DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE
A Sexual Adventure in a Fantasy World
Chapter V -- Another Place?
Scarlet watched with envy as Alan stood at the edge of the shaft attached to the long rope. Calling the hole a shaft was definitely an understatement; it was a massive vertical cavern, and she hoped to be first down. She argued that if Alan reached the end of the 150-meter rope before he found the bottom, he would need to ascend back up. He hadn't argued that it would be easier for her to climb back up but simply trumped her by pointing out that she had discovered the new cavern. As he was the head of the expedition, she should let him find the bottom of the Dragon Pit.
Alan hesitated on the rim of the shaft. He was about to drop into the unknown. There was something unusual about this hole. Rationally, it was just another section of the cave, but something felt off--mysterious. He wasn't sure. Foreboding? Maybe. Maybe it was just the talk of Dragons. He dropped over the rim into the abyss. There was rock to repel off of for about sixteen descending bounds, and then he found himself hanging free in the thick humid air as the cavern expanded. They had selected a dry place to descend, but there was so much moisture in the air that drips still found him. He descended another thirty feet, then stopped. As he spun around, dangling on the rope, his light disappeared into the inky darkness. There was nothing to see but glimpses of the spectral cavern wall. Shining the light upward, he saw the overhang he had dropped off of and the light coming from the team above; that was all. He considered ascending the rope because the may have been no bottom, but there was no such thing as a bottomless pit--was there? That thought passed: if the bottom was there, he needed to find it. He looked up and shouted, "I'm hanging free. This hole is even bigger than it looks from up there."
"Be careful," he heard.
"You put a knot in the rope, didn't you," said a second male voice. It had happened--rappelling off the end of the rope, but this was attended as a joke. There was a big stop that he could not slide past. He hoped. The descent down the rope was slower than usual as he considered the enormity of the place.
For the crew above, it seemed like a long time before he radioed up the shaft. He said there was rope to spare, but not much, perhaps twelve feet...fricking remarkable. Marcus asked him what it was like, and he only replied that it would be worth the climb back up. The only other thing he was firm about was that they should pull the hoisting gear through the small passage just in case.
Nicolet knew what that meant: in case she or Sean was too weak for the climb out. At least she was not uninvited from seeing the bottom after squeezing through the crack. She looked at Sean, wondering if, at some point, he would chicken out. He had shown more courage than she expected, but she still thought he was more bluster than substance. She asked herself, 'Are you still sour from the other night, Nicky? Maybe his bravery was because of you. Would his out be to gallantly volunteer to stay with his scared girlfriend if she balked? Well, if that's it, he's going to be in this to the end.'
Scarlet had not been the second down but the last. She began to look around as her feet hit the ground amongst the other wandering headlamps. As soon as she was off the rope, Alan moved them into an adjoining cavern to dry off. The diffuse moisture coming down the shaft somehow soaked them through on their descent.
"Now that we are here, what do you think?" Alan asked no one in particular.
"This is fucking amazing, Alan," said Marcus. "We have discovered something truly remarkable. It's hard to believe, but the dripstone here looks to be even more impressive than above. It seems alive."
"In a sense, it is. At this depth, with all this water, these features are actively growing. Not like up in the drier portions."
"Did you get a good look at those huge rippling drapes hanging from the roof," said Scarlet.
"There must be a set of parallel fractures that focus the water like that," added Alan. "I think we are in the land of giants, and there looks to be a lot more beyond the range of our headlamps."
"Still, this is a place of dragons, Dominic?" asked Nicolet.
"If I was one, this is where I'd be. You could fit a mighty big dragon in here."
"What does that look like?" Sean asked. shining his headlamp on a nearby column with distinct layering.
"It looks like a version of the Tower of Pisa, a non-leaning version," said Nicolet.
"I looked around some while you guys were prepping to come down. It's quite wet in here. All the water flows toward the south, which is in that direction. The passages in the north, west, and east quadrants don't appear to go very far, but we need to check them all. There are a lot of nooks and crannies, and I can't believe there isn't a massive cave network at this level. I feel it. Regardless, the alcoves I've seen have remarkably beautiful dripstone. Amazing, actually. I think we should call this level Wonderland, and this spot will be Home Base. It's the driest flat place I found in my brief recon."
"The name fits. This is a heck of a rabbit hole," said Jackie, having not spoken for a while, clearly awe-struck.
"So, where does the water go?" asked Scarlet.
"Is there another shaft?" asked Sean, his voice not hiding that he hoped not.
"There is more exploring to do tomorrow, but it feels like we have descended to the depth of the water table. It looks like there might be a lake off in that direction. My light seemed to have reflected off something, but getting there didn't look straightforward. I had to find my way back here, so I didn't venture too far in that direction."
"You think the lake is isolated and perched, or does it connect to something?" asked Marcus.
"I don't know," said Alan, "but I suspect it's not perched. There is a lot of water at this level. We might find ourselves hemmed in by pools and lakes, but there is plenty of cave to explore above water."
"Let's go look for this lake," said Scarlet.
"I'll second that," said Nicolet, fascinated by the thought of an underground lake.
"Hold on, guys. Have any of you looked at your watches? It is after 8 p.m. Let's haul the gear over, establish camp, and have something to eat. We can explore and map tomorrow. Even if we don't find a major cave system branching away from here, just mapping these alcoves will be incredibly fascinating."
"It's feeling a bit tropical down here," observed Sean, "humid and warm."
"Dragon's breath," said Dominic.
"Sean's right," said Scarlet. "It's warmed up a bit more than you would expect from just the geothermal gradient. Some of the inflowing water may be hot. Hope you guys don't mind if I sleep naked."
Nicolet chuckled but then realized that maybe Scarlet was not kidding. It was uncomfortably warm for what she was wearing, especially for sleeping. This was something she had not expected in a cave. Everyone she had been in so far had been comfortably cool.
<<<< -- >>>>
The realization that it was well into the evening caused Scarlet and everyone else to notice their hunger. They quickly, very business-like, set up camp on a rise a couple of feet above the cavern floor. There was a quick freeze-dried meal, and people were coming down from the excitement and settling in. Scarlet was not coming down. She was aroused by the day's excitement and asked Alan, "Can you show me some of the dripstone in these alcoves before we settle in?"
He was tired but immediately became attentive, knowing what she was after. He had just the spot, far enough back with dripping water to muffle any sounds they might make.
"Yeah. Let's go explore for a bit before knocking off. We won't go far, guys." 'Almost' everyone knew what they were really up to; it wasn't looking at dripstone.
They walked back into a reasonably dry alcove off the main axis of the cavern they had settled in; there were several of these clustered on their side of the cavern. Many branched with short offshoots. The one they picked went back about a hundred feet amongst towering dripstone columns and stalagmites before it became too tight for their needs. They could only faintly hear the conversation of the others over the dripping water, so if they were reasonably quiet, no one would be the wiser. They took their helmets and headlamps off and set them on a flowstone-covered limestone block that looked like a giant loaf of iced pound cake. They left Alan's light on low so they didn't get disoriented and lose anything. The excitement of addressing their mutual need was amplified by doing it more than a couple thousand feet underground in a new cave with five other people nearby.
First, Alan said, "I've had an odd feeling since we entered this cave. I feel like we are being watched, and it's grown stronger as we've descended."
"Okay, that's impossible, right?"
"Yeah, of course. Something just feels odd, I guess, and I'm not sure exactly what feels off."
"Well, if someone is watching, let's give them a show."
There was no more talk; they both knew exactly what they needed. It was hard to know who was the horniest, but Alan had the upper hand. He had Scarlet pinned against a phallic-looking stalagmite about twice his height.
They kissed passionately for only a few seconds before he kissed down her jawline to her neck, working his way to her collarbone. When her muddy shirt got in the way. He pulled it up over her head and then roughly pulled off her sports bra with her eager help. Mud had worked its way under her bra.
"We need to give each other a sponge bath," he said.
"Yeah, okay. Not now, though. It clean mud."
"Agreed." He ignored the cave mud. It was nothing new after the slither through Pancake Passage--the name had stuck. He grabbed her nipples between his fingers while he kissed her deeply. Pushing him back, she gave him a look that revealed precisely what was on her mind, a look that any man could interpret as I want it--badly. He wasn't sure how her eyes so expressly said that, but there was no mistaking the longing there, which matched his. She moved a few feet over to the iced limestone block, pulling him along by the hand, sat down, and pushed him down to his knees in front of her. The height was just right for him to stretch up and kiss her breast, working first on her right nipple. He ran his tongue around for about five circles, and then putting her stiff knob between his lips, he sucked it in and out. This got her gasping. If she was very horny, her nipples were an extremely erogenous spot, and this alone could bring her close to an orgasm. Once this started, she was putty in his hands. He undid her pants, and she lifted her butt to let him slide them down to her ankles. Their foreplay moved along more quickly than usual, but it was an unusual circumstance. He, however, was not going to pass up eating her pussy-- even in the dim light, her now visibly damp pussy. This was one of her very favorite parts of foreplay, and he was not going to skip it. She would pay him back; they both loved oral sex and frequently just had long sessions of licking and sucking until they were exhausted. But when she was as excited as she was at that moment, nothing but a good fuck would be enough. He placed his face between her open legs, licking along the folds of her vulva.
She was glad he was not skipping his usual routine; she liked how he ate her pussy. He was running his tongue along her pussy lips and in and out of her hole, spreading the wetness up to her clit, but not quite touching her love button. When she had enough of the teasing, she grabbed his head and directed his tongue to her clit. He went to work, sending a tingling jolt of pleasure through her body. First, he circled the sensitive knob with the tip of his tongue. When he began to flick it, she felt an orgasm building right away, and when he pressed down with more pressure, she was fast approaching a reprieve from months of sexual frustration. But he backed off a little when she was panting hard and puffing. He made gentle circles around her clit and then pressed hard down as he licked from her cunt to her anus and then back up. When her breathing slowed, he started the hard, fast licking again, and once again, she was close to orgasm. This was a game they played. Now she wanted to cum, but she wanted to cum with him--with him inside her. She wanted them to cum together, which meant she needed to go to work on him.
She pushed his head back and pulled it up, making it clear that she wanted him to stand. She quickly undid his pants and reached in and grabbed his cock, which was rock hard and caught in the gap of his underwear. She corrected that condition and began stroking it in her hand, admiring his stiffness and swollen head in the faint headlamp light. It seemed extraordinarily hard, and she couldn't wait another second before taking it into her mouth. She wrapped her lips around it and started to take it deeper into her mouth. Then they heard voices in the cavern very near their nook.
"Shit. It sounds like Sean and Nicolet," Alan said in his quietest whisper.
"Think they will go away?"
"It sounds like they're exploring the alcoves. Who in the hell let them do that?"
