Talis left to venture through the tunnels, leaving two skeletons to their company. Natus piled lessons and conclusions onto Naives’ straining mind. Naive succeeded in paying attention to half the lessons, needing only the occasional reminder. Don’t walk into mouths. Determine what something is doing before they’ve done it. Let’s move your coffin. Are you listening?

“Are you listening? Naive, did you stop listening again?”

Natus’ voice held more inflection than usual. Naive identified it as “the voice Natus uses when i’m not listening”.

“I was listening, I just wasn’t thinking about what you said.”

“Only a coffin’s owner can open or move it, to anyone else it's far too heavy. Lets go.”

Natus shot up and stomped off towards the plateau. Naive followed after, trotting to keep up with the fast pace. It wondered where they were moving the coffin to. Naive remembered some recent advice. It looked around, trying to find a solution in the placements of the coffins that covered the cavern. Having failing that, it used the other method at its disposal. Asking Natus.

“Where are we moving the coffin?”

Natus, stopped and looked back at Naive, levelling a gaze for a moment before answering.

“Off the plateau. Come, walk beside me.”

Naive caught up and now, walking together, the two walked up the plateau. Naive walked up to its place of beginning and regeneration, assumed a stance and pushed it off the back. As if on cue, Naive turned to Natus as the coffin crashed into the ground and asked:

“What now?”

Natus looked at the practical skeleton in quiet. Moments passed, minutes, then many more before it answered.

“Now you choose a path and go on it.”

Naive looked out from the vantage point, seeking out the many tunnel entrances that littered the edge of the cavern. Its eyes caught on the closest opening before guiding its legs to the tunnels edge. Onwards and upwards, the skeleton clambered up the steep tunnel.

Foot over the ledge of the slope, Naive stepped into a cavern much smaller than expected. A hallway with an exit on either side, the way ahead interrupted by a sconce placed directly in the center of the path. Atop the sconce was a thing most bizarre. Its main body jumped about, letting loose tendrils of orange above. The tendrils danced wildly, its form ethereal for a moment and fully visible the next. Naive stared fascinated into the flickering mass, failing to discern a motive to its movements. Pulling its eye sockets from the sconce, the skeleton directed its gaze back to the room itself. Distant from the sconce all looked normal, the walls their familiar grey and brown color. There was a soft edge drawn along the ground that raised up to the walls and disappeared near the sconce, an edge that marked a change. Past this line, color seemed to changed, turning more and more red. This line of change moved as one with the strange flickering creature, erratically marking the room with its colors. Naive wondered if the room was a part of the creatures body and if walking in would get the skeleton eaten again.

Failing to determine a motive and unable to find an answer, Naive breached the line, stepping into the red and met a few surprises. First of which was nothing that happened to the skeleton. No pressure, no cloying air. The second surprise was that a dark figure appeared at Naives feet. A pair of legs on the ground sprouted from the bottom of Naives own. Confused, it introduced itself.

“Call me Naive. What’s your name?”

Naive figured that the floor skeleton didn’t have a name, which Naive found odd. Did it not read its name plate? If the floor legs didn’t have a name then Naive would just have to kill it and give it one. As Naive took another step forwards, so too did the floor bound counterpart, revealing a normal, if dimensionally stunted, skeleton. Naive’s line of thought shattered. The standing skeleton stepped forward, getting copied in time once again. A new conclusion was formed: the floor skeleton belongs to Naive.

Mystery solved, Naive focused its attention on the other subject of confusion. The sconce and its dancing inhabitant hadn’t reacted to Naive in any way, continuing as it always had. As Naive began to grow near, a strange feeling pressed into its bones. It brought discomfort, faint at first, the feeling burrowing from the surface to the depths of Naive’s bones. The skeleton was close enough now that the dance covered its vision. The fascination returned as it gazed into the flickering form. What would Natus be able to tell about this strange thing? It was only when Naive reached up a hand to grasp the flicker that it got interrupted.

Naive fell hard, its skull meeting the floor with a hollow clonk. Pushing itself up off the floor Naive noticed that it was no longer attached to its darker self. The dark floor skeleton swept an arm out, hitting Naive where foot met ground, threatening to trip it again. Naive, musterings its dexterity, narrowly managed to land on its hands. Knowing climbing up to its feet would be all in vain after getting kicked to the floor again, Naive invented a new technique. Shuffling backwards on its hands and knees, Naive escaped the floor skeletons clutches.

Now out of danger, Naive reassessed the situation. The dark skeleton stayed where it was, placed between Naive and the sconce. Still intending to show Natus the thing that flickers, Naive resolved to get past the floor skeleton. Having felt quicker than ever before on its hands and knees, Naive got back down and scuttled as fast as it could. Confident it was too quick to be tripped, the racing skeleton got slapped in the knee when it met the ground, sending Naive sprawling, the weight of 206 bones crashing into the sconce and bringing them both into the ground

The fall of the sconce wrought the death of the flicker and the room went dark once more. Naive, after walking to test for the skeletal tripping hazard, confirmed both its company to be dead. It came up with names and allotted them to memory. Flicker and Trip.

With no more reason to remain in this cavern, Naive continued into the next tunnel.