“Probably just more storage back there,” Christine offered. “Might find some usable stuff inside.”
“Might,” Michael agreed. “But there’s no hurry. We still have plenty on our plate for the moment.”
There was the sound of footsteps rapidly descending the office stairwell.
“Hey, Mom!” Andrew Franko bounded down the stairs and into the office a second later. He glanced over to where Michael was still standing, positioned partway between the slid-out bookshelf and the wall.
“What’s up, big guy?” his mother smiled at him tiredly.
“Oh, nothin’ much,” he said back.
Her little boy was growing up into such a young man. It seemed like he’d grown an inch just since their arrival to the tower. And he reminded her more of his father with each passing day. That was a good thing – physically. She couldn’t deny that his father was a handsome man. As long as Andrew retained her personality and not his father’s.
“How you guys coming on your work?”
Andrew took a deep breath and exhaled heavily. “Can we take a break? We’re beat,” he referenced the task of mopping the third and forth floors at which he, his brother, and young Justin Justak had been working. “We’ve done the fourth floor and it’s almost dry. We’re about halfway done with the third floor,” he looked at her hopefully.
In turn, Christine looked at Michael. Michael, in turn, looked at the youngster. Michael felt bad that the boys had to go through this. No kid should have to deal with such death and destruction. But there was little choice in the matter. Everyone had to chip in and do his or her part.
“Sure,” he shrugged. “One hour. You’ve earned it. Once we get this place back into shape, I’ll get you a whole day off from chores. How does that sound?”
“Freakin’ awesome!”
“Language,” his mother gave him a tight-lipped glare.
“What?” Andrew put his hands out, palms up in front of him. “Awe, come on. I said, ‘freakin’.’ I didn’t say…”
“That’s enough,” his mother cut him off before he could dig himself into a deeper hole. “Okay. Go have fun.”
Andrew charged excitedly back up the stairs.
“Try to stay out of any blood or guts that are still around!” she called after him as his footsteps faded.
“He’s thinking along the right lines,” Michael turned to Christine. “We should probably all take a break. We’ve earned it.”
“Damn straight,” she breathed exhaustedly running a hand through frazzled hair. “How many hours of sleep did you get last night?”
“Two…maybe three. Not really sure. You?”
“I gotcha beat. I think I made it all the way to four, maybe five if you count dozing.”
“Wow. You’re livin’ the dream,” Michael smiled. “Buy you a beer?”
“Ugh,” she sighed at the thought. “Don’t be cruel. It’s been waaaay too long,” she sighed.
“I hear that,” Michael came to put an arm around her shoulder and lead her out of the office to where most of the other Blenders were still working. “Let’s take five!” he called to them, much to their relief.
CHAPTER 16
Victor didn’t know exactly what had happened or why his plan hadn’t worked. What he did know was that things had gone wrong – terribly, terribly wrong.
For the first time, a plan of Victor’s hadn’t worked. Almost his entire herd had been killed. And those who hadn’t been killed had fled into the night, abandoning him, the one they thought was their leader, their teacher, their savior.
The female, the one who had been with him from the start, was the only one who remained by his side. And now, here they were, exhausted and starving, having to sleep in the cold darkness. Worse yet, Victor was injured. One of their prey, one of the small young ones, had used an exploding device on Victor and its hot steel had torn into his arm.
Cheryl was huddled beside him, scared, tired, and shivering from the cold. She could tell that Victor’s failure had affected him. He seemed anxious, agitated, and for the first time since she had known him, uncertain of what to do next. They’d spent most of the time since their failed attack resting and nursing Victor’s wounded arm. When he wasn’t resting, he was up, anxious, pacing, and easily agitated.
It was time for Cheryl to be strong for the two of them, just as Victor had been for so long before his defeat. Yes, they were defeated, but they weren’t dead, and that was what counted. But they wouldn’t be alive for long if they didn’t find food. Victor’s idea of starving the herd had worked to motivate his followers to attack even more viciously than normal. But that same decision was now coming back to haunt them.
It had been four days since they had eaten last. And the longer they went without feeding, the weaker they both became. Her front teeth clacked together inadvertently at the thought of fresh human flesh. With her male’s arm injured, though, it was going to be up to her to try to find food. But finding food meant finding prey. And lately, their prey seemed much more ready to defend against their kind. Far more of them were armed with the deadly exploding devices that had injured her male and that so terrified Cheryl.
Suddenly she heard something and sensed movement. A glimmer of light illuminated their darkened burrow. Cheryl was frightened at the movement. Yet at the same time, rather than heading out to hunt food, she found herself hopeful that food might finally have found them.
CHAPTER 17
“You’re it!” Andrew nominated his younger brother Jack as first ‘seeker’ in their game of hide-and-seek.
“Aww…okay,” his brother grumbled dejectedly but gave in.
All of the boys admitted that the tower had to be the best location ever in the history of hide-and-seek games. It was about the only reason they counted themselves lucky to be trapped in such an uninviting place. They only wished they had a few more kids with whom to make the game a bit more interesting. Having only three players inside the monstrous structure could make for some lengthy games. And today’s session, by Michael’s instruction, would only last an hour. Sometimes it took an hour for the first seeker just to find someone. This was why they had taken to limiting search times to 15 minutes. It made the games short enough to stay interesting, and it kept anyone from getting to discouraged and giving up.
“Post office teller window is base,” Jack referenced the old Lyons post office display on the fourth floor.
“Count to a hundred?” Justin Justak asked hopefully.
“A hundred?” Jack scoffed. “How could you possibly need to a hundred in this place? Fifty. That’s the best you’ll get out of me. If you can’t get to a good hiding spot in a fifty count, that’s your problem, not mine.”
“More than I’ll need,” his brother Andrew said confidently. “I’ve already got an awesome spot picked out.”
“Then you’d better move,” Jack said. “One…two…three…” he started counting.
Andrew bolted for the office stairwell. Justin took off after him.
“…four…five…I hear you heading for the office stairs!” Jack called after them. “Six…seven…”
As they reached the stairwell, Andrew whirled to face Justin who almost ran into him.
“What are you doing?” he hissed.
“I’m following you. You said you had a good spot,” Justin retorted matter-of-factly.
“Yeah…for me,” Andrew made wide eyes at the youngster. “You have to find your own spot.”
“Aww, come on. I wanna see your new spot.”
“But then you’ll know where it is when you’re it,” Andrew argued.
“…seventeen…eighteen…nineteen…” Jack kept counting.
Andrew listened to the count increase. He was running out of time. He figured that Justin would follow him anyway, whether or not he gave his permission.
“Fine,” he sighed. “But we have to hurry.”
“Okay,” Justin said excitedly in anticipation of seeing the new spot.
&nbs
p; The two started downstairs, Andrew leading them all the way down to the ground floor. There, they exited into the office.
“We’ve hidden in the office before,” Justin frowned. “He’ll be sure to look for us here.”
“Yeah, but not in this spot,” Andrew motioned Justin forward from where he stood at the base of the stairs.
Justin followed Andrew back behind a bookshelf that had been slid askew.
“Wow,” he breathed softly in awe of Andrew’s find. “I thought this bookshelf didn’t move. And there’s a hidden door behind it?” he whispered, amazed.
“Yep,” Andrew whispered back, nodding proudly. “And no one has explored what’s behind it yet. I was here right after Michael and my mom found it.”
“Cool,” Justin breathed.
“Ready or not, here I come!” they heard the faint echo of Jack’s voice trickle down the stairs.
“Come on,” Andrew clicked on a flashlight he carried. “Let’s check it out.
In all honesty, Andrew was kind of glad Justin was with him. He was at an age where he’d seen enough horror movies to be wary of exploring hidden spaces beneath stairwells in cold dark towers by himself.
He led the way, squeezing in behind the bookshelf and opening the hidden door. The door opened just far enough before bumping against the back of the bookshelf to allow the boys access inside. Andrew waited as Justin squeezed past him and then closed the door. Its latch clicked shut behind them.
* * *
“Did you hear something?” Charla asked from where she sat with Chris outside the office. They were on watch duty.
“I thought I did,” he nodded from where he sat in one of the swivel office chairs before the barricade. “Sounded like voices from inside the office.”
“I thought everyone was upstairs on break. Maybe one of the couples broke off for a little bit more than a break,” he eyed her slyly.
“Maybe,” she gave him a devilish grin back. “But which one? Julia and Josh or…”
“…or Michael and Caroline?” Chris gave her a grossed out face at the thought of the sexagenarians getting it on.
Chris rose from his chair, walked over to the office door and peeked inside. Then he gave a shrug, walked back, and sat down with a groan beside Charla who was sitting in her own office chair.
“Didn’t see anybody,” he reported. “Man am I sore. Hauling those damn biter bodies all day really takes a toll on you. You don’t really feel it until you sit for a while. Then your body starts cooling down and all those muscles that have been stretched out start pulling themselves back together into tight little knots.”
Charla rose and came to stand behind Chris’ chair. She placed her hands on his shoulders and then slowly began a soft massage.
* * *
Inside the office closet, Andrew shined his light around them. He was surprised to find that the closet was not a closet at all. It was a continuation of the stairwell above them that continued down to a lower level.
“Wowwww” Justin breathed again. “Coooool! What do you think is down there?”
“Who knows? Let’s check it out,” Andrew whispered, stepping tenuously onto the first step.
The two boys cautiously crept down the darkened stairwell. It was very cold, and there was a sort of funky smell to the air inside the space. At the base of the stairs, both boys stopped. Andrew shined his light around the space illuminating a hallway that stretched toward the north side of the tower.
“This must be the tower’s basement,” young Justin breathed softly.
“No kidding, Einstein,” Andrew shot him a glance. “I’ll bet we’re the first ones to be down here in years.”
“Maybe even longer than that,” Justin said. “We’re like explorers of a new land.”
“We’re like archeologists in a mummy’s tomb or some sort of ancient ruin,” Andrew grinned in the darkness. He continued to shine his light around. “Look! I think there are some doors up ahead. Let’s check it out.”
“Okay,” Justin said far more timidly than his older friend.
The two boys walked for about ten feet and then stopped at a junction with a short hallway that broke to their right while the hallway they were in continued ahead of them. Directly to their left was a door.
Andrew turned to face the door. “Should we see what’s inside?” he asked. His voice was full of anxious anticipation.
“Sure,” Justin breathed quietly behind him sounding less than certain.
“Here goes,” Andrew reached out and turned the doorknob.
The door was unlocked and Andrew pushed it open with a hand. It creaked on rusty hinges.
The two boys held their breath as Andrew shined his light inside the darkened room. The space was nearly packed solid with stack upon stack of metal folding chairs.
Andrew’s shoulders slumped. “Well that’s exciting,” he said dejectedly.
“Could be good for adding to the barricade,” Justin said hopefully.
Andrew turned and led them back out into the hallway. They bypassed the hall that turned to their right and continued toward the north end of the tower’s basement. Eventually, they came to two more closed doors, one on either side of the hallway.
“Which one you want to try first?” Andrew asked.
“Well,” young Justin considered with his nine-year-old logic, “we tried the left side the first time, so let’s try the right side this time.”
“Okay,” Andrew agreed, turning toward the door to their right. “Here goes nothing,” he reached out and opened the door. It opened more quietly than the last.
The boys entered into a larger, less cluttered room. The door closed behind them.
“What is this place?” Justin asked.
“I don’t know,” Andrew shook his head as he shined his light around the room.
His light’s beam illuminated a waist-high, yellow-painted metal railing about halfway across the room ahead of them. The railing ran about ten feet out from the center of the tower’s north wall, made a 90-degree turn, and continued for about another ten feet to the center of the tower’s east wall. It effectively sectioned off the northeast corner of the space, which was about half the room.
“Neat,” Justin said as they walked over to the railing and looked down into a square concrete pit that dropped about five feet into the floor. An iron ladder was built into the side of the pit. In the center of this pit was another circular pit about five feet in circumference. This pit was filled with frozen water. A large metal tube ran up from one side of the pit, along the ceiling, and disappeared out of one side of the tower wall.
“I think this is a sump pit,” Andrew said. “We had something like it in our house’s basement. It was just a lot smaller than this.”
“Ohhh,” Justin drawled, nodding even though he had no idea what a sump pit was or what it did.
“A pump sucks up water that drains into the basement and spits it outside,” Andrew clarified. “The pump is probably down under all that ice. That pipe is what the water comes up through,” he shined his light up the steel tube, following it with his light along the ceiling until it disappeared through the tower wall.
“Ohhh,” Justin nodded again, getting it now.
“Kinda cool,” Andrew shrugged.
“Wish we could throw stuff in the water,” Justin muttered forlornly.
“We could try to break the ice!” Andrew said excitedly.
The two had completely forgotten about their game of hide-and-seek, and poor Jack wandering around upstairs searching for them.
“Yeah!” Justin nodded eagerly. “Let’s try!”
The two boys began searching the room for something they could toss into the pit. They found it in the way of a large brick lying near one wall.
“Here, hold the flashlight,” Andrew handed the light over to Justin and picked up the brick. “Here goes,” he hefted the brick over his head with both hands and flung it into the pit.
Justin followed the brick with the
flashlight’s beam. It hit the ice with a thud and skidded to a stop against one side of the concrete pit.
“Humph,” Andrew said with a grimace. “Ice must be pretty thick.”
“Must be,” Justin nodded dejectedly, handing the flashlight back to Andrew.
“Let’s see what else is down here,” Andrew guided them back out into the hallway.
* * *
Upstairs, Charla continued working on massaging Chris’ shoulders.
“Ughhhhh…” he moaned. “That’s sooooooo goooooood.”
“You’d better appreciate it,” Charla laughed. “And don’t get used to it. This ain’t happenin’ all the time. Wendell is lucky to get a massage like this once every blue moon. And if…”
Suddenly there was a noise behind them.
Charla turned to see Wendell standing there, a plate of food in his hand.
“Speaking of the devil,” Charla smiled at her husband, pausing in her massage of Chris but not removing her hands.
“I brought you food,” Wendell gave her a stare that could have cut through steel. “But I see that you’re busy, so I’ll just leave it here,” he set the plate on a small table nearby.
“Wendell, it’s not what you…”
But Wendell was gone, already storming his way back upstairs.
“Uhhh,” Charla groaned, her shoulders slumping as her head tilted back in exasperation. “Great,” she let her hands slip from Chris’ shoulders. “I’ll be back,” she told Chris and turned to follow Wendell upstairs to explain.
* * *
“Any guesses on what’s behind door number three?” Andrew asked Justin as they stood in the hallway one floor below.
“Probably just more chairs or junk or something stupid,” Justin mumbled, fast having become disillusioned with their grand adventure. “It smells bad down here,” he waved a hand in front of his nose as Andrew opened the door.
The Last Bastion (Book 3): The Last Bastion Page 18
