Beau and the Beetle

Adrien awoke, cold and uncomfortable, to impenetrable darkness. For a panicked moment, he thought he’d gone blind, and cried out in fear.

But his voice echoed strangely, and the surface he lay on was dusty, frigid, and hard like stone. The air was musty and still, without even a draught for him to follow.

Panic seized him again as he got to his feet to pat himself down. He still wore his day clothes, but his wallet, keys, and phone were missing. Squatting, he groped around blindly, hoping his things had fallen out nearby. Except, nothing but dirt met his desperate fingers. Adrien whimpered, tears springing to his eyes.

‘What happened?’ he moaned. ‘Where am I? How did I get here?’

His tremulous whispering sounded peculiar. Resting on his knees, he felt along the walls and called out a weak, ‘hello?’

He stood up to continue to map his immediate vicinity with his hands. He was surrounded by rough hewn stonework, in a tunnel with a vaulted ceiling. He could stand at his full height, but when he reached up, he could touch the ceiling without having to extend his arms too high.

‘Hello?’ he called again, his voice ending on a sob. ‘Help.’

In the darkness, he lost which way he had been facing when he woke up. If whoever had put him here laid him down with his feet pointing to the exit, he would’ve had some indication of which way to go. Unfortunately, after turning around so many times, he had completely disoriented himself.

Adrien drew his lips in between his teeth, and bit down hard. He tried not to cry; it wouldn’t help, and could dehydrate him faster if he couldn’t find his way out.

A thought occurred to him, frightening and unpleasant. People went missing in the catacombs all the time. Would-be explorers, the morbidly curious, or just unlucky drunks, anyone who entered the labyrinth under the streets of Paris risked remaining stuck down there forever.

‘Oh God,’ he whispered, fervently wishing he was not about to join their unfortunate ranks.

He recalled a vague memory of his basketball coach telling him that if he ever got lost, the best thing to do was to stay where he was and wait for rescue. Assuming he really was in the catacombs, and not victim to some cruel prank, he decided it would behove him to heed that advice. Someone had left him there. Surely, they would return at some point to verify his condition.

Adrien sat down, his back against a wall, as he concentrated on breathing. Giving himself something to focus on would stave off the hysteria boiling in his gut, at least for a little while.

He closed his eyes, pretending the absolute darkness was the result of his eyelids, but there was nothing he could do about the profound silence. The only sounds were the ones he made, from his breathing, to the rustling of fabric when he moved, his throat each time he swallowed, even the sound of his own heartbeat. It was all unbearably loud in the oppressive silence.

He wondered who had left him there, and why. It seemed too cruel a joke for his classmates, and it didn’t fit the typical behavioural pattern of an obsessed fan. He briefly thought of Felix, and his simmering rage of the past few weeks, but quickly dismissed the idea. Felix was ambitious and aloof, but he wasn’t the type of person to resort to something as unsophisticated as this. Left with no other options, Adrien was flummoxed.

Time lost all meaning. He could have been there for minutes, or hours. He may have drifted into a fitful doze a couple of times, but he couldn’t tell.

After what felt like an extremely long time, Adrien’s mouth began to dry out. He chewed his tongue to stimulate his salivary glands, but he was still thirsty.

It wasn’t until he began to feel weak and dizzy when he guessed he’d been there for, at least, a day. He’d learnt from experience that he could go for twelve hours without eating, but as he was also without water, he realised his calculations would be off.

A body could go for a few days without food, but without water, his condition would deteriorate much faster. He wasn’t desperate enough to drink his own urine, nor was he willing to risk going deeper into the tunnel. So, he continued to wait.

A scratching noise startled him from an uneasy sleep. It was the first sound he heard, not made by himself, since waking in this dark hellscape. He was relieved at first, encouraged by the sign of life. He hoped it was someone come to rescue him, at last. But there were no voices chattering, or calling his name, just a light, ominous scritching.

He remembered some horror movies he’d seen, and suddenly recalled where he was. It was rare, but occasionally a magic user lost control of something they’d summoned. Their creatures were supposed to be dismissed properly, sent back to where they came from, but sometimes, the lazy or incompetent magician just hid the beast away. The catacombs were the most popular dumping grounds for magic gone awry, with rumours and urban legends aplenty.

Adrien shook his head. There was no truth in those stories – they’d just been sensationalised in popular culture. Pleased with his ability to think rationally, he relaxed.

When the scuttling began again, Adrien was reminded that a rat, or a pack of them, wouldn’t hesitate to eat him, if they sensed weakness. They wouldn’t even wait until he was dead first.

Spurred on by fear, Adrien staggered to his feet and walked as quickly away as he could. Mercifully, the sound didn’t follow him.

After his surge of energy abandoned him, Adrien leaned heavily against a wall. His shirt snagged on the rough stone, and he was sure he was dirtying it beyond salvation, but he didn’t care. He was scared, hungry, thirsty, and driven onward by his sense of self preservation.

He hoped he had picked the right direction; his chances of survival narrowing from slim to nil if he hadn’t. As he walked, he hoped he hadn’t been gone for too long. He didn’t want anyone to worry, or fear he’d met the same fate as Marinette. He didn’t want his friends to mourn another loss so soon.