Chapter Eleven – Logan #2
This is some crazy shit right here.
I have to duck majorly to get past the second, and when I go to stand once I’m past it, I’m greeted by a sharp pain on the top of my head, telling me there’s another wire up there and I don’t have room to fully straighten myself out.
It’s like one of those spy movies with the red lasers pointing every which way, only I’m not a superspy who’s been trained to get through a trap like it. I’m just me, and this shit is way out of my comfort zone, but I’ll be damned if I die here, wherever the hell here is.
It isn’t easy, maneuvering my way through that room.
I get cut half a dozen more times. It’s worse when I hurry through it, so I learn to move achingly slowly and take my time.
The worst cut I get is right on my neck at the very end, the last strung wire before the door.
A wire at that position is meant to decapitate, or severely cut those important arteries in the neck.
Thankfully I’m moving slow enough that I won’t bleed out in a minute or two from the wound.
Hurts like a bitch, but I’ll live.
Once I make it to the door, I practically hug the damn thing. I don’t know what I’m going to find on the other side—seems to me this place gets worse and worse the farther you go into it—but again, I have no other options but to push forward, so onward I go.
I make it to another short hall, although this one doesn’t have any turns in it. It leads right to another door a good four feet away. I stretch out my left hand in front of me and wave it through the air, just to make sure there aren’t any more wires strung across that I overlooked.
The hallway is just that: a hallway.
Throwing open the next door, I start to step inside with an abundance of caution, and it’s a damn good thing I’m not letting the adrenaline pumping through my veins cause me to rush, because if I would’ve been rushing, I might not have heard the sound of a gear shifting or felt the tautness of a string at ankle-level just inside the room.
The moment I hear metal moving, I step back into the hall—just in time, too.
With the flickering light in the room, I barely see the axe as it swings down from the ceiling.
It’s a fucking boobytrap. Someone trips the wire with their feet, and a fucking axe comes down out of nowhere, cleaving your head in two and killing you on the spot.
Seriously, this is some horror movie shit right here. I would ask if I’m dreaming, but the numerous cuts on my body and the pain from them tell another story.
This is real. This shit is really happening.
After the initial axe, the room is clear. I make it to the end and get to a long, winding hall that reminds me of a maze. There are numerous spots where it dead-ends and I have to turn back. It takes me forever and a day to find the next door, and before I enter it, I pause to hype myself up.
I can do this. I have to do this. Whatever’s in the next room could very well kill me, but I’ve made it this far.
What’s a little more? I’m not going to die in this place, wherever the hell I am.
I’m going to get the fuck out of here, find whoever brought me here, and kick their ass from here to Sunday.
Hell, maybe I’ll even kill them. Obviously they were okay with killing me.
Never thought myself a would-be murderer, but a situation like this kind of lights a fire under your ass.
Once my nerves are steeled for whatever comes next, I push inside the next room.
This room is the biggest out of all of them, by quite a bit.
It’s also the most dimly-lit. I don’t trip any wires on my way in.
No axes to the head or other parts of my body.
I step inside and am faced with two doors on the opposite wall.
Two doors. Centered above the two doors is a message: Make your choice. On the left door the words Your Life is spray-painted, and on the right door…
Let’s just say my heart sinks when I see the word on that one.
Hers.
Just a single word on the door to the right, but it needs no other words near it for its meaning to dawn in me. My life or hers. I’m no fortune-teller, no mind-reader, but the only girl whose life matters to me, the only girl whose life I would ever even think about choosing before my own is Wren.
My life or Wren’s. Is that what this choice is supposed to be?
If I pick my life, does that mean Wren will die? Does that mean she’s here, in this God-awful place, going through the same shit I just did?
A year ago, my choice would’ve been instant.
Hell, even seven months ago I would’ve known my choice.
Nothing and no one could have ever made me debate on choosing the other door, no matter what was written on it.
Even if it came down to me or my brother…
I’m a selfish prick. I’d choose me every damn day.
But me or Wren? Fuck, I don’t think I could bear to choose myself over her. She’s a better person than me. Her future is brighter than mine. If anyone deserves to have decades more added onto their life, it’s her, not me.
I know that choosing the door on the right, the one labeled Hers, might be the last thing I do, and still, I only stand there for a minute or two before I move toward it.
My heart beats so fast in my chest it feels like it’s going to burst, and not in the good I’m-in-the-middle-of-a-fantastic-fucking-session kind of way.
No, this kind of fast heartbeat is acceptance.
If I have to choose between her life or mine, I choose hers. There’s no other option. I won’t run from her again. If I never would’ve ran after that song on stage with her, she never would’ve been hit by a car. She got hurt because of me, and I’ll be damned if I make the wrong choice again.
Stopping in front of the door on the right, I gather myself and try to calm myself down. If I die the moment I walk through this door, then… fuck, I guess I die, but I die with the hope that whoever did this will leave Wren alone.
I exhale slowly and yank open the door, and to my surprise, I see a stairwell. Not exactly what I thought I’d see. Honestly, I thought I’d walk into a room and instantly die somehow. A bullet to the head. An axe to the neck. Shit, something that went along with the rest of this fucking place.
But there’s nothing. Nothing but a stairwell that leads up.
Ugh, don’t tell me there’s a whole different level to this maze. Please don’t tell me there’s more to this.
Only way to find out.
I press forward, moving toward the stairwell, and once I reach it, I take it one step at a time, moving as slowly as I can. The steps seem stable. None of them creak beneath my feet. There are no wires to trip me or make me fall backward and crack my head open. The stairs are literally just stairs.
Making it to the landing at the top, I face a closed door.
This one doesn’t have any message on it.
I don’t know what I’ll find once I open it, but I need to be ready.
Prepared for anything. I might have numerous cuts all over me, but I’m not dead yet.
I’m not even half-dead. Whatever it is, I can do it. I have to.
My hand reaches for the door knob, and I hold my breath as I twist it and push it open. What I see when I step through catches me so off-guard, all I can do for a moment or two is stare.
No more dim, flickering lights. No more traps.
Just a wide-open kitchen space, which immediately tells me that horror movie maze was in someone’s basement.
But, of course, it’s not the fancy kitchen that calls my attention the most. Nope.
That honor belongs to the person sitting at a nearby table, sipping from a mug like he’s right where he’s meant to be.
Like he’s at home.
Fucking Professor Scott.