“Don’t mess with the unknown, lest it messes with you.

- Standard Burrow doctrine.

“I’m telling you, they were Founders.”

“Can’t be true,” Dagger said. “They had to be something else.”

“Think you idiot,” Pickle replied. “The Mark never increases when slaying monsters. Unless we kill something that isn’t a monster. Something, or someone, who’s death would count as murder in the Forgefather’s eyes…” He was constantly moving his makeshift light-source during the argument, casting large, shifting shadows along the depth of the tunnel. “Don’t look away! You know I’m telling the truth.”

“Would you two please shut the fuck up?” Sly asked whilst looking over her shoulder. Her glare lingered for a few more seconds before she continued walking, prodding a sharpened piece of bone into Bob’s back. The former, scared, tunnel guard grumbled, dragging his feet as much as he could get away with. “Keep moving, traitor. We’re almost there.”

“Keep prodding, lady, see what happens...” Bob’s threat sounded hollow, for his hands were bare, and up in the air, but that did not stop him from flapping his tongue. One that has been spewing non-stop dissent ever since the incident of last week. “Listen to me, Marcus. We… no, you, need to get out of here. Trust me.”

Trust me, says the traitor. How ironic. “One more word, and you’ll be breathing through your chest,” Sly hissed, kicking the man hard enough to send him tumbling to the ground. She barely waited hoisting him back up before giving him the motivational prod to move forward. We didn’t have time for his shit, especially not after all he did.

“The balls on this guy,” Dirk whispered besides me in the back. “Riling the whole Awakened group up for a takeover, while we were busy making tools, weapons, and equipment from those corpses.” He spat on the ground. “I say we gut the little shit, captain. And be done with it.”

“I still prefer using him as life bait,” I replied. “That way he’ll turn out at least moderately useful.” Compared to that shit show at the tunnel. God, did he fuck that one up.

“I hope you’re right,” Dirk pointed further up the tunnel. “Since he’s going to need to prove it real soon.”

“Halt,” Sly commanded. The small group skidded to a stop, leaving nothing but the faint crackling of fire, and the soft whistle of wind, to linger through the tunnel. Before us was the breakthrough, or at least that’s what Bob had used to describe the opening those creatures had made.

“What the fuck kind of breakthrough is this?” I asked. I was certain I’d heard stone falling when those things finally dug their way through, but no loose rock was to be seen—not even bits of gravel for fuck’s sake. Only a perfectly round hole, one whose size could easily let a cart pass. “Who made this shit? This wasn’t here a week ago.” I turned to Pickle. “Did anyone sneak into the tunnel without permission?” The man shrugged his shoulders, clearly he didn’t know better. “Pickle, I want you ready to seal this hole with me the moment something even farts in our general direction. Collapse the ceiling if you have to.”

“Sure thing, captain,” Pickle smiled. If there was one thing Pickle liked more than lazing around in his free time, it was wrecking stuff under orders. That, and bar fights. A few seconds later, Pickle began to move towards the front, myself following closely behind, before stopping in front of Bob. “Don’t drop it, it seems you’re going to need it.” Pickle gave the man his… torch. If you called an arm bone with a bunch of lit beard hair stuck on top a torch, then yes, he handed him a torch. Or as Pickle liked to call them ‘fart sticks’, cause, oh boy, did they stink.

“Don’t do this, we’ll all-”

“Yeah, yeah,” Pickle mumbled as he began pushing the man towards the hole. “Less talking. More walking.” With a final shove the man stumbled forward, only to land face first into an invisible wall. One which flattened his face, but didn’t seem to stop his torch from tumbling through.

“What the fuck.” My surprise was echoed by several of my fellow rats, albeit a bit cruder. Never seen this before. That can’t be good. I gave Sly a whistle, making several, short stabbing motions. She quickly got the idea as she began prodding Bob back into action.

“Ow! Stop that,” Bob said while rubbing his red nose. “Gods, what do you want from me?”

“Push through it,” I replied. The man raised an eyebrow. “Try ramming it, shoot some magic at it. I don’t know. Just do something. We’ll figure out what works soon enough. Though you better hurry if you want to save that torch.” The thing was still burning, revealing nothing but bare rock around it. But it was the only light that managed to illuminate the blackness around it, a small island of light among a sea of darkness, for our own torches didn’t illuminate past the hole. Or maybe the light doesn’t want to. Whatever it was, this place was setting off all kinds of alarm bells; alarms caused by a simple rule known to all those that ventured into the underground.

“I think we should turn back,” Dagger spoke up. “The instructors warned us about messing with the unknown.”

I wanted to agree with her, were it not that we were stuck, and running out of food at an alarming rate. The fried maggots would last another week at best, and then we would be running on nothing but an empty stomach. If only we had more time. “No, we proceed as planned,” I finally decided. “Digging another tunnel will take too much time, besides we don’t know how far this passage will lead. Knowing the Founders it’ll probably run around this entire lake.” That possibility still existed, and wasn’t that rare of an occasion. The Founder’s were known to make whatever freshwater supply there was as accessible as possible. This usually meant an abundance of tunnels leading up to, or around the thing they wanted to reach.

“But-”

“No buts.” I cut her off. “We’re definitely in Founder territory. Their corpses are proof enough.” I held her gaze as she opened her mouth to speak. “My face felt like it was being scorched off, Dagger. I don’t know what we killed, but it seemed to have pissed of the Forgefather. Or are you suggesting that the Forgefather has a fondness of mutated humanoids for no apparent reason? Humanoids that just happened to vaguely resemble the Founder statues of old.”

Dagger shut her mouth, opting instead to look at her feet. I understood her reluctance to accept what was happening; the implications alone were staggering. Not to mention the uproar our report would bring to the Burrows. If we reach the Burrows, that is. And in order to insure said goal, a certain someone needed to start enacting his role of bait.

“Sly, if he doesn’t start pushing within ten seconds, you have my permission to provide external motivation.”

Sly and Pickle couldn’t help but chuckle at my wording; a chuckle that was totally absent on Bob’s face. “Fine,” he said. “But don’t say that I didn’t warn you.” Yeah, yeah. We’ve heard enough of your lies. Bob finally laid his hand on the invisible wall, planting his feet solidly into the ground. If it weren’t for the soft breeze carrying his voice, I would never have heard his whisper, “My wife is going to kill me.”

The cave began to rumble, crack, and shudder as Bob put strength into his arms, groaning as he pushed against something, “Yes, yes... I know… you don’t want me here.” He drew breath once more before continuing his push. “But it seems… that choices were made.” The rumbling intensified in a mere minute to almost earth-shattering proportions, causing bits and pieces of the ceiling began to clatter down upon the floor.

“Stop pushing!” I yelled at the top of my lungs, hoping to overcome the deafening noise.

Bob ignored my command, choosing to push on instead. “You asked for it… so you’re gonna… get it!” With those last words, he broke through, almost flying into the blackness beyond. The rumblings instantly ceased when he did, though that meant nothing for the damage already done.

The support beams showed numerous cracks along their surface, and the rumbling had instead been replaced by a soft groan in the ceiling. One which would undoubtedly escalate in mere minutes.

“Back to the lake!” I shouted. The rest quickly followed, leaving Bob behind, though that part didn’t really bother us. We sped through the tunnel, only to be met halfway by a panicking mob of Awakened. One headed by Hammer, and the rest of the Warlock leaders.

“Through the tunnel!” Hammer bellowed, not sparing us a glance. Whatever had spooked the man, it wasn’t your average thing. I, and the others, immediately turned around, not wanting to be squashed beneath the oncoming horde.

“What’s happening!” I shouted over the roar of thundering feet behind me.

“The ground shook!” Hammer shouted. “Then things began crawling out of the lake!” That made their panic quite apparent. Whatever things were swimming in that lake, they were bound to be dangerous. Especially at the depth we were currently residing.

“We don’t know if the passage is safe!” I shouted back.

“Better than the shore! There’s hundreds of them!”

“Fuck it!” The opening came in sight. “Passage it is!” Soon after the mob of Awakened barreled through into complete darkness, safe for what small flickers of light that their fire mages had hovered above their hands. To my relief, most of them had supplies and equipment clutched in their hands. Though some entered the passage panting, sweating, and devoid of any possessions.

I quickly found Sly in the crowd, and made her make a few hands signals with fire. A minute later our group was stationed across the opening, ready to take one whatever things that were chasing the few stragglers at the end.

But they didn’t come, nothing did except for a few exhausted Awakened happy to see a friendly face. “I’m the last one,” a black haired man said. He was carrying another unconscious Awakened on his back, covering the large scar one would normally see near his shoulderblade. “The rest is either dead, or soon to be dead.” He glanced over his shoulder, gazing into the darkness. “I would’ve been a goner, were it not for this tunnel. Those things stopped chasing me the moment I set foot in he-” He suddenly wobbled, almost crashing to the floor.

Dagger quickly caught his faltering frame. “Easy there, Botan. You did good.”

“Get him inside, Dagger. I need our healer fed and rested. He’s got some work to do.” It seems I needed to have a talk with the others. Letting our recently discovered healer almost die was a mistake I wasn’t about to-

The moment Botan and Dagger passed through opening, everything changed. The passage disappeared in the blink of an eye, leaving only smooth, rounded stone behind. And more curiously, there suddenly was light. Lots of light, created by even more crystals. Crystals that somehow appeared out of nowhere. Or maybe they were already there? It didn’t make sense. Nothing made sense. And I wasn’t the only who was seeing things. Everyone else in the group gasped, and whistled at the sudden change.

Everyone except for one.

A someone called Bob, or should I say Gob. For his head grew some awfully familiar pair of ears as he made his way towards me, stopping just a few feet away to sport that stupid grin of his.

“If I knew you were this stupid, I would’ve left you on that bridge, Boss.”

How about I smack you instead?