The Sinner Program

by B L Teschner

  We locked eyes with Layla and Toby nodded, giving her the cue to step in with Connor. “Hey now,” she said, falling to his side. “It’s okay. You’ll get to go home soon.”

  Connor scrambled to a sitting position and curled up against Layla as Toby and I slowly backed away, making our exit.

  “Don’t worry little guy,” we heard Troy mutter. “You’ll be fixed soon. I promise.”

  We hurried into the hall and went down the stairs to where Martha’s office was. It wasn’t going to be easy—there were kids walking around—but we knew we had to take the risk with them. It wasn’t necessarily the sinners, it was the fixed ones. We were worried they would rat us out. But to be honest, even though they were all total butt kissers to the staff now, they didn’t seem any more on their side than they were before. They seemed to respectfully mind their own business. If they weren’t that way, they would have said something when Toby got Troy’s keys, because I knew at least one of them had to see that happen. Or maybe not; Connor had put on such a good performance that maybe they were focusing more on him. We didn’t know for sure, which meant we had to work fast.

  “I think Jill saw all this happen,” Toby said beside me. “She knew you got something from the kitchen and now she knows it was the knife. I heard her talking with her group of friends when I cut the keys off.”

  I smiled warily to a couple of passing kids. “Do you think she’ll rat us out?”

  “I don’t think so. At least, if she knows what’s good for her she won’t.”

  We cut over to the entrance to the restrooms and surveyed Martha’s office door. Toby’s breaths were rushed as he stood beside me, looking carefully around the side of the wall. “Luck’s on our side; Jan isn’t at the front desk. It’ll be easier to get in now.”

  “But what about anyone else?” My heart was beating wildly in my chest. What if a member of the staff saw us go in? We would be dead meat. Or even worse: We would be “fixed.”

  “Maybe we should knock.”

  “Are you crazy?” I shrieked in a whisper. “You must have a death wish or something.”

  “Well how are we supposed to know if anyone is in there?”

  Martha’s office door opened and out she came, followed by Steven. “I just want to see what the fuss is all about,” she told him as they walked up the hall to the twisted staircase.

  “Probably another fight,” Steven answered. “The kids have been getting rowdier by the second.”

  We could barely make out what Martha had said since they were so far up the hall, but it sounded like she blamed anxiety for any of the sinners’ rise in misbehavior. Hell yeah we were anxious; we were watching the kids around us being taken and brought back in a catatonic state, with no way to get help from the outside world. Who wouldn’t be anxious?

  The lights flickered as a heavy gust of wind made the old building creak. “You ready?” Toby asked beside me.

  “No.”

  He took my hand and we hurried back into the hall and over to Martha’s office door. Toby’s hands were shaking a little as he pulled out the keys and began testing each one in the lock. He was successful with the fourth one. He slowly turned the knob and pushed the door in, peeking around the side. “Okay let’s go,” he said quickly, opening it the rest of the way and pulling me inside, closing it quietly and locking it behind us.

  Martha’s office was clean and cozy, with a large antique wooden desk and a couch across from it for her guests to sit on. The couch reminded me of one of those old ones from the black and white movies, with its rounded back and tufted cushions. There were file cabinets, and some art was hung on the wall, most likely painted by the same artist as the generic flowers and landscapes that were hanging in the halls. A water dispenser was positioned against the wall between the desk and the couch, and a folder on the desk right beside…

  “A phone!” Toby shrieked, running over to it and picking it up.

  “Call 911!”

  He typed in the numbers and put it to his ear. “What the hell?” he huffed.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s like a prerecorded voice or something. It says to enter the security code to make an outgoing call.”

  “Dammit,” I sighed with frustration. “They’ve thought of everything!”

  He put his finger on the hook mechanism to get back to the dial tone and tried again. “It’s saying the same thing,” he said, hanging the phone up for good.

  “And I thought that would be our chance to escape.”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  The phone rang and our eyes grew wide with panic. “What do we do?” I asked.

  “I’m gonna answer it.”

  “But what if it’s someone who’s in on it with them?”

  “I’ll answer professionally and if it doesn’t seem like someone who’s in on it, then we need to ask them for help.” I gave him a quick nod and he picked up the corded phone. “Mendukiah Center for—” His eyes cut over at me.

  “What?” I asked quietly. “What’s going on?”

  “It’s the same prerecorded voice; I need a damn security code to answer the call.”

  “What?” I groaned. “Are you kidding me?”

  “Hello?” he blurted into the phone. “Can you hear me?” He brought the phone away from his ear. “They’re saying hello and asking if anyone is there. They can’t hear me!”

  “Try putting in numbers!”

  He plugged in random numbers and put it back to his ear. “It says incorrect code… No, no don’t hang up!” He cursed and clanged the phone back down on its cradle. “They couldn’t hear me; they hung up.”

  “You’re being too loud,” I reminded him gently. “There’s nothing we can do about it now; we need to keep exploring.”

  “Yeah,” he agreed, working hard to brush off his anger. “Let’s get going.”

  We expected a uniform office from Martha, but what we didn’t expect was another locked door on the back wall. It was made of dark wood and had the intricate designs of a skilled craftsman who probably etched them in when the building was first constructed.

  “I hope this is a good idea,” I hesitated in front of it.

  “Nothing we’re going to do today is a good idea.” He tried the handle and found it locked. “Crap; I hope it’s the same key.” He took the keys back out of his pocket with a sigh. “This is taking us too long; we’re gonna get caught.”

  “The guard probably realized his keys are missing by now. They’ll be panicking I’m sure.”

  He got the door open and peeked his head around it. “It’s a hallway,” he said, pushing it open the rest of the way and going in. Once again, he closed and locked it behind us. “I don’t know which way to go.”

  It wasn’t a long hallway; it didn’t span the length of the entire building. Unlike the rest of the halls, it was carpeted. There were four original doors along one side which all had little square windows in them, and there was another door at the very end of the hall that was windowless. It had a sticker that said something on it but was too far for me to make it out.

  “I go left, you go right?” I whispered the suggestion.

  Toby nodded, and we went our separate ways. I peered into the window closest to me and saw a room with two desks with a large computer monitor sitting on one of them. The monitor was turned on and displayed four squares that were filled with images of the rooms in the building. I watched in shock as the squares would change after a few seconds, showing other rooms, as well as the grounds outside. It flashed to the club room and I saw Connor and Layla sitting at one of the long tables. The guards and Martha weren’t there. It flashed again, and I noticed the cafeteria in one of the squares. There the two idiots were, sitting down and seemingly enjoying something to drink. They must not have noticed the missing keys yet.

  I looked over at Toby who was already on his second door, peeking through the window. I slid down to mine and carefully peered inside. My eyes widened when I saw the doctor sitting at
his desk, working on his computer. I sunk down and tiptoed as quickly as I could to Toby.

  “What’s wrong?” he whispered.

  “It’s the doctor! He’s in his office!”

  His shoulders rose and fell with a heavy, panicked breath. “Okay, we need to get out of here then.”

  “What was in your rooms?”

  “Just an office and storage. There were some wheelchairs in the first one.”

  “What about that one?” I asked, pointing to one last door that was on its own at the very end of the hall.

  “No, I haven’t checked. There’s a sticker on it that says Janitorial.”

  “Well we should probably check it to be safe.”

  He nodded and we went over to it, placing one foot in front of the other as carefully as we could along the way. Toby tried it, only to find that it was locked.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said with a heavy sigh as he, once again, pulled the keys from his pocket.

  “Quiet,” I hushed him. “The doctor will hear that.”

  “I’m trying!”

  He got it on the second try and slowly opened it, working hard to make sure it didn’t creak. The light from the hall filtered into the area, showing us how unimportant it was. It was a decent-sized closet with a lot of unused space. There were cleaners and rags on a shelf straight ahead, some push brooms and mops to the left; a large rolling mop bucket was to the right. The space smelled musty and the air was frigid, like it was cut off from the heat of the rest of the building.

  “I guess that’s it,” I said, defeated that we didn’t find Dwayne.

  A door behind us creaked as it opened. Our eyes locked together and we hurried into the closet without a second thought, closing it slowly behind us and locking it in place. Toby’s hand found mine in the dark as we strained to hear a door close, another one open, only to be closed again.

  “I think he went into Martha’s office,” Toby suggested with ragged breaths. He let out an exhausted sigh. “That was close.”

  “The first room I checked had a computer monitor on the desk with video footage of places in and around the building.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah. They’ve been watching us.”

  “Well that explains why they know a lot about what’s going on around here. They always seem to show up in the middle of stuff.”

  “They must not have been watching when I stole the knife, but I’m sure they’ll run the tapes back and see once they find out it’s missing.”

  “And us cutting off the keys, too.”

  “I don’t think they noticed yet,” I whispered. “I saw Troy and Steven on the monitor in the cafeteria.”

  “Well those guys are idiots, so I’m not surprised Troy didn’t notice dangling keys missing from his side.”

  I looked around the room as if I could make out anything in the darkness. “I think there was a lightbulb hanging above us. If we reach up we can probably find the pull chain.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea; the light might give us away.”

  “Yeah, you’re probably right,” I sighed, feeling like a fool for asking the question. “Do you notice how cold it is in here?”

  “Yeah, I was just thinking that.”

  A faint noise—possibly a distant cry—cut through the dark; our hands squeezed each other’s in unison.

  “What was that?” I whispered nervously.

  “I’m not sure.”

  We stayed quiet and heard the muffled sound once again. It was so muted it was almost too hard to hear.

  “Where is it coming from?” I asked.

  We waited to hear it again. Silence.

  Toby crouched down, pulling me down with him. “It sounded like it came from below us.”

  “You mean under the floor?”

  “Yeah.” He let go of my hand and skimmed his fingers across the ground. “Do you feel that? It’s cold air. I can feel it seeping up through the carpet.”

  “Yeah, I feel it.”

  “We need to try and pull the carpet up.”

  We worked together to quietly move the mop bucket away from one side of the wall and over to the other. Going only by feel, I slid my hands into the corner and pulled up the carpet, separating it from the floor. The more I peeled it back, the more the space was bathed in muted florescent light. Toby took over and rolled it back as far as he could to the door. We stood up and stared down in awe at the giant grate below our feet.

  Our hands joined together once again. We found where they were taking the kids.

  Thirteen

  Toby

  “Toby, I’m scared.”

  “So am I.”

  “What do we do?”

  I sighed nervously. “Well, there’s a ladder made onto the wall. We climb down it.”

  Millie’s face was gently illuminated by the filtered light shining up at us as she stared down at the slotted barricade. “Do you think Dwayne is down there?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’m pretty confident he is.” My hand squeezed hers before letting it go. “You ready?”

  She gave me a solid nod. “Let’s get our friend back.”

  We bent down, working together to move the heavy metal grate away from the hole just enough for us to fit. “There’s something else here.” I pointed down at a square metal tube that was recessed into the concrete beside the opening. “Weird.”

  “What is it?”

  “I’m not sure, but it looks like something bolts into it.” I sighed and peered down at the floor beneath us. “We’ll need to move the grate and carpet back.” I looked over at her. “I don’t want you going down there first. Do you think you’ll be able to move the grate back over the hole by yourself?”

  “I think so; I know I’ll try as hard as I can.”

  “Okay.” I pointed to the carpet that was rolled to the side. “Let’s pull this up as close to the opening as possible. When you come down, try to roll the carpet out over the hole to cover it as best as you can before pulling the grate over the rest of the way.”

  “Okay.” She bent over and rolled it out to where I was. “How’s that?”

  “That should work.”

  I sat on the edge of the hole where the ladder was and planted my feet on one of the rungs a few spaces down, carefully turning around to face it. “Let me make it down first before you follow; I want to make sure there isn’t anyone down there.” My hands gripped the coldness of the ladder and I noticed it seemed very secure. It looked like it was made of old steel rebar; it was thin, rough, and was attached somehow to the concrete wall, either welded or parts of it made into the concrete itself. Going down wasn’t too long of a descent, just to another floor that was the same height as the other floors in the building. When I made it down I stepped off the ladder and looked up and down the hall. It was a stark contrast from the rest of the building. The entire floor had fallen into disrepair. I focused back up at Millie. “Okay, go ahead,” I called up to her.

  Her feet found the rungs of the ladder and she moved down a few steps, stopping when her head was just shy of the opening. I could hear her huff as she reached her arm up and brought the carpet over the hole, trying her best to make it roll back to its original position. “I can’t make it smooth down in the corner.”

  “It’ll have to do.”

  She held onto the ladder with one hand and grasped the grate, trying with all her might to move it back over the hole. “I, I can’t do it; it’s just too heavy.”

  “That’s okay.” I jumped back onto the ladder and hurried up it, stopping on the rung that was just below the one she was standing on. With one hand holding onto the ladder next to her side, my body pressed against the back of hers as I reached above her and gripped onto the cold metal of the grate. “On three,” I said behind her. “One… two… three!” We pulled simultaneously, urging along the grate until it was back in its original resting position. “Let’s just hope no one heard that.”

  She looked back at
me. “Thanks for your help.”

  “No problem,” I said with a smile, wishing that it was different circumstances so I could kiss her. But instead, I retreated back down the ladder.

  Millie came down after me to the dilapidated floor. Her hands left the ladder and she surveyed the hallway. “Wow.”

  “I know.”

  “It looks like we went back in time.”

  I smoothed my hand along the concrete wall beside the ladder. “It’s wet; the rain must be getting in from outside. It explains the musty smell.”

  “And the dampness in the air.”

  The wall we had climbed down was concrete but the hall wall across from us was covered in crumbling plaster that was shedding from age; countless pieces of it had peeled away and littered the cement floor up and down the entire dimly-lit corridor. There were dilapidated chairs in random places; some were sitting upright while others had been pushed over and left to rot. There was an overwhelming eeriness to the hallway that we couldn’t quite put into words. All we knew was that we needed to find Dwayne and get away from this place. And now that we had the keys, we were hopeful that we would all be able to run away.

  I surveyed the area, looking for signs of security cameras. “I don’t see any cameras in here, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t some hidden ones.”

  “I didn’t see this area on any of the monitors.”

  “Let’s just hope there aren’t any.” Up and down the hall, rusty metal doors were spaced widely apart, and they all had little square windows in them. “I guess we start our search,” I suggested as I carefully stepped forward to the door closest to us.