The rest of them give confirmation of the lack of signal after checking their phones, there is no signal down there. “It must be because of the ground and the building over us, right?” Dr. Abernathy asks Story, since he seems to know a lot of stuff.

Story replies, “Probably... that and the warding spell..." saying the second part quieter and they all glance up at him.

Dr. Paul Abernathy quickly interjects, “Well guys, the way I see it is, we have to find a way out of here... if you were like me, you didn't give details about our um... trespassing endeavor to anyone, I sure didn't tell my wife any details. So, that means no one is going to rescue us.”

“Oh shit... uh sorry for the language,” says Steve to Paul and Ivory but mostly to Paul because Paul has a theology doctorate, and he always feels bad swearing around him.

“It's okay Steve, really,” Dr. Abernathy assures him and pats the back of his shoulder.

A few minutes later they are all moving down the tunnel as the stench of old rotten flesh gets stronger. They collectively try to resist gagging on the smell. Some areas of the cave/tunnel look natural while other areas look like it has been carved or dug out. Crude supports seem to be holding up these areas. Portions of the cave are narrow, and people have to move through single file, while other areas are wide enough that they could all walk shoulder to shoulder.

The only source of illumination is from what light they brought along; the air is cold, damp and smells bad. Behind them is nothing but the silent oppressive black void with the occasional sounds of something skittering off in the distance, this makes them uneasy, so they often shine lights behind them to make sure there is nothing there.

“There certainly was no civil engineer involved in the making of this tunnel system,” says Dr. Abernathy and continues, “It looks like this work has been going on for years down here, this is crazy.” He speaks mostly to take his mind off of the dire situation and keep his mind occupied.

The tunnel widens and there is a side tunnel for a possible antechamber. They hear a scratching sound coming from the side tunnel, or is it chewing? “Do you guys hear that?” says Story, there is something in the darkness over there.” As he gestures toward the antechamber. He can't see what could be making the noise because it's behind some debris.

The group shines their lights into the darkness, Ivory holds her breath forgetting to breathe for a moment.

They see red eyes in the darkness glaring back at them from around the side of the rubble. It's low to the ground like a dog maybe. “Um, is that a dog?” says Steve.

“No..." says Story because he can see more than the rest of them and he can see something else, it's not entirely natural. “Something isn't right, I sense magic at work... and it's... big.” As it comes out from behind the rubble into plain view. It's a huge black rat that is the size of a medium size dog, not counting its tail.

Steve lets out, “That's disgusting,” louder than he intended.

“Oh, good god," says Ivory, “What the hell do we do?” Then she screams as it charges at them.

The huge black rat lunges at Story, knocking him down from the impact of it hitting him in the chest. He blocks his face and his neck, or it would have torn his throat open. “Holy shit!” he exclaims.

Steve replies to Ivory's query with, “We kill the damn thing!” He wastes no time in reacting and immediately kicks the huge rat in the ribs, knocking it off of Story's chest but this action makes it turn its attention to him instead. He pulls out his survival knife as it leaps onto his chest, knocking him into the tunnel wall. It tries to bite his neck, but he blocks it with his arm as it bites into his forearm, he starts to stab it over and over in the neck.

Story is now off the ground and grabs the beast and throws it to the ground as hard as he can, then him and Steve start to kick it until it stops moving and continue to kick it until Ivory yells at them, “Guys, guys!” As she grabs their shoulders, “I think it's dead.”

A few minutes later they are field dressing Steve's arm with a first-aid kit he brought in his backpack. They all try to gain back their composure. “Okay, I didn't know rats could get that big..." States Dr. Abernathy, “What is going on here anyway?”

Story answers, “Apparently, some can but I don't think it was entirely a natural phenomenon, there is magic at work here.”

“But magic isn't real, I thought..." Steve says, trying to wrap his head around the events and implications of it all.

Steve stares off while the rest of the group listens to Story, “I was told that it wasn't real all my life. I was even put on medications to make me see things the way the doctors wanted me to... but I'm telling you, magic is real, monsters are real, but this stuff was always rare, lately it's been happening with more and with more frequency. Something has changed in the World but I'm not sure what... yet. The Merging could be happening, I knew it was going to, eventually. I just didn't think it would even be in my lifetime."

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Ivory says, “Either way, I'm taking a video of this and pictures.” Then she makes a quick video of herself standing next to the giant dead rat and makes a report explaining the situation.

“We should get going." Says Dr. Abernathy after being thoroughly creeped-out by Story's ominous foresight, “We have to get out of here.”

A few moments later they are on the move again, working their way carefully through the caves and tunnels.

The tunnel spills out into a larger cavern space, there are various occult markings on the floors and walls. The group shines their lights around the area as Dr. Abernathy shines his wide-view lantern around to get a better understanding of the space. There is a strange old, poorly made alter with what appears to be a dead body lying on top. He slowly approaches, “Oh good Lord, I believe it's another body..." He says quietly, clearly disturbed by this, possibly because of the twisted occult/religious nature of the site. The corpse is severely decayed, making it difficult to tell if it was a man or a woman.

As he gets closer, he steps over a floor marking as Story says, “Oh shit, stop!” but is too late. Story sees the marking on the floor flash, it appears to be some kind of spell/ward that triggers something when it's disturbed, it looks like there is supposed to be some word spoken to deactivate the spell trigger.

Some kind of blackish-purple mist swirls around the corpse and seems to be absorbed into the corpse's body. Then the corpse starts to move and sits up letting out an unnatural sounding groan as it's empty eye sockets glow purple.

“What, the, fuck?” Ivory manages to say.

Steve mutters, “Oh, my God.” He tries to position himself between the creature and Ivory.

Dr. Paul Abernathy is simply and utterly gob smacked at what is happening. The reanimated corpse moves with surprising speed and is quickly on its feet and says, “Fleshhhh,” in an unnatural voice. It runs full speed at Dr. Abernathy and closes the 20-foot gap between them in a second, leaping at him and knocking him to the ground and grabbing him around the neck. The reanimated corpse starts to strangle the doctor while trying to bite his face, but he turns his head enough that its bite lands on his helmet.

“Get it off him!” Ivory screams.

Story and Steve snap out of their shocked state and grab the living corpse and throw it backward to the ground but it jumps up quickly and bites Steve on the shoulder; making him yell, “dammit, you son of bitch!” as he punches the creature in the ribs and tries to peel it off himself. His punches seem to have no affect as Story helps him pull the creature off. When they finally manage to peel the creature off, they throw it to the ground as violently as they can.

Paul is still trying to pull himself up and is in shock still as the creature is knocked into him and almost knocks him back down. Finally, Story and Steve pin the creature down as it keeps trying to bite and scratch at them while making unnatural sounding screeching and growling noises. Ivory yells at them, “Kill it, somehow!”

Steve and Story constantly struggle to hold it down, then Steve says, “How the hell do we kill something that is already dead?!”

“Paul, I have an idea! Say a funeral prayer for a person at rest or something, it might work to force it back to being dead!” Yells Story, trying to get through to a dazed Dr. Abernathy.

Dr. Paul Abernathy starts to respond, “I, I don't, know what to do..."

Ivory grabs him and places a hand on each side of his cheeks, forcing him to look at her, “Paul, say a funeral prayer.”

His eyes are wide from the horror of the creature and the attack, but he understands her. He responds, “Okay, okay, I'll try.” He falls to his knees, pulls out the cross around his neck, closes his eyes and starts to speak,

“May the road rise to meet you,

May the wind be always at your back.

May the sun shine warm upon your face.

May the rain fall softly upon your fields until we meet again,

And may God hold you in the hollow of his hand.“

The corpse screeches and a blackish-purple mist comes out of its mouth and dissipates as the glowing purple eyes fades to empty cavities, then it collapses lifeless on the floor.

“Holy shit, it worked... you did it Paul, you cast a spell!” Story says with excitement.

Paul replies in disbelief, “No, it was a prayer.” His hand over his mouth, in shock and feeling all the emotions, the adrenaline, the spiritual and metaphysical implications and his faith are all too much and he starts to weep.

“Nearly all prayers are spells, you're a scholar so I'm sure you know this already. I've just never seen one work before.” Story continues with a more sensitive tone, “Your faith is strong Paul, it gives you a direct link to Tetragrammaton.”

Ivory starts to cry as well, overwhelmed from the experience as Steve tries to comfort her. He says, “It'll be okay baby, I promise, we're gonna get out of here.” He kisses her lips softly as he holds each side of her face, then he holds her.

Ivory gathers her composure, takes a drink of her bottle of water, then starts to speak, “Okay, this is bringing back stuff that I wanted to forget about, you know what I'm talking about, Story?”

Story rubs the back of his neck and sighs, then says, “Yeah, I know what you mean, I was in therapy for years accompanied with a lot of medications. . . and then self-medication after that.”

Steve and Paul look at Ivory and Story with curiosity.

“You remember her? Or should I say that thing and all the weird stuff that happened?” asks Ivory.

Story replies, “I do, and I told the doctors that I didn't believe it anymore and that it was all just my imagination gone wild, but I always knew the truth, I knew it was real.”

Steve and Paul start to get confused looks on their faces, combined with being alarmed from the tone and seriousness of Ivory and Story's conversation.

“It's a tale for another day, now is not the time to talk about this,” Ivory states, capping the conversation while she takes pictures of the zombie.

Story October takes pictures of the floor markings and a quick video for his YouTube channel, explaining their encounter with the creature.