[Darkness is relative, though not many people know that. But it's true. There's a vast difference between the darkness of a city at night, still lit up by distant buildings, and the darkness of the countryside, where you've only the moon and a flashlight to keep you safe. Or, in a more immediate example: there's the darkness of Beacon, with its bonfire and its torches and its people . . .
And then there's a mine.
You don't need supernatural horror for that. A mine's darkness is complete, utterly so. And what very few ways one might have to light up the night-- those lanterns that you'd better not let go out-- doesn't so much eradicate the darkness as dirty it.
But it at least gives some context for setting.
They're in a mine shaft, which seems to stretch out both before and behind them for miles. There are branching tunnels, places they can turn left or right, but perhaps that isn't the most advisable thing when you're lost underground. The tunnel is wide enough for two abreast, with rough walls that snag at skin and rusted grooves etched deep within the floors.
And behind them, slow but inexorably steady: a noise. A steady thump . . . thump . . . thump . . . that seems to never falter.]
THE MINES
And then there's a mine.
You don't need supernatural horror for that. A mine's darkness is complete, utterly so. And what very few ways one might have to light up the night-- those lanterns that you'd better not let go out-- doesn't so much eradicate the darkness as dirty it.
But it at least gives some context for setting.
They're in a mine shaft, which seems to stretch out both before and behind them for miles. There are branching tunnels, places they can turn left or right, but perhaps that isn't the most advisable thing when you're lost underground. The tunnel is wide enough for two abreast, with rough walls that snag at skin and rusted grooves etched deep within the floors.
And behind them, slow but inexorably steady: a noise. A steady thump . . . thump . . . thump . . . that seems to never falter.]