Chapter 9 - No Turning Back While looking at the globe, he slowly came to him. He couldn't swim across the oceans, but that wasn't the shortest way to China anyway. The fastest way to China would be straight down. He could DIG to China! Besides he had heard that the earth was hollow. All he had to do was find the right cave, or maybe dig for a little while to get inside the world. From there, surely he could find his way to China! The more he though about it, the more perfect it sounded. The next morning he smuggled himself back to shore on one of the long boats. He spent most of the next couple of days searching for a cave. The best he found though was a dry sinkhole. Time to fall back to plan B he thought. Tomorrow he decided to start digging. That night he returned to the human fort. He saw that the two ships had departed for Spain that day, so he knew that he was now trapped on this island for a long time. The following morning Christofert returned to the deepest sinkhole that he had found. He went to the center and began digging down at a steep angle. At first he was digging through old moldy leaves and mosses. Eventually he reached a layer of sandy rubble. While he was moving a larger piece of rubble, the sand at his paws began to sink. He started to back up and WHOOSH, the rock he was moving disappeared. A small hole appeared in its place. Quickly the sand and rubble around his paws started flowing into that black hole. He desperately scrambled backwards, but it was useless and he slid downward with all of the debris. He found himself in complete blackness sliding downward, when suddenly the ground disappeared from below his paws and he was falling. It wasn't much of a drop, but when none of your senses are working, any fall seems to take forever. With a thud he landed on a pile of sand and rocks and slid downward a few ferret lengths before coming to a stop. He lay perfectly still. He didn't seem to be injured, although his delicate nose had received quite a bump. The only sound he could hear was that of sand and pebbles hitting the pile above him. He could see nothing except a small dim light from the tunnel above. He tried to judge the distance, but it seemed like it was as high as the masts on the Pinta. There was no way he was going to get back up to the tunnel. He was trapped, and couldn't see a thing. Christofert was on the verge of panicking. (to be continued) Bryan P. Coffey - Boston, MA Weasel Warriors - Albi, Esef, Merri, and Mint http://www.gis.net/~bpcoffey/furball.html [Posted in FML issue 2825]