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Because this was yet another incredible discovery. I was sure of it. Maybe even a more important one than the others we had been documenting.
By its dim green-yellow glow, I assessed that it had been painted with some kind of illuminating element. Not modern either, by the look of it.
Stepping closer, my fingers reverently reached up to touch it. Quickly I pulled my Nikon camera out of my backpack and snapped several photos. Finished, I pulled out my knife to take a small scraping to verify its natural components, nicking the base of my left thumb in the process.
“Ow,” I hissed through my teeth, shaking out my stinging palm.
Bad move. The blood beading from my scratch splattered onto the glyph itself.
Cursing my stupidity and clumsiness and the blasphemy at ruining any archeological treasure in such a way, I pulled a cloth square from my pack and tried to gently dab it off. Unfortunately it only managed to smear it more.
“Idiot, McEwan,” I chided myself.
One more attempt, I decided. Then I would stop and hobble back to Maggie to tell her...
Suddenly my headlamp and flashlight simultaneously blinked out, throwing me into darkness.
Rumbling started, growing louder and louder until the entire room was roaring and vibrating.
An earthquake! Or cave in!
Or another “natural, accidental” explosion. Oh, God!
I had to get out of there!
A massive quake, then dust and rocks rained down from the craggy ceiling.
Gasping, I limped fast for the main tunnel and was almost to the mouth of the rattling cave when a falling rock hit my forehead.
And all went black.
* * *
I woke to the darkness and roaring pain in my dizzy head. It took me a few seconds to settle my fractured thoughts and assimilate the events that reminded me where I was and what had just happened.
A cave. An earthquake.
Trapped in a cave in?
No, I didn’t think so.
Still, I tamped down the panic at the possibility and quickly crawled and felt around the cave room for my lost headlamp or flashlight. Remembering my penlight, I pulled it from my shorts pocket and snapped on the tiny beam.
Debris was everywhere. My satchel, headlamp and flashlight were all buried somewhere in the rubble piles. I started to lift rocks out of the way to search for them when another rumble shook the ground.
No time to find them. I had been lucky this last time, but the next quake might do the trick to bury me alive, making me some future archeologist’s discovery. I had to leave everything and get out now, then come back later when it was safe.
Using my penlight to guide my gimpy steps, I picked my way through the tunnel, careful to avoid fallen debris.
I returned to the fork where I had taken the wrong turn, relieved when recognizing the correct path forward and following the tunnel until I spotted dim light ahead. With great relief, I clicked off and pocketed my penlight, then limped fast towards the brightening entrance, until I was gratefully outside again.
“Maggie, I’m here!” I called, exiting the cave.
I leaned back and raised my face to the warm afternoon sun, sucking in a deep breath. Never had I breathed anything so wonderful as the cool mountain air filled with pine and cedar resin. I unzipped and slipped off my dusty coveralls, then tossed them aside, glad to be rid of them.
“Maggie, sorry I was hung up back there, but you’ll never...”
I check around. No Maggie.
