Amanda glanced nervously aside. “It ain’t that limited.”
“But it’s still limited,” Isaiah repeated. “It finally found a way to get through these titanium vaults, but I bet it pays a price.” He took a moment. “It’s like beating your head against a wall. You can do it but it’s gonna cost you. Same with this thing.”
Amanda nodded, finding herself also gazing around at absolutely nothing. “And if we do see blood?”
“Then it’s probably right beside us. Or in front of us. Or behind us. Either way, it’s not gonna be pretty.”
“Can’t you say anything good?”
Isaiah stopped and turned into her, wrapping his arms gently over her shoulders. He stared down. “We’re not dead, yet.”
She tilted her head, then buried her face into his chest.
“Oh, come on,” Isaiah pushed back her bangs. “It’s not that bad, honey. If there’s a way in, there’s a way out. We just have to find it.”
“You make it sound simple,” she murmured. “But I’m not an idiot, Isaiah.” She leaned back, gazing up. “And I know this. If these people are no longer in control of their secrets, they’ll make sure that everything down here stays buried till the end of time.” She blinked, as if remembering. “Did you ever read the old Edgar Allen Poe short story, ‘The House of Usher’? It wasn’t actually a book.”
“I’ve read it.”
“Remember how Usher’s sister was alive in her grave and she had to claw her way out of that coffin? Or tomb? Or whatever it was?” She gazed along the walls. “That’s how I feel right now. I feel like we’re covered in blood wandering the halls of some cursed mansion. Or clawing our way out of a grave.”
Isaiah said nothing as Amanda continued, “Do you remember how his sister suddenly appeared at Usher’s library door, all bloody and torn up just before the place got nuked by the Wrath of God?”
Isaiah laughed, “I didn’t know you had a photographic memory.”
“A story about a young girl being buried alive makes a very strong impression on a young girl. But what I’m saying is that they have put a hundred billion dollars into this place to make sure nobody ever emerges in the case of a worst-possible scenario. And this is a worst possible scenario. I mean, good God, this is even worse than ‘The House of Usher’ with a dead girl roaming the halls.”
“She wasn’t actually dead.”
“She was close enough!” Amanda glanced along the walls. “What I’m trying to say is that I don’t think there’s any way out of here because these people will nuke this place themselves before they let their secrets get out. And I want you to know it’s okay. I think you did a really great job in a very bad situation.” She paused. “And if I have to trust my life to anybody, I’ll trust my life to you.”
With a faint smile, Isaiah asked, “Did you tell me the truth earlier?”
“About what?”
“You’d really work for free?”
Amanda laughed, “Do you have full medical?”
“I’ll get it.”
“What about visual and dental?”
“I’ll get that, too.”
“And equal profit sharing? Just you and me? Faith in each other?”
“I’m game if you are.”
She smiled. “We’ll see.”
***
Roy had reached the first vault.
It was shut like an anvil and the vaguest thought of how that animal could knock this barrier to the ground was simply stultifying. Roy didn’t even try and imagine what else it might be able to do. This was bad enough.
He had left his vest, his arsenal of grenades, his rifle—everything but the .45 caliber pistol—in the Observation Room. And he wasn’t even sure why he’d brought his sidearm but, standing in the vault like an Olympic runner set to begin a race, he didn’t care. He only knew something in him didn’t want to die without putting up some kind of fight, however futile.
For a split-second Roy had a hideous vision of some Unnamable It stalking ’round the far corner of the world laughing with its empty skull sockets glowing red and a single skeletal hand holding a dagger dripping with blood whispering his name …
Roy muttered, “You guys better be ready to haul ass.” He keyed the mic. “Okay, Janet, open the first vault and watch me closely. Open the vaults one by one as I get to them. And close the last vault as I pass through it. Don’t let that thing come up behind me.”
The vault opened with a steady but slow speed and Roy rolled under the base before it was two feet above the floor and then he was running but not full out. He knew he had a few hundred yards before reaching the next barrier and an unequal distance to each wall before he reached the civilians; he paced himself at what he knew he could maintain and not much more because he didn’t fail to remember that it was a long way down there and a long way back. And he wasn’t about to lock up before he made it back.
He covered the distance, not even bothering to scan connecting corridors for dead bodies or living creatures. He knew that almost all maintenance personnel had abandoned this place at the first magenta alarm and anyone that stayed behind was dead. In fact, the only reason he involuntarily glanced into connecting tunnels at all was because he was horrified that he might see the gigantic bestial thing loping toward him, claws clutching …
Roy estimated he would get off a few shots, but the end would be the same.
The second vault was open when he reached it and he kept his stride to the third vault and then …
Roy stopped in a single stride and thumbed back the hammer of the .45 to take a dead aim. He didn’t shout a warning.
Isaiah and Amanda Deker stared at him in open shock.
Roy waved sharply. “Come on!”
No questions.
Isaiah reached Roy easily even after he snatched up the woman, who was gasping and clutching her chest. Roy sternly pointed up the corridor.
“Go as fast as you can!” he demanded.
Roy turned and was running, half-expecting the man to fall back a stride but the man matched his pace as if the woman were weightless. With every glance over his shoulder Roy confirmed that the man still held her tight in his arms, almost flush against him in every way, her arms folded across her chest, her face flat against his chest.
“Keep running!” the man shouted.
Roy needed no encouragement; he increased his pace to all he could maintain for the remaining distance and when they cleared the last vault to the Observation Room the man had only fallen back a dozen paces. Then, when the two of them cleared the portal, Roy raised the radio again, “Lock the vaults! Lock the vaults! Lock the vaults!”
Immediately the closest vault slid from the ceiling and three seconds later it shut with the sound of a vacuum. Then, and only then, did Roy allow himself a moment. He fell back against the wall and bent, hands on knees, heaving air. He wiped sweat from his face and could not have cared less about the identities of the man and woman. His chest was a blast furnace, each breath boiling in his throat. He dimly realized he had his hand on the .45 but there was no sensation.
He knew he was alive although he only knew that because he could see that he was still standing. Nothing in his body—or, rather, no feeling confirmed it. Finally Roy managed to gasp, “How … how the hell did you guys get in here?”
The man slowly settled the woman to her feet as she leaned into him. “We were shanghaied.” He took a moment. “They were going to sacrifice us to those things.”
“How’d you know there’s two of them?”
“We ran into one of them. We saw evidence of the other one.” The man named Isaiah gazed across the ceiling. “What’s the body count down here?”
“There’s ten or so alive in the control room. I’d guess that anyone who didn’t get out of here before the shutdown is dead. And we’re next if we don’t hit the road.” He
raised the radio. “Janet? Do you copy?”
The response was instant: “Great job! I watched every step! I think you covered that last half-mile in, like, three minutes! That’s gotta be some kind of record!”
“Tell Tanto not to shoot the first thing he sees coming down this hall because it’s gonna be me. We’re headed your way.” Roy took a deep breath. “Can you guys go a little further?”
“Lead the way,” said the man.
“What’s your name, anyway?”
“Isaiah. This is Amanda.”
Roy gasped, “Yeah, I thought so. Just wanted to make sure.” He glanced at Amanda. “Nice to meet you.”
“Hi,” said Amanda.
“We just have a little ways to go, guys. Then we got food and water for you. Sure you can make it? We can take a break if you need one.”
“I can make it,” gasped Amanda.
The man nodded.
Roy spoke into the mic, “Janet? Open the doors one by one and keep everything behind us on a monitor. Make sure that thing doesn’t sneak up on us.”
Isaiah gazed down at Amanda. “You sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
With an irritated groan Roy pushed off the wall and began walking down the hall with a faint wave. “Cheer up, guys. A couple hundred yards and you can rest.” He inhaled deeply. “We’re hoping to get out of here.”
“Thank God,” whispered Amanda.
Isaiah glanced back at the vault.
“That vault won’t hold it,” he stated.
“We know,” said Roy.
“So what’s the plan?”
Head bowed, Roy simply shuffled forward. His voice, when it reached back, seemed weak and defeated. “Hell, I just said we’re hoping to get out of here. And hope ain’t nothing like a plan.”
***
As Isaiah rested, head bowed, on a desk, Amanda began with rapid-fire questions after she drank a bottle of water. Then she pointed to a monitor focused on the elevator.
“I know that guy!” She leaped forward. “Isaiah! Come over here and look at this monitor! That’s Tony and the guards! And Tony’s still got your Honjo Masamune! And a machinegun!”
Tanto lifted his head. “The Honjo Masamune? The demon sword?”
“Yeah,” Amanda replied with a smile. “It’s Isaiah’s sword.” She peered closer. “Why don’t they leave? Why don’t they go up to the surface?”
“Because all the elevators are on lockdown,” said Janet. “And until I decide to take this place off lockdown, nobody’s going anywhere. Not us. Not the scientists. Not the guards. And not those things.”
Amanda stared before she leaned back in the chair, one foot hoisted. Her voice, when she spoke, was hoarse and coarse. “Yeah. I got it. You’re not going to unlock this place until those things are dead.”
“Good and dead,” elaborated Tanto.
Janet didn’t reply as Amanda stated without hesitation, “I think Isaiah and I have a right to know exactly what those things are.” She paused. “We’ve already been introduced to them. And my sister is probably dead because of one, or both, of them. We have a right to be here and we have a right to know some things.”
Janet asked, “My personal opinion? They’re demons.”
“That’s what I think, too,” Amanda muttered. “Oh, happy days.”
“I’m sorry about your sister,” offered Tanto with what seemed like true empathy. “I lost a couple of brothers to them, too.”
Amanda turned, “May I ask your name?”
“Tanto.”
“Thanks, Tanto. I’m Amanda. This is Isaiah.”
“Yeah,” he nodded. “We got briefed on you guys. I was afraid you’d work your way down here and get involved in this fiasco. But, as it turns out, it’s all hands on deck, anyway. We need all the help we can get.”
A very tired smile cracked Amanda’s face.
“On a more somber note,” Tanto continued, “some of us think they’re demonic but we don’t know. All I know for sure is they’re the most dangerous things I’ve ever seen. And I thought I’d seen it all.”
“I’m Major Roy Burris,” said the commando who met them in the corridor. “I’m glad you guys survived this long but you need to prepare yourselves. We’re here to destroy those things, so this ain’t over by a damn side. Still, if there’s a way out of here, we need to find it. And after we kill those things, we’ll use it.”
“And if we can’t kill them?” asked Amanda.
Roy focused on her. “Then we have a bomb big enough to bury this place for the next ten thousand years.” He frowned. “And nobody goes home.”
Silence.
“What unit are you guys?” asked Isaiah.
“Delta,” said Roy.
“Thanks for your help, major.”
“Just call me Roy. We were sent here to destroy the collider but that plan went the way of all flesh right off the bat.”
“Who briefed you on us?” asked Isaiah.
Jackman waved. “I did. I’m General Atol Jackman.”
“That’s four whole stars,” commented Tanto.
Jackman laughed. “Your file came from the White House. Don’t ask me where they got it.”
“Thanks, general,” Isaiah nodded. “Yeah, we’ve come to understand that the only secret here is this place itself.”
“It ain’t a secret no more,” muttered Jackman. “If all the survivors are running around topside screaming about being chased by monsters down here, the word is out. I wouldn’t doubt that the Swiss military has already set up a perimeter.”
“We were hoping you guys wouldn’t show up,” Roy stated. “But then we saw you on a monitor and decided we couldn’t let you die, so we took a chance. Went after you.”
“You guys risked your lives to save us,” said Amanda.
Roy stared in his coffee cup. “Ah, if I can help it, I ain’t gonna let nobody get killed by those things. Wouldn’t be decent.”
“Thank you, major.”
Roy simply nodded.
Janet said blankly, “Well, no worries. We’re temporarily safe. But I think one of those things heard something and came after you guys. I saw a table get tossed aside in a conference room about ten miles down the tunnel. But it hasn’t registered since then. Or not that I’m aware of. It’s not like I can actually see them.” She blew out a hard breath. “My best guess is that they’re trying to access an electrical tunnel or crawl space or maybe a maintenance walkway. Something that will allow them to bypass the vaults.”
Isaiah commented, “These things know more than you think.”
Roy turned. “Why do you say that?”
“It’s an intelligent entity,” Isaiah said without hesitation. “What it really wants is to access this control room. It’s far more intelligent than man, so it should be able to solve the problems you haven’t been able to solve in no time. And you’ve already hooked up the collider with enough power to make its plan work.” He paused. “It’s looking for this room. And when it finds this place, it’s going to carry out its orders.”
Roy frowned, “Orders?”
“Both of these entities are soldiers,” said Isaiah. “In their dimension they have majors, colonels, generals. About the same as our world. And then there’s a king. And, ultimately, that’s who gave them their marching orders.”
“How do you know this?” asked Janet.
Isaiah shrugged, “Well, so far, everything in Jewish legend has turned out to be true. So if I’m right, that thing is what we would instinctively call a demon. Now, ‘demon’ is just a convenient word. In reality, it’s just a creature from another dimension. But it’s a creature with a far different nature. It’s a creature of chaos and cruelty and it has its own obscene reasons for why it does things. But if Jewish legend is right, then these things have a hierarchy, and
I think these two are soldiers. That’s why I think they’re gonna try and use that portal to bring the rest of their army into this dimension.”
Roy was silent, then, “What, exactly, is their big plan once they get here?”
“My best guess is that they want to turn this planet into a slave colony. And once they get a big enough army, they’ll attack who they’ve been waiting to attack for millions of years. But they’ll have to get here and get organized first.”
“Organized?” asked Roy. “To attack who?”
Isaiah didn’t blink.
“God.”
***
The conversation took the wind out of the room. Everyone spent a good five minutes simply staring at walls or computer screens or their feet. Then Janet asked, “How do you know all this? I mean, I’m not an idiot. I’ve read up on this stuff. But you sound like some kind of rabbi and I’m not absolutely convinced this is demonic. First, I’m formally a scientist, so I like proof. And I know that there are at least eleven dimensions and these creatures could have come from any of them. So there’s no empirical evidence that they come from what Christian mythology calls Hell. They could be from Mars. They could be from a dimension in one of my fingernails.”
“For practical purposes, and considering our current situation, it makes no difference where they come from,” Isaiah answered. “We know they’re physically and intellectually superior. And I wouldn’t doubt that they’re superior to us in warfare. So any thoughts you harbor of fighting them with conventional weapons is more than likely doomed. You might wound or kill a few million of them but I think there’s billions. There’s nine billion people on the Earth. Why can’t there be nine billion in their dimension? So they’ll eventually overrun and enslave us and no wall can stop them.” He frowned. “You think these two expendable soldiers are dangerous? Let me educate you. These two are probably peons compared to their master. And when he gets here, it’s over. There’s only one power in any dimension strong enough to stop him. And, unfortunately, that power isn’t here to take care of this.”
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