The Fungus

But now the crisis had arisen. They were running short of water as well as candles. They had planned to drink the water from the cave’s public toilets, but an investigation had shown that the water now entering the cisterns was a very strange color. The bottled water they had left would last three people only a couple of more days. They had no option but to make a journey to the surface.

The meeting had been called to decide who should go. Sheena knew it wouldn’t be Geoff. Most likely it would be her, but if Geoff decided he didn’t want to risk losing the only woman in the group then Horace would be the unlucky one. Poor Horace. Horace Snell. What a name for a 25-year-old Marxist revolutionary. But it suited him. He was a Horace.

Sheena’s main worry was that Geoff might miss arguing Marxist theory with Horace more than he’d miss sex with her. After all, the former occupied him for hours at a time while the latter took him two minutes, at best. Prerevolutionary ejaculation, she called it — although not to his face.

It was time to vote.

The result was as she feared. She lost two to one.

They both stared at her expectantly. “Well, off you go, Sheena,” said Geoff. “If you go now you can be back by nightfall.”

She came to a decision. “Up yours, Geoff,” she said calmly. “I’m not going anywhere.”

They both looked profoundly shocked. “But we’ve had a vote,” protested Horace. “You have to go.”

“I’m not going and you can’t make me so that’s that.”

They tried to argue with her for several minutes but all she did was shake her head and repeat that she wasn’t going anywhere.

Finally Geoff said to her sorrowfully, “I’m very, very disappointed in you, Sheena. You’re not just letting us down, you’re letting down the whole of the International Socialist League.”

“Screw the International Socialist League. I’ve decided to become an anarchist.”

Geoff stiffened. He said sternly, “Sheena, you leave me no choice but to expel you from the Hastings Branch of the League. Take your things and leave immediately.”

“Expel until you’re blue in the face, Geoff. I’m not leaving the cave.”

He sighed and turned to Snell. “I’m afraid you’ll have to go instead, Horace.”

“Me?” It was almost a yelp.

“Well, I certainly can’t go. As League coordinator for the entire Hastings area I’m far too important to the Cause to be put at risk.”

Snell obviously wanted to discuss this further. Indeed he looked as if he would like to have discussed it at great length, but instead he reluctantly got to his feet, picked up one of the remaining candle stubs, and made his way slowly out of the cave. “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he told them, hopefully.

He was some way from the entrance to the caves when the candle went out. He couldn’t see a thing but he was confident he knew where he was. Just before the light had gone he’d seen the big fissure where the tiny ends of beech tree roots had found their way some sixty feet underground.

He walked on, hand brushing lightly against the slightly crumbly cave wall. Suddenly something touched his face — something wet and cold. Slimy. He reached up to brush it away.

The next thing he knew his wrist had been seized in some kind of loop that tightened painfully and, at the same time, started to pull his hand up toward the ceiling.

With a panicky yell he grabbed at the thing with his other hand with the aim of wrenching himself free. He found himself holding something the thickness of a strand of macaroni. A snake, he wondered as he pulled on it as hard as he could. But whatever it was didn’t give way. Instead he continued to be hauled inexorably upward.

He screamed as he felt another loop tighten around the bicep of his other arm. A third loop snaked around his right forearm.

Screaming and kicking, he was pulled upward until he could no longer touch the ground with his feet.

He screamed even louder as something sharp began to bore itself into the side of his stomach. After that came an explosion of intolerable agony.

A short time later he was dead.

In the bottom cave Geoff and Sheena heard his screams. When they’d started Geoff had looked fearfully at Sheena and said, “Jesus, Sheen, you’d better go see what’s happening.

“Me. No way. You go. You’re the man.”

“That’s a pretty reactionary, not to mention sexist, thing to say!”

She simply shrugged.

The screams changed pitch. It no longer sounded like Horace, but some animal being burnt alive.

“Look, how about we both go?” cried Geoff, his eyes bulging with alarm.

She thought it over and nodded. “But only if you take the lead,” she said firmly.

The screaming had ceased by the time they started to move. They progressed warily through the series of caves, Geoff stopping several times when his flickering candle produced menacing, shadowy shapes ahead of them. He was holding the nearest thing to a weapon they had — a small axe. Sheena stayed well behind him despite his requests for her to close the gap between them.

Finally they reached Horace.