Page 24 of Rat Race

We took a left, then were forced to the right, the path ahead opening up into a square room. The far wall was smooth except for a seam in its middle, the rest of the room with ends of dozens of pipes poking from the rock.

Overhead, the Devil’s Playground theme crackled lightly through the speakers as we entered. Slowly, I walked around the perimeter, looking for loose bricks, pressure plates, rope… a big red shining button? Anything that would offer a hint about how we were supposed to get the doors to open.

The watch on my wrist buzzed, the feed of chatter suggestions moving too fast for me to make sense of it beyond the idea that maybe the pipes overhead had something to dowith the solution. But that seemed a bit… overly simplistic for the maze.

I’d just opened my mouth to ask Ella what she thought when colored ropes descended from the ceiling at different lengths, their ends hidden by holes that could be several inches or feet deep.

“Dead end?” Ella said, huffing with irritation. “That’s going to really slow us down… Fuck, we needed to move faster.”

“Naw, not a dead end.” I corrected her, motioning to the seam in the wall. “Look.”

It felt a bit like counsellin’ the younger kids on how to solve the puzzles inside the maze. Obvious to me but lost on them.

“C’mon now, you’re smart as a whip. You gotta be able to see it, right?”

“A big flat wall, yeah, I see it, genius.” She sighed, looking around the rest of the room. “Those holes aren’t big enough for us to fit through,” she added, her hand stretching out to wrap her fingers around one of the ropes.

I fought the urge to roll my eyes, forcibly taking her chin in my hand to turn her head to look at the seam. “Naw, sugar, one of those must openthat. Not a fuckin’ clue how we’re supposed to know which one, though.”

“Right,” she mumbled, shaking my hand off and staggering back.

It was almost cute how clueless she was. At least I reckoned it would’ve been if she wasn’t a total disaster who was gonna get us both killed.

I didn’t have time to play no fuckin’ babysitter. I was here to win, by any means necessary.

“Well,” Ella said, fingers tightening on the rope. “I guess we just try one?”

“Hello!” A cheery, masculine voice called over the intercom system. “The Company is happy to provide you some assistance in the form of a riddle clue?—”

Ella yanked on the nearest rope, a low rumbling beginning in the distance. A bit like the sound of a lot of pressure being released all at once. My lips parted as I looked first at the seam in the door and then at the intercom, my heart already beginning to race.

Couldn’t be fuckin’ good.

The cheery male voice had a definitive air of irritation as it came through the speaker again. “Well, I did have a whole thing planned. Was sort of my one job to read these to you, but since you decided to be a dick and not listen, I’ll have to give you a different one.”

Ella tried to shove the door open with brute force, her shoulder hitting the rock as if it were made of steel. Surprising absolutely no one, she fell backwards. The doors didn’t even have the good manners to quiver.

“I’m sorry, mister!” I shouted up at the speaker as Ella tried to pry the gap open with her hands. “Ella! Quit that and come apologize for Christ’s sake. The nice fella is going to get us a clue.”

Overhead the pipes groaned, the wind roaring miles above making Ella jump.

“Okay, okay!” Ella said, her terrified eyes flicking to mine. “I’m sorry! What are the clues?!”

There was a sigh, the masculine voice clearly irritated that his perfect setup had been interrupted. “Oh, so wearegoing to play? Fine. Look down, look down. Stop at the stone that makes a sound.”

“Stone that makes a sound?” I muttered, crouching to take in the stone floor for anythin’ that might’ve been invisible to the naked eye in the low light. I’d been so busy looking for pressureplates that I hadn’t been botherin’ to take notice of anything else. “Ella, walk the length of the room, and listen for a loose tile.” I ordered, doing the same on the other side.

It took a few passes before I found it, close to the middle, a tile that, when stepped on, let out a metallic sort of clang. I bent, my fingertips moving along the ridges until they caught on an uneven bit at the tile’s edge, yanking it up to reveal the start of what looked like a trap door.

“Ella! Come help me, would ya?” I called to the brunette, grunting slightly as I pulled up tile after tile.

The group of them seemed to interlock on a tongue-and-groove system like puzzle pieces, lifting away easily after the first was pulled. Ella came to join me, pulling more until a six-foot square was uncovered, large silvery metal rings screwed into the surface of a painted black surface.

“Grab one,” I ordered unceremoniously, taking hold of the other with both hands. She followed my instructions, and I braced myself, preparin’ to do the lion’s share of the work. “Pull.”

I yanked on the ring, surprised when the wood didn’t fall away and pulled upwards instead, a stone box standing at table height when all was said and done. A mechanical click let us know that the box was secured in place.

It was like some sort of altar—fitting, since I reckoned I was in the middle of yet another test.

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