by Amy Cross
In one particular gap, between the walls that separated the hallway from the kitchen, a long metal thread was slowly running through the darkness. Sharp metal teeth covered the thread, shuddering slightly as they moved past a cleaver-sized blade that was trundling the opposite way. Just a couple of millimeters away, another thread ran at a ninety degree angle, sharing the same space but engaged in a completely different task.
Every gap, every clearance, had been judged perfectly.
Further along, at a junction near the living room wall, another blade stopped suddenly as a much larger blade slid slowly up into its new position, and then the first blade started moving again, directed by a century-old mechanism that had been designed by a master using a complex weighting system.
Bronze gear wheels.
Metal pulleys.
Guide-wheels.
Cantilevered plates.
Serrated cogs designed for timing purposes.
A symphony of engineering genius existed behind the house's walls, tucked away from sight but still working perfectly, even after so many years. Few men could ever have even dreamed that such a system would be possible. Fewer still could have believed such a thing, even if they'd seen it with their own eyes. And as for conceiving, designing and building the mechanism...
Only a handful of men in history had been capable of creating such a device. Maybe only one man.
***
Sitting at the bottom of the stairs, too scared to move and still cradling her mother's bloodied corpse, Jenna sat sobbing. Her whole body was trembling with shock and fear, but she couldn't bring herself to actually move from the spot where she'd watched her mother die. Or was it that she couldn't bear to leave the body? Her hand was resting on her dead mother's shoulder, and every few minutes she pulled the corpse a little closer. For comfort.
She knew that any step in any direction would be fraught with danger, and she felt certain that there would be some kind of trap waiting for her if she tried to make the three or four meter journey to the front door. For now, she simply held her mother and waited for a miracle.
And all around, the walls were still alive with the sound of hidden machinery. It was almost as if the house's teeth were chattering with anticipation, waiting for the next taste of blood.
“Please,” Jenna whimpered, squeezing her eyes tight shut but unable to stop more tears running down her cheeks. “Just wake up. Please, I need you.”
She gave her mother's body a gentle shake, but she could tell that there was no life left in the limp, loose limbs. After a moment, she pulled her closer.
“Please,” she continued. “Please, please...”
She waited, but her mother's body was still and silent, unlike the constant ticking and clicking of the house.
Finally, Jenna reached down and picked up the baseball bat. Her hands were trembling, but she knew she couldn't simply sit still and wait for someone to help. Miracles, she'd learned over the years, just didn't happen. Her mother had used her last words to urge her onward, to tell her to get the hell out of the house, and she knew she had to find a way. She used the bat's tip to check the floorboards, and then slowly she eased her mother's dead body down against the floor.
“I'll come back for you,” she whispered, sniffing back tears. “I'll get us out of here, I swear. I won't...”
She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself.
“I won't let the house beat me.”
The words sounded insane, and she could barely believe they were coming from her mouth. At the same time, the house's walls were still ticking steadily, still waiting for her to make her move.
She paused, almost as if she was waiting for her mother to say something, before finally turning and forcing herself to crawl toward the front door. She felt certain that she'd feel one of the floorboards move under her weight, but slowly she managed to reach the door and then she looked up, watching the handle and wondering whether it, too, might be rigged. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw her mother's corpse still crumpled on the floor, and she made a quick mental note, reminding herself that at least she knew of one safe spot, one patch on the floor where she could regroup if necessary and come up with another plan.
After a moment, she turned and saw the framed photo of Cesar Marchionne high up on the wall, and she felt a shiver of anger as she realized that he might very well have been responsible for everything that had happened. The more she looked at the picture, the more she saw arrogance and evil in the old man's face, almost as if the photo was his way of still watching over the carnage he'd created.
“What is this place?” she asked him, her voice trembling with fear. “Why are you doing this to us?”
Again, she half expected an answer from the old, faded photo.
She stared at the image for a moment longer, before looking once again at the handle. Telling herself that there was no point waiting, she reached out and grabbed hold of the handle, and then she came up with a plan. She paused, counting to ten in her head, before suddenly turning the handle and then pulling back, crashing down against the floor and waiting to see what kind of trap would be triggered.
She waited.
Nothing happened.
Apart from the ticking walls. The house sounded as alive as ever. It sounded excited, as if it was enjoying the game.
Feeling a crushing sense of fear in her chest, Jenna sat up and reached out to once again grab the handle. Cautiously, she gave it a slow turn, but the ticking sound remained constant. All the other times, there'd been a subtle change to signal one of the traps being activated, yet now it seemed as if the handle wasn't wired up to anything at all. When she tried to pull the door open, however, she found that it was locked. She pulled on it again, but still it wouldn't budge. The key was still in the lock, so she turned it, but still the door wouldn't open.
“Come on,” she stammered, trying the key several more times before realizing that it had clearly been rendered useless. Whatever was keeping the door shut, there was no longer anything a simple key could do to help.
“Damn you,” she muttered, trying the handle one more time before finally letting her frustration boil over. She tried to shake the lock open, only to end up banging her fist against the door and then slumping back as fresh tears filled her eyes.
After a moment, she looked over at her mother's dead body at the foot of the stairs.
“Please wake up,” she whimpered, crawling toward her and checking her pulse again. She knew there was little chance, but still she searched for a pulse, pressing her fingers against Helen's cold neck. “Please, Mum... Please, I need you...”
She waited, but she already knew the truth.
“Dad!” she screamed suddenly, sitting up. “Dad, where are you? Dad, please...”
Her whole body was shuddering now, as she began to sob. The idea of her father coming to the rescue was absurd. After a moment, however, she turned and looked up at the narrow window next to the door. The lights were all off, but a patch of moonlight was streaming through the glass and slowly she came up with another plan.
With the baseball bat in her right hand, she got to her feet and stepped closer to the window, while raising the bat over her shoulder. She took a moment to gather her strength, and then she let out a cry of anger as she swung the bat against the glass, only for it to rebound and jump out of her grasp. Horrified, she watched as it hit her mother's corpse and then rolled down to the ground.
“Sorry,” she stammered. “I'm...”
Muttering a couple of curses under her breath, she grabbed the bat and tried again, with the same result. She tried for a third time, adjusting her grip each time, before realizing that the glass seemed to be reinforced. She tried aiming at the bottom corner, but still she couldn't cause so much as a scratch.
“I'm trapped,” she muttered, turning and looking across the hallway and seeing open doorways leading into other dark rooms.
The ticking sound continued, as if the house was taunting her, and she felt
certain that too many steps in any direction would trigger another of the traps. At the same time, standing still wasn't an option, and she knew she'd have to take a risk soon. The house was sealed, and she was starting to panic, worrying about the air supply. After a moment, she looked at the photo of Cesar Marchionne.
“Is this what you wanted?” she asked. “Is this why you built the house? So you could...”
Her voice trailed off as she realized how insane that idea sounded. She raised the bat, ready to smash the photo, but after a moment she lowered it again.
“No way,” she continued, swallowing hard. “I'm not wasting my energy. Anyway, some asshole from the eighteenth century couldn't have set this up. No goddamn way.”
Still, she was starting to feel short of breath. Stepping back, she tried to tell herself that her imagination was running wild, but when she looked at the reinforced window and then at the securely locked door, she began to worry that no air was getting into the house. She tried taking slow, deep breaths, but a sense of pure panic was rippling through her chest and she could feel the air getting thinner and thinner.
“It's okay,” she said out loud, still trying to get control of her rushing thoughts. “You've got air. You're not suffocating.”
She leaned back against the wall, just below the photo of Cesar Marchionne, and placed a hand on her chest. She could feel her heart pounding, but she'd experienced panic attacks before and she knew the sensation would pass. This time, however, she was starting to feel a crushing sensation in her chest. Getting down onto her hands and knees, she crawled back to the door and pressed her fingers against the gap at the bottom, and to her relief she realized she could feel a faint breeze.
Leaning down, she felt the flow of air on her face, and the panic began to pass. Air was getting into the house after all.
She wasn't suffocating.
“Okay,” she said, trying to get her head straight. “You can do this. You just have to come up with a plan.”
Looking around, she tried to work out which way to go, before figuring that her best bet would be to head through to the kitchen and try to get out via the back door. She knew it'd probably be locked, but she also felt that there had to be some way out. It made no sense for the house to simply trap her and kill her, so she figured there had to be a chance to escape. Slowly, after using her baseball bat to check the floorboards ahead, she began to make her way toward the door at the far end of the hallway.
In the distance, from some other part of the house, there emerged a brief bumping sound, unlike anything else she'd heard so far. It only lasted for a couple of seconds, but it seemed less regular than all the other noises, less mechanical and clockwork.
“Dad?” she called out, still clinging to the hope that he might be alive somewhere in the house. “Are you... Are you here? Can you hear me?”
She took a couple more steps forward, before pausing and listening for some hint of a reply.
Now there was just the constant ticking sound.
“Dad, please,” she continued, as her voice began to tremble more and more. “I'm sorry for the mean things I said to you, and I'm sorry for doubting you, and I'm sorry for everything, but can you please, please help me? I'm really scared and I need you.”
Still using her bat to check the boards, she started walking toward the kitchen door again.
“Mum's dead,” she said out loud, sniffing back more tears. “I couldn't save her, and now she's dead, and she saved me from two of the spikes but now...”
Her voice trailed off as she started sobbing. Almost at the kitchen door now, she had the bat held out, pressing against the floorboards. As long as she checked every step first, she figured she'd be okay.
“Dad please,” she continued. “You have to be okay. You used to tell me that there's always a way, you said no matter -”
Suddenly a blade sliced down from the top of the door-frame. Jenna cried out and fell back, landing hard on the floor as the blade cut through her baseball bat and hit the ground.
Staring wide-eyed with shock, Jenna watched as the blade shuddered slightly in the frame. After a moment, the ticking sound changed a little and the blade began to rise again, quickly disappearing into the top of the frame, ready to strike again.
“I didn't touch anything,” she whispered, looking down at the floor. “There wasn't a...”
Raising what was left of her bat, she saw that the top half had been cleanly sheared away.
“No,” she stammered, filled with a fresh wave of panic, “I didn't... I didn't touch a goddamn thing!”
Staring at the floorboards, she tried to work out what had happened. She'd been checking for some kind of switch, but the baseball bat hadn't seemed to click against anything, so she had no idea how the door had managed to sense her approach. She'd been so sure that she understood how the traps worked, but this time there'd been no trigger, no clicking sound, no warning from behind the walls. The door had clearly sensed her some other way.
“No!” she shouted angrily as she realized that maybe she didn't understand the house's rules after all. “That's not fair! You can't do that!”
She held the broken bat out, testing to see whether something else might have caused the blade to come down, but nothing happened. Her hand was trembling now, and finally she pulled back, not daring to try going through the door again, not if she didn't understand what had caused the trap to go off.
“Another way,” she whispered, remembering that there was a second route into the kitchen, via the front room. “I'll just...”
She turned and tested the next door, which led into the laundry room.
Immediately, three spikes sliced across the open space. She pulled back, and a moment later a blade crashed down. She pulled back, shocked that the door laundry room seemed even more deadly than the door to the kitchen.
“Another way, then,” she stammered, not daring to try again. “I'll find...”
Her voice trailed off for a moment, before she turned and began to crawl back the way she'd just come. When she got to the bottom of the stairs, however, she froze as she stared at the empty space on the floor.
“Mum?” she stammered, looking around but seeing no sign of her mother's body anywhere. As panic and hope and fear rushed into her chest, she got to her feet. “Mum?” she shouted. “Where are you? Mum!”
Chapter Thirteen
The blood smear was clear and fresh, running across the hallway's wooden floor and into the study. Although she hated the sight of so much blood, Jenna followed closely on her hands and knees, filled with hope that her mother was somehow alive and had managed to crawl away to safety.
“Mum?” she called out, her voice trembling more than ever. “Give me a sign, Mum! Let me know where you are. Mum, please -”
Stopping suddenly as she reached the doorway, she looked through into the study and saw that the smear ran for a few more feet and then abruptly ended. She hesitated, trying to make sense of what she was seeing, before looking up at the door-frame and trying to spot any sign of a trap. There were no holes that she could see, and no signs of a small gap that could suddenly release a blade. Still, she couldn't quite bring herself to go through.
Already, too many sudden attacks had trained her body and mind to be wary. Even when her mind told her to take the risk, her body refused.
“Mum?” she shouted again, staring at the smeared blood. “Are you in here? It's me, it's Jenna!”
She waited, before realizing that she had no choice. Holding out the broken baseball bat, she rolled it through the doorway and watched as it bumped to a halt against the side of the desk. Taking a deep breath, she tried to find a sliver of courage from somewhere, but her body seemed locked in place, refusing to follow her mind's order.
“Come on,” she muttered out loud, “you can't stop here. You have to find her.”
She waited, trying to unlock her body's frozen joints, and finally she lunged forward, rolling onto her side once she was in the room and then f
reezing again, waiting for any hint that danger was coming. She looked around, frantically watching for movement, but so far the room seemed completely still. Her body was shaking, though, and the tide of panic in her chest was higher than before.
The walls were still ticking, but with no greater urgency than a moment ago.
“Mum?” she said. Glancing across the room, she realized there were no spots where her mother could hide, but she was still certain that she must have somehow ended up moving through to the study. “Are you here?”
She waited.
“Dad? Did you find Mum and...”
Her voice trailed off. In truth, there had been no sign of her father since the moment after her mother had been injured, and she knew deep down that he wasn't going to suddenly ride to the rescue. Besides, she figured that if he did show up, he'd just find a way to make things worse.
“Mum?” she shouted, before turning to look over at the window. “Help!” she screamed. “If anyone out there can hear me, we need help! Please!”
Shuddering, she realized there was no way help was coming. The house was far too remote, and she hadn't seen a single car pass along the road since they'd arrived earlier in the day. There was no sign of light outside, but she figured it must be around three or four in the morning; that, in turn, meant that it was a little over fifteen hours since they'd first arrived at the house.
Fifteen hours for everything to fall apart.
Grabbing the stub of the baseball bat, she began to use it to check the floorboards ahead. Crawling forward, she had a vague plan to get to the window and find some way to open it. Figuring that the doors were probably sealed, she told herself that the windows were the best bet, and that somehow she'd be able to break the glass. Then she'd be able to wriggle out, get to the car, somehow start the engine and drive away to get help.
And then the police would come and make everything okay again.
