FLOOR 21: Descent (The Tower Legacy)

by Jason Luthor

Tommy’s smirk is both infuriating and cheering. “Is that any worse than just the Creep?”

  He’s been getting a lot of points from me recently for keeping my mood up. “The fact that I actually enjoy having you around at this point is a life fail.”

  “Could do worse,” he says with a final wink.

  I don’t want to give him any credit, but, I dunno.

  He’s probably right.

  Recording Eighteen

  Climbing down that elevator shaft is like lowering yourself into someone’s throat. The entire time the darkness is creeping up like it’s trying to swallow you, and only the light from the exit gives you anything to aim for. My hands are locked like iron clamps on the ladder as I climb down, but I don’t really understand how terrible I’m feeling until I’m hanging besides the shaft doorway. I reach out and grab the edge before probing with my foot, stretching it out so I don’t miss the ledge and plunge to my death. Then the air explodes out of my lungs as I just about throw myself through the door and onto Floor 22.

  For a second, I take time to adjust to my surroundings. The light’s all a rusty haze, so pretty much what you’d expect from a part of the Tower overgrown with infestation. Somehow, it’s even worse than Floor 21. You can tell the difference Security makes on the floor above, because everything here’s overgrown. The ground’s soft and sticky, and our feet push into the mucus as we spread out. Between the wheezing of the Creep walls, I hear one of my teammates cough as they look around, wiping at their mouth and spreading a thick trail of phlegm onto the back of their gloves.

  Gross.

  Abbott falls behind everyone and nods to Sunny. “Captain, you have point,” he says as he nods to the head of the group.

  “Don’t I always?”

  It’s this weird little moment where I’m like . . . did he just talk back to the commander? I kinda brush it off, but it lingers in my head. Abbott stares at him for a second, but I dunno, I guess he brushes it off because he just keeps talking. “Alright everyone, prepare yourselves. At this depth, there’s not much to be wary of, but take care that you don’t step into any growths. Think of this as a practice walk before we descend further. Our immediate goal before the end of the next few days is Floor 30, but there’s no direct access from this elevator shaft. You all have tablets, so you can check our route any time you wish, but Captain Allen will be more than a sufficient guide for finding our way to the next descent point.”

  Sunny’s visor is up, so you can still see that never-ending grin of his. Funny how being down here can make you appreciate something like a smile. Anyway, he waves everyone forward. “Hands off your triggers, people, we never find anything to fire at this high up. Might want to rethink that strategy on Floor 30, though. “

  It quickly becomes super obvious who the veterans and the rookies are. While all of us noobs are walking around like our pants are on too tight, Abbot and the rest of the vets are chatting it up like this is just another job. Which, I mean, I guess that’s kind of true. It also dawns on me that unless they chill, we’ll never learn how to take it easy. I can’t say for sure, but I’m pretty willing to bet that if we’re walking around acting like we’re about to die that we’re more likely to get the Creep all antsy.

  “Just relax,” I tell myself as my fingers clutch the handle of my bat. “It’s just Floor 22.”

  Tommy laughs. “Just Floor 22. Yeah, we’re just out for a walk, Jackie. Nothing strange about this.”

  Shreya Bhasin turns around and stares us down with those almond eyes, even if now they look like they’re roasting. “Want to shut it up back there, Jones?”

  “Hey, just keeping things cool,” Tommy says, but his tone drops as he leans over to me. “I mean, nothing’s going to happen on this floor.”

  I nod and watch as Bhasin turns back to the front. “Yeah, you’re probably right,” I agree. “Just be chill though, Tommy, and not like in that weird way where you pretend everything’s okay. If you keep acting like that, you’ll piss off someone else that’s more worried than you.”

  “Yeah, yeah, be a good teammate. I just don’t want to walk around all day acting like something’s going to kill us.”

  “Well, maybe not on this floor.”

  He chuckles a little as we look ahead. Sunny’s leading with Lieutenant Valerie Nieto as he walks us around the corner. Our team is creating this big thumping with our footsteps, and I wonder if the Creep ever gets annoyed at loud noises or anything like that. I mean, mentally I know it doesn’t, but still. For some reason, down here in the Deep, I just keep thinking this will be the first time a Scavenger team dies because it was too noisy.

  Thing is, as weird as it is to be down here, Captain Sunny’s actually pretty much right. You can really only psyche yourself out for so long because, after that, you’ll either go crazy or you’ll just get used to your surroundings. So, after marching for, like, fifteen minutes, I’m already getting used to all the haze and the creepy vibes that keep tingling in my skin. I mean, it’s still a little disturbing, don’t get me wrong. I don’t think anybody actually enjoys walking near a wall that looks like it’s partly covered in muscle tissue, not to mention the way it keeps pulsing while it breaths is disturbing.

  What was I saying? Oh yeah. What I’m saying is that human beings are crazy, and we can get used to just about any surroundings.

  Every time we take a corner, I can’t help but stare down the hall ahead. They all seem to stretch on forever, like my eyes are playing tricks on me, and a lot of the time they’re all broken up with patches of darkness. Whenever the Creep came through this part of the building, it obviously took out a few lights. Some of the lamps on the walls are shattered, which we’re reminded of by the crunching glass beneath our feet.

  I think the biggest difference between this floor and Floor 21 is the fact that nobody ever comes through to burn back the Creep, so now you’ve got it wrapped into doorways or dripping in bulbs from above. There are more than a few doorframes cracking apart because tendrils are squeezing on them, and we get a good look into a few that are wide open. Not that there’s much to see inside. I mean, unless you like seeing a bunch of torn up furniture buried in goop and mucus.

  There’s something else about just being one extra floor down that kind of gets to me. I’ve been thinking about the people on Floor 21, and it’s just like, they could be here right now. They could almost be completely swamped by Creep. I mean, it’s not much of a jump from here up the elevator shaft, so it’s hard to think about how bad things probably got the night Creepy Sally went on her rampage. What I saw on Floor 1 was bad, with Security everywhere and Creep coming up the stairs. Even Floor 4 looked like it was getting hit hard. But, out of everyone, it was Floor 21 that got hit first. It makes my skin crawl to think about the Creep crawling up the elevator shafts and choking the stairwell. How did anyone survive? Were they safe in their rooms?

  I trot ahead of Tommy to catch up with Jamila, who throws me a smile as I get alongside her. During training, we ended up bonding over dumb stuff, which, I mean, that’s not surprising, right? It’s always the dumb stuff that makes you like someone. For me and Jamila, it was our hair issues, because that struggle is real. Neither of us like straightening our hair and the humidity down in the Creep’s a frizziness threat. Allison doesn’t really get this problem, since even when her hair’s frizzy, it’s just not the issue that mine becomes. Because basically mine explodes. I feel like I’m a prisoner inside of it sometimes, like I’m carrying around a bush strapped to my skull. Jamila gets that, since she’s actually had to deal with the same issue. I decided to get my hair cut down a little, but she went with some short braids that tie into a bun above her neck. It works, actually better than mine, but whatever. Anyway, she looks like she’s happy enough to see me. Why else would she bother saying hello? “Hey girl. Had enough of Tommy for now?”

  “Him? Nah, we’re cool. Surprising life twist, I know.”

  “He’s not so bad. You just like giving people a hard tim
e.”

  “There’s literally no way I can argue that,” I joke. “But uh, Jamila. I was wondering if I could ask you something, seeing as you lived on Floor 19 and all?”

  “Jackie, we’re good. Anything you want to ask, go ahead.”

  “Cool, well, here’s my deal. The day that the Creep Incident happened last month, I was high up in the Tower, so I don’t know what it was like for people living down here. Not to seem like a complete monster or anything, but I haven’t thought much about what it was like for people on the lower floors. So, basically, what I was wondering is, if things got super intense down where you were living?”

  “You’re kidding,” she says, not asks. “It was terrible. I know you’re acting ignorant, but really.”

  “No, I’m being totally serious. I want to know what it was like.”

  “I don’t know,” she hesitates, her shoulders bouncing as she shrugs. “It wasn’t easy, Jackie, and I don’t like thinking about it.”

  “I bet. I just kinda, I don’t know, need to know. That’s, like, my deal. I ask questions.”

  “Believe me, I’ve learned that. Okay, well, you know it was bad. I know the whole Tower was going crazy, but it was worst on the lowest floors. Plus, it happened so late, you know? We barely had time to react. If I remember, I think it was probably close to midnight when I heard something blow up. At least, that’s what it sounded like. That got me out of bed and I was like, what the hell? I mean, right? So, my mom comes to the room with my dad and we’re all in the living room together. Every family on my floor keeps a flamegun on them for clearing Creep, so you know we already had ours loaded, but that’s when the room started coming apart. You know those tendrils the Creep have?”

  “Obviously, I mean, it’s not like they’re hard to miss.”

  She smiles, but it’s faded. “Well, they’re even harder to miss when they’re cracking through your walls. Know what I’m saying? A couple of them tore the door apart then started shooting into the room. At that point it’s like, what do you do? So, dad just kept firing the flamegun until the Creep backed out. He must’ve gone through the whole canister by the time he was done, and we still stayed awake because the Creep was tearing up the whole hallway and crawling up the walls. But that wasn’t all. It tore doors right off their hinges and threw them around the floor or just dangled them in the air. Plus, you know how it gets all rusty whenever the Creep’s annoyed?”

  I wave my finger around. “You mean kinda like now?”

  “Yeah, well, it was like that, but just so much more . . . I don't know. I think what I’m saying is that it was intense. It was like there was blood in the air.”

  “How about the hallucinations? Did you see anything super creepy or something?”

  “Jackie, don’t play. You know I did. When we went back into the apartment, I thought the whole place was full of Demons. My dad kept an eye on the door the whole night, until we finally saw Security in the hall, but that didn’t make the visions go away. I was seeing things for a week.”

  “Damn.” I shovel my hands into my pockets. “I’m not going to lie, Jamila, but that sounds like a nightmare.”

  “Well, the nightmares I can deal with. The real problem is trying to live without food. That was actually the worst part about it. See, all of our food was rotted or eaten by the Creep, so I had to go hungry until the next Sevenths Day. My whole family would have died if we hadn’t gotten water from Security, and I was surprised they even gave us that much.”

  “That sucks. So, it’s tough living down on Floor 19?”

  “What do you think?”

  “How do you guys even get enough to eat? You know, I’ve always wondered that.”

  Jamila lets out one burst of a laugh that catches everyone’s attention for a second, but she lowers her voice as we keep walking. “Come on now. We have to come up with our own.”

  “Okay, but like, how?”

  “We’ve got our own stuff down on the lower floors to grow vegetables. They’re not as good as the ones you guys get from the roof, but they keep us alive.”

  I shake my head. “You think what we get from the roof garden is good?”

  “One day, you should come by and have some of our food. You’ll see what I’m talking about.”

  “Ugh. I’m not sure I want to know.”

  Recording Nineteen

  Descent points are anything you can use to go lower into the Tower, and that usually means it’s an elevator shaft or a stairwell. Now, sometimes you do find other ways down, by which I mean sometimes there are just holes in the floor that you can fall through. Not that Commander Abbott’s big on walking around in places where the floor looks like it’s about to collapse. Makes sense, right? My point being that we spend a lot of time trying to find safe ways down. Abbott likes to remind us that we don’t have the time limit that a Scavenging normally has, since the Second Scavenging is supposed to be special. Which, that’s cool, but it still feels like we’re burning up days just trying to stay safe.

  Then again, I think that might be the point. There’s lots of rookies on the team, and we’re basically all still getting adjusted to being down here. I get that. My problem is that it took, like, a month just to get down here. By the time we get into the really low parts of the Deep, will there even be any survivors left? Even if Mike’s alive, what’s he had to do to survive this long? So yeah, I know we can’t rush ‘cause that’d probably end up with all of us dead. That doesn’t mean I don’t get antsy when Captain Sunny decides a staircase isn’t safe and keeps looking for another. Still, if anything, all the wandering around has helped me realize that the Tower’s even bigger than I thought. It hit me the other day, after we’d passed up our, like, third staircase in a row. I checked my tablet to see the map and realized you could spend days on just one floor, if you really wanted. So, using the word ‘big’ would probably be the most incredible understatement ever. If I were to try and pick a word, it’d be . . . mammoth. Goliath. Titanic.

  Yeah. Titanic’s about as accurate as I can put it.

  But I still think we’re taking so much time just because Abbott’s making sure we won’t crack. I notice him, every once in a while, staring at one of the rookies. Now, I’m not psychic or anything. I mean, I’m no Joanne, but I can tell he’s got something going on in his head. He’ll stare for, like, a minute, then start tapping into his tablet. I hope he’s making notes about how we’re performing and not just being, like, pervy. ‘Cause that’s a whole other ball of nonsense I just don’t need in my life right now.

  If I can say anything for sure about our trip, it’s probably the fact that things are getting worse as we go deeper. You barely notice it on Floor 23, you think it’s getting slimy around Floor 24, and then you’re on Floor 30 and bam! Creep city. I mean, technically it was always getting worse, but for some reason it just gets super noticeable. Even Tommy starts to gross out a bit when we hit the ground there. The walls go through stretches where there’s nothing on them, then you get to a new hallway and the entire thing is choked up so bad you’d have to be suicidal to try and walk through. Abbott claims it’s doable as long as you keep your emotions under control, and my answer to that is hell no. I’m not exactly into trying to shove my way through an area so tight that I’ve got saliva and mucus sliding down my face.

  Also? Floor 30’s definitely got a different vibe to it. Abbott’s a lot less chatty and he’s not interested in observing us anymore. I mean, the guy’s not even hanging out at the back of the group like he used to. I didn’t even notice it until we were passing close to hall 30-15. Every hallway’s marked by the floor it’s on and its individual number, which makes our location a hundred times easier to keep track of. It helps that our tablets keep the building mapped, too. Anyway, Jamila’s busy talking up everyone and keeping our spirits high, which makes sense since she wants to be a Morale officer one day. So, we’re tromping through, and I’m doing my best to ignore the moist squelch under my feet, when I notice Abbott pushing past u
s. See, nobody seems to care, but I do. Everything I think I know about Abbott says that he might be a good fighter, but that he likes to put other people at risk first. I mean, he’s been serving for years, so I’m sure he doesn’t want to kick the bucket at this point. So, he heads up front with Sunny and starts pointing down the hall, and they keep whispering as we pass below some thick stalks of Creep hanging from the ceiling.

  “Something’s going down,” I whisper over to Tommy, who’s smiling as he talks up Dodger on his left. “Feel like keeping it in your pants for a second?”

  He frowns as he looks over. “Chill out, Coleman,” he says, leaning toward me. “What’s going on?”

  “Check their hands.”

  Tommy follows as I nod toward the commander. Abbott’s got his palm resting on the handle of his sword, and Sunny’s finger is tightening on the trigger of his rifle. The entire time we’ve been on this mission, they’ve been playing it pretty chill, so even small signs like this trigger the hairs on the back of my neck. A frown curves along my face and my fingers wrap around my bat as I whisper, “Something’s got the vets spooked.”

  “Oh crap. Where are we?” he asks, grabbing his tablet from his satchel. “Hall 30-10, coming up off Hall 30-11.”

  “Okay, so, what’s that mean exactly?”

  “Don’t you remember what the commander said? This is around where the last Scavenging team disappeared. Remember, we’re heading for Polar North?”

  My frown widens. “Want to share how you know this?”

  “Jackie, he told us this on the first day of the Scavenging.”

  “Really?” My eyes go to the front of the group. “I really need to stop ignoring the commander.”

  “Uh, yeah, especially since we’re down in the Deep now.”

  He’s obviously right, and I nod absently. From the corner of my eye, I see Tommy as he goes back to talking with Dodger, but I keep my head moving around the group. Lieutenants John and Valerie have fallen behind, and Michael’s dead smack in the middle of us. Basically, all of the vets are spread out so that they can protect us. I mean, if they have to, but just the fact that they feel they might need to do that is ominous.