"They had to have gone down this hallway. Look at all the destruction," Liam jerks his head towards the broken bodies of even more F.E.A.R. agents. For the past thirty minutes we've been wandering down the hallways, scanning for any signs of Kyle, Myra, and Comrade.
"If this base is anything like the ones I used to work in, the holding cells are probably below us. That's where it looks like this path of bodies is leading us anyways..." I trail off. Most of the lights here have been blown out, and the ones that haven't are flickering eerily, so it's very had to see just where we're going. "Here, I'll lead the way."
I take initiative and pick my way over bodies, broken ceiling tiles, puddles of blood, and sparking wires. I can't say I'm sorry for the F.E.A.R. workers, but this had to have been a downright massacre.
If I'm correct, the door at the end of this hall should lead down to the containment cells. I'm just thankful that most F.E.A.R. bases are set up identically, otherwise we would have a real problem. The door is already ajar and the knob is destroyed, confirming my suspicions. Someone had to have broken through here.
The door leads to a staircase that winds down, stopping at a platform with a door at every few flights of stairs.
"This way," I call over my shoulder before hopping down the stairs. I wait on the platform for the others to catch up. The door here has been forced open as well.
I creep through the open doorway. This opens to another hallway, albeit a dimmer and barer one. The floor here is simple concrete, the walls stripped of paint and other decor. The doors on either side are simple unvarnished metal. This is definitely a prison.
"Hello?" Someone calls from up ahead.
"Comrade?" Kasper shouts, her voice conveying all of her hope and relief.
"Kasper! Over here!" The Sokovian calls. She sounds like she is about three doors down. I sprint to her cell, using my abilities. We have no time to waist.
"Here, let me open that," Kasper says. She stretches out a hand and extends her fingers. Then she closes them into a fist, and simultaneously the door crushes off it's hinges into a little ball of crumpled steel.
"Comrade!" Kasper exclaims when she sees her friend.
The younger girl is zip-tied to a wooden chair, but looks no worse for wear. Well, except that her eyes are literally bulging in shock at seeing Kasper just crush that door. Oh yeah, I should probably close my jaw too; I was just so surprised at the suddenness of the action.
Dante pulls a knife out of his pocket and goes to work on Serik-Zauresh's restraints while Kasper hugs her friend, smooths her hair out of her face, asks if she's injured. Comrade is definitely bewildered, but she has no injuries.
"They just brought me here and left me. A guard brought food on the first day, but yesterday no one came. I heard commotion from cell next-door, but I don't know what happened," Comrade explains.
"The entire base is destroyed. The F.E.A.R. guys are either dead or knocked-out, and the lights are all wonky," Dante explains.
Serik-Zauresh looks confused, but says nothing. Once Dante is finished with her ties, we check the other cells for signs of life. They're empty.
"Well, now what?" Kaishi asks.
"I can try to track Kyle or Myra through scent, but I'm not really in practice, y'know?" Liam says. He cocks an eyebrow in a way that a find insanely adorable, but he catches me staring. I can fell myself blush, so I pretend to look around the hallway.
"It's worth a shot," Dante admits, scratching the back of his neck.
"I'll try for Kyle first. He wears that really girly cologne that makes me want to gag, so if he's around, I should be able to find him."
Liam raises his head to the air and starts sniffing around the room. "This is harder in my human form–oh! I think I have a trail. Yup, that's definitely his woman stink. This way."
Liam leads the way back out the hallway and up the stairs, then all the way back to the generator room.
"It's fainter here, but let me see if I can follow it any further."
I glance around at the destruction. The shadows seem to press in on my vision every time the lights flicker. It's really disorienting. I glance at a few of the open doorways, complete darkness on the insides, except– there! There was someone standing in the doorway nearest to me, a shadow figure, somebody watching us.
"Guys over here! Guys? Wha–"
When I turn around, my friends are all gone. Not like 'they continued down the hall' gone, they are 'gone' gone. Like vanished out of thin air.
And what happened to the hallway? The doors are all gone, and the walls are pressing in, too close, like... Like they're moving! The walls are moving in, they're going to crush me!
"Help! Help, someone, please!" I shriek, running to one of the walls and pounding with all my might.
"Let me out!"
I kick the wall, and it pushes me back. It's getting hard to breathe, I know I'm panicking. My vision starts to tilt, the fear making me dizzy.
"Get me out of here!" I scream, clawing at the door. Tears force their way down my cheeks, and I just want to leave. I run around the room as fast as my powers will take me, ramming into the walls with my shoulder until I can't feel it anymore for the pain.
The walls are dangerously close now, and I have to turn sideways so I don't end up a human pancake.
"Please," I whimper, my voice giving out.
I tap the nearest wall in a last ditch effort, and surprisingly, the entire thing falls over. I race out of the cramped space into darkness, kissing the ground and sobbing terribly.
Someone giggles in the gloom, and I see a figure in the darkness before it scampers away...
XxXxX
Another shorter chapter, but the next few will be like this, short little POV chapters as the characters face– well, I won't give it away haha. Give your predictions and comments in the reviews, and thank you all for reading! I hope you all are enjoying these characters as much as I am!
On a side note, after this story I am considering doing a sort of non-canon sequel before doing a real sequel to this story. The non-canon sequel will be set a few years after the events of Follow Me Down, and will take place in the zombie apocalypse. If you guys are interested and would like me to use your character from this story in the non-cannon sequel, let me know in a pm or in the reviews. Thanks!