Free Spores by Ian Woodhead Page A

grinning like a mad clown. She was so glad it was him instead of that other one. Hayder scared her. As soon as the bastard pushed his ugly mug through the opening, he was going to get this tin slammed right into his mouth. Amber wanted the fucker to choke on his own teeth.
    Oh God, listen to her, as if he was going to poke his head in here like a bear groping for honey, he would shove his arm in either that or his pissing rifle. As he reached for the door, Amber crawled further into the tight space.
    She yelped in utter shock as her legs fell out from under her, Amber looked back, panic bubbling up as she felt her torso slipping back. Oh Jesus. Someone or something had burrowed up from fuck knows where, right into the back of this cupboard. Pembroke opened the door and reached in with both arms. Amber didn’t know what scared her the most her falling backwards or the look of sheer terror etched on the soldier’s face.
    “Grab my arms, woman!” he shouted.
    She dug her fingers into the edge of the wood and fervently tried to pull her body up. Amber just couldn’t hold on for any longer, the interior of the tunnel was coated in a thin film of gloss black glutinous slime. Pembroke leaned further in, trying to wrap his fingers around her wrist but he just couldn’t reach. Amber’s already exhausted muscles couldn’t hold her any longer. Her fingers let go and she plummeted backwards, shrieking.
    Before she had time to try to slow her descent, Amber fell through and landed on a pile of what felt like soft material. She dared to open her eyes and found herself looking up the hole she’d just fallen through and at the tiny features of Pembroke at the top.
    That soft material turned out to be a thick carpet of huge, black mushrooms. She cried out in revulsion as the crushed caps and stems beneath her released a rank, foul stink. Amber rolled of the stuff, stood up, and wiped as much of the crap off her clothes as she could.
    Where the bloody hell was she now? No way could this dark room be part of the Institute. It looked as though the cube shaped room had been hewn out of solid rock; was this a natural cave?
    As Amber slowly turned around, she saw that the hole she fell through wasn’t the only one. Above her head were five more next to each other in a circular pattern. They remind her of the barrel on a revolver. She looked up and in the distance glanced pale blue sky. The exit looked like it was miles above her head, Amber reached up and gingerly touched the surface of the hole, it was just like the other one, gross and slimy.
    “I won’t be getting out that way,” she murmured.
    She padded back toward the opening she’d emerged from, stepping over that vile carpet of strange looking mushrooms. Amber crouched down and gazed up the hole. The face was no longer there. She wasn’t sure whether she was upset or relieved. The gradient didn’t seem to be too steep; if she could find something to dig into the side there may be a chance of getting out of here. Amber stood up, wherever, here was.
    Opposite from where she stood there was a huge lump of dark stone jutting out from the wall, Amber made her way toward it, and as she got closer, Amber saw with surprise that it wasn’t natural. A human face had been carved from the rock. As her eyes got used to the dim light, she noticed more discrepancies. Close to the opening was what looked like a pile of broken stone columns, next to those were the remains of the statue of a naked man.
    “Oh how fucking fantastic. I’ve fallen into what could be one of the greatest archaeological finds of the decade.” Her voice echoed around the room, “Yippee, I’ll be famous.”
    Then her eyes saw something else that wasn’t so ancient. Amber’s stomach flipped when she noticed a pile of glistening bones next to that broken statue. She looked around and saw with growing horror that there were another four piles. She took a step back and gasped when her foot crushed what felt like a