by Bryan Smith
Karen’s comment was offhand, flippant.
She couldn’t know one of her friends meant to do that very thing.
“Nobody’s killing themselves.” Alicia sounded weary and out of patience. “Let’s get up in this fucker and see if we can get some help for that little asshole.”
Meaning Chad.
They all got out of the car and stretched their legs. Dream stared up at one of the gabled windows. A flickering light emanated from the darkness there. A candle. She walked up to the porch, climbed the steps, and soon stood before a large door. Karen and Alicia, still wary, trailed after her, and stood to either side of her.
The door was ornate and carved from old oak. There was a small window at about eye level, and there was a heavy brass knocker below the window.
Dream grasped the knocker. She rapped it hard against the door four times and stepped back.
There was no initial acknowledgment of their presence from the other side of the door. Dream was ready to reach for the knocker again when they heard a muffled click of footsteps from somewhere inside. A woman in heels, from the sound of it. Then yellow light was blazing through the small window. A moment later, the door creaked open.
A tall, slim woman of about forty stood in the opening. Her expression was severe, made more so by the way her black hair was pulled tightly away from her face. She wore a simple black dress, a dress an urban woman might wear to an elegant club. Something in her posture and the set of her features hinted at cruelty.
A smile devoid of warmth twisted the woman’s thin lips. “Are you ladies lost?”
Dream gulped. “Um …” She cleared her throat and somehow found her voice. “Yes. We’re lost and we need help. A friend of ours is… dead. And another one is missing.”
Dream’s voice quavered with unexpected emotion, the veil of detachment slipping momentarily away. “Please, we need to call the police. Please help us.”
“Oh, my,” the woman gasped, an exaggerated, nearly theatrical sound. “How dreadful.” She made a tsk-tsk sound and shook her head. “Why don’t you ladies step inside?
You can call me Ms. Wickman, by the way. We’ll have a talk and figure out what to do about your missing friend.”
Dream stepped over the threshold and into the house. Alicia and Karen followed her inside, and the heavy oak door swung shut behind them.
Ms. Wickman turned the lock.
“There,” she said, obvious satisfaction in her voice. Her hazel eyes sparkled with ill-concealed excitement. “Now no one gets in or out.” She chuckled, a sound that unnerved them all. “We’re all safe from the big, bad killer.”
Dream was appalled by the inappropriate nature of a humorous remark at a time like that, but then Ms. Wickman swept past them and beckoned them to follow her. So they did, moving down a short hallway off the foyer, then stepping through a doorway into a large and impressively appointed living room.
“Here, dearies, have a seat on the comfy sofas.”
The women seated themselves, settling into squeaky leather.
Alicia said, “We appreciate the hospitality, but what we could really use is a phone.”
An expression that was nearly a smirk tugged at a corner of the woman’s mouth. “Yes, I suppose that’s so. There isn’t one in this room, unfortunately. Relax and get comfortable.” She smiled again. “You should know that this isn’t my home. I am merely an employee of the man of the house. He will be in to see you shortly.”
She was gone before they could question her further.
Alicia released a shuddery breath. “Oh my God, she is so fucking strange.”
Karen looked startled. “Don’t let her hear you say that.”
Alicia laughed. “Yeah, what’s she gonna do? You think she’s coming back with a chain saw? Get real. She’s just an antisocial wacko living up here in the woods with her recluse boss.”
Karen said, “Think about what you just said. That last sentence.”
Alicia frowned.
Dream cleared her throat. “You both need to calm down. You’re jumping at shadows.”
Karen’s head jerked toward Dream. “Yeah, and for some pretty good reasons, or have you already forgotten? What’s wrong with you, anyway? You’re acting weird.”
Dream sighed. “I am not. I’m just tired.”
It was only a partial lie.
She was acting weird, and she knew it.
Hell, she felt weird.
Strange.
Well, this was her last night on earth.
How else should she feel?
But the suicidal thoughts vanished as she became aware of a new presence entering the room. She felt a strange tingle as she turned to get a glimpse of the best-looking man she’d laid eyes on in a long time. He was maybe six feet tall, solidly built, and blessed with square-jawed movie-star looks. He caught her eye immediately and smiled in a way that made her knees shake.
Alicia whispered, “Oh, my!”
His compelling gaze never left Dream.
She went to him, extending a hand. “My name is Dream.”
He clasped her hand.
His touch sent a shiver of sensual delight through her.
He smiled. “Welcome to my home, Dream.”
Dream blushed.
She felt weak.
Helpless.
Lost in his glittering eyes.
Chad followed Cindy through a narrow tunnel that steadily curved and sloped ever downward. The going was slow. You didn’t want to work up too much of a head of steam, or you’d go tumbling ass over teakettle down the tunnel. Staying upright was a job and a fucking half, but Chad found it helpful to let the fingertips of his right hand glide over the tunnel wall. The technique worked well enough, for the most part, but he was unsurprised to find himself stumbling as they rounded yet another bend. He righted himself with a wild pinwheeling of the arms, drew in a steadying breath, and slipped his right foot back into the primitive sandal it had just vacated. “Hey, uh, Cindy?”
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “Yeah?” He resumed walking, even jogged for a moment to catch up to her, the sandals slapping against the hardpacked dirt. “Look, I can dig all this stuff about how you do what you have to do down here. Law of the jungle, survival of the fittest, and so forth. But since we’re sort of comrades-in-arms now, having been through a kind of trial by fire together, I thought I’d appeal to your better angels and ask you to give back what’s rightfully mine.”
“What are you saying?”
“I want my fucking Reeboks.”
“It’s good to want things, Chad.”
Chad groaned. “Jesus Christ, woman, you’re taking me down into the bowels of, well… hell… or something. I should get to make the journey in a modicum of comfort. Or is that too much to ask?”
“I think you already know the answer to that one.”
Chad sagged. “Congratulations, you are now officially the ball-busting champion of the world. I know you must be proud.”
Cindy’s expression softened, the smirk becoming an almost affectionate smile. She walked up to him, cupped his face in her palms, and kissed him full on the mouth. Chad’s eyes widened as she continued to kiss him for several seconds.
She broke off the kiss and said, “What were you saying?”
Chad frowned, and nervously cleared his throat. “Um … that was unexpected. Unexpected and startling …” He almost smiled. “… but nice.”
Chad watched a single tear spill from one of her eyes and trace a path over the contours of one of her lovely cheeks. A familiar ache sparked to life in his heart, the leading edge of a mass of pain he tried to keep tucked away in one of the darkest corners of his soul. That corner housed the love he felt for Dream that could never become the romantic love she so desired. Oh, he loved Dream so much. His one regret in the world, the one he would change if he could, was his inability to be what she wanted him to be.
A man worthy of her bottomless wellspring of love.
Cindy
wasn’t Dream. They were different in countless ways. But here was that same source of angst again. He stared at her and felt a terrible empathy. The thin film of dirt that covered her body was heartbreaking. He looked at her unwashed hair and thought how coarse it must feel to the touch. He ached for the woman she’d been prior to coming here, a woman he’d just gotten a bittersweet glimpse of, a mom and a lover and a nurse. A good person. His own eyes glistened with moisture.
No one deserved this fate.
He took her into his arms and she stepped willingly into the embrace, wrapping her arms about his back as she cried softly against his ear. The embrace was brief, but he sensed it was a welcome gesture. When they parted, Chad sensed something fundamental had changed between them. He thought maybe he’d touched something long dormant within her.
“Thank you,” she said softly. “Sometimes it all hits home.” She managed a small smile. “Sometimes I get desperate to wake up from this nightmare and I just lose it.”
“You don’t ever need to be embarrassed to be human in front of me, Cindy”
Please let me have a chance to say that to Dream before I die, he thought. That and so many other things.
She kissed him again. A light peck on the cheek. “Thank you. Now …” She heaved a big sigh. “This has been … nice … but we should get going again.”
Chad nodded. “Right.”
Cindy clasped hands with him, and they began to make their way through the tunnel again, this time at a slower, more deliberate pace. Chad was so preoccupied by the abrupt change in the tenor of his relationship with Cindy that he failed to immediately notice the widening of the tunnel. He was so immersed in contemplation of the development that the hum of nearby machinery didn’t register until Cindy said, “Slow down.”
Chad looked at her. “What?”
So she said it again. “Slow down. Listen.”
Chad did. He frowned. “What’s that?”
Cindy looked troubled. “Checkpoint. We have to pass through it to return Below.” A shudder rippled through her. “We’ll be encountering some nasty people in a bit, and, well, no offense, please keep your big mouth shut. I’ve been through this before and I can get us through this now, but you need to leave the talking to me.”
Chad shrugged. “Fine.”
The tunnel continued to widen as they trudged forward. The steep downward slope began to level out, only a little at first, then dramatically, and soon they were walking on flat ground. The tunnel’s ceiling became higher, as well, and they began to perceive a glow of artificially produced light. The hum of machinery grew louder. Chad was pretty sure they were hearing a generator. This suspicion was confirmed as they came around what turned out to be the end of this branch of the tunnel. They stepped out of the tunnel and into a much larger area.
“This is the checkpoint,” Cindy breathed.
Chad glimpsed a dark opening beyond the checkpoint and realized his earlier perception hadn’t been quite true. The tunnel didn’t really end. Not exactly. Its dimensions changed here and there, particularly in places where more room had been carved out of the earth for places such as this. There was a shack to his left that looked a bit like a construction site office. A row of military-style transport trucks were lined against the opposite wall. A holding pen occupied the space between the shack and the trucks. Chad counted thirteen people in the pen. Slaves, he assumed. The area was lit by klieg lights, a brightness that approximated midsummer daylight.
Rifle-toting guards patrolled the perimeter of the pen. They wore body armor and black helmets with inscrutable black visors. They were lean and muscular and lithe, and they moved like hungry panthers stalking prey.
Satan’s shock troops.
Chad whispered, “Holy shit. Pardon me while I pass out.” He looked at Cindy. “Please tell me you’re sure they don’t know about…”
His eyes flicked back toward the tunnel. “You know …”
Crimson-tinted images of the holding facility massacre shook him.
Cindy arched an eyebrow. “Of course they know. Don’t be naive.”
A jolt of terror slashed through Chad’s heart and caused his eyes to open so wide he thought they might fall out of their sockets. “What!?” He was still whispering-a guard was approaching them-but he was agitated now. “What the living hell, Cindy? You said you could get us through this.”
“I can. I think.” There was an edge to her tone now, an implied warning. “You just have to shut up and trust me. Now hold tight.”
The guard reached them. He held his rifle in front of him, and Chad noticed his forefinger was curled around the trigger.
The guard’s voice was brusque. “Identification.”
Cindy reached into the pouch at her waist, pulled out a card, and handed it over to the guard, who gave it a long inspection. “I am formerly the property of Overlord Gonzo.”
Chad thought, Overlord Gonzo?
He heard a feigned pride in her voice when she said, “I am an emancipated slave.”
The guard studied the card a moment later, glanced at Chad, and handed it back to her. “And who is this?”
“This is my new slave.”
The guard studied Chad. The scrutiny made his skin crawl. It was like being sized up by The Terminator. The inscrutable visor increased his anxiety level by several degrees. An urge to turn and flee back through the tunnel gripped him, but he remained where he was, counseling himself against acts of impulsive-as well as suicidal-stupidity.
At last, the guards gaze went back to Cindy. “You’ll have to meet with the Stationmaster.” He nodded at Chad. “Your slave will have to stay in the holding pen.”
The holding pen!
Chad looked at the hungry eyes of the slaves in the pen. “Are you kidding? I won’t last ten minutes in there.”
Cindy backhanded him, a blow that rocked his head and sent him staggering backward. She stalked after him, glaring at him with real malevolence, and drove a fist into his solar plexus. He dropped to his knees and gasped for breath. Cindy grabbed a handful of hair, yanked his head back, leaned in close, and hissed, “Mouth off again and I’ll have this man shoot you.”
Panic filled Chad’s soul, wrapped a cold fist around his heart. He had fucked up. He knew that. Cindy’s anger was genuine, albeit for reasons other than what the guard would assume. He’d broken his vow of silence. He had to consciously remind himself she was role-playing-and that she alone best understood what it would take to get them through this place.
“I’m … sorry!” There was a quaver in his voice, and he realized he was close to blubbering. But that was okay. A little role-playing of his own couldn’t hurt. “It won’t happen again, I swear. Please don’t hurt me anymore.”
Cindy relinquished him.
The guard said, “I like the way you discipline.”
There was something new in the timbre of the guard’s voice, a deeper, raspier tone, and he was speaking at a level just above a whisper. Chad had a disturbing notion, an idea that he was beginning to know how Cindy meant to get them through this checkpoint.
He ached for her again.
“And what about my body?” Her tone was matter-of-fact, the voice of a person negotiating a business transaction. “Do you like that?”
The guard chuckled. “Very much.”
Cindy nodded. “You’re Stephens, right?”
The guard licked his dry lips and smiled. “Yes. I’ve been waiting for you. I’m the new Stationmaster.”
Cindy pursed her lips. “And the old Stationmaster?”
The guard’s smile widened. “Hawthorne.” He shrugged. “A real by-the-book, rules-and-regulations guy!” A tone of mock solemnity entered his voice. “Tragically, he just met an untimely end.”
Cindy nodded.
As if the information wasn’t news.
Stephens said, “I’ll just need to discuss some loose ends with you. In private.”
Chad’s stomach roiled.
She wouldn’t really let th
is happen, he was sure of it.
Stephens slung the rifle back over his shoulder, cupped his hands around his mouth, and called out, “Coleman!”
Another patrolling guard stepped away from the holding pen and strolled over to where they were standing. “Yeah?”
Stephens nodded at Chad. “Keep an eye on this guy while the lady and I conduct some business.”
Coleman grinned. “Sure.”
The guard and Cindy entered the tunnel, and Chad watched them disappear around the bend through eyes blurry with tears. Several long moments elapsed during which nothing seemed to be happening.
And then he heard them.
Dimly at first. Then louder. High-pitched cries of sexual enthusiasm. Cindy. And a lower-pitched series of testosterone-charged grunts.
Stephens.
This went on for a time.
Chad felt a welling of tears. He doubted he could quantify how infinitely sad what was transpiring made him. It was wrong. An unforgivable offense against the universe. Which was a melodramatic thing to think, he realized, but he believed it nonetheless. He was seized by a desire to bring this place down. He wouldn’t be satisfied with just his own escape. Not anymore. He would settle for nothing less than complete destruction. An inferno. The oppressed rising up to mete out a justice every bit as ruthless as the vile transgressions against humanity this underworld’s powers-that-be seemed to engage in as a matter of routine.
But that was ridiculous.
He was a systems analyst, not a revolutionary.
How could he hope to change anything down here?
When Cindy and the guard emerged from the tunnel, she seemed reluctant to look at Chad. He met her gaze once, tried to transmit a message of concern and empathy, but her eyes flicked instantly away.
The guard who took Cindy into the tunnel sent Coleman away. “You’ll be boarding the next transport run when it leaves, which should be within an hour. You and your slave will be taken Below. You will be carrying documentation verifying your status as an emancipated slave.”
Then he was gone, leaving Cindy and Chad standing there unguarded.
She said, “See? I know what I’m doing.”
Chad nodded. “Sure.”
But there was a distance in his tone, a faraway look in his eyes.
