Shaqq-ud-Diba

Pat winced as the aged and brittle bones of small animals snapped beneath his boots. From where he stood three tunnels burrowed their way into the darkness. For half an hour he and Thunderbolt had searched for Johnson’s body. So far it had been dragged into the Shithole and through several tunnels... but here the drag marks had stopped with no body at the end of them, which made for troubling implications. As far as Pat knew, the Shithole had been abandoned since the town was buried in a landslide. The army wouldn’t have even known there were tunnels left over if a few of the latrines hadn’t collapsed into them, hence naming it the “Shithole.”      
Pat crouched down and shined his flashlight in each tunnel. In the last a pair of eyes low to the ground reflected back at him. Pat stared at them, unsure if they were stalking closer when a crunch from behind caused him to glance back. Thunderbolt had joined him. Focusing back on the tunnel the eyes had disappeared. Pat pointed down the tunnel and gestured for Thunderbolt to take point.
Thunderbolt grumbled. “Why we gotta be down here, Takahashi? We need a dog catcher to hunt a sick dog, not soldiers. This is bullshit.”
Pat spoke back softly. “Three of our boys’ bodies have disappeared, and this is the first time we’ve had witnesses. Johnson wouldn’t have even got dead to get stolen if we had seen that dick with the assault rifle. So I volunteered us.”
“I mean 'why we' as in 'why am I' included in this roundup? I don’t want to get rabies.” Pat ignored Thunderbolt’s complaining and followed him into the next room. A mostly eaten dog corpse stank in the corner. Even more tunnels spread in every direction.
Thunderbolt shined his light into each of these tunnels, revealing nothing. “You think those kids lied to us about it being a dog? The body stopped being dragged a while ago, but we ain’t seen it yet.”
Pat stooped and checked the ground. “Nah, they’ve always been straight with us and the eyes I saw down thattaways definitely belonged to some big animal.”
After chewing it over a minute, Thunderbolt asked, “You think it might be a bear? They can carry shit.”
“No. No I do not.” Pat said without glancing back. “The older boy said it was a hyena, said it was like the ones his dad used to take care of. His brother asked all wide eyed if it might be a ghul. That’s when they all clammed up and wouldn’t open up even when you offered them your candy bar.”
Thunderbolt snorted. “What the hell is a gool?”
“Ghul.” Pat emphasized. “It’s a folklore thing. Like a boogeyman. Or a witch that turns into a hyena. They rob graves and shit. Like that Skin-walker story you told at the bonfire party last month.”
Thunderbolt paled. “Listen man, I ain’t superstitious like my grandma but the stories she told me about Skin-walkers were fucked up. They ain’t to be fucked with fiction or not. Bad things happen when you talk about them in the dark. I wouldn't of spoke a word about it if I wasn't drunk.”
“Right, nothing superstitious about you at all. Fact of the matter, It’s probably just some freak that lives down here with his dog. Maybe it even is a hyena. The important thing is that the guy probably doesn’t speak English, so let me talk to him before anything else.”
 “No promises. I doubt we can even find the guy in this maze. Which way do we even go?” Thunderbolt gestured to the various exits.
“Left. We stay consistent and we’ll be able to search most of this place without getting lost.” Pat marked the wall. “Though, this’ll help.”
Thunderbolt began leading the way to the tunnel when the sound of laughter pealed out from the rightmost one, almost making him jump out of his skin. “Or right, I guess.” Pat said flatly.
He walked to the mouth of the tunnel and yelled into it. “Hello? U.S. Military! A dog dragged a friend’s body down here and we have to get it back for a proper burial! Don’t worry if the dog damaged it, we won’t blame you!” He waited a minute for a reply, and with none coming, he signaled to for Thunderbolt to follow the tunnel.
Part of the way along both of their flashlights began to flicker and they paused until the light steadied.  They looked at each other and shrugged, then continued forward. A room emerged at the end of the tunnel and Thunderbolt rushed forward, stumbling over a bundle that lay in the doorway. Pat crouched down and inspected it closely. “It’s a kid’s skeleton.”
Thunderbolt stepped back over to the body and took a look. “Goddamn, Takahashi. This guy has to be fucked in the head. He let his dog crack open these bones for marrow.  We need to get Johnson out of here quick if we want there to be fuck all left.”
Pat stayed quiet and stepped over the bones. He gestured around the room. “That laughter could have just been a hyena, but there are blankets over in the corner, and cold ashes here. So for sure someone is living down here. Maybe just that kid or several people. No spoor from any dogs though.”
“So, do we go left then?” Thunderbolt moved the skeleton to the corner and placed the blankets over it.
“Like I said, consistent, we went right, so we’ll keep going right.” Then Pat whirled as footsteps ran off from the leftmost tunnel. “Take point, don’t get too far ahead of me. “
Both men chewed on their thoughts as they again followed hidden sounds deeper into the town turned catacomb.  Again their flashlights flickered. Again they paused until the lights stabilized. Then they moved ahead again before their flashlights went out entirely, plunging them into absolute darkness.
Pat froze and could hear Thunderbolt’s heavy breathing. “Grab your flare, T.” Thunderbolt scrabbled for the light and lit it, drenching the tunnel in a red. Not twenty feet ahead of them a dog... no woman crouched. She flinched at the burst of the flare and scrabbled into a hole in the wall. Thunderbolt rushed forward and Pat grabbed him by his belt.
“Don't take another step. There's a huge crack in the floor ahead of you. Step aside.”
“Thanks, man. I would've fell flat on my face tripping over that.”
Pat picked up a large piece of rubble to heave onto the tunnel floor ahead of them. Where it hit the floor spiderwebbed and began to fall away into darkness. Pat lit a flare of his own and dropped it down into the hole, just large enough for a person. The flare disappeared into the pit.
“Tripped nothing. You'd be dead.”
Thunderbolt looked queasy. “Where to now though? We can't use this tunnel.”
Pat grabbed a few more pieces of rubble and tossed them around the pit.
“Seems solid enough. But no point tempting fate. We'll find another way.”
Thunderbolt nodded eagerly.
The two walked back to the crude camp they had found, their flashlights flickering back on once they reached it. Pat pulled out his canteen, “We'll take a water break and I'll see if I can get a signal in here to let the brass know there's people down here.” Thunderbolt gulped at his drink, desperately replacing what he'd sweated out. “What the fuck was up with that chick? She looked like an animal. How long has she been down here? This is giving me the fuckin'... Pat?”
“What?”
“Where the fuck did those bones go?”
“What?”
“Those bones that were in the doorway. They ain't fuckin' there anymore.”
Pat put the useless radio down and walked over to the doorway. The bones of the kid were gone. A few pieces were left, but someone had bundled them all up and walked off with them. Thunderbolt nervously pulled out another smaller silver canteen and took a swig of that and passed it to Pat.
“I don't like this place. Bad things have happened here, and they're gonna keep happening if we stay.”
Pat took a drink and looked to Thunderbolt. “Maybe. But we're not leaving without that body.”
==The Two Kings and the Two Labyrinths==
Dead end after dead end greeted Pat and Thunderbolt as they searched for the body of their comrade. Even the way they had come had closed off, kilotons of sand blocking what was once a good sized hall. Soon they had one option left, the tunnel where their lights failed them, with the crack that led into depths they could not see.
On the return to that tunnel, their flashlights worked fine. Pat went first with Thunderbolt following. The edges around the crack proved far more solid than their fears. The tunnel broadened until they could no longer see walls. Gold glittered where there lights fell. The two had found themselves in a palace, long buried, even before the decrepit town they had worked their way through had been. Piles of gold and silver decorations, tapestries preserved by lack of moisture and insect life, and furniture covered in layers of dirt.
"Shit, Takahashi. This is big. Nobody has any fucking idea this is down here. Jesus man, we don't need no fucking E3 pay any more after this."
"Shut up."
"What? Man this-"
"Shh. We're being watched."
Pat lit another flare and tossed it ahead of him. Barely beyond its glow something other than gold glittered. Eyes, again. High up. A person, or a dog standing on something. Pat called out to it, and they pulled back into the deeper darkness.
"Just shoot it next time man." Thunderbolt complained. "I don't want my throat chewed out by some feral woman just when we've hit a huge jackpot."
Pat shrugged. "Maybe. But we can question a woman, we can't question a corpse." He walked over to his flare and picked it up, holding it well away from his face and tossing it further ahead. It bounced off a wall that Thunderbolt and Pat had not noticed by flashlight. The flare landed next to a door set into the wall.
Pat grabbed the flare again and entered the room, glad he had the foresight when his flashlight failed again. He quickly checked the corners as Thunderbolt followed him. A spartan room lay before them, not at all like the grand chamber of wealth they had passed. Large paved stones made up the floor and the ceiling was low and carved. On the other side lay a slumped form in the uniform of the U.S. army. Pat and Thunderbolt dashed forward, Pat freezing at the sounds of grinding stones. Paved stones lifted from the ground and clammy hands reached out and grabbed Thunderbolt, pulling him off of his feet and his lip splitting as his face hit the ground. They began to drag him under the stones.
Pat took his knife and severed a hand, the other releasing Thunderbolt and sliding back under the stone which settled back into being level. Thunderbolt was screaming until Pat clamped his mouth shut. Very carefully Pat laid his head on the stone to listen. Words whispered up to him in an old Arabic.
"Where is the other one? I can not hear his tread above us and I can not see in the light of their fire!"
"Who cares?! He took my hand! We will loosen every stone and bite at every beating heart within reach!"
"How? The light takes our eyes, he makes no sound, and he leaves no greasy stench like the other one. And if we were to have luck on our side and bite him? His skin would break our teeth. We must be more quick in grabbing the other one, then we let the creature of tin die of thirst."
Pat was confused. This whole situation was out of a horror movie. He attempted to lift the stone flag, but his fingers could find no purchase. He grabbed Thunderbolt and lifted him to his feet.
"Can you walk?"
"What's the point man? We're going to be eaten by skinwalkers. They live in the dark places of the world and we found them. We can't even go out the way we came."
"Keep talking like that and I'm going to leave you in the dark with no light. You're a soldier. Next time remember that you are trained in the gun and knife you have on you."
Thunderbolt looked down, ashamed. They hurried to the body at the end of the room. The stones behind them shifting with each step they took. The body lay face down, but it definitely looked like Johnson's kit. It was impossible to tell the hair color, except that it was dark, in the light of the flare.
Thunderbolt reached down and Pat knocked away his hands. "If you set off a fucking grenade your ass is grass." Thunderbolt grumbled, "Who'd have a grenade down here?" Pat looked at him askance. "Johnson for one."
The sound of laughter came from the entrance to the room. Pat looked back at the doorway and saw a low animal shape slinking out. He turned back to Thunderbolt. A man in Johnson's kit had Thunderbolt by the throat from behind. His face looked dessicated and his eyes were dilated to mere pricks. His eyes didn't focus on much of anything. Pat raised his gun, but not before the man opened his mouth and black sprayed out, into Pat's eyes, onto the flare, drenching everything in an acidic shadow.
==A King's Pride==
Pat rolled in the darkness in pain. A strong jaw clamped onto his arm and began to drag him. Several other mouths attempted to bite him and they yelped and ceased, but the jaw on his arm kept dragging him.
Eventually he stopped and a mocking voice spoke in his ear.
"I do not know if men of tin need drink or sustenance, but they do need light. We have stripped you of your torches. We cannot eat you, so we consign you into the darkness. If you find your way out, travel far and wide, warning fools to stay out of our home."
Then with a nudge, Pat began to fall. When he landed, he lost consciousness.
Two weeks later Pat emerged from one of the camp's lavatories. He was rushed to the medic and healed up in another two weeks. The brass had plenty of questions. At the end of one meeting the Army Corp of Engineers was sent for. Pat watched up on a hill as the dynamite was placed. The crater left after the demolitions and the excavations of the tunnels is called the Cleft of the Hyena by the locals, but no one has seen even a large dog there since the dynamite went off.
Category:Fiction