by Ike Hamill
“Crude? Out here with these hills, we’ll be lucky if we pick them up at ten miles. Even then, we won’t know if it’s Merle, or someone’s personal vehicle catching up with us,” Mike said.
Robby nodded and agreed. He pressed the gas pedal down a little harder.
From the back, Sariah asked, “Stay in touch with whom?”
“Mostly his mother, I gather,” Mike said.
“Did anyone see Amy Lynne tonight?”
“She must be at the lake,” Mike said.
“And if Merle is off wandering around, then she won’t know of the emergency,” Sariah said.
“Shit,” Robby whispered under his breath.
Chapter 53: Liam
“What the hell would a ghost want to hang around this place for?” Jackson asked.
Merle looked down at the floor, unable to look his father in the eye.
“Hold on,” Liam said, trying to intervene. “We just hit a bunch of buttons for water and light and everything. I’m sure that the noise we heard was just some machine warming up, right? Did anyone hear which door the sound came from?”
Both Jackson and Merle raised their hands to point at the same door.
“Good,” Liam said. “Let’s go check it out.”
“Wait,” Jackson said. “That’s not the mission. We’re supposed to find the place and then get back so we can tell everyone else how to get here.”
“There are a couple of problems with that,” Liam said. “First, we don’t know if it’s safe until we find out what made that noise.”
At the frightened look on Merle’s face, Liam put up his hands and quickly said, “Not that I think it’s anything harmful, just that we should know. Second, we can’t expect all the people and supplies to be loaded into that trapdoor shaft back there. We have to get to the exit and find a way to keep it open. Merle, you said we would be able to get supplies in through the exit, right?”
“Yeah, but it won’t stay open. Someone has to stay inside to trigger it.”
“Not a problem,” Liam said. He was eager to find some excuse to stay inside. So far, he had seen no reason that he would ever want to leave the bunker again. “So, we keep going and then call the others when we find the exit, agreed?”
Merle nodded after a quick glance around for ghosts, spirits, demons, poltergeists, manifestations, or whatever else that Jackson had put into his head when he was a kid.
“Wait,” Jackson said. “You guys go on and I’ll go back.”
“Why?” Merle asked. His question, once it left his mouth, made him blush a little.
“It’s the bridge,” Jackson said. “If they get close, they’re still not going to have any idea how to get across to us. I have to tell them to go east to that bridge.”
“The one we jumped?” Liam asked. “You’re crazy if you think that anyone else is going to do that.”
“You had your eyes closed,” Jackson said. He dug around in his bag and pulled out a radio. “It was barely anything. You guys head for the exit and call me on this when you get there. I’ll take the truck to the other side of the river and try to catch the others before they get too far north. Otherwise, they’re going to get to the river and assume they have to go west.”
Merle took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“The two of you will be fine,” Jackson said.
“And you?” Merle asked his father.
“I know the way out. It’s through there, follow the twisty hall, back out to the ambush room, and then up the ramp and climb the shaft. Easy peasy.”
“It’s through that door,” Liam said, pointing. Merle was pointing at the same door.
Jackson shrugged. “Close enough. I’ll find it.” He started off toward the door that Liam was pointing at.
“Dad?” Merle asked.
Jackson turned around.
“You need these?” Merle asked, holding out the keys to the giant truck.
Jackson returned for them, plucking them from his son’s hand. “It will speed things up a little, I suppose.”
He was gone with a grin.
Liam turned back toward the door that the sound had come from.
“Your choice, find the noise or find the exit?”
“I think they’re behind the same door,” Merle said.
The door slid to the side instead of swinging. Liam found that it moved at the slightest touch. As he slid it out of the way, Merle was pressed close behind him, breathing heavy as he looked over Liam’s shoulder. For all the drama of the reveal, the hall looked perfectly normal. It was just narrow enough that Liam could have trailed his fingers down both walls and touched both. He didn’t though—he kept his arms tight at his sides as he and Merle started down. The walls were unbroken by other doors. The ceiling had the same light panels that the control room had. They gave off a silent, fuzzy light that Merle claimed was created chemically.
As soon as they were through the doorway, he turned at a noise.
The door was quietly sliding its way closed behind them.
“Maybe that’s what we heard?” Liam asked. “That mechanism was waking up?”
Merle shook his head slowly and pointed down the hall.
“It came from that way,” Merle said.
“How do you know?”
“That’s how it happened last time.”
“So you remember this passage? Is this the way toward the exit?”
“Maybe. It changes every time.”
Liam stopped and turned to face Merle.
“The passage changes where it goes?”
Merle nodded.
“What do you mean by that?”
“It’s technology, or something,” Merle said. “They probably did it so that nobody would have any idea of how to get to them in case an invasion made it past the ambush room.”
Liam shook his head. “I’m not understanding what you’re saying though. Does the passage shift or something? Does a door open that wasn’t there before? How does it work?”
Merle only shrugged.
Liam sighed. “Well, what was at the end of this hall last time? Do you remember?”
“Yeah. This one went to what I call dining area one.”
“Okay.”
Liam led the way. He tried to improve his posture and walk with a confidence that he didn’t feel. Merle kept up with him. At the end of the hall, it took a jog to the right and ended at another one of the sliding doors. Liam put his hand out to push it aside.
Again, at his touch, the door moved easily. Above them, the lights warmed up and began to illuminate the room. The room was the biggest they had seen. Around the perimeter, the ceilings were fairly low—only about seven feet or so, Liam guessed—but in the center, the ceiling was vaulted and colored light blue. It gave the feeling almost like they had a view of the clear sky. Under that vaulted section, circular tables were surrounded by chairs. The tables had a fake woodgrain pattern and the chairs had padding on the seats and backs. It gave the room the look of an office cafeteria on one of the shows that Liam liked to watch on DVD.
“There must be a kitchen here somewhere?” Liam asked. He started to thread his way between the tables.
He glanced up at the fake sky as he passed underneath. The effect was well done. The way it was lit, his eyes didn’t find the surface of the ceiling. It looked like it went up to infinity. Liam would have preferred it if it had been a little less convincing.
“I don’t know,” Merle said. “This is flipped around since the last time I was here. The entrance was on the other side and all these tables were facing the other way.”
“How could they be facing the other way? They’re round.”
“You see how the wood grain goes this way,” Merle said, gesturing at the tables. “Last time, they went that way.”
Liam stopped and turned toward Merle again, giving the young man a frown.
He opened his mouth to say something and realized that he didn’t know exactly what to say. There was no point in cal
ling Merle a liar. There was no reason to question why Merle would have noticed the grain of the tables, or why he would make up a story about the direction that it faced.
“Which was is the exit, if you had to guess?” Liam asked.
“Probably over there?” Merle pointed in a direction that didn’t make sense to Liam. The wall had an arch and another passage. If they went that way, they would essentially have to be heading back toward the control room. If the hall was straight, and it looked like it was, then he could imagine it coming to one of the other doors of the control room.
He started to say that, but three things happened at the same time and he didn’t get the chance.
First, the door from the hall—the one that they had come through—started to close. This wasn’t alarming. The other door had shut on its own as well. This door had simply taken longer to respond.
The second thing was odd. Behind him, Liam heard a bell go off. It almost sounded like one of those desk bells that they kept on the hotel check-in counter in one of the other shows he liked to watch.
The third thing defied explanation. A couple of tables away from Liam, two of the chairs tilted back and then fell to the floor before they skidded to a stop.
Merle moved closer to Liam, crowding into his space.
“Relax,” Liam said. “It was probably wind created by a pressure change from the door closing or something.”
It was the first thing that popped into his mind and he said even though it didn’t make any sense at all. He hadn’t felt any wind, and none of the other chairs had been affected. Liam didn’t know why he felt the need to try to explain it at all.
“Bullshit,” Merle said.
“Yeah. You’re right.”
Together, they backed away from the overturned chairs. Liam ran into one of the other tables. It made a terrible sound as it chattered across the smooth floor. He felt Merle stiffen next to him, but he didn’t tell Merle to calm down this time. He had lost his credibility and it wouldn’t do any good.
Instead, Liam turned so he could find his way through the grid of tables and he took Merle’s arm to guide him. Together, they kept an eye on the whole room as they moved toward the archway. Merle claimed it led toward the exit. Liam didn’t understand how that could be true, but he didn’t have a better idea.
They were almost to the archway when another chair began to lean back. They slowed to watch it as it balanced on the back legs. When it finally began to topple over, they hurried their step. Liam was practically running as they passed under the archway. In the hall, they both turned to run.
Around the first corner, they stopped and pressed themselves back against the wall.
“That was close,” Merle said.
“Forget about that,” Liam said. “You think this is the right way?”
Merle looked down the hall, considering. At the far end, maybe about thirty paces down, the hall took another left. That would bring them back toward the cafeteria, although the room hadn’t been that wide. Maybe it would lead them back to the kitchen that they hadn’t seen. This hall was different from the other one they had seen because it had doors on either side. Each door was flush with the wall and none had a handle.
“I don’t know,” Merle said. “Probably? I guess? Everything is a mirror image from the last time I saw it. These should be living quarters on either side. If I’m right, they’re the quarters for the officers. I pulled one or two corpses out of them.”
“You’re afraid of ghosts, but not of corpses?”
“What’s a corpse ever done to anyone?”
“Except spread disease? Except come back to life and try to bite people?” Liam asked. He regretted the questions as soon they left his mouth. Merle was shaken by the images that Liam had just planted in his head.
“Listen—forget I said that,” Liam said. “Let me duck my head in one of these rooms and see if they are officer’s quarters. Then we’ll know, right?”
“Sure,” Merle said.
When Liam went to move past Merle, the young man grabbed his sleeve. He tagged along with Liam, walking close behind him. Liam didn’t brush him off—it was a decent idea for them to stick together. Simply laying his hand on the door didn’t make it open.
“You have to knock,” Merle said. “The door doesn’t recognize you, so you knock like you’re asking permission to enter.”
Liam wondered if this was something that Merle had read somewhere, or if he was making it up. It didn’t matter. When he knocked twice on the door, it slid to the side. In the room, a few lamps began to glow, giving the room a cozy feel. The bed was made precisely. Everything was neat and tidy. Liam’s eyes danced around, taking it all in. The place was spare and efficient, like a hotel room. The bed, on the right, was flanked with two end tables with lamps. Across from it, a little bureau held a lamp and two picture frames. One frame showed a picture of a man in a suit. The other had a dog.
Liam imagined the contents of the top drawer before he opened it. He was not disappointed. Pairs of socks, neatly folded, sat in rows and columns next to a perfectly aligned stack of boxer shorts. They had a tropical print of flowers and birds.
At the far end of the room, the door to the bathroom was ajar. Next to it, light came through a curtained window. Curious, Liam moved to the end and parted the curtains. He could feel Merle’s impatient pull on his sleeve—the young man wanted to get out of there.
It was a fake window, filled with a painting that was glowing with a backlight. In the painting, a snow-capped cabin sat just beyond a frozen pond.
“Look,” Merle said.
Liam moved to the side to follow Merle’s pointing finger.
“What? I don’t see anything.”
Merle was pointing at the blank wall over the sink in the bathroom.
“Exactly,” Merle said. “Where do you think the mirror is?”
“How should I know?”
Merle let go of Liam’s sleeve and crossed carefully to the side of the bed. Like a magician revealing his trick, Merle threw back the comforter. The mirror was laying, shiny-side up, in the middle of the bed.
“See?”
“I guess? Why is the mirror on the bed like that?”
Merle moved back to Liam, standing right in front of him but glancing over his shoulder at the mirror.
“It’s how they invite spirits down into the bed. I told you—it’s haunted. I wouldn’t stay in this room in a million years.”
Liam had just been thinking the opposite. The room looked comforting and perfect to Liam. It was well underground and tucked off of a secure hallway with no windows to worry about. Everything about the room was wonderfully safe. Liam looked back and forth between the mirror and the bathroom, where the mirror should have been. He resisted the urge to put it where it belonged. It wasn’t time yet to move into this room. They had other things to accomplish first.
Instead, he took Merle’s arm and began to lead the young man toward the door.
“You know, the people who built this place anticipated an invasion. They built that whole ambush room so they could hold the place against their enemies,” Liam said.
“Sure,” Merle said.
The door began to close automatically. Merle reached out and reversed its course by putting his hand in the way. The door opened back up again.
“Maybe they also put a few things in here to keep people away in case someone came when nobody was home. Maybe there were strings in the cafeteria to pull those chairs over, or maybe it was done with magnets. Maybe they wanted to make us think that the place was haunted so we wouldn’t stay.”
“That mirror wasn’t like that when I was here before.”
“Didn’t you say that this wasn’t exactly the hall you remembered? Are you certain there’s not a hall that looks a lot like this only headed the other direction? Maybe that’s why it’s reversed.”
Merle thought about it. Despite the skeptical look on his face, he nodded at whatever idea was crossing his mind.
“All I’m saying is, let’s not make a hasty judgement,” Liam said. Comforting Merle made Liam’s own fears diminish. He liked the way it felt—like he had power over the situation.
They moved down the hall toward the next bend.
There were even more living quarters around the corner. The door of a room with lots of beds stood open.
“I assume that’s for the low ranking guys,” Merle said. “In that one, or one just like it, I found that each bed had a couple of drawers with it. Most of them were empty. I bet people are going to fight over the private rooms.”
“Maybe,” Liam said.
When they found the kitchen, the second cafeteria on the other side, and another set of hallways, it was all starting to make sense. There was nothing really to differentiate one unit from the next, and every other hall was flipped from the one before. Even Merle had to admit that he couldn’t be sure which ones he had explored the last time, so his notion that the hallways had ever changed direction seemed unwarranted.
“We’re going to have to paint lines or something so people know where they’re going,” Liam said. They were walking side by side down a hall.
Merle had to admit that he wasn’t confident where they would find the exit, so they continued searching, simply trying to head a consistent direction.
“I wonder how many there are,” Merle said. “The pattern just seems to keep repeating.”
Liam reached forward and moved the door to the side. It was another cafeteria, just like they expected to find. He started across it with confidence, knowing that in the corner on the far side they would find a shadowy entrance to yet another kitchen. With the number of rooms they had found, people wouldn’t have to fight over the private suites.
“Maybe not repeating,” Merle said. “Maybe it’s the same one.”
“What?” Liam asked, turning around.
Merle was still in the middle of the room, under the faux sky. He was looking down at two overturned chairs. A little farther away from Merle, there was a third chair that had been tipped.