by Jeff Wheeler
Timothy Williams was extraordinary in several ways. He had, in his youth, been exceptional at the video game Excitebike for the Nintendo Entertainment System. His skills with the Alt+Tab function of the Windows operating system were precise and efficient. He could time his avocado selection to correspond with a desired date of ripeness nearly every time.
This was generally where the list ended.
The morning was fresh and bright, and smelled comfortably like new laundry and warm apples. The Laundromat across the street and the apple tree near the train platform were, respectively, to blame.
The train was late, but that wasn’t so bad. Tim leaned forward on the uncomfortable bench, smiling when his eyes met those belonging to the girl at the end. She looked away and adjusted her dark brown hair.
“Where are you headed?” he said, in a moment of unusual bravery that would almost certainly be added to the list.
She turned to face him in her seat. “Downtown. I’m starting a new job.”
“Good luck,” he said with a grin. “Are you nervous?”
She shook her head, her curls bouncing over her shoulders. “I’ll be fine. I have nerves of steel.” Her smile was bright and eager, and Tim couldn’t help but laugh.
“What about you? Going to work?”
He nodded as he stood and walked the few steps between them. “Yes, but it’s not a new job. I do data entry for a software company. Really boring stuff.”
The train arrived and they climbed aboard.
“By the way, I’m Katie.” She reached out a slender hand. Tim shook it and introduced himself.
“So, Katie, what do you do at your new job?”
“I’m a research psychologist at the university.”
“So you’ve been analyzing me, then?” Tim suddenly felt his personality to be underdressed for the occasion.
She laughed, a pretty sound, causing her head to tilt back attractively. “No, I’m off the clock. And anyway, your motives are clear enough, even for a nonpsychologist.”
He blushed at that. “I guess I am pretty obvious. ‘No sense in dancing around it.’ That’s what I always say.” Tim rarely ever said it.
Tim’s regular stop was quickly approaching. “I guess I’ll see you again tomorrow? Provided they don’t fire you on your first day.”
She smiled and nodded. “Yeah, I’ll be around.”
Pretty good day. Tim thought to himself as the train doors opened. He stepped out onto the platform.
And then he fell. Hard. He tripped and fell face-first onto the pavement, his skull bouncing off the concrete like a medicine ball.
As the train pulled away and he looked up from the platform, he could just barely make out the look of shock and mostly disguised amusement on Katie’s face.
It was nice of her, at least, to not laugh right away, Tim thought. He pulled himself to a seated position and brushed off his pants, ignoring his head, which was simultaneously ringing, throbbing, and aching.
After the embarrassment had worn off slightly, leaving mostly the physical pain, he started the short walk to work. As he stepped off the curb to cross the street, a car raced by inches away, its driver blasting the horn and shouting unintelligible obscenities. Tim shook his head, still disoriented, and looked more deliberately left, then right. He hurried across the street and into the safety of his familiar building.
He leaned against the wall as he waited for the elevator, cradling his still-tender head. A glass of water and to sit down, he decided—that’s what he needed.
Office policy stated company-issued laptops were to be taken home each night, or locked up in a desk drawer. Tim didn’t like taking his home on the train, and further, didn’t care for the added obligation of a job that couldn’t be left at the office, so he opted to lock his computer up.
He produced his key and turned it in the familiar lock. He slid open the drawer—and found it empty.
Crap, he thought.
A hot ball of anxiety started to form in the pit of his stomach. He tried to remember the previous day’s events. He would’ve remembered taking it home, if he’d had a reason for doing so. Right?
He slid the drawer closed, and checked the other two drawers for good measure. No computer. Maybe he forgot to lock it up? Whenever that happened, his manager would typically move it to her office for safekeeping.
He absently rubbed the tender spot on his head as he approached her office. She was sitting behind her wide oak desk, typing furiously in a designer blouse and tight gray slacks. Tim knocked on the open door. “Jane? Did you happen to see my laptop? It’s not in my drawer and I think maybe I forgot to lock it up.”
Jane turned in her chair, still keeping her fingers on her keyboard as she finished the last line of an e-mail. “Let me check,” she said. “I don’t remember picking up your computer, but I usually put them in my drawer.”
She finished the last of her keystrokes with emphasis and turned her attention to a desk drawer. Sliding it open, she found it empty.
“Hm,” she said. “I guess I don’t have it. Are you sure you didn’t take it home?” She stood and walked out of her office, her steps brisk, used to constant hurrying.
Tim started the walk back to his workspace, increasing his pace to match Jane’s stride. “I guess I must have, but I don’t remember doing it. My regular routine is to lock it up.” They had reached Tim’s desk, and to punctuate his point, he slid the drawer open.
There sat his laptop, just as it did every morning.
He looked up at Jane sheepishly. “Huh. I could have sworn it wasn’t there before.”
Jane patted him on the back. “Weird joke, Tim. Let me know if you need anything else today.” She half smiled at him and power walked back to her desk.
Tim picked up the laptop and tucked it under his arm. Only a few other people were in the office so early, but he assumed one of them must have been playing a trick. He walked a lap around the small office, alert for any indication of the prankster, but he didn’t receive anything from his coworkers other than benign smiles and distracted glances.
He gave up on the search after a few minutes—his head was still throbbing and he still hadn’t had his water—and returned to his desk. He opened the drawer that had held his computer, half expecting a note or some other message from the culprit, but he found nothing. He was disappointed; it at least would have made for some excitement in his day. He stashed his cell phone in the drawer and slid it closed, and turned his attention to his work.
Data entry is boring and unappreciated work, but at least it’s steady and quiet. Tim fetched a glass of water and some aspirin, and after a short time, found that his head was feeling marginally better.
Coworkers shuffled in and took their places at their desks. Tim typed away dutifully, answering e-mails and comparing voluminous spreadsheets.
For lunch, a tall man—whose name escaped Tim—who worked a few desks over had brought salmon. “Sorry about the smell,” he said from the break room to no one in particular.
Usually Tim didn’t mind the smell of fish, but he suddenly found himself repulsed and nauseated at the faintest whiff. He raced for the bathroom and barely made it to the toilet before losing the contents of his stomach.
He walked slowly from the bathroom, first returning to his desk, then reconsidering and heading for Jane’s office. Again he knocked at the open door, and again she was typing furiously, this time with her phone balanced on her shoulder. She held up a finger and mouthed “one minute” when she saw Tim, and he leaned against the door frame.
“What’s up?” Jane said as she hung up the phone.
Tim cleared his throat. “I just—got sick.” he said. “I think I’m going to head home for the day. I can take my laptop and work the rest of my hours tonight.”
“Sure, Tim, whatever you need to do.” Before her last word was even spoken, Jane had returned her attention to an e-mail, her typing a signal that Tim was dismissed.
He returned to his desk and finished the report
on which he had been working. He clocked out for lunch, intending to use the break to travel home and possibly take a nap. He disconnected the computer from its dock and slid it into his shoulder bag.
His phone was still in the drawer, and he opened it to retrieve it. The drawer sat empty, nothing but blank gray metal. Just as before—no note or anything. He slid the drawer closed and laughed, thinking maybe the culprit would hear and react. No response from any cubicle neighbors.
There was a troll doll—the kind with long neon hair and a gem in its rotund belly—that occasionally made its way around the office as a prank, being secreted in desk drawers and behind monitors. Tim had half expected the doll to be in the drawer or on his desk, a sign that a joke was indeed being played. He leaned out of his cubicle to glance at the desks of a few neighbors. Not seeing his phone, he returned his attention to his own possessions. He checked the pockets on his bag, then those on his pants and jacket.
He considered another trip to Jane’s office but decided against it. He looked on the floor around his desk and everywhere on top of it, to no avail. He checked the drawer above and the one below the empty one, still finding nothing.
He decided at last that perhaps he’d missed it the first time, and gave the drawer another look. The phone slid to the front as he pulled the drawer open.
He pulled the phone out tentatively, as if unsure he’d actually be able to grasp it. He turned it over several times in his hand, looking around with less suspicion than confusion.
Tim returned his gaze to the drawer; it sat empty again, but it had appeared empty before as well. He was sure of it. He hadn’t missed or overlooked his phone. Certainly not his laptop. They’d been there when he closed the drawer, and were not there when he next opened it.
He took a pen from the top of his desk and placed it in the middle of the drawer. He slowly slid it closed, and realized he was holding his breath. After waiting a moment, he opened the drawer again.
It was empty.
He felt the bottom of the drawer for any opening or trick. He examined every angle he could see and felt the back of the filing cabinet and the cubicle wall behind it, finding nothing that seemed unusual. Leaving the middle drawer open a crack, he slid the bottom drawer out. There had to be some kind of mechanism or trapdoor—a catch or lever that was activated when the drawer closed, and moved its contents to a secret compartment.
But where was the compartment? He’d checked the top and bottom drawer; there was no sign of a space that could conceal anything. The other drawers were as plain as the middle one, five pieces of flat steel without any seams or breaks.
He opened the middle drawer, and—as he expected—the pen had returned.
Tim had felt the back of the cabinet with his hand but decided to get a better look. Maybe it would hold the answer. He shimmied the heavy thing out a few inches at a time, until there was a space of a foot or so between it and the wall behind. He climbed below his desk and examined the cabinet thoroughly, using his phone as a light. He looked at the space on the carpet where the cabinet had been, and tilted it up to peer beneath it. Nothing looked out of place or strange. It was by all accounts a normal filing cabinet.
He stood and brushed off his pants, then considered the phone in his hand. An idea struck him. He opened his camera and turned on the flash. He placed the phone faceup in the drawer. He set the timer for ten seconds, started it, and slid the drawer closed. He waited just a moment and opened the drawer, verifying the trick had worked—the phone was gone. At least he’d see the inside of whatever compartment the phone ended up in. Maybe he’d even hear the camera click, or see the flash go off.
Ten seconds passed, and Tim didn’t see or hear anything. No worries, he thought, let’s see what this compartment looks like. His heart beat a little more quickly as he pulled on the drawer, revealing his phone, just as he’d left it.
He lifted the phone and opened his pictures. Most of him expected an out-of-focus, up-close view of a gray metal drawer, but he was still excited as he pulled up the most recent photo.
No part of him expected what he saw. The camera was pointed at what appeared to be an arched stone ceiling. The picture clearly showed the seams between large carved stones, tan-colored blocks streaked with white and brown. The arch reached its peak above the camera, showing the picture to have been taken from more or less the center of the room. Pillars reached to the ceiling along the sides of the picture, and Tim found there was an increased feeling of falling the longer he stared at it, a tightness in his chest that wouldn’t release him.
He slid his chair away from the cabinet slightly, eyeing it warily. This “prank” was getting weird. And weirdly elaborate.
“A photo,” he whispered to himself. It’s just a picture of a photo stashed inside the compartment. Right?
Tim sat still for a long moment. Video, he decided. He’d take a video, and then he’d be able to see where the phone went, and that it was just a photo and there was a trapdoor or a false bottom and there would be a rational, tangible solution.
His head hurt. He tapped the screen a couple of times, started the video recording, and lowered the phone into the drawer. He closed it gingerly and immediately opened it again, ensuring it was empty.
He waited for as long as he could stand, which turned out to be about three minutes, before closing and reopening the drawer to retrieve the phone. He leaned over the drawer, surprised at the look he saw in his own face displayed on the screen. It was fear.
Tim stopped the recording, then waited in agony as the phone processed the file. He pressed Play, his eyes glued to the small screen. The video went dark as the phone was closed into the drawer, then almost immediately, bright light flooded the screen. Once again Tim was staring at an arched stone ceiling, but it was undeniably real. He could feel it, sense it—so real it was almost living.
There was a faint sound coming from the phone. Tim increased the volume, bringing the phone closer to his face while keeping his eyes fixed on the screen. The noises didn’t sound like anything in particular, but Tim knew at once they weren’t sounds from his office. He strained to make sense of it, and thought maybe he could hear footsteps. The video drew to its last few seconds, and Tim was about to set it down on his desk when he saw a black shape fly across the screen. Then darkness, and the drawer opening, and Tim’s face.
“What was that?” Tim whispered.
A bird, he thought. Must be a bird.
He played the video again, skipping to the end. He paused it and stepped through slowly, but the bird—the thing—was too fast. And too large.
With too many limbs.
Tim put the phone down and rested his face in his hands. I’m not crazy, he thought. I’m pretty sure I’m not crazy.
He sat for several minutes, until his heart rate slowed and he could stop his hands from shaking. He reached for his phone again. He ignored the part of him politely insisting that he run from the building screaming. Tim rummaged through another drawer until he found what he was looking for: a binder clip, the black plastic kind for holding stacks of hundreds of pages. And also, it happens, perfect for holding a phone upright. A handy little office-supply tripod.
He started the video recording again and placed the phone in the drawer. He sent the phone away again, confidently, as if he were mailing a letter. He waited only a minute before retrieving it, eager to see what else was in the room with the stone ceiling.
He replayed the video with a shaking hand, his heart pounding in his chest. It showed a large room stretched out in front of him, with pillars near the wall that looked as if they’d thrust themselves out of the ground rather than been carved or constructed. They stretched hungrily to the ceiling, fleeing the depths of the earth.
Tim brought the phone closer to his ear, and he could definitely make out voices. Several of them, echoing in the chamber. They were chanting something he couldn’t understand, but it sounded eager, and unkind. Threatening.
The video ended without
any flying creatures, but Tim was unnerved all the same. He had an awful feeling about the chanting. It put images in his mind he was sure weren’t there before. Deep water and stone tombs, and icy-cold blackness.
Tim’s hands shook as he held the phone. He considered leaving; he’d been sick, after all. He tried to get up but found that his body resisted. His curiosity was too strong a force, a gravity that pulled his mind continually back to that place. The drawer. The stone room.
He had no desire to hear those voices again, but found himself reaching for the drawer. He chose a new angle for the camera’s focus as he placed it, then slowly closed it. He let several moments slip by, then watched in horror as his hands reached for the drawer and its nightmarish contents.
Once again the phone had captured the chanting voices, but the new angle also captured their source. As Tim reviewed the video, his eyes widened. His breath caught in his throat, and the phone almost fell from his hands.
A simple wooden throne rose from the otherwise bare stone floor. In the seat was a man, his arms and legs bound and his head hanging down toward his chest. On either side and behind the throne were tall hooded figures, swaying from side to side and droning the oppressive chant. Tim assumed it was coming from them, though their faces were shadowed by their gray robes. At least two of the figures held long curved knives in their hands. As the video drew to a close, Tim thought he saw the man struggle slightly against his bindings.
He slid the phone into his pocket and stood from his chair. He looked out across the cubicles filling the floor.
It’s a portal, he thought. It’s some kind of opening to a different world or dimension or something. He continued looking around, not sure what he was expecting to find. His coworkers continued their tasks, oblivious to the crisis he was experiencing.
I have to help him, he thought. Don’t I? He was unsure of the protocol of the situation, but assumed that if things were reversed, he would want a stranger from another world to at least make an effort.
Tim noticed a door on the far wall that he didn’t remember ever seeing before. Maybe there’s another portal, a way to get to that other room. He crossed casually to the door, noticing there was no sign or indication of its contents. He tried the handle and found the door locked.