Lonely Among us.

[Marla McGivers]

"Do we really have to go down there now?" Helen Turnbull was not happy about their interrupted leave, but as she donned her overalls she knew all too well the answer her husband, Robert, was about to give her.

"Of course we do. You know John is off sick at present and they said it was important we check this out now, it can't wait honey." He shared his wife's frustration, but their employer, The Cordorian City Council, had been informed by adventurers that a section of the sewer system, which ran beneath the city, was extremely unstable and they had to check it out and report back.

"They can take their job and stick it... Oh" She exclaimed in mid-sentence, covering her baby bump with her hands as she felt it kicking.

Robert walked over smiling and laid a hand on her tummy. "He's going to be a strong adventurer himself, I can tell."

"SHE will do no such thing." Helen retorted and, grabbing her backpack, she turned and strode for the door, leaving him trailing in her wake. "Come on, sooner we get this done the sooner I can put my feet up."

The sewers, as you'd expect, are not the nicest of places to go trudging around in and she never let him forget it as they went down one tunnel after another, pausing from time to time to consult her map.

"Are you sure you don't have that the wrong way round?" He moved closer to her, using his torch to bring more light to proceedings. The flickering flame cast shadows on the walls like demons doing some frenzied dance. He waited for her to bite... and she did.

"Of course it's the rig..." She trailed off as she saw him giggling. He loved to tease her. The giggling soon subsided, after a swift elbow to his ribs.

"It's just up ahead." she said as she forged ahead.

Broken masonry, splintered wood and other debris littered the floor as they drew close to the reported area. Robert paused, using his torch to inspect different sections of the support beams and ceiling.

"Definitely the older tunnels here. Look." Helen pointed to the map, which showed the layout of the sewers with various notations detailing the dates sections were added. "One of the earliest areas here... didn't I tell them the beams needed strengthening?" She shook her head as she retrieved a book from her backpack and began scribbling notes into it.

As she continued her observations Robert looked around and began to wonder why any adventurer had come down this far. Even the gangs and creatures that sometimes plagued the sewers left this section well alone. Maybe with good reason...

"Almost finished... I'll write up the rep... A loud creaking noise filled the tunnels, cutting her off in mid-sentence and then all hell broke loose. It sounded like the end of the world, as beams cracked as the ceiling gave way.

Perhaps the gods had something to do with it, or maybe it was the flight instinct. Whatever it was Robert reacted with incredible speed and reflexes pulling his startled wife to one side as huge chunks of rock, dirt and wood crashed down to the ground. Clouds of dust erupted into the air and they both fell backwards to the floor, his torch flying out of his hand as they collapsed in a heap.

Darkness reigned in the sewers, save for the fallen torch, still flickering in the gloom.

Robert staggered to his feet, a wet sensation running down his cheek. Water or blood? Probably the latter. He dismissed it from his mind as his first thought, as always, was for his beloved wife.

"Hon..." He spit dust and grit from his mouth and clawed at his face to clear dust and dirt from it as he spoke. "Honey, are you alright?"

Grabbing the torch he illuminated his wife's face and saw she too was doing the same. A thumbs up from her reassured him, she was alright, though he was still concerned about their unborn child.

Helen eased herself onto a nearby section of fallen masonry.

They took time to check themselves over, light another torch, bandage a couple of cuts they had both gotten and get water from his pack.

"You really are a pack rat." She said wearily.

His beaming smile back at her made her laugh. Typical, nothing gets him down and always that stupid grin of his... It reminder her why she loved him and how he'd won her heart. She'd had many suitors, but his sense of humour, sense of optimism and the grin had captured her heart. The fact he was also a good cook and put her first in everything just cemented it.

As the dust settled Robert began to inspect the damage.

"Shit." He exclaimed, kicking a loose stone against the huge blockage now preventing them going back the way they came.

"It's serious then. You never swear." Her voice remained steady, despite the situation. She had to be calm. For him, for their child to be.

"We can't go back that way... Let me see where this goes." He gestured further down the tunnel. "Maybe it loops back or even leads to an exit... Where's the map?"

"Under all that." She gestured to the rubble.

"Oh well, I was never good at reading those things anyway." She knew he was making light of it and went along with it.

A Rat scurried past them, from the direction of the cave in.

"Well someone can come and go as they please at least." Helen joked.

"At least we won't starve." Came a cheery retort as he started down the tunnel, torch held high.

The thought of eating rodent made her begin rummaging through his pack to see what provisions they did have. There was oil and flint, so a fire wouldn't be out of the question. Cooked Rat? She shuddered at the thought and continued searching.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw a light coming towards her from where Robert has gone just a few minutes before.

"Hello?" She nervously said, reaching for a rock.

Robert emerged into the light of her torch.

"What have you forgotten?" She sighed, partly in relief and also annoyance.

"Nothing... it's a dead end I'm afraid." For the first time his voice was tinged with despair.

Her ash covered face concealed the fact that the colour had drained from her face as his words sunk in.

They were entombed.

[Marla McGivers]

It's surprising how quickly people settle into a routine, even in the direst of circumstances. You adapt. You deal with it.

It was difficult, of course, with no sense of the passage of time, but they managed to create a routine regardless.

Waking from sleep was the beginning of a new day (in their minds at least), so they ate breakfast. The morning meal, like every other one they would have, consisted of a meagre amount of the food they had brought with them. When that run out Helen swallowed her pride and the Rat meat that Robert killed. (Fortunately there always seemed to be an ample supply of the rodents and Robert had managed to fashion a crude catapult, the sort a child would have, with which he was a dab hand (product of a misspent youth so he proudly told her). It became the staple of their diet, with insects and the moss (that's what they called it) that they found growing on rocks and the walls.

Tymora was smiling on them, so he would claim with a kill, though Helen felt the Lady of Luck was laughing rather than smiling.

Water wasn't an issue, as it continued to trickle through the fallen blockage and although it smelt and looked green, once boiled it was just about passable. When their flints and oil ran out they began cannibalising the support beams and unused materials left behind when the tunnel was left unfinished. This was a substantial amount of wood and so a fire was always burning, be it for light, warmth or cooking.

They would take turns in standing near the cave in and calling out, hoping for anyone who might be nearby.

Helen spent most of her time, however, trying to rest. The baby was but a couple of months away at most. She hoped that aid would come before then. The thought of giving birth down here filled her with dread.

Surely the gods would not be that cruel?

They were.

When her water broke and the contractions began, Robert, her dashing Knight in armor, turned out to be as hopeless as most men in this situation. He paced back and forth, babbled nonsense and, at one point, simply screamed for help.

When he finally managed to pull himself together he began to be of use to her, raising her ankles by resting them on chunks of masonry he'd managed to haul over, mopping her brow, giving words of encouragement and, finally, holding her hand.

At this, she exploded.

"Don't you bloody come near me! This is YOUR fault!"

For a moment he was taken aback, but then his normal charm kicked in.

"Honey, the supports were rotten and..."

"Not THAT, THIS!" She pointed to her bump.

"Oh... Well, I don't remember you complaining at the time. As I recall you rather enj..." He quickly moved away as she swung for him, before breaking into a laugh, then a cough and finally crying out in pain as she knew it was very near time.

"PUSH!"

"I AM PUSHING!" She screamed back at him.

It seemed an eternity down there, the torch light just about illuminating her as she pushed, rested and repeated until finally...

"It's a GIRL!" Robert exclaimed enthusiastically as the little bundle of joy entered their miserable, cramped world and didn't they know it as she announced her entry wailing like a Banshee.

After cutting the umbilical cord and cleaning the screaming infant as best as possible he handed her to Helen.

It took moments for the newborn to quieten, now in the arms of her mother, which amazed Robert as he beamed with joy, their dire situation, for now, forgotten.

"We should name her after your mom. What do you think?"

He dragged his eyes away from the infant to his wife, for a reply but she was fast asleep, exhausted after the ordeal.

"KIrsten it is then."

[Marla McGivers]

Lonely Among us - Part III

"Dear Diary" Robert paused in his writing to look up at his baby girl. Baby! She was what... seven, eight? He couldn't be sure. How long had it been now since they had become stuck down here? How long since they'd all but given up on being found? How long since his beloved wife, Helen, had passed away?

She had been weakened by the birth and never recovered. The foul stench, the food, the vile water... Kirsten. All had contributed, no doubt. He vaguely remembered someone once telling him that tiny bugs, invisible to the eye, caused all illnesses. He'd always laughed at such a notion, but perhaps they were real after all. Whatever the reason Helen had grown weaker with everyday that passed and suckling her child had made the strain intolerable. Fortunately they managed to wean Kirsten onto solid food before the end or she too would have... he dismissed that train of thought and resumed updating the diary that Helen had begun since the day they were trapped here.

Thwipp The sound of an arrow being released and the thud and squeal as it hit its target made him look up. He grinned to himself, she was definitely HIS girl that was for sure as he watched her retrieve the dead rodent. He'd managed to cobble together a rickety bow for her (He couldn't bring himself to let her use his trusty catapult!) and a few crude, stone tipped arrows. She practiced daily and it was clearly paying off. They wouldn't go hungry today.

Days blurred into weeks, months and years...

One morning he began to suspect his time was now drawing near. He'd been feeling weaker and sicker, as his wife had done. He lay there watching her "play" with Gef (A Rat that had wandered into their tomb one day and, for reasons he never understood, Kirsten had let it be. Emboldened, it returned, day after day and she had begun feeding it. The bond had grown between the two and he could swear she even learned to communicate with it.) , as he did the thought that had, increasingly begun to plague him returned.

What would happen to her once he was dead?

It was a terrible dilemma. If he did nothing, she would live on alone. He knew she'd survive, she knew how to hunt, cook her food and was young and strong enough to endure for many years... alone. All alone, among her parents remains. Lonely among us, he grimaced.

The only option, to spare her that horrible fate was to... kill her.

He turned over as silent tears began to fall.

"Pa..pa..." Her broken speech and her tugging at his arm made him turn back to face her, wiping his tears away secretly as he did so.

She was much older now, perhaps late teens, early twenties, yet her appearance was old and haggard. Her hair was wild, unkempt and matted. Dirt covered virtually every patch of her bare skin, her rags, fashioned from Rat hides, and torn cloth covered the rest. Cuts and scars, badly healed, filled in the rest. It didn't matter, she was beautiful in his eyes.

He slowly rose, and another day in hell began.

His old boss had once told him that time was a luxury he didn't have. Time wasn't a luxury, he mused. It was a torture.

That torture was now almost done and his dilemma with it. He couldn't kill her. He knew there was no chance of rescue but Kirsten had known nothing but their prison and what you have never had you don't miss. Maybe that's why she never seemed miserable or despairing, She had no clue as to an outside world and no education, bar what bits of language he could impart to her. For whatever reason she struggled to master any words bar a few.

He finished the last entry in the diary and set it down. Robert spent the rest of the day playing games with her, fussing over her and holding her close.

"I love you Kirsten, never forget that." He wasn't sure she understood his words, but the tone of his voice had gotten through and she hugged him.

As they lay down for the night, he allowed himself one long last look at her and then closed his eyes.

He knew he'd wouldn't be opening them again.