Chapter 1

Rotting death, perhaps that might have made it more interesting. Trying to find something interesting in the situation seemed a bit of missing the mark. However, there was no other option that remained. No options existed at all. Existence, a short dead end existence rang at the only truth.

It was the same as any other day, for as much as one day from another could be explained. The only light that entered into the unfortunately large underground was through a few slits in the ceiling at the top of a pit. Only a little bit of the day could be understood from such a terrible view, one that she long ceased to follow. Darkness was the only thing that she knew anymore. She gave up on even caring about it. There was no reason.

Death’s visit would come in time. She only had to wait.

She waited. Forgotten the time that she arrived or even how. It all blurred away.

In the near blackness, she sat huddled over with her bones unable to remember walking. Muscles stripped of their vitality hung on to dear life praying for any source of energy to keep themselves together. Where the worn tunic didn’t cover her body, the skin rolled around bone exposing a shape the human was not meant to have.

Silence her only companion with the darkness, she waited for the end.

Only when food and water dropped for her did she move. Dirty or mud covered bread, depending on the water, failed to fill any hunger, but it kept her visitor away. Not accepting it one time came as a more frequently asked question within her mind, but it was something that she turned down.

Perhaps she had hope.

But hope can only last for so long before despair destroys it.

It was just another day, she assumed since the food had only just arrived. The wet plop of the leftover bread was the only break to the numbing silence that she received. Even talking was gone for her as there was never any answer. A wall provided no conversation.

The woman tilted her head with the whites of her dim half dead eyes slowly turning to see her life line. She stared at it with a singular thought in her mind. ‘Is this the day?’ Every day before she could tell herself to do it. Each time it repeated and she kept going, but the question felt heavier than ever. ‘I should…die…’ She leaned away as if part of her lost the strength to support her.

Cold dirt caught her fall brushing over her face, if she had much of a visible one with her time locked up. Her eyes disappeared behind her eyelids as the only thing filling her mind was the empty stench of the hole. A distant unpleasant familiar odor churned in the air summoned up by her nose crushed into the dirt. She knew the smell since she created it and anyone else that had been in here before her. The whole place filled with it that she managed to not notice it most times, but broken down in the dirt she recognized it again.

Not even a cough at the disgusting stench could be managed.

She was ready. She felt ready.

Her fingers balled up clinching dirt in the nails and folds of palm packing it.

Ready.

Strength squeezed through what could amount to muscle in her arm. Her fists pressed into the dirt weakly in her attempt.

Ready.

Nothing would happen immediately, even though she felt like it would. It made her heart pause for the moment that everything broke. She could have cried if she had enough left in her for tears.

A loud screeching broke her thoughts as she managed to pull herself back up enough to see a shaft of light splitting the darkness. It seemed a little strange that it would be food, considering that they already gave her that and it was never that noisy. Her mind couldn‘t even come up with an idea. She had to see.

The impossible seemed to have happened. Her eyes lit up for the just briefest of moments when she saw the silhouette. Forgetting as many things as she had, it wasn’t one that she would. What she dreamed of and haunted her mind, she never allowed herself to forget.

Another person.

Another instant later, she withdrew and fell back down to the dirt. The hole in her heart increased once again. She knew immediately what was happening. Enough remained that she could still figure it out, most of the time anyway.

It was just a trick.

“Is someone there?” called out a soft and scared voice. The voice had a calming effect sweet like candy that beckoned at her. Every part of her body ached to just look. Even her mind started to crumble believing it.

She squeezed her hand tighter. ‘N-no…keep it together!’ Dirt caked hands trembled just wanted to give in.

“I did hear something, right?” they asked themselves now in self doubt. As the painful seconds ticked away with the alluring sound worming through even the dirt towards her.

Even without sight, as she only saw a shape, her mind started building a wonderful image in her mind of who the person was. It happened effortlessly that they were a young man by the soft and worried tone’s in his voice. The little trembling told her that he lacked experience in life, but his body was an adult with the subtly deeper tones that slipped through. A small frame that despite appearances was actually strong from working out under the sun. He worked hard and never was given any attention for his labors, just a beating from his master for a slip up. Someone that cared and listened.

Every part of her was already engrossed in the fantasy. Dark almond colored hair that ran wild around his ears crudely maintained because he didn’t have the right tools and had to find anything sharp that might do. A rugged look befitting his shining blue eyes the color of the Aegean Sea.

Just the thought of him conjured up the rocky cliffs overlooking the sea. A breeze off the coast blew in against her. Faint memories that remained of her home brought her back to ease and comfort. Seeing the green meadows over the darkness cracked her heart.

She lifted herself off the dirt to stare over at the human shape in the center of the underground chamber. Long already had the shaft of light disappeared with only the faint glimpse making down. Catching a look at him would be even more difficult now.

All that made it through to him was the light that bounced off her eyes and the low sobbing coming through her lips. From his point of view, he now had confirmation of something else in the dungeon with him. “Are you able to speak?” Expectations were that he would only find another human down with him, but he wouldn’t put anything past the Greeks to do them if they wanted some sort of sport. And in the moment, nothing about what he saw or heard told him it was undeniably a human.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

The thought it could be a trick completely left her mind, caught up by the dream. She crawled a little towards the light, but stopped afraid if reality was different from the vision she made. “Y-yes…”

He released a heavy sigh of relief as he fell back into a more relaxed seat. “That’s a relief, I was worried they might have left some wild animal down here so that they didn’t have to execute me.”

“They’re going to execute you?” she asked with an unnaturally hopeful tone in her voice.

“I wish they wouldn’t, but that’s what happens when you’re tossed in here right?”

“I don’t know. It’s been too long since anyone’s been here.”

“Are you alone?” The mysterious newcomer walked over into the darkness trying to reach her. As to be expected of the darkness, it was difficult to see her. A vague hint of an outline was all he got and not even a complete one. Only by her voice, coarse and shallow as it was, he did know that it was a woman.

When he started to reach out to her, her mind finally regained control and she backed away with surprising speed for being starved. “N-no! Stay away!” She grasped her head with only muttering coming from her voice now. “It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not…” Repeating the words gave her some sense of stability again, that she could still remain herself.

“I didn’t mean to scare you.” He made an effort to lower himself so that he might not appear as threatening, even though she couldn’t even see him. “We’re in here for the same reasons. I’m not going to hurt you.”

She tried shutting it all out, but he remained talking to her. Even muffled through her hands, she could hear the faint echoes of his voice. “Stop talking! You’re not real! I’m fine. I’m fine. I just have to focus. Focus. It’ll all go away... Away…Focus…”

“Miss! I’m real, I’m not an illusion!”

“Focus…block…stop.”

Words alone weren’t going to reach her, he realized as she began her chanting. “Damn, she’s losing it…” He had no idea what he should be doing in the situation, but went with what made the most sense to him. Reaching his hand out to her, though fumbling in the darkness without even his eyes adjusted made it more difficult than he expected. Each time he thought he reached her it was just air and moving quickly wasn’t an option as he wanted to calm her and not frighten her further. “Come on, you’re out there somewhere!” Swatting at air slowly with his fingers, he struggled to reach her in any sort of time that felt normal.

His fingers brushed against something that he determined to be the woman and grabbed with his hand hoping to draw her attention. “Listen to me! I’m real, I’m touching you. See? If I wasn’t could I do that?” Excited that he finally reached her, it took his brain quite a bit to process that there was something strange. He rubbed his fingers over what he thought was her wrist and it did not have the right texture. “You’re really flaky and crumbly…”

“That’s the wall…” she answered, having come out of her chanting. She felt the air brush against her lightly from his moment and feared what he might do. But harassing the wall defused so much of her intense emotions.

“Oh…” The man backed away brushing his hands off of dirt realizing his mistake. Doing his best to brush off the embarrassment, he turned towards her voice. “My plan worked, exactly as I thought!” He forced as much confidence as he could to cover up the whole thing.

A bit of a smile cracked over her lips for the first time since she found herself in this hole. “Your plan was to grope the wall to make me believe that you’re real?”

“It worked, didn’t it?”

“You expect me to believe that?”

“I’m not very good at coming up with plans.”

“Clearly.”

“Plus you were screaming and going crazy. I didn’t really have any time to think.”

“You’re putting this on me now?”

“I mean look at me. Do I look fake?”

“I can’t even see you.”

“Right…my voice is…trusting?”

“Your foundation is cracking.”

The play ran as far as it could and he stopped the effort. He couldn’t help but laugh a little at the argument that they got into over his embarrassment. It was infectious enough that he realized he wasn’t the only one laughing. His new roommate joined him, though she lacked any of the thick heartiness that he had thanks to having been living on the outside until today. “I’ll consider it all good for making you laugh.”

A bit of a shocking gasp came over her as she realized that she caught up in the moment. She paused pondering what she was doing. ‘Is he really…truly real?’ It could all still be a trick. Stretching her hand out, she roughly knew where he was from the sound of his voice. With just her index finger extended she leaned out towards him slowly pushing through the void until it would hit something. Part of her figured that she would just hit a wall like he did, but she was pretty certain that she found him.

She turned out to be correct with her aim. A long poke against his arm, which at first made him think he just had an itch until it continued longer. “Ow, that hurts!”

“I’m so sorry!” she yelped, jumping back. Her hands clasped together trying to put away the weapon until she started to hear laughter. If he could see her, there was a little red showing up in her cheek from annoyance and embarrassment. “Don’t do that!”

“Sorry…sorry. I couldn’t resist.”

“You’re real mean for the first person to be down here for as long as I can remember.”

“How long is that?”

“I don’t know. I stopped counting after two weeks.”

“You’ve been alone for a month?”

“Probably more than that…”

“Sorry…” He looked around as meaningless as the effort was in a place so far that the walls couldn’t even be identified. “How are you still alive?”

“They toss me food every day. Though at first I thought that they forgot about me as I almost starved.”

“Not to sound cruel, but don’t they want to kill you? There were others in here right?”

A nod came from her, though that did nothing as she realized. “That’s right. There were a lot when I came.”

“What happened to them?”

Pieces of the events were hazy for her. Everything leading up to being tossed in the hole was hard to put together. They were facts that she believed. Yet the rest, she just knew that they were here and then couldn’t remember them disappearing. “I don’t remember…I think they were taken?” A gap in her memory didn’t seem to be possible. She was certain she could remember it happening, but pressed for an answer she came up empty.

“And you?”

“I don’t know. They left me.” She nodded affirming it for herself. “I’ve been alone since.”

“How are you still sane?”

“You might still be in my head, so I don’t know anymore.”

“Have you hallucinated before?” Judging from her reactions before, he felt like he had his answer already. ‘How bad is it?’

She contemplated her answer. They were more recent memories for her. Every time she thought it was the first person only to be wrong. “Yes. They’re very convincing and then they just disappear on me or I wake up.

“Well you don’t have to worry about that. I’m not going anywhere!” He thought about the answer and the reality. “Until the Greeks do, but until then I’m all yours!”

“I’ve heard that before.”

“Oh, not a new line? Like word for word?”

“…not word for word…”

“Then we’re still good!"

“We are?”

“Definitely! Best to remain positive!”

“We’re locked in a hole waiting for the Greeks to execute us.”

“But we’re still alive!”

“That optimism won’t last.”

“I guess that’ll be our bet then. What’s your name?” He put out his hand in a vague area of where he thought she was, though only realized afterward that she probably didn’t even see him do it. There was a chance she might have heard him move, but that had no indication that he was trying to be friendly.

The question made her recoil and fold her legs up close to herself. Memories flipped through for her as the question sent a probe through her mind. However, nothing came back for her. It wasn’t even something that she noticed. It stunned her. Realization paralyzed her body completely. “When did it happen?”

“What do you mean?”

She looked over to his voice pleading in her eyes that could not be seen. “When? I have a name. I know I do! What is my name?”

Panic flooded through her voice like a river unleashed by a broken dam. He tried to reach out to aid her, but fumbled around looking for her. “Miss.” The young man found her at last and put his arms around her, feeling her whole body shaking. If she continued it felt like her skin would slide right off her bone. “It’s ok. You don’t have to think about it.”

“But I know it. It’s there!”

“I’m sorry for bringing it up. Focus on me.” He rocked with her doing everything he could think of to calm her down.

Trembling in her voice began to ease up a little. “What’s your name?”

“Hmm? Oh, it’s Aniketos.”

“Aniketos…"