The mine had darkened, as the majestic sun concluded its journey across the blue sky, and descended into the horizon beyond. The walls and other paraphernalia in the mine cast ominous shadows on the rocky ground, meticulously covered with well-laid mine tracks. This scary location taunted the bravest of men to venture into its depths to find the hidden treasure of the legendary pirates of the high sea. However, the darkness was not the only thing that haunted this eerie place. The location was also fraught with untold dangers, which only the most skilled of men could bypass. And I was one of them.
The morning was cheerful; the silence of the previous night was instantaneously broken by the sing-song voices of the numerous birds that had made this countryside their home. I was so focused on the day’s task, that my regular morning routine flashed by before I even acknowledged it. I had carried with me a length of rope, a flashlight, a pen knife and a ruler as I set out on my journey to the fabled mine. The mine had been inconspicuously located just inside the jungle that surrounded the area. The path to it was simple enough to follow. But the real dangers began inside.
Upon arriving at the location, I immediately tied the rope to a rock, which would anchor my weight as I descended into the darkness of the mine. After just a few minutes of rappelling down the mine, I was enveloped by a shroud of darkness. Luckily, I had switched on my torch before entering, and was holding it between my teeth as I continued to descend. After about thirty minutes of climbing, my feet finally found solid ground again. “Now my adventure begins.” I said to myself.
After an hour of walking, I began to hear faint whispers. “Just my imagination” I thought, “Just my imagination.” As time went on, the whispers gradually became louder. “Great” I thought, “I’m losing my mind already.” I had heard from friends that people who entered this mine tended to lose their heads after some time. I was at my wit’s end. Soon, I started to hear slithers and scratches of various insects. I stopped. “These sounds are not familiar to me.” I thought. I shone my flashlight in the direction the sound seemed to be coming from. Suddenly, a small snake moved behind me. As it moved its scaly body over my feet, I was careful not to move an inch, lest I aggravate it. As soon as it passed, I continued onwards.
As I moved deeper into the mine, the whispers had become so loud that I could now easily discern what they were speaking of. Stories of adventure, murder, backstabbing among many others floated through the air. “A pirate’s life truly is one of the hardest.” I said to myself. The deeper I went, the darker the mine became, and harder it was for my flash light to cut through the darkness. Finally I came into a clearing, and what I saw left me seeing stars.
When I finally came to, I found that I had been tied to a chair, a wooden one by the feel of it. Here I was, in the deepest depths of a legendary mine, in the midst of the capital of the underground black market! When I had come into the clearing, the first things that I had laid my eyes on, before getting struck, was the logo of the notorious black market, which was a snake biting its own tail, its body convoluted in the shape of infinity:
“Wow,” I thought, “I came here searching for treasure and found myself here. The headquarters of the black market of all places!” As I gathered my bearings, I took in the various sights that surrounded me. I was apparently in a small makeshift room. Simply by looking at them, the walls seemed to be made of plaster, suggesting poor construction. There was a medium sized wooden door in front of me. And at that very moment, the door opened, and my captors walked in.
“Well, well, well…” One of them said. “What do we have here?” The man was well-built, had a wide chest that expanded and contracted with every breath. He had bushy eyebrows that showed his jet black eyes. He had a long scar that ran from the bottom of his ear to the side of his lips. His hair was a striking blond, but on the whole, he seemed to be a man who could do damage. The other man, was small and lean. He had thin eyebrows, and big brown eyes. He had black hair, with streaks of deep blue in them. In the shadow of the bigger man, he seemed to be smaller, but much cleverer. From the looks of it he was the brains behind the operation.
“Who are you ?” I demanded, “What do you want from me?” “Oh, we don’t want anything. We want to know what you are doing here!” the bigger man said. “Oh. Well that’s easy. I am searching for the pirate’s treasure.” I said, exhaling a deep breath that I had no idea I was holding. “Gah!” screamed the man, “That’s what they all say!” “Pirate’s treasure blah blah blah… Lots of money blah blah blah… Have you seen it blah blah blah… blah blah blah!” “Wow, you have some anger management issues.” I said to him. “That’s what they all say.” muttered the man quietly to himself.
“Well can I go now?” I asked. “Nah, the only thing leaving here will be your corpse!” exclaimed the man. “Oh, stop being so dramatic!” squeaked the smaller man. He had a small nasal voice, which gave one the impression of a mouse. “We are letting you go, all right. But we need to extract a promise from you first.” “How now?” I said. “A promise. One that we are sure that you will never break.” he said. I was reaching the limit of my patience. “A promise of what?” I said, composing myself. “A promise that you will never reveal what you saw down here. You will say that you couldn’t find the ‘treasure’ and gave up.” “Well that’s simple. I promise” I said. “Not so easy!” exclaimed the man angrily. “If you do not keep this promise, we will hunt you down. And when we do, we will kill you. But not fast. Slowly, so slow, that you will be able to feel every last breath leave your body.” said the man in a sinister voice. “I… promise…” I stammered.
“That’s more like it!” exclaimed the other man joyously. “Now you are free to go.” I slowly walked out of the room. As I left, I took one last glance behind me, marking the location of the room by dropping my ruler on the spot, before bolting away. My acting skills had been up to the mark. “Wow,” I said to myself, “those guys are really stupid.” I had already made up my mind to inform the police as soon as I left the mine. After another two hours of walking, I pulled myself out of the mine.
“The pirate’s treasure” I thought, “does not exist.” “Time to destroy this elaborate hoax once and for all!” I said to myself as I made my way to the local police station. Upon reaching the station, I demanded that I meet the senior constable at once.
“What!” exclaimed the officer, “You found the headquarters of the black market!” “Yes,” I said, after repeating the story five whole times to the man. “It was clearly depicted with the symbol of the infinity snake.” “Well then, what are we waiting for?” screamed the man, “Let’s go there at once!”
I descended back into the mine, but this time I was not alone. I was accompanied by the senior constable and thirty more police officers. We retraced my long path through the dark depths of the mine before coming back to the clearing. And once there, bam! The same thing happened! But this time not only to me, but to all the police officers.
“Thought you got rid of us so easily, did you?” said the big man. “And lookie here, you got Charlie along too.” Charlie was the name of the senior constable. “You know these guys?” I said the Charlie. “Everyone knows Bruno and Tim, the most notorious of all criminals.” muttered Charlie. “Well, we figured that you would bring some of your friends, so we brought a few of ours.” said the big man, Bruno, motioning to the thirty or so men hiding in the shadows of the room. By now, I had realized that the policemen and I were not actually bound and were free to move. They had actually forgotten to bind us! “Well, you didn’t count on us having BACKUP!” I screamed.
In that moment of confusion, as a single entity, all the police officers and I each attacked the criminal beside us. I clipped Tim in the jaw and landed a kick in his groin. As he lay groaning on the floor, I saw Charlie pummel Bruno in the stomach with his huge fists. In under a minute, all the criminals were bound with the same rope that they were meant to tie us with.
The police officers dragged the criminals out of the mine after about five hours of constant dragging, shouting and cursing. The part where we had to pull the men out of the mine was especially difficult but we managed to tie them one after the other to the rope, and hauled each of them out of the mine. That last part itself took about two whole hours. But eventually, the police managed to get them all out, and in a matter of minutes all of them were tied together in the back of a police jeep and we were heading towards the station.
“Thank you so so much.” said Charlie, for the nth time, after getting all the criminals into their respective cells. I simply shook my head and headed back home.
The mine had darkened, as the majestic sun concluded its journey across the blue sky, and descended into the horizon beyond. The walls and other paraphernalia in the mine cast ominous shadows on the rocky ground, meticulously covered with well-laid mine tracks. This scary location taunted the bravest of men to venture into its depths to find the hidden treasure of the legendary pirates of the high sea. However, this legend has been forgotten, and the cave is now a famous tourist spot. The various species of animals discovered here were so rare, that there were talks of the whole forest, the cave included. becoming a wildlife sanctuary. This was to ensure that these rare ‘cave’ species would be allowed to live without getting extinct anytime in the near future. Charlie managed to procure a nice house located on the beach just five minutes form my old house. He found this as a way of repaying me for my heroic deed. Well, this place has changed forever, and all because of a cave.
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