by D. S. Ritter
Chapter Six
Monday’s dawn found Sam awake and restless, the mysterious book laying open on her bed. The last pages, the ink of the sketches and writings were smeared and brown, like dried blood. She didn’t doubt that's what it was. Exhausted, she glanced over at the strange key chain John left as collateral, sitting on her tiny makeshift kitchen table. The key on it appeared normal, a house key maybe. But the charm gave her the creeps. The eye, not quite human was surrounded by odd scratches, some of which seemed to form letters. In her state of paranoia and sleeplessness, she had a horrible feeling that sometimes, when she glanced away, the eyeball shifted, but that was silly. Or was it?
Sillier than monsters?
Nervous, she put it in her bag by the door, hoping that out of sight would mean out of mind.
The book, though. The fucking book. It was as though something heard about what animals were supposed to be, but had never seen any, and had an incredibly abusive childhood in a closet full of pickled octopus parts and decided to draw all its worst daydreams. If only she could read the damn thing. It turned her blood cold to think of how many clues might hide there, and how frightening the future it held might be.
“What the fuck is going on?” she asked herself for the tenth time that day.
The sun rising outside was bright and unassuming, and Sam wondered if she might get some sleep. How long had the sun hung over a world containing such terrors? How did nobody else know about it? How old was the damn book and the horrific creatures in it?
Her internet searches would probably have landed her on some list. She looked up how to pour concrete, how to buy or make explosives, information on welding. Her mind kept racing back to the idea that, if she could only block up the cistern, everything would be fine. Sure, there might still be monsters in the well, but they would die eventually, right? Or, at least, never eat anybody. Then, her life would go back to normal, and she might be able to sleep again.
All day, she dreamed up plans and abandoned them, forgetting to feed herself, obsessed. Then, one idea emerged. It was simple. It was almost sad, how simple. Coming to a decision, she grabbed her purse and drove to the hardware store.
***
Tina looked surprised when Sam drove in to Seven-One on her day off, but employees parked for free in the garages, so it wasn’t out of the question. Tina wasn’t interested in much beyond Snapchat or Instagram, and Sam was sure she’d slip from the other attendant’s memory. Technically, she going to commit an act of vandalism, and didn’t want any more attention than necessary.
She drove down to the supply hold and looked inside. The bags of chemical melt were all still there. She hesitated before putting her key in the lock. When they investigated, if they ever did, the company would know whose key had been used and when. Sam had tried to come up with a way to switch hers with Tina’s, but the idea of throwing her under the bus didn’t sit well. So, in the end, it was Sam’s key that turned the lock.
Thirty bags sat in the hold, each weighing about fifty pounds. Sam hefted one of them and slogged it to her car. Then another. And another. Soon, her trunk had about six hundred pounds of chemical melt in it.
The car wasn’t new or in the best shape, so Sam took it real slow driving up to the cistern. It rode low to the ground because of the extra weight. “Come on, baby,” said Sam as she urged the old sedan up the ramp. “I’ll never ask you to do anything like this ever again, just come on…” She didn’t want to think about how much damage she might be doing to the poor thing. It was loyal though and crawled along without even a grumble.
A big pile of salt would draw attention, but Mondays were always slow. Chances were, Tina wouldn’t notice until the car count at the end of the night, and maybe she still wouldn’t bother to call it in. Sam was counting on her laziness.
She parked her car next to the cistern and got out with a plastic bag. The guy at the hardware store had assured her it would suit her purposes. From the bag, she took out a two-step epoxy kit and read the instructions. The whole thing seemed simple enough. She mixed the two ingredients and applied them to the lid. The epoxy was fast-drying, but it would still take time to set. Sam had thought about trying to bolt the cistern shut, but the equipment was more expensive and she doubted she had the skill, or could work long enough without getting caught.
The epoxy smelled horrible, like it could lead to brain damage, but Sam hoped the nasty stuff would do the job. Once she’d finished, she waited about ten minutes and began to pile the salt bags on top. The first two went okay, but then the third…
She felt a strange vibration when she put the bag down. “Just your nerves, Sam,” she said to herself. “Keep working.” When the fourth bag on, there was a jolting clang from the cistern lid.
“Shit,” she muttered under her breath and ran back to the car for the next bag. Lifting the first three had gotten her a little tired, but the scratching on the other side of the lid was giving her a brand new, manic energy. She hauled those salt bags faster than she ever thought she could, but it didn’t feel nearly fast enough. The scratching and clanging only got louder the more bags she added, until she’d piled all twelve up on the lid, and threw herself on top.
Whatever was down there smashed against the lid, shaking it. Sam hoped it wasn’t enough to ruin the epoxy. The monster slammed and clawed and scratched, trying to break through.
But the weight was too much. Eventually, it seemed to figure this out, and the noises stopped. Sam worried the creatures might get out into the world somewhere else. “Fuck, I hope not,” she said to herself, climbing down from the pile of bags.
She hoped the ordeal hadn’t made too much noise. Nobody seemed interested in seeing what it was.
As she drove out of the garage, she noticed Tina hadn’t even moved from her position beside the gates. “Have a good night, Tina,” she said as she waited for her automatic pass to register.
“Coming down here on your night off,” said Tina, frowning at her phone. “You crazy? Go get a life, would ‘ya?”
“I’m trying,” said Sam as the gate popped up.
Chapter Seven
When Sam came to work on Tuesday, she was tired and anxious to find out if the bags and epoxy had done their job. When she got to Seven-One, she checked on the cistern. Someone put the bags away, but that was ok. The epoxy seal was whole and seemed solid enough. The thing might as well have been welded shut. She knew it would probably piss the city off, but Sam didn’t care. No noise came from inside at least, and she relaxed. What lurked inside probably hadn't died yet, but it eventually would. In a strange corner of her mind, she almost felt sorry it would have to suffer.
Things got quiet for a while after that. Sam slept at night, though it took a few days to get comfortable with the dark again. She still experienced a twinge of fear when facing legitimate darkness; Sam still didn’t know if the creatures had found another way out of the cistern. What if the sewers were full of monsters? But, she didn’t see any running wild in the streets and her sanity encouraged her to put it from her mind and go on believing the problem was contained under the parking garage.
The week before the University of Michigan started up was always crazy. This year was no exception. Sam came into work thanking her lucky stars that her regular garage was nowhere near the dorms.
She remembered the first year she’d been working for Empire, when she didn’t have a regular position and they shifted her around a lot. At the garages more central to the dorms, the traffic would be crazy and even worse, dealing with the parents! Many of them seemed to think parking should be free, despite the garages being public and not university property. They also had very little patience for anything. Gates were broken, cashiers were yelled at, it was chaos.
Move-in weekend continued the visitation of hell on earth, with kids who had never been off the parental chain before going around town, looking for places that didn’t ID as much as they should have, or having dorm parties. The frats would explode before rush we
ek even started. It was considered by all to be a hot mess.
So, when that Saturday rolled around, Sam was not at all surprised the insanity spilled over to Seven-One. Being closer to the grad bars and more expensive restaurants on Main, it was usually spared most of the worst offenders. All the really terrible stuff happened over at Seven-Two, which stood next to one of the most notorious bars in town, the Zoo. Seven-Three came in second, being close to all the most popular undergrad bars over on University Ave.
“HQ to Seven-One. Hey, Seven-One,” squawked the radio.
Sam picked it up, having no customers to wait on. “Seven-One here.”
“We got a report of something weird going on upstairs. Not sure what level. Can you take a look? Also, get us a car count while you’re up there.”
Sam’s skin prickled at “something weird,” but she said, “Ten-four,” and headed for the elevator. She rode it all the way to the top of the structure and walked out into the night air. The lights of Ann Arbor shined too bright to see much of anything in the sky, but she looked anyway. It was always quiet up on the roof, away from the noise of people and traffic. She could gaze up and experience some kind of tranquility for a moment.
There was nothing going on up there, so she continued to walk down, keeping track of how many cars were parked in the structure. The office would check that against the number of open spaces and change the electronic sign out front, if they even needed to.
A few levels down, Sam would have guessed the structure was still about a quarter, or a third full. She reached 5a and saw a young man squatting, bare-assed beside a car. “Hey!”
Startled, the guy fell backward, right into the massive shit he’d been taking. The expression on his face was all horror, surprise and drunken embarrassment. She watched, speechless, as he scrambled to his feet, pulling his underwear and pants up over his soiled butt and bolted, barely staying upright. Sam didn’t bother giving chase. “Seven-One to HQ.”
“HQ here.”
“Just found a guy taking a huge dump next to one of the cars.”
“You found what, Seven-One?”
“I just caught a guy pooping, HQ. Can you send someone over with the biohazard stuff?”
“Ten-Four. Can you give me a description?”
“I’m guessing you mean of the guy…?”
“Yes, Seven-One, of the guy. Of the guy!”
Sam told Marcus what the kid had looked like and worn, and the location of the mess for maintenance, thankful that cleaning human poop didn't fall under her job description.
She kept walking until she got down to the basement. At the top of the ramp underground, she stopped for a second, listening. There was a quiet, metallic scratching echoing up from the depths. Sam felt her heart turn to ice in her chest, but forced her feet to keep walking. Just because the creatures might try again, didn’t mean they’d get through. They were probably starving and weak now. Was it really surprising they might make one last effort to escape?
To be safe, she stopped at her car and got out the golf club. She’d thought about buying a machete at the hardware store, but the club had more reach and weight, which were more important to her. Quietly, she crept down to the next level.
The first bad sign was the automated lights were already flickering before she even reached the bottom of the ramp. Her breath caught in her throat when her eyes fell upon the shadowy LARPer, bent over the cistern, trying to scrape away the epoxy. This time, she didn’t say anything, but walked up and swung the club low, kneecapping the cloaked figure.
“Fuck!” The voice sounded masculine, familiar and surprised. The LARPer struggled to get away, but Sam leaped on him, kneeling on his chest and throwing back his hood.
“Shit,” she cried in surprise. “John!”
His hair was still messy, but he didn’t smile at her this time. “Hi, Sam.”
“What the fuck are you doing?”
“Do you really want to know?” Sam hit her club on the concrete, hard, and the noise it made got her point across. “Okay… but this’ll go a lot easier if I could breathe, right?”
Sam cocked an eyebrow. “If I get off of you, you’re going to run.”
“I’m not going to run.”
“What the hell is that thing you gave me? That weird key chain?”
“Just a key chain.”
“I think it’s about time you stopped lying.” She said, nodding at the club still in her hand.
“Okay, okay. It was sort of… charmed to spy on you.”
“You son of a bitch.”
“You were supposed to be the canary in the coalmine, okay?” he said, trying to shrug. “I was just using you to see how far along this thing is.”
“You have such a way with words. How far along what is?”
“You don’t know?”
“Enlighten me.”
He laughed, despite the weight on his chest. “Oh, that is… I mean, what? You don’t know what’s coming? Or maybe it should be who, but with a definite side of what...”
“Dude, shut up and talk already.”
“Let me up, I’ll explain everything. It’s not like running will change anything, anyway.”
It was against her better judgment, but Sam got up. She watched John like a hawk as he picked himself up and brushed the dirt off of his cloak. “What’s with the outfit?”
“Tradition. You got time to get a drink?”
***
Sam had never drank on the job before, but here she was on break, in one of the most expensive, posh bars on Main with a guy wearing a freaking full-length cape. Then again, a few months ago, she wouldn’t have dreamed of fighting monsters either. At least she’d had the presence of mind to change out of her Empire polo, opting for the tank top she’d worn underneath.
“I’ll have a whiskey,” said John, “something top shelf. What are you having?”
She thought for a second, then shrugged. “Something fruity, I guess. I don’t like the taste of alcohol.” John rolled his eyes at her choice and she glared at him.
“I don’t care what you think of my drink preferences; I’ve killed two monsters with sheer blunt force trauma. I could order a fuzzy navel if I want and still be a bad ass. Anyway, explain. Pretty much everything. Now.”
John nodded. “Okay, so, the world is going to end, coming up. I know you have the beast journal, so I’m surprised you didn’t figure it out.”
“Wait, you can read it?”
He laughed. “God no. I don’t think anyone can. It’s in the coded language of a madman. If it even made sense to him. Plus, it’s old as hell. I’m guessing you didn’t notice the little star charts every couple of pages?”
“I was a bit distracted by the sketches of horrible monsters, actually.” Sam glanced around. Considering what John was wearing, they were getting minimal glances from the other drinkers. “So, star charts… like a calendar?”
“Exactly like a calendar.” John nodded to the bartender as he brought their drinks. “A countdown to the end, if you will.”
“The end of the world? Seriously?”
“Do I look like I’m fucking with you? Cape aside, I mean.” He took a sip of the whiskey and made a face. “The monsters are just the beginning. What’s coming is much, much worse.”
“But, I sealed the cistern. They can’t get out.”
He smiled in a way that was nowhere near cheerful. “They don’t even need to. Anyway, you’ve just plugged up a hole in a dam that’s been crumbling for years. And what’s behind that dam, well. Concrete and steel might as well be tissue paper.”
Sam took a big swig of her drink, barely tasting it. “Um,” she half-coughed. “Explain…?”
He sighed. “Okay, so, once in a while, the stars start to align, and I guess that’s what gets things going. Cosmic energy, what have you. The beginning is the monsters. Then, a thrall or sometimes, multiple thralls are chosen--”
“What’s a ‘thrall?’”
He thought for a second. “Li
ke, a zombie? Or a servant. Servant’s probably a better term. The dark forces take over a human and use them to do their bidding.
“The thrall, or thralls, then gather the various accouterments necessary to allow for those dark forces to emerge, thus, bringing the world as we know it to a fiery, horrifying and violent end. The closer the stars and planets come to alignment, the stronger the darkness becomes.” John recited this like he was giving a history report at school. Sam couldn’t stop staring at him.
“Dude, what the hell? Where did you learn all that?”
“It’s kind of part of the lore of my order,” he said, shrugging. “Chaos magicians live for this kind of stuff, unfortunately.”
“Chaos magician…?” Sam signaled for another drink.
“There really isn’t such a thing as chaos,” admitted John, also signaling for a refill. “Chaos is just a word for order so intricate and widespread, it’s impossible for most people to see it. Even the best chaos magicians can’t understand the whole thing.”
“So, you do, what, magic? Fireballs?”
“Not really. I can sort of manipulate the laws governing the cosmos and maybe see some causality that would escape the average person, but it’s definitely one of those, ‘don’t quit your day job’ situations. I never studied that hard, and you wouldn’t believe how much math you have to do.”
Sam nodded, letting the alcohol wash over her. “Wait, so, what does that have to do with the cistern? Like, are you trying to end the world early?”
“Those creatures aren’t born. They’re created by whatever’s down there, which means they contain power. If I could harness that power, maybe I could…”
“Save the world?”