A Perilous Journey

         Frederick peered cautiously around the corner of the wall. On the other side of the gap lay bounty, enough to feed him for a week, if not more. His stomach growled, gurgling a symphony of need and hunger. His insides clenched in dread. The price of his meal might very well be his life. If he was lucky, he might only lose a leg.
         The in-between space, that perilous gap between safety and sustenance, was littered with the remains of those less fortunate. Those unable to traverse the intervening space without perishing. It could be done. He'd seen the tall, black female with the scarlet red tattoo make it across, twice in fact. But even she had struggled, her legs dragging against the sucking, sticking, muck until with a gasp of victory, she had made it across.
         His mind begged him not to go. But his stomach demanded food. His limbs, weak from hunger quivered in anticipation. The threat of starvation spoke louder than the fear.
         It had been too long since his last meal. Instinct for survival would be the one that shoved him forward. Instinct rules all, pushing, shoving, and clawing unwilling players onto the stage, ignoring their whimpers and protestations, their desire for safety. The drive of hunger was second only to the drive to mate. It had succeeded in assassinating more than one soul by its desire for sustenance, even if that morsel was poisonous. The urge to eat would always be obeyed when the belly was empty enough.
         And so, compelled to answer his need just like every other primitive animal, Frederick took that first step. And then another.
         He halted at the edge of the tunnel. Carcasses, in various stages of decomposition, littered the ground and in some cases, part-way up the wall. Light peeked through from the other side, enough to illuminate the grisly scene, but not enough to reveal a safe path more than two or three steps at a time.
         The stench was almost overwhelming. Dry, brittle, dusty must with an unpleasant undertone of rot. Pungent, putrid, gooey ooze that seeped in through the nostrils, bypassing the little hairs that are meant to trap the malodorous, and down into the gullet, where they threatened to expel the small traces of bile which was all that remained in Frederick's stomach. Thick, wet scent that settled on the tongue and made the eyes water. And an odd, almost chemical smell that was faintly reminiscent of peanut butter.
         It was the last that spurred Frederick on. That peanutty goodness banished the other smells to the back of the mind, where their clamor could be ignored. Food. There was food on the other side and regardless of the other unfortunate souls that he had to step over and around, he would eat. His very survival depended upon it.
         He made it over the first carcass, small and pitiful. He steeled his heart against its long-ago fate and continued on. The ground sucked at his feet. The walls, strangely shaped, one shorter and slightly slanted, the other longer and tilted at a forty degree angle met the ceiling at an off-center point.
         Near what he judged was the center of the tunnel, white letters against a red background stood out. CHMAST. There were other letters on either side going up the walls, but the dim lighting and carcasses obscured their identification. So close. He was so very close, and yet, the most difficult part was yet to come. The last part of the tunnel, the bodies were literally stacked upon one another, limbs and heads mashed together in a macabre game of Twister. There was barely room to edge on by, certainly not without stepping upon the grisly remains. Frederick closed his eyes, wrenched his foot from the goo that sucked greedily at him and released its hold reluctantly.
         Sickening crunch, squishy give, burst of fragrance only a vulture could love. His foot slid in the greenish black ooze, knocking him off balance. He flicked out an arm to regain his balance, clenched around the first object it met, then let go in horror when his head turned and he realized he had grabbed onto the empty eye sockets of an old victim. The movement knocked him further off-kilter, the walls tilting, the light spinning, his stomach heaving.
         Frantically, he spun, twisted, flailing for purchase, but it was too late. He crashed down, limbs sinking into the floor with a sucking sound. The ghosts around him screamed in victory. They would have another member in their feast of the dead. Frederick found himself face to face with one of the damned; a gruesome smile upon its dry, withered head. Sightless eyes stared out from their cloudy membrane, a mirror for his fate.
         Instinct once again propelled his limbs to move, to fight against the trap, against the slow, agonizing starvation death that awaited him. Yet, once more, instinct only made it worse. The more he struggled, the tighter he was held in the gluey embrace. Energy exhausted, Frederick panted, a single tear dripped down his cheek which was bound tightly to the sticky floor. At least he no longer stared into sightless eyes, although the decayed legs and arms of the dead presented no less putrid a portrait.
         After an hour, he no longer even noticed the smell. It had settled into his being like a virus squatting in its host. After a day, he stopped opening his eyes at the sounds of struggle from others, who, when driven by the same desperation that felled him, also fell prey to the trap. Another day and his breathing stopped and it was Frederick's sightless eyes that would observe the next hapless victim's treacherous and deadly journey.
         A week later, giant hands reached into the crevasse and lifted up the oddly shaped tomb. Large eyes peered inside, observing the myriad victims. Enormous lungs gathered air which was expelled though matching lips. "Ewww, that's gross and disgusting. Dad, do we have any more spider traps? This one is full."