Undesirable

Chapter 33

No matter how tired our legs get, or our muscles are willing us to stop, we keep on running as fast as we can. Kanan may be arrogant, but he is not stupid. He will cross that walkway, just like we did, and when he does, he will come after us. We have to keep going.

The next opening we come across is a huge empty space. Nothing is it in. There are no holes on the walls for arrows to shoot out of, no tiles on the floor to set off traps, nor axes swinging from the ceiling. It's completely empty. Only black iridescent rock forming the walls and floor. The silence is deafening. I want to say it's trap-free, but everything we have been through since entering the tunnels suggests otherwise.

"Do you know what it is?" I question Cesare. Judging by the puzzled expression on his face, he doesn't.

"Whatever it is, it's well hidden," He replies, not filling me with the confidence I desire. "We need to throw something into the centre of the room and see if it sets anything off."

"How about a rock?" I ask. There are literally thousands of them lying about on the floor, we can use one of them.

I bend down to pick one up when Cesare screams to stop me.

"No! Don't touch a thing!" He yells, freezing me to the spot. "We don't know what the trap is, it could be anything." Death by touching a seemingly innocent rock would be a clever idea, but an entirely empty room is a bit too extravagant to hold them in.

"Well, what do you suggest?" I ask. There is nothing else for us to use, we brought nothing with us, and with each second that passes Kanan draws nearer. We are handing him an advantage.

"Pick it up with this, at least," Cesare says, taking off his cloak and handing it over to me. I wrap it around my hand and pick up one of the rocks, before throwing it into the centre of the room.

It bounces a few times, before sliding across the shimming black surface and stopping dead in the centre. Nothing happens. The rock just sits there as we both stare at it, waiting for a possible trap door to open, a tidal wave to appear out of nowhere, or hundreds of swords to be shot across the room. But there is nothing.

"Maybe they forgot about this room," I suggest, clinging to the hope that it is true. We can't stand here all day waiting for something that might not happen, not with Kanan chasing after us. We will just have to take a chance, charge across it, and hope we make it in one piece.

"There has to be something," Cesare insists, fidgeting in his stance. "They wouldn't just leave this room empty..."

As if on cue, sheets of rain come hurtling from the ceiling, hitting hard on the floor and spraying out in every direction. We both jump back from the fright. I dig my palms into the side of my head, the droplets are so loud that I can barely hear myself think. It sounds more like a waterfall hitting the ground than rain.

After a few minutes, the rain stops, and the room falls deadly silent once again.

"That's it?" I ask, still unsure what the trap actually is. If we ran across with the droplets hitting us, it would equate to the same pain as being pelted by rocks, but it wouldn't be strong enough to kill us.

"No, look at the rock you threw," Cesare points out. I search for the rock in the centre of the room and see that it's foaming, melting before our very eyes. "It's acid rain."

So, running across would kill us then. Looks, like we are going to need a plan B.

"What do we do now?" I question.

"It looks like the rain comes down in sections," He replies. Taking the cloak out of my hand, he picks up another rock to throw. It lands near mine and the rain starts again. "Look, there is a sequence. There is always a space free from the rain."