Steady Ground | ✔

4 | A warm hug

Atlas marveled at how the groundwater dripped despite it being below freezing outside. Actually, he almost felt like removing his jacket. If he looked around the rocks, he could see the moisture slowly evaporating, only to condense and fall back down as a gentle mist.

Was it even safe to be walking down here? And why did the crevice have a near smooth floor that led deeper into the rocks like a small maintenance tunnel?

The snow that had fallen already began to slowly melt, turning into a slippery slush. It forced Atlas to grasp the walls as he followed in Ashe's footsteps.

"This is weird," he said aloud, hoping to capture her attention. "How about we go back up and show this to the others?" And let them take care of it, he thought, but didn't say aloud.

"Sure," she said. Yet, she continued to walk forward, looking more than comfortable to walk along evaporating slush.

The mist swirled out of her way as she continued forward. It was cool on the skin, contrasting the strange warmth that only seemed to increase as they continued down the hundred meters of broken earth.

Eventually it came to a halt, and at the end of the expanse was a wall of stone that seemed to glisten like the sun shone upon its surface. But the sun wasn't shining that day.

Ashe was in front, so he couldn't step around her to look at it, so he remained close behind. "Is it crystal?" he asked. It was like his words were forced into a whisper, like each syllable was slowly drawn out of him. The air that returned into his lungs tasted sweet and he couldn't help but be caught by the beauty of the shimmering rock. It reflected light like an oil slick, changing color when he tilted his head one way to the next. "Or metal?"

"I don't know," Ashe said, her voice sounding the same.

She pressed her finger tips onto the surface, and the wall rippled like she just dipped her hand in water. When she pulled them back they were normal, not even a drop of moisture on her skin.

Atlas stared in curiosity.

"Let's go back and tell Aronne," he said. Yet there was a strange reluctance deep in his heart. His words came out just as reluctant as he felt, and when Ashe hummed in agreement, neither of them could get themselves to move.

It was like his legs were morphing into the stone below him. He felt heavy. The heat closed in around him like a warm hug.

He reached out around Ashe, and laid a hand on the slick. There wasn't rock there. What he touched only seemed to want him to come closer, like it was heaven itself taking a grasp of his hand and pulling him toward it. He could almost smell his mother's sandalwood essence which she burned in the winter to remind herself of her summer hikes before her health went sour. And he could hear her laugh, loud and contagious.

What... was this?

"What are you two doing?"

Aronne's voice snapped through the crevice like a pin through a balloon. 

The image of his mother vanished from his mind, and when he looked back at his fingers, they were only touching normal, gray rock. He was pressed beside Ashe's shoulder, nearly standing on top of her.

He backpedaled, giving Ashe her personal space. "I'm so sorry," he said. "I—"

"It's okay." She rubbed her arm and exhaled.

Atlas peered up. Aronne kneeled at the edge, eyes narrowed as he scrutinized them from above. Only his head showed, as he stayed far enough away just in case it started crumbling down with vibrations of an aftershock, which still had the potential to happen.