The jackal had been absent from the prison here and there, returning at times to check on the growth of the subjects Bacchus was spending his time raising, and also tending to the bare lights spread through the tunnel. Sometimes he would return with a familiar, disappear into the room he'd taken over as his "laboratory" and leave with oil on his paws. Whatever he was doing to those poor gembound was his own business and he rarely shared it with the others.

But now he returned with a much more serious purpose. The last few cycles had mostly been spent reading, or learning to read. The librarians in Cepheus had been more then happy to get him started and as was usual for him, he took those lessons and taught himself the rest. Now he felt confident that he could dive into the book revealed to him some time ago and understand its contents.

His nose raised in the air to smell for the now familiar scent of paper, he padded into the prison, although he took a moment to close his eyes and remember the vision. Behind the stone counter at the front, undisturbed, unknown-of besides him.

He climbed over this Reception Desk and found it almost immediately. It was the only thing here that wasn't stone and dust. A book, restored to its prime. He carefully maneuvered it so that the spine was facing up and picked it up firmly, but as delicately as possible so his teeth did not puncture its precious pages.

Returning the book to his small, pretty bare laboratory, he pulled over one of the many small branches he'd gathered some time ago and opened the lighter. A quick flick and a cast of magic and...the stick crumpled into ash.

He frowned and pulled another piece of precious wood, trying the spell again. At least the wood didn't burst into flame this time, but the spell didn't quite work. The fire that caught on the branch was nonmagical...but at least it was light.

With an annoyed huff, he turned to the book, prying open the pages, deciding that he'd read what he could before this particular fire went out.

The book was a logbook, at least to begin with.

Its heft was immense, a thick volume, a tome (no other word would do it justice) surrounded by dust; even flipping open that heavy book cover was enough to send a thin sheet of the stuff puffing away. And that was only what had settled here in the day or so it had taken for Anubis to arrive again.

Within were those logs. Designations, crimes, durations, cell numbers, neatly arranged in columns and etched in broad, but tidy, black strokes.

• Tourmaline five-two-six. Theft from Overseer rations. Six cycles. B-6.
• Peridot nine-three. Dereliction of duties, multiple infractions. Four cycles. A-9.
• Olivine four-seven...

...and so it went, page after page after page. Some of them held checkmarks, or thin lines passed through them, indicating perhaps demise or release--there was no key to explain this. And the writing of this book, the careful way that it was kept and the sameness of the writing throughout the first third or so of its width, suggested a singular Gembound dedicated to this task, having served at this desk for years.

There were interesting variations, here and there. Quite a few of the longer sentences bore a cell prepended not with a letter A through L, but with the word "Pit." There was no explanation of what the Pit might be, but its cell numbers ranged nearly to the triple-digits. Some of these even had no duration to their sentence, and many were crossed out.

And there was something else, too: a final notation scribbled beneath some of the names. The Farm. The Abbatoir. The Cisterns. There was no indication of what this meant, either.

Inevitably, Anubis would grow bored. Flip through pages. Push on, toward the end, to see how it had ended. And it was not with the perhaps expected long sleep the rest of the caves had experienced--instead, something else had, if the logs were a true indication, happened before this could occur.

The logs ended abruptly. Beyond, blank pages. But in that thin sliver in between--a dozen or so leaves of paper--were an account. That neat black hand scrawled, rather than rows and columns and designations, a hasty documentation of emergency. Within the measures taken and minor events, Anubis could pick out the important points...

The cave's Overseers came, and even many from beyond, together. Cassiopeia's been closed off. Rebels are in the tunnels, in the walls. They are breaking in. I have never seen the Overseers this focused. There is an intensity of purpose to them--why come here?

...

They say there is a chance the prisoners will join the rebellion. Apparently many lives have already been lost. It is not deemed a risk they want to take. We are to begin a purge. They will start in block A, and move north from there...

...

...the cracking of the chrysalises. It is a heavy chore and already they are growing tired. Despite their numbers, despite the cell doors, there are injuries. To force one into its gemstone, and then break through and kill it beyond, is no easy task. They fight hard, and a stray strike here and there adds up. And there is a clamor outside. The Overseer they've left on watch is anxious, I'm sure of it...

...

They were stopped at the Pit. I warned them it would not be easy. There are so many loose in there, left to their own devices. Even the doctor has trouble when he needs a subject. They will not accept extinction without a fight. I almost respect them for it. The Overseers have agreed it would be suicide to press further, and have turned back...

...

We are trapped. Some of the rebels have made it to the gates. The Overseers who remain are collapsing the Prison exit, and hoping we can simply sleep until this has passed. Enemies on one side, and desperate prisoners on the other...

The book ends here. There's no neat chrysalis behind the table; no indication of what might have happened to the inscriber of these words. Instead, there's only dust, darkness, and the remains of ancient crumbled stone in the cells beyond--cells whose doors have long since rusted away.

@Anubis

He took some time to read the book, as much time as he could before his little torchlight went out and then lit another, careful not to set the pages ablaze. He flipped through the logs for a time, reading with interest the many infractions the gembound of ancient times put against those thrown in these cells. As he suspected, this was most certainly a prison once upon a time. With a very grim history, as evidenced by the many cisterns he'd discovered and the gruesome imagery he'd seen in his hindsights.

After a while he did, indeed, grow bored and flipped further until he reached what were essentially journal entries. Rebels. Overseers. Purge. The Pit. Was that the place where something had chased him? Where he had been forced to retreat, too alone in the dark to want to risk whatever it was hiding deep within.

His eyes went foggy as he wondered. What had that been? An ancient gembound still hiding deep within its eternal prison? Still expecting the Overseers to come and purge it from its nest, that it had defended for hundreds of cycles? Maybe thousands? Millions?

Well, that had been interesting. He flipped the logbook closed and sat silent, considering for a moment. It was time to see what was hiding deep in the Pit.

The plan was already forming in his head. There was only a couple of sticks remaining, the last of his lightsources finally going out without any magic to back it. He tried again, but again, the magic slipped and failed him.

Well, he didn't need the light right this second. So he stood and turned, leaving the book in his "lab" and followed the faintly illuminated tunnel back to the surface, muscle memory leading him where vision failed. He eventually stepped out, blinking rapidly in the bloom of vision for a moment, before he briskly walked towards the walls where he had noted seeing a number of bats flying around.

He approached, crouching as he got closer, trying not to be seen by the rather shy species of Lessers, but unfortunately his paw caught an errant pebble and the flying pitch rats he was trying to get close to were quickly alerted. A cry went up and they lifted off, fluttering away.

Frustrated, he rose up stiffly, a frown narrowing his eyes.

He watched them for a while, where they roosted up the walls a way and decided to forgo stealth. They were too far up now to simply sneak up.

He got a little closer, careful not to alarm them too much, and then, in a burst of movement and spellcraft, golden wings burst from his back as ethereal armor wrapped around his body. He pushed off from the ground, the wings thrusting him into the air. He felt his stomach drop at the suddenness of the flight, not quite a sensation he was used to yet, and darted straight up towards the flying pitch rats, who, as soon as they saw him approaching, began to scatter in fear.

But he didn't need all of them. Just one.

One that had been holding onto the side of the wall became his immediate target, as it had to take the time to lift off again and gain momentum, trying to desperately escape. He had plenty of time to dart its way and get close enough before it could fly away with its brethren.

A surge of magic rattled Anubis's body, almost knocking him out of the air, lancing towards the Lesser Gembound and spearing right into its mind, where Anubis took seat. His magic changed it, opened its awareness, linked them together. And suddenly it wasn't trying to flee, shocked into sudden obedience to stay, as Anubis slowed, once the spell had completed. He was panting from the effort it took to cast, but looking up and down the specimen he'd acquired. Not bad - it would be swift enough, and it had a lot of eyes, and the feet would be able to carry a torch.

"Come," he commanded, mentally and verbally to his new familiar. It followed him as he soared back to the ground.

As they came down to a rest before the prison, Anubis quickly scavenged up more material for torches, picking out a thick, sturdy stick that would suit his needs. The flying pitch rat landed next to him, curious nose twitching as it watched him drop the stick and take out the lighter that hung around his neck. With careful paws, he clicked the flame alight and sent the magic through the device. This time, it took and the torch blazed to life, magically empowered to burn forever.

Anubis turned to the pitch rat and nodded to the torch. "Go on, take it. You'll be my eyes." He mentally pathed the way through the prison into the bat's mind. He assured it that he would lead it through from his place here. If it ran into a leopard, or any of the children trapped in there, it would pay them no mind. They were not important right now.

The bat was unsure at first, but Anubis's will was stronger then the Lesser's fear, and after a short mental battle, it picked up the torch in one of its claws and took off into the prison.

Anubis remained just outside the entrance and sat himself down, closing his eyes to focus on the flying pitch rat's senses, leading it through the prison to where he remembered the Pit to be. Straight down. When the path splits, go left. Go for a while. Pass the first split. Pass the right hallway. Take the next left. There you are. Go in, look around. See what you can. He watched, peered through the bat's eyes, as it made its way, torch in its claws, into the Pit.

The bat saw through many eyes. It also saw, as it plunged into pitch darkness that swept any available light bar its fire away, with the faintest ping of sonar. It wasn't as strong as that used by the smaller, big-eared bats, but its ability to navigate was enhanced by this. It would be perhaps disorienting for Anubis, to suddenly perceive the world in this way: like a second sight, a cascade of sensory information dictating shapes and empty spaces, material substances and even damp.

The new familiar had to pause to crawl. It was trusting its new partner, sensing Anubis's urgency and not understanding it to be selfish. It didn't know that its new 'friend' might care very little if it perished, here; and that somewhat frightened wariness had to be bolstered by that trust. So down it went, shifting the torch to its teeth, ears pinning as it wriggled through the same space beneath shattered and toppled portions of dusty stone that had partially blocked the main passageway.

The sonar reached where light could not. Ahead it sensed an empty space, and to the right, too, a gap in the wall to indicate another. The faintest sound of running water--the lightest of trickling--reached its ears from both of these locations. But Anubis was directing it to its left: southward, down a narrow passage half the width of the main tunnel, straight and dark.

There was a smell here. A rancid odor, dusty still but almost musky: something alive, and recent. The Pitch Rat hesitated as it reached the end of this passage.

The smell ahead was danger, wrought electric through every instinct it possessed, screaming for it to flee. The light it carried made it a target; though it was now airborne, it was hesitating to leave the tunnel, keeping it low to the ground. Its next step would need to be urged--or forced--by Anubis, one way or another, unless that step was to turn tail and flee. The scent wasn't the only reason for that, either.

Sensations continued their two-way flow, distracting to the creature perhaps but enlightening to the jackal. The space ahead was... massive. Despite the name, it was not particularly sunken; worn away, maybe, the footsteps of hundreds or thousands having eroded it some. But it wasn't a hole. It was pitch black, the firelight suddenly seeming pitiful as the walls behind fell away, curving away to either side, and upward. The bat's sound sensitivity could not even find the other side, so huge was the space: like a cave unto itself, perhaps hundreds of yards across. It felt like a dome, cut in half; like the walls arching upward would eventually meet, beyond sight or sonar's reach.

That wasn't the worrying part.

The worrying part was the something that shifted in the dark, beyond the firelight; a huge shape that had turned, as if noting the new arrival, the little sparking ember alone in the black.

@Anubis

The sonar offered Anubis a sense of scale that he hadn't been able to achieve before, and he understood how massive this space was. He frowned. What was the purpose of it, then? To let the most dangerous beings roam around and kill each other? To cage a particularly large, violent being? He wanted to know - no, needed to know.

He could sense the bat's hesitation and pressed against its mind, like a touch to the shoulder, or a flank against a flank, sending words of comfort, feelings of peace. Keep going. It's okay. I won't let you get hurt." An obvious lie to anyone outside of a Lesser's mind, but perhaps enough to get the bat to continue farther in. Fly up, give yourself the best chance. It is safer in the air then on the ground. Try to catch a glimpse of what it is. What is in there.

Anubis continued to watch, feeling no fear from his place of safety outside of the prison. And he pressed this lack of fear into his familiar. But to himself, he did not care what happened to it. If it caught even a glimpse of the creature in its dying moments, then it would all be worthwhile.