Two seconds later and from what seemed like far underground I could hear Charon’s voice, “It’s not what I thought; I can’t get back out!”
“Empty all the water in your boots; don’t leave a drop,” shouted Hilts as he and Larry began pouring water from their own boots down the hole.
“Charon’s too?” I asked as I lifted one of them up to pour. “Won’t he need this water to get back to the Styx?”
The water from Hilts’ and Larry’s boots had slowed the closing of the portal. Charon’s voice sounded much closer. Behind us the town had suddenly changed into a cardboard cutout of a town. Every feature had been replicated in exact scale but in cardboard.
