Chapter 16:
Six
Six stood with Eight before the very place she'd vowed never to return to. It loomed above them; a monster of grey steel, cold and guarded. They would be venturing right into its very belly, freeing those trapped within.
Six just hoped she could free them. Another engine had failed while the girls were making the journey here, and Six swore that the Maw had even shifted under her feet this time, tilting fairly noticeably to one side. At this rate, the Maw would tip too far and the way out would be submerged underwater.
"Are you ready?" Eight asked, giving Six a cautious look. She'd put her hood back on after stepping out of the elevator, cloaking her face once more. She hadn't noticed that her hands had curled themselves into fists, and she tried to relax them.
"As ready as I'll ever be," Six answered truthfully. Her efforts to relax were futile; her hands were now fidgeting with the rubbery material of her raincoat. It was still flecked with blood - the remnants that Eight hadn't been able to wipe off - and Six wondered whose blood it was.
The rat, the Nome, the Lady...Six shivered as she recalled the moments she'd been overcome by agonising Hunger. It had clawed at her insides, reducing her to a weak and trembling mess and swallowing her mind so that she couldn't think or control her movements. Then she'd suddenly 'woken up' in time to see the carnage she'd caused and feel the guilt brimming in her throat, a taste more repulsive than the blood in her mouth.
Shadow Six's taunting echoes had grown even stronger since she'd consumed the Lady's essence. Shadow Six seemed to have a physical presence now, too. She wasn't just a brief shadow in the corner of Six's eye, or a faint voice that she heard occasionally. No, Shadow Six was really real now.
The incident in the Guest Area, no more than a few hours ago at most, was proof of that. Six still couldn't recall everything that had happened. What had she done? How had she acted? All that Six remembered was that she'd felt a surge of confidence and power before she'd entered the Guest Area, a sense that she was indestructible, and then everything from that point forward had felt like a dream, like she was viewing things as if she was underwater as Shadow Six took over. A compelling, irresistible voice had come from within Six, and she'd obeyed everything it told her to do as if it was her own free will.
Six wanted to ask Eight about what had happened in the Guest Area but she bit her tongue. She realised Eight was speaking to her anyway, and glanced up to meet her eyes.
"Sorry...what?" Six asked.
Eight's eyebrows knitted in concern. She looked to the heavy sealed doors before them and then back at Six. "I was just running through what we should do again, once we get inside. Do you remember the plan?"
Six pushed the thoughts from her mind for now. "Yeah. I'll open the doors."
She approached the doors and concentrated on them. According to Eight, she'd managed to open an elevator in the Guest Area before without touching it, thanks to the Lady's power. She tried to do that again now, calling upon the power within her that had now fallen dormant for the time being. It stirred at her command, awakening and sitting up straight like an obedient dog waiting for an order.
Six focused her efforts on opening the doors and immediately they slid wide apart with a resounding groan, coming to rest with a hollow clunk. Six marvelled at how easy it had been. Her new power really was strong. She hadn't even had to release her tendrils, those shadowy snakes made up of wispy mist.
"I hope no-one heard that," Eight murmured anxiously from behind Six. She padded closer, gazing into the darkness. Six looked too, the night-vision she'd acquired from the rat helping her peer through the gloom. She recognised this place. The Unloading Bay. This was where kids came onto the Maw from the outside world; this was where she'd had her very first memory of waking up in a cage with nothing but her raincoat and lighter.
"Don't worry, even if someone did hear I'll be able to protect you if they come for us." Six flicked on her lighter and took a step into the yawning darkness. "Stay close, ok?"
Eight swept her flashlight beam around the space as they walked in. All the cages stood empty now but from the look on her face, she recognised this place too.
"You had the raincoat and lighter ever since you came onto the Maw, right?" Eight asked suddenly as they continued through, her lips pursed in thought.
"Yeah," Six asked. "Why?"
Eight turned the flashlight in her hand. "It's the same with my flashlight. Right from when I woke up in a cage here, I had it with me. So...I think it's mine. Judging by the size of these things - your lighter and my flashlight - the outside world must be normal-sized if they came from there, right?"
"Yeah, I suppose so."
"So in the outside world, we must be normal-sized kids," Eight went on.
"Yeah, why wouldn't we be?" Six didn't say the words harshly; she was merely preoccupied with getting to the Nursery and keeping Eight safe along the way.
"Well," Eight gave a little laugh, more like an exhale. "It's kind of silly but I always felt like everything on the Maw was normal-sized and us kids were just tiny, like little bugs."
"It's designed that way," Six said. It was the most obvious explanation in her mind. "Everything is massive on purpose so it's harder for us to escape."
"Mm, yeah, I think you're right. It'll just...be weird I guess to finally be in a world where we're a normal size. Like we finally belong, you know?"
Six nodded, but deep down she wondered how she of all people could ever be 'normal' in the outside world. The Maw was unquestionably evil, yes, but at least her powers and curses and traits made some kind of sense here. They helped her survive. But in the outside world, they'd only haunt her.
Maybe she didn't belong anywhere.
...oOo...
As per the plan they'd discussed earlier, Six and Eight made it to the Nursery without wasting any time. (Six did know the layout like the back of her hand anyway, having made the journey to steal food from here so many times).
However, the Nursery had changed since the last time either girl had been there. The Eye Beams that turned kids to stone and the electrified metal bars were switched off, totally harmless. The Lady's death had really emphasised how vital she had been to the Maw's survival. Without her magic, even basic functions like electricity were failing.
As a result, the place was even darker and dustier than it had previously been. It seemed deserted too. Toys lay scattered across hallways like forgotten bones, but there was no-one there playing with them. Six and Eight wandered cautiously around the Nursery's ground floor, finding that each dormitory room was not only shut but also locked. Six used her magic to open a few of them, but they all stood empty. Where had all the kids gone?
"I don't like this," Eight muttered, voicing Six's own thoughts. "Where have they all gone? Maybe they were moved somewhere…?"
"The Janitor can't have had anything to do with it - he's dead," Six reasoned. "So maybe…" a realisation clicked inside her like a lightbulb being switched on. Eight's eyes lit up at the same moment, too.
"The Wax Bellman!" they both said in unison.
"He must've gathered up all the kids after the Janitor never returned from his Lair," Eight theorised. Her words were tumbling out rapidly, as they so often did whenever she had an idea. "They must be wherever he is, maybe in cages or something. Maybe some of them even escaped before the Wax Bellman realised the Janitor was dead."
Six nodded thoughtfully. "It makes sense. But where would he have taken them all?"
Having never been a prisoner in the Nursery, Six didn't have a really clear idea of what the Wax Bellman would have done with the prisoners. She wracked her brain, trying to come up with ideas. Nothing.
But Eight knew.
"The Mad Rooms," she said suddenly.
"The what?"
Eight pointed to the floors above. "The Mad Rooms. Or the Dungeons - that's their nickname. They're where the 'mad' kids are taken, the really badly-behaved ones. If they misbehave enough, or if they try to escape, they're taken there one day and are never seen again."
Six's eyes followed the length of Eight's finger, gazing upwards. "Have you ever been in there?"
Eight shook her head. "Of course not. I had a good record of being one of the most well-behaved kids. The doors are really heavy and bolted, but getting in there should be easy with your abilities, right?" Eight couldn't keep the excitement out of her voice. "I'd say that would be a good place to keep kids from escaping. Maybe the kids are in there, or there could be clues to tell us where they've gone."
"You're probably right," Six agreed. It's worth a try."
...oOo…
The hefty bolt of the first door scraped noisily as it was unlatched without being touched. Six and Eight stood on either side of the door, prepared for whatever might be inside. Six ordered her power to stay alert for any kind of danger that might harm them. But as the seconds became minutes, nothing happened.
She signalled to Eight and they quietly pushed the door the rest of the way open and slipped inside, entering the first of many Mad Rooms that stood on this floor.
On the inside, the room was much different to anything Six - and Eight too, she guessed - had ever seen. At first glance, it looked like some kind of office, relatively normal due to the desk with its stack of paperwork and the filing cabinets lining one wall. But that's where the normality stopped.
On the other side of the room were a handful of cages, and beyond that was a steel platform that was strewn with various medical instruments for testing or experiments of some kind. Six looked through the shadows and saw that there was also a shelf of ancient, ornate books similar to those she'd seen in the Lady's Quarters. And above that was a thick roll of off-white fabric, large rusty scissors and a conveyer belt of hooks identical to the ones that had carried bundles of meat to the Kitchens. They stood frozen now due to the lack of electricity, but Six imagined a time when they would've been swishing through the air, loaded with their grim cargo.
Six and Eight glanced at each other worriedly, trying to make sense of the place. It felt too sinister, too surreal.
"Help!" A tiny voice whispered through the gloom. Six and Eight both froze instinctively, hearts pounding. Six's head swivelled towards the source of the sound and located the group of cages that had appeared empty at first glance. But now she saw a small figure standing at the door of one of them, slim fingers curling around the bars. She whispered to Eight to switch on her flashlight, who did so and shone it across the room.
The boy in the cage squinted at the light and shielded his eyes. Six and Eight took in his appearance: shaggy black hair, a faded button-up with many of the buttons missing, grimy bare feet...and then they also noticed the other pair of caged kids there as well, rising slowly to their feet and shuffling stiffly over to their own cage doors.
3 in total. 2 boys and a girl. They didn't look like they'd washed or slept or eaten properly in days. But they were alive at least, and they could most likely tell Six and Eight what was going on in the Prison.
"Who are you?" The first boy asked. "You're not from the Nursery, are you?"
"No," Six answered. "But we don't have the time to explain. We need to get you out of here. The leader of the Maw is dead; the ship is sinking."
There was a ripple of shock at her declaration, but then the girl piped up uncertainly. "How can you be sure?"
"Because I killed her myself." Shock met her words again, but this time it was the stunned, silent kind. Six felt it again - that dangerous surge of power and invincibility. Shadow Six thrived on it, and she was somewhere below the surface, waiting for a chance to gain more. Six did her best to smother the feeling before it could grow any more and focused on the task at hand: saving the kids.
"Can you open the cages?" Eight asked.
"I think so," Six replied. With only a second or two of concentration, all three cages sprang open at the same time. Six felt a spark of pride but extinguished it quickly. Even though she was getting good at using her new abilities, she couldn't get cocky. That was what Shadow Six wanted.
"How did you do that?" The girl squeaked.
"Like I said - no time to explain. Just come."
"Ok, quickly now. You're safe now…" Eight murmured gently as the kids climbed down from their cages and onto the floor.
"I'm hungry," the second boy whimpered, presumably the youngest. Eight knelt before him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I know, little one, but we have to rescue more children first. And then you can have something to eat, ok? You've been very strong - hold on a little longer, alright?"
Six watched on as the boy nodded bravely and took Eight's hand when she offered it. She wondered where Eight had learned that sympathy from. It was something she didn't have. Didn't need. She had power instead.
"Hurry up," she found herself saying curtly before she had even thought about speaking the words. Her feet moved forwards, almost of their own accord, towards the next room.
Eight gawped behind her and then turned to the other kids, trying to sound cheery and confident. "Ok, let's go. Follow us and stay close."
...oOo...
Dungeon after Dungeon yielded the same scenario - more kids who were scared and cold and hungry, usually about 4 or 5 in each room. Six nonchalantly opened the cage doors and let Eight do all the explaining as the group of escapees became larger and larger. They followed behind her like startled little ducklings as Six strode on ahead, not bothering to turn back to see if they were getting too far behind.
So weak, she'd found herself thinking. Then she caught herself and slapped her hands against her face to snap out of whatever was going on with her. I told you to leave us alone, she growled at Shadow Six mentally. She heard nothing but a cackle echoing back at her.
She and Eight reached the fifth room and had rescued about half of the kids in the Nursery before they ran into any trouble.
"Not going," rasped the boy, Fifteen, even after his cage had been opened. He hadn't moved at all. He still had his back to Six and Eight, his shoulders hunched forward and his chin resting on his knees.
Eight gave Six a bewildered stare then talked to the boy. "It's alright now, you're safe," she soothed. "Come on out now, ok? We're finally getting out of this place."
The boy didn't move. Six remembered what he'd said to her when they'd first met, what seemed like a century ago: It's not like we remember where we came from.
Her mouth curled up in disgust before she could stop it. "Leave him," she said abruptly, turning away from the cage and pacing towards the exit.
"Six!" Eight hissed, but Six ignored her.
She heard Eight continuing to plead with Fifteen as she walked to the door, her voice growing more and more desperate. As if on cue, the Maw gave a lurch to one side and a resounding boom vibrated through the floor. The band of children gathered around Eight, about 20 or so, gave a collective gasp.
"That's the third one!" Six heard one of them say in panic as they regained their balance. "What's happening?"
Eight was trying to shush the worried cries of the kids, smiling and trying in vain to calm them. She distractedly turned back to Fifteen and called again, but there was no answer.
A new, different sound. Six strained her ears, the rat's essence aiding her hearing, and made out the steady thud of booted feet approaching their room. The other kids didn't seem to have heard it, too busy panicking to notice.
Six ran to the doorway, releasing her tendrils. They quivered and swirled as they were freed into the air, reaching like serpents waking from hibernation, ready to kill and feed.
Shadow Six reared her head like an audience waiting in suspense. There was that deadly surge of power again, exploding in Six's chest - and then the Wax Bellman's shadow falling across the doorway.
- End of chapter -
