Zahra gently swung across the opening in the earth, bracing the impact with her legs, using them as a natural suspension system.
The swing to the other side was a success, except now she was twenty-five feet beneath the ledge and only had one-and-a-half arms to use. The pain was excruciating… but dying would be worse. Zahra put every ounce of her strength into the sheer vertical ascent. The stone beneath her feet was impeccably smooth and would be no help. This would be an old-fashioned rope climb — like back in gym class.
Halfway up, Zahra’s labored breaths became bestial snarls. With five feet to go, Zahra’s inhuman growls transformed into tear-filled, muffled sobs. She openly wept with the flashlight pinned between her teeth, praying for the agony to subside. Blood freely ran down her arm, draining off her elbow into the void below. She pictured some demonic entity standing beneath her with its mouth open, relishing in her flavor.
She chuckled; glad she could retain her sense of humor even under duress.
Finally, she made it to the top, but she needed to make a choice. Reach the top with her good arm and use her injured appendage to support her weight or do the opposite. Either way, she’d have to put a lot of weight on her left arm.
“Come on, Zahra,” she said, mumbling through the flashlight, “you can do this.”
She came up with a third option — and just in time too!
Her grappling hook suddenly disengaged as a shrill beep rang out around her. The button release on her belt had obviously been damaged too. She caught herself with just her right hand and watched her beloved piece of gear disappear into the darkness. There, Zahra just dangled, unable to pull herself with just her one arm. The last leg of this excruciating ascent would require both arms. So, she bit down harder on her flashlight and slowly lifted the damaged limb. It wasn’t until she got as high as her shoulder that the movement made her cringe and flinch. But still, she continued, feeling her grip on the ledge wane.
Zahra kept her arm in tight to her body, climbing the wall with her fingers inch by inch. The higher it got, the worse the pain became. With one final push, the fingers of her left hand summited the wall. She wrapped her fingertips atop the ledge, feeling the muscles in her arms flex and shudder.
Taking a portion of her weight in her left arm, she slid her right hand forward and gripped the edge with her wrist. Then she lifted her head and slipped her chin atop the precipice. She flexed her chin downward and inched her right arm higher until she got the edge into the crook of her armpit. With renewed vigor, she brought her left arm up, happy that the particular motion didn’t cause her any additional pain. Now, she had both arms entirely atop the edge, as well as her head.
Now what? she asked herself, relaxing her arms. Zahra flexed her shoulders and back to pin herself in place. The tension caused the injury to flare up and she scrambled for another handhold. In one motion, she threw her right leg up and shoved into the ground with her right arm. She snagged the support post with the heel of her boot.
Zahra glanced up and saw that the other post was just inches from her head. She slid her right elbow across the ground and felt herself slip back into the void. Zahra lashed out and gripped the other post with her hand. She flexed her quadriceps and glutes, locking her right leg in place. With half of her body atop the ledge, she gave herself a moment and dangled her arm over the edge. The discomfort immediately began to subside with the lack of use.
Like an overextended worm, Zahra inched and flopped to the side, slowly completing the climb in the oddest way possible. When she was safely across the gap, Zahra breathed easy and nearly passed out. There, she laid on her stomach too exhausted to move. With no one following her, Zahra took her time. She wasn’t going to move until she was confident that she could without falling over.
Note to self, she thought, have Tommy figure something else out. Her grappling hook had almost gotten her killed. She needed something less techy and more reliable. Something with less brittle, moving parts that could still be used in the same manner.
Minutes passed before she moved a muscle. When she did, it was her neck. She lifted her head and looked away from the gap, spitting out her light as she did. It rolled for a few feet before coming to a stop against the far wall. Its beam illuminated a portion of the next archway’s base. As soon as it did, Zahra climbed to her feet, taking care of her left arm. But she barely noticed the ache in her badly damaged limb. Instead, her attention was focused on what lay inside the passage.
Bodies. Dozens and dozens of bodies.
Before heading off, Zahra adjusted the tourniquet on her arm, but it wasn’t enough. With great care, she once again slid out of what was left of her black thermal. Zahra unsheathed her knife and sliced through the fabric, separating the right sleeve from the rest of the garment, and dropping the remains to the floor. As she had done before, Zahra tied the sleeve around her arm, this time, focusing on the gunshot wound itself. She needed to stem the flow of blood before she became lightheaded. Even though she had successfully evaded Joe and his men, Zahra was still in a lot of danger.
She picked up her felled flashlight and pointed in down the dark passageway. Looking up, she saw something that filled her with dread. This archway wasn’t adorned with the architect’s ancient dialect. Starting on the floor, she traced her light from left to right, following the arch until her beam met stone, once more.
Long ago, human skulls had been embedded into the rock, and each of their mouths were wide open, frozen mid-scream. Zahra had a feeling that she was about to see firsthand the aftermath of the Amazonian people’s brutal practices of human sacrifice.