Chapter 9

There was a little awkwardness between the girls when they woke up in each other's arms. That mostly came from Sarah who had been the reluctant one and who now felt somewhat guilty that she had enjoyed herself so much while her twin was missing in the cold, wet night.

Hannah was so full of life and outgoing that the awkwardness didn't last beyond the first hug they shared however, and they both got up to discuss what they were going to do.

"I think we should go and check out the cliff where they would have climbed up to see if there's any sign of them," Sarah suggested, keen to be doing something to bring herself closer to her twin.

"Good idea," Hannah replied.

Elizabeth and Thomas were still cuddled together and they debated whether they should wake them or not.

"I think we'd better. It's important that they know where we've gone and anyway, we can't leave them sleeping - something could sneak up on them," Sarah said.

Hannah immediately had an image of David creeping up on the sleeping twins, while Sarah was more imagining a wild animal. Their separate images convinced them that they had to wake the others and Hannah crossed over to push Elizabeth with her foot.

"Wake up. Elizabeth, wake up."

Sarah blew on the embers of the fire and added some of the wood that they had gathered the day before. Elizabeth stirred and then sat up. She yawned and then looked at the other two girls.

"What's going on?" she asked sleepily.

"We're going out to see if can find any sign of Ben and Adam," Sarah told her. "We didn't want to leave you both asleep."

"Okay, I'm awake. Thanks for worrying about us."

Satisfied that she was now on the alert, Sarah and Hannah dashed out into trees. When they emerged from the trees, they found that it was still pouring rain and they headed in the direction of the cliffs. The deluge had them soaked within a few yards of being out in the open and they had to slow down, as the rain was so heavy it made it difficult to see where they were going.

Hannah seemed to think it was great and she laughed and skipped in the rain.

When they reached the point that they had all used before to climb up to the escarpment, they could see that the boys wouldn't have been able to use it. The saturation had caused huge chunks of the cliff to slip away and the 'easy' route they had used was no longer there.

"I wonder if they even managed to climb up?" Hannah questioned.

"They must have, otherwise they would have just come back to the shelter. No, I think this must have happened later. That's why they couldn't come back last night - they must be trying to find an alternative route down," said Sarah.

The possible explanation made both girls feel a little better, but there was nothing else they could do where they were.

"I'm going to follow the cliffs for a bit and try to find another way up and down," said Hannah, looking at Sarah as if to question whether she would join her.

Sarah nodded and the girls started walking along the foot of the cliff together. They chose to walk in the opposite direction to the one they had walked previously - possibly because their subconscious factored in that there was a waterfall in that direction and it was bound to be swollen with the rains.

Ben and Adam were cold and stiff when they awoke, but both of them put a brave face on things. They had killed five birds to provide the group with food - that was a success - and now they just needed to find a way to return to the shelter. Ben walked over to the edge of the cliff and peered down through the rain.

"It looks as if the cliff is gradually falling away. If we can't find a way down it will eventually run out anyway I think, " he said.

Adam joined him and could see the truth of Ben's words. The cliff was possibly only about two thirds of the distance above the plain below as it had been where they normally climbed up.

"Well at least we know it's got to come to an end at some point then. That's a relief," laughed Adam.

They swung the birds over their shoulders, holding them by their feet, and started out walking again. The boys took it in turns to walk to the edge to survey for a route down, but as the day wore on they had still not found a way.

The rain didn't seem to be about to let up any time soon and it dampened their spirits somewhat.

"We could be walking for days," Adam grumbled after several more hours of walking.

"I'm sure we'll find a way down soon," replied Ben.

It was his turn and he walked to the edge of the cliff. Adam watched in horror as the ground beneath Ben seemed to simply fall away and his friend vanished over the cliff-edge with a scream. He dropped his birds and fell to his hands and knees so that he could crawl forward.

Ben felt the ground beneath him begin to move and the next thing he knew he was falling rapidly downwards. The cliff at this point was mostly soil, not rock and the rain had made it extremely unstable. Ben's weight had been sufficient to cause a landslide and he was no plummeting towards the foot of the cliff with tons of mud and soil buffeting him on the way down.

When Adam was able to peer over the raw, newly formed edge to the escarpment, he blinked the rain from his eyes and tried to pinpoint Ben below. Panic set in as there was no sign of his friend, just a mass of mud.

"BEN!" he cried out.

There was no answer and he tried again several times.

"He's buried under the mud!" he thought to himself.

Adam's thinking narrowed and he was able to come up with a plan immediately. He was responding to danger by becoming more focused, clearer in what he had to do. He stood up and grabbed his dead birds before hurling them down onto the floor of the plains below. Without any hesitation he swung his legs over the edge and began to slide down the mud on his butt. His friend needed him!

Adam's momentum broke more soil free and belatedly he realised he was in danger of burying Ben in even more mud. There was nothing he could do about that now as he had committed himself, so he focused on trying to keep himself upright until he reached the bottom of the slide.

When he eventually came to a stop, he found that the mud made it difficult to stand up. It was pulling at him and panic once more threatened to overcome him.

"Stop it! Ben needs help!" he chided himself and tried to get up once more.

Trial and error showed him that it was better to try to move slowly and gradually rather then make sudden motions. First one arm and then the other emerged from the mud and he was able to sit up. Standing was even more difficult, but by maintaining his slow movements he was eventually able to get up on his feet. The heavy rain was making things worse, as more of the soil turned to mud beneath him. He knew it was a race against time, a race that he could only run at a snail's pace or he would be swallowed up!

The mud reached up to above his knees and Adam had a difficult job to move forward at all. There was a real concern that Ben had already been suffocated under the weight of the mud, so he tried to keep at it, making slow progress.

The sound of coughing and spluttering snapped his attention over to his right. With a huge feeling of relief, he saw something sticking up out of the mud near where the grass started at the foot of the slide.

"BEN! BEN! ARE YOU ALL RIGHT?"

More coughing followed and then Adam heard a groan. He was still labouring to take slow steps forward, one leg moving at a time through the cloying mud.

"Ben, don't panic and don't try to move too quickly! The only way to make any progress is to take it real slow."

"I'm stuck!" Ben croaked weakly.

Adam almost cheered out loud when he heard Ben speak those first words.

"Don't panic. I'm nearly out of the mud and then I'll be able to help you."

Ben could feel the mud trying to suck him back down, but Adam's warning managed to cut through his growing panic and he stopped flopping around. Immediately he felt the drag on him reduce and he knew his friend's advice was good. It took all of his courage to simply hold himself still while he waited for Adam to free himself and come to provide help. He was facing back up the slide and therefore wasn't able to see what progress Adam was making and that added to his fears.

It took another hour of painfully slow movement before Adam was able to collapse onto the soaking grass, with the rain beating down on him. He had to lie face down for a few minutes to try to catch his breath and to let his legs recover a little from the strain he had forced them through.

The feel of something running over his bare foot caused Adam to move. He looked down and saw that the mudslide was growing and moving towards him. That in turn meant that it would be stranding Ben even further away from safety and he had to try to do something about that before it was too late.

Staggering to his feet, Adam looked across at Ben and gulped. In the time it had taken to extract himself from the mud, Ben had sunk back down quite a way and there wasn't much of him left to see above the surface of the slide.

Adam hunted frantically for something that would help him extract his friend from the treacherous glabber. The closest trees were mostly softwood, but there were some small saplings dotted around. Dire need lent Adam the strength to bend a thin Ash tree until it snapped near the ground and he ran back to the slide with it.

"Ben, I'm going to try to pull you out. Whatever you do, don't struggle. That's only going to make you sink into the mud even faster," he warned.

While Adam had been looking for his 'tool', Ben had slipped noticeably deeper into the mud and he could only see his head and one hand. He steadied his breathing a little and then tried to manoeuvre the sapling into the visible hand. He managed it on his third attempt and breathed a sigh of relief.

"I've got it," croaked Ben.

Adam guessed the mud or the fall had damaged Ben's throat but he had to ignore that for now and pull as hard as he could.

It was a frustrating and frightening experience. With only one hand, a hand covered in mud at that, Ben frequently lost his grip on the sapling. Despite digging his heels into the wet grassland and leaning back with all his weight, Adam more often than not slipped onto his butt than actually succeed in pulling Ben from the gloop. He found there were tears in his eyes as he failed to make any headway at all and the last of his strength seemed to be waning. It was terrible looking across the short distance into Ben's panic stricken eyes and not being able to get him out.

"Aaaaiiieeeee!"

The sound of the scream made Adam jump and he slipped for about the fifth time. He turned to his left and saw Sarah and Hannah both screaming.

"Sarah! Hannah! Help me! Ben's stuck in the mud!" he shouted.

The sound of Adam's voice seemed to cut through the girls' screams and they calmed down. Their eyes swung to the mudslide and then back to Adam lying on the ground and they ran forward.

"We didn't recognise you, you're covered in mud. I thought you were some strange savage or something," Hannah explained.

"Where's Ben?" Sarah asked.

Adam pointed towards the mud and the girls turned to look. It took some moments before they realised the 'lump' close to the end of the sapling was actually Ben's mud covered head. When they did, Sarah let loose an agonising wail.

"BEEEENNNN!"

"I wasn't strong enough to pull him out by myself. Both of you need to help me," ordered Adam, getting to his feet once more.

All three of them grabbed hold of the sapling and began pulling with all their strength. For a long time it didn't appear they were making any headway and Ben lost his one-handed grip on the sapling several times. Sarah in particular was growing increasingly hysterical at the thought of losing her twin.

"This isn't working. We need to try something else!" Sarah screamed.

She dropped her hold on the sapling and ran to the nearest of the pine trees. Adam and Hannah watched as Sarah began to rip branches from the tree and then run to the edge of the slide. She threw the pine branches towards Ben and then ran back to collect more.

Adam caught on to what she was trying to do.

"Come on Hannah! She's trying to make a carpet of branches so Ben can pull himself onto it. The branches will help spread his weight and stop him from sinking back into the mud!"

With three of them working at it they soon had a thick carpet of pine branches immediately in front of Ben. When that was in place, they tried pulling on the sapling again and were overjoyed to see they had managed to gain a few inches. Ben's arm was now out of the mud and lying on the pine - still holding tightly to the sapling.