Clockwork
She knows the walls are but a disguise.
That the truer nature of these areas stays hidden, shaded by a mantle of mass-produced concrete, she can guess from wherever the mask breaks. If even this geometry can come undone, she thinks, then anything can happen.
The cracks are not rare, and repeat themselves as she progresses. She never misses one. From there, the red shades pour out like fire, lost at the other end of charcoal grids. She watches them, wondering if the infinity that lies beyond is the truth.
All it takes is a passage – a door to the other side. If she finds one, she is positive the facility will bend to her heart's content. It is no more than a machine after all, if so scarily big. It has buttons to press, junctions to bend.
She expects to feel in control. And she does, at first, when she slips out – if the chambers she fought in become gigantic mouse traps to her eyes, the back areas look exactly like she believed they would.
A metal skeleton, bathed in blood-red lights. No more than that. But the glass pipes are long – can she handle them for real? – and she crawls and tumbles heavily, she is beaten away, out of control.
She was right – there is so much more to this place. The bowels of its core are near endless. But things so huge, just beyond her steel resolve, do scare her.
It is a mechanism. A piece of fine technology gone rogue, overgrown on itself. Like the test subject she is, in a way.
She wipes away her sweat, and follows the drops as they get lost in the great darkness below. She breathes.
For a moment, she finds herself wishing she had never made it.