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ran for a few minutes, getting into some thick foliage. He held up his hand to stop me, but I couldn’t halt in time and ran straight into his back anyway. I knocked him over, causing him to land on his stomach with me on top of him. He let out an “oompf” as the air left his lungs. It was a few seconds after I’d apologized that he finally started sucking air in again in noisy gasps.
    “Sorry.”
    “Naw, Kelsie. It was my fault,” he said finally.
    I rolled off him and sat down. We went still, listening. I heard the distant sounds of crickets behind us, a good sign. He turned to look at me through the gloom from his position still on his stomach.
    “I think we might have lost them.”
    I’d just nodded when I heard an owl call – answered almost instantly by another, less-natural-sounding owl. The various creatures of the night had also grown silent.
    I heard him grumble. He moved his arms to push himself erect, like a pushup. He was just pulling his knees under him when the ground in front of him disappeared and he vanished into blackness.

CHAPTER FIVE
::DRAKE::  

    I FELL HEADFIRST THROUGH the hole, forever, it seemed. Finally, I landed in the dark, smashing into the ground on the back of my left shoulder. I felt a pop at the base of my neck and a flash of burning pain as the rest of my body impacted. The wind was knocked out of me, so I couldn’t make a sound other than a grunt, which probably came out more like a whimper.
    My whole shoulder was afire. It went down my spine and up my neck in pulses timed with my heart. I became aware of Kelsie’s frantic whisper from above.
    “Drake! Drake! Are you all right?”
    I still couldn’t respond, but I was able to manage an audible groan.
    “Okay, good. You’re alive. I hate to freak you out, but they’re almost on us. Like right here.” Her whisper was growing panicked.
    I coughed, clearing my throat. I finally was able to draw in almost a full breath. “Get down here.” I wheezed. “I think it’s only four or five meters.”
    Her whisper became higher pitched. “Are you crazy? I’m not dropping down that far. That’s like three times taller than me!”
    I pushed myself up, growing impatient. “Kelsie, if they’re right there, the only thing to do is drop down! Just go feet first and bend your knees. I survived, and I fell head first; you’ll be fine,” I thought about it, “probably.”
    She made an exasperated sound.
    “Kelsie, you don’t have a choice! Now, get down here. You know what will happen if they catch you.” I heard the restrained urgency in my own voice, glad that it came through, but I hoped it didn’t sound panicky. I wasn’t panicky by any means but I knew that if I sounded panicky she would freak out.
    I went through this kind of situation all the time. It was part of my job. It was Kelsie I was worried about. When I went on snatch-and-grabs, I always went alone so I had only me to worry about, though often having another person there would have been far easier. Now I had to think about someone else. Not just anyone, either. Kelsie.
    I heard clumps of dirt and debris hit the ground next to me as Kelsie positioned herself to drop in. The small light spot in the dark above me disappeared. I dragged myself out of the way, I didn’t feel like ending up with a foot in my lap, but didn’t feel like standing quite yet, either.
    I was dimly aware of a shape dropping through the air and hitting the ground where I’d been seconds before. As Kelsie hit, she must have bent her legs as I suggested because they then unfolded, launching her off-balance backwards into me. More specifically, into my lap.
    She landed on me with a squeak that paired up almost harmonically with my third “oompf” in as many minutes.
    “See? That wasn’t so bad, was it?” I grunted out through clenched teeth and a grimace.
    “I’m so sorry! You’re like a magnet,” she said, sounding apologetic, but making no move to get off me.
    “I get that a