by Hamill, Ike
The door opened inward and had a light switch on the wall next to the frame. Stephen pushed open the door and then flicked on the lights. A single bare bulb lit up a storage closet. Gray metal shelves lined one wall and held stacks of big bottles. To him they looked like large bleach bottles like the one his mom kept in their laundry room.
He shut the closet and moved down down the hall. Stephen didn’t want to get boxed in to a small space. The next door looked serious—big, solid, and metal, but it was locked.
A few feet down, a door was cracked open. Stephen pushed it open and immediately backed up, closing the door again. He remembered that smell. It was the smell of the gas that had made him pass out. He cracked the door enough to feel around the corner and found a switch on the wall. When he flipped the switch, lights came on in the room and he pushed the door open but he stayed in the hallway.
He saw the pole and the cage. He pulled up his shirt to cover his mouth and nose and stepped into the room. The gas wasn't nearly as strong, and barely made him light-headed. The pole was no help to him. He gave it a try, but couldn't even climb the rope in gym class, so he didn't expect to get anywhere. The room had no other obvious exits.
Something about the ceiling caught his attention. Not a particular feature—the ceiling was smooth and white, except for the big hole around where the pole came through—but it stood much higher in here than in the other rooms or the hall. He poked his head back in the hall, saw only the dead guy, and looked up at the ceiling. The ceiling was definitely lower in the hall. He shut the door to the pole room and tried the rest of the doors. They were all locked.
He checked back in the closet. The ceiling was definitely lower, and it was a drop-ceiling, a grid of acoustic tiles. He wondered what he would find above those tiles.
He closed the door behind himself and went to the far end of the closet. The neatly stacked bottles didn’t go quite all the way to the wall. He set the knife down on a shelf, put his foot up on the second shelf, and carefully tested how much weight it would hold. It didn’t budge under his full weight so he climbed up the shelves until he reached the tiles. Stephen paused for a second to consider his options. He could go back down the hallway towards the dead guy, but Jack might have woken up, and Jack had a gun.
With no more deliberation, Stephen pushed against one of the half-tiles near the wall and slid it to the side. The drywall continued above the ceiling for another six inches or so and then ended. There he found at least three feet of space above the ceiling, filled with dust, pipes, beams, and cables. He grabbed one of the beams and climbed, putting all his weight on the big supports. Once he pulled his feet through, he balanced with one hand while he slid the tile back into place. It was dark, but enough light came through the top of the ceiling fixtures so that his eyes quickly adjusted.
Immediately in front of him, the top of a stud wall rose to meet the beams he clung to. He figured it was the back wall of the closet. Just past this wall, he could see another drop ceiling, but there didn’t appear to be any light down in this room. He saw the top of an unlit fixture ahead. He wished that he had stopped to steal a flashlight from Jack before leaving the examination room.
Stephen debated pulling a tile from this room’s ceiling to see what was below him, but then decided to keep moving. It was impossible for him to move laterally—the beams that he gripped were bolstered with a sine wave of iron bars, too close-packed to squeeze between.
He struggled down the length of the room before finding another stud wall. He moved one hand or foot at a time, and only a few inches. Maneuvering around the wires that held up the lights took extra patience. Twice, he thought he might fall when traversing a set of conduits that ran perpendicular to the beams. Sweat dripped from his nose by the time he found the next stud wall. His muscles ached and strained.
On the other side of this wall, he found the tops of more lights. These were switched on, and with the light coming through he spotted the next wall only a short distance ahead. He figured this must be another hallway—the walls stood too close together for a room. Encouraged, he climbed quickly over to the next wall. On the other side he found thick insulation beneath him. It continued for several feet before the next wall and another section of drop-ceiling. Here he caught a glimpse of the room below.
One of the tiles below had a damaged corner, and Stephen could see down into a small closet with a folding door. A high shelf sat only a couple of feet below him. His arms and back shaked with exertion, so Stephen decided to try a descent. He pulled the ragged corner of the tile and slid it to the side. He didn't want to reveal himself, but realized that if he didn’t climb down now, he might soon fall.
Stephen tested his weight on the shelf and then lowered himself into the closet. He couldn’t get low enough to replace the tile above him, so he left it and climbed carefully down to the floor. He peeked between a gap in the folding doors. In one direction he saw a long wall with a bureau, topped with a television. In the other direction he saw a door with a peephole and emergency fire evacuation diagram. A “Do Not Disturb” sign hung on the doorknob. Behind him, on the closet rod, the hangers had solid loops instead of hooks.
He couldn’t see around the corner to the bed, or the other direction to the bathroom, so he listened closely for almost a minute. Detecting nothing, he decided to make his move. If this was the room that he and Jack had entered before, he knew he would find a hole behind he dresser that would lead to the secret passage. Stephen folded the doors and moved into the room; he closed the doors, trying to get them positioned just as they had been.
On the balls of his feet he started to creep towards the bed and then changed his mind. He moved backwards towards the bathroom. The lights were on and he looked up to see that the ceiling in here was solid—not tiles like the rest of the room. Something caught his eye: he saw a painting on the bathroom mirror. He felt a chill tingle up his back. A sinister bull’s face looked back at him. Stephen shuddered and crept back to the living space.
This looked just like the room that he and Jack had found. More than the look though, he had that feeling again, like he shared space with where a monster—a murderer of children—had lived. He'd spent weeks in this building, but only this room had a lasting effect on him.
Stephen poked his head behind the heavy bureau and verified the hole to the secret passage. He could pull it away from the wall enough to fit behind, but he was compelled to put it back once he had crawled through the hole, and this turned out to be extremely difficult on his own. Stephen grunted and tugged to get the bureau back to its proper location.
He slunk through the passage, arms outstretched. The ambient light from the hole faded quickly as he rounded the first corner, but he had a couple of rays of light from holes in the passage walls. Once he rounded the next corner, he found only darkness.
Stephen struggled to remember if there was another corner before the vending room. He felt his way along. He turned a corner. After groping for several minutes he reached a dead end. It made sense, once he pieced it together—the hole in the vending wall led to a passage that ended quickly in one direction and continued on in the other. He must have passed the vending room, and the lights must be off in there as well.
Backing up, Stephen crouched to find the hole. After just a few steps, his left hand waved into space. He turned towards the hole and felt around its outline. On the other side of it stood the heavy machine. Someone had moved the machine back to the wall.
Stephen laid both hands on the back of the machine and pushed. It slid forward just a couple of inches before turning slightly and jamming against the neighboring machines. He got the machine unstuck.
Suddenly, a disabling hopelessness washed over him in the dark. He was alone, far from home, and had nobody to trust. His faith in Jack had eroded, now it had nearly vanished. Stephen wondered if Jack had really tried to fool The Management. It was possible, he figured, but seemed unlikely. But he couldn’t think of another reason why Jack would hav
e apologized and untied him.
Digging in, still laboring in complete darkness, Stephen pushed at the heavy soda machine and moved it a couple more inches. He paused for minutes between each attempt. Listening for any sounds, he waited until he caught his breath and then pushed again. The machine suddenly slid much more easily and he fell to the floor. He moved between the soda machine and the wall. This gave him a huge advantage—he braced his feet against the wall and pushed much more efficiently.
In a few good thrusts, he had the soda machine pushed all the way out. Stephen squeezed through the gap between the soda machine and the ice machine to his right. On this side, the lights from the machines lit up the room enough so he could find the light switch and the door. He flicked on the switch and exhaled with relief as the lights came on.
His hand moved directly from the switch to the handle, but it was locked. The handle didn’t even turn—he thought it felt like a decorative handle, it was so rigid. He kicked the door in frustration.
Stephen considered his options: go back through the hole, or find a way through the door. He looked up and realized he hadn’t considered the ceiling. He needed to find a way up there.
The ice machine had a door about halfway up and he thought he could use that to boost himself on top of the soda machine. It was even easier than he thought. In a few seconds, he sat on top of the dusty soda machine and pushed up one of the tiles. It took a second for his eyes to adjust. He saw bad news—the walls went all the way up.
He pushed up a few more tiles to verify that walls block him in every direction.
Stephen started to feel helpless again. He pulled himself together enough to prioritize his needs. He knew that he had to get out of the hotel, and to tell someone about Jack. His former friend had gone crazy, and needed help. For the moment, both of his needs seemed unattainable. Stephen pulled his legs up on top of the soda machine and felt his hope ebb away.
Jack
Jack found himself back in the exam room, strapped down to the chair. Jack struggled clear his head, but he felt sluggish, like something held him just below true consciousness. Then he saw it—a needle poked out of his right arm and a tube ran up to a clear bag on a stand. Even in his diminished state Jack realized that this couldn’t be the same exam room that he had rolled Stephen to earlier. It just didn’t look right to him. The handle was on the wrong side of the door, as was the light switch.
A deep voice startled him—“Waking up?”
“Why did you drug me?” asked Jack.
“You’re not going to work out, Jack,” said the man from behind him. The man circled around the chair and faced him. Jack craned his head up to get a good look at the man he had pursued. He thought it must be another trick, this couldn’t possibly be The Management.
The man standing before Jack looked old—Jack figured older than his dad. White hair at his temples faded back over his ears. The man’s face was deeply lined, tanned, and his eyes were barely visible with the way the man squinted. His mouth was small and secretive, guarding large, tightly-packed teeth. He wore baggy clothes that barely disguised the extra weight he carried. Jack looked with open wonder at this small, ordinary man who had created these elaborate and challenging puzzles.
The man adjusted his stance and squared his shoulders with Jack. “In my day we listened to DJs on the radio. Everything was fine until you met one, then you spent the next few months trying to align the face with the voice,” the man said. “I suspect you’re having that same feeling right now.”
Jack shook his head. His head felt heavy, but his neck worked like a swivel and his head flopped from side-to-side.
“But don’t worry,” added the man. “You’ll only have to deal with this visual discrepancy for a matter of hours.”
“Why are you giving up on me so quickly?” asked Jack. “We can fix this.”
The man approached Jack, putting his weathered face within inches of Jack’s fearful expression. “Why am I giving up on you, Jack?” he asked, whispering the question. “Perhaps if you really think through the question, you’ll understand how illogical it is. There’s almost nothing that bothers me more than an illogical argument.”
The man backed away and turned his head slightly, looking over at the counter. “So, Jack,” he began in a normal tone of voice that ramped up quickly, “maybe I’ve given up on you because you TRIED TO KILL ME,” he ended with a scream.
“You’re upset because you didn’t see it coming, aren’t you?” asked Jack.
“There’s another bad question,” said the man. “After all, I sent a decoy out to meet you.” He paced around the foot of the chair. “You also brought a decoy. Mine performed perfectly, and yours kicked you in the face,” he smiled. “I would have enjoyed teaching you how to properly control a decoy. So, given the fact that I sent a decoy out to meet your well-aimed bullets, are you still inclined to believe that I didn’t anticipate that move?”
“I guess not,” said Jack. His efforts to coax his way out of this situation had, so far, failed. He needed to introduce another variable into The Management's equations. “But Stephen’s going to bring other people back here. You’ll be caught if you hang around.”
“You’re not thinking this through,” said the man. “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. It’s probably the drugs I’ve given you. They’re confusing you, aren’t they?” He leaned over and thumbed a dial on the IV bag shut. The drip stopped immediately. “It will take a while to wear off completely, but you’ll be a little more rational soon, I suspect,” he said.
The man continued pacing and recommenced his lecture. “Of course I took great care to make sure that Stephen cannot escape. I’ve got to admit though, he nearly has enough fortitude to make a decent replacement for you. He’s a little squeamish, but he seemed to go along with everything pretty well. Perhaps I could groom him.”
Jack decided to play his trump card. He had one piece of insurance set aside in case things went this badly. “I’ve written everything down, you know,” said Jack. “I’ve documented everything I could find out about the Vigue case, this hotel, and the connection to the disappearances in the sixties. That’s where you learned it, right? From that guy in Georgia?”
“You have indeed done some excellent research, Jack,” said the man. “It’s not too difficult to collect that kind of information these days though. Personally, I think that I had a much harder time doing that same research back in sixty-four. I had to spend weeks in the library, reading microfilms of archived newspapers. You, on the other hand, spent a few hours on some websites.”
The man walked to counter and opened a drawer below. He pulled out a yellow envelope and unwound the red string. He upended the envelope and dropped its contents into his hand. He looked at Jack — “You’re referring to this documentation, of course. I found it in the second drawer of your dresser, under your tee shirts. How did you expect this to help you, though? By the time your mom found this I would have been long gone.”
Jack exhaled slowly and considered his situation. This man had easily outwitted him at every turn. He had no leverage, and no course of action. He inhaled deeply and smelled his own tears welling up behind his eyes.
“Now if you don’t mind,” said the man, “I’m going to get some work done while we wait for Stephen.” He pulled a set of thick goggles out of a drawer and pulled them over his head. The goggles magnified his eyes enough so that his irises looked to be the size of nickels. The man pulled a rolling chair over to Jack’s leg and sat down on the edge. He looked up at Jack again and warned him, “This is going to hurt quite a bit, but it’s something I always do.”
He slid a portable tray up beside Jack and grabbed a knife.
“Hold still,” he said to Jack as he cut through his pants. He started the knee and cut a big patch of fabric out of the thigh of Jack’s jeans. “It probably seems a little backwards, but I always sign my work first. It looks so much better if done on a live muscle.”
Stephen
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He couldn’t stay on top of the vending machine, he reasoned. Stephen thought that if he went back to the crazy-man’s room, he might find another way out. But someone had locked this door on purpose—probably the guy Jack had killed—and the way out would require going back to that place. Stephen didn't want to confront all that yet. He would start with exhausting his other options.
Stephen jumped down from the soda machine and made his way into the dark passage. He paused to look through the peep-hole into the hotel room filled with books.
A distant voice made him freeze. Someone yelled. Stephen willed himself not to run; he knew that he must keep control. The voice continued at a lower tone and he shuffled carefully over to the opposite wall and worked his way down to the next peep-hole. When he got close, it came back to him—this hole looked into an exam room.
Stephen held his breath and put his eye to the hole. He saw Jack, strapped to a chair. The man talking to Jack faced away from the hole, so Stephen couldn’t see much, but he could hear the man’s voice. It definitely sounded the same as the voice from the loud-speaker. That last realization took some time to sink in. If this was the man who had talked over the speaker, Stephen wondered, then who was the dead guy in the hall? Perhaps that guy wasn’t dead after all, he thought.
Stephen began to consider the implications of the scene in front of him. If this man had captured Jack and meant to hurt him, he would be on his own to get out of here. Plus, he’d have this psycho hunting him. However, if Jack somehow escaped, Stephen would have to worry about Jack’s intentions. They hadn’t parted on the best terms.
Stephen couldn't think of a good answer unless something bad happened to both Jack and the man, or somehow he found a way out.
He rocked back on his heels and hoped an idea would come.
