by Peter Clines
“Oh, God,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “You’ve been walking for two days, that’s for sure.” She tugged off the sock with two fingers, held it like a dirty diaper, and set his bare foot down on the floor. The sock flew toward the bathroom and she picked up the other sneaker. The knot fell apart under her fingers and Nate realized he was stretched out on his couch with a pillow under his head.
“Just go back to sleep,” said Veek. She dragged a thin blanket over him. “Like Tim said, we can talk about it tomorrow.”
He was going to answer this time for sure. He even had a clever joke about her pulling his clothes off. And then he was asleep.
* * *
“This room was marked ‘control,’” said Nate the next morning. He’d been out for ten hours straight. He hadn’t slept that many hours in a row since college.
He turned in a slow circle. He looked at the towering walls and window of Clive and Debbie’s apartment. “It’s the control room.”
Tim looked up at the high ceiling. “Controlling what, though?”
“The building,” said Veek.
“Yeah, but what does that mean?” said Tim. “Is there something in here that controls the temperature or the water pressure or the power usage or...” He shrugged. “How do you control a building?”
“It’s got to have something to do with the walls in here,” said Nate.
Clive looked around his apartment. “The fact that they’re two stories tall or the fact that they’re wood?”
Nate eyed the tall planks. “I don’t know,” he said. “Yes? Both? This is the only place with walls that aren’t painted, so we know there wasn’t something written here. But we know it’s a special room because it’s built different than all the rest.”
“But they’re all different,” said Tim.
Veek nodded. “Right, but this is seriously different. It’s like apples and oranges and a cinderblock. So what’s in here that makes it special?”
“It’s got a chandelier,” said Tim.
“I’ve helped Oskar change bulbs on it twice,” said Clive. “If it was the big secret, I don’t think he would’ve let me get that close to it.”
“Unless he doesn’t know it’s the secret,” said Nate.
“I have a question,” said Debbie.
“Sure,” Nate said.
“Did the diagram say ‘control room’ or did it just say ‘control’? There’s a difference.”
“How so?” asked Tim.
“Well if it’s just ‘control’ then it might mean like a control group,” she said. “The one you don’t do anything to so you’ve got a baseline.”
“Like an experiment,” Tim said.
Debbie nodded.
Nate wished he had Xela’s pictures. “I think it was just ‘control,’” he said.
“Well, that’s a pleasant thought,” murmured Clive.
Veek’s lip twisted up. “What are you worried about? If that’s right, we’re the lab rats and you’re the one getting sugar pills.”
“Yeah,” said Debbie, “but all the rats get dissected at the end of the trials. That’s just the way it goes.”
Nate stood by the couch and studied the walls. “There’s got to be something else,” he said. “You haven’t noticed anything else? Anything at all.”
“Nope,” said Debbie.
“Nothing’s attached to them,” said Clive.
“Oh,” Debbie said. “Yeah, there’s that.”
Nate looked at them. “What do you mean?”
Clive gestured at their kitchen area. “Nothing’s attached to the walls. Anywhere. The counter, the sink, the cabinets—it’s all a big free-standing piece, like an entertainment center or something. There’s a five-inch gap between the counters and the wall.” He pointed down. “The outlets aren’t even in the walls. They’re all in the floor.”
“You never told me that,” said Veek.
Debbie shrugged. “With all the things you’ve found, it just seemed like minor weirdness.”
Nate went to the counters, and stretched his arm in the space behind them. His fingertips parted cobwebs and brushed something that whisked away. The wood was lacquer-smooth behind the counter, too.
“There’s nothing there,” said Debbie. “I’ve dropped a dozen forks and spoons back there and had to go after them.”
“And a spatula,” said Clive. “It ended up dead center in the middle. Took forever to get that damned thing out.”
“Language,” said Debbie. “And I told you to just leave it.”
“Yeah, but then we wouldn’t have a spatula.”
“We could’ve got one at the Ninety-Nine Cents store.”
Veek leaned over Nate and her phone shined white light into the space. He glanced up at her. “High-tech to the rescue?”
“Velma’s the smart one,” she said. “I don’t see anything.”
“Neither do I.”
“Told you,” said Debbie.
Nate slid his arm out and tapped his fingers on the counter. “If there was something to find,” he said after a moment, “if you were going to hide something, you wouldn’t put it down low.”
Tim nodded. “You wouldn’t want somebody stumbling across it by accident.”
“Right,” said Nate. “So you’d put it where someone could only find it if they were looking for it.” He pointed above his head. “And who’s going to stumble across something twelve or thirteen feet up?”
Veek already had eyes on the loft platform. “Can I look?”
“I’ll go with you,” said Debbie. They climbed the staircase and started to pore over boards around the bed.
“I looked at the walls a lot when I built the loft,” said Clive. “I’m pretty sure there’s nothing up there.”
“How sure?” asked Nate.
The other man shrugged. “I thought it was pretty amazing, all this hardwood,” he said. “And I know I checked it again when we moved the furniture up there. The guy I asked to help was a little rambunctious and kept hitting the walls. I was freaking out about how much it would cost to repair them if one of the boards got gouged or cracked.”
“And you never saw anything at all?” asked Tim.
Clive shook his head and shrugged again. “Not up there. And we’ve been up there every night for two years. Debbie even studies up there sometimes.”
The women took another ten minutes. “Nope,” Debbie called down. “We can’t find anything.”
“We’ve got to get out there and check out the rest of it,” said Veek. She gestured at the high walls. “We need a ladder.”
Fifty
Roger had a collapsible ladder in his truck. He unfolded it in Debbie and Clive’s apartment until it formed an A-frame eight feet tall. It stood against the wall near their loft. “What am I looking for?”
Nate shrugged. “A hidden panel or switch or something,” he said. “Maybe something between the boards. Something that looks like it could be some type of control.”
“So...something weird?”
Nate smirked. “Yeah.”
“Yeah. Getting sick of that word.”
Over the next hour, Roger worked his way across two walls with the ladder. Tim took over for the other two. When they got to the end they reconfigured the ladder into a straight length and leaned it back up against the walls. It went up sixteen feet, well into the next floor of the building.
Veek looked up the ladder. “Not for me,” she said. “I’ve got a thing about heights.”
Nate glanced at her. “I thought you had a thing about bugs.”
“I’ve got more than one thing. It’s allowed.”
“You were okay up in the loft,” said Debbie.
“Because the loft is a nice big space with guard rails,” Veek said. “A ladder’s a flagpole with delusions of grandeur.”
“S’okay,” said Roger. “I’ll do the high stuff. I’m fine on a ladder.”
Veek coughed once. “So where’s Xela?”
“Working on some
thing for a class tomorrow. A painting. She was excited about the big hike and forgot it was due.”
“When’d she remember?”
“Early this morning,” said Roger. “One of those things where she just opened her eyes and said, ‘Shit, I’ve got to do this thing.’”
Veek pursed her lips and nodded.
Roger caught himself halfway up the ladder and gave her a wry smile. “Didn’t hear that from me, though.”
Clive snorted out a laugh.
“Hey,” said Nate. He gestured at the walls. “Less bragging, more climbing.”
Roger went up a few more rungs and balanced on one near the top. He examined the seams between the planks. Nate felt pretty sure the rung below Roger’s feet said something along the lines of DO NOT STAND ON OR ABOVE.
Veek leaned next to him against the couch. “So,” she murmured. “Xela and Roger.”
Nate glanced at her. “For someone who’s not jealous,” he said quietly, “you keep bringing this up a lot.”
“I’m just thinking of you,” she said. “You’re not jealous?”
“Why?” said Nate.
“Single guy,” she said, “pretty neighbor...” She shrugged.
He shook his head. “A little envious, maybe, in that basic guy kind of way, but hey, good for them.”
Veek nodded. “Good. I don’t want you all mooning and heartbroken and distracted when we’re getting close.”
“Nope. Don’t worry about it.”
“Good.”
“Hey, check this out,” called Roger. He balanced on his left and leaned out past the ladder. His finger touched a black spot on one of the planks.
Nate tried to focus on it. Against the dark wood it was almost invisible. “What d’you got?”
“This isn’t a knot,” said Roger. “It’s a hole. A drilled hole. Looks like a coffin lock or something.” He leaned a little further and squinted at the spot.
“Seriously?” asked Clive.
Roger nodded. “Yeah, I can see the socket in there. Got an Allen wrench set?”
“Yeah.” Clive stepped away towards the oversized tool chest.
Nate tapped the ladder. “What’s a coffin lock?”
“Special latch,” said Roger. “Use ‘em when you want to have a low-profile connection you can undo real easy.”
“They use them in theaters to hold sections of the deck together,” added Clive. He held up a small silver rectangle for Roger to see and then lobbed it underhand up alongside the ladder. Roger snagged it in mid-air.
“The deck?” asked Tim.
“The stage floor,” Clive explained. “It’s called a deck.”
“Learn something every day,” said Tim.
“What,” said Veek, “that wasn’t in one of those books you published?”
Roger unfolded the Allen wrench set and slid one of the thicker arms into the small hole. “Not good,” he said. “Might be metric. Maybe custom, knowing this place.” He aimed a small flashlight into the opening. “Yeah, it’s kinda funky. Looks like two of the sides are longer. Diamond-shaped, like a jewel or something.”
“Can you make it work?” asked Veek.
Roger nodded. “Think so.” His face bent into a look of concentration as he worked the Allen wrench with his left hand and hung onto the ladder with his right. “Wrench is biting, but the lock’s stiff,” he told them. “Feels like it might be rusted or something.”
“Careful,” said Nate. “You don’t want to break it.”
He shook his head. “Doesn’t feel weak,” he said. “Just stiff. Ahhh!” He grinned. “Got it loose.”
Roger twisted his hand and the lock turned.
A series of clanks came from inside the walls. They banged out one after another. It was the sound of chains and giant clocks grinding to life.
A second noise, a shrill sound, started up behind the long wooden planks. All around the apartment, they trembled in time with the sounds. A deep rattle echoed out, and Nate realized all the sounds had become much clearer.
“Fuck!” shouted Roger.
Clive lunged at the ladder as all the walls in the room became hazy. The boards puffed out years of dust along their entire lengths. The tremble became a blur. A beat later Nate realized why Roger had shouted.
The planks turned like a monstrous set of vertical blinds. The ladder shifted with them and almost toppled before Clive leaped onto the bottom rung to balance it. Nate and Tim dove in to help. Roger slid down, almost fell on top of Clive, and a loud crack echoed in the room. The rotating boards forced the loft away from the walls. The side of the wooden steps splintered as the outer edge of the platform refused to budge.
The ladder fell against the kitchen counter and crashed to the floor.
The planks kicked up more dust as they swung open to reveal the dark space inside the walls. Sounds echoed out and shook the glass in the windows. The boards pointed straight out from the wall and slid back into narrow slots.
The noises stopped. There was a beat of silence.
“You okay?” Nate asked Roger. His eyes stared past the man to the new walls.
“Oh, yeah,” he said. He stared over his own shoulder. “That big wet spot’s just a drink I spilled in my lap.”
Tim chuckled and batted his hand at the air.
Debbie coughed out some dust. “Oh my God.”
The walls behind the planks were brass and wood. In places they were steel. A faint hum drifted from them, felt on the air more than heard. In a few spots there were tall cylinders. Veek pointed at the wall by the apartment door. It held racks and racks of horizontal glass tubes, each one strung with a series of glowing wires. A second row was visible behind the framework holding them. “Are those fuses,” Veek asked, “or vacuum tubes?”
“Christ,” said Tim. “It’s all World War One high tech.”
“Forget World War One,” murmured Clive. He and Debbie clenched their shaking hands together. “It’s all steampunk.”
What had been the space between the kitchen and the loft was now a large panel of switches and pushbuttons, levers and knobs. They were grouped in rows and in small rectangles. A handful of large gauges clustered above the controls, like six brass portholes.
“What the fuck is all this?” murmured Roger.
Nate glanced at Tim. “You were right,” he said. “You don’t control a building. You control a machine.”
Fifty One
Veek walked up to the control panel and shook her head. “I think I can say a Victorian super-computer was one of the last things I expected to find in this place.”
Clive and Debbie looked at the wall of fuses. Half of it was hidden by their loft. He reached out to touch one of the glass tubes and she jerked his hand back. She glanced back at the others. “Do you think it all still works?”
There was a crackle of energy from one of the tubes. Debbie stepped back as it flared a brilliant orange and then faded. Tim leaned past them and peered at it.
“Power surge,” he announced. “Almost blew the fuse, but not quite.”
“So it’s a fuse?” asked Roger.
Tim shrugged. “Maybe. Just a figure of speech, I guess.”
Clive inspected the edge of one of the boards. An inch of it still stuck out between the banks of glass tubes. He pinched it between his fingers and slid his hand down its length. “They’re covered with rubber inside,” he said. “Electrical insulation. It probably soundproofed the apartment a bit, too.”
“So this is what all the power’s for,” said Nate. “Whatever the hell this is.”
“It’s a Koturovic,” said Veek.
“Sorry?”
She pointed next to the kitchen counter. There was a brass plaque on a dusty wooden panel. The word was engraved across the plaque in tall letters. “Koturovic,” she repeated.
“What the hell’s a co-turravitch?” said Roger.
“Is it the machine,” asked Tim, “or the creator?”
“Or someone they dedicated it to?” sai
d Clive. “Maybe someone who died while they were building it. It could be a memorial.”
Debbie’s face lit up. “K is one of the letters on the cornerstone, isn’t it?”
Veek gave a half shrug. “It is, but it’s a middle initial. Kinda weird to just use your middle name on a plaque.”
“Koturovic’s a surname,” said Tim. “A patronymic. Not a middle name.”
“Know what?” said Roger. He was standing by the gauges and switches. “These controls are all fucked up.”
Nate looked up from the plaque. “What makes you say that?”
“Everything’s at zero.”
“So?”
He gestured at the wall of tubes. “Power’s on right? Things are glowing, tubes are sparking, all that?”
“Flux capacitor is fluxing,” nodded Clive.
“Should be reading something, then, right?”
“Maybe zero is what you’re reading,” said Nate.
Roger shook his head. “If zero’s normal what do the needles do when the power shuts off?”
“Maybe the power isn’t really on,” said Debbie. “Maybe this is all...I don’t know, in sleep mode or something.” She gestured at the kitchen counter. Behind it was an array of brass cylinders like a pipe organ. “You can have power running to the microwave even when it’s not doing anything.”
Roger shook his head again. “It’s old and it’s busted.”
Tim walked over and peered at the brass-ringed dials. “Zero’s in the middle,” he said, “not at the end.”
“So?”
“So it means the needles can go either way,” said Tim. “They’re not at an extreme, they’re at a midpoint.” He tapped one of the dials. “These tell you if it’s in balance.”
“If what’s in balance?” asked Nate.
“Beats the shit outta me,” said Roger.
“Question,” said Veek. “Do you think this is all one thing, one machine, or is this a bunch of stuff that’s just all controlled here?”
“Kinda the same thing, isn’t it?” asked Clive.
Nate shook his head. “You can have a universal remote that controls a bunch of stuff.”