I burst into my old house, the door hitting against the wall. I kicked it closed, stumbling into the kitchen. The mask landed on the kitchen table as I grabbed a glass from the cabinet. Flicking on the water faucet, I filled it with water. I hadn’t had water in so long, so I downed the entire glass in a matter of seconds. I rummaged around the drawers, looking for something to eat. No one had been in this house in ages, so most of the food was either mouldy or stale. Eventually, I found a jar of peanut butter and uncooked rice. Delicious. I can’t wait for this meal. It would be like chunky peanut butter, if the chunks were uncooked rice. I dumped the peanut butter into a bowl and poured some rice on top of it. With a fork, I stirred it together and took a bite. It was surprisingly crunchy. I ate the rest of the bowl, not paying much attention to the taste. I was hungry, I would have eaten nearly anything.
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When I finished my ‘food’, I wandered through the house, looking at all the things I remembered from Before. Before Reaper, before floor 50, before everything. I looked at pictures and books, items randomly thrown around because no one cleaned them up. A board game played halfway, never to be finished. A dead plant in the corner because there was no one to water it. A glass of water, with the water inside still moving from whoever placed it down. Cobwebs and dust in every corner. I needed a double take with the glass of water. That wasn’t mine, I left it in the kitchen. This had been someone else’s. And it was still moving, so they must have touched it recently. Next to the glass were a few crumbs. Someone was here, and they had been eating and drinking in this exact spot not too long ago. “Hello?” I called. “Who’s there? I’m not here to hurt you, I’d just like to know who you are. I can help.” I heard someone shush someone else. I walked around the corner, looking down the hallway with Mariah’s old bedroom and the laundry room. “Hello?” I took a step past the door to Mariah’s room. I barely had a chance to look in before someone brought me to the ground with a knife to my neck.
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My knees gave out as I was slowly lowered to the ground by whoever held the knife. I squeezed my eyes shut, sure that I was going to be killed. “Elias. Look at me,” she commanded. I opened one eye. Maggie stood over me. Jasmine, Melissa, and Juliet were standing in the room as well. “Who was the person who taught us how to play my favourite card game?” Maggie asked, eyes blazing. “What?” I said, trying to move away from the blade. “Answer my question,” she demanded, lightly touching my skin with the knife, just so I could feel the cold metal. “Um, it was, er, Caryn. At camp.” Maggie moved the knife away. I rubbed my neck and sat up. “What was that for?” I asked her. “We needed to be sure you weren’t a… a fake,” Maggie said. “Did you need to do that with a knife to my neck? You could have killed me!” I shouted. “Look, I’m sorry. It’s just a precaution we needed to take,” she said as she folded away the blade and tucked it into her pocket.. “Okay. Yeah, I… I overreacted. My bad,” I said with a sigh. “We’re just glad you’re safe,” Jasmine said, placing a hand on my shoulder. Melissa was holding a touchpad, reading something. “Hey, I'm sure everyone is happy to see Elias, but we need to head back,” she said, lowering the device.
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Jasmine smiled, then followed Maggie and Melissa out of the room, leaving me alone with Juliet. “Hi, Elias.You came back to me, just like you promised. You weren’t too far away,” she said, hugging me around my waist. “Of course I did. How did you get here?” I asked. “I ran away from the big fight. It was scary. I didn’t want to hurt anyone, so I needed to go away.” She looked up at me with wide, glossy eyes. “I didn’t mean to be mean. I hurt people. I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t stop. I was really mean, Elias. Really, really mean. But I didn’t want to be mean to you. So I ran away and hid here.” Juliet was crying now. She sniffed and continued. “”Then, the nice ladies found me, and made me nice again. They gave me a cookie.” So that’s where the crumb had come from. “Juliet, which did you mean by, ‘you didn’t want to be mean to me’?” I asked. “I was mean to your friend. Do you ‘member?” I took a quick breath. Juliet was the demon who killed Jake. I bent down and hugged her. “It’s okay,” I whispered as she cried. “You’re not mean. I came back for you. I'll keep you safe.”
“Promise?” she asked. “I promise. I’ll keep you safe, always and forever.” She nodded and wiped her eyes.”Come on,” I said. “Let’s go find the nice ladies.” Juliet reached out her arms, and I scooped her up, walking into the hallway. Looking down the hall, I saw Melissa standing in the doorway of the laundry room.
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Poking my head into the room, I saw exactly what you would expect. A washer and dryer, an ironing board, a drying rack. And a massive, open part of the wall, revealing a damp passage. I pointed at the hole with the hand that wasn’t supporting Juliet. “How long has there been an underground tunnel leading into my laundry room?” I asked in shock. Melissa smiled. “Well, how long ago did we start building the base?” she asked. “I believe it was a few years ago, wasn’t it?” Jasmine answered, looking around the edge of the opening. Melissa turned back to me. “A few years, then.”
“And why am I only finding out about it now?” Melissa shrugged. “Let’s get going. We need to get back ASAP.” She climbed into the tunnel. Then Maggie and Jasmine climbed up after her. I placed Juliet inside, then stepped up the two and a half foot wall. Jasmine pushed a large button, and the wall slid closed.
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The tunnel was lit by staggered fluorescent lights, making some areas very bright, and others barely lit. Juliet climbed onto my back after a few minutes of silent walking. She was having trouble keeping up. She fell asleep as I carried her, her head resting against the base of my neck. As we walked, I talked to Melissa and Jasmine about what had happened on floor fifty. “All of a sudden, I was actually there. I wasn’t a projection. I was real, and then I escaped, and now I’m here. I was gone from the room at the base. How?” I asked. Melissa flicked through a few things on her touchpad before turning it off. “We don’t know. That has never happened before. We’ve been doing projections for a few months, and nothing has ever gone wrong like that. Though, this was our first time trying it on a camera outside of T.R.I.B.A.U.M.'s network.” I stopped dead in my tracks. “I’m sorry, what?” Melissa clicked her tongue, and looked over to Jasmine. “We were never given a good opportunity to test it, and we didn’t anticipate anything like this happening,” Jasmine explained. “But that’s not a reason to have me risk my life, as well as the lives of everyone inside the Brick. Speaking of, was that whole ‘exploding the Brick’ thing you guys?” I asked, checking the volume of my voice to be sure I didn’t wake up a certain someone. “Yes, it was,” Melissa said. “Why, then? Why did you try to blow up the Brick?” I asked, exasperated. “Oh, we didn’t just try. We did blow up the Brick,” she replied, showing me an image on the touchpad. It was a live video feed, showing where the Brick was. Or, used to be. Now, it was just a pile of debris, with a few metal poles sticking up out of the ground. Everything was gone. All of the demons were somewhere in Salef, the Elite were either dead or scattered.
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That reminded me of Eliet. His mask. It was still in the kitchen. I turned around, looking back the way we’d come. The end of the tunnel was barely visible. “Don’t worry. We’re sending a group back tomorrow to scout out the house, as well as parts of Boulevard. We want to get trackers on as many demons and Elite as possible,” Jasmine said, noticing my concern. I nodded, and kept walking. Maggie was quite a bit ahead of us. She looked back to Jasmine, Melissa, and me, waiting for us to catch up. When we did, Maggie tapped her ear, where an earpiece was placed. “Yeah, I’ll relay it now. Em-Be, out.” She turned to us. “Jasmine, you and Juliet need to hang back for a bit. I’ll send a transport to come pick you up soon. Elias, Melissa and I need to get back. Within the hour,” she reported. My gaze flicked between everyone. “Wha… why? What’s going on?” I asked as Jasmine sat down on the ground. I set down Juliet, letting her lay down and rest her head in Jasmine’s lap. She stroked the sleeping child’s hair as Maggie pulled Melissa away. They were still within earshot when Maggie said, “Can you tell him? I really don’t want to. This is going to destroy him.” Melissa nodded and approached me. “Elias, something’s happened. This has been the situation for about two months. We weren’t sure when, or how to tell you this. Something happened to Mariah.” I let out a shaky breath. “Lead the way, then,” I said. When Melissa and Maggie didn’t start walking, I shouted, “Now! I need to see her.” We started running through the tunnel.154Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsTgKmodps1
