Chapter 15
Once Lionel finally managed to convince Mads that they couldn’t stay slumped on the floor forever, he got to his feet and put out a hand to help Mads up.
Mads hesitated just long enough for Lionel to wonder if he was about to resist, then slipped his hand into Lionel’s and let himself be pulled to his feet.
Once upright, Mads immediately slid an arm around Lionel’s waist, guiding him away from Derek’s body.
The sight of it—still, slumped awkwardly, a dark puddle slowly spreading beneath the shredded fabric—hit Lionel all over again like a punch to the gut.
His stomach lurched, tightening painfully.
He squeezed his eyes shut and drew in a slow breath, forcing the bile back down.
Mads must have felt it, because he turned them more firmly, shielding Lionel from the worst of it.
Together, they moved down the hall. Only after they’d put enough distance between themselves and the metallic stink of blood did Mads speak, voice low and careful, as if afraid anything louder might shatter Lionel.
“Where should we go?” he asked.
Lionel blinked, shaking his head once, then again, trying to physically knock the haze from his brain. Get it together. He was the one who’d been making plans, the one who kept insisting they could find a way out. He couldn’t let Mads see him faltering again.
So he sucked in a sharper breath, gave a tiny nod to brace himself, and then reached out to take Mads’ hand in his own. The contact jolted something in his chest—a little spark that eased the tremble in his gut. Their fingers laced together easily, somehow warm even through the cold.
A small smile twitched at Lionel’s mouth despite everything, and he started forward. “I think we should try the elevator shaft.”
Mads’ expression wavered, pale eyebrows drawing together. “Do you think… the first floor even still exists?” He asked slowly.
“We won’t know until we try,” Lionel said
It helped that this hall was eerily quiet—no echoing screeches, no whispering voices that didn’t belong to any living thing, not even the soft shuffle of something watching from around a corner.
Just their footsteps, the faint tap of Lionel’s knife handle against his leg, and their breaths puffing in little white clouds in the lingering chill.
When they reached the elevator doors at the end of the hall, Lionel finally let out a relieved sigh. The metal doors gleamed faintly, untouched by blood or scratches, almost normal-looking. He placed a hand against them, feeling the cool press of steel under his palm.
But as soon as he did, dread pooled in his gut.
They’d left their bag of tools—he couldn’t even remember where.
Maybe in the snow-flooded apartment, maybe somewhere on the floor where Derek had been.
They had nothing to pry the doors open. He turned helplessly to Mads.
Mads’ eyes flicked from the doors back to Lionel’s face and seemed to understand instantly.
“It’s alright,” Mads murmured, stepping forward. He set his own hands against the tiny seam where the doors met and dug his fingertips in. For a moment, nothing happened—just the strain of tendons standing out on the backs of his pale hands, his shoulders bunching.
“I don’t think that will work,” Lionel told him.
The power had been shut down. He didn’t think anything besides a crowbar would be able to get the elevator open at this point.
He should have thought of this. “Maybe we should look—” Lionel blinked as the elevator doors pulled open as easily as though they had called for it as normal. “How did you…”
“I didn’t even have to pull that hard,” Mads laughed. “Maybe the power being out made it easier.”
Lionel wanted to argue that, but decided to keep his mouth shut and walk over instead.
He peered down at the endless shaft, but saw that it did in fact have a bottom to it and hadn’t disappeared into a strange, otherworldly space.
“I think that’s the first floor,” he said, pointing down to an area where they could just see the outline of another metal door.
“And then all the way down would be the basement.”
“We could also try the basement if there’s no way out of the first floor,” Mads said.
Lionel nodded and looked around, gazing upwards. He frowned, wondering where the elevator box itself had gone. When he called for it before, when all of this started, it had looked like a monster had taken a giant bite out of it. Maybe whatever had done that had come back and devoured it entirely.
“The drop to the first floor isn’t that bad,” Lionel said as he got down on his hands and knees before dropping to his stomach to get a better angle. “It’s maybe ten or twelve feet.’
“Are you planning on just jumping?” Mads asked, stooping down to kneel beside him.
He was also peering over the edge, eyebrows pinched together, and when Lionel looked up at him, he couldn’t help pausing.
He was very well aware that Mads was attractive, but now, with his shirt pulled slightly astray and his lips still pink from pressing against his own so many times, it made his ribcage feel too small for his pounding heart.
“We could try to find a ladder, or a rope,” Lionel said after a moment. But, even as the words left his mouth, he knew that it was a dumb idea. What would they secure it to? Where would they even put a ladder?
He sighed as he pulled himself back up and onto his feet.
He paced for a few moments, gnawing on his fingernail as he debated the next step.
Lionel was just about to give up and say they needed a new plan when Mads made a noise of surprise.
“Lionel,” he said, waving a hand at him, urging him back over to the door. “Look.”
The elevator shaft was warping.
At first, Lionel thought it was a trick of the light or the strain on his tired eyes.
But no, he had seen this before. The same unsettling distortion that had twisted the hallways and staircases was happening again, but this time the effect wasn’t one of stretching or spiraling outward.
It was the opposite. The shaft, already narrow and claustrophobic, seemed to pull in on itself like the space between the walls was collapsing.
He watched, frozen, as the lowest floor—the basement, or what should have been the basement—raced upward toward them.
Simultaneously, the ceiling above came plummeting down, the metal beams and crossbars overhead bending inward like they were folding into each other.
The visual was all wrong, like gravity had given up on picking a direction.
Lionel’s stomach lurched. “Mads!” he gasped, grabbing the other man and yanking him back from the lip of the shaft.
Without thinking, he wrapped his arms tightly around him and shoved Mads’ face down into his own chest, shielding him as best he could.
He braced himself for the inevitable—screaming metal, crushing impact, explosion, something—but the moment never came.
Everything stilled.
Lionel opened his eyes slowly, blinking in the dim light. He felt Mads shift in his arms, one hand resting gently on his chest as if anchoring them both. Then, quietly, Mads pulled back, just enough to look up at him with wide, curious eyes.
They moved together to the edge again. Where moments ago there had been an impossible plunge into blackness, there was now a flat, solid surface only a short drop below. The ledge of the first floor sat maybe three feet down, close enough that they could easily step or hop to it.
Lionel stared, brows furrowed. “Well,” he muttered, voice low and guarded, “that’s convenient.
” But his tone was more suspicious than relieved.
He narrowed his eyes at the floor below, then up at the shaft around them.
The air felt… wrong. It was too still, as if the building was holding its breath, watching them.
Mads didn’t speak, but Lionel felt his gaze shift toward him, searching for what came next. Lionel chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Do you think it’s real?” he finally asked, only half-joking. “Or is it a trap?”
The first floor had been their goal, but now that it was so close, so suddenly accessible, Lionel didn’t feel triumph. He felt like someone in a horror movie finally stumbling on the exit, only to see the killer’s shadow waiting on the other side.
He crouched to get a closer look at the edge, noting the way the floor curved ever so slightly at the corners. The shadows below were too clean, too exact, as though drawn rather than cast. “It’s almost like it wants us to go this way,” he murmured.
Mads stepped forward beside him. “That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t,” he said, voice quiet but sure. “Just means we stay alert.” Lionel glanced at him. The calm in Mads’ expression steadied him, just a little. It didn’t erase the fear gnawing at his chest, but it gave him something else to focus on.
Lionel wanted to argue, but Mads was already moving before he could get the words out.
He watched as Mads sat down on his butt and scooted until he could step down onto the first-floor ledge.
He dug his fingers into the door’s crevice and opened it as easily as he had the first one. He poked his head into the lobby.
“All clear,” Mads said, looking back up at Lionel. He grinned at him and offered a hand, “Come on, I’ll make sure you don’t fall.”
Lionel sat and slid down as well, Mads' arm winding around his waist even though he was perfectly steady on his own two feet. Lionel let Mads leave his arm there, his hand cupping his hip, even as they walked out onto the first floor.