THE CAVE MONSTER
The airport was particularly busy today, of all days. Emma stared at the floor at the departure lounge, it felt like she had been there forever, she glanced at her watch, it said 10pm, she was supposed to be there 2 hours ago.
There, was Scotland, east Scotland University; her sister is studying natural history, good for her, Emma couldn’t think of anywhere more bleak to study natural history, why couldn’t she be closer to civilisation?.
Jean, Emma’s sister had written to her a number of times inviting her up there to sea the landscape she had described as beautiful and untouched by human hands, or at least most of it was.
Emma got on the plane when it finally arrived and just stared out of the window wondering if the landscape was going to be how she imagined, beautiful but stark.
After 2 hours flying Emma finally got there to be greeted by Jean, they caught a taxi and went to Jeans hall of residence to get some sleep, it was 12.30 by the time Emma slept on nice crisp sheets, and closed her eyes to sleep.
The next day Jean had classes for the majority of the day so she told Emma where to go and see a local beauty spot.
When Emma got there it was more than how she imagined and looked in awe at the gleaning sea and crashing waves on the sandy beach, the blue sky , beautiful enormous limestone cliffs and the seagulls were screeching, nothings perfect. looking. Looking down from where she was standing she could see People in boats in the distance on the waves, it was beautiful and serene. She climbed down the craggy path in the limestone cliff to the beach below where she skimmed stones for awhile on the crystal clear waters, after awhile Emma became bored so she started to walk along the beach,she found some rock pools and started to heave big rocks to see if there was anything interesting underneath, it was disappointing there wasn’t much to look at. Then looking around she noticed caves in the cliff faces, she counted 4 of them, before deciding to explore, she felt very adventurous, thinking Lara croft or Indiana Jones, more Lara croft she hoped, although she wished she had a body like that.
Emma started walking into one of the bigger caves watching where she was treading and holding onto the caves walls for support on the jiggered rocky surface, as she walked further and further in to the cave. This place was like a labyrinth, every way she turned looked the same. It felt like she had been going for miles. She thought she could see things moving in the shadows, and hearing far off noises that made her feel sick to her stomach. She turned another corner and she lost her footing, with one almighty crash she feel into a deep pit in complete darkness and past out. When she awoke she could feel what felt like bones beneath her, all slimy and wet smooth and yet splintered ends. She imagined she had fallen on top of a load of chicken carcasses, except it was much worse, Emma had a LED torch attached to her keys so she shone it on the floor, then wished she hadn’t, the whole floor was covered in bones, mostly human by the size of them, she retched a bit then composed herself. Shining the light above her she could see a way back up to the tunnels, she carefully climbed up, trying not to slip, she didn’t fancy joining the skeletons below her. She got back to the cave of tunnels and tried turning around and going back out the way she came, but it was hopeless, it all looked the same, until she found an opening a huge cave where sunlight was pouring through, she immediately went to stand in the light and bask in the warm sunlight when she heard something, something close, she tried no to turn around but she couldn’t resist. Standing to the entrance to the cave was a monster, it was at least 7 foot tall, covered in hair with two horns on it’s head, one was broken, it had an angry looking face, big teeth and big blue eyes, if it wasn’t so terrifying it could be rather cute, it was the eyes, they seemed almost human.
Emma didn’t stick around to find out whether it was harmful or not, she just climbed through the hole in the cave wall where the sun was coming from and legged it back to the top of the cliff.
From there she took some gulps of blustery wind and let it blow through her hair and clothes to try and get the stench of death beasts out of her. After some deep breaths she walked calmly back to her sisters dorm, where she eating her later than usual lunch.
‘ Hey, you’ve been gone for hours , been having fun?’
‘Not quite, the scenery is lush, but the contents of those caves down by the beach have a lot to be desired’
‘ Oh, I should have warned you about them, there are local superstitions about those caves, some say that there is a group of Minotaur living down there, apparently the Greeks were trying to get rid of them back in the day and the ship crashed on the rocks next to that cliff, some locals have gone down there over the years to prove or disprove it but none of them have come back, they say originally only one Minotaur was on that ship that crashed, don’t worry it’s just myth’
‘That’s a creepy tale, who would believe it?’
‘Exactly, now, would you like some food’
Emma was glad to be amongst friends in the bustling canteen and eating chips, but she couldn’t help wondering whose big blue eyes she looked into in that cave, or who it used to be.