It took all three of them to lift the heavy trapdoor. Underneath was a staircase leading to a locked door. None of the keys on the keyring would open it.
"Damn," Henry said. "Never thought I'd say it...but what I wouldn't give to crawl through a hole about now."
Eileen ran up the steps to the garden, to the fountain. She pulled something out of the top basin and hurried back down the stairs.
"This should do the trick," she said, and put the key in the lock. The door opened.
"How did you…" John asked.
Eileen shrugged. "If I were hiding the key to this door, that's where I'd hide it."
There were more stairs. A lot more stairs. Finally, a metal door, that unlocked with the same key. They went through the door to find…
Metal shelves surrounded them, containing hamburger buns, huge cans of condiments, and other such items. Dust lay over everything.
"Of all of the things…" Henry said.
"You've GOT to be kidding me," Eileen said.
John shook his head. "Who the hell needs a Happy Burger half a mile underground?"
They exited out the front of the restaurant into a long hallway. Rooms opened off of either side. Bulletin boards lined the hallways, and rows of lockers took up the remaining space.
"It's a school," Henry said. "An elementary school, or a junior high."
"There's something familiar about this place," John said, "but I can't put my finger on it."
They walked down the empty hallway, the sound of their footsteps echoing from the walls. Some of the lockers stood open, with books, pictures, and the usual things in them.
Little footsteps approached them, rapidly. They glanced around, but saw nothing. Then, a movement several feet away.
"Look!" Eileen cried.
A tiny shadow stood by a door. Its outline was indistinct, but it seemed to be child-shaped. As they watched, it stumbled and fell to the floor. It pulled itself up, clapped its hands together and melted through the wall.
Something glinted in one of the lockers. Eileen reached in to take it.
"Wow," she said, pulling out a large black submachine gun. "Let's hope that this doesn't actually belong to some kid here."
John's face grew stern. "Damn right. Someone here needs help."
The classrooms were unremarkable. Rows of child-sized desks filled the rooms, and blackboards, bulletin boards and storage shelves lined the walls. One room had a large map on one wall, with pushpins in various places. There was a music room, too, with a piano in its middle. The keyboard lid was locked.
Another room was obviously an art room, with large tables with mats. Lumps of gray clay sat on the mats, some shaped into bowls and cups, others into animals, as if just abandoned.
"Smelly little gray lumps…" Henry murmured.
"What?" Eileen asked.
Henry shook his head. "Nothing…just remembering something."
John touched a gray pot lightly. "Still wet."
"When I was a kid, I once took my clay and buried a shot glass in it," Eileen said. "I asked my teacher to let it dry naturally. Then, when it was dry, I pretended I was an archaeologist and dug out the shot glass."
"Cool," John said. "I think they sell kits for that these days."
"My father was mad. It was his favorite shot glass."
"Look at these pictures," Henry said. They surrounded the teacher's desk, on which were scattered childish paintings and drawings. One showed a huge lizard with its head split in two. Another was of a strange white-winged figure. Still another depicted an enormous moth.
"These are strange," John said. "Not what you'd expect a kid to draw."
They returned to the hallway.
One of the classroom doors opened, and Laura came out. She frowned at them.
"What are you doing here?"
"We could ask you the same question," Henry said to her.
"I'm looking for Grandpa Frank. Have you seen him?"
"Frank? Frank Sunderland?"
"Yeah, Frank," Laura said impatiently. "He's not really my grandpa, but he lets me call him that. He's nice to me. I can't find him anywhere."
"He was with you?"
"Of course. But he wandered away. He's trying to find James."
"Is he OK?" Eileen asked. "He hasn't gotten hurt, has he?"
"No, silly," Laura replied. "Why would he be hurt? Anyway," she continued. "I know what you want. I haven't seen James."
"Laura," John said, "how about a teenage girl? Shoulder-length dark hair? Looks like me?"
"No," Laura said. "Why? Are you looking for her too?"
"Sort of," John said. "She came here a while ago and I don't know where she is. She's my sister."
Laura nodded. "I haven't seen her. I'm sorry." She turned to go back into the room, then stopped. She faced John. "You're a nice man. I hope you find her."
"So do I," John said.
Laura went back into her room, and they continued down the hallway.
The door at the other end of the hallway led to more stairs, and another hallway. But this one was different. The floors were no longer linoleum, but rusted chain-link, and the walls were covered in blood.
In one of the classrooms, the desks were all pushed to the sides...all but one. That desk sat alone in the middle of the room, isolated. Graffiti covered its surface.
Witch. Devil. Freak.
Henry picked up a piece of paper from the teacher's desk at the front of the room.
I have become very concerned about Alessa. Every day, she seems to deteriorate further. She does her work well, but the other children don't talk to her. She has only one friend, a girl her own age, Claudia. The circles under her eyes are growing, and I see bruises on her arms. That damn cult. What are they doing to her?
Please, is there anything I can do? There's got to be something. We may not have much time.
K. Gordon
"Poor little girl," Eileen said. "I wonder if she was ever in that prison we saw."
"Look!" John cried. A figure had appeared, seated at the isolated desk. She was a young girl, about ten or eleven, with dark hair and eyes. She wore a light-colored top and dark pants and sat staring straight ahead.
John approached the figure. His hand shook as he reached toward it.
"Angie?"
The figure looked up at him, smiled, and disappeared.
"Angie...it was her," John said. "I know it. It looked just like her, just before our mother died."
Eileen put her hand on his shoulder. "Maybe it was the girl, Alessa..."
"No," John said firmly. "That was Angie. I'd recognize her anywhere." He looked at the desk for a moment, then turned away.
The hallway ended at an arched wooden door. Henry's hand reached for it, but John stopped him. He pulled out his revolver, and the others held their weapons tightly.
They needn't have worried. The room beyond was small and uninhabited, except for two very dead bodies hanging on either side of another large wooden door. The bodies were wrapped in white fabric, and stank horribly. The door had three dark rectangular indentations, and a small slit across its middle.
Henry reached for the doorknob, but he pulled back quickly.
"It's hot. Very hot." He pulled the cuff of his jacket over his hand and turned the knob quickly.
The door opened to a room of fire. The walls licked flame, and the floor seemed molten. They stood on a small wooden platform, while balls of flame swirled around them. The heat was unbearable.
"Can we get to the other side?" Eileen yelled over the roar of the flames.
John pointed at a small rope walkway that spanned the room. On the other side, barely visible through the shimmering air, was a door.
"Let's hope it's unlocked," Henry said, and they started across.
The little bridge swung and swayed as they picked their way along. Eileen knew the ropes might give out at any moment, and they kept as rapid a pace as caution would allow.
Henry stepped onto the platform first, then Eileen. John was two steps away when a voice echoed through the room.
"Johnny…"
John froze in mid-step. He turned around and scanned the room. Behind them, a tongue of flame flew up on one side of the bridge, but did not recede.
"Johnny..."
Its shape changed…it grew a head and arms…it shaped itself into the figure of a young woman.
As they watched, the figure's hair became dark, and features formed on its face.
"Johnny…"
John's face was frozen in shock. Then, his mouth opened.
"Angie!"
"Johnny…help me…"
"Angie…"
"…it's so hot in here…it's hell, Johnny…"
A long object formed in one of the figure's hands…a knife? A small, sharp knife. Where had Eileen seen that knife before?...
The hand flailed around, and she saw the blade flash as it fell. It sliced cleanly through the rope on the other end of the bridge, and the bridge began to fall.
Henry and Eileen each lunged for one of John's arms. They pulled him onto the platform just in time, and they saw the bridge catch fire and begin to burn upwards.
"We've got to get out of here," Henry said. "Let's go."
The figure still was flailing as they hurried out the door and closed it quickly. They leaned against the door, panting for breath. They were in a long hallway, and the air was cool and sweet.
"It was her," John said quietly. "She was in pain."
Eileen and Henry were silent.
At the end of the hallway was another hole. They crawled in almost gratefully.
This passage was shorter than the last, and they crawled for a few minutes before it ended. They dropped into another dark room, but this time the area stayed dark after their arrival. The sound of running water broke the silence.
"I don't like this," John said. "Feels like a setup."
"I know what you mean," Eileen replied. "Something's wrong."
"Hang on a minute," Henry said. Eileen heard him searching in his pockets, then after a moment his flashlight clicked on. The beam played around them, and John drew in his breath sharply.
The room they stood in was covered in blood and gore. The smell was overwhelming.
Water ran in a trough down the center of the room, and the floor sloped down to it from either side. Hooks hung from the ceiling. From those hooks were suspended...cuts of meat? Body parts?
Eileen's eye caught something that looked like a long, slender arm, and she turned away. But then, in front of her, lay a mutilated corpse. Human...female...naked but for one shoe. The abdomen was ripped open, and it no longer had a face. But the hand that hung blue and limp looked so much like her own...and the shoe was identical to those that she'd planned to wear to that party so long ago...
She was shaken to the core, and she felt her nerves stretch and nearly snap.
"There's a door over there," Henry said.
"Let's get out of here," Eileen said, and she followed the other two across the room, picking her way through the blobs of bloody whatever that littered the concrete floor.
The door was old and wooden. It was marked with the circular symbol that they'd seen earlier...and a lot of blood, as well.
As Henry's hand reached for the knob, Eileen craned her neck over John's shoulder to look. She couldn't stand being in this room for one more second. Then, something behind her brushed against her arm...
She turned and swung blindly, the spade flying up and down, blood and gore flying everywhere. She felt wet droplets hit her face, and she kept swinging. She heard someone calling her name far in the distance, and still she swung.
Finally, the clank of the spade hitting concrete instead of flesh reached her through her frenzy, and she slowed. She felt an arm around her waist, holding her tightly, and something grabbed the spade and slowed its movement. Finally, she could swing no more, and she sagged against Henry as John took the spade from her hands.
"What...wha..." she began. Her eyes opened, and Henry turned her head into his neck before she could see anything.
"Shhh..." he said. "It's OK...it's safe." She wriggled, but he held her firm. She felt his head turn, probably toward John...
"No," she said calmly. "Let me go, Henry." He complied.
On the floor lay a body, obviously dead. It was slim and female, like the one she'd seen before. Her spade had done its work well, and not much was left...but she saw enough of the face to wish she hadn't seen it at all. A large metal hook still pierced its shoulder, tied to a fragment of rope.
Henry's face was pale...he'd seen it too. John's jaw was firm as he bent over the body.
"There's something in its hand," he said, and gently pried the clenched fingers apart. Something gleamed, and he stood up and turned it over in his hands.
"Some sort of emblem," he said. He held it out toward them. It was cross-shaped, but its top was a loop. The bottom long leg of the emblem had scratches across its width.
"Life," Eileen said. "Oh God...she is giving us life. Why..."
The door creaked as it swung slowly open.
Beyond lay a large, domed room. The floor was metal bars, radiating out like bicycle spokes from a small circle of metal in the center; they. A faint light emanated from underneath, and illuminated the bars with a reddish glow. The top of the dome was too dark to see, but a rustling and slurping from above told them that they were not alone.
The door slammed closed behind them. Henry held up his flashlight and pointed it across the room, searching.
"There's the exit," he whispered, pointing to the other side. Eileen could see a rusty door with an oddly shaped dark patch in the middle, but it was too dark to make out the shape.
"Whatever's up there...we have to get across without letting it know we're here," John said. "Maybe if we go around the sides...they won't be able to see us as easily."
Henry bent to look at the bars that made up the floor. "There's something on them. Looks like blood. We'll have to move slowly, or we'll slip."
John reached for Eileen's hand and pressed the emblem into it. "Just in case," he said, "get to that door. Do whatever it takes. This has got to be important somehow."
She nodded.
John moved left, and Henry and Eileen moved right. They sidled along the edges of the room, pressed against the walls to avoid the light. The rustling above them continued, but Eileen still could not make out whatever was causing it.
"Are you OK?" Henry whispered.
"I'll be fine," she replied. In the faint light, she saw his head turn to her, and he smiled encouragement. She managed a weak smile.
Just then, something fell from the top of the dome, and landed almost at their feet. A hand. A female hand...followed by a swooshing sound.
Something was approaching!
They flattened themselves against the wall and held their breaths, weapons at the ready. Eileen could barely make out John's still figure across the room...it looked as though he'd heard it too.
The swooshing closed in on them. A dark figure approached, cutting through the stale air like a bird. It dropped near the floor, and hovered over the hand. Eileen smelled blood and rot and death. The figure reached out a long, shadowy arm, as black as the rest of it, and picked up the hand...then lifted it to its mouth.
As its mouth opened, it stopped suddenly...and the head turned to face them. Its eyes glowed green in the dark, and its mouth was stained with blood. The mouth opened to reveal broken, bloody teeth, and curved up in a smile.
That's it, Eileen thought, and she gripped her spade more tightly. As if on cue, she and Henry split and ran around the creature, as John sprinted across the slippery bars to join them. All three raised their weapons, and as the thing began to move upwards, they slammed their weapons into its body. It screamed, but did not stop moving...however, somehow it seemed more substantial.
"Did you see that?" she hissed.
"Yeah," John said. "Eileen, you get yourself over to that door. Henry and I will cover you. Get that door open, I don't care how."
They ran as fast as they could across the room, slipping and sliding as they went. Just as they approached the door, a black figure materialized before them, broken grin glowing in the dark. A low laugh chilled her to the bone.
Henry and Eileen swung as John turned to watch their backs. They rained blows down upon the creature, which screamed and writhed. With every blow, they saw it taking clearer shape...
It swung an arm out and slashed at Henry. He jumped back just in time, and the claw sliced through a pocket on his jacket. Eileen heard something clink as it fell from the pocket and hit the metal bars. Henry's hand grabbed for the object as he swung the axe with his other arm.
"Incoming!" John called. Their heads turned to see two other shadows floating toward them at a leisurely pace.
"I've got this one," Eileen called.
"You sure?"
"Yeah," she replied. Henry turned to the new arrivals, and the two men loaded their guns as the shadows approached.
Eileen turned back to the dark figure before her. It looked different...more substantial, yes, but more human. Male. She slammed the spade into it again, and it cried out in agony.
Now, it had dark hair. Clothes formed around its body, and it turned its face to the floor as it screamed. Blood flowed from its wounds, and it made no movement toward her. The sound of shooting from behind her drowned out any faint noises it might have made.
Eileen raised the spade overhead, and brought it down with all of her force onto the thing's back. It spasmed, curled upwards, and its head arched back.
The face that the creature turned to her was very familiar, but so different. The brow was lined, and the corners of the mouth were turned down as if from decades of frowning. But the planes of the face, though more aged, were as well known to her as her own, and she found herself staring into what might have been Henry's face had he lived thirty more years with hate and loathing and despair.
The familiar lips moved. The sound was nearly drowned out, but the word was clear. It came out as a growl.
"Eileen."
She hesitated just a moment as his hand lifted to her. But the hand was clenched in a fist, and it swung at her in a way that suggested it had done so for years.
No...
Eileen swallowed hard, stepped forward, and raised her foot. It came crashing down on that familiar body, and as her boot ripped through flesh and bone, she felt pain tear through her as it never had before.
The body shuddered once more, then the hand dropped and lay still.
Eileen stood panting for a moment, staring at the figure's shape. Behind her, two guns were still blazing.
"Go!" John screamed. "Eileen, get the door open!" Henry paused to reload, and she realized that they were using up precious ammo while she stood there.
That shook her out of her daze, and she dashed forward to the door. The hole's shape was familiar, and she slammed the emblem into it, then yanked on the handle.
The door did not budge.
She screamed in frustration, and hit it with her hand. She felt something other than wood, and saw...a second hole, strangely shaped, awaiting an object of similar shape. And a third…and a fourth. And a fifth.
Shit, she thought. We're stuck here.
"No luck!" she yelled. "There are four more holes. These things have to be holding whatever fits in them! Keep fighting!"
She hurried back over to them. By this time, they had brought the two creatures to the ground, and were hammering them with blows from their melee weapons. She lifted her battered spade and joined in.
The figures were mutating, changing, as the one before had done. Two male figures, one tall and lean, the other slightly shorter but much stockier. She recognized neither one.
Suddenly, the two men stopped swinging. She looked from one to the other. They were staring at the faces on the bodies on the ground, looks of shock on their faces.
"Come on," she cried, as she raised her spade yet again. God, she was tired... "We have to."
John stepped forward, eyes fixed on the face. It was a large, square, beefy face, with dark hair and a hard mouth. Dark eyes looked accusingly at John, and the mouth opened.
John closed his eyes, and his lips moved for a moment. Eileen heard a quiet "forgive me" before his heavy shoe came down on the thing's head.
She turned and brought her spade down on the beast in front of Henry. The body wore a dark woolen jacket and dark pants, and its short, thick hair was streaked with silver. As her spade connected with its midsection, it turned to her and emitted a low gurgle. Something familiar about that face...
Its eyes were a brilliant blue, and looked at her imploringly. It raised its arm over its head to protect itself, and she could only see its nose and mouth. Suddenly, she knew where she'd seen those before, and she knew who this man was.
"Henry," she said. "You have to..."
He lifted his foot. The eyes followed his motion, and the mouth opened one more time.
"Henry..." it said. The voice was low, yet commanding. "Stop it. Now."
Henry's mouth was a hard line as his boot came down.
The three stood still, catching their breaths and collecting themselves for a long minute. Henry was still holding whatever it was that had fallen from his pocket, and as he moved to put it away, Eileen's eye caught the glint of the dog tags.
John was the first to speak.
"What just happened?" he said.
"I don't know," Henry said.
"This place...it...how did they..." John fell silent.
The body in front of John shifted then, and they all jumped. Its arm slid off its chest, and its hand opened. Glinting in the palm was an object that none of them recognized. It was shaped like a T, with a snake and a pair of wings. Eileen grabbed it before it could fall through the bars of the floor.
Henry pried open the hands of the body in front of him, and found a six-cornered object in one. He tossed it to her, and she ran to the last body. Its hand held another item, red and oval. In its other hand was clutched a golden dagger. Funny, she hadn't noticed it there before...
She slammed all four into their holes on the door, and the sound of the lock clicking open was one of the sweetest things she'd ever heard.
"Let's go," she called. The two men turned slowly away from the bodies on the floor, and walked toward her.
John stepped over the third body first. As Henry moved past it, he looked down, and froze. His mouth dropped open. He gaped at the thing, then looked at Eileen, horrified.
She stared him straight in the eye, and shook her head wearily. Later...
On the other side of the door was yet more darkness. There was a breeze coming from somewhere directly in front of them, though.
Henry's flashlight came on.
"Another hole," John said. "Let's get out of here."