The 11th Floor

by Charles Culver

  As Jonathan sat on the end of his bed pulling his socks on, he came to the sudden realization that it was quiet… much quieter than normal. In fact, he could not hear any of the cacophony normally produced by the city at this time of day. Mysteriously but pleasantly missing was the sound of trucks and horns honking.

  Stunned, he dropped his second sock, stood up, walked to the nearest window, and peered through the gap in the curtains. The window overlooked one of the city’s busiest avenues. It appeared deserted. Quickly he ran back into his bedroom and into the closet. Digging through boxes, he retrieved a pair of binoculars that had been his father’s. While now considered antique, they provided a great magnification, unparalleled by most of the models that were on the market today.

  Without hesitation, he rushed back to the window, threw open the curtains, and peered down at the street. Same as without the binoculars, the street was empty. He could clearly see parked cars, but no drivers or pedestrians. Looking higher up into the windows of other buildings, he could not see anyone in offices or other apartments.

  Then, a black object flashed past the front of the binoculars. It was too close to ascertain what exactly it was because he was focused on a distant building. It just appeared as a fast-moving blur. Stepping back from the window a bit and lowering the binoculars, he saw it again, this time with clarity. Falling past his window were thousands of black birds, plummeting to the ground below.

  Chapter 6

  Living in a plastic-covered refrigerator box, behind a dumpster at the end of an alley, isn’t much of a home. Unfortunately for Eddie, it was all he had to call home. He’d had a long string of nothing but bad luck lately. A little more than a year before, he lost his job when the company went bankrupt. Shortly afterwards he got sick and the medical bills piled up. Unemployment eventually dried up and he found himself unable to pay the rent. He ended up getting evicted. He had already sold most everything he had to buy food, so he packed up what was left, some clothes and personal effects, and hit the streets. He didn’t have any friends or family he could move in with. What little money he had, he spent on alcohol to help drown his sorrows. So he spent his free time, which was all his time, wandering around gathering cans and bottles, which he called his “salvageables,” and stockpiling them next to his cardboard home.

  That morning, Eddie was startled awake, not by the sound of a honking horn, or a garbage truck emptying his dumpster, but by the sound of metal creaking. The metal creaking was followed by a bang noise, a grunt, and footsteps running away. When he peeked around from outside his box, he saw a young man wearing jeans and a T-shirt running down the alley. He was really running fast, and he kept looking around as if he was expecting someone to be chasing him. When he reached the end of the alley, he stopped for a moment, turned right out onto the street, and walked away.

  Eddie looked up at the fire escape and figured that was where the guy probably came from and what had made the metal noise. Following the escape ladder up, he noticed there was only one window at the top of it, and it was blacked out, but left open. The guy must have left via the window, but why was it black? Curiosity got the better of him so he decided to climb up and find out what was going on.

  Luckily the ladder was already down so getting up there wasn’t difficult. Upon climbing up the ladder and reaching the black window, he looked inside. Why would the man take off running down an alley after leaving an empty room? Nothing inside the room seemed worthy of running away from. Eddie saw nothing in there except a little girl’s dolly. It was certainly ugly, but not scary, and it didn’t make him want to run away. So why did the guy run off? Eddie decided he wanted to follow the guy; he had nothing better to do that day anyway.

  He descended the squeaky ladder and walked back down the alley to the last spot where he saw the man. He poked his head around the corner of the building to see if he was still there, trying to keep hidden in case the man was violent. The man in jeans was not close, but further down the street, walking alone. Quickly, the man jumped back toward the street, away from the building and spun around in a circle, as if he was spooked by something in the window of the store he was passing.

  Eddie watched the man in jeans for a bit from around the corner of the building. The man appeared to just stand there looking back and forth, confused, then started walking down the street again, and turned another corner. Eddie came from around the building and jogged down the street to the spot where the mystery man started acting oddly. He could see nothing in the window or anywhere in the area that would cause that kind of reaction. Why was this guy acting so strangely? Perhaps he was an escaped mental patient?

  Eddie decided it was best to just avoid this guy entirely, and find himself some breakfast. He walked backwards a little bit before turning around completely and heading down another street, away from the man and toward a shelter he knew of that gave out free food occasionally. His stomach was growling.

  Chapter 7

  Few things are as disconcerting as hearing disembodied laughter, unless of course you couple it with being alone in an entire city and having woken up next to a headless corpse. Upon hearing the laughter, Luke took off running down the street, not knowing where to go. The laughter was coming from every direction. Where would be safe? He covered his ears and continued running, hoping to escape the sound.

  Turning the next corner onto a different street, he was struck in the head from above. He slowed his running and glanced back to see what it was. Immediately he noticed it was a dead black bird. Then another, and another, and then hundreds of them falling from the sky. More hit him on the head, shoulders, and arms. Even though they had soft bodies, they still hurt, and some of the claws and beaks cut his skin. He quickly ducked under the nearest awning and into a doorway of a building to get out of the death storm.

  As he stood in the doorway watching the birds rain from above, he realized the laughter had stopped. Replacing the laughter now was the nauseating sound of thumping and glass breaking as the birds landed on every surface in the street. His current location was safe from falling objects, so he decided now would be a good time to rest while he decided what to do next.

  He sat down and pulled out his cell phone. He tried to make some calls but they would not go through. Cursing at the screen, he furiously pressed the send button repeatedly but continued to be greeted with the same message every time: “No Service.” He finally gave up pressing the button and was about to put the phone away when he noticed an icon had just lit up on the top of the screen.

  This was an icon he had seen many times before, three curved lines of increasing length, one over the other forming a cone shape. It meant there was a Wi-Fi signal available. This was great news for Luke. If there was an open Wi-Fi signal, he could make a call over the Internet. He went into network settings and found the signal was indeed available although its strength was weak. The name of the network, however, troubled him. The network was called “How did those birds feel?”

  Clearly, he was not alone and he was being watched. He stared at the screen, wondering if he should connect to the network anyway and try making a call. He pressed connect and waited for confirmation. He was now successfully connected to the open Wi-Fi signal. Simultaneously, the dead birds ceased to fall. The storm was over. He stood up and walked out into the street. The birds were gone, none to be found anywhere. There was no shattered glass or other visible damage. The cuts on his arms and head were even missing.

  “What the hell is going on,” Luke said out loud.

  His phone rang. The screen revealed “Answer me” as the name of the caller. No phone number was shown. He answered the call with a wary, “Hello?”

  “What are you doing here?” asked the caller.

  “Who is this?” asked Luke. “How did you get my number?”

  “Did he send you to try and stop me?”

  “What the hell is going on? Did who send me?”

  “Either you are dumb, or you play dumb very well,” said the calle
r.

  “I just want to know where I am and how I got here,” said Luke.

  “You are exactly where you need to be,” the caller said, then disconnected.

  “Hello! What is going on,” Luke screamed as he tried to redial the call. There was no number, so the call didn’t go through.

  “What do I do now?” asked Luke.

  Obviously he was being watched, so the person behind the mysterious call and Wi-Fi signal must have been close by. He looked back down at his phone again and found that the signal was still there, weak but still present.

  “If I can find the source of the signal, maybe I can find the guy on the phone, and perhaps a way out of here,” thought Luke.

  He scrolled down though the list of apps on his phone. He found and opened the one called “Wi-Fi Analyzer” and began a scan.

  Chapter 8

  Joseph pulled away from the curb so quickly that the tires on his old Cadillac actually squealed for a couple of seconds. Tina put up the window as fast as she could, while letting out a nervous scream. She looked back toward the area where they had just been parked, but saw nothing except a cloud of dust left by the car’s tires.

  “That’s it, I’m out of here. We’re going home,” said Joseph.

  “Okay by me,” replied Tina. “I’m so scared. What happened to everyone and what was that laughter?”

  “Honey, I have no damn idea and I’m not sticking around to find out.”

  Joseph circled around the block to head back out of the city, but the road that would normally lead out was missing. He looked around at the street signs to make sure he was in the right area. There was even a sign saying “To Bridge” with an arrow pointing in the correct direction, but the road was gone. In its place now was a building that looked like it had always been there.

  “What the hell? Where is the road? Where did that building come from, it wasn’t there before, I’m sure of it,” said Joseph. “This is the way we came in, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah Daddy, pretty sure,” said Tina. “I don’t know my way around as well as you, but I’m almost certain we came in this way. We only circled around the block. It’s kinda hard to get lost doing that.”

  “Yeah. Well I’m going to try going down and over a few streets to try to get around this block… find another way to the bridge,” said Joseph.

  He turned the car right and drove a few streets back toward the location where they had been parked when they heard the laughter. When they approached the spot, they noticed another car was now parked there. As they got closer, both noted that it looked oddly like their Caddy; in fact, it was identical to their Caddy. It was the same year, color, convertible; even the license plate was the same. How could this be possible?

  Joseph slowed his approach to get a better look at the car. As they rolled up next to the other Cadillac, they could tell that no one was inside. He came to a full stop next to the other vehicle and they both rose up in their seats to get a better look inside the other car’s windows. Inside, they saw their duplicates, another Tina and Joseph, but dead. The car seats were covered in blood and the back seat was torn to shreds. On the passenger-side window appeared to be a bloody handprint smeared down the inside of the glass.

  Tina screamed. “Daddy, get us out of here!”

  Joseph hit the gas pedal and drove away from his and Tina’s corpses as fast as the car could take them. He was doing nearly 70 miles per hour when he noticed a woman in a white dress and hat with a stroller walking across the street up ahead.

  “Look out,” Tina yelled.

  He slammed on the brakes, skidded a good distance, and turned the wheel sharply to the right. The car spun out of his control and side swiped another empty car, stalling out, breaking the windshield, and popping a tire on Tina’s side.

  The two of them sat in the wrecked car, crying and hugging each other. Over her father’s shoulder, Tina could see in the direction where the woman had been walking. She was gone. There was no sign of her anywhere at all.

  “Daddy, that lady with the stroller is gone,” Tina said.

  Joseph broke the hug and looked around. The woman was certainly nowhere to be seen. Down the street a little further, he noticed a giant flashing billboard, which read, “Just crashed your car? City empty? Can’t find the way home? 110 4th Ave. We can help.”

  Chapter 9

  The falling swarm of black birds seemed to go on for at least five minutes, and then almost as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. He looked down at the street again with the binoculars, but he could not see any of the birds anywhere on the street. He lived fairly close to his company’s building, so he decided to call over there to see if anyone else had seen the birds.

  As he crossed his bedroom to get his phone off the nightstand, there was a knock on the door. He looked down at his watch, which read almost exactly nine o’clock.

  “Who is it?” he asked.

  The visitor responded with more knocking, louder this time, in the fashion of “shave and a haircut.”

  “Who is it,” Jonathan repeated, almost shouting.

  No one responded. He wondered who it could be. He didn’t have any friends that would show up unannounced, especially at this time of day. He especially didn’t know anyone who would respond to a “Who is it” question with a tacky knock like that.

  He went out into the living area, walked up to the door, and gazed through the peephole. No one was there. It was just an empty corridor with a clear view of the elevator, which according to the readout, was on the first floor of the building.

  He turned his back and began walking to his room again when the knocking came a third time. Quickly, he ran back to the door and looked through the peephole. This time he saw a baby on the floor, crawling back to the elevator doors, which were now open, but the there was no car inside. Realizing the baby was going to quite possibly fall into an open elevator shaft, he unlocked his door and ran out into the hallway.

  By the time he got the door open and ran out, the baby was gone and the elevator doors were closed. According to the display, the elevator was still on the first floor. There was nowhere the baby could have gone. There were no other doors on this floor except his. Were his eyes playing tricks on him?

  He approached the elevator and pushed the button. Nothing happened. He pushed the button several more times, each time harder and faster than the last. Still, nothing happened. The button never lit and he heard no sounds of a moving elevator inside. It was obviously broken, which would require a call to maintenance for repair, along with that other call to his office about the birds. This morning was shaping up to be quite an odd day, and Jonathan didn’t care for oddness.

  He turned and started walking back to his door and just when he was about to walk through, it slammed shut in his face. He stood in disbelief for a few seconds, and then tried to open it. It was locked. He realized that in his rush to save the mystery baby, he left his wallet and keys on his entryway table, inside his home. On an occasion like this, he would go down to the lobby and report the lockout to the maintenance department in person, but the elevator was also broken. Rather than descend twenty flights of stairs, he decided that he needed to get back in his home by himself.

  He tried pounding on the door, rattling the handle, even hitting and kicking the door to bust it open. It seemed his door was very secure, which on any other day would have been very pleasing to him, except now when he was the one trying to break in to his own home.

  Giving up for a moment and sitting down with his back to the door, he heard a knock come from inside his home. He quickly stood up and backed away from the door a few feet. Then there came another knock.

  “Who iiissss iiitttt,” a voice from inside said playfully.

  Puzzled, Jonathan said “What do you mean, who is it? This is my damn house. Who are you?”

  “Who is it,” the voice from inside said again, followed by another single knock and the sound of giggling.

  “My name is Jonathan and this
is my home. Open up immediately.”

  The sound of rattling could be heard from the hallway, and then the door opened a crack. Without hesitation, Jonathan kicked the door, opening it forcibly enough that the doorknob made a hole in the wall behind it. He looked inside and could not hear or see anyone. When he walked through he expected to see someone lying on the ground, injured from the door hitting them. There was no one around.

  When he first moved to the city, he was the victim of a burglary, so he had purchased himself a nice home defense weapon for future protection. He reached into the nearby closet and retrieved his Remington 12ga, loaded with 00 buckshot.

  He went room by room, slowly, quietly, looking and listening for the intruder, but found no one. After several minutes of searching and finding nothing, he decided it was best to finally make those two calls and get the elevator fixed. He didn’t imagine that anyone would be in a hurry to assist someone on the twentieth floor without a working elevator.

  He sat down on the bed, finished putting his socks and shoes on, and dialed the office. No one answered, not even the voicemail. Something was going on, but he was unsure of what. Somebody should have answered the phone: the switchboard, or a secretary, if the voicemail was broken. Having his company functional was a top priority for him and not answering the phone was unacceptable. Someone had to be held accountable.

  He ended the call, and began placing the second call to building maintenance to fix the elevator, and now his front door as well. Just as he was about to press the send button, he heard a bell chime from the hallway outside his door. He got up, walked out to the front door, and noticed the elevator door was open. The light inside the elevator flickered occasionally and soft music could be heard from the speakers. Apparently the maintenance department was already aware of the malfunction and had fixed it. This pleased Jonathan, as he loved efficiency.