Chapter 7

Time: Saturday, December 22, 2018 3:52 PM

They had a very quiet and somber ride back through Red Mall. They passed by the Dress Barn briefly and retrieved the note Mark had left at Ace Hardware, and then they headed for the surface complex that was strangely starting to feel like home. The team members looked a bit surprised when Mark asked them not to leave any indication they were passing through the Dress Barn, but they complied without comment.

Once in the circular well, Mark looked at his phone and noted the time at 3:52 PM. He raced up to the top and did a critical survey of the sky. It was still cloudy, but the rain had stopped, and he thought the sky had the typical lighting pattern of being twenty minutes before sunset, right on schedule. He breathed a huge sigh of relief. Everything in this place seemed so crazy, but at least the rest of the universe seemed okay.

Meanwhile Jada was fitting the door to the mall with a Kryptonite lock. Emily stood next to her wondering what she was doing but decided not to comment. She said instead, “Just think, twenty-four hours ago we were peacefully driving along Lost Nation Road. It seems like an eternity ago.”

“Yeah...” Jada turned and saw Mark returning to the bottom of the well. She called out to him, “This last lock is a perfect fit. Want to test it?” The lock Jada had chosen had a thick 3-cm thick core of hardened steel, and it was a precision fit to the thick eye-bolt just above the door handle. With the lock in place, the door couldn’t move a micron.

Mark removed the lock and walked through the door, then Jada locked the door again behind him. He tried the door and felt nothing but a solid wall. There was not even a faint click. A moment later Jada let him out. The rest of the group looked at them wondering why they were doing this, but no one asked any questions.

The door issue resolved, the group left their bikes at the bottom of the stairwell and retired to the lounge. It had been an exciting day, and the comfort of their temporary home was very welcome. Mark sat by the western windows overlooking the sand park and announced he was going to watch the unfolding of twilight and see if there were anything unusual about it. Emily got busy analyzing the data she had collected. The others got busy plugging in their phones for additional charging and using the three Leophones to call 911 again.

Madison was the first to try. “Hey everybody, listen to this!” she yelled. She put her phone on speakerphone and redialed 911. A recorded voice said, “Due to unprecedented call volume, the Skylands network is currently unable to place your call. Please try again later, and please limit your dialing to emergencies and other essential calls. Please keep calls brief, otherwise time limits will become mandatory.”

“Holy shit!” shouted Hannah, using language very untypical for her. “It’s not just us. The rest of the world seems to be having strange times too!”

Ashley stared at Hannah and shouted back, “And did you notice they didn’t bother with an error code? That’s downright ominous!”

Jada sat down by Mark’s side on the sofa. “What do you think it means, Mark? Sounds like a widespread problem to me.”

He nodded. “Unprecedented call volume? Yeah...”

Fatima came over and stood before them. “I did a brief inspection of the lounge. I’ve found something new, something interesting.”

“Someone’s been here?!” Jada asked with a raised voice.

“Huh? Oh no, sorry, Jada. I didn’t mean to be misleading. The blue numbers on the elevator display, they’re now reading 029:108.” She sat down on the other side of Mark.

Jada blinked. “Ah ... Last night they were, what, 037:112 I think.”

Fatima nodded. “After I took my ride here, I thought the numbers might represent the number of men and women that came to the parties. When my group of thirteen came through the elevator, the numbers changed from 032:094 to 036:103, and there where four men with us. It was also the right ratio for what I saw in the tunnel.”

Mark added, “That’s consistent with what my group did. We pushed it from 36:107 to 37:110.”

Ashley was listening from nearby. “Mark, that means there must have been another four women who came to parties, sometime between Fatima’s ride and ours. I wonder which party they went to.”

“It wasn’t It’s My Party,” said Fatima. “I would have seen them.”

Jada finished the thought. “And Emily and I pushed the numbers to 37:112, the final total of 149. We were definitely the last ones to ride. Our trip barely managed to meet the deadline.” She frowned. “What are we saying? Do we really think the elevator could count not just the number of people but also count by sex?”

Mark shrugged. “It’s not that far fetched. Facial recognition software could do that easily.”

Jada frowned. “So we were being scanned. I guess I’m not surprised.”

“The point,” said Fatima, “is how should we interpret the current value of 29:108, a total of 137? I’m thinking perhaps twelve people have managed to find their way out of here.”

“Interesting conjecture,” said Mark. “Sounds reasonable.”

“Pleasant conjecture,” said Jada. “Too pleasant. Without evidence of what it means, it’s dangerous for us to be optimists.”

“Dangerous?” Fatima tilted her head. “What do you mean?”

“If we indulge in pleasant fantasies, we’ll let down our guard.” Jada gave a deep frown. “This place gives me the creeps. For all we know, we are all being hunted down by bug-eyed monsters. Perhaps the bugs have already bagged their first dozen meals.”

“Uh...” Fatima laughed nervously, “Well, yeah, that’s true. I keep reminding myself not to make assumptions about this place.”

Jada nodded and tried dialing 911. She waited a minute and tried again. Fatima gave Mark a friendly pat on his leg and got up and went over to talk with Emily. Mark leaned back on the sofa and also tried dialing the police. He kept a close eye on the time and a critical eye on the evening sky as twilight fell.

Time: 4:31 PM

“So, fearless leader,” said Emily as she plopped herself down close by Mark’s side. “I hope you’re enjoying the views of the evening.”

He grinned. “As a matter of fact, I am. Sunset was right on schedule, and the twilight is falling at just the right rate. Yep, very enjoyable.”

Emily looked around. Hannah had been sitting by Mark a moment before but had wandered into the kitchen muttering something about dinner. Emily sat in her place and asked quietly, “My gosh, Mark. Alien abduction to another planet? Are you really worried about that?”

Mark shrugged and tried to hide how uncomfortable the question made him. “Well, if you put it like that, no, I guess not.”

Emily’s eyes shifted to her sketchbook. “Want to see some numbers?”

Mark gave her a happy smile. “Spiral numbers? I saw you busy with your calculator. Sure, what have you got?”

Emily opened her sketchbook onto Mark’s lap. But before Mark could study her work, Emily put her hand over it and said with a grin, “So, let’s see what kind of mathematician you are, Mr. Two-And-A-Half-Years-In-College! Just from your observations in the mall, what kind of spiral are we working with here?”

Mark grinned. “Ah, I love a good math challenge. Okay!” He thought for a long moment. “Not an Archimedes spiral. For a fixed displacement along the path of the spiral, that would have the delta-r on an asymptote to zero. We definitely weren’t seeing that.”