I like this first scene, just saying. I never planned on anything like it, but it just came to me and seemed perfect. I hope you like it too!
Within minutes, Phineas, Ferb, and Baljeet found something rather interesting. They were just walking along, when they found a doorway, with the door hanging half off its hinges. A soft breeze blew from inside, and a few sheets of loose paper were scattered in the hall just outside. Curious now, the three friends cautiously walked over and went into the room.
It looked very much like a study. An open window on the far side was the source of the breeze. There was a large desk just under the window, with paper lying all on top of it, some pieces being blown off by the wind. Bookshelves covered the entire left wall, with dusty old volumes lining them. A smaller desk sat off to the side of the larger one, against the right wall, and it had a box full of old quills and ink bottles, as well as more papers. A large rug covered most of the floor, and there were a few blood stains in it. There was also a small fireplace in the right wall, with various fire pokers leaning against it.
"This looks promising," noted Phineas, walking into the room and towards the desk. Ferb took a moment to look over the bookshelves for anything that could be helpful, but it didn't take long to see that everything was written in German, one of the few languages he did not speak, and so he joined his brother and Baljeet at the desk.
"These almost look like floor plans," the red-head mumbled, looking over the many papers. He spread the decipherable ones out over the large desk and the boys all examined them. The majority of them did indeed look like floor plans, even if they were very confusing ones. They all looked very similar, as if plans for the same house. Baljeet was the first to notice something.
"Take a look at these numbers," he said, pointing to one sheet in particular. It was one of the more readable ones, although it still made no sense to either brother. In darker ink was the basic floor plan, and then there were lighter lines connecting rooms seemingly at random, and numbers quickly jotted down alongside certain spaces. There were X's over areas, and circled areas as well.
"What does all this mean?" asked Phineas, the question being directed at Baljeet. The Indian boy looked over the plan one more time before his eyes widened in disbelief.
"This is a floor plan of the house!" he exclaimed. "You see those lines? They correspond to the rooms that connect, and the numbers explain when they will move. The circled area must be stable, while that area near the bottom seems to refer to the sub levels, if there are any- wait! It refers to the number of very unstable rooms with rotating exits, appearing as sub levels, and they are grouped together as to make it easier to read! That is very clever. So this area at the top must be-"
"Woah woah woah, slow down there Jeet," interrupted Phineas. "I don't mean to be rude, but what are you talking about?"
"Well, I suppose not all of us have taken college level math classes," he replied. "To make things simpler, I can read this like a map! It can tell us how to locate the front door!"
Neither Phineas nor Ferb could believe what he was saying. Had they really been lucky enough to find a readable map of the crazy house? If so, and if Baljeet could truly read it, then they would be able to get out no problem!
"Baljeet, you are my new hero!" said Phineas simply. He high fived his friend, and then the Indian boy took to quickly scanning the map.
"Alright, if my calculations are correct, we must be here," he stated, pointing to a spot on the paper. "This room apparently does not move, most likely because the door is not on properly. If we follow this line… I've got it!"
"Then lead the way!" said Phineas, gesturing to the door. Baljeet began walking out, still studying the map. Ferb followed, and Phineas was about to, when he paused for a second. He quickly ran back and grabbed one of the fire pokers, thinking it may be useful, and headed out the door after the others.
This creature was really starting to get on Isabella's nerves. If she was going to be chased almost every second, it would be nice to have some variety, but this same winged creature seemed determined to keep at it until they were dead. After a few times, it got more annoying than scary, because while it wasn't very fast, it also wasn't very smart, and kept falling for the same tricks over and over again.
After ducking and having it run into the wall for the fifth time, she was in desperate need of something new.
"This is getting old," she panted.
"We need to find a way to get rid of it for good," agreed Django, who was running alongside her. They turned a corner and kept running down a long hallway. The creature let out a shriek and continued chasing after them.
The hall stayed the same for several minutes, and they didn't see anything. Neither of them felt like they could run for much longer; they had been doing so for almost ten minutes. True, when your life is at risk, you can do almost anything, but that doesn't mean you can run that long without getting tired. So when Isabella finally saw something ahead, she was almost relieved, until she saw what it was.
"Django, stop!" she said urgently. She instantly stopped and grabbed his arm just in time to keep him from falling through the giant hole in the ground. The hallway suddenly cut off at a dead end, and an empty space covered several meters to the wall. With nowhere to run, Isabella trusted her instincts and, at the last second, ducked down, bringing Django down with her, and the creature sailed straight over them. It crashed into the wall, before gravity took over and it plunged into the darkness below. Its cries could be heard for several seconds, and then all fell silent. The two kids sat there panting, glad to finally be able to rest.
"Quick thinking again," Django managed to get out between gasps for air. Isabella only smiled in reply, too tired to do anything else at the moment. They both sat there for a few minutes longer, before they were able to stand up without their legs giving out from exhaustion. The only way to go was back where they had already come from, so they headed down the same hallway again, in hopes of finding a room this time.
Following the map was confusing at first, but Baljeet was a great problem solver, and he was finally able to get a solid system down for tracking their progress. It began with many wrong turns and dead ends until he noticed patterns and certain numbers and was able to test out his navigation skills by leading them back to a room they had already been in before. It had worked, so he was now sure he could successfully get them anywhere in the house, including the front door. There was just one little problem. There was no way they were leaving without Isabella and Django, who could still possibly be alive somewhere, just lost. But the map didn't show them how to find their friends, so they were forced to keep wandering.
After at least an hour of aimless walking, they sat down to rest in a small room with four chairs and a little table.
"I don't know about you guys, but I'm getting kind of hungry," commented Phineas, leaning back in his chair.
"I too am wishing we had brought something along to satisfy ourselves," Baljeet agreed, sighing. He glanced at the map quickly again, knowing that they had moved, and he tried to figure out where they would be once they left the room.
"I wonder what time it is now?" wondered the red-head. Both Baljeet and his brother looked at him. None of them had any means to check the time, but it always looked dark outside. It had been around seven o' clock when they had gone in the mansion, and they had been in there for hours, yet they had no way of properly tracking time, so they were left to guess. It was mostly likely early the next morning, but again, there was no way to tell.
"I was wondering earlier if time runs differently in this house," said Baljeet, as his friends looked at him curiously, so he explained more. "What I mean to say is perhaps this monster is able to alter the flow of time. What other way could Tommy have survived for this long without food and water? He would never have lasted longer than a week, and yet he died today, or yesterday, depending on when it actually is. So we never know how time is running in here. For all we know a month could have passed by us already, and we would never know until we left here. It is also possible that our time perception is altered when inside, so that we cannot try to guess how long we have been trapped inside. Without an accurate method for measuring time, you would have no way of knowing when it was midnight, and when the door would open."
What he said made sense to the brothers. If time really was different, who knows how long they had been gone for? Maybe they had been gone for weeks, and their parents had called the police, but of course nothing could be found. Either way, there would be a lot of trouble once they got out, if ever they did. What would they even say to all the questions? But they didn't have time to linger on the future. All that mattered at the moment was what was happening inside the mansion.
"We shouldn't think about it too much; it'll only distract us," suggested Phineas. The others agreed and stood up along with him, and they left the room. Phineas still had that fire poker he had grabbed earlier. He hadn't needed to use it just yet, but it felt good to have it in case they ran into trouble. Plus, it was pretty much all they had found of that sort, so they thought it best to keep it.
Who knows how long later, Baljeet started having trouble with the map. He was rambling on about how some lines intersected, which meant they could be in one of three places, and he could have sworn that lines had been added and moved around, and how once they ended up in a completely different place than he expected them to. He said it was some kind of interference? But even that didn't make any sense to him.
Seeing as they found nothing while walking, they made next to no progress, other than aimless walking. They were just about to rest again, when Phineas heard something up ahead. He stood up and started running towards it, the others following. Up ahead in the hall, it went on ahead, and another shorter hall turned off to the right. He stopped by the turn, seeing that at the other side, it was the same as his side. He didn't hear anything else, and was about to pass it off for nothing, and started to turn away, when something caught his eye. He whipped his head around to face the hall, and he couldn't believe his eyes.
Good news: that same monster stopped chasing Isabella and Django. Bad news: every other single monster seemed to find them now.
It started with some weird misty humanoid shape whose wails caused the two kids to have ears ringing for minutes after. Somehow they lost it, and then they ran into something that looked like a cross between a tiger and a spider. Once they lost that, they found themselves being chased yet again, this time by a shadow much like the one that had chased Baljeet and Buford earlier, except this one was solid. The two of them had been running almost the whole time, other than when they stopped to try to fight the tiger/spider.
"We got to lose this one now," panted Isabella, who felt like she couldn't run another step.
"But there's nothing here," Django called back, seeing as he was a foot behind her. "And how can we even fight a shadow?"
Isabella desperately racked her brain, trying to think of anything that could be useful. They turned a corner, and then she remembered something when the floor creaked under her feet. Knowing that if she was wrong, they were as good as dead, she stopped running and pushed against a board in the wall. She let out a triumphant cry as it came loose, and she grabbed it before it fell into the blackness behind it. Django stopped just next to her, and she swung the board around as hard as she could. It came in direct contact with the black shape, and it fell to the ground. The young girl couldn't believe she had just done that.
They two kids backed up slowly as the black shape stood up. It opened its mouth, showcasing four sets of razor sharp teeth, and a black snake-like tongue. It hissed loudly, and then advanced on them. Django did the same as Isabella, and got himself a loose board, holding it up protectively in front of him. The creature made a sound that sounded vaguely like laughter, as if it found their desperate defense attempts amusing.
Isabella swung the board again as the creature came close to them. It backed up, and she missed, and then lunged forward, Django swung out and hit it, and while it was distracted, they ran. After a few seconds the creature was in hot pursuit again, however it was going noticeably slower this time. The kids, driven by pure adrenaline, sprinted as fast as they could down the long, dark hall. They slowed down as they gained more distance, and finally when Isabella glanced behind her, the creature was nowhere to be seen. As they neared a turn in the hall, they stopped running finally. Isabella let the board fall to the floor as she stopped in the middle of the hall, placing her hands on her knees and breathing heavily.
And then, all of a sudden, she heard a sound, or more accurately, a voice. A voice she was sure she would never live to hear again.
"Isabella?"
Cliff-hanger! Also, the next chapter will be the second to last one. I'll update the final one on Monday (Halloween). Now, reviews?