STRANGER WORLD

by Jack Castle

  “Uh, Dad,” Maddie said in a patronizing tone. When he looked down at her she rolled her eyes toward a black square pad to the side of the door.

  Was that even there before? How could I have missed it? I must be more tired than I thought.

  Maddie leaned forward and depressed the large black pad with her small hands and the sound of whirring gears and cylinders unlocking could be heard from within.

  Their salvation far outweighing his pride he asked her, “How’d you figure that out?”

  “Uh, duh… video games.”

  “Nice,” he said sardonically.

  The door cracked apart horizontally with a pneumatic hiss. He gently moved her behind him.

  The bottom half of the door descended smoothly into the floor with no problem. But the top half rose only a quarter of the way into the ceiling before jerking a few times and getting stuck fast. Unseen motors whined in protest, several sparks popped around the frame and the motors were soon silenced.

  George shielded his eyes from the sparks and kept Maddie at a safe distance. The small fire that had sprung up was over before it began, leaving only small scorch marks on the door.

  “C’mon, let’s go.”

  They ducked quickly under the top half of the door. As they passed under, George noted the steel door was a lot thicker than he first realized. “Keep moving,” he said firmly for fear of the broken-half dropping down on them.

  Before George could even scan the room’s interior he heard Maddie say behind him, “Uh, Dad? I think I’m stuck.”

  George turned and saw part of Maddie’s hospital gown was stretched between her waist and the doorframe. He immediately identified the culprit as a gear sprung loose from the doorframe.

  “Hang on, baby-girl, I’ll get you out,” he started to say, but he’d never get the chance to because just as he feared, the heavy door fell.

  Maddie screamed.

  Chapter 8

  “Break Room”

  Maddie knew her dad would never save her in time.

  Her father lurched forward with uncanny speed, but Maddie quickly calculated the distance and knew he would never reach her, so she simply closed her eyes.

  When the top half of the heavy door fell, she waited for the terrible crushing blow that would end her mayfly existence. Oddly enough her last thought was how sad he was going to be after she was gone.

  A tearing sound.

  Strong hands around her waist.

  Her spine curving backward as she was violently pulled forward.

  A deafening crashing THUD behind her.

  When Maddie opened her eyes she was surprised to find herself amongst the living and lying on her dad’s heaving chest. She could feel his heart pumping furiously beneath her.

  “Holy cats, that was close,” he exclaimed. And as they both sat up he asked, “Are you alright?”

  She could only nod in answer. Maddie wanted to say thank you, she wanted to tell her dad how much she loved him, but the first thing she blurted out was, “You ripped my gown.”

  Her dad stared to where she was clutching the torn cloth in her hand. He raised his eyebrows, rolled his eyes, and shook his head.

  Maddie gazed back to where the top half of the steel door had crashed to the floor and should have crushed her. She accessed her memory and said aloud, “You know, we studied guillotines in school. I never thought I’d actually see one.”

  “Very funny.”

  Maddie thought it odd her dad thought this funny. She was being totally serious.

  Inside the room were long rectangular tables. They were rotting from the water leaking from broken pipes overhead. On the floor, in many places, were still pools of water. Two dozen chairs, most of which were overturned, littered the floor like children’s toys, and against the walls were brightly colored machines standing like stalwart sentinels.

  “What is this place?” she asked.

  “Hhhmmm. Some kind of break room, maybe?”

  Her dad took a step forward and he heard something crunch underfoot.

  “Wait.” he said, holding her back with an outstretched hand. Maddie immediately froze. He pointed to the floor. “Glass.”

  Maddie nodded solemnly. He knelt down so she could scramble up onto his back.

  Clinging to his back, they crossed the large open room. He stopped next to a wall that had caved in and studied it.

  “See these rocks here?” he asked.

  “Uh-huh,” Maddie replied, nodding even though she couldn’t see them while she was on his back.

  He righted one of the few chairs that wasn’t rotted and stood her on it so she wouldn’t step on broken glass with her bare feet. “These rocks are compacted and smooth, indicating they’re very, very deep.”

  Maddie recalled that after her dad had retired from the military he had taken an interest in Geology, even going as far as to take a college course on the subject. When they would go on road trips in the Pacific Northwest he would point out unusual rock formations or pick up strange and unique rocks and explain their make-up and origin. She couldn’t care less about rocks but his enthusiasm was so infectious she usually played along. But not this time.

  “So what does that mean, that we’re deep underground?”

  “Hhmmm-mmmm… I thought we were in an above ground bunker or only slightly below ground, but the formation of these rocks suggests we are way, way below ground, maybe even miles.”

  Maddie gulped. She purposely slumped her shoulders forward, frowned, and said, “We’re never getting out of here.”

  Her dad dropped the rock he was holding, brushed the dirt off his hands and then gripped her gently by the shoulders. “Hey, what’s the number one rule for survival?”

  Maddie rolled her eyes to their corners. “Hope.” And when she didn’t complete the answer he raised his eyebrow at her and she added, “Without the will to live you have nothing.”

  He gave her a crisp nod. “Right.” Then spotting the stalwart sentinels she had spotted earlier he added, “Now, what do you say we break open those snack machines against the wall and see if any food pops out?”

  “Oh yes, please,” she replied enthusiastically, but when he moved toward them they both heard it at the same time.

  A woman’s voice.

  They both cocked their heads to listen more intently. George gave her a questioning look and pointed to the doorway as if to say, ‘I think it’s coming from down the hallway.’

  Maddie nodded. He turned his back for her and she climbed on board the daddy-express and they exited the room.

  It was definitely a human voice, but the one thing that bothered Maddie the most was she couldn’t make out the language.

  It might as well have been an alien from another world.

  Chapter 9

  “Costuming”

  “Qing mai chu di yi bu.”

  They followed the sound of the woman’s voice down a darkened corridor. Many of the bulbs were flickering or had already burned out. As they entered another large open area they heard a warm humming noise.

  “Hello?” George called out tentatively.

  In answer, a fluorescent neon-green pedestal rose up from the floor in front of them.

  The pleasant female voice they heard earlier said, in a tone akin to a request, “Qing mai chu di yi bu.” When neither of them moved the voice repeated, “Qing mai chu di yi bu.”

  After hearing it the second time George said, “I think she’s speaking Chinese.”

  “Where’s it coming from?” Maddie asked. “I don’t see any speakers.”

  She was right.

  The glowing platform gently blinked on and off and was accompanied by a soft chime as though urging Maddie to step forward. “BLING… BLING… BLING”, it emitted softly.

  Maddie must’ve been thinking the same thing because she said, “I think she wants me to stand on this green platform thingy.”

  Before he could tell her not to step on the glowing green thingy Maddie, of course, did just t
hat.

  A half dozen, neon-green, laser-light beams appeared from nowhere. After a few seconds of searching, they converged on Maddie. The beams began scanning her body and paid special attention to the details of her face. Maddie must have seen his body tense up because she said, “Dad, it’s okay. It doesn’t hurt. If anything, it kinda tickles a little.” And in a matter of seconds the lasers had created a computer rendering of her in hologram form which was now floating in front of her.

  “Cool,” Maddie breathed. “Just like on Star Trek.”

  Again, George was amazed at the level of technology in this place.

  Several free-floating screens winked into existence and floated around Maddie in a semi-circle. Each panel began flashing hundreds of wardrobe selections across their frameless screens in rapid succession. At first the selections were far too fast to follow to make out any real details. All George could tell was some of the clothes were brightly colored and others weren’t. After his brain and eyes finally began to keep up he could see the wardrobes weren’t so much clothes as they were costumes--pirate costumes, cowboy costumes, super hero, military, animal, Indians, the choices were as numerous as the antiques back in the giant hangar.

  There was some more scanning and the pleasant female Chinese voice returned. “Qing xuanze.”

  When Maddie didn’t make a choice the computer program seemed to be narrowing down the selections for her.

  After several more seconds, only five selections remained, one for each hovering screen. Two of the choices resembled princess gowns, one a cowgirl, one a zombie, and another a pirate theme. All had constructed an image of Maddie inside each costume. The constructs smiled back with lifeless eyes as they modeled their respective costumes for her.

  After a few moments of indecision, Maddie selected the simplest of the bunch--a blue knee-length dress, with a dark blue ribbon for her hair, white socks that went up to her knees, and black ankle-strap shoes.

  “This one.” She leaned forward slightly, touching one of the floating screens in front of her with her forefinger.

  In an instant, the other screens vanished, and the screen with her selection slowly followed suit.

  Silence.

  Finally Maddie said, “What now?”

  In answer a half-dozen laser thin elongated robotic arms descended smoothly out of the ceiling. As George and Maddie stared up at them they didn’t notice the four solid walls silently rising up out of the floor until it was too late.

  “Maddie,” George said. “Maddie, get out of there right now!”

  George bounded forward but the smooth walls rose up around her, cutting him off from her and encasing her within. Just before she had vanished from his sight completely she had turned her chin over her shoulder to gaze back at him. She was frightened.

  “Daddy,” she said softly, “Daddy, I’m scared.”

  Maddie’s pleas became muffled as the four rising walls melded with the ceiling.

  “Let her go, damn it!” George shouted, but no amount of pounding, kicking, or cursing did any bit of good. He ran around Maddie’s cylindrical tomb and found nothing in the way of a handle or window. Putting an ear to one of the walls he could barely hear the muffled whirring noises within as the lasers did their work.

  “Maddie, if you can hear me, I want you to get down on the floor, as close to the ground as possible.”

  No answer.

  Seeing nothing to batter the wall down with George took a few steps back and was about to charge Maddie’s enclosure when he heard a loud hissing sound coming from the ceiling. The four walls dropped back down and he thought he glimpsed the robot lasers in the mist as they vanished back up into the ceiling.

  Waving the dense fog away he shouted, “Maddie!”

  Whirring fans in the floor sucked away the steam and he could see Maddie standing on the pedestal that even now was lowering back into the floor.

  “Oh, thank God,” he said, as they ran into each other’s arms. “You okay? Let me look at you.”

  Maddie’s eyes were wide but she seemed unharmed. When she spoke it was with a sense of wonderment. “That…was…so…COOL.”

  She was no longer wearing her hospital gown and in bare feet. Instead, she now wore the light blue dress and black shoes she had selected earlier, and somehow the machine had even styled her hair and tied it up over her shoulders with a pretty blue ribbon.

  “Seriously, Dad, you’ve got to try it.”

  As though sensing Maddie’s request the disembodied voice returned, this time in a lovely British accent. “Please step forward.”

  George shook his head. “Yeah, I don’t think so.” The closest he would ever come to playing dress up was the uniform he wore for the military for twenty years.

  Even though he hadn’t stepped on the pedestal the lasers did a quick scan of him anyway and soon a mirror image of him appeared. Within seconds this time, several floating screens displayed pictures of him wearing various costumes. One was a cowboy, another a fighter pilot, there was a space pirate, and some kind of super hero in yellow and black tights with claws for hands.

  Maddie clapped with glee a few times and pointed. “Oh, I like the cowboy one.”

  George shook his head again, grabbed her by the hand and pulled her along after him. “Awww, man,” she complained. “But Dad, you would’ve made a great cowboy. Look, he even has a shiny badge on his vest.”

  “Please step forward,” the voice wailed after them.

  The corridor went on for some time but eventually they popped out into an enormous tubular tunnel. The tunnel, (easily fifty feet across), was white as snow, had smooth walls and, except for the large square beam that ran the length of the ceiling, was fairly nondescript.

  George was still trying to wrap his mind around the costuming machine back there. It had not only undressed Maddie, but put her in a costume, styled her hair, and did it all so quickly. The technology was unbelievable. This had to be a dream.

  They stepped off a deck resembling a subway loading platform and onto the floor of the giant tube. They were barely halfway across when they felt a brisk wind tugging on their clothes.

  “You feel that?” Maddie started to say, but a loud howling noise was growing louder by the second.

  George froze. This was something familiar. Then he had it. “I know what this is.”

  Hearing the fear in his voice, Maddie asked, “What?”, but she had to yell to be heard above the rushing wind and screeching growing steadily stronger by the second.

  “We have to move!” he yelled, pulling her toward the platform on the opposite side, still a good twenty-five feet away.

  They had nearly reached the other side when they heard an even louder crashing sound on the platform directly ahead of them.

  It was the angry hover drone; the same one with the damaged brow over its single eye. It had just crashed through a concrete wall and was now floating on the loading platform before them. It immediately brandished its weapons, the undamaged ones anyway, and pointed them right at George and Maddie.

  “Dad!” Maddie cried, patting his shoulder.

  “I know, I see it,” George replied but he soon realized it wasn’t the hover drone that had gained Maddie’s attention.

  It was the tube-shaped tunnel train speeding right at them. George had only a second to think, How is it moving through the tunnel when there are no tracks?

  Maddie stood there and screamed.

  Although still heavily damaged, the hover drone fired off several shots only narrowly missing them.

  In a last ditch effort, George scooped Maddie up in his arms and scrambled back the way they had come. Their only hope lay in reaching the platform they had come in on.

  But George tripped and stumbled, and they both went tumbling to the ground.

  By the time George had got them both to their feet he knew they’d never reach either platform in time. It was still another twenty feet away and the hover drone was only a scant few feet behind, closing fast. The hover
drone was not going to let them get away this time.

  George buried his daughter’s sobbing face into his neck and said, “Close your eyes, baby-girl,” and they both waited for the inevitable.

  Chapter 10

  “Clamoring for the Surface”

  A feeling of weightlessness overcame him and was over in less than a second.

  At the last moment a trap door opened beneath his feet and dropped them down into a square-pegged hole. The drop hadn’t been more than seven feet, but they had landed on hard concrete, which hurt like the dickens. Of course, the alternative was being splattered across the front of a speeding train so George wasn’t complaining too much.

  In those last few seconds he had lifted his gaze to the hover drone closing in on them. After they had been dropped down the hole it took a few moments for the angry robot to figure out where they had vanished to, but it was soon staring down on them. It had its laser sights focused on their foreheads when the subway train car plowed into it at Mach speed.

  The explosion was deafening. George shielded Maddie with his body as best as he was able to in the confined space. When he glanced up a second time both train and hover drone were gone as though they had never existed.

  Satisfied they were out of danger for the moment, George did a cursory check on Maddie for any injuries. He found none. He would’ve thought she’d be sobbing by now, because he sure felt like it, but she was only breathing hard.

  When she finally caught her breath she lifted her wide eyes to him and said, “Now I really have to go to the bathroom.”

  George let out his breath. He hadn’t even realized he had been holding it. He smiled, tousled her hair the way she hated, and then hugged her fiercely. Still holding her he said, “Let’s get out of this hole first.”

  George rose to his feet. The square hole had no apparent purpose other than saving their lives. “I don’t get it.” He would’ve expected a maintenance ladder, or access to underground piping or electrical wiring, but there was none of that. It was as though the hole had popped into existence solely for their benefit. He ran his hand on the smooth sides. “How is this even possible?”