Falling down into the deep and dark depths of an endless abyss was something Trianglechest did not have on his bucket list. Unfortunately, it was something fate kept handing his way. Kassius V, Spinner's Nebula, Swamp Delta, even the engine room at one point. The list goes on.
As such, he was intimately familiar with the uncomfortable sensation of falling faster than your stomach, of the instincts that screamed at you of the rapidly approaching ground - though the lack of an atmosphere was a nice change. None of that pesky roaring wind you can't hear yourself think over.
Of course, it was instead replaced by the comms of the suit, filled with the manic laughter of the Captain and the melancholic wail of a Squareface who was in the midst of coming down from his uncharacteristic surge of courage into the more familiar pit of depression he resided in.
Trianglechest merely sighed, thinking fondly about the comfortable warmth of his bed which he had been so cruelly ripped from by his vicious Captain. He glanced downwards, a flicking a button on his wrist to switch on a torch and pointing it into the darkness.
The walls, now illuminated, were revealed to be formed of that same crystal mutating the sand outside. The only difference was these were of a pure obsidian colour. He touched it experimentally, but it was far too smooth a surface and the tunnel was too wide for him to slow himself down.
It seemed that hoping for a soft landing was his best bet. Towards that goal, the torch was of little help as it only penetrated several metres down and the ground was still far below.
Even Squareface and the others were far below him, but strangely the comms had gone silent, not even the usual static. He furrowed his brows.
'Something's not right'
"Captain, you hear me?", Trianglechest spoke but the lack of reply only increased the tension in his tone. "Squareface, Captain can you hear me? What's going on down there?"
There was no response, save for the rushing of air as he fell at an ever-accelerating pace (Yes, I do know about terminal velocity you absolute cloth-brained cardboard box).
'Wait a second. Air?'
Trianglechest held his breath, concentrating to hear what was going on outside. The planet had no atmosphere at all and no sound should carry from outside his suit.
But the rushing noise was unmistakable.
'At least air will slow me down a bit, but it begs the question...well...too many questions. Whatever, I bet its dangerous. I really should have stayed home'
Alas, his whining could not help his predicament no matter how hard he wished such a thing could be possible.
'I never thought I'd say this but we need Hexagoneye back. At least he's got some semblance of common sense amongst these idiots'
His thoughts were soon interrupted by a sinking feeling accompanied by an itch behind his left ear. Trianglechest quickly got into a brace position, holding his rod out to absorb as much of the impact as possible, just seconds before his wrist-mounted torch revealed the ground and he slammed into it at extreme velocity.
Or, at least, he should have.
Still bracing for an impact that should have arrived seconds ago, Trianglechest slowly opened his tightly shut eyes. He was hovering, pole in one hand, about a metre off the ground.
For a second, he was in shock. Then reality set in.
"Ha", he let out a loose, breathy laugh. "Ha ha"
"I can fly! I always knew there was something special about me, I always could jump that little bit higher than Circleface!"
Unfortunately, he was immediately proved wrong as gravity re-asserted its dominance and he slammed face first down onto the ground. It seemed like a harder hit than a fall from that height should incur, but it wasn't like the planet itself was sentient and had the humour of a child and couldn't help but slam him down a bit harder than normal after that statement. Not likely at all.
Trianglechest groaned as he found himself in a heap on the floor for the second time in almost as many hours.
'Really not my day today'
As he got to his feet, his surroundings came into view. Above him was the long abyss he had fallen down, the top so far away that it was barely visible. The area he was in was a small, round opening. Shining the torch in a circle, he noticed four exits, each made of a similar material as the tunnel above.
He reached out to one of the walls, touching it tenderly. A splodge of strange, sticky mucous attached to his fingers as he withdrew it.
"Gratches Great and Glorious Gletrious", he swore so colourfully so as to make the Captain proud. "I definitely should have stayed in that ship."
There was still no answer from his comms and there was no way he could climb all the way back up that tunnel so, despite all his cowardice, he picked a tunnel and walked forwards with a brave expression on his face.
The fact that it was the furthest tunnel from that mucous is nothing worth mentioning, or the fact that in the process of scanning for the tunnels he jumped at an oddly placed rock at least four times.
"This is fine. This is ok. You're gonna be alright, Trianglechest. Absolutely nothing can go wrong after falling into an abyss that hurt your eyes just by looking at it, somehow learning how to fly, forgetting how to fly, being separated from the others. After all, you've still got your trusty staff."
He brought it before him, feeling comforted by its presence. His twirl, however, was cut short as it clanged into the wall. He sharpened his gaze and shone his torch towards the wall.
"Is this...contracting? Nah, must be my imagination. I really can have an active one at times, haha."
The forced laughter was swallowed by the darkness with a seemingly intentional malice. Trianglechest decided to employ one of Squareface's methods and firmly ignored the obvious implications of the contracting tunnel, the viscous fluid, the other similarities with a large and alien digestive tract, and decided to walk forwards.
Though, at a much more hurried pace. That quickly accelerated into a jog. Then into a run.
After about thirty seconds had passed, a noise sounded from his comms, filled with static.
"...here. Go the other way you Gletrious-damned fool. No! Is your central nervous system a flurdle-gloop? I said the OTHER WAY!"
The Captain's characteristic voice roared through the comms. Trianglechest could almost feel the spittle through the comms system, but any disgust at that phlegmy voice was overpowered by relief.
"Captain, Captain, can you hear me?", he spoke frantically, coming to a sharp stop in his tunnel.
"Yes that way, finally, Great Gratches be praised."
He paused before continuing.
"Huh, is that you Trianglechest? Where are you, we lost contact about two thirds of the way down that accursed tunnel."
"I don't know Captain", Trianglechest replied honestly. "I somehow figured out how to fly but then forgot and landed in some opening with four tunnels. I picked a random one and ran down it until I heard your voice just now."
"Figured out how to fly?", the Captain's voice filled with sharp, acerbic humour. Squareface even let loose an uncommon snort as though holding back laughter. "The same thing happened to all of us, how did you think we survived the fall?"
He burst out into a phlegmy laughter that degenerating into a hacking fit that would have caused any self respecting lung to commit suicide out of solidarity with its abused companion.
Trianglechest merely sighed.
'I guess it just wasn't my day. One of these days, I swear, I'll prove to them that Trianglechest is more than a coward'
He paused, as though mulling over that thought.
'Of course, I'll have to live to see that day for that to happen. Best to be cautious, in that case'.
He nodded to himself as though happy with the amendment, before replying to the Captain.
"Yeah, yeah laugh your lungs out again, Captain. In case you forgot, I'm still lost here. Do you, maybe, want to let me know where you are in this forsaken abyss?", Trianglechest had regained his laidback drawl as though his previously terrified countenance was nothing but a dream.
"Oh yeah, good point", the Captain spoke in an impressed tone as though having genuinely just thought of that. Well, yeah, to be honest he had just thought of that.
"Which tunnel did you take, by the way?"
"Why do you ask?", Trianglechest replied slowly. "It was the one on the opposite side from that strange mucous thing"
There was only static for a few seconds, until the Captain cleared his throat and spoke slowly.
"So, uhh. Don't panic. Or actually, panic - it might help. So that one isn't a tunnel and you should probably get out of there as fast as you can. Once you make it to the opening, go into the tunnel on the right"
Squareface's dejected tone butt in.
"Although you probably won't make it, no point in even trying. Accept the inevitability of death. Lucky guy"
Not even bothering to respond, Trianglechest turned around and bolted down the enormous gullet as fast as possible. A squelching sound rapidly approached from behind and he spared a glance over his shoulder.
The tunnel was collapsing in on itself, writhing and twisting like the contractions of an intestine. That strangely non-Euclidean crystalline material warping in an abominable mimicry of biological fashion.
He turned back forwards and sprinted with a speed he didn't even know he possessed. Heart thumping loudly in his ears, he made it to that opening in record time, barely stopping before dashing down the tunnel on the right of that viscous splodge.
He kept going at that speed for another while, not daring to slow although the danger should have been far behind. Eventually, he came to a stop, heaving deep breaths with his hands on his knees.
"Captain", he squeezed out between breaths. "Where are you."
The static of the comms cut into the Captain's voice.
"Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"
A sinking feeling assaulted Trianglechest's stomach as a faint susurrus of chittering claws approached from the darkness beyond his torch.
"Yeah, Squareface meant the left tunnel, not the right one. The right one has a swarm of bugs in them, so you might wanna get moving."
The Captain paused and Squareface spoke, not bothering to correct the Captain's assignment of blame onto his heavy shoulders.
"I'd rather get eaten by a living tunnel than insects. They creep me out just imagining all those tiny claws as they burrow into your face and eyes and-"
Trianglechest cut the comms with a firm click, forcing his tired body up. The rasping noise was only getting louder as he let out an audible groan.
On shaky legs, he set off back to that tunnel, reactivating his comms.
"You sure you got it right this time, Captain", he said sarcastically. "Or is the next one filled with lava?"
"Lava? No that's the fourth tunnel. The one left of the mucous is the one we want."
There was a sound of something shuffling and the faint voice of Squareface berating Circleface.
"You might want to hurry up, we need another pair of hands here. Well, a pair of competent hands at least."
The comms cut out and Trianglechest halted his reply in his throat as a chill ran down his back. Swiftly grabbing behind with his free hand, he grasped something and ripped it off his back. The bug frantically buzzed its wings in an attempt to get free, It's rabid face and claws biting at his fingers, but he crushed it in his grip, spilling its purple blood all over his suit.
'This is not gonna wash out easily, is it?'
"I'm on my way, Captain."
Some time later and covered with a lot more of that fetid blood, though luckily none had gotten into any cracks or on his visor, he made it back to the opening. As he swung his torch around, he noticed the first tunnel he had been down was back to being open, its darkness warm as though inviting him to volunteer himself as a morsel of delectable food.
Not willing to spend another second there, he dashed down the tunnel left of that viscous landmark, hoping that the Captain wouldn't be wrong again.