Tunnels 03, Freefall

Chester threw back at him.
    "Actually, no, you didn't. Bartleby chose the last one," Will reminded him.
    "Well, let him do it again," Chester suggested.
    They both turned to regard Bartleby, whose head was high in the air as he sniffed, his tail swishing briskly.
    "Go on, Bart, take your pick," Will urged him.
    " Bart? " Chester asked. "Where did that come from?"
    "Cal," Will said quietly.
    "Oh, right, yes." Chester stole a glance at Will, wondering how he was dealing with his brother's death. But Will seemed to be entirely focused on moving through the network of tunnels, as if he had some sort of plan in mind. If he was as concerned about their current predicament as Chester was, it certainly didn't show. At least they knew that there had been people down here from the discovery of the nets on the fungal outcrop, even if they weren't still alive. But apart from this, there was no getting away from the fact that he and Will were just wandering aimlessly along. However, Chester wasn't about to tackle his friend about it because they had to do something .
    "If you can't make your mind up, I'll decide which way," Will said to the cat, who seemed to be in ho hurry as he continued to sample the air. Then Bartleby scampered into one of the tunnels. He had gone a little way down it when he came to a sudden halt. Following close behind him, the boys pulled up just as smartly.
    "Jesus!" Will gasped as the odor of decay hit him. "Something big died in here!"
    And Chester noticed the sound his boots were making as he stepped across the tunnel. "There's gooey stuff on the floor. It looks pretty rank."
    "Over here," Will whispered, as he caught sight of a number of structures along the wall.
    There were four wooden benches in a row against the side of the tunnel. Resembling something one might find in a butcher's shop, they were sturdily built, their legs and tops made of thick pieces of timber. This impression was further enhanced by the fact that they were bloodstained and covered with what seemed to be scraps of old, dried meat, in some places several centimeters deep. A huge hatchet was buried in the top of one of the benches, as if its owner had swung it down hard, and was expecting to come back and use it again.
    "Oh, no!" Chester swallowed as soon as he laid eyes on the hatchet. He gave a horror-stricken glance.
    Will's first thought was that they could have stumbled upon a tribe of subterranean cannibals, although he wasn't about to share this with his already-petrified friend. As he took a step back from the benches, he lost his footing in the debris covering the floor. He landed on his knees, just managing to keep a grip on Elliott. It gave him an opportunity to see more closely what they had been treading in.
    It appeared to be a mass of hacked-off body parts, but there was nothing Will could immediately identify. "Bits of animals?" he said, as he noticed a huge compound eye, and the sections of shiny-black articulated legs covered in bristles almost the width of his little finger. "No, insects... giant insects?" he croaked in disbelief. The largest intact body part he could see consisted of ten or so glossy-black insectoid segments, all with legs sprouting from both sides. It could have come from some colossal centipede, but as each individual segment was half a meter long, he wondered how big the whole creature had been.
    "We are getting out of this, right now," Chester said, in no uncertain terms, as he helped Will to his feet. "And as far away as we bloody can."
    They raced back to the intersection again.
    Chester was pointing down one of the other tunnels when a piercing screech made them leap out of their skins. "What the hell was that?" he whispered in the ensuing silence.
    All three of them, the boys and the cat, immediately looked up, noticing for the first time that there was a wide fissure right above their heads. The screeches began again, sounding like fingernails being dragged down a very long chalkboard. Apart from the fact that the boys had no idea what was making them, the sounds themselves were painful, tearing at their nerves. Then the echoes of the screeches died away.
    In the lull, Chester spoke very quietly. "That's not rocks cracking or something like that, is it?"
    Will didn't answer immediately, observing how agitated Bartleby had become.
    The nerve-jarring calls came again, louder than before.
    "No," Will whispered, "it's not geological. Maybe it's got something to do with all those bits of