The dripping water echoed throughout the newly discovered cave; our Battalion had gotten separated from the main force after an earthquake that seemed to shake the earth to its core. We had fallen maybe fifteen hundred meters, maybe more, but there seemed to be no way out. I can hear Sergeant Perry breathing heavily about 10 to 20 meters from me, “Perry, you okay?”

“Do I sound okay? I think I broke my leg…you know what, it looks really bent out of place, so I’m sure it’s broken,” he said from the depths. I crawled to the edge of my platform and gently lowered myself onto Perry’s crag. I tapped the trigger of my torch, but it wasn’t igniting. There wasn’t enough cloth. The torch orb that protected the cloth had shattered and ripped it to shreds. “Hurry up, Eli, I’m dying here,” Perry complained. For a guy who just took a big fall, he sure knew how to keep his mouth running. After a couple failed attempts, I fumbled around in the dark, looking for his torch. The orb was smashed too, but the cloth was intact. After some ticking, I got the torch working. It lightened the weight of the dark.

“Finally…the dark was getting to me,” Perry said.

His leg was a fuckin mess. It was bent backward and sticking out upright. I also noticed some empty vials on the ground. Painkillers. He’d taken a lot of them, which explains why he wasn’t screaming in pain.

“This is worse than I thought,” I told him.

“Listen, there’s no need to amputate okay, just break it back into place and-”

“Break it back into place?! Who do you think you are some sort of Ironman?” Perry struggled together a laugh. Ironman was our trump card up top. They were soldiers that didn’t feel pain and had the full arsenal from the Fringe Science Association. “I just took 3 times more than the recommended dose of painkillers. I’ll…be fine,” he slurred. “Wouldn’t be here if I was an Ironman.”

I looked at him for a second and then placed down the torch. This was going to hurt a lot. I took some cloth and tightened it around his leg to cut circulation. I grabbed one part and firmly pressed against his good leg. Then I stopped. I took a deep breath in and slammed down the leg that was sticking up. He fainted. After a couple of breaks, I was able to straighten his leg into something that looked like a normal leg. There was a high chance he wouldn’t be able to walk on it ever again. I wrapped up the leg with a brace and slung Perry on my back. I peered over the edge; there were a couple of platforms for us to travel down to.

Once I reached the bottom, I noticed some more footprints leading deeper into the cave. Without Perry’s approval, I ventured down the trail. Judging from the footprints, I could tell they belong to one of ours. The enemy we were fighting didn’t necessarily have foot soldiers, emphasis on foot. I could hear those godforsaken beasts up top roaring with all their might. For a once, I thanked God that I was down here and not up there.

The trial told me that they had someone injured, and with our luck, we would meet up soon, and we did. “Who’s there,” said a voice around the corner. I stopped for a second. I knew the voice.

“Major Addison, you’re alive,” I said, revealing myself.

Major Addison was sitting down with a brace on her arm and her crossbow aimed at me. Next to her laid Sergeant Scott. “Sergeants Elijah, Perry, I thought you guys were goners. Is he-“

“No, he’s just asleep from all the painkillers he took,” I answered, creeping closer to the fire Addison had made for herself.

“Wait, don’t move. How do I know that’s really you,” Addison asked, her finger cradled gently on the trigger.

“Paranoia,” I thought, but it’s for a good cause. We only found out two days ago that some of the enemies could shape-shift into people we knew. We had the overwhelming advantage in numbers, and in a split second, those numbers were halved, and the next thing anyone knew was that the enemy was on top of us.

I cleared my throat, “~They got a name for the winners in the world/ I want a name when I lose/ They call Alabama the Crimson Tide/ Call me Deacon Blues~” Addison sighed. She released her hand on the trigger and dropped the crossbow.

“Thank God you guys are okay.”

“What happened to Scott,” I asked.

“I think he’s asleep. He was talking a few moments ago, something about how we’re close. He fell on some jagged rocks and ripped himself open, but I somehow was able to close the wound.”

“Did you use the Angel’s Kiss on him?”

“Yeah, does Perry need some?”

“Oh yeah, his right leg is pretty much mush,” I said, placing Perry down on his back. Addison pulled out a clear bottle with an eyeball submerged in a white liquid. She poured some into Perry’s mouth. He twitched for a moment, and then I felt his right leg began reforming bones, muscles, and skin tissues. “If he wasn’t on all those painkillers, he’d be screaming,” I said, chuckling to myself.

Addison gave me a stern look and then closed the bottle, placing it back into her pouch. “Amazing stuff,” I thought. It’s not fair that only high-ranking officials can have them. The idea of an undying command who shank fear into our enemies was a pointless theory. The monsters never feared us, and they will never fear us. I know a lot of good men that could have used that miracle drink.

“Have you been further down,” I asked. She shook her head no.

“You know, this could have ended a lot worse,” Addison said. I looked up to face her.

“What do you mean?”

“Before this battalion, I was a member of AF-365, you know the one that was meant to be scouting for advantage points in Devil’s Claw.”

“Yeah, I know, were you the one that you know — ” The word hung in my throat. It was like if I said it, it would have jinxed us or something.

“The beasts have this powder. They call it Hero’s Ecstasy.”

“What does it do?”

“It makes the user see monsters, but it also gives the user confidence, a lot of confidence,” groaned Scott, slowly opening his eyes.

“It creates illusions,” I asked.

“Something like that. It was made to cure fears, but it can be deadly if used as a weapon.” I looked back to Addison. She had her eyes closed and was taking deep breaths.

“I am sorry to hear that,” I responded, looking further down the cave. “We’ve lost a lot because of the war. Those good old days of having a beer at the bar down by the ocean listening to Steely Dan are long gone.”

“What’s your favorite Steely Dan album,” Scott asked.

“Aja, it’s the only one for me.”

“Addi, please shoot Eli in the head. He’s a traitor.”

I chuckled while Addison tapped Scott on the forehead; he winced.

“Not funny, “ she said, leaning back against the boulder. It was nice sitting by the fire, not worrying about being ambushed. No need to shoot flare nets into the sky to protect against aerial attacks. It’s been years since we had peace, after the assassination of Hitler and World War 2 coming to an end. We thought that was the end of everything, but dead men always have a trick up their sleeve. Then they attacked.

Perry slowly opened his eyes and got up.

“Perry, glad to see you awake,” Addison said, shifting her position.

He didn’t respond and started walking deeper into the cave. “Sergeant Perry, where do you think you are going,” Addison demanded.

He didn’t respond. I got up and collected the torch and relit it.

“Perry, Perry,” I called out, but he just kept ongoing. Scott grunted himself up.

“The voices got him,” he said, starting to walk after Perry.

“What voices,” asked Addison; following after Scott, I followed behind.

“When I was unconscious, something called out to me. I thought I was dead and the voice was an angel or something. It kept showing me this path.”

“Did the path look just like this,” I said, pointing at the road ahead of us.

“Yeah, it looked a lot like this,” Scott finished, and we followed along. The path twisted and turned around walls of stone. There were claw marks on the walls. We readied whatever weapons we had on us: torches, knives, and Addison’s crossbow. It was only after having a close look at the crossbow that I notice it had no arrows. Not much you can do to the enemy with these, I thought.

We snuck along the walls until we found Perry’s tracks. They led to a small opening. We could see a blue light on the other side; our guts warned us of danger. “We might need a scout,” I said, crouching down trying to peer into the cave.

“Thanks for volunteering,” said Addison pulling out a metal plate from inside her jacket. It folded out to a helmet.

“Why me, why not, Scott? He’s a better scout than me,” I complained.

“That’s a lie, and you know it,” Scott shot back.

“Stop it, both of you, Elijah; you’re the one with more experience on this than all of us. Not to mention you still talk to it,” Addison butted in.

“You make it sound like it’s a bad thing.”

“It’s weird,” said Scott.

I grabbed the helmet from Addison’s hand and gave her the torch. I found a seat by the entrance. Not in front of it but adjacent. I put on the helmet. It had a slithering snake inside this tube that wrapped around the base of the helmet. I flicked the switch on the side, and this sharp pain hit my mind, and then it went numb.

I woke up in a black room by myself; a small child sat in the middle. I walked up to him and sat down.

“You want me to go out there,” he asked.

I nodded yes. The child stood up. Small rocks fell to the floor. Rocks that were once precious to me. The child stopped and turned back to me. “I’ll be careful,” he said, and he was gone.

The child oozed himself out of my stomach like a newborn baby covered in some type of clear liquid. He crawled away from me and stood up.

“That never gets old,” Scott said, trying to hold himself back.

“Don’t go barfing on us, Scott,” Addison commanded, “Elijah do you sense anything?”

The child shook his head no and then walked through the entrance. Once inside, the child discovered that the blue light was just blue crystals illuminating the path. The child continued down the trail. He started to get goosebumps, which started to show up on my skin. The child pressed on slowly, looking around the cave. He caught a glimpse of a long centipede-like body scampering into the shadows. He shook his head in disapproval, and so did mine.

“You’ve got to find Perry, Elijah. Keep moving forward,” Addison pleaded.

The child moved down the path quickly. The faster we find Perry, the faster this could end. After thirty minutes of traveling, the child ended up in this open room, and then he found him.

He was standing in front of this large blue crystal. It was bigger than any navy ship, bigger than any skyscraper. Perry started to raise his hands like he was worshiping it like some type of god. Then they got him. Wrapping around him with their bodies and wings. Ignoring his screams and ripping him to shreds. The child started to back away but never made it.

I jumped up in pain, grabbing my chest. Trying to dig into my skin. “What did you see Eli,” Scott asked me, keeping me steady.

“Dragons,” I gasped out.

“Dammit!”

“Calm down,” Addison reassured us like she had some plan hidden away, “What happened to Perry?”

“Perry, he was devoured. They attacked him like he was some fuckin sacrifice,” I said, panicking.

“I think we should proceed forward,” Addison suggested.

“Go forward, are you mad? There’re Dragons down there. The monsters that have been picking us off like food,” Scott raged.

“Yeah, but what do you want to do; stay here and die from starvation, or until one of us loses our minds and we start devouring each other. There’s no backup, and we can’t just climb up to something.”

“It’s better than being ripped apart.”

“What’s stopping them from coming after us, coming through that entrance,” Addison said.

Scott turned to face the entrance; even though a full-grown dragon couldn’t fit, their destructive power could break through it. He turned to face the opposite direction.

“Fuck,” he said, “Let’s do this before I change my mind. What’s the plan?”

“Well, I have none yet, Elijah. What else did you see,” Addison asked.

“Well, there was this large blue crystal. Perry was worshiping it before he died. There were also some smaller blue crystals lighting the way,” I said.

“Well, I have the making of a plan right now, but you’re not going to like it.”

“We are not getting out of this alive, are we,” Scott asked.

“We might if we play our cards right, but we’ll have no more Angel’s Kiss left.” Scott and I both looked at each other and then back to Addison.

Once inside, the cave felt colder than before. “Death’s presence,” joked Scott. Didn’t really make traversing the trail any better, especially because I had already traversed this trail before.

I knew what was coming.

Once we got close enough to the large crystal, we could hear the Dragons' scampering around us. Then I stepped in something wet. I looked down and placed my hand on the puddle. It flowed back into me along with the pain. I don’t know if I could bring him out again.

We handed our torches to Addison, who wrapped them up to make a bigger torch. Scott and I readied our knives and slowly started to creep around the edges of the cave leading up to the large crystal. The Dragons slithered away from us; we had to be cautious. Addison threw the torch in the middle of the room. It wasn’t lit. The Dragons leaped from the shadows and onto the torch. Addison had tied a string to it.

Once we had reached the large crystal, we whistled to notify her that it was time. The dragons turned around to face us. Addison jumped from her cover and pulled the string. It flicked the lever and reignited the torch into a blue explosion knocking Addison back and the dragons forward. The smell of burnt meat made me wince. Without hesitation, Scott ran forward and started stabbing the creatures. Then the dragons started to scream, sounding like small children. It froze me in place. 

Addison had just joined the fray and was cutting some beasts down. As I stared at them, I could see them laughing, giggling enjoying themselves. All fear they had just vanished. I heard rumors that Angel’s Kiss was flammable, but I also heard that the gas was poisonous. I just couldn’t remember if it was fatal. “Oi, Addison, what’s next,” I asked.

Addison and Scott both looked at each other and started laughing. “The crystal silly,” Addison said.

Crazed, both of them ran towards the crystal and jabbed their knives into it, causing it to crack. I watched as the cracks shot up the crystal. Then it stopped, and I didn’t hear any more stabbing. I looked back down to see Addison and Scott not moving but looking at me. Their eyes glazed over in a blue haze tint.

“Guys, you okay,” I ask, slowly approaching them. Addison staggered up to me and swiped at me with her knife. She grazed my chest. I moved forward and disarmed her.

“Major Addison, what in the seven hells are you doing,” I yelled.

She didn’t respond. She only struggled to get out of my embrace. I felt a sharp pain in my back, and I released her. I turned around to see Scott with a bloody knife in his hand. He dashed towards me, and I charged into him, dropping my knife.

Knocking him down but not before he jabbed his knife into my stomach. I turned my head to see Addison dashing towards me, and I rolled out of the way. I got up to attack, but I witnessed my mistake. Addison had fallen on top of Scott and was repeatedly stabbing him. I ran forward and kicked Addison in the jaw, knocking her back.

Once she was on the floor, and I landed on top of her. She looked at me with tears in her eyes and then bit her tongue. After a couple of minutes of just holding her down, she either drowned in her own blood or choked on her tongue. It didn’t matter which because life had left her. I got up and glared at the crystal. I grabbed my knife from the floor and started walking towards it.

I knew we weren’t getting out of this alive; I was surprised we made it this far. The crystal had some type of power, something that could control people’s minds. Then I noticed it. Claws. There were these massive claws on the side of the crystal. They were huge. I looked around the room. I didn’t see anything that connected to it until I looked up. Two large eyes stared down at me; two large dragon eyes, two blue eyes. I walked up to the crystal, and I started to jab into it.

The first jab felt like some was taking my soul away from me. It brought me back to the black room where the kid in me was pulling with all his might from my arm. A blue door had shown up. I jabbed again, and instead of walking towards the door, it came closer.

“Don’t do it, you can’t kill it, you can’t,” the child said.

I jabbed again, and I fell to my knees, coughing blood.

Coughing and sweating in my own filth, I raised my hand one last time. “Erde den Drachen, we win,” I said, and with one last jab we…