What Lay Below
Nyctophobia Horror
(Full disclaimer, this is just me reading in Voice Memos)
There are hidden places in the world, recesses in creation, where time immemorial pools. Most of these places are harmless, housing nothing but ancient rock and primordial waters. But there are some of these secret places that delve deeper, to places where sleeping things lay, undisturbed by the slow passing of history. Which have I stumbled upon this time… These thoughts bubble up in the man’s mind as he dips his canoe paddle into the water, quietly propelling himself further into an ever darkening cave. He usually talks to himself on these types of outings, but he can’t bring himself to break the silence of the cavern. A strange feeling - is it fear? - tells him that to pollute the quiet would be more than just profane, it would be dangerous. He feels almost as if he might disturb something. His thoughts stay trapped in his mind because he is afraid, - yes, it is fear - afraid that if he speaks, something might hear.
He has been in dozens of caves along this coast, sometimes by canoe, sometimes on foot, and occasionally by climbing gear. He has never seen this one before, and he tells himself it’s the low water levels that revealed it. A deeper part of him wants to question it’s sudden appearance, but he doesn’t entertain the thought. He looks back over his shoulder to see the diminishing circle of light that is the mouth of the cave. It’s now the size of a quarter and it appears that the cavern goes much deeper still. It smells ancient, like old, wet rocks long submerged, now dredged up. The widening cone of daylight from the entrance glimmers off the surface of the water. He is so far inside that the light has dimmed to the point of enveloping him in almost total darkness. The mouth of a cave has never been more aptly named…
Suddenly, the faint light from the entrance to the cave quivers and then disappears completely, like a cork has been placed in the entrance. The darkness becomes an impermeable shroud over his eyes. He raises a hand to his face and can’t see even the faintest whisper of it. He looks back to where the ever-shrinking light of the cave entrance was, but there is no halo of light there any more - not even a trace. Could he have possibly gotten the tides wrong? That’s the only explanation, yes, he must have; and now the water has risen above the entrance. He tries not to worry, but feels a mounting uneasiness that borders on panic. Very carefully, so as not to tip the canoe, he removes his phone from the waterproof bag between his feet. He powers it on and notes that there is no service in here before turning on the flashlight. He has three flares in his emergency kit, but the phone will suffice for now. The pale white glare of the flash reflects off the surface of the water, revealing nothing but dark ripples all around him. He knows it isn’t, yet he can’t help but feel that the water itself is black: that if he were to scoop some up with his hand it would be an opaque, black liquid. He isn’t even sure which direction the cave walls are. It’s entirely possible he could have drifted slightly and is now facing the wall. The ceiling is much higher than he thought, his phone's flash reveals nothing in the upper black space - not even a subtle pinprick of refraction.
Fighting down his mounting fears, he leaves the flash of his phone on and opens the compass app. He has already paddled in quite a ways and if his suspicions are correct, the entrance is now under water and will remain so for a few hours. Paddle further in, in hopes of finding another way out, or sit here until the tide recedes?… Using the arrow of the compass as a vague guide, he paddles deeper into the cave, hoping that he will see daylight and find an exit. He paddles on for what feels like an eternity, carefully propelling himself forward and then raising the flash to ensure he’s not heading for a rock wall. The air grows steadily colder and more acrid the deeper he gets, and he can’t help but think, Into the belly of the beast now. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here. On and on he paddles, until he is startled out of his focus by the bump and tap of something against his paddle. His heart lodges itself in his throat as he fumbles for his phone to shine a light on what he hit.
The light quivers as he quickly shines it over the side of the canoe onto a shape in the water. He feels some of his mounting tension relax as his flash illuminates a piece of driftwood as long as his oar. There looks to be seaweed or something on the end of the stick - no, not seaweed, but strips of black fabric. Curious, he bats it over with his oar to the side of the canoe, and retrieves it from the dark, frigid waters. He’s completely baffled to find that it is a very old looking torch, the kind seen in movies where someone gets crucified or stoned. The man is nonplussed and places the torch in the bottom of his canoe. The ghostly light of his phone shines down into the bottom of the boat where the torch lay, casting eerie shadows every which way. He can very faintly make out symbols etched carefully around the handle, towards the top. He doesn’t recognize any of them and finds the whole inscription mildly unsettling. He picks up the torch and watches the looming shadow of his own hand gripping the handle elongate and warp. It strikes him how menacing shadows can seem; like they are hiding behind what casts them, avoiding the light that would reveal their true form.
Something rocks his canoe, and the stark terror that fills his body almost causes him to cry out. He just barely maintains a grip on his phone, his only flashlight, and whips it up toward the bow of the canoe. The nose of the canoe is softly bumping up against the cave wall. He feels that stark terror recede again to lurk in the back of his mind, though not as far away this time. He scans his light up the face of the featureless rock wall and it seems to stretch upward forever, reaching into the lightless pit above. It’s hard to believe the cave can be this spacious, when viewed from the outside. In contemplating the height of the vault, he begins to wonder at the depth. He reaches behind the bench he’s seated on and finds the sounding wire he always has in the canoe. He sets his phone face down on the bench across from him, and the light casts alien looking shadows onto the cave wall, each shadow swaying gently with the canoe. Carefully, he dips the weight at the end of the rope into the murky waters, then eases it downward with a practiced motion. The rope is still wet from being used outside the cave, where he found the depth to be close to 25ft. He counts as he unspools the 100ft coil, anticipating a bottom somewhere around 20-30ft. As he eases more and more length into the water, he feels the rope become dry and realizes he lost count. No matter, he would just wait until it hit the bottom and count it back as he reels in the length.
He continues mindlessly unwinding the sounding line into the water, glancing around at the cave wall. The ridges and edges of the cave wall each have a worm-like shadow that shifts and changes with the bobbing canoe. Then he realizes his prior assessment was wrong, the cave wall is not featureless: there are small carvings in strange shapes spread all over. The symbols look arcane and worn nearly smooth by water, each about a handbreadth in size. Who had etched these here and how had they managed it? He scrutinizes the carvings, and recalls the haunting etchings on the torch handle. He reaches one hand for his phone and holds the rope with the other. Shining the light onto the torch and back at the wall, he feels the sinking feeling of fear creeping back into his mind. As he expected, he can see some of the symbols match: there’s a triangular shape with a line out the bottom and then three lines across that one. It feels familiar in one of those strange, unplaceable ways. Staring blankly at the cave wall, the man suddenly remembers the sounding line in his hand. When he shines his phone’s flash back to where the coil of spooled rope should be, there is nothing there. The rope runs directly from his hand to the boat hook that holds the end of the rope.
With a start, he realizes he must have dropped the entire length of rope in without realizing it hit bottom. When he tugs on it however, he feels the familiar heft of weight at the other end, meaning it wasn’t on the bottom. But that’s impossible, it couldn’t be over 16 fathoms deep here? If anything it should be getting shallower the deeper he goes into the cave, and yet he knows his sounding line isn’t lying. He sits, staring at the line in his hands and envisions the depths he sits atop: an enormous canyon of water below him, along with whatever daring creatures swim into this dark place. And as if summoned by his wandering thoughts, he suddenly feels a tug at the sounding line. He is not a fisherman but he knows that feeling of a fish testing the bait on a hook. Except this is not a hook and there is no bait, so why would a fish bother it? Not sparing it much thought, the man begins reeling in the sounding line. He falls into a rote motion of pulling in rope and coiling it up at the same time. He pulls in about 45 feet when he feels that tug again, but with slightly more force. Strange, that the fish should have followed the weight that far toward the surface…
He coils three quarters of the rope on the bench in front of him when he feels a hard tug on the rope. It’s enough that his canoe rocks uncomfortably back and forth on the surface. Wide-eyed and confused, he attempts to reel in the rope, but he can’t pull it an inch. It must have gotten snagged on a ridge of the cave wall…that’s the only thing that makes sense. Those tugs were probably just the weight bumping against rocky outcrops. Yes, that must be it… But even as he explains it to himself, he feels panic creeping closer and the fear settles into his bones. He gives a couple of tugs on the rope but he can’t pull with too much force or he’ll capsize himself. He is holding the string when it starts to be pulled through his fingers. He stares in shock as it slowly uncoils off the bench and snakes away through his hand back into the water. Something is pulling on the other end…
The rope begins unspooling quicker and quicker. The man realizes with a shock that if it reaches the end still attached to the canoe, it will capsize him for certain. He hastily fumbles with the knot that ties the end of the sounding line to the canoe, racing against the rest of the line that is snapping over the side, back into the water. He finishes with the knot and makes a split second decision to clip on a small buoy that has reflective tape on it. He closes the clamp on the end of the rope and throws the buoy into the water as the last bit of rope disappears below the surface. The buoy is yanked under the water with what looks like a lot of force and his mental shock is transformed into a deep-seated terror. He watches as the reflective buoy sinks straight down, drug deeper and deeper below the surface. His terror is complete as he watches it become a tiny, dim glint, reflecting his phones flash. The buoy becomes obfuscated by the depths; swallowed by the fathoms and fathoms of black water.
Unable to the grasp the implications of what he’s just seen, the man stares blankly down into the water. He seeks a fitting explanation, but finds everything he grasps to be slick with doubt. It could be an orca, or perhaps a shark? If the water really is as deep as it seems, a large orca could easily find its way in here, or even a squid. But the explanations ring hollow in his mind. This train of thought brings him face to face with the fact that the water here must be at least 32 fathoms - 200 feet of water. The insurmountable number looms in his mind and his deepest fears populate the space with horrible creatures of monstrous size and ancient birth. He envisions dozens of horrid creatures all clinging to the rocks and flitting across the depths below; each one vying for the meager food that wanders into the cave. He lapses into imagining that these terrible beasts below haven’t yet noticed him in his dinky plastic canoe. He suddenly feels paralyzed with terror, unable to move for fear of disturbing the surface of the water and attracting the notice of what lay below.
He slowly pulls his gaze back into the canoe, and stares down at the torch. He attempts to unclench his terror, but he is now acutely aware that something is down there. It feels like an eternity he sits there, suppressing his terror and building the resolve to move. Very slowly, his shaking hand places the phone on the bench and he tries to calm himself. He reaches a quivering hand for the canoe paddle and holds it tight against his body as he fights the panic back.
After a long time, he works up the courage to move again and slowly dips his paddle into the water. As he gingerly places each stroke, he recounts the few things that have happened, doing his best to explain them. He carefully fights back panic with small success, and continues to mindlessly dip his paddle and ease his canoe forward, ensuring the cave wall stays in view. Just then he notices a cool breeze blowing the hair off his forehead, insinuating the existence of another exit. He silently prays that it is easily accessible and large enough to fit through.
His heart is pounding in his chest to the point that he swears it is audible in the eerily silent cavern. Ahead, he can very faintly make out a light coming from the cave wall he’s nearest. This must be where the breeze is coming from. Yet, the man can’t help but feel uneasy, as if something isn’t right. He carefully and steadily continues paddling toward the flickering light. The light dances on the cave wall and as he watches the shadows hide behind cracks and bumps, he realizes what isn’t right about the light: the flickering. The way it shifts and shudders across the cave wall the closer he gets, it acts more like firelight than sunlight. He ceases paddling and the canoe quietly glides across the water until he can see past a small outcrop. Unwittingly, he is forced to see the source of the light as his canoe drifts. Further down the cave wall, there are dark shadows in unnatural lines - lines that are clearly made by someone. There are curving arches and tall columns, resembling the exterior of a coliseum. Set into one of the carved out doorways is the source of the flickering light: a torch, held by a figure.
The pounding of his heart seems to be inside of his ears, drowning him in sloshing thumps that squeeze his head. He sits in his canoe just out of sight and holds absolutely still, not even risking a breath. The thing that holds the torch is exactly like a man, but there is something… off: some undefinable characteristic or quality that is missing, rendering the shadowy figure wholly abhorrent. It is completely still but when it moves, it does so with small, jerking paroxysms. The figure turns haltingly, and recedes into the opening of the cavern wall. The gait of the figure is an unpleasant rendition of shuffling or staggering, yet there is no impression of being unstable, just grotesque. He watches the sinister firelight dance and sun on the face of the rocks as the torch is carried off. A whole host of feelings and thoughts invade the man’s mind once the figure disappears into the rock face, but one thought prevails: he does not want to be seen by that thing.
Long after the torchlight has completely faded, the man calms himself enough to paddle. He propels his canoe nearer to the arched doorway, but stays far enough to the side that he wouldn’t be noticed, should anything emerge. He is frozen with indecision on whether or not he should seek an exit down the path the creature went. After a long debate fraught with several reversals in position, he decides to at least see what lay down the path. He will exit the canoe holding one end of some top he has, the other end tied to the canoe, and walk as far into the passage as he can get. If nothing useful surfaces, he’ll turn back and paddle back toward the entrance rather than deeper into the huge cavern. From the strange doorway into the cave wall there are steps of rock that descend into the water. Despite all his terror and reservations, he feels a pull toward this ominous hole in the rock: like he is being drawn toward the inky black mysteries it holds. He shakes himself out of this stupefied state, and he guides the canoe to the steps.
The man steps out carefully onto the slick rock and very hesitantly begins walking down the passage. The flash of his phone gives a much more ghostly light than the torch, and everything takes on a spectral quality. He hears a sound and pauses in his cautious walk inward. A soft thump from behind him; the canoe bumping the steps. He takes another step forward but hears a muffled boom from far ahead of him. It sounded like a large drum or a massive door being shut, but that’s okay. The further he walks into the passageway, the more he feels drawn inward, as if pulled by an unseen force. He walks on until the end of his rope slips neatly through his fingers, but he thinks that’s okay too. He walks on, and the tunnel starts to gradually slope down. The pounding sound has taken on a regular and steady pace, matching his heartbeat. He finds himself longing to see whatever is making the sound, and that’s okay too.
He walks with his eyes fixed unblinkingly on a steadily brightening point ahead. The narrow passage continues down and he finds himself reaching out toward the light at the end of the passage. His feet begin to step on things that crunch and crack, and he starts to kick unseen things that rattle with metallic sounds, but that’s all okay - he’s close now, so close. His senses feel dulled, and yet heightened somehow. He is hyper-aware of the light dancing at the end of the tunnel and the strange shadows that seem to pass in front of the light. But he is only vaguely aware of the skittering, chitinous sounds now surrounding him, and the rising temperature. Suddenly his foot catches on something solid and he is pitched forward before he can catch himself. He sees the ground rushing up toward him before everything goes black and quiet.
Groggily, the man becomes aware of himself. He blinks and sees his hand against the stone floor. He rises and feels his face peel from off the stone, a small pool of blood lay where his head was. Across from him there is a thick, loose chain laying on the floor. There are three more chains, but each one is taut and bearing a great deal of strain: two in the upper corners of the passage, and one in the lower, with the loose chain snaking across the floor. He feels his head and his hand comes back sticky and red. He can’t remember what he was doing… then he hears the skittering sounds of innumerable insects. When he looks up at the ceiling, he gasps in horror and recoils. It is crawling with thousands upon thousands of insects; spider-like but longer like a mantis. All of them are chittering and moving toward a light at the end of the passage - where the chains are leading. Something vaguely humanoid moves in front of the light and then out of view, doing some type of profane dance around the source of the light. Crawling backwards in terror, the man sees more shadows dance across the opening.
As he crawls away, his hands begin landing on dry things that crunch. When he looks down, there are bones scattered throughout the passageway and his hand rests against a human skull, the hair and skin still in the process of decaying. He cries out and begins to turn and dash out of the passageway when a drum-like sound begins. It is so deep and loud that it reverberates through his chest as he runs and it knocks some of the crawling insects down from the ceiling. He runs on, screaming in terror, fleeing from things he doesn’t understand. The three chains bearing tension shift and pull, as if they are holding something captive at the other end. He sees the rope that leads back to his canoe and runs faster, blindly swatting away repulsive falling insects as he goes. Then he’s at the end of the passage and he climbs into the canoe so fast that it nearly tips over. He steadies himself and pushes off the steps with his paddle.
The passage seems to be getting brighter and the drums seem to be getting louder. From somewhere above him there is a hideous screech of incredible proportions. Whatever made that sound is terrifyingly large. The man fumbles for his phone, thinking it holds some small key to safety. When he gets hold of it and moves to shine his light up, he is inwardly hoping it won’t reveal anything. In his feverish movements however, he loses his grip on the phone and it makes a soft plosh sound as it falls into the water. The phone is waterproof so the flash shines on as it sinks further and further away. The man stares down at it, willing it to come back - to somehow save him from this nightmare. While he watches it sink, he witnesses the most horrifying spectacle yet. The harsh white light illuminates a massive serpentine moving shape. Sections of a huge tendril are lit by the flash as it descends and the writhing tendril extends, snaking up from the depths toward the surface.
He is jolted out of his stark terror by an impossibly loud sound: like every whale crying out at once. The sound shakes the surface of the water and the man can hear rocks splash down from the cave ceiling. When he looks back down in fear, the flash of the phone has disappeared. A new sound rises to match the low rumble emanating from the water. It has a much more insectile quality and echoes off the rocks: like a plague of locusts that speak as one. The cave is pitch black again with the loss of his phone, and he can only cower in his canoe to hear the horrible clicks and drones of whatever massive insect is above him. He tries to cover his ears and block out the screeching but it is ear-piercingly loud. The man shakes his head wanting nothing more than a cessation of sound. His head bumps against the torch in the bottom of the canoe, and he is reminded of his emergency kit under the bench that houses three flares.
The canoe rocks as he turns over to search for the emergency kit. He lays hands on it and pats down the contents trying to discern which invisible item is the flare gun. Somewhere in the impermeable darkness, an intense eruption of water sounds, like something exploding through the surface from the depths. The man’s hands shake as he blindly fires a flare away from himself. A brilliant, burning red light ignites his surroundings and glares off of the water and the damp cave walls. The loud hiss and crackle of the flare causes a new and horrible response of sounds from whatever prowls the darkness. The flare shoots up at an angle in the darkness and the radiating sparks of light reveal pieces of the terrible scene; each ambiguous unknown contributing to his debilitating state of terror.
The refulgent ball of burning red light temporarily blinds him, but then he is able to see several things: three undulating tentacles of incredible thickness reaching out from the deep, with water pouring off of the glabrous flesh of whatever horrid thing sits in the depths of the water; above, stretching down from the cave ceiling, is a massive insectile wing, translucent like a locust’s and shimmering with indescribable, alien colors. He cowers in the bottom of the canoe as the flare hits the water with a sizzle. The insectile thing somewhere above him let’s out a shattering screech as the man gropes for the next flare charge. He has a hand on it when the thing in the water bellows out an answering roar of deafening volume. The man fumbles the charge into the water and cries out in frustration. He is on his hands and knees searching for the final flare charge. When he lays a hand on it, he is met with a sudden physical sensation.
He feels a heavy impact that jerks his head forward and then weightlessness and a rushing of air. Something huge slammed against the bottom of the canoe and the man was thrown high into the air. He hits the water heavily and feels the freezing cold water envelop him. The chaotic sound of insectile humming is replaced with the unbearable muffled bellows of whatever is under the water. The man sinks into the freezing water and frantically attempts to get above water again. He makes terrified scooping motions through the water with his hands, attempting to get back above the water. He battles his mounting terror as he is forced to screw his eyes closed tight for longer and longer while he struggles to find the surface. He bursts through up into breathable air in terror and darkness, trying to inhale a much needed breath, but his lungs feel as though already filled. The cold has shocked his body and a primordial fear of the unseen depths below him has him frantically waving his arms in search of something to climb onto. But there is nothing - wait, his hand bumps against something solid. It’s too small to be the canoe, and he almost ignores it but he grasps at it blindly and finds himself feeling the flare gun.
He is barely able to tread water, as the cold is already paralyzing his muscles and the horrible shrieking and hissing sounds paralyzing his mind. He feels the final cartridge inside the flare gun and shuts it, aiming straight up - he squeezes the trigger. He is both dreading the illumination and craving it: needing to see his surroundings, but fearing them all the same. The immediate glow of the flare shows him that he is nowhere near the cave wall. Water is the only thing around, except for directly in front of him. There, he sees such a terrible sight that his mind has trouble processing the information. Monstrous tentacles rising up from the water toward the cave ceiling, and they seem to be attacking something. The wrinkled and ancient flesh of the tentacles reflects the burning red light of the flare. There are massive chains hanging from some of the giant limbs. In the midst of these hulking, writhing tendrils, is what looks like a small island - no, not an island: a face, with a menacing eye the size of a car. It reflects the sparking fire of the flare and the man feels as though he sees eternity in that eye.
The vast translucent pair of insectile wings reaches down from the cave ceiling. Now the man can see all too clearly what they belong to. Clinging to the ceiling is an enormous insect with six spiked legs and a long hooked tail, like a mayfly. The head of the creature has mandibles that could cleave a building in two. The face has dozens of malicious eyes, each one as black as the night. The horrifying carapace is centipede-like, but with chitinous spikes across the spine. From its front sprout two huge arms with pincers like a scorpion. As the intensity of the flare dissipates, the man watches a few final details unfold. He sees the strange rune-like etching from the torch and the cave-wall are also branded into the carapace. Then he watches as its long curving tail strikes at the rising tentacles, accompanied by hissing and roaring. The light of the flare fades and the final sight illuminated by the dying red glow is the thing in the deep rising as the insectile creature lunges at it from the ceiling. The whole earth seems to shake and in the suffocating blackness, a horrible battle ensues and the man hears it all.
WHAT LAY BELOW
Anthology of Hidden Places, 1/5
WHERE GOD ONCE LAY
Anthology of Hidden Places, 2/5
terrifying
Absolutely terrifying! As the man paddled further into the cave, i was whispering. “No, no, no…go back!” So many primal scares here: cave darkness, deep water, knowing something big is below you, horrible insects! Pure nightmare and beautifully delivered.