trap in darkness
the darkness wasn't empty it was waiting. Elias reailzed this moment he stepped into the tunnel and the light behind him vanished not faded not dimmed but cut like a wire snapped clean.
the air grew thick pressing against his skin heavy with the smell of damp stone and something older something patient. he stood still heart thudding listening Drip breathe then the darkness shifted .
not visually there was nothing to see but spatially as if the tunnel had folded in on itself.
Elias took a cautious step back his heel didn't ground lt hit nothing.
he stumble forward instead catching himself against a wall that hadn't been there a second ago panic flared he reached out again trying to map the space but the darkness swallowed his hands.
he couldn't tell where his fingers ended and black began.
hello? his voice came back wrong thinner stretched something replied.
not in sound in absence a sudden impossible silence where even his breathing disappeared the darkness tightened pressing in from all sides not crushing him just containing him.
Every step he took rewrote it Every movement fed it the darkness wasn't closing in because he was trapped inside it
a memory surfaced uninvited the warning carved above the entrance half eroded and ignored.
Elias froze the darkness paused too like a predator caught mid breath.
they waited there together locked in stillness until his muscles began to tremble and fear demanded motion.
the darkness poured into him eyes mouth lungs filling every hollow place with cold certainty.
the last thing Elias felt wasn't pain but understanding.
and somewhere deep underground the darkness settled back into silence fuller than before waiting for the next step.
