Secrets in the Dark

by Darcy Coates

  Using the red light as a guide, Clare took the stairs two at a time. She stayed conscious of Dorran beside her, silently counting his steps and listening to him breathe. He didn’t sound good.

  Beneath them, the lab doors banged open. Clare clenched her teeth. Her mind ran through the building, hunting for any way out. The hollows surrounded the ground level. She had no idea how to control the lights and audio system to drive them off. They could hide in one of the rooms, but that was, at best, a temporary measure. Ezra knew the building. Ezra controlled the surveillance and the security systems.

  We can’t hide. We can’t leave. Can we fight?

  She didn’t want to be a killer. The hollows were one thing, but this was a human—a living, thinking, sensitive human. She didn’t know if she could look him in the eyes and end his life.

  Is there any choice? Dorran was in no shape to fight. He moved unsteadily, eyes half closed. He didn’t want to tell her how bad it was, but his pain was evident. She had to protect him, no matter the cost. I need a weapon. Something that can compete with a gun.

  In the three weeks he’d been trapped, Ezra must have gone through the entire tower. He’d marked the rooms with hollows inside. If there were any weapons, he would have found them, and most likely hidden them. He’d expected his transmission to draw irrational, dangerous people. He would have been prepared. He would have ensured he had the strongest upper hand possible.

  Not quite. There’s one weapon in the building he didn’t hide. The hollows.

  They reached a landing, and Clare pulled on Dorran’s hand to keep him from turning the corner. The thump of feet on marble stairs rang from below. They sounded heavy; Ezra was already flagging. A different kind of thumping came from behind them. Clare turned towards the hallway.

  Rows of doors lined the walls, with the red exit light above their heads radiating its grim colour across the space. Something unseen beat its fists against the nearest door. Red masking tape had been used to draw a large X across the surface.

  “I need you to trust me,” she hissed to Dorran.

  He gave her a crooked smile. “I always have.”

  “When I say go, unlock that door and open it.”

  Clare left him beside the occupied room and jogged along the hallway. Ezra must have already searched the space; doors stood open, exposing sterile meeting rooms and abandoned lecture halls. Inside the second conference room, she found a fire extinguisher half-hidden behind a dead potted fern. She wrenched it out of its holder and removed its safety pin as she returned to the hallway.

  Dorran waited beside the door. Clare paused behind him to listen. The footsteps were drawing closer. Close enough, she thought. She nodded to Dorran. He nodded back, turned the lock, and pulled open the door.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  A hulking, misshapen creature spilled into the hallway. Drooping, pendulous flaps of skin pooled over each other, swinging as the hollow turned towards Clare. She had just enough time to see its beady eyes flash red in the exit light, then she pulled on the extinguisher’s handle.

  White foam exploded across the creature. It bellowed, a deep, reverberating tone that shook the air around them. Clare moved a step nearer, the extinguisher shuddering in her hands, and the hollow’s howl intensified as it retreated.

  Clare knew the monster had spent most of a month in isolation, and she’d hoped the sudden stimulus would be too much for it to cope with. Her gamble paid off. The hollow staggered towards the stairs, and Clare followed it. As they neared the top step, Clare lifted the extinguisher and slammed its base into the hollow’s chest.

  The creature howled as it fell down the stairs. Horrible crackling noises rose as its fragile bones broke. Clare stepped back, breathing more heavily than she’d expected, and stopped at Dorran’s side.

  A surprised cry rose from Ezra. Clare closed her eyes, half of her praying the strategy would work, the other half dreading it. A gunshot echoed from the landing below, followed by a second. Clare waited. She was greeted by silence.

  One bullet to kill Peter. Two bullets chasing us out of the lab. Another two to kill the hollow. He should have one left.

  “Up,” Clare whispered, dropping the fire extinguisher. “We need to find another hollow.”

  Dorran followed her onto the stairs. New noises rose from the lower floor, and Ezra was swearing. The hollow had upset him. Good.

  Her legs burned, and her chest ached where she’d been hit, but Clare didn’t slow down. The hollow hadn’t stalled Ezra for long. They stopped at the fifteenth floor, and Clare slunk forward, listening. She couldn’t find any red tape on the doors. The floor was silent.

  Dorran gave her a short nod, his hair shining in the red light, and they turned back to the stairs. Clare could no longer hear Ezra’s footsteps below them. That worried her.

  They took the next two flights in long strides. The stairs ended in a narrow foyer with windows on either side. Harsh lightning illuminated the room in sporadic, painful flashes. A single door stood in front of Clare. It looked familiar. She turned and saw a solid wall where the stairs were supposed to continue. They had reached the highest floor.

  She pressed a hand over her mouth as she tried to swallow the overwhelming sense of panic. They were cornered. There was nowhere to hide on the highest level, and no hollows; just the maintenance room. They would be sitting ducks.

  “Back down,” she hissed. She didn’t know if they had time to make it to the floor below before Ezra caught up to them or what they would do once they reached it. She just knew that they needed to keep moving.

  She fought to keep her footsteps light so she would hear Ezra’s approach before he was on them. As they neared the landing, she pressed her shoulder against the wall and leaned forward to glimpse around the corner. There was no sign of Ezra, either on the stairs or in the hallway. The level was suspiciously quiet.

  Maybe he realised we were trapped. Maybe he’s hiding around a corner, waiting for our inevitable retreat. A point-blank shot.

  He had only one bullet left, though. He couldn’t hit both of them. Clare put her hand against Dorran’s chest, pushing him back behind herself as she slunk around the corner. The next flight of stairs was empty. She moved silently, holding her breath, straining to hear any human noises: the rustle of a jacket, the squeak of a shoe, or a breath. The storm continued to rage around them, drowning out any of the subtler noises.

  “Clare.” Dorran’s hand fell on her shoulder, halting her. “I hear something.”

  She frowned, listening. She could hear the storm. She could hear creaks as the wind’s pressure made the metal tower sway. She could hear drumming rain. “What is it?”

  He leaned close, his breathless voice in her ear. “Mechanical, I think. It blends into the thunder, but it is something different.”

  Clare took another step. She was nearly at the carpet. A faint light blinked at the other end of the hall. She hadn’t seen that light before, and it took her a second to realise where it came from.

  He brought the elevators back online.

  Ezra had realised they could outmatch him in speed, so he’d taken away that advantage. But it gave Clare an opportunity. She grabbed Dorran’s arm. “We need to shut off the power. Quickly!”

  He turned back towards the stairs, Clare following closely behind. She could make out the mechanical noises of the elevator gears turning as it drew closer. They skidded around the corner and onto the highest floor. The door to the maintenance room was locked, but it was only made of wood. Dorran lifted his foot and kicked. The wood cracked as it splintered, and when he kicked it again, the door burst inwards, the lock surrounded by a halo of broken wood.

  “Get the lights.” He was already fumbling for the lids on the generator.

  Clare felt for the switches beside the door and turned them. Rows of lights blinked on overhead. Dorran bent over the generator, his face full of hard angles and his hands buried inside the machine. The lights stayed on for all of two seconds before
they died with a long, drawn-out whine as the power drained out of the building.

  The darkness was oppressive. Clare closed her eyes and tried to remember the last time they’d visited the highest floor. Ezra had brought a torch. He’d been forgetful with it. He’d put it down on the workbench, and she didn’t remember him picking it up again after that. Clare moved towards the surface, clipped her hip on the edge of a pipe, and hissed.

  “Clare?”

  “Just a moment.” She found the bench and ran her hands across the surface. Her fingers found something cylindrical and cold. Light exploded around them as she turned on the torch.

  “I think we’re okay.” She moved back towards Dorran, her ears trained on the lower level. “I think we cut the power before he could open the elevator doors. He’ll be trapped in there until we turn the power back on.”

  “Good.” Dorran turned so that his back was against the generator and slid to the ground. He exhaled deeply as his long legs stretched out.

  Clare dropped down beside him. She finally had a chance to get a good look at him, and what she saw filled her with quiet dread.

  Blood ran from his nose and lips, though it was already drying. It was tacky in his hair too. He’d taken on an awful grey shade. His beautiful eyes were deeply shadowed and duller than she was used to.

  Clare ran her fingertips across his cheek as gently as she could, and he leaned into the touch. “Does it hurt?”

  “No.”

  There was an undercurrent in how he carried himself that made her think he was lying.

  “Oh, Dorran.” She trailed her fingers over his chin, where the blood had cracked. “What did he do to you?”

  Dorran closed his eyes. He looked exhausted. “Don’t worry about that. We just need to find a way out of the tower.”

  Clare bit her lip and turned the torch across the space, scanning the room. Ezra seemed to have spent a lot of time up there, probably trying to keep the generator running. Bottles of water lay discarded on benches, along with thick manuals and open boxes of supplies.

  If we can find his computers and figure out how to activate the lights and alarms, we might be able to leave while he’s trapped in the elevator.

  Her stomach coiled. Leaving Ezra to starve might be even crueller than unleashing hollows on him. Clare tried to balance her perspective as her mind, panicked, darted between ideas. Ezra would probably figure out how to get out of the elevator. She just hoped that wouldn’t happen too quickly.

  Dorran suddenly moved. He bent over, facing away from her, and retched. Her torchlight picked up bright-red blood pooling over the ground, and Clare clutched at her throat. “Dorran?”

  He held up a hand, asking her to wait. The fingers shook.

  Please, Dorran, please hold on.

  The panic was rising like a tsunami. She didn’t know what had happened to him, and there was precious little she could do to help. She couldn’t even give him time to rest. Each minute inside Helexis was an extra minute Ezra would be working on opening the elevator.

  Leaving the tower was only one issue. Even if they figured that out, Clare didn’t know what they would do afterwards. Dorran wouldn’t be able to run much farther, or even walk. She wasn’t strong enough to carry him. Blocked roads meant not even a car could help. She felt like she was being pressed in on all sides, with no routes to escape.

  Dorran slumped back against the generator. The muscles in his face were slack. He’s dehydrated. That, at least, is something I can help. Clare crossed to the bottles she’d seen on the bench. She found an unopened one and broke the seal as she returned to her companion.

  “Dorran?” She crawled to his side, afraid to touch him in case she somehow made him worse. “We have water. It might help.”

  “Mm.” His eyes cracked open. “Thank you.”

  “Shh, don’t try to talk. We’ll be okay. I… I’ll…”

  Clare wanted to promise him she would solve everything. That he didn’t need to worry. That he just needed to stay alive, and everything would be all right. She felt like a liar.

  He drank slowly then lowered the bottle while it was still half full. “Is there a cloth anywhere?”

  “Hang on. I’ll find one.” Clare sprang back to her feet. The room was cluttered, but for all of its chaos, she couldn’t find any fabric. She took up a knife and used it to rip the sleeve off her jacket, then she returned to Dorran and offered it to him. “Sorry, this is all I could find.”

  “It’s perfect.” He poured water on it and used it to clean his face. Clare huddled at his side as he worked. His spare arm slipped around her shoulders, and for a moment, Clare was transported back to a better time. When they had been at Winterbourne, they had often sat like that in front of the fire: on the rug, legs stretched towards the flames, Dorran’s arm around her. She leaned her head against his chest to complete the picture. She wished she could pull back the smells from those earlier times too—clean linens and burning wood, instead of the blood, metal, and stress that surrounded her.

  Dorran threw the cloth away. He’d cleared the blood off his face, but she could still see some of the stickiness in his hair. The grey shade wasn’t improved. She wrapped her hands around his arm, desperately holding him against herself.

  “Don’t be afraid.” He tilted far enough to kiss the top of her head. “We will make this work. We always do.”

  “We always do,” she echoed.

  All the while, her subconscious was tracking each passing second. Dorran needed rest, but the amount she could give him—a minute or two at most—seemed horribly inadequate. She stretched them as long as she dared, counting the seconds, pushing for just a little longer.

  A noise echoed from deeper in the building. Clare squeezed her eyes closed, praying it was just the metal complaining under the storm’s strain. If Ezra had gotten out of the elevator, they were sitting ducks. The torch at her side gave them a little bubble of light. She could turn it off and let them take shelter in the darkness. But even that would only delay the inevitable. Ezra would be coming up to restore the generator. If they tried to run, they would meet him on the stairs.

  The stairs… That’s what it sounds like. Footsteps on stairs. Hundreds of them.

  A deep, thrumming echo rose through the building. It was faint, but persistent. Clare squeezed Dorran’s hand, her breath catching. “I think we need to put the generator back on.”

  He pushed away from the floor, staggered, and leaned against the generator. “Light, please.”

  She turned the torch around to help guide his hands. He’d taken out the fuse and carefully refit it. The machine began to whirr as lights flickered on above them.

  Clare looked towards the display panel Ezra had shown them above the generator. Six little lights tracked which windows were locked and which were open. Five of the lights were green. One was red.

  Dorran followed Clare’s gaze. He took a slow breath. “We are out of time.”

  Clare stepped back from the machine. Her mind ran through every option, searching for some way out. The stairs. The windows. The locked rooms. The elevators.

  The elevators…

  “Can you run a little more?” she asked.

  He nodded, and Clare gripped his hand to keep him at her side.

  They moved back down the stairs, this time pushed by a fresh sense of urgency. Each second, the noises echoing from the floors below grew louder.

  Clare staggered to a halt on the fifteenth floor. At the opposite end of carpeted hallway, the elevator doors were open. A block of light flowed out. It was a sharp contrast with the shadowed walls and red exit sign. As she watched, the doors slid closed.

  “Ezra?” Her voice caught. She squeezed Dorran’s hand, her fingers clammy, and took a step towards the elevator. “Please, listen—just for a moment. We can’t afford to fight each other anymore.”

  He couldn’t have gone far. She took the hallway in slow, measured steps, passing rows of closed doors. Her nerves were raw. At the back o
f her mind, she kept track of the chatter rising from the stairwell. It was closing in on them, already too near.

  “We have to work together if we have any chance of surviving.” She was nearly at the elevator, and yet, there was no sign of Ezra. If he was near, he was keeping quiet.

  He can’t have gone up; we would have met him on the stairs. Did he go down? Back to the work room, maybe? Or the labs? They were nearly at the elevator. Clare reached a shaking hand towards the buttons.

  “Give it back.”

  Clare swivelled. Ezra stood at the opposite end of the hall. He stepped out of the stairwell, gun aimed towards them.

  “Ezra, please. We don’t have much time.” Clare held her hands up. “The hollows—”

  “The USB!” The gun shook. “You can’t take it! Give it back!”

  “I—I—” Clare threw her mind back. It felt like an eternity ago that she’d talked to Ezra about the USB containing his code. Do I have it? I don’t remember. When was the last time I saw it?

  “Give it to me!” A fleck of spittle flew from between bared teeth. He’d been pushed to his limit, to the point where madness started to seep through the cracks in his composure. Clare had felt what it was like to be pushed to that edge herself. She knew how bitter and frightening it was to teeter on that line, unsure of what was real, unable to trust her own mind.

  “You can come with us.” She held out a hand to him.

  Ezra didn’t show any awareness of cacophony in the stairwell. His whole attention was directed towards Clare, eyes wild and desperate.

  Then the shadows in the red-tinted stairwell suddenly morphed. They began to tremble then dance. Then they exploded in a frenzy of movement. Clare sucked in a sharp breath. “Behind you!”

  Ezra turned just as the swell of hollows rose out of the stairwell in a wall of frothing limbs and gaping mouths. The gun fired, spending its final round into the crowd. If it hit any mark, it was quickly swallowed under the frenzy.

  Dorran dragged Clare backwards, away from the swarm. They hit the elevator doors. Clare reached out blindly and pressed the button.