fredbassett

Title : Riddles in the Dark, Part 3 of 3
Author : fredbassett
Fandom : Primeval
Rating : 15
Characters : Lester/Lyle, Finn, other OCs (plus a guest appearance from another fandom!)
Disclaimer : Not mine (except the OCs), no money made, don’t sue.
Spoilers : None
Word Count: 8,900 in three equal parts
Summary : Lester and Lyle make a return trip into the Devil’s Crowll in search of some missing cavers.
A/N : 1) Written for louisedennis’s fandom stocking. Sorry it’s late, Louise! It got a bit long to post in comments and I ran out of time. I hope this is in keeping with our fandom stocking traditions… 2) Set in my Stephen/Ryan ‘verse.

“Don’t come any closer.” Lester wasn’t sure why he’d spoken but when the round, watery eyes widened, he knew he’d been understood.

Gurgling laughter bubbled up in the creature’s throat as it climbed around the edge of the sump pool like a large, albino spider. Its limbs and body were emaciated, its backbone showing clearly through skin that looked to be stretched too tightly over flesh and bone.

“Fishes, no fishes, preciouss. We came looking for fishes, we did,,,,”

“You won’t find fish here,” Lester said calmly. The creature didn’t seem overly threatening, but the teeth looked sharp and he was willing to bet there was surprising strength in those long fingers.

“No fishes? We followed the string, we did, looking for fishes but all we found was themses…. themses but no fishes. Curses and splashes, precious, curses and splashes.”

“James…” There was a warning note in Lyle’s voice. A warning note that said, as plain as words: shoot the fucker, shoot it now.

“Get Haller up the ladder, Jon, then cover me while I climb.”

“They’re leaving us, precious, was it something we said? Don’t they like us?”

“It’s nothing personal,” Lester said, fighting down mounting incredulity. He ran an operation devoted to chasing dinosaurs, so why the fuck was this creeping him out? “Did you come through a light?”

“A light? It knows about the light, precious, yes it does. What does it know about the light?”

Lester heard Finn’s warning call followed by the slap of the ladder hitting the mud of the chamber floor. A brief scuffle followed, along with some choice curses from Lyle that called into question the validity of Haller’s parent’s marriage, amongst other things.

The creature raised its non-existent eyebrows and tilted its head to one side. “Been hanging out with orcses, has it? Talks like ‘em, and smells like ‘em. We tried to help, we did, but they tried to run away. Sméagol only wanted to help.” The creature made a gulping noise in its throat.

A shiver ran through Lester’s body. This was beyond weird now and well into did he get really pissed last night and was this just a crazy dream territory.

“Is that your name?” Lester said, forcing the part of his mid that just wanted to jibber quietly in a corner to man up and deal with this shit, when all he really wanted to do was to get the hell out of the chamber and away from something that shouldn’t exist outside the pages of a book. “Sméagol?”

The creature – Sméagol – made the gulping, gurgling noise again. Lester took it as a yes.

“Is the light still there, Sméagol?”

The head swung from side to side. “Sometimes there, sometimes not. Sméagol stayed here with new friends.”

“Your new friends are going now. Follow the string, Sméagol. Follow the string back to the light. There are no fish here.”

“No fishes? Curse us and splash us, my precious. No fishes?”

“No fishes,” Lester said. “This isn’t your world, Sméagol. Go home.”

“Home, precious? Sméagol has no home.”

“Ready when you are, sweetie,” Lyle said, his voice cutting through the surreal exchange.

The use of the pet name told Lester that Lyle didn’t immediately regard the creature as a threat – or if he did, he clearly thought that the Mossberg would be more than adequate to deal with the problem. He was probably right, but Lester was strangely reluctant to use force on the wretched beast.

“You can’t stay here, Sméagol. There are no fish and if the light closes again, you’ll be struck here, alone, with nothing to eat. We’re leaving now, and you need to find the light.”

“The light hurts our eyes, precious. Hurts our eyes, it does.”

“That’s better that than staying here to starve, Sméagol.”

“Sméagol wants fishes.” The voice sounded sulky now, but there was an underlying note of fear – and a deep well of loneliness so stark that it made Lester’s heart ache for the creature.

“Go home, Sméagol. This isn’t your world. You don’t belong here. You need fish and you won’t find them here.”

“Sméagol can come with you. New friends, Nice friends.”

Sméagol climbed around the rock and sat on the mud bank a few metres away from Lester, his head tilted to one side, hope shining in the huge eyes.

“You can’t come with us, Sméagol, this isn’t your world.” Lester groped frantically for an argument the creature would understand, but came up blank. This was just too fucking surreal, even by ARC standards of weird shit. He risked a quick glance at what was happening on the pitch. Haller was being helped off the ladder by Finn. The young soldier’s eyes were almost as wide as Sméagol’s but despite that, he was getting on with the job of getting the men out of the cave.

“Start moving them to the squeeze,” Lyle instructed. “Get them through if you can.”

“Go with them, Jon,” Lester said. “I’ll be fine.”

“Like fuck you will.”

“Sméagol doesn’t like him.” Sméagol sniffed and made the gulping noise in his throat.

“The feeling’s mutual,” Lyle muttered.

“Play a game with us,” Sméagol demanded, crossing his ankles and wrapping his skinny arms around his knees. “Play riddles. We likes that game, don’t we, preciousss?”

“And if I win, you’ll follow the string and go back through the light?” Lester was grasping at straws, but he knew how this was meant to go down. Or at least he thought he did.

“And if Sméagol wins, we comes with you!”

“Cutter’ll freak out,” Lyle muttered, but loud enough to be heard.

“He won’t have a monopoly on that,” Lester said. “Jon, do what I said, start getting the other three out of here. I’ll catch you up. I’ll be quite safe. He’s hardly the most dangerous thing I’ve faced, remember?”

“Sméagol’s not dangerous,” the creature whispered. “Sméagol wants to be your friend, yessss he does, preciousss…”

Lester sat down on a rock, the Mossberg cradled across his knees. He wished he’d followed Lyle’s lead and strapped a Sig Sauer to his thigh, but the shotgun would have to do. If he fired it, the noise would be enough to terrify the creature even if the shot went astray.

“You start,” he offered, desperately racking his brains for anything even remotely resembling a riddle.

Sméagol rubbed his thin hands together in glee.

“I yearn to have what I had yesterday.
It hurts men and hinders words,
but makes speech easier. What did I have?”

Lester smiled. He’d spent long enough with Lyle and the soldiers to know the answer to that one. “Beer,” he said with confidence.

“Yesss,” Sméagol hissed gleefully. “We likes this game, precious. Your turn now…”

“I fly without wings and cry without eyes. What am I?” If that was the best he could come up with, this wasn’t going to be a long contest, but to his surprise, it seemed to have Sméagol stumped. Maybe the wretched creature had been under the earth too long to remember the world outside…

Sméagol shook his head from side to side, thinking hard. He muttered to himself and scratched at his thin hair. “A cloud!” The words burst out of him and he smiled widely, maybe remembering happier days. “He’s a cloud, precious!”

Lester forced a smile. “Well done. Your turn now.”

A skeletal hand slapped the surface of the water. “ I am not alive, but I grow; I don't have lungs, but I need air; I don't have a mouth, but water kills me. What am I?

Lester shivered. He was starting to get cold, the damp of the cave seeping through the material of his oversuit. What he really wanted was to be curled up in front of a warm… “Fire!”

The round eyes blinked hard in disappointment and Sméagol’s thin shoulders drooped. His face furrowed again in thought, then a slow smile spread across his face. “I have eight eyes and eight feet and knees above my belly. I can walk upright, or upside down. What am I?”

After a moment’s thought, Lester smiled. “A spider.”

The answer had obviously come too quickly for Sméagol’s liking and the light in his eyes darkened for a moment, but then the simple pleasure of the game took over, and for an instant, Lester could see what he once might have been and not just the creature he’d become.

“My turn,” Lester said, tuning out the noises from above that indicated that Lyle had finally done as he’d been instructed and was doing his best to get the three exhausted, freaked out cavers through the first major obstacle on their route back to the surface, the Devil’s Arsehole. The two soldiers were amongst the most capable Lester had ever caved with. It would take time, but he knew they were more than equal to what lay ahead. Lester just hoped he was. He didn’t relish having to explain Sméagol’s presence in the group if he lost the game. Thinking of Lyle and Finn brought something else to mind. “ I am black when you buy me, red when you use me, and gray when you throw me away? What am I?

Sméagol was silent, wringing his thin hands together as he muttered to himself and his precious. “What iss it? What iss it, precious? A long time since we have bought anything, precious, yes, a long time? What does it mean, preciousss? Tell us! Tell Sméagol!”

“You want me to tell you the answer?” Lester asked, and immediately cursed his question.

Sméagol jumped up. “No! Still thinking, still thinking, precious!” He paced around the small chamber, clasping and unclasping his arms around his body, shaking his head. “No, don’t tell us, don’t tell us. More time, we just needs more time.” He gulped and gurgled in his throat.

“You’ve had plenty of time,” Lester said, desperate to draw the bizarre competition to and end and get away from his companion.

Sméagol turned and banged his head on the rock wall, desperate for the answer, then he swung around, his eyes gleaming with silver light. “Charcoal, charcoal from the fire! We remember it in the woods, we do! Before we followed the river to the roots of the mountains. Charcoal, it is!”

The simple joy Sméagol took in the answer brought a smile to Lester’s face. “Well done, Sméagol.”

The creature jumped for joy. “Bless us and splash us, precious! Bless us and splash us. Our turn, our turnses now…” He screwed his face up in thought, maybe remembering his days outside the mountains again. “Our turnses… I am a giant that walks the earth….” He puffed himself up and took a large step, his bare feet slapping down in the wet mud. “I swallow the waters and the woods. He took another step, this time towards Lester, who tightened his grip on the shotgun across his knees but tried hard not to let his unease show. Sméagol lowered his voice to a sibilant hiss.“I dread the wind, but I don’t fear men!” He shouted the last half of the sentence and jumped towards Lester, who forced himself not to recoil. “What am I?” Sméagol demanded, his face thrust close to Lester’s, rank, fishy breath heavy on the damp, cold air.

As Sméagol skipped around the chamber and paddled along the edge of the pool, Lester turned the words over in his mind, but the answer stayed stubbornly out of reach. All he could think of was the next riddle he wanted to ask, not the answer to the riddle that had been asked of him. He needed to get a grip, and he needed to get it fast, or he was going to have some explaining to do back at the hotel.

“We win, we win, preciouss!”

“Not yet, you don’t,” Lester said, trying hard to clear the fog from his mind. “Fog! You’re fog!”

“Ach! It’s too clever, precious, too clever it is, curse it and splash it! Curse it and splash it!” To make his point he jumped into the edge of the pool, sending up a swathe of water and mud.

“Don’t be a sore loser, Sméagol. My turn now… The more I take, the more I leave behind. What am I?””

“What is it, precious? What is it my precious?” Sméagol started to pace again like a caged animal, his large, flat feet slapping in the mud.

Lester forced himself to keep his eyes on Sméagol’s face, watching the play of emotion over the surprisingly expressive features. If he looked beyond the pale skin, the emaciated body and the sharp teeth, there was still a vestige of happier times left somewhere that the years of loneliness and scavenging hadn’t quite wiped away. He wished he had something to offer the creature, some sort of hope, something that might drive the darkness away, even if only for a short time. Maybe it would all end as it had been written, but maybe there was still some chance to make a difference… Lester shook himself. That was ridiculous, he wasn’t inhabiting the pages of someone else’s book, it was always possible to make a difference.

Sméagol stamped a foot in the mud, sending up more splatter. One lump landed on Lester’s nose and he brushed it away, probably leaving even more mess behind.

The creature pointed and laughed, and Lester hoped the mud had been enough of a distraction. He joined in the laughter as Sméagol capered around the chamber, dancing to music that only he could hear, his hands raised in the air.

“What is it, preciouss? Bless us and splash us, what is it? Sméagol knows, Sméagol must know!”

“Then what is it?” Lester asked gently. “What is it, Sméagol?”

A foot tapped impatiently in the mud, making a splatting noise. “More time, precious, it’s got to give us more time!”

Lester fought hard to stop himself shouting out the answer, knowing that at any moment, Sméagol might realise that it was actually blindingly obvious. But he desperately wanted to keep the creature’s goodwill, wanted to bring this whole crazy game to an end that didn’t involve the use of a shotgun shell. His dominant emotion was now pity. Pity for a creature deprived of companionship for longer than he could imagine, driven half mad by loneliness and the fear of loss.

“This isn’t your home, Sméagol. Go back to your mountains, follow the river back out to the forest. See the sun and the clouds. Feel the rain. Go back into the light.”

Sméagol turned and raised his head, tears shining in his eyes. “Give us the answer, precious, give us the answer and we’ll go. Sméagol promised, he did, and Sméagol keeps his promises…”

Lester smiled and finally gave into the impulse to look down at the floor of the chamber. “Footsteps, the answer is footsteps.”

Laughter bubbled up in Sméagol’s throat and he made the strange burbling sound again, but Lester thrust the knowledge of the other name away. He had no idea where that other story had come from, but maybe this Sméagol still had a chance. Predetermination was a crap philosophy. If there was one thing he’d learned over the last few years it was that time was more fluid than most people realised, capable of constantly reshaping itself, flowing around events and taking different, unexpected turns.

Sméagol laughed and there was joy in the sound, not anger. “Footsteps!” He slapped his feet in the mud and danced again and his laughter echoed around the chamber, inviting Lester to join in. Lester laughed with him and stood up, slinging the shotgun over his shoulder.

“It was a good game, Sméagol,” he said, when the echoes of their laughter finally died away.

“Bless us and splash us, it was a good game, precious. Sméagol will go now. Maybe we will follow the river again, precious, but first Sméagol has to find the light….”

Lester smiled again. “You will. I’m sure you will.”

With laughter in his throat rather than the gurgling gulp, Sméagol turned and dived into the water. With a sudden flurry, he was gone, leaving ripples spreading in widening circles across the surface of the dark water.

Lester waited until the surface of the pool had grown still, and then he waited even longer, but the water remained quiet. Eventually, he turned away, stowing the rifle in the tackle bag and quickly climbed the short pitch, coiled the metal ladder and stashed that in the bag as well, along with the rope and then other bits of tackle. The rest of the kit left behind by Haller and his friends had already been removed.

Moving quickly to get some warmth back into his cold, stiff body, Lester covered the 40 metres back to the squeeze, and with a grimace, he got down on the floor and shoved the full tackle bag through in front of him. Moments later, the bag was whisked away, and he heard Lyle say, “What kept you, sweetheart? We’ve just managed to get the three of them up the pitch. I had to tell them the eyes in the dark were coming for them to get the fuckers to move…”

“Subtle as ever, darling…”

By the time Lester emerged from the Devil’s Arsehole, he was sweating rather than shivering. Lyle hauled him to his feet and pulled him into a hug.

When they finally drew apart, Lester smiled and said, “Thanks for trusting me, Jon.”

“It wasn’t the first time, and I doubt it’ll be the last.” Lyle kissed him lightly on the lips. “Your nose is covered in mud, by the way. Now come on, before we meet the rescue coming down to meet us.”

“What do we do about those three and their eyes in the dark?”

Lyle’s grin took on a distinctly feral look. “Hallucinating, all three of ‘em. And if they ever forget that, they’ll have more than eyes in the fucking dark to worry about. By the time we’ve dragged their arses out of here, they’re never going to want to think about this trip again, as long as they live. Trust me on that.”

“I do, my little wolverine, I most certainly do.”

“Below!” Finn yelled, as a heavy coil of rope slithered down the pitch.

Lester picked up the free end. “Age before beauty, snookums. Six hours to get ‘em out, you reckon?”

“Five and a half. Five if I shout a lot and take turns with Finn on the hauling.”

“You’re on…”