Chapter 94

Time: Friday, August 8, 2019 12:13:17 PM GHT

Jessica whimpered in the pitch darkness. Just a few seconds ago she had slid herself closed inside the bottom closet drawer, and the instant after the drawer closed it seemed to bump and start to slide out again. Only this time the closet was in absolute darkness and the air completely still. Jessica groped for a moment along the floor until her hand found an air duct. Nothing.

Did she cause all this? The closet went dark the instant she closed herself in the drawer. The timing seemed too perfect to be a coincidence. So the closet shuts down when there’s no one inside. That makes sense. So what’s the big deal? Jessica paused. So why weren’t the lights back on now?

Ricardo could be opening her door at any moment. Jessica fought down a rising tide of panic and tried to think. “How does the closet sense someone is in the room? What would explain the air and lights being off now? Why can’t the closet see me?” The answer came to her in a flash. “Of course! Once the closet is empty and the door is closed, why keep the sensors running? I bet the sensors are turned off until the door opens again. The system isn’t expecting people to enter the closet through the drawers! This is so obvious!”

But how should she proceed? How much time did she have? Every second was precious. Ricardo would murder her if he could. Jessica had seen her death warrant in his mind, signed by his fear and hatred of her. How would he kill her? Jessica shuddered and thought he might pick strangulation. It was so easy to imagine. Jessica forced to lie prone on the floor, Ricardo’s knees digging into her back, his incredibly powerful hands at her throat. He’d work the bruising of her neck tissues for a long time, trying not just to kill her but to humiliate her. Jessica’s eyes went wide in the darkness. Would he mount and fuck her as he choked her? What could be more humiliating than that? Yes, Ricardo’s ultimate power trip. She had to escape! But how?

Back in the drawer? Once inside, could she try to keep the drawer closed by pressing backwards against the top? Probably. But how long would it take for Ricardo to check here? A half hour? More perhaps if he were being very thorough. Of course, if he were checking every drawer, Jessica was doomed away. Maybe she should ... Should what? Should she try to flee? Was that her best chance?

No! She’d walk right into the monster! Her best chance was here. But the air wasn’t flowing. And Jessica was breathing and would keep breathing even in her drawer. The CO2 buildup would kill her eventually, and if Ricardo opened the door and noticed the stale air, the game would be lost. Just returning to the drawer wasn’t an option. What to do? Flee outside? Again her mind screamed no at the thought.

Jessica needed to get the air flowing again! Of course! Just open the door a crack and the sensors should pick up her presence again. Close the closet door, get back into the drawer and close it to within a centimeter, just enough to watch the closet door. The instant the handle started to move, Jessica would close herself in and hold the drawer closed until she was just about to pass out from the CO2. Then she would open the drawer and hope. It was her best chance.

She felt her way over to the door and found its handle. She turned the handle slowly, hoping this motion alone would turn on the lights and air so she wouldn’t have to actually open the door, but the lights remained off. Bracing herself for a burst of bright light, Jessica slowly opened the door.

And the light never came. Incredibly the corridor outside the closet was without power too. Jessica would have to rethink her assumptions. “Two days ago when we first entered this building, all the power was off. It’s happened again! What should I do?!”

The child Jessica inside Jessica’s newly integrated mind screamed for aggressive action. If their fate was to be murdered while being raped, the child definitely did not want to go meekly into the night and start the ordeal by being pulled out of a drawer. Jessica’s adult mind agreed, and she took a moment to return to her drawer and remove her almonds before closing the drawer. Then she slipped into the corridor as quietly as she could and closed the door behind her.

After a moment of tense listening and hearing only silence, Jessica sat down in the darkness and took off her boots, her socks too which she tucked into the boots, and she hung her boots around her neck. She would walk in bare feet, and as for the boots, well, it was a very cold calculation. Ricardo would use them as a garrote if he caught her, and Jessica hoped he would misjudge how effective the laces could be. She would much rather die quickly under the laces than slowly under his terrible fingers.

Jessica would try to work herself away from the dead end she was trapped in. Her direction was obvious. But which side of the corridor to follow? The convention for her would be to stay to the right and let Ricardo pass on the left, and Jessica decided Ricardo would think so too so she needed to reverse the logic. Or should she double reverse it and stay to the right? No. She pressed up against the wall on her left and walked as silently as she could, taking slow breaths and focusing her ears to the very limits of her abilities. Realistically she thought her odds for surviving the next hour were slim, but they weren’t zero. She was going to try her absolute best.

Meanwhile, approximately 12 km south and 22 km east at the Yellow Mall home complex.

Toshi, Farideh and Peggy had spent several minutes testing their dead library consoles and elevator and Leophones, and then a bit more time inspecting the first floor rooms as they passed. By the time they reached the circular staircase, they saw Mark and Holly at the bottom of the well already returning from the spiral mall. The stairwell area was brightly lit from the transparent dome above, but Toshi could see the entrance to the Farmer’s Market store below and it was leading to pitch darkness.

Holly touched Mark’s arm and pointed out the three people descending the stairs. She called out and tried to add a bit of levity to reduce her tension. “So, who ordered this?”

Toshi cracked a quick smile as she and Farideh and Peggy joined up with Mark and Holly. “Yeah. We checked just about everything on the first floor, no power anywhere. How about the mall?”

“About what we expected,” said Mark. “The entry store is dark, the spiral too. Thank God for Carla and her foresight.” Mark was referring to a mall store Carla and Tom had raided shortly after returning from the equatorial pyramid. It was called Captain Dave’s Survival Center and located about three kilometers from the Dutch Market, White Mall’s terminal store. Inside the survival center were cases of flashlights with built-in mini generators, bright white diodes powered by hand cranks and ordinary Earth-type rechargeable batteries. Several of these flashlights were now positioned at every critical mall position.

Farideh tilted her head up and looked at the orange sunlight at the top of the stairwell and then spoke to their new member from Yellow Mall. “This happened to us once before Peggy, months ago while we were trapped. It was pitch dark in the basement and the air wasn’t flowing either. Unfortunately we were at the opposite end of our space from where our entrance door was, and we never thought to test it. We spent about fifteen minutes getting together and talking about what to do, and then the power came back on.”

Peggy nodded and added, “On our way down here we tested the door to the outside. We have access, so we have fresh air and a pool that is drinkable. This is MUCH better than being trapped in an airtight basement! But what should we do? Should we stay outside in case the door locks? Our food is on the inside, but the fresh air is on the outside. The windows don’t open, do they?”

“No, they don’t,” answered Holly. “But we have protocols for this. Don’t worry about the air. If we’re safe where we are, and we are, we are to remain in place for twenty-four hours. Our long-term rendezvous point is Green Mall’s home complex. We’ve built up extra supplies there. We’ve packed the pantry there with ready-to-eat packaged stuff that doesn’t need the null-time storage.”

Peggy looked thoughtful. “Bike all the way to Green Mall in the dark?”

“It shouldn’t be too bad,” replied Holly. She tried to sound optimistic. “We have the flashlights and we’ll take it slow. Just follow the spiral centerline and remember, safety first! We can’t afford any injuries.”

Peggy still looked skeptical. “Whoa. Bike seventy kilometers down a dark tunnel? That’s going to give me the creeps.”

Holly shrugged. “We won’t try it till tomorrow.”

Farideh spoke up. “Can we time twenty-four hours? I guess we can judge by the sun, but does anybody know how long the power’s been out?”

Mark reached into his pocket and pulled out a mechanical stopwatch. “Another present from Carla. We’ve been dark for thirteen minutes now.” He frowned. “Our last outage lasted fourteen minutes. We’re about to find out if this one will be longer.”

Meanwhile, twelve minutes ago (one minute after the outage) and approximately two kilometers west of Jessica’s position...

Ricardo was through slamming the console with his hand, but he was still fuming mad. So close! He had come so fucking close to forcing the console to recognize him as Security Director. So close! One minor error in the command format, and it should not have mattered. So close! And this was the prime window! His best chance! The next window would not open for another sixty-three days. Ricardo knew exactly what he needed to do now, but would he be alive in another sixty-three days? Ricardo took a deep breath and tried to think objectively, using the question to calm himself. Realistically, what were his chances?