Page 11 of Hell's Fear

“I hated science!” Willow exclaimed and frowned.

“Match the symbol to their element to escape. You’re allowed five errors,” Davies read out loud.

“Where’s Magic when you need him? I bet that fuck aced this,” Inglorious said, and everyone laughed.

“Okay, the cans have the symbols of the elemental table. The display screens on the shelves are lit up. This one says Hydrogen, which is H. Does anyone see a H?” Smokey asked.

We hunted through the pile, and I handed Smokey a tin labelled with H. He placed it on the shelf, and the red light on the screen turned green.

“Okay, together, we should get through this,” I said hopefully.

It wasn’t as easy as I hoped. After we’d just made our fifth mistake, we still had three left to go, and we all looked at each other, worried.

“What happens with another error?” Grey asked.

“I suspect we lose a member,” I replied and studied the remaining letters.

Pr, Pa, and Pd remained. On the shelf, protactinium, palladium, and praseodymium remained. I picked up the Pr. “Let’s vote,” I said.

We voted to put Pr on protactinium, and I winced when a siren sounded, and the walls flashed red.

“That’s creepy,” Fish muttered.

“And wrong,” Davies stated. A panel slid aside, and a man appeared. He carried a hammer in his hand, and we all froze. When he didn’t move, Fish grabbed the can and shoved it on praseodymium. It turned green, and we sighed.

“Pa?” Fish asked. We voted to put it on palladium, and once again, the fucker lit up red. A second panel opened, and another man materialised.

“I really don’t like the look of them,” Willow muttered, moving behind Grey.

The men were dressed in blue overalls with heavy boots and wore a welding mask covering their faces. The second guy held an axe.

I grabbed Pa from Fish, dumped it on the shelf and stuck Pd on palladium, and the shelves glowed green. With a click, the door opened slowly. We headed there, keeping a wary eye on the men. As we approached the doors, the lights went out, and I wasshoved through the door as it locked behind me. I spun around as a dull light came on and swore.

Smokey and Grey were both missing. We weren’t going so well.

“Um, this looks bad,” Willow whispered.

Standing inside of glass pods were people all wearing overalls, boots, and welding masks. There were about ten in all.

There was Fish, Willow, Davies, Inglorious, and me remaining. Above the escape door, the time showed an hour and a half.

“How many more rooms?” I demanded, and Willow let out a low chuckle.

We searched for a clue but found nothing. The walls were bare, devoid of boxes or any objects or any clues. The single bulb flickered as we scratched our heads.

“Well, I’m stumped,” I said and leant accidentally on a pod. The pod shifted, and I jumped away.

Inglorious looked intrigued and shoved another pod. That moved, too.

“Here!” Fish called and pointed to a circle on the floor.

“I think we have to put the pods on the circles,” I suggested.

“That’s too easy,” Willow muttered. “Look at the ground.”

The ground held ruts, which potentially allowed the pods to slide around.

“I hate these puzzles!” Inglorious whined.

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