Chapter Thirteen

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A few minutes later, Hailey, the stranger, and I all rushed down the blank hallways. This time Hailey was in the lead. The stranger and I followed her down hallways at a hurried pace, but not the breakneck pace we had been going before.

Our destination?

My grand plan goes like this; water has to come from somewhere and leave through something, right? All water pipelines have to connect to the sewage somewhere...right? And considering the amount of water a place as large as this uses, I will willing to bet that the connecting sewage was fairly large...maybe even large enough for someone to crawl though. At least, that's what I was hoping.

The plan was that the stranger and I were going to crawl through those sewage pipes, but Hailey was staying here. She had tried to argue against that, but both the stranger and I thought it was better if she stayed, but for different purposes. While the stranger just didn't trust her and would prefer to not have to look after another person, I liked the thought of having someone that I knew, if that entirely trusted, on the inside, to make sure that Jordan is okay. She very reluctantly agreed. But there was still something I wanted to know...

I pulled ahead of the stranger, until I was sneaking alongside Hailey. "When I last saw you, you seemed content to be the scientists lapdog. What made you change your mind?"

She paused briefly, her steps faltering for a second, before she resumed walking. "I never changed my mind. I wasn't ever with those bastards in the first place." Sighing, she glanced over to me as I walked beside her. "Before I got this job, I never knew what they did here. In fact, even several days into the job, I still didn't know. They kept me oblivious, naive, weak. Until you came along, and the truth started dawning. I saw through their pretty disguises, starting to see all their lies and deceptions. And even worse...all their hellish deeds. These people..." She paused and her eyes roamed the hallway, burning and angry. When she continued, her voice was filled with fire. "These people are playing the hand of God, and they will be burned for it."

The conviction in her voice almost made me believe her, and I half expected the hand of God to descend from the ceiling panels to crush the very building around me, destroying all these monsters and their creators. But of course that didn't happen, and I shrugged off the feeling and tuned back in to reality.

"We will be burned for it," she added softly. So soft, in fact, that I thought I hadn't heard her right. But when she abruptly turned towards me, stopping in the middle of the hallway, her eye's full of so many different emotions, regret and remorse most of all, I knew that I hadn't. "I did some terrible things, things I will have to live with now..." She hesitates, as if waging an internal battle. I guess she must have come to some conclusion, because she continues. "Listen, you need to know-."

But before she could even utter the words that she though were so important, a drawling voice interrupted us. "Well, as sweet as this little conversion has been, we really need to get going."

I spun on the stranger, glaring at him, but it was already to late. Hailey nodded, and quickly resumed her pace. "You're right. We need to leave."

Frustrated, I followed them down the hallway. What had she been about to tell me? Was it about the experiments, the cells, the place we were being held prisoner in? Sadly, I didn't think I would ever get the chance to know, because as we rounded the next corner, Hailey stopped in front of a plain, unmarked door. The stranger and I kept watch as she quickly punched in the security codes, and then we slithered into the darkness beyond, closing the heavy door behind us.

A sight unlike any I have ever seen before assaulted my eyes. First of all, the room beyond was huge. I mean, the place stretched for what seemed like miles. Second, the entire floor was covered in row after row of shelves. Now these weren't normal shelves either; they stretched almost to the ceiling, and were covered with varying forms, all draped with white sheets as if to hide what was under them. We were crowded on a tiny overhanging stairway, raised just high enough for us to be able to see over the rows of shelves. As we slowly descended the stairs, I couldn't help feeling like I was slowly drowning in the mouth of a giant monster. I felt puny looking up at the countless looming shelves.

How where we expecting to find anything in this giant mess?

"Okay," I mummered, turning to Hailey. "Where too?"

"Umm..." For some strange reason, she looked just as lost as me. "I don't really know. I haven't actually been in here before." ...Or maybe not so strange. She hurried on before I could start to panic. "But don't worry! I know they sewage drain is somewhere in here. The place is so large, so I had to study a map before I even started working. It's one of the requirements of the job."

A hopeless feeling filled my chest as I turned back to look at the rows of looming shelves. It would take us forever to find the sewage drain in all this, not to mention the dark, which just makes it worse. "Okay..." I took a deep breath. "Then we need to go off of the things we do know."

"Sewage smells," the stranger added helpfully, and I barely restrained the urge to glare at him.

"Yeah, thanks for the obvious, stranger," I muttered. My feet shifted over the ground and my eyes roamed, looking for anything, any mark or flutter or, hell, even drop of water, to help me out. Yet again, my eyes found the ceiling.

...The ceiling that was covered entirely with pipes and wires.

"Got you." I faced Hailey and the stranger again, that ghosting smile back on my lips. They had started to drift in different directions, but they both paused when I said, "The pipes. They must connect to the water drainage somewhere. We just have to follow them."

Hailey mumbled, "Good idea," and started to walk down one isle, following a pipeline on the ceiling. But the stranger hesitated. "Which one do we follow?" This caused Hailey to pause, and scurry back to us.

I was at a lost. The pipes were to far away for me to be able to see if they were labeled, and there were literally thousands of interlocking pipelines, all heading in different directions. I racked my brain, trying to think of some way to tell them apart. Wait...weren't the water pipelines in the utility room before blue? "The water pipelines will be blue. Just find those and follow them." Back as I looked back at the ceiling, I realized the problem with that. The room was dark, and in the dark, all of the pipes looked the same light gray color. Frustrated now, I buried my hands in my hair, trying to think.

"Great idea, except for the fact that it's dark, tiger." The strangers sneering voice pried its way into my brain. Annoyance flared, and I spun on the stranger... only to stumble as painful needles pricked into my brain. My vision went dark, before flaring back twice as strong. It was happening again. The strange blackout sessions and the even stranger moments of pure sensual intake. But this time, I was thankful for it. As I looked up again, the room spun into intense focus, every detail contrasting sharply clear. The dark was suddenly lifted, and as I looked towards the ceiling, I could plainly see the larger, blue pipes that held rushing water, which resounded to my suddenly keen ears. "This way." My voice sounded strange to my ears, deeper and suddenly filled with confidence.

Without giving the others time to object, I hurried off down an aisle, eyes glued to the ceiling as I tracked the pipe. I heard the others footsteps as they followed. We were halfway through the maze of shelves, the sound of water faintly trickling to my ears, when the door leading to the hallway banged open. I didn't need the superpowered senses to know that. Even as the banging door sounded in my ears as sharply as a gunshot, the light that suddenly flooded the darkness of the ceiling was enough to make us realize that they were coming. We each exchanged a single glance, and as one, we all started running.

The guards boots and monotone commands ringing from seemingly everywhere, we dashed through the maze of shelves. It soon became obvious, though, that we wouldn't be able to outrun them. We were only three people, all on the same path, and from what I could hear, there seemed to be at least a dozen, if not more, guards. And they were all spread out, cycling through the room several rows at a time. At this rate, they would find us before we had even reached three fourths of the room. Time for a plan change.

Grabbing both Hailey and the strangers hands, I ducked quickly into the shelve beside me. Pulling the white sheet up, I waved for them to get beneath it, then, glancing quickly at the ever growing light in the isle over from ours, I followed. We huddled beneath the harp, staring at the material, all watching as a small, steadily glowing light grew closer and closer. My breath was trapped in my chest as the guards flashlight shown from right outside of the tarp. An eternity seemed to pass before the guard continued down the isle. I waited until the light faded, the guards soft footfalls growing fainter, before turning towards the others. "Come on, let's..." But my voice faded as I saw what was behind them.

They looked to where I was looking, eyes following my gaze. "That's...creepy," Hailey breathed.

"Yeah."

The entire shelf behind them was covered in toys, piles and piles of them, all broken or burnt. I saw a yo-yo with no string, a hand puppet that was in tatters, baby doll with her hair in crisps and one eye missing, each item getting worse and worse. What was a pile of children's toys doing in a place like this? Just looking at them made me shudder, and I was about to turn away, to dismiss the crazy sight, when one toy in particular caught my eye. It was a small stuffed bear, it's nose fibers unraveling and it's button eye loose and dangling onto its cheek. It was ripped in several places, the stuffing falling out. And yet, I couldn't shake the feeling that it was familiar to me. That I knew it from somewhere...

A sudden memory flashed across my mind, of this bear, full and brand new looking, with its eye and stuffing still intact, being held in the small, pale arms of a toddler. Along with the memory came a wash of some kind of sweet smell. The memory fled just as fast as it came, leaving me with just the reminder of cinnamon. I lifted my hand slowly, my brow furrowing, trying to place the strange memory. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the others staring at me, Hailey with a look of confusion masking her features, and the stranger... he was just staring, face stone-like. My fingers brushed the bears matted fur...

Suddenly, the bear toppled from the pile, knocking several toys down in its path. They tumbled to the ground with a crash. Among those toys was a metal train, the surface melted and distorted. When it hit the ground, the tiny thing kicked on, wheels turning sluggishly and a sound like a drunk whistle blowing from it. All of us froze in panic for an moment, before the stranger swiftly bent down and swiped the train, burying the sound box in the fabric of his sleeve as he searched for an off button. Apparently not finding one, he opted for a different method. He threw the thing on the ground, making another loud bang, and stomped it with his boot. The already ruined metal caved in under his heel, and, after a final breathy blow, the train died and all was once again quiet.

The world seemed to freeze, everyone holding their breath. And than, all at once, it exploded. Shouts sounded from all around us, feet stomping as multiple pairs of boots headed in the same direction as one. Time to go. We all tumbled from under the tarp and ran. I was in the lead, making sure to occasionally glance at the ceiling to be sure we were going the right way. I cut a quick corner, feeling the others close on my heels.

Only to almost smash headfirst into a guard hiding in the darkness.

It was a gut reaction. Before the guard had even had time to realize who we were and fire his weapon, I brought up my hands, grabbed the raised muzzle of the gun, and snatched it from his hands. Using my momentum, I swung the gun, handle first, over my head and smashed it into his helmet. The helmet shattered, the glass from the visor flying, pieces shredding into the guards face and eyes. His surprisingly young face. He fell to the ground, drops of blood mingling with the shattered helmet and running through his fingers as he covered his eyes, yowling. I raised the bent (bent?!?) metal of the gun and smashed him upside the head again. He fell silent, knocked unconscious. For a second, all I could do was stare at the gun as I held it, completely shell shocked and revolted by what I just did. Sure, he deserved it, having been working alongside the scientists and helping kill young children, even if he didn't physically do any killing. Still... the guy was undoubtedly blind now, and it was all my fault.

I was knocked out of it by the sound of more footsteps, growing steadily closer. Throwing the now useless gun aside, I stepped over the guards prone body and continued down the dark aisle. The guards were right on our heels, flashing lights swinging all over and occasionally throwing light onto the dark ceiling, allowing the others to see brief shots of the pipes. Most importantly, the large blue water pipe.

Eyes glued to the ceiling, we sped around corners, down long, seemingly endless aisles. Our hearts pounding, legs pumping, my hair flying out behind me like an endless curtain. The bottoms of my bare feet start to ache from smacking the hard linoleum. I don't stop. I can't stop. For Jordan's sake.

And for my own.

We were almost there. I could see the wall that the pipe slithered down, disappearing behind it into the room beyond. Just one more stretching aisle, a few more meters. My body was already stretching forward, ready to grip the handle of the door. Ready to grip the handle to freedom. Hope filed my heart, hope for freedom and life and normality. Hopeless wishes, really. My life would never be normal.

Maybe that's why it came as such a shock when my view of the glorious handle was suddenly filled with flashing bright lights, dozens of tiny bobbing suns to my ultra sensitive eyes. I barely stopped myself from crashing headfirst into them. My feet skidded as I dug in my heels to stop, and automatically turned back around. The path back, though, was also filling with guards. I froze, unable to go anywhere. The stranger, Hailey, and I all stood back to back as the guards continued to move closer, their tas-guns trained on our chests. Hopelessness and frustration burned through my body. We couldn't have gotten this far, done this much, for nothing.

The guards monotone voices rung out as one, "You are surrounded. Drop to the ground and put your hands behind your head."

The guards multiple flashlight looked like the eyes of a ginormous monster, the guards moving shadows behind them like its oil filled body. The personification of my childhood horror, a nightmare come to life. A sudden, all consuming blind terror, unlike any I have felt before, surged through my brain, crashing through all of my defenses like they were nothing more than paper walls, splashed its way through my entire body as I dropped to my knees along with the others.

I couldn't go back.

I refused to go back.

I won't go back.

I WON'T GO BACK!!

Without warning, the shelves around us started to shake violently, tarps fluttered, the items trapped beneath shaking. Things started to fall from the shelves, raining down onto the guards heads. Books and papers and toys and dishes, random objects that were, for some odd reason, stashed here in this forgotten room. The guards broke from their foundation, looking about in wonder and confusion, avoiding or not avoiding the items as they fell. A tarp fluttered down, landing on top of the heads of the group of guards in front of us. Seeing our chance, I grasped the wrists of the two people beside me and ran, shooting like a rocket past the floundering guards. The guards behind us shouted, and started to give chase, and the sound of weapons firing resounded into the chamber. I felt a dart glaze my shoulder, and I pushed faster. A sudden creak made me look up. The shelve beside me was slowly bending, falling down towards the ground, bringing with it immanent death. Breath lancing painfully from my chest, I focused on the door at the end of the isle. Ignoring the guards and the guns and the flying objects and the looming crushing shelf.

With a crash, the shelf fell. We just cleared it. I actually felt the brush of the metal smack my back, pushing me forward. We all fell face first onto the floor. Dust billowed around us, making me choke and hack, feeling as if my already sore lungs were burning. As the dust settled back down, I pushed myself back onto my knees, eyes on the wreckage that was once an aisle. The entire thing had collapsed, falling in on itself as if it had no nails to hold it up in the first place. The rubble was still. Nobody was under there. Nobody alive, anyway. Right at my feet was a tas-gun, and attached to that was an arm, and attached to that was...nothing. Just a pile of growing blood. Horror filled my body. So many people...dead. Just like that. The worse part? I had a sinking suspicion that I was the one that had caused it.

Just like that, my brain shut off, my overrunning senses snapping back to dull reality.

Shaking, exhausted, bruised, and beaten, I bent to pick up the tas-gun. The smooth metal glowed white under my hand. I let my fingers trail over the surface for a few moments, letting my mind reveal in the fact that I was now in control of the very thing I had feared so for many years, and not on the scene inches from my feet. Then, in a blast of movement, I spun on my heel, raised the gun, and fired at Hailey.

The dart pierced her shoulder, and she dropped to the ground with a cry. The stranger backed away, eyes wide, wearily watching me. I threw the gun away and crouched down to Hailey. "I'm sorry about that, but they weren't going to believe you if you weren't injured. That's why I'm also sorry about this."

With that, I raised my foot and smashed it into her head, knocking her out cold. A wound opened up on her upper eyebrow where my foot had connected, the skin around it already turning purple and bruised. She wasn't alone. My toes ached where they had connected with her skull, and I knew they would probably be bruised also. I leap up and strode to the door, yanked on the handle, and opened the door, glancing back over my shoulder at the still frozen stranger. He was staring at me with a quirked brow, a shadow of shock in his eyes. In reply, I quirked my own brow back at him and snapped, "Are you coming? Or am I leaving without you?"

He grunted and followed me

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