Episode 6

She tried to establish contact with her colleagues while simultaneously tending to the injured man. The professor’s self-diagnosis was spot on. His ankle was broken, and his tibia was likely fractured as well. Additionally, his right hand was broken, and his left palm was scraped bloody. First, she injected him with a good dose of painkillers. While waiting for them to take effect, she cleaned and bandaged his bloody palm, all the while trying to reach Sándor and the others on her small radio. Occasionally, she heard static, sometimes even words, but she couldn’t make out their meaning.

“The layers above us are blocking the signals,” - Ágoston said with calm seriousness. By now, she had already splinted his arm.

“Do you know exactly what happened, Professor?” - she asked him. The question was also a way to test whether the man had suffered a head injury.

“What’s your name, dear?” - the elderly instructor looked up at her.

“Gyöngyi.”

“Gyöngyi,” - the old man hummed, - “a beautiful name. Call me Ágoston. Since you’re fighting for my life, no need for formalities.”

He paused for a moment, then hissed as Gyöngyi, with a decisive motion under the light of her lamp, reset his ankle.

“So…” he groaned. The painkillers weren’t fully effective. A lot of muddy clay has accumulated in the chamber above us over the millennia. However, there’s been a lot of rain recently. I suspect water seeped between the rock and the clay lens, loosening the lower layers. When we descended with the group, the vibrations from our footsteps might have caused the lens to shift. Can you follow?”

She nodded.

“This shift is geologically minor, barely one or two percent relative to the size of the entire chamber, but it was enough to send me tumbling down here… What happened to the students?”

“They’re fine,” - she replied seriously. She saw no point in mentioning Imre, as the others had already pulled him out and likely taken him to the surface. - “Do you have any ideas on how we can get out of here?”

The man asked for the lamp and shone it around the rocks above them. Unlike Gyöngyi, he immediately spotted the point where the entrance had been.

“That’s going to be tricky… unless they can punch a hole through the clay layer from above,” - he said, looking up at her. She had just finished splinting his injured limbs and examining his head, which seemed unharmed at first glance.

“Kid, there’s nothing we can do but wait.”

He was calm, just as calm as she had been since focusing on the injured man. Yes, they had to wait, eat, rest, and hope something changed above. She pulled a blanket from her bag, spread it on a flat rock, helped Ágoston over to it, and they both sat down.

“Definitely more comfortable than lying on cold stone,” - the old man remarked. He gladly accepted the water bottle and half a sandwich. They ate in silence, Gyöngyi occasionally listening to the radio, but her thoughts wandered far, circling around her dream.

Karin… they hadn’t spoken in two years.

There had been no painful breakup, no fight. They had been together for months, and although they didn’t hide their relationship, they didn’t flaunt it either. Their intimate moments were always private. Then came her summer internships, competitions, and trips abroad. Karin understood these and never tried to dissuade her. Slowly, they drifted apart, and by the time the third semester started, they no longer sought each other out. Later, she saw Karin with another woman, while she herself had no one for the next two years—though she wouldn’t have had time for a proper relationship anyway. Then came Feri…