by Walker, Luke
“Wait. Please.”
It was no good. Rod could do nothing to stop the boy he’d been from passing beyond the long beams of sunlight into the nothingness of the lift. There was an idea of watching the child enter a long tunnel, the walls smooth and lit by flames and the floor soaked by stagnant puddles. Rod strained to see deeper into the image and caught the suggestion of the tunnel dipping out of sight, falling away into the mouth of the earth where a terrible stink of a monster’s breath wafted.
Nice to see you again, Rod. It laughed. And I don’t want your new friends to worry. The others are here for them. Their daddies and their husbands and their children. All here for them. Again, the sound of gallons of rainwater swallowed by the mouth of a rotten drain; again, the awful, mocking laugh.
I let them in, you see. I opened the door and let them in. I gave them a safe place from the fire outside and they brought their burns to me. They gave me their ruined flesh and I ate it, I ate it all up because they owed me after I kept them safe from their fire because it’s fire outside, fire for all of you. Abruptly, the voice went from a conversational tone to a mad raging. ALL OF YOU WILL BURN IF YOU GO OUTSIDE GO OUTSIDE GO AND COME TO ME COME TO ME SO I CAN EAT YOU I CAN TOUCH YOU AGAIN I CAN MAKE YOU BURN BURN BURN—
Then all Rod had was himself, crying and running forward. He howled his grief and hurt, both rising from his barrel chest and burning in his mouth.
“Not my fault, it wasn’t my fault, it wasn’t my fault, you bastard.”
Filling the lift door, Martin Williams came from nothing, a smiling face, opening arms ready to hold and hug and never let go. And Rod’s perspective changed, dropped to a lower point because he was dropping; he was lowering.
He was a boy, again. A running boy now running over the good fields of his parents’ farm while winds gusted and didn’t bring the scent of the morning’s rain, but rather the scent of a wild animal closing in; an animal’s mouth wide open that he was sprinting straight for.
The mouth became a tunnel and the tunnel became a slope falling through the dead stink of a monster’s breath and Rod fell with it.
Chapter Thirty-Three
It was only when the ache in her chest registered that Alex realised she was holding her breath. She let it go. On all sides, the building settled with an almost audible sigh and the echo of the lift doors snapping together as they closed faded into silence.
“Rod?” she whispered.
If there was a reply, the sound was far too indistinct to be named. She ran past Kelly, yelling for Simon and Dao. All three hit the lift at the same time.
“Get it open. Get him out,” Alex shouted.
Grunting, the men dropped their improvised weapons and dug their fingers into the tiny crack between the two doors. They pulled. Nothing happened.
“Pull harder,” Dao yelled.
“I am.” Simon’s face was already a bright shade of red while the thin cords of tendons jutted from Dao’s long arms.
“Bastard,” Dao spat. “Fucking open, fucking—”
He fell back and Simon jerked his hands clear, as if the metal had abruptly grown scalding hot.
The sound Alex caught a few seconds before came again, a little more clearly now because she was closer to it. Faint screams. Rod’s faint screams.
Moving as one, they backed away from the lift, Alex weeping silently, Dao shaking his head and Kelly wanting to answer Rod with her own cries. They were trapped inside and maybe she should have been grateful for that, but letting them go and giving up seemed like her idea of heaven when compared to what she was seeing, what they all saw.
A tunnel underground, black and damp. Mould and moss grew over the walls, rising to the low ceiling and turning the air into a redolent stink. The cloying stench coated each uneven section of the floor and swam on the surface of dozens of puddles. A drip fell with a regular tap somewhere in the poor light while shadows cast by sputtering flames capered over the walls, and Rod’s voice was a holler in the distance; his begging for help falling away from this gloomy space because wherever the tunnel dropped into a slope somewhere beyond the last light, Rod was right on the end of that tunnel, surrounded by the reek of the mould, and unable to stop himself from staring straight into the mouth below from where the wind blew and its stench played with the thin strands of his hair with a touch that was nowhere near human enough to be called care.
All of that before the mouth below swallowed him, and the last of his cries were a dying echo, bouncing off damp wall to drown in the puddles.
Kelly bent double. While her stomach hitched and all the saliva in her mouth became a thick paste, the savage cramp passed. Blinking repeatedly until her vision levelled out, she managed to stand straight for a moment. Then her back found one of the pillars. Grateful for its support, she slid straight down, legs splayed.
“Rod?” Dao reached for the lift. He didn’t dare touch it and eventually lowered his hand.
“He’s gone.” Alex backed away, glanced down at her sister and heard inside the echo of Carl’s name. Had that really only been a few moments before all this? Keeping hold of the idea of normal time was as hard as keeping hold of any idea. Everything she wanted to touch was slick like oil.
“It took him,” she finished and wandered over to the reception desk to rest her face on its cool surface. That was okay. That was heaven. She twisted her neck, trying to get her cheeks, nose, and chin onto the smooth surface. Let it take her sweat and stink. Let it wipe her clean.
“I saw it.” Simon moved a little closer to Dao, unsure of why he needed the other man to know it, and unable to stop himself. “I saw… it.” But had he? Something filled the entrance to the lift a moment before Rod ran to it, and that something might have been the shape of a man. He couldn’t be sure of a fucking thing right now, least of all whether he was now a part of the others or still so much skin fading into thin air.
No. I saw it. I am here.
He spun Dao around, and Dao’s mouth opened and closed without a sound emerging.
“I saw it take Rod.”
“Great,” Dao muttered. “Now you see what we see. Now you see what’s trying to kill us.”
He walked to the main entrance and kicked at the glass. As before, it shook but didn’t come close to breaking. Back still resting on the pillar, Kelly gave no reaction when Simon wandered over to her and dropped onto his haunches.
“You okay?”
She knew he was speaking and she knew she should answer, but words were outside the world. All she had was the image of Carl in the bed out on the road overlaying the image of Rod shrinking into the body of a running child and a grinning man with his arms open wide before both of them fell down, rather than into, the lift and the doors closed.
Simon tried to take Kelly’s hand. Alex ran to them, knocking him over. “Don’t touch her.”
Not giving Simon chance to reply or move aside, Alex knelt and took hold of Kelly’s shoulders.
“You talk to me, Kel. You tell me why you saw Carl outside.”
While there may have been no words left in the world for Kelly, there were still lies. She found one and let it free.
“I don’t know.”
Barely even a murmur and it was all she could manage.
“Bullshit.”
Kelly’s eyes rolled, then found her sister’s. The women stared at one another, Dao and Simon forgotten. High above, a curious gaze landed on the split group, amused by their arguments as it was amused by their guilt. It waited for the truth to come, not disappointed when it didn’t. Now wasn’t the right time. Not yet.
“I don’t know,” Kelly repeated in a flat tone. “Get the fuck out of my face, Alex.”
Alex backed away. She spoke to all of them but kept her regard on Kelly.
“I don’t care about anything but getting back to my children. Not one single thing.”
With that, she turned towards the side of the cash office, heading for the open door of the building’s ground floor offices. Simo
n took a few hesitant steps after her, then looked back at Dao.
“What do we do?” he asked.
Dao left the entrance. Kelly was struggling to her feet. All at once, Dao registered the pain in his fingertips from their attempts to open the lift. His palms were sore, too. A few useless smacks of the doors had done nothing but hurt him. Along with that soreness, muscles throughout his body demanded rest. Not enough food or sleep and a non-stop fear had combined to almost wipe him out.
No. Not yet. Not yet, you hear me?
Peering over the railings of the tenth floor, the shape of a little boy let out a soft laugh that registered in Dao’s heart and not his ears.
“We follow her.” Dao held a hand to Kelly without looking. She took it and stood. “We find any door on this floor or a window on the next if we have to, and we get out. Ghosts, dead things, monsters. I don’t care. We are getting out.”
Gathering their dropped knives, the others followed Alex, who was already through the open doors into the back offices. And all wished in their own way that Rod walked with him.
*
The reception, empty again.
The reception, waiting.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Beyond the wide space of the back office, with its waiting area and its desks and phones, they found their way into a curving corridor. The walls from floor to ten feet above a smooth, featureless white and no doors lining them. Windows filled the remainder of the wall area, bringing in daylight. Dao let the door shut behind them, morbidly convinced it would lock with a gentle, mocking click the second they let go and leave them trapped. With the others focusing on the floor and walls, he gave the door a soft push. It opened. Relaxing as much as possible, he let go of it again.
“You know where we are?” Simon asked Alex.
“No.”
Seemingly not bothered by this, Alex strode over the floor and stared straight ahead. Simon offered Dao a raised eyebrow and followed. Dao gestured for Kelly to move. She tried to smile and failed. He followed her, listening to the soft tap of their shoes and boots. The corridor flowed in a long curve and formed a semi-circle that he imagined went around the entire ground floor. All he could do now was hope they came to a fire exit, or another office that in turn led to an exit. Seconds ticked by; Lin spoke up inside Dao’s head.
Keep going. There has to be a way out. She was calm and together while his insides jumped. I know it’s bad but you can find a way out.
I will, he promised his wife.
Good. Make sure you do. And do whatever it takes to get out.
Dao slowed, not aware he was doing so. Lin’s voice sounded a little harsh. While his wife was not afraid to say what was on her mind or challenge anyone, she was not aggressive with it. Right now, a note of ruthlessness came, and although Dao knew on all levels he was simply talking to himself in Lin’s voice, it didn’t alter the tone. He trotted to keep up with Kelly while Simon and Alex were a good ten feet ahead. The tap of their feet grew hollow; the walls remained a pure white and still no doors or windows, still no way out other than back the way they’d walked, still one short now Rod was dead, still—
He sweated, suddenly too hot, despite the cool air. A shout for the others to stop trembled on his lips while his peripheral vision wavered; the walls flowed into a bleached stream and the floor became a silver river eager to sweep him away before it closed over his head and filled his mouth, lungs, belly.
Calm down, Lin told him.
Wonder of wonders, Dao came back to the reality of the solid walls and floor and the rest of the little group a few paces in front. Although it felt like he’d been losing it for minutes, no more than a few seconds could have passed.
That’s right. They’re all still here and you’re still here, Dao. Keep your eyes on them, on Kelly. Watch her back and keep focused, okay? You can do that, my love. It’s easy. Just one foot in front of the other, okay, Dao?
Okay, Dao replied.
Good. Keep going. You’re doing well, Dao. Stick with the others and keep moving. Keep your eyes on them, okay? Keep watching Kelly. Kelly. Kelly.
With each repetition of the girl’s name, Lin’s voice altered, dropping lower and becoming rough, as if she had a particularly sore throat. He had the strange sensation of Lin grinning in an ugly manner before she spoke again and her voice was a choking, wet mutter. Now watch her, watch her, watch her arse.
Dao managed a little hiss. The sound failed to reach any of the others. He tried to yell his horror but could only manage another hiss. No moisture coated his tongue or lips; the corridor had become a boiling oven, and the walls were a blinding white. He would burn. They’d all burn in the oven and that might be welcome if it meant getting away from the nightmare yelling right in his ear.
Watch that little arse right in front of you; she’s right in front of you, that arse, that little bitch, that fucking whore with that sweet arse, you want it don’t you it’s okay I know what you want I can’t blame you it’s sweet, so small so little like a child’s—
Inside, Dao cried for Lin to stop. She would not.
—that arse, it’s small like Rod’s was when he was a boy so look at it Dao look right now and imagine fucking it imagine fucking her I bet she loves it like that she looks like she does I bet she’s had it loads and that’s why they don’t get on because Kelly’s nothing but a little slut a slut who takes it off anyone who offers it the fucking little bitch you could fuck her right now and she wouldn’t mind—
The raging screeches descended into an image Dao could not lose; his wife hammering a picture into his skull of himself sprinting forward, clambering onto Kelly’s back and shoving her to the pure white of the floor while she shrieked and his fingers found the waist and zip of her jeans and Simon and Alex cheered him on.
(daddy stop it)
Dao managed a small grunt as if he’d been punched. One foot twisted, knocking the other. He tripped and went down, hard.
Pain.
It was a welcome pain because it had one immediate effect. Lin’s image vanished in a silent explosion, and that explosion was the hurt flowing through his body.
Groaning, Dao rolled over. Rod’s blade clattered as Kelly’s toe kicked it. Spots filled Dao’s vision, all dancing. He blinked until his surroundings returned to normal, and Kelly’s face loomed over his.
“Dao?”
He had a brief flashback to his attack and her cries before he managed to push the image away. Lin was not with him. Only an ugly thing with no name and no face that belonged to his wife spoke here. Let it speak. Let it rant. He would not listen to it now or again.
“I fell,” he muttered. Then stupidly: “Sorry.”
Alex and Simon arrived at his side, Simon reaching for him with one hand, clutching the blade and his knife with the other.
“What happened?” Simon asked.
“Tripped.” He coughed, a flame burning in his chest. Simon helped him up and handed over the blade. “Sorry,” Dao said again,
“Don’t worry about it.” Simon glanced at the women. “We walk in a line, yeah? Not apart?”
For a moment, Alex’s face suggested she was going to simply ignore this and walk ahead alone. Then she relented by giving a single nod.
Not surprising Dao, Kelly took his left hand side while Simon walked on his right, leaving Alex to take the far end of their small line. The sisters were as far apart as they could be, and Dao asked himself when whatever truth festered between them would come out, rather than if.
As long as it doesn’t get in the way of us getting out, then I don’t care, he thought in his own voice. Lin, or whatever had pretended to be her inside his head, had gone, and that could only be a good thing.
They walked for another minute, the corridor sliding to the left instead of right as might have been expected. At its end, a fire exit filled a large chunk of the wall.
They stopped.
“I think this leads to the carpark,” Alex murmured. “Sternfield Street is on the ot
her side.”
“You sure?” Simon asked.
“No. I… ” She rubbed her forehead. “I think so. I don’t know.”
Alex lowered her hand. While no sounds reached them, Simon and Dao wondered if she was hearing her church bell again, which led Simon to hear the autumn wind blowing down the long flight of stairs, caressing the door behind them and sneaking through cracks.
Leave it. You’re almost free.
Something right beside his ear laughed. He refused to turn or acknowledge the wave of icy cold swallowing his body from his toes to the top of his head.
Dao and Alex moved at the same time, striding forward while Kelly and Simon trotted to keep up. The four reached the fire exit and stopped as one. Alex tapped the cool metal of the grey bar crossing its centre.
“If this is locked, I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she whispered.
“We’ll knock the fucking thing down if we have to,” Kelly said.
Alex’s hold on the bar grew firmer.
“Wait a second,” Dao said. He placed a hand beside Alex’s and looked at Simon and Kelly. “All of us.”
Four hands found a space on the dirty grey of the bar. Simon’s question—what do we do if those burned people are out there? —lived only in the panic and confusion of his head, and maybe that was for the best. Verbalising it would do no good.
“On three,” Alex said. Then in a mad rush: “One, two, three.”
They shoved on the bar.
Chapter Thirty-Five
For the third time in as many minutes, Simon pushed on the useless door. Again, it was like pushing at the floor and expecting it to give way.
“You need to stop doing that,” Kelly said, her body against the wall. She sat, and was made smaller than usual by bringing her legs up to meet her resting chin.
Simon kicked the door. “Why?”
“Because it’s doing no good.” Alex took a few breaths. “It’s not going to budge, Simon.”
He struck the bar hard enough to hurt his fingers. “Fuck.”