by Cross, Amy
“I'm starting to wonder that myself,” he continued. “It took me two months to make the trek back up to meet you today. There are even tunnels down there, I think they might lead to other towns. I'll check them out later, but for now I figure I'll keep heading down. Every time I think I've reached the Border's bottom level, I see another door in the corner. It just goes on and on.”
“And you go through the doors?”
“Of course.”
“And is it...” She paused. “Is it worse each time?”
“It's sure not better, let's put it that way. Mostly it's empty, but every so often I still find... Well, I don't know what they used to be when they first went down, but they're sure as hell not human anymore.”
“Maybe it's time for you to stop,” she continued. “That Paula woman phoned again and -”
“Don't tell me.”
“The Border's finished,” she told him. “You've cleared so many levels of the damn place, there's no way it could ever come back.”
“Oh, it could come back,” he replied, with grit in his voice. “I have to get to the bottom level, wherever the hell that is, and scrape it out clean. I've seen things down there, Jane, things that you wouldn't believe are possible.” He paused for a moment. “I'm real glad you stopped coming down there with me. I wouldn't want you to see what it's like.”
Lucy waited, but suddenly Ben seemed to have fallen silent. Swallowing hard, she figured she should probably just turn around and leave, but at the same time she wanted to hear more, to work out what, exactly, her uncle was doing. She knew that Jane brought regular supplies to the abandoned office building, and she'd figured out a while ago that she was meeting Ben, who blatantly hadn't skipped town again. Now she wanted to know what all the talk of the Border was really about, and what levels her uncle was going down to, and -
“Gotcha,” Ben said suddenly, stepping through the doorway and putting a hand on her shoulder.
She stepped back startled.
“Jesus Christ,” he continued, with an expression of shock. “Lucy, is that you?”
Before Lucy could say anything, Jane followed Ben out into the corridor. “Lucy? What the hell are you doing here?”
“Please don't be mad,” Lucy stammered, “I just... I followed you. I wanted to see what was happening here.”
“Oh God,” Jane said with a sigh, turning to Ben. “I swear, I had no idea she was here.”
“I believe you,” Ben replied, keeping his gaze fixed firmly on Lucy. “Wow. The last time I saw you, you were, what, six years old?”
“It's been a while,” Lucy admitted. “Aunt Jane told everyone that you'd left Bowley.”
“Well, I guess I did,” he said with a faint smile. “I just left vertically instead of horizontally.”
“You've been underground?” she asked. “No way, what are you doing down there? Is it, like, some kind of bunker?”
He paused, before shaking his head, and now the smile had left his face.
“You should go,” Jane told her. “Lucy, we'll talk about this later, but following me is definitely not cool.”
“I had to,” she replied. “I asked you so many times what was really going on here, and you never told me the truth!”
“And now you see why,” Jane muttered.
“Not really.” Frustrated, Lucy turned to Ben. “What's going on? Why do you need bullets?”
“I...” He paused for a moment. “Jane,” he said finally, “can you give me a moment with Lucy?”
“But -”
“Come on,” he added, turning to her. “It's been twelve years since I spoke to anyone up here apart from you. No offense, Jane, but as hilarious and entertaining as you are, a little variety is always good.”
“I'll be outside,” she replied, clearly not happy even if she wasn't going to force the issue. “Just... be careful what you talk about, okay?”
“Gotcha,” Ben said with a wink, before leading Lucy into the office as Jane headed along the corridor. “So how's she doing?” he asked.
“Jane?” Lucy paused. “She's okay.”
“Come on, seriously.” He took some bullets from the case and began to reload his shotgun. “She's most definitely not okay.”
“She took over Alex's job,” Lucy told him. “She takes it very seriously, she's a lot better than him.”
“By which you mean she doesn't blame everything on passing vagrants?”
Lucy smiled. “Bowley's a pretty boring town. It's not like when there were all those murders when I was a kid.”
“Good.” He slung the shotgun over his shoulder. “There's nothing wrong with a bit of boring now and again. You should remember that when you head off to college in some big city. There's no reason to...” He paused, and then he sighed. “Ah, who am I kidding? You're a teenager. You're gonna make all the usual mistakes that teenagers make, and maybe you'll even invent some new ones. At least you won't have a place like the Border bubbling away beneath your feet, ready to swallow you up.”
“What is the Border?” she asked.
“A dark place that isn't going to cause any more problems. I'm nearly at the lowest level, I have to be. If it goes much deeper, I'm gonna end up in...” He caught himself just in time. “It's huge,” he continued. “That place down there defies all belief. If I even began to describe it to you, you'd think I'm nuts.”
“But do you really need to keep going?” she asked. “Maybe if we just seal it shut so no-one can ever head down there again, you can get on with your life?”
With a wry smile, he shook his head.
“But why not?”
“Because you can't just ignore evil,” he told her. “You can't pretend it's not there, put it out of sight, and expect it not to affect you. Even if you turn your back, even if you're real good at fooling yourself into forgetting about it... If it's still there, still festering out of sight, it'll reach you like it's radiating through the air. And it'll eat at everyone around, some more than others, but it'll get you in the end. It's like cancer, you have to cut it out if you want to stand a chance of living. Otherwise it'll spread unnoticed until one day, you'll either drop dead or you'll realize it's too late.” He paused, watching his niece with a hint of concern. “So I can't stop, not until I know the Border has been completely scraped out. I fell into that trap before, but now I'm old enough and stubborn enough to keep going.”
“But -”
“Listen,” he added, “I have to get going, but tell Jane I'll stick to the usual arrangement, okay? Thank her for the stuff she brought, and tell her... Well, tell her I appreciate it, and tell her she should try to relax a little. Has she met anyone else since Jack died?”
Lucy shook her head.
“Try to get her to go on a date with someone,” he continued, heading toward the door in the corner. “Life has to move on.”
“Are you really going back down there?” she asked.
“I sure as hell am.”
“And when will you come back up?”
“In a year.”
“But then you'll go down again?”
“The job's done when it's done,” he replied, with the cases and Tupperware pots in his arms as he opened the door and stepped through into the darkness. After staring down the steps for a moment, he turned back to Lucy and smiled. “Say hi to your Mom for me. Tell her I miss her, tell her you bumped into me or something, but don't tell her where I am or what I'm doing. And tell her to dump that Bob asshole. Sorry, kid, but your father's a loser. If I ever get done with the Border, I'm gonna come back up and chase that loser right out of town.”
She smiled.
“Be seeing you,” he added, turning and heading down the steps. “You seem like a good kid, Lucy! Have fun at college! Don't do anything I wouldn't do!”
She paused, before hurrying over to the doorway and looking down. For a moment, she saw Ben's shadow on the wall as he disappeared back down into the depths of the Border. She wanted to go after him, to just get a glimpse at
the place, and after a moment she made her way down the first few steps and then leaned forward, peering around the corner. She could hear Ben whistling in the distance as he made his way down to the next level, but all she could see was a bare, red-walled room with bullet holes peppered across several of the surfaces.
Fighting the temptation to go further, she turned and headed back up into the office. Once she'd pushed the door shut, she could no longer hear Ben whistling.
***
“Hey.”
“Hey.” Looking up from where she was sitting on the steps in the cold night air, Jane saw Lucy emerging from the building.
“He said to say thanks,” Lucy continued, taking a seat next to her. “He said he'd stick to the same routine or something like that, whatever it means.”
Jane nodded. “I figured.”
“It's not true, is it?” Lucy asked. “I mean, it can't be! There can't be this place underneath Bowley that just keeps going down forever, with more and more levels. If it was true, what would he even be finding down there? People?”
“I don't know,” Jane replied. “I stopped asking a while ago. He never told me much anyway.”
“It's not right,” Lucy continued. “Uncle Ben's such a nice guy. I mean, I know he can seem kinda weird sometimes, and I know Uncle Jack used to have some pretty bad things to say about him, but I don't believe any of it. I think Ben's cool, and I hate to think of him spending his whole life... Well, whatever he's doing down there, he should be happy.” She paused. “Do you think he'll ever be finished with the Border?”
Jane looked up at the stars for a moment as she contemplated her answer. “I think one day I'll come to meet him and he won't show up,” she said finally, “and I think that'll be the end of that.”
“So you don't think he'll get to the last level?”
“I think if he does, he won't have the strength to come back. I think whatever he finds there...” She paused, before turning back to Lucy. “I should have stayed down there with him, but I had Stuart and Oliver to think of, I couldn't leave them behind to go fight whatever's in the Border. Ben could do that, finally someone was willing to make the sacrifice, and all of Bowley should thank him except... No-one has any idea. He's fighting the darkness so that the rest of us don't even have to admit that it exists.”
They sat in silence for a moment, each of them thinking about Ben making his way wearily down into the depths.
“Let me know,” Lucy said finally. “I won't ever tell anyone, but... Let me know if one day he doesn't show up anymore.”
Jane nodded.
“And if he ever does get finished with the Border...” Sighing, Lucy stared ahead, seeing the edge of the town square in the distance and hearing the sounds of people laughing and talking. After a few seconds, all she could think about was the fact that she'd be leaving town soon, and that she'd be living in a city. “Wait,” she said cautiously, with a frown, “what were we just talking about?”
Jane stared at her niece, before putting an arm around her shoulder and smiling. “I think we were talking about how you're going to be getting out of town tomorrow, and how you're going to be moving to the city.”
“I can't wait,” Lucy replied. “I mean, I love Bowley, but... This might sound crazy, but do you ever feel as if there's something dark here, something that people don't notice?”
Jane paused. “Like what?”
“I don't know. Like, something beneath our feet. It's just, like, an itch of a thought really, but it's been nagging at me.”
“Don't you remember what just -” Another pause, before finally Jane understood. “I wouldn't worry about it,” she said finally. “If there is anything dark here, I've got a feeling someone's taking care of it.”
***
“I think,” the man in the suit said with a frown as he stared at the screen, “maybe we finally have to admit defeat here.”
He watched for a moment as the screen showed a CCTV image of a man approaching a door. With a shotgun in his hands, the man kicked the door open and stepped forward, before opening fire.
The man in the suit flicked a switch and the screen switched off.
“He's not going to give up,” he muttered. “The Border beneath Bowley is obviously lost.”
“So should we start working on a plan to start it up again?” the technician asked. “It probably wouldn't take that long. We could have a team there within a weak, they could deal with the guy who's causing all the trouble and then, I don't know, they could probably have a new Border up and running by Christmas.”
“I don't know about that,” the man in the suit replied, heading across the room and stopping to look at the vast world map that filled the far wall. Tens of thousands of red lights were lit up dotted all over the map, marking locations on every continent. “We've waited long enough for this tiresome individual to abandon his crusade. Maybe the Bowley site should remain closed, as a reminder to us that sometimes, just sometimes, we can still be vulnerable. A little humility is good for any organization.”
“But -”
“I've made my decision, and I'll relay it to the boss.” He turned to the technician. “Bowley is to remain inactive. Ben Freeman is never going to get back up, he'll just keep going down and down until he reaches...” He paused, and slowly a faint smile crossed his face. “Let him have his little victory. Let Bowley become a peaceful, calm town again. We have so many other facilities, so many other Border locations, I honestly don't see the need to worry about that little scratch of a town. Bowley was one of our smaller sites anyway, its only real value was sentimental. After all, it was the very first Border location that ever existed.”
“So should I stop monitoring the place?”
The man in the suit nodded, before heading to the door. “Forget about Bowley. Shut off the cameras. Let it sink back into insignificance and just become a boring little town where nothing ever happens. I'm sure everyone will be so much happier like that.”
Rolling his eyes, he stepped out into the corridor and paused for a moment to light a cigarette. He took a long, slow drag and felt an immediate sense of relief, not only because of the nicotine but also because finally, after twelve years, he'd come to accept that the Border at Bowley would have to remain lost. The situation had already taken up far too much of his time and as he turned and headed along the corridor, he couldn't help but smile as he thought of some loser still down there, still fighting, still trying to keep Bowley safe.
Stopping at the far end of the corridor, the man in the suit stubbed his cigarette out, took a moment to check that his tie was straight, and then opened the door.
“It's me,” he said as he stepped into the control room. “I've reached a decision regarding Bowley. We're going to abandon the site. Let it rot. We can just focus on all the other Borders out there. Let's not be greedy.”
Back in the control room, the technician tapped some panels on a monitor. Nearby, a screen showed a black-and-white live camera feed of Ben pushing another door open and raising his gun. A moment later, the feed was cut and the monitor faded to black.
Also by Amy Cross
THE FARM
No-one ever remembers what happens to them when they go into the barn at Bondalen farm. Some never come out again, and the rest... Something about them is different.
In 1979, the farm is home to three young girls. As winter fades to spring, Elizabeth, Kari and Sara each come to face the secrets of the barn, and they each emerge with their own injuries. But someone else is lurking nearby, a man who claims to be Death incarnate, and for these three girls the spring of 1979 is set to end in tragedy.
In the modern day, meanwhile, Bondalen farm has finally been sold to a new family. Dragged from London by her widowed father, Paula Ridley hates the idea of rural life. Soon, however, she starts to realize that her new home retains hints of its horrific past, while the darkness of the barn still awaits anyone who dares venture inside.
Set over the course of several decades, T
he Farm is a horror novel about people who live with no idea of the terror in their midst, and about a girl who finally has a chance to confront a source of great evil that has been feeding on the farm for generations.
Also by Amy Cross
ANNIE'S ROOM
1945 and 2015. Seventy years apart, two girls named Annie move into the same room of the same remote house. Their stories are very different, but tragedy is about to bring them crashing together.
Annie Riley has just broken both her legs. Unable to leave bed, she's holed up in her new room and completely reliant upon her family for company. She's also the first to notice a series of strange noises in the house, but her parents and brother think she's just letting her imagination run overtime. And then, one night, dark forces start to make their presence more keenly felt, leading to a horrific discovery...
Seventy years ago, Annie Garrett lived in the same house with her parents. This Annie, however, was very different. Bitter and vindictive and hopelessly devoted to her father, she developed a passionate hatred for her mother. History records that Annie eventually disappeared while her parents were executed for her murder, but what really happened to Annie Garrett, and is her ghost still haunting the house to this day?
Annie's Room is the story of two girls whose lives just happened to be thrown together by an unlikely set of circumstances, and of a potent evil that blossomed in one soul and then threatened to consume another.
Also by Amy Cross
ELI'S TOWN
“Someone really should go check on Eli...”
Every year, someone from the Denton family travels to the town of Tulepa, to check on weird old uncle Eli. This time around it's Holly's turn to make the journey, but when she arrives she discovers that not only is Eli missing, but the locals appear to be hiding something.
Meanwhile, a strange curse seems to have struck the town. Every day, at exactly noon, one resident drops dead. Is the string of sudden fatalities just a coincidence? If it's something more sinister, why does no-one seem to be trying to uncover the truth? And what do these deaths have to do with the disappearance of Eli Denton, a strange old man who has barely even left his house in more than a decade?
