“Blank space?” asked Asher.
“It’s the stairwell,” said Ramos.
Carmody continued to study the map. “I don’t think so.”
“I paced it out myself two days ago,” said Ramos. “Other side of that wall… stairwell.”
“Not anymore.” Carmody squeezed into the access passage.
“What are you doing?”
“Just checking it out.”
Carmody shuffled sidestep to the end of the short passage. She rapped on the wall with her knuckles, pushed against it.
“See?” Ramos poked his head into the access. “A wall.”
Carmody stared curiously at the wall.
“D’you hear that?” she asked.
“Hear what?”
“That.” Carmody put her ear against the wall. “You don’t hear it?”
§
Elizabeth Owen and Lisa Powell started down the aisle at an easy pace, the cubicles on their left, the cream-colored wall on their right. They had finished the rest of the office, this was the last row. Owen stopped and waited as Lisa went into the first cube and poked a yard stick into the trash can. She tapped the end of the ruler against bottom of the bin and watched for any reaction.
Nothing.
She stepped back into the aisle and they moved on. Coming out of the next cube, the doors to the copy room and supply room were on their right. They went into both, flipping switches, examining shelves and looking into boxes and bins.
Back to the cubicles then and the current mission to check all trash bins. Lisa expected nothing from this latest search, and Owen was for the most part disinterested. She looked out across the cubicle jungle spread out over the open floor.
“What a horrifying thought, working in a place like this day after day.”
Lisa smiled dutifully and said nothing. She and Dr. Owen had often spent weeks at a stretch working in a small, cluttered three room office.
“Still,” Owen sighed, stepped back as Lisa came out of the cubicle and continued on. “I suppose what this replaced wasn’t any better. Probably a sight worse.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Lisa.
“Acres of floor space, filled with hundreds of small metal desks lined up in perfect rows.”
“I’ll take this over that.”
“Thank goodness you and I had other options, eh?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“I wouldn’t have survived a day.”
“Suppose not.”
Reaching the end of the aisle, they should have turned left, as this was the only way they should have been able to go. This was the end of the cubicle maze, facing a row of cubes set against the far wall.
Today, however, they turned right around a corner that hadn’t been there before. Here in this small side room they found another set of cubicles. They walked cautiously down a narrow aisle that ran along the wall until they reached a door set slightly open.
It was another supply room. Gray metal shelves lined the walls, and on the shelves were supplies from the distant past: typewriter ribbon, small bottles of black ink and white-out, metal paper trays, staplers, inkpads, rubber stamps, calculator paper rolls, index cards…
“Wow,” said Owen. “Talk about your blast from the past.”
“Do you hear that?” asked Lisa.
“Of course I hear that.” It was a dull, distant sound, a faint roar felt as much as heard. Owen stepped further into the room. There was another door set between two of the gray metal shelves that lined the opposite wall. “It’s coming from there.”
§
Banister had spent a good twenty minutes relaying to Quinn the various observations and suppositions that he and Church had drawn regarding the peculiar communication cycle that existed between them and the outside.
Their conclusion, such as there was a conclusion, was that their ability to communicate with the outside had as much to do with the mechanics of where they were as with the Adversary allowing it; at least in as much as the Adversary had to work within the laws of those mechanics.
“And just where are we?” asked Quinn. “And what are these mechanics?”
“Where we are is someplace other than our own world, perhaps even some place other than our own plane of existence. Whatever this place, whatever this reality, we are here because here is the limit of the Adversary’s reach.”
“He has no influence in our world?”
“Which is why he brought this one to us.”
“Then how are we able to communicate with the outside at all?”
“The answer must lie in the cycle,” said Banister. “Wherever we are, however this place works, there is a mechanism operating that brings us around, lines us up, puts us… in range, you might say… every thirty seven hours twenty minutes.”
Quinn looked skeptical. “And just how might that work, Doctor, the inside communicating with the outside? What with these being two different planes of existence?”
“Ya got me,” shrugged Banister. “We’re giving you our best guess based on what we know at the moment.”
“What you think you know.”
“Suppositions based on conjectures.”
Quinn grinned. “I thought as much.”
Lisa Powell appeared suddenly in the opening to the cubicle. “We found something.”
§
Asher listened at the door set into the inside wall of the newly discovered supply room. Carmody stood beside him, some of the others just beginning to gather in the small room or just outside. Several backpacks and utility belts were already piled nearby.
“What is it?” asked Carmody. “Is it the same as—”
“Yes. It is.”
“Same as what?” asked Owen. She was standing to the side, arms folded across her chest, her brow furrowed.
“We heard this in the restroom; the utility closet.”
“All right. What is it?”
“Don’t know,” said Carmody.
“The sound of the way out,” said Asher.
“I figured out that much all on my own, Peter,” said Owen. “But I sure wasn’t about to step into it alone. Remember the jet plane?”
“Good call.” Asher took a step back from the door. He looked to Quinn, who was squeezing past several others as he came into the room.
“Professor Asher,” stated the lieutenant.
“Everyone here? We ready to do this?”
“Sergeant Costa will lead the way, Professor.”
“I’m fully capable of opening a door, Lieutenant.”
“Nonetheless.”
“A point of order, Professor Asher,” said Banister. He had made his way into the supply room behind Quinn and was standing near the pile of backpacks. He picked Asher’s out from the pile and handed it to him. “Can you in fact open that particular door?”
“Right. I’m going to feel awfully foolish if I can’t.” Asher took the pack and slid into it. He took the utility belt offered and strapped it on as he looked again to Quinn. “If this is the way off the floor, we’re all going, whatever we find on the other side. If it’s not, or if there’s something bad waiting for us, I’d like to go first, knowing Sara is at my back.”
Quinn didn’t like it, but finally gave Asher a curt nod. He nodded then to Sgt. Costa, who had been standing out in the aisle beyond the open door. She came into the room having already donned her backpack and utility belt.
“Ready when you are, Professor.”
“Great,” Asher said, just a moment’s hesitation. He faced the door, reached down and turned the knob.
§
They entered a huge room to the overwhelming din of hundreds of old typewriters at work, row after row after row of small desks, where women in conservative fifties dress sat at the old machines.
Lisa Powell turned to Owen. They looked dumbfounded at one another. This was exactly what Owen had described only minutes before.
“Holy crap,” whispered Owen.
“This is—”
&
nbsp; “Yes, hold that thought. Like… forever.”
The floor boss, a middle-aged woman with precisely combed hair and a stern gaze, strode imperiously down the central aisle. She stopped three steps from Asher.
“This way,” she stated coolly. Her precise words easily pierced the roar of the typewriters. She turned about and retraced her steps up the aisle, never looking back.
Asher looked at the others and grinned, then followed after the woman. The rest of the team followed Asher.
The woman opened a heavy mahogany door and stepped through, moved to one side and held the door open for Asher.
He entered a large, well appointed office with paneled walls. There was a leather couch and chair to one side, glass-fronted shelves on the other. A large desk dominated the center of the room; a well-dressed, middle-aged man sat behind the desk in a very nice leather chair.
“Ah, Asher,” said the man. He waved for Asher to come closer. Asher took several steps toward the desk, and the others moved into room behind him.
“That would be me,” said Asher.
“So good of you to come.”
Quinn stepped up beside Asher. “And who would you be?”
The man behind the desk took no notice of Quinn, or of anyone other than Asher.
“Nice work on the Higgins account, Asher. A helluva job.”
Asher looked quickly at Quinn, glanced briefly back over his shoulder, turned back then to… his boss?
“Um… I did my best, sir.”
“Of course you did, son. Of course you did. And don’t think you’re not getting noticed, my boy.”
“I’m… flattered. Just doing my job.”
“Oh, don’t play coy with me, Asher.” The man leaned forward and pointed a thick, well-manicured finger. “You’re one of our best and brightest. You are going places.”
“Thank you.” Asher felt a hand grip his arm. Susan was standing behind him. He could hear her breathing. He kept his focus on the man. “Does this mean—”
“You’re moving on up, son.” The man put on a wide grin. “You should celebrate. Take the afternoon off. Take the family out for a nice lunch. My treat.”
The man gave a nod to the woman who had escorted them into the office. She stepped back to the door, held it open and waited.
Carmody looked up at Quinn. “I don’t understand.”
Quinn kept his attention on the man behind the desk. “I suppose that’s it then.”
“Thank you, sir,” said Asher. He turned about. Susan stepped aside; they all made way.
Susan leaned near Church. She spoke in a whisper. “Is he saying what I think he’s saying?”
“Are you thinking that Asher is being kicked upstairs and we’re all going to lunch?”
“And that means…”
“I think so.”
Professor Asher stepped through the open door…
§
The observation room was circular, about thirty feet in diameter, enclosed in a Plexiglas dome. The floor was stone, polished smooth. There were two plastic benches, one telescope mounted on a tripod, and nothing else.
The world beyond the glass was speckled with small impact craters, the landscape barren and gray, stretching out to an impossibly close horizon. The sky was deep black, scattered with extraordinarily bright stars.
“Where are we?” asked Lisa.
Banister stepped up beside Asher, who had walked across the room and was standing next to the telescope.
“Hazarding a guess, Miss Powell,” said Banister, looking out beyond the dome. “I would say we’re on an asteroid.”
Asher pointed to one of the objects in the black sky; a faint, fuzzy blue sphere, appearing no bigger than the larger stars. “I’m betting that’s the Earth.”
~ end of episode four
Episode Five
Night Train
Prolog
The narrow wooden door opened almost silently. Sgt. Costa came through first and stepped into the passenger car. She felt the easy side-to-side rocking of the train beneath her feet, heard and felt the rhythmic rumbling of wheels on track.
The vintage train car looked like something out of an old mystery novel that she might have read years earlier; the wood floor running the length of the car was scratched and worn from decades of use; a row of thickly padded blue seats with wooden armrests lined either side of the car. Yellowed tulip glass light fixtures hung along the length of the car above the seats; vertical sliding windows were set into dark wood framing.
The others began coming through the door behind her one and two at a time. Susan Bautista was being helped, Banister at one arm, Peter Asher the other. She took in cautious, shaky breaths as she clutched an elbow. They guided her over to the nearest seat and eased her down.
“You all right?” asked Asher.
“Fine,” said Susan. She took another cautious breath, the pain showing on her face.
“Nothing broken, my dear,” said Banister. “But we should wrap those bruised ribs.”
She nodded but said nothing. Banister gave her a pat on the shoulder as he looked up at Church, just coming into the car and looking anxiously about for Susan.
“She’ll be fine, Nate,” Banister said quickly.
Owen tossed her backpack onto another of the seats. “Well, that was the weirdest thing ever,” she said. She looked over at Susan. “You okay, hon?”
Susan managed a nod and slight smile.
“What were those things?” asked Carmody.
“Somebody’s idea of a nightmare,” said Ramos. “Were those arms or legs?”
“A bit of both, I should think,” said Banister.
“Certainly gave them the advantage on the cliff,” said Church.
Costa maneuvered herself between several passenger seats and studied the scene beyond the window.
“Doctor Owen, I might just be able to match you on the weird meter.”
Owen lowered her head and looked out at the darkness beyond the glass. “I hardly think nighttime constitutes weird, Sergeant,” she said at last.
“That’s more than just dark, Doctor,” Costa stated flatly. “It isn’t night out there. It’s empty.”
Episode Five / Chapter One
Lieutenant Quinn stood at the table with his arms folded across his chest, watched as Ramos began setting up the radio. Costa and Carmody waited at the last table near the far end of the dining car.
“It looks fine, sir,” said Ramos. “I think we’re good.”
“Thank you, Corporal.” Quinn looked then to Costa, who slid into the aisle and approached.
“Sir?” she asked.
“You and Carmody search forward, all the way to the engine, if possible. I’ll head down train. We’ll meet back here.”
“Yes sir.” Costa led Carmody forward.
Quinn glanced back to Ramos. The next communication window to command was a long ways off. “Do you need anything?”
“I’m good, sir.”
Quinn looked at his watch. They had found over the last few floors that no matter what the local time might be on an individual floor, the communication window held consistent: thirty seven hours and twenty minutes, their own time. He kept his watch on that communication schedule.
The next window to command was more than five hours away; plenty of time for preliminary searches and prepare a report for General Wong.
“Very well, Corporal,” he said. “I’ll be back soon.”
§
Susan sat staring out the window in the train’s passenger car as Dr. Owen and Lisa Powell used strips of a cotton tablecloth to bind her ribs. They finished pulling her shirt back into place just as Lieutenant Quinn entered the car and started down the aisle, using the chair backs on either side for balance.
“How are you feeling, Doctor Bautista?” he asked. He had to take a step back to make room for Lisa to move out into the aisle. He smiled awkwardly.
“Quite well, Lieutenant,” said Susan. “Thank you.”
“Very good. You take whatever time you need. Everything is quiet enough at the moment.”
“There hasn’t been much of that lately,” grumbled Owen. She settled into a seat on the opposite side of the aisle.
“Whenever we can, Doctor Owen.” The lieutenant appeared a bit distracted. There was a slight, goofy half-grin whenever Lisa looked in his direction. “We should all take a moment whenever the opportunity presents itself.”
“Uh, huh. Right,” said Owen.
Lisa finally noticed Quinn’s attention. She turned away uncomfortably and reached down to pick up the last of the homemade bandages and bindings that were piled on the seat beside Susan.
“I should put these away,” she said, and mumbled an apology as she stepped past Quinn.
Quinn gave his own fumbling apologies to Susan and Owen and continued on down train.
Owen looked first one direction, then the other, watching the door at each end as they slowly closed.
“This is going to be nothing but trouble,” she growled under her breath.
“I think it’s cute,” said Susan quietly. She was still looking out the window, out at that strange black void. There was nothing… absolutely nothing.
Owen plopped her head against the back of her seat. “Cute? I just know that somehow, some way, I’m the one that’s gonna get bit in the ass.”
§
The kitchen car was forward of the dining car. Church and Banister had begun searching cabinets for food, were gathering together what little they were finding and stowing it in the tall central cabinet beside the stove. So far… a few bags of flour, rice and ground coffee.
“The thirteenth floor,” said Banister, closing and latching one of the overhead cabinets. “You know what they say about the thirteenth floor.”
“It is a most peculiar tradition, not naming the thirteenth floor the thirteenth floor. Setting superstitions aside, it is still the thirteenth floor after all, whatever they choose to name it.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been in a building that had that many floors.”
“We’re in one now,” said Church.
Banister chuckled. “True enough. I wonder what’s going to come of it, circumstances being what they are.”
The Black Tower: The Complete Series Page 14