PLAZA

by Shane M Brown

  'We're in the Gallery,' realized Randerson.

  'No shit. What did you think I was trying to do - jump over the fucking thing?'

  'What are you doing crawling around on the floor?' asked Randerson, clicking the bike’s light down to a less dazzling setting.

  'Looking for you,' spat Fontana, still turning his head from the bright light. 'Why didn't you answer me?'

  'I just woke up,' explained Randerson. 'Just this second. Why didn't you use your flashlight?'

  There was a strange unease in Fontana's voice when he replied. 'It's broken. And this chamber isn't how I remember it. The entire layout is different. I didn't need a flashlight to know that.'

  'Why didn't you use a flare?'

  Randerson knew Fontana carried at least three flares in his hip webbing. Spader had a list of things they must always carry, including backup light sources. Fontana always took extra flares. Each member's flares were color coded to the person carrying them. This seemed like overkill to Randerson, but Spader insisted. Fontana's flares were bright red. Randerson's were lime green. Merc was blue and Dale was yellow. Gordon was orange and Spader was gold.

  Fontana fingered his flares. 'Not sure how much air we have in here. Didn't want to chew through the oxygen if it was a cave-in.'

  Bullshit, thought Randerson. Flares don't consume oxygen. The damn things would burn underwater. Wait, did he just say 'cave in'?

  Randerson tried to orientate himself. It was too dark where they were. The chambers immediately connected to the Gallery entrance should be lit with natural sunlight and the researchers’ navigation lights.

  'What happened? How long have I been out?’

  'Couple of minutes,' replied Fontana, scanning the chamber. 'We both spilled over the handlebars. I rolled further than you. I crawled back towards the sound of the engine cooling down.'

  Randerson heard the tick-tick-tick of the engine recovering after Fontana's savage treatment.

  'This isn't the entrance chamber,' declared Randerson. 'We must have ridden in further than you realized.'

  'Oh, really?' Fontana crossed the chamber through the bike's light beam and picked up some cables. He shook the bunch of severed electrical cables at Randerson.

  'This is why it's so dark,' he declared. 'The cables are sliced clean through! All the power's gone.'

  Randerson crossed to where the severed cables ended. He knew one quick way to tell for sure.

  Quickly donning his goggles, Randerson checked Spader's cave code.

  'You're right,' Randerson admitted reluctantly. 'This is the first chamber. This stone barrier must be blocking the entrance. Let's see if it moves.'

  Both men braced themselves and pushed the barrier without success.

  'We're locked in,' said Randerson.

  'What about the air?' asked Fontana.

  Randerson jerked up the nylon tether from around his neck. A yellow device slid up from under his shirt. The device was about the size of a cigarette lighter. This was Randerson's lucky charm. It had saved his life twice. He only took it off to shower.

  The Yellow Canary was the modern equivalent of its namesake. The handy little device analyzed air samples. Within seconds, it could provide a crude analysis of the surrounding air’s major components. Oxygen content was pretty stable when nothing else was filling the place where the oxygen was meant to be. The Yellow Canary couldn't detect anything as specific as sarin gas, but more people died from a lack of oxygen than from toxins like sarin.

  If the surrounding air was determined safe, the device gave three small electronic beeps like a canary. Two tweets meant the sampled air was questionable. One tweet meant it was time to take drastic measures.

  Neither he nor Fontana carried breathing apparatus in their packs, so drastic measures basically meant they would suffocate.

  Fontana stared at the device as it performed its silent analysis. Randerson held his breath to avoid skewing its sample with his exhaled carbon dioxide.

  'Well?' prompted Fontana.

  'Wait.'

  Fontana waited all of three seconds. 'Well?'

  'Just frigging wait.'

  'Give me that thing.' Fontana snatched for the Canary, but Randerson turned on his heel, keeping his body between Fontana and the device.

  The Canary beeped three times. All clear.

  'Looks clean,' reported Randerson.

  'I could have told you that. I can't smell anything.'

  Randerson shook his head. 'Doesn't work that way. You never smell it. That's why the miners and underground explorers had the live canaries. Many of the nastiest gases are odorless. They're working through your system before you even realize it. I think it should be OK to light a flare.'

  'Be my guest,' offered Fontana. 'I'm not wasting one of - wait, did you hear that?'

  Randerson hadn't heard anything. Just the echo of their own voices. Something else was concerning him right now. He walked back and righted the motorcycle. The front wheel was buckled, but he managed to push the bike into the west corridor and use its headlamp to light the way ahead. There was nothing new to see down there. It looked the same as when they passed through earlier. They still seemed to have access to the Gallery in that direction.

  Randerson propped the bike on its kick stand.

  'Shhhhh,' hissed Fontana. 'I can hear something moving. There it is again. Like someone dragging something.'

  Fontana peered through a triangle-barrier to the south. He hollered through the hole, 'Spader! Gordon! Is that you?'

  No one answered.

  Randerson winced at Fontana's echo. Yelling didn’t feel safe. 'Fontana, don't yell like that. We might not be alone in here.'

  'I can't see anything in there,' Fontana complained, squinting through the aperture into the next chamber south. 'Give me your flashlight.'

  'No. Use a flare. That's what they're for.'

  'Give me your flashlight, Randy!'

  As Fontana beckoned for the flashlight, something struck him in the chest. He hollered in surprised shock. His torso slammed up against the barrier. His boots lifted off the floor. His arms and legs spread out like a giant starfish.

  Something was pulling him through!

  Randerson dashed forward and hauled on Fontana's belt. It felt like Fontana was fastened in place with rock bolts. By degrees, something began pulling Fontana through the hole.

  It's going to bend him in half backwards!

  Bracing a boot on the wall, Randerson yelled, ‘Fontana, help me you big bastard. Fight it!’

  'I'm......trying….' hissed Fontana. His entire body shook with effort. Tendons strained from his neck. Fontana even used his forehead to push away from the wall. Almost imperceptivity his torso began inching away from the barrier. Randerson pulled so hard he thought his shoulders might dislocate any second. Fontana's hips straightened and began pulling away from the aperture.

  Randerson jumped and braced his other boot on the wall. Now his full bodyweight hung on Fontana's hips. He hauled with all the strength in his legs and back. Something tore near Fontana's chest. Fontana shot back into Randerson's arms, knocking all the wind from him as both men tumbled wildly backwards into the chamber and away from the barrier.

  'What happened?' gasped Randerson, untangling himself from the bigger man. 'Did it let go?’

  'My body armor,' Fontana panted between words. 'It ripped off...my fucking...body armor.'

  'What the hell was that!' barked Randerson, glancing up at the empty aperture.

  'A tongue!' Fontana scrambled backwards away from the hole. He found his carbine. 'A giant lizard! On the other side of that wall! A huge giant lizard!'

  'Are you sure? What kind of lizard?’

  Fontana gaped at Randerson. 'What kind of lizard? The kind with a huge tongue that shoots out and grabs you, that's what kind!'

  Randerson only knew one lizard like that.

  'It's a chameleon,' he breathed. 'That's why we couldn't see them outside. They can camouflage. That's what we saw comin
g into the Gallery. It wasn't a heat haze. It was these damn things. There must have been dozens of them. They must be massive!'

  ‘That’s what I’m telling you.’ Fontana's gunpoint never left the aperture. 'Is it gone, do you think?'

  Both men held their breath to listen. What they heard, instead of the dragging sounds Fontana noticed earlier, was the muffled crack of gunshots. Weapon fire coming from outside the Gallery. And then what could only be screaming.

  'I don't like the sound of that,' remarked Randerson. 'That sounds hardcore.'

  'I'd still rather be out there,' countered Fontana. 'I think we need to - WHOA!'

  Without warning, the walls started moving. Randerson was looking towards the bike when it happened. With barely a whisper of stone grazing stone, all the barriers in the chamber suddenly shifted orientation.

  Un-fucking-believable was all Randerson could think. The barrier north, previously a bare stone slab, cartwheeled into the wall. A new triangle-barrier settled into its place.

  Across the chamber, the motorbike was caught. Randerson had parked it under an archway. Rotating stone crunched the bike sideways. The fuel tank ruptured. The seat compacted like an accordion. Pink-tinged petrol exploded from the ruptured tank, splattering the stone work.

  Randerson expected the stone to slice the bike clean in half, but the engine block arrested the shearing edge, wedging against the bottom of the archway. The barrier shuddered to a stop against the pulverized bike.

  Randerson smelled the spilled petrol.

  A minute earlier, he'd stood where the bike now lay crushed. He could just as easily have been the one pulverized instead of the bike.

  Fontana yanked at Randerson's arm. 'Look. It's open!'

  Randerson saw what Fontana meant. The barrier separating them from Fontana's giant lizard stood completely open. Randerson didn't bother shining his flashlight into the newly opened chamber. He didn't need to. He could hear the animal. As he warily sidestepped towards Fontana, the reptile’s giant head emerged through the archway into their chamber.

  It was a chameleon alright, but its head was more than two feet wide. Its blunt snout emerged from the darkness three feet above floor level. Eyes on pyramid stalks locked on Randerson.

  Randerson didn't pause long enough to catch any more details. Fontana seemed to have the right idea.

  Fontana was squirming through the triangle of open space above the wedged motorbike. There was nowhere else to go. If not for the wedged bike, they'd be trapped with the monstrous animal.

  Within the space of two heartbeats, Randerson was scrambling over the shattered bike. Fontana's boots disappeared through the gap. The speed with which Fontana had scrambled through the narrow gap was astounding. Randerson thrust his head and arms through the hole, smelling hot petrol fumes and feeling the sharp angles of the crushed bike catching on his clothes. But he wasn’t going to be fast enough. The chamber behind him was pitch black now, but he heard the hideous animal surging across the stones towards his still-vulnerable legs.

  Suddenly the bike jolted beneath him. He looked back and saw the terrifying outline of the giant lizard devouring his legs. It had him! He imagined the massive shearing jaws clamping down over his legs like a great white shark. Confused, expecting excruciating pain as his flesh tore away, Randerson looked back down his body when his legs still felt intact. The animal's mouth was wedged open.

  The back wheel! The motorbike’s back wheel had saved his legs. The animal must have turned its head sideways to attack, and the bike's back wheel had wedged open its mouth.

  Randerson didn’t wait for the creature to try again. He began squirming through the gap, but then suddenly his leg was stuck.

  For fuck’s sake! What now?

  His pants were snagged! He couldn't squirm any further through the hole!

  'Help, it's got me!' roared Randerson at the silhouette of Fontana crouching over the front wheel. Fontana grabbed Randerson under the armpits and hauled.

  Randerson felt his whole body lifting.

  In the Fontana verses lizard tug-of-war, Randerson and the motorbike were lifted clear off the floor. The stone barrier reacted by grinding shut another inch towards Randerson’s ribcage.

  This thing will cut me in half!

  'Pull harder!' Randerson shouted frantically. 'The wall's closing!'

  Fontana's knee hit the bike's instrument panel. The bike's orange indicator lights started flashing on and off.

  By that flashing light, Randerson saw the horror show trying to eat his legs. The wheel's steel rim started buckling, ready to fail any second. He'd already heard the tire burst.

  I see it!

  He spotted his cargo pants snagged on the bike’s rear foot peg.

  'Let me go!' he yelled at Fontana. 'I'm caught, let me go!'

  Fontana stopped pulling, but didn't loosen his grip. Randerson tensed his stomach and shuffled six inches down the bike, just enough to unhook his pants. For that spilt second, he needed to push his leg further into the animal's mouth.

  As his leg came free, the back wheel collapsed.

  Fontana hauled again. This time Randerson slid through the gap like a greased piglet.

  The bike jerked the other way, unwedging the engine block. The barrier swung shut. The bike's front wheel and instrument panel, completely severed, skittered into the corridor where Fontana and Randerson lay on their backs gasping for breath. The bike's headlight, separated from its power source, instantly extinguished, plunging the corridor into total darkness.

  Both men lay in the dark, panting at the ceiling.

  Without rising, Fontana uncapped one of his precious flares. He wacked the ignition plug on the stone beside him. Red light illuminated the corridor. Fontana lifted the flare and turned his head to check Randerson's legs.

  'I thought your tap-dancing day were behind you.'

  Randerson stared up at the red ceiling and laughed with relief. 'That is one...angry...lizard.'

  'Where's your flashlight?’

  'I think that big bastard ate it.'

  'This place is starting to make sense now,' said Fontana.

  Randerson started to rise, then stopped, seeing what Fontana really meant. Both men stared at the stone carvings. The nearest carving depicted a man missing his left leg. On either side were equally ghastly illustrations, both of people sporting less than the optimal number of body parts.

  'We're in deep shit,' declared Fontana finally.

  Chapter 13

  'Everyone stay together,' barked Rourke at his six security guards. 'You two, don't fall behind again!'

  The two guards hurried to catch up.

  'We all move together at the same time,' insisted Rourke when the party reformed. 'I'm not backtracking for stragglers again. If you get cut off, then you're on your own.'

  Rourke meant it.

  Since the Gallery came alive, Rourke had backtracked three times for lost men. His coding system proved useless once the barriers changed orientation. In fact, he suspected he was further from the core chamber than ever. One thing was certain. He couldn't let his team become fragmented. Six men were optimal for his plan to succeed. Four men, in a pinch. He doubted three men could physically get the job done on time, especially with the shifting barriers.

  The Gallery's new dimension didn't surprise Rourke. He'd established that the barriers could move months ago. Although they complicated his operation, part of him felt exhilarated to witness the Gallery operating as designed. The place had enchanted him from day one. And from day one, Rourke knew the barriers were the key to the Gallery. Once he'd established how to move his first barrier, the Gallery's secrets stood revealed.

  Rourke shone the flashlight around the chamber, calculating which direction to choose next. Something glinted in his sweeping flashlight. He jerked the flashlight back, illuminating the small object on the floor. Had it not been lying at an angle to reflect his light, he would have missed the item completely.

  He squatted to retrieve the l
ittle foil disk. A chocolate coin wrapper. From the chocolate coins Claire used for the practical joke this morning. Only Ethan March could have dropped it here. Rourke had wondered about Ethan after the bunker steps incident. It seemed the King of the dirt-jockeys was taking matters into his own hands.

  Is he working with the intruders?

  Rourke felt the situation slip a little further from his control. He should have killed Ethan when he had the chance. Well, he wouldn't make the same mistake twice. The next time he saw Ethan it would be to put a bullet in his brain. Rourke rose from the floor, contemptuously flicking the gold foil across the chamber. Before the foil landed, the entire chamber began transforming.

  It's happening again.

  Rourke stood in the center of the chamber. He could see down every intersection. He caught glimpses of barriers reorienting in every direction. The entire Gallery, every corridor, every chamber, seemed to come alive. Rourke felt again as though he were standing among the living gears of some giant engine.

  When the engine stopped, when the Gallery became quiet, Rourke saw a new light source. Intensely red light blazed from two chambers removed to the south. The light penetrated down the interconnecting corridors, illuminating Rourke. It was a flare. Rourke squinted into the flare light, trying to distinguish friend or foe.

  The flare bearer was big...turning around...raising a weapon!

  Fucking hell! Rourke dived from his exposed position. Bullets ricocheted wildly into his chamber.

  Two of Rourke's team, one either side of the south archway, hung their rifles around the archway and returned fire. Rourke caught a glimpse of the flare-bearer dodging away, but not before sending another burst of automatic fire between the chambers. The guards firing through the archway started to pursue, but Rourke yelled, 'Hold your position. We stay together no matter what.'

  The men pulled back, but kept their weapons trained down the corridor.

  'There's at least two of them,' shouted Rourke, taking in the new orientation of tunnels and options around them. 'I think they are heading the same way we are.'

  Rourke heard something clatter onto the stone floor behind him. He spun and saw an MP5 submachine gun come skittering across the stone towards him.