Chapter 43 #2
I shrugged. “Keep going. This is all staged by Clik Games, so we have to assume that nothing in here will actually hurt us seriously.” Maybe if I said it confidently enough, I’d believe it.
But in truth, it was my own competitive need to win and the intense desire for more adrenaline that pushed me forward.
Xavier grunted, sneezed, then shook his head. “What do you consider seriously hurt? You just got electrocuted, and you’ve got what looks like a serious burn on your hand. Is that not enough?”
I sighed because he had a point. The only justification I could come up with was that their trap malfunctioned or someone miscalculated the voltage. Easy mistake to make, probably.
Just as I was about to make that observation, a girl came stumbling around a corner, clutching at her chest and sobbing. No, hyperventilating.
“Gem?” I called out, recognizing her pigtails. “Is that you?”
“Oh my God!” she moaned, rushing toward us while glancing over her shoulder every couple of steps.
“S--s--someone tried to kill me. We have to go!” Her breathing was so labored it was a harsh wheeze, and she barely got the words out as her face turned red.
Clearly she hadn’t managed to retrieve her asthma inhaler earlier.
“Hey, you gotta calm down,” Xavier ordered, grasping her upper arms to give her a little shake. “They’re just scare actors, remember? They won’t actually hurt you.”
“No!” she wailed, spinning around to show us her back, where her shirt was torn and a bloody gash cut across her shoulder blade.
Startled, I looked up at Xavier, and he just stared back at me with wide eyes. Clearly, none of us knew what the hell was going on in here.
“Okay, we need to get you out,” I said to Gem. “Let’s go back to the entrance and try to leave via the elevator or…or maybe there’re stairs?”
Xavier nodded. “Yes, good thinking. Come on, Gem. We’ve got you.” He wrapped his arm around the sobbing girl, and she leaned into him like he was her savior. It caused a weird feeling to run through me, but I brushed it off as an impending sense of doom.
How had she gotten down here, though? Who was chasing her? And more worrying…where were they now? I paused a moment as Xavier led Gem away, glancing back along the corridor in the direction she’d come. Why was no one chasing her now?
“Come on, Noah,” Xavier called out. “Gem needs medical attention.”
“Coming,” I called back, giving one last glance to our unexplored corridor. Was the golden token down there somewhere? Or back the way we’d come? With a sigh, I started to follow Xavier and Gem, only to have the heavy door between corridors slam shut between us.
“What the fuck?” I exclaimed, reaching for the circular handle but hesitating again. My hand was in absolute agony from the last time I’d grabbed a door right after it closed, so what would this one do?
“Noah!” Xavier yelled from the other side, and through the tiny window, I could see him trying to open the door. Nothing happened, and I wish I could say I was surprised. He didn’t get zapped, but it also didn’t open.
“This feels like a setup,” I called back to him through the window. “Take Gem. I’ll find another way.”
He gave up on the handle, meeting my gaze through the dirty glass. “Find the token, if you can. Get us all out of this hellhole.”
I nodded, anxiety and adrenaline flooding through my veins so hard it was making me dizzy. “Easy.”
“Wait, Noah, I need to ask something before…” Xavier frowned, looking troubled. “Before you go. The night you told me about. The one when your taxi crashed and you drowned in the river before someone saved you. Was it the Rainburst Springs Charity Gala two years ago?”
I nodded before I could think it through, and something like relief or understanding passed across his face.
Weird question. “I’m going to keep going before I get murdered.
If I don’t make it out…” I trailed off, my words drying up.
What message could he possibly pass on that would be worthy of a message from the grave?
So I sighed and shrugged. “If I don’t make it out, adopt a cat and name her for me. A fluffy one, with lots of fur.”
Xavier’s lips curled in a smile, and he put his middle finger to the glass between us as I laughed.
Fuck it. No use lingering while Gem slowly died of blood loss. So I gave Xavier one last glance before turning and heading as confidently as possible down the corridor, holding my injured hand against my chest to protect it if someone rushed me.
Once I turned the corner that Gem had come from, my anxiety doubled.
If someone was chasing her, they could be hiding somewhere.
Waiting. Every door I passed was locked, and I wandered for what felt like forever, turning on light switches with my elbow with each new turn and testing door handles with my sweater wrapped over my hand.
Finally, I found myself in front of another heavy metal door and gritted my teeth as I grasped the wheel handle with both hands to unlock it. It hurt enough that I gasped and saw stars, but the door opened, so it was worth something.
Inside, I couldn’t find a light switch, so I swapped back to my phone flashlight to look around and discovered that I was in a small room this time. A small room, with a hatch in the middle of the floor.
“This feels dumb,” I whispered to myself, kneeling to test the hatch. It was unlocked and opened with some effort thanks to its weight. When I cast my light inside, I groaned. And laughed.