Holes in the Ground (53 page)

The batling rose above his cohorts, looking down at them with pride. They stood beneath him as one single being: a legion.

“Yesss, I will lead you to a magnificent victory over the rancid hordes of humanity.”

There was a chorus of bloodthirsty growls, snarls, and hisses.

“We must leave this place—a place that has shackled you and your brethren for far too long. We must leave now and wreak our vengeance. We are the scourge. Let us return to our past glories.”

The army of beasts slithered, crawled, and stamped down the corridor of subbasement 1, heading towards the elevator shaft that would take them to the surface.

• • •

The ladder rattled and creaked with every step they took. Several times, Andy looked down at the terrifying drop beneath him, into the rising river of cement, and shuddered.

“We need to get a move on,” said Lucas. “I don’t much fancy taking a dip in that pool down there.”

“I’m going as fast as I can,” said Jerry from above them. “But exercise was never really my thing, you know?”

“Then perhaps you should have gone last, lad.”

“Cheers for that.”

“Don’t listen to him, Jerry,” said Andy. “You’re doing fine. Just keep going, one rung after the other.”

Jerry was huffing and puffing, gave no reply other than an affirmative grunt. He did, however, manage to pick up speed.

Andy focused on Sun, climbing the rungs just above him. He watched her regain her strength with every step, growing fitter rather than weaker like the rest of them. She was back to her determined self—back to the woman he married.

We have to get out of this place alive. I can’t watch her die.

After another two minutes of climbing, they neared a hatchway built into the side of the shaft.

“It’s the old maintenance hatch for subbasemnt 9,” said Nessie. “There should be one at each level. It will let us know how far much farther we have left.”

“Great,” said Andy. “So we have another eight levels to go?”

“No,” said Nessie. “We have eight subbasement levels plus the four other floors that house personnel and the Nucleus. We have another twelve floors in total until we reach the surface. Even then we have to deal with the fact that the shaft has been sealed at the top.”

“Let’s just concentrate on getting to the top,” Sun said, “before we worry about the next part.”

Everybody shut up and resumed their focused climbing. No sound existed inside the shaft, other than their laboured breaths and the soft pitter-patter of wet cement flowing beneath them. It was disconcerting.

Calm before the storm,
thought Andy.
Where is the batling? We can’t allow him to leave this place.

“Anybody got any charming tales to tell during this quite time of contemplation?” said Lucas. “Feels like if someone wished to unburden their souls, now would be a good time.”

“Giving a confession to the devil doesn’t sound like a good idea,” said Jerry. “Think I’ll pass.”

“Me too,” said Andy.

Sun let out a bitter laugh. “I did terrible things while under the influence of an ancient, malevolent being. I’m not even close to being in a place to talk about that just yet. First place I’ll go if I get out of here is therapy.”

Andy laughed. Therapy or not, he had hope that his wife would be okay. Not remembering her actions was a blessing.

“I’ll confess something,” said Nessie.

Everybody went silent.

“My dad was a terrorist. Emigrated to America from Belfast, but took his ties with him. I was just a little girl when he tried to blow up the British embassy in Boston. The car bomb went off, but somebody had parked a delivery van beside it, which dulled most of the blast. Seventeen people still died though, including a pregnant women one week away from maternity leave.”

“Wow,” said Jerry, breaking the silence that had fallen over everybody. “That’s…horrible.”

“Me and my mom were taken away and given new identities before the public could find out who we were and lynch us. My dad shot himself in a Dairy Queen parking lot before the police could capture him. When I kissed him goodbye that morning and went to school, I had no idea that I would never see him again—that I would never even be able to say his name again without my mom crying.”

“I’m sorry,” said Jerry. “I know what it’s like not to have a father, but I can’t imagine what that was like for you. Look how far you’ve come, though.”

“Yeah,” said Andy. “You should be proud of yourself.”

Nessie grunted. “Proud of myself for burying myself in a great big hole where the world can’t get at me? Truth is: I never got over what my father did. I threw myself into study, determined that I would somehow change the world. All it did, though, was lead me here.”

“You can still change the world,” said Sun. “But right now we need to stop the batling and his army from leaving this place. Do that and I guarantee you will save a lot more lives than your father took.”

“And whether or not it helps,” said Lucas. “The good Lord does not blame a man or woman for the sins of their fathers.”

“Thanks,” said Nessie. “It was nice just to get it off my chest. You people are the closest I’ve had to friends in…well, ever, really.”

“There’s another hatch up ahead,” said Jerry.

“Must be subbasement 8,” said Nessie. “Everyone still okay?”

Everyone groaned and nodded. Andy felt his calves cramping up and wondered if he could really make it all the way to the top. If he couldn’t then he was a dead man. They couldn’t even stop and rest as the cement was quickly filling the shaft beneath them.

Just ignore the pain. We have to keep going.

Another five minutes passed and they had ascended beyond subbasement 7 and started towards subbasement 6. Despite the cramps and tiredness in Andy’s calves, the pain was not progressing any further. If anything, the ache was turning to numbness. He started to feel hopeful that they could do this.

It wasn’t until they made it all the way to subbasement 1 that Andy began to have doubts.

The sound of chaos had returned.

Growls and snarls from animals that would not be found anywhere within the pages of National Geographic textbooks filled the corridor beyond the closed hatch.

Jerry stopped climbing, bringing the line to a halt. “Do you guys hear that?”

“Yes,” said Andy quietly. “Just keep going.”

Jerry nodded and continued upwards carefully.

So did everybody else.

It was Nessie that let them all down.

The assault rifle strapped around her neck swung back and forth as she climbed. Just as she passed by the maintenance hatch, the rifle butt struck against one of the steel rungs.

The hollow ring reverberated through the entire ladder, sounding almost like a church bell chiming.

Everybody froze.

The animal noises ceased.

A stretched-out moment of tense silence ensued. Andy could hear his heart beat in his chest. It pulsed in his eardrums.

The more time that passed, the more Andy was sure they’d gotten away with it. He waved his arm and signalled upwards. “Jerry, start moving again, but very very slow-”

The hatch burst open, the steel plate almost taking out Nessie as it flew into the shaft. A gap opened up in the wall, letting in a flood of light and, with it, a swarm of spiders.

They were the same as the ones they had seen earlier—many-legged monstrosities risen up from the blood and gore of carnage.

There were hundreds of them. And they could climb much faster than Andy could.

• • •

Jerry cried out. “Shit, man, what do we do? I can’t take anymore spiders.”

Andy swatted at a crawler on the wall of the shaft two feet away. “Just keep climbing. Fast as you can.”

Jerry started running up the ladder, his feet clattering on the rungs and making the entire ladder wobble.

Everyone began yelling out as the spiders swarmed on them, skittering around the walls of the shaft and surrounding them on all sides. Andy managed to swing his leg and crush one against the wall with the toe of his shoe, but doing so almost sent him slipping from the ladder. He was left with no choice but to concentrate on climbing. There was no choice but to ignore the relentless biting and scratching that drew blood from his flesh in a dozen places. He closed his eyes and ignored the feeling of glistening fangs opening up the back of his neck.

“These things are biting me,” said Nessie.

“No shit,” said Andy.

“Perhaps we should try biting them back,” Lucas suggested, as helpful as ever.

Andy took a firm grip on the ladder and allowed himself a quick shrug. He managed to dislodge the spiders that clung to him, but many more were ready to take their place.

“Look,” said Sun, pointing below them. “The cement is almost at the open hatch.

Andy looked down. The cement was steadily rising, only a few feet below the lower lip of the open hatch. Spiders were still scurrying through the opening, but they would be engulfed by cement soon. Andy also saw that the spiders he had just shrugged off were now thrashing beneath the surface of the cement, sinking to their doom.

“Everybody stop and fight,” said Andy. “We just have to hold them off a few more seconds. We need to deal with the ones already in the shaft.”

Everybody wrapped an arm around the ladder and held on tight. Then they kicked and flapped at the spiders, batting them down the shaft like some sort of hellish rainstorm.

The day it starts to rain spiders, just count me as done!

Andy felt blood running down the inside of his shirt; felt feverish from the mixture of pain and adrenaline. He was aware, however, of the relentless attacks reducing. The spider’s numbers were thinning out, and it was because the cement had now engulfed the hatch and cut off reinforcements. Andy and the others had only about ten feet of grace before the cement caught up with them.

A spider from above landed on Andy’s neck and hissed. He quickly batted it away into the consuming soup below. Several more followed as Andy kicked and swatted all around him.

The spiders were down to less than a dozen now. They ceased their attacks and seemed to be scuttling away to safety.

“Get moving again, Jerry. Quick as you can.”

With the needed boost of adrenaline, the line started moving upwards quicker than before. Each of them almost sprinted up the ladder, making only brief contact with each rung.

It was less than a minute when they passed by the maintenance hatch for level 4. They all slowed down and eyed the metal doorway suspiciously, each of them expecting, but praying otherwise, that the hatch would burst open like the previous one.

It did not.

“Come on,” said Andy. “Keep going. We’re almost at the top.”

He looked down into the shadows of the shaft below and could no longer even see the rising cement. They had gained a decent advantage, but a brief moment of dawdling could see that easily melt away.

They all kept moving, not stopping even as they passed by the other hatches. They made it all the way to level 2, where the Nucleus was located, when they were forced to stop.

“What is it?” Andy asked, squinting upwards. “Why have we stopped?”

“Because I just banged my bloody head,” came Jerry’s irritated reply. “The hatch stops here. It’s sealed tight.”

Andy focused his eyes and saw the ceiling. It was a vast sheet of metal attached to the shaft by thick rivets.

There was no getting through it.

“Looks like our happy trails end here,” said Lucas.

“We’re screwed,” said Nessie. We’re going to be stuck here until the cement catches up to us.”

“No,” said Andy. “We need to get through the hatch.”

“And go back inside with all of those monsters?” said Jerry. “We may as well let the cement get us.”

“We’re not going to stay here and die,” said Andy. He took a few steps down the ladder, prompting Lucas beneath him to move lower to accommodate him. There was a hatch on the wall between them.

“We have to get this open,” Andy said. “We’ll have to make our way through level 2 to the elevator and climb the shaft there. It will take us all the way to the surface.”

“And through a bucketful of nasties,” said Lucas. “But I would rather go down with my middle finger in the air, so I say it’s the best idea we have.”

Andy leaned away from the ladder, towards the hatch. “Help me get it open.”

Lucas reached out and grabbed a hold of an iron lever attached across the bottom. Andy grabbed a matching one above. Together they yanked the levers towards them.

There was the grinding of metal on metal and then the hatch loosened on its hinges. Andy grabbed the edge of the door and shoved it open, revealing the brightly lit room inside. It was filled with brooms and shelving units.

“It’s a store cupboard,” said Lucas. “Just what we needed. Now we can vacuum our way out of here.”

“Just get in there, Lucas. We don’t have long before the cement gets here.”

Lucas hopped off the ladder and landed inside the store cupboard. He immediately turned around and extended his arm to Andy.

Andy leapt from the ladder and fell into Lucas’s grasp.

The Irishman smiled. “You can have this hug for free, but the next one will cost ya.”

The two men waited in the hatchway as Sun, Nessie, and Jerry climbed down the ladder and leapt through the opening and into the cupboard. Once they were all inside, the small room was extremely cramped.

“Grab what you can,” said Andy, nodding at the various cleaning supplies.

Jerry grabbed a broom and removed the head. Nessie clipped a wrench to her belt as backup for her assault rifle. Andy still clutched his revolver, while Sun found herself two long necked screwdrivers which she wielded like a ninja. Lucas, as always, refused to select a weapon.

“Everyone ready?” Andy asked.

“Ready as we’ll ever be,” said Sun, grabbing him around the waist and snogging his face off.

Andy spluttered, lost his breath.

Lucas grinned. “Well, if we’re going to die, that’s the note to end on.”

Jerry and Nessie looked at one another sheepishly, seemed to blush.