Chapter 3

Monday Evening, April 20th

By the time I finished putting away my easel and the portrait of Imari that I'd started, it was past five-thirty. I still had to straighten up the art room, arranging the desks and chairs that had been pushed out of the way for the Art Club. That took another ten minutes and I couldn't believe my bad luck as I finally left the classroom, locking the door behind me.

The one person who didn't want to be there, was the last person to leave. Me!

As I walked through the deserted school, I didn't see another living soul. The faculty office was open and the lights were on, however, so I knew I wasn't alone in the building. Probably the janitor was making his rounds or something. It didn't matter, except I felt very annoyed with Imari for wasting my time. This was her job anyway, locking the art room after every meeting, not mine. She wanted to be in charge, but she'd made up some excuse and...

I narrowed my eyes at the key locker I'd just opened. There were a lot of them there and the hook labeled "Art Room" was empty and waiting for the key in my hand, but something else caught my eye. At the very end, a key hung from a hook that wasn't labeled.

Unlike the others, which were silver and shiny with constant use, this key was made of dull brass and oddly shaped. A skeleton key?

I removed it from the hook and tried to read the wooden tag attached to the key ring. It was smooth, the words almost worn completely away, but I could still make them out: "Basement SR" -- Basement Storage Room.

The school was empty. I glanced over my shoulder, looking around the faculty office, but I was alone. This could be my chance to check out that mysterious storage room and put an end to Saeki and her stupid stories about magic and demons and ceremonies. What had she said? Nothing is a truth or lie until you see it with your own eyes.

Now I had a golden opportunity to lay those rumors to rest. I'd go down there and see for myself, maybe bring back a souvenir just for her. An old, dusty textbook would be the perfect gift, I thought. I'd even sign it for her.

Having made up my mind, I snatched the storage room key off its hook. I only hoped that whoever might still be around wouldn't catch me. I could get in trouble as the basement was off limits to students, and the storage room doubly so. My sister would kill me if I got expelled from school. She'd probably send me back to my parents!

I shuddered at the thought and almost changed my mind.

Visions of confronting Saeki with the truth proved stronger than my fear. What if I could convince her to give up those silly books and try something else for a change? Like going out with me, for example. Even if I proved her wrong, she might still be impressed with my intrepid search for the truth. Wasn't that her whole point? Saeki could hardly blame me if it turned out I was right and she was wrong.

Or if not her, perhaps Ito or Murai might be interested in going out with the man who solved the mystery of the storage room. Well, Ito was kind of a bitch. She looked cute, but her attitude was even more annoying than Imari's. On the other hand, Murai would be a lot of fun to have sex with, but she was such an airhead. I'd need another girlfriend just to have someone intelligent to talk to afterward.

No, Saeki was the one I really wanted. She was beautiful, smart, and very independent, which made her the most difficult girl to get. Aside from the utterly unobtainable Shiraki, I mean. At least I stood a chance with Saeki, but only if I found a way past her fixation with magic and that meant I had to find some proof.

Making my way towards the basement stairs, I wished Ito and Saeki were around to see me unlock the door to their so-called Secret Room. Ito would have to eat sour grapes and Saeki would thank me for showing her the truth. Unfortunately, they belonged to the girl's Yoga Club, which met in the mornings before school. There's no way they'd still be here at this hour.

Well, they'll probably insist on seeing for themselves anyway, I thought. Now that I knew where the key was kept, I could get it anytime I wanted. The first time, it would probably be better if I went alone anyway. I didn't expect to find anything but junk down there, but what if there really was some truth to the rumors? Six students had died down there while performing a black magic ceremony, or so the rumors claimed. Did I want to go down there? Did I want to know the truth? I looked around the empty school and the silence was oppressive. The windows were already turning a dreadful shade of grey as night crept closer.

Of course I had to go. This was only the first door anyway and it wasn't locked. Like most students, I'd been inside the basement before to help a teacher retrieve books or supplies for our classes. It was the storage room beneath the basement that frightened everyone. I had to admit that being alone in the basement did feel creepy, but only until I turned on the lights. The place looked completely ordinary, like any other basement in any other school, and I crossed it easily to find my real goal.

"OFF LIMITS"

A sign had been posted at the top of the stairs leading to the basement storage room. Someone had played a joke, drawing on the concrete floor a circle with a pentagram inside. Or not drawn, I realized, but gouged into the cement and probably a long time ago, judging by the smooth edges and thick dust. It had been placed where one would have to step over it to use the stairs and reach the room below.

That gave me pause as I stared into the well of blackness beneath me. The basement lights behind me illuminated only the first few steps and the narrow stairs disappeared quickly into the shadows. I felt something cold as well. A thin draft blew upward from the basement, washing over my bare hands, neck, and face.

Chiding myself for being so foolish, I spoiled the gloom with a derisive chuckle. I saw a switch on the wall beside me and flipped it on. The resulting light seemed extremely weak and not to my liking at all. Even if nobody used this place, they could at least install some fluorescent lights. Before me, the steep staircase led to a heavy steel door at the bottom. Stepping over the pentagram, I descended that ominous hole with the key clutched tightly in one hand, feeling my way against the wall with the other.

I stepped gingerly, listening to the eerie sound of my footsteps echoing in that closed-off, cramped space. The air grew noticeably colder and I noticed a dampness that seemed to reach all the way down to my bones. Why anyone would want to put a basement under a basement was beyond me. Maybe it had been a bomb shelter during World War II or something? There were still a few of those around, usually forgotten until they started digging a new subway and broke through an unexpected wall. Whatever the reason, the door looked serious enough. It was made of steel and rusted around the edges, especially the hinges. I wondered if it would even open.

The door had graffiti on it, old and smudged and barely legible in the dim light. Among the cryptic symbols and diagrams, there were words written in Latin, but I'd never paid much attention in that class. I wished Yukiko was with me. She had a talent for languages, speaking not only Japanese and English, but Latin and French as well. After she graduated from the university, she wanted to find a job as a translator. I just wanted to get this over with. The place was kind of freaking me out.

"So this is the secret room," I muttered aloud, just to hear the sound of a human voice, even my own. They should have painted the door pink or red. But no, that would have been really creepy.

The chill and damp made me shiver. I wished I'd brought a jacket, but all I had was my mostly empty book bag over my shoulder. I figured I'd just have a quick look and get out. The key slid into the keyhole easily, a perfect fit. Turning the key to the right, the bolt sounded like a gunshot in the silence. Now, I thought, nothing can stop me from learning the truth! From this moment on, the secret room will no longer be secret. I grasped the doorknob, twisting and pushing the heavy door open with a grunt.

"Grrrr!" I had to lean into it as the rusty hinges tried to resist. It felt almost like something pushed against me from the other side, but with a screech of metal the door swung slowly open.

Not all the way open, just enough so that I could peer into the room beyond. I wasn't frightened, but I had no idea what I might find in there either. Being alone kind of sucked. All I could see was an empty, black gulf devoid of light or warmth. The musty scent of dust and mold assaulted my nose and I closed my eyes, bracing for a sneeze that never arrived. The place smelled like a crypt, but even worse was that it felt like one too. I almost turned around right then and there.

Almost. "Time for a tour of the secret room," I joked, pushing the door open with another annoying screech. Between the rusted hinges and all the dust, it wasn't difficult to believe that no one had been down there for over a decade.

I couldn't see a thing as I shuffled forward, arms extended like a blind man trying to feel my way through the emptiness. I had the odd sensation that I was about to touch something, but I took a half-dozen hesitant steps without finding a wall or anything else. I drifted towards the left, reaching out for the wall that I knew had to be there. I needed to find a light switch or a fuse box. There had to be at least one light down there, I figured.

At last I felt the rough texture of concrete beneath my fingers. The room seemed to be made out of cinder blocks with much of the mortar between them crumbling away. There! I found a metal box and a switch, which I pushed upward with a sharp snapping sound.

Nothing happened. Click - Click - Click ... I tried a bunch of times.

"Shit." The room remained completely black. Maybe there were lights down there, but evidently there wasn't any electricity. Or maybe I was turning on and off something else altogether? I almost grinned as I imagined the school's outdoor lights flashing, but that wasn't helping me.

I started moving again, slapping at cobwebs as I followed the wall looking for another switch. A flashlight would have been handy and I wondered if I shouldn't find one and come back later. I'd probably have to go all the way home though, and it was already getting late. I had an old lighter in my bag, I remembered, but it didn't have enough fuel to produce much more than tiny, weak flame. I'd found and kept it for no particular reason. I reached into my book bag anyway, although the lighter would hardly be useful as a torch.

Leaving empty handed after all this trouble didn't appeal to me at all. Maybe if I flicked it fast enough, I could at least see something and...

Thump! "Whoa! Ouch! Dammit!"

I'd tripped over something on the floor, very nearly falling onto my face. Normally, I'm not that clumsy, but that particular day had been a real trip. My stupid pun made me grin as I bent my knees and felt around for whatever I'd kicked. It sounded metallic, half-rolling, more like skidding away from my foot. It seemed heavy as well, so it couldn't have gone too far.

It was definitely metal, cold to the touch as I found it with my fingers. A candlestick, I realized. A long one, a tall as me and bracing several candles on its spindly arms. My lighter sputtered to timid life and it wasn't easy getting the first candle lit. The dust and damp made even that simple task a frustrating chore. But soon enough I'd lit one and then three more candles. The fifth candle was missing, but I was just thankful that there wasn't a draft to make things even worse.

Suddenly I could see the place and it wasn't anything like I'd expected. There were no old text books rotting away in piles. No broken desks or forgotten supplies. Not even canned sardines or gas masks. Instead, I discovered something more closely resembling a temple. The rumors had been right! There were more of the tall candelabras around the room and I resisted the urge to light them all. Even the illusion of warmth would have been a comfort as I took in my surroundings.

Beneath the dust and mold that covered the floor, a large circle was unmistakable. It must have been painted on the cement. Everything else seemed to be arranged around its precise design. There were words written in Latin. Diagrams and symbols whose meaning I wouldn't dare try to guess. A cross seemed to divide the circle into sections. Around that cryptic design were other, smaller circles. The one nearest me had a triangle inside it, the others had different and equally meaningless designs. I seemed to recall seeing those before, printed on the back of Saeki's Tarot cards.

What had she called them? Talismans? I couldn't remember and it didn't matter, except to confirm my growing discomfort.

In the very center of the circle, a table had been arranged like an altar. That's the impression I had of it, probably because of the heavy cloth that hung over the table like a shroud. Behind that, against the far wall, some sort of shrine had been posed. Beneath another pentagram, I saw cups and candles, incense holders and other things unrecognizable. They were dusty and tarnished, but doubtless exactly as they'd been left twelve years before.

"What the hell is this?" I wondered aloud.

Everything seemed so bizarre, like a scene straight out of a low budget horror movie. But this wasn't fiction, and not a rumor anymore. I might have suspected a prank, a setting staged by some occult lover to fool unsuspecting victims, but no. This was all much too elaborate for a joke. Too serious to be anything but real. There had been a ceremony, just as Saeki and her friends insisted, and if they were right about that...

"Ah! Fuck!" I jerked backwards, stumbling over my own feet as I realized I'd been standing on a huge bloodstain.

The floor was darker in places, the mold perhaps thicker where it had feasted on the mortal remains of slaughter. They weren't shaped like bodies, those stains. They didn't look like anything, but just seeing them was like taking a Rorschach Test and everywhere I looked I saw the corpses of those girls who had died. I could see their dismembered limbs and headless torsos spraying blood across the floor. There were also stains on the walls and even the ceiling, and I fought to control my panic. They weren't really there. Nothing remained. The bodies had been taken away and the room sealed. I was alone.