by T. Wyse
They proceeded out again and further down the hall, nearing another stairwell. "This is the 'fire room'." Lyssa declared, opening the door. It was a twin in size to the games room, but featured a softer look, a fireplace stood on the far wall of the room, now boarded neatly up. Couches and plush chairs dotted the room, but it was bare of any specific distractions of its own.
They left the room again and into the hallway. "That's the library again." Lyssa declared dismissively at the door directly opposite. They turned towards the stairwell, and headed up to the third floor.
"The second and third floors are residence dorms, and a few classrooms. They are generally for seniors at the school who have chosen to take our special courses. You aren't forbidden to tread on these floors, but it would be best to have a reason to be there."
"I won't be sleeping there?" Amelie asked, causing the woman to stop abruptly.
"No...and I hope you'll be understanding of this." The woman said, resuming her pace. "We have a special accommodation prepared for you."
They proceeded to the third floor, and down a hallway the exact mirror opposite of The Professor's tower of books though the entrance was on the first floor. Instead of hulking wooden doors the hall was separated from the structure with cruder metallic ones similar to those on the stairwells.
Amelie pondered briefly, the fact that there was a lock on the door.
10
The Glass Tower
Odd turned out to be something of an understatement.
Accepting that the tower would be her ‘accommodations’ with fair ease, she had expected something similar to The Professor’s tower. Surely there would have been some clear use or function to it at the very least.
The door led into a small alcove jutting to the right, surrounded and shaped in tired grey that featured a cramped metal door. Lyssa unlocked and then opened it, performing the magic trick of flipping the light switch to reveal that it was a tiny bathroom, sink and toilet, before killing the light and turning to the stairwell opposite.
The stairwell wound upwards with such a tight and claustrophobic path that the destination and the way they had come were hidden from them as they climbed. The walls closed in so tightly that Amelie herself could almost reach both sides with arms outstretched. Star fields framed the smooth and white stairs, which would have been a stumbling trap without their guidance. Finally a checkered square of light, mostly red but with an edge of blue and clear, banished the star field glow and they emerged into the spectacle of the tower proper.
It must have been twice, no ten times brighter than the bathed whiteness of the commons room.
It was as large as The Professor's, but the glass cylinder was unobstructed, the transparent panels facing her everywhere she could turn. It gave a clear, though multicoloured, view into the sky and a stunning vantage to the world outside. The cylindrical shape itself was marked with multicoloured panes of glass, greens and reds, blues and yellows, all in a seemingly completely random placement. The light filtered in through the glass in such a distorted patchwork that it almost felt like being outdoors under some alien canopy.
In the centre of the room waited a bizarre sight, the only feature besides the stairs, and a small set of furnishings half hidden to its side. It was a huge machine, slightly raised with a diameter similar to that of The Professor's alcove in his tower. It was of a more modest height than the office however, and its platform could be easily scaled if the need arose.
The thing's purpose was unidentifiable by sight to the girl, the closest parallel she could think of was a telescope, but the device didn't pierce the glass outside, nor even come close to the edge of the room. It looked somewhat like two telescopes of red and deep green with their wider ends pasted together, then a third one with a hooked end to balance them like a see-saw. Its surface was textured oddly, in a right-angled maze of dizzying squared patterns that followed its contours. The thing was absolutely massive, and seemed to radiate a brooding presence accentuated by the dull warmth of the room.
"Don't ask what it's for, please." Lyssa caught Amelie's gaping stare. "It's one of those strange features of the original construction, much like the artifacts on display. It's all very old, and not even James, Professor Barret rather, knows what it does exactly.”
The woman had begun to rustle around with the furnishings, opening and unlocking things.
Kokopelli stalked the machine. He stepped through different tinted squares of light, his fur being an ample canvas to capture a single colour at a time. He finally stopped, his fur tinted red matching his eyes well, staring silently at the machine tail flitting back and forth.
"Promise me you'll be able to leave it alone, and we'll be fine." The woman said furtively.
"I wouldn't dare touch it." Amelie replied. She didn't sense any kind of odd malevolence to it, but its undeniable gravity did make her feel somewhat on edge. "I can't vouch for him though." She gestured at the red tinted cat creature regarding the machine. She winced slightly, as he leapt up and over, landing on a flat and raised portion of it, disappearing over the top.
"I don't think he can hurt it. I don't think you could hurt it either." Lyssa chuckled to herself. "I was more worried about you. The thing's never moved, but if it did it could crush you easily, and we don't want that."
The woman unfolded a bed, it crashed to the floor with a metallic shriek. "This will be your sleeping area, until such a point as we resolve your...issues." Lyssa concluded.
Amelie noticed small dark shapes in the windows, perched on the sills, on the top of the cone. She wondered why she hadn't seen them before, wondered how she could have forgot them.
"Oh." She closed her eyes, denying their existence. Having faced the ultimate results of their attentions, and feeling safe here, they were more of a nuisance than a danger.
"Now, I'm not sure where you'd like this set up." Lyssa motioned at the bed and the other miscellany. "Nobody will come up here, but still I'm not sure if you'd feel better on the opposite side of the stairs or not. We've also got a four sided privacy curtain to let you change in peace, given that there aren't really any walls to be had." The woman unfolded a wheeled curtain, setting it on the floor.
"I'd feel better closer to the stairs, I think." Amelie decided.
"Certainly, help me move the bed then." They proceeded to wheel the bed over, to the side of the machine facing the stairs. "I'd feel anxious with open stairs like those nearby, but then having that thing between me and the route out wouldn't make me feel much better." She chuckled.
"Now the curtains." They pulled two sets of curtains, one set up around the bed, and another smaller one towards the side. The woman pulled a cloth over the top of the four sided curtain obstructing the bed. "I assumed you would want that, in case you are here during the day, or to feel more secure in the night."
“Thank you.” Amelie smiled. In truth, the openness of the space made her tremble with joy. For the first time in days she could see the sky again, but now in complete safety. If nothing else, perhaps it could be akin to her hair tie, a stolen and false comfort.
Finally they moved a throw rug, a small bed stand, and a foot box with extra blankets inside it around the bed. With her little campsite set up, the woman regarded her briefly then finally broke the silence with reluctance.
“Now, I suppose we should address the reason you’re up here more specifically.” Lyssa looked upwards, shading her eyes.
"The crows, I know." Amelie said, acknowledging the growing shade under the roof of the glass tower.
"You have to understand." Lyssa said with a soft tone "There are so many of them...at night they've been keeping people awake. The Professor believes that having you up here will help us all sleep. I really am sorry."
"It’s not so bad, honest." Amelie smiled. “The wind moves around in here so much, and the roof is so high above, it almost feels like being out in the open. Not quite, but close enough,” she added, feeling regret that it was causing the woman grief. She did, however, feel
a pang of nakedness in the place, and the thought of the shape night would take burbled in her stomach.
"You...you haven't seen them." The woman said with a hushed whisper. "At night, at night they're different somehow. I've seen them, they fly around the entire school, every night since the day you were brought here, they encircle the entire building, the flapping...the sound of their wings alone is like nothing I've ever heard."
"We can't even estimate how many there are, they blend in with the darkness so well." The woman looked up at the things blanketing the roof of the tower.
"Well, they cut out the sunlight quite nicely." Amelie said with a vicious drollness.
"I...I'll stay with you tonight, just to make sure you're alright." The woman declared with resolve, there was a faint hint of reluctance there though.
"No, no please. I'll be fine, I've been dealing with them, I'm glad that I got the one night's sleep last night." She tried to give an assuring smile.
"You haven't heard them." Lyssa repeated, her eyes distant looking up at the crows.
“I’ll be fine. I will.” She said, believing it herself. “I’m safe here because of you, and I don’t want anyone to be bothered by me being here. I’m used to it now, really, used to all of this.” Amelie stretched her arms out with the gesture of an exhausted magician. A shadow passed over Lyssa’s face, and for a brief moment she thought she recognized a flash of sad pity before she shuffled again into the light, her mask returned.
“It’s the price I pay, and I’m willing to pay it.” Her honesty wavered with each growth of the darkness. Echoing whispers of that thing, that eyeless tarry thing, echoed in her head and brought the tickling on her skin to a head.
Lyssa gave her a wide hug, whispering softly "I don't know, how you can manage to be so brave."
Not brave, no. Resigned perhaps, thought Amelie. She looked at the brown sleeve of her jacket, yearning to see the billowing white of her dress once again. She had lost that, she wouldn't be flying again, not for a very long time. She would have to make do here as best she could, until the season took whatever price it had in store, and the world returned.
She thought of Meldice, her kindness, her strength of character. Meldice had lost her world, she had no guardian to soothe her fears, to tell her fanciful fables of Aspects and Seasons. Meldice had instead anchored herself to an ideal, and to her mother, they bolstered each other's wills, tempering iron into steel.
She thought of M'grevor, who had taken her in even as Mrs. Woolley had rejected her. She thought of his strength, his smile, his gentleness. He had stood stalwart, declaring to protect her, even knowing that he could not possibly do so. She missed him, and worried about all who had been there, trying to assure her mind that they were fine...somehow.
“There’s a brush here somewhere. I swear there was,” Lyssa muttered, picking at Amelie’s tangles.
“It’s alright, I shouldn’t need—”
“Ah here we go.” A brush presented itself, clean and new, hungry teeth ready to gnaw and drag. “Take it, get yourself sorted. I need to get started making lunch and we can’t spare much more time.” She looked down at Amelie with a sideways worry. Amelie nodded, silently trying to assure her that she would be fine, and took the brush in hand.
She dragged the thing through her hair, tugging and cracking as it went. Her hands managed to drop the thing twice, leaving it spinning merrily across the smooth white floor each time.
When she had retrieved it for the third attempt, Lyssa snatched it from her and wielded the thing like a knightly blade. No more than eight swift rending motions and she was finished, giving a quick bat at the results. “Good enough for now.” Lyssa nodded finally. “We have to get going, sorry.” She made a long toss and the brush plunked down onto the bed with enough force to rumple the blankets.
Amelie shot a look back, checking to see if Kokopelli was going to follow them. He was nowhere to be seen, evidently still lost in his inspection.
"You don't have to help today, really." The woman offered, as they stepped towards the threshold of the door.
Amelie pointedly noticed something. The door actually had two locks, one of them was a manual bolt, to keep people out, the other was a keyhole, a two way keyhole, which could be used to lock her in.
"I insist." Amelie smiled, trying to banish thoughts of crows and locks.
They returned through the still silent and black cafeteria and to the kitchen. It was already illuminated, and two uniformed children stood in wait at the far side of the table. Their uniforms were matching in states of dirtiness though it was the same labored dirt that the gardeners bore with a silent pride. They were of approximately the same age, a boy and a girl. The boy looked somewhat chubby and extremely world worn. The girl seemed distant, her gaze far off and pensive.
The two of them had begun working without prompting on one of the two long tables in the central island of the room. Amelie found herself almost hypnotized by the humming ambience the lights created, electricity again being a new miracle.
Amelie stood on the table opposite the other two and was wordlessly passed a tool from an adult hand. A little bewildered she began trying to mimic the simple scrubbing actions that the other two were performing. The goal seemed to be to remove the grime from the skin of the vegetables in addition to the jutting sprouts, then to deposit them in sorted piles on mobile boards.
The boy nodded in acknowledgement of Amelie as Lyssa went to ignite the oven in whatever inscrutable way it did so.
"My name's Craig, that's Wendy over there." He motioned at the girl with a nod, his hands seemingly moved without his attention. "What about you?'
"Amelie." She replied. Still not getting any specific instructions, she attempted best to replicate the actions of the boy and girl. He scrubbed with a roughened mechanical practice. Wendy seemed much more dreamy and dazed, her motions slower and meandering yet still cleaning at a respectable pace.
"I hear you're on the cleaning crew, yeah?" He asked, not looking up.
"Yes." Amelie answered, trying to best clean the dirt off of the potato she had found herself scrubbing. The dirt crumbled off easily, and the potato was strangely perfect, devoid of eyes although sprouts were everywhere along its skin. She attempted to pare the sprouted limbs off of its sides with the sharp end of the tool.
"Careful, don't lose too much of the skin. We keep the sprouts off in another pile, here." He motioned to a semi-hidden pile of severed limbs from the tuber vegetables.
"So you met Melissan then, didja see Monkey?" He gave a somewhat malevolent grin, raising his eyes to meet Amelie's.
"Now now, don't call her that." Lyssa scolded from the oven. The four pots each had begun to hint at the beginnings of steaming.
"I won't, when she'll tell us what to call her!" He protested, giving a half look back. "I'll call her princess if that's what she wants, but until then she might as well be Monkey, that's what everyone calls her." His gaze caught Amelie's again. "Girl climbs twice as good as one, and is about as wiry and jumpy as one too." He gave a more mischievous smile.
Lyssa sighed, mumbling something about the boy being one to use nasty nicknames but leaving the issue be.
"So when didja come in?" He asked, his pile of potatoes climbing higher and higher.
"Oh, three days ago or so." She answered, not really knowing the truth herself.
"Three days." Lyssa confirmed.
"Haven't seen you around though." He scraped off the limbs, barely even looking down, his gaze now inquiringly pointed at Amelie.
"I was hurt a bit, not badly though." Amelie replied, Lyssa coughed uncomfortably in the background.
"You saw the crops then at least then, pretty great huh?" He grinned broadly. "We've got all sorts of stuff growing, they grow so fast too."
"I didn't see them on my way in no." Amelie replied. "Which side of the school are they on?" Perhaps she could see them from the tower in the morning.
"You...didn't see them?" Craig stopped, stunn
ed. Apparently the question had been meant rhetorically. Wendy added a confused look at Amelie. “They’re by the entrance to the school, the only entrance to the school.”
"Oh, I came in at night, wasn’t paying much attention either." Amelie replied, Lyssa had turned to the two workers, unseen by them, and had been about to say something, but apparently her reply had been the right one and the woman returned to the pots.
"Night, ugh, don't envy you there." He shivered a little. Wendy's face conferred a level of horror.
"Heard bad stories about the nights. There's strange things out there, even in the daylight." He said, his face darkened with shadows. "Stack ready, here." He declared, passing a board stacked with potatoes over to the woman. He began to move some carrots under the brush, they bore the same rooting stems, but odd perfection of shape the potatoes displayed.
“You can stare out into the horizon during the day hours, and I swear you can see things out there. People say it’s just mirage, or mind playing tricks, but I’m not so convinced.” He muttered, his voice becoming dire and low.
"Heard stuff about things out there, monsters...real monsters. We had a group pass through here early on, they were from the coast. The wave came, and they thought they were the lucky ones, thought that they could survive with fishing. “Craig’s hands stopped moving a moment in concentration.
“One of em goes out onto the water in an old boat, alone. Came back fast, came back screaming about something trying to swallow him up, something bigger than a whale. He couldn't even tell us what it looked like, closest he could come was something between a jellyfish and one of those deep sea things, the ones with the lanterns on their heads." His voice had dwindled into the warning whisper of a gossiping old woman.
"Anglerfish." Wendy added with an even voice. "Platter up." She said, handing her tray to Lyssa, and taking Craig's emptied one back. The woman had been running the potatoes frantically through some sort of cubing machine, adding the results evenly to each pot. Wendy begun into a set of onions.
