Day 2,176

Lord only knows what they faced that made them remove the floor to their buildings, leaving dozens of walkways and living quarters suspended over the thousand foot drop that they'd set their civilisation above. Between that and the countless tonnes of rock above them, the subterranean citadel was quite the sight.

All the laser image mapping in the world could never quite capture the sheer scale of it all, how everything seemed to sway to an unfelt breeze and how it all still stood after innumerable untouched centuries. We were so eager to see and to understand it all that we never bothered to check the chasm itself.

Why would we potentially waste our time at the bottom of a great pit when a long-gone people had carved gargantuan stalactites into reverse skyscrapers and seemingly left all their worldly possession inside all these years. It was looking like the greatest archeological find since Tutankhamun's tomb.

Everything was looking up, everyone was looking up... everything was looking up. The shadows were more intense than we'd initially anticipated and the air was stale and clammy, especially as the network of vents they once used had long since collapsed as the world shifted.

We briefly considered resorting to oxygen tanks but the walkways were frailer than they looked and we ended up travelling with little more than climbing gear and cameras. Gods above we were vulnerable to begin with and we just kept making ourselves more and more vulnerable right until the end.

I was in the remains of a nursery when the first strike occurred, safely obscured by dozens of cradles all hanging in various stages of collapse. At the far end was what appeared to be an adult sized cradle, perhaps meant for a guardian, which I climbed into when the screaming began and remained in until it died down and the shadows seemed to recede.

You have no idea how glad I was to see a few others had survived as well but they'd all sustained similar looking insect bites all along their legs. About two hours later we encountered what is now known as the second strike, one that I alone survived.

We're all holding our breath and waiting for the third strike, the one that will kill me and finally seal the mission's fate as a complete and utter failure. I feel fine, I truly do. Then again so did all those poor souls involved in the second strike.

Whatever the third strike is, I hope it's quick.