13
Matt sucks in a breath, surprised. He knows I wouldn't wager that much money unless I seriously considered a chance at winning.
However, unable to back down without looking like a coward, he gives me a nod. "Deal."
With a grin on my face, Matt follows me to the cave entrance. It's really more of a crack in the mountain, only being about three feet wide and ten feet tall. The early sun only illuminates as much as two feet inside, and the rest is pitch black.
The dirt floor gives way to solid rock, which won't be comfortable to sleep on. I can see from the dirt there are prints of an animal, but they are indistinguishable. Where the floor is rock, I can see scuff marks, as if it was dragging its' feet.
However, the prints are old, and whatever made them is probably long dead, or if not then it's moved out.
I set my small overnight bag down and hug Matt, giving him a grin. "I'll expect my hundred dollars tomorrow."
He light-heartedly replies, "Yeah right, like that'll happen. I'll be expecting my hundred dollars tonight when you run out of there screaming your head off."
I smile at his response and let him go, then pick up my bag, take out my flashlight, and head in.
The cave is dark, illuminated only slightly from the sun outside. The walls are smooth from water, the floor is extremely uneven, and the ceiling stretches far above.
Slowly, it widens into a chamber about fifteen feet by twenty feet. There are stalagmites and stalactites scattered throughout, but it is otherwise empty. When I point my flashlight up, I don't even see bats.
As I walk into the chamber to look around, I notice a foul smell, nearly gagging at the stench. I set my bag down in the middle and set up for the night. Once all my stuff is ready, I take out some food and eat while I use my flashlight to read a book.
As I walk into the chamber to look around, I notice a foul smell, nearly gagging at the stench. I set my bag down in the middle and set up for the night. Once all my stuff is ready, I take out some food and eat while I use my flashlight to read a book.
By the time I finish the book, I realize I should've brought another, and that I also ate all my food. The vivid pictures and coherent speech soon fade, and I'm left sitting in a mostly dark, silent cave. I check my phone, and it's 8:47 with no cell service.
I breathe in, then slowly I take in the silence of the cave and walk between the stalagmites. As I get to the wall, I walk along the edges of the room and come across a small cleft in the wall.
Curious, I squeeze myself inside. Eventually it gets wide enough I can walk comfortably, but then the ceiling gets lower and I have to crawl. Surprisingly, there are no spiders to be seen, or any other critters either.
Eventually, after what was probably five minutes, I come out of the tunnel and into another chamber, this one smaller. My knees and hands are wet and dirty, and I quickly wipe as much of the dirt off as I can before I point my flashlight back up to look around.
The beam of my flashlight is pointed directly at a person with the head of a pig, drenched in dried red paint.
~~Matt's Point of View~~
After Mia went into the cave I set up my camera about 15 feet from the entrance to watch the cave, then walked back to my tent.
Using my data, I watch YouTube until the sun is about to set. When I look up and see how long I've been watching YouTube I groan. "F***! I won't have any data left!"
I put down my phone and rummage around in my backpack, looking for food. I bring out a granola bar and some trail mix and quickly eat it. I'm more hungry than I realized.
I look for more food and find a bag of marshmallows and some jerky. Not being a big fan of jerky, I decide on the marshmallows. But marshmallows are only good roasted, so I reluctantly get up and look for firewood. It takes me about twenty minutes to find enough wood, another ten minutes to set it up correctly so it doesn't a fall, then another thirty just to try and get a spark going.