It’s so cold I begin to shiver. The further down we go, the more frigid it gets. Clearly, the bunker had been abandoned long ago, with no generator to keep it heated like ours was.
I truly do not want to keep going down this path to hell, but Sako won’t stop walking down those stony stairs, step by step. I can see she’s just as scared as I am, yet something within her refuses to turn back. Not until she knows what’s down there. Maybe it’s nothing. Maybe it’s something. The only way to know is to find out.
In my opinion, curiosity is both a flaw and a strength. It’s led to some of humanity’s greatest discoveries, but also some of its stupidest deaths. There’s a thin line between winning the Nobel Peace Prize and ending up on an episode of 1000 Ways To Die. Not that either of those things exist anymore.
Back then, I was content just watching everything unfold around me. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Nothing worth the effort. Not when I could just sit in my room and play games or watch brainless internet videos. I was rotting away, and I didn’t even care. Not when the world was an awful place to be if you weren’t born with a million dollars.
Funnily enough, now it’s an awful place to be for everyone. Doesn’t matter if you were a billionaire before; now, you’re just HET food. Though I suppose there is at least one exception.
“Say, Lily,” Sako says. “How deep do you think these stairs go? You think they go on forever?”
“What, like that SCP?” I ask.
“What’s SCP?” Sako asks.
Oops. I let my geeky niche interests show again. Of course she’s not familiar with internet subculture. She was too busy experiencing the world.
“Nothing. Just a… story,” I say. “Wait, isn’t that-”
Sako stumbles forward, barely catching herself with her foot as she finally reaches the bottom. The torch flickers from the fall but doesn’t go out, and it continues to dimly glow in the dark interior.
“Are you okay?” I ask, stepping right beside her.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Sako says. She begins slowly shifting the torch around, unveiling a cracked concrete floor in our vicinity. It’s a decently sized space with a few pillars holding it up, though it’s nowhere near as huge as our complex was. I can’t see the whole thing with our dull torch, but I estimate it’s large enough for several families to live comfortably.
We see a countertop to our left with something on it. Sako walks over and picks up a rectangular device with a lever attached to it.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“A hand-crank flashlight,” Sako says as she hands it to me. “We used to carry one whenever we went camping in case our other power sources went out. Spin the crank! See if it works.”
I take the hefty flashlight and begin to spin its noisy little arm. As I do, its glass head begins to sputter with light. After a minute of rapid cranking, it’s shining pretty brightly and is much more effective than Sako’s makeshift torch.
“Good! Now we can split up,” Sako says.
“I’m not splitting up,” I say.
“We’re not actually splitting up,” Sako says. “I can see the other end of the room from here. I was saying I’ll look around this side and you can look over there. We’ll be able to see each other’s light the whole time.”
“Fine,” I say. “But if you find some sort of secret passage, make sure you don’t go down it without telling me.”
“No prob,” Sako says.
I start to trek to the other side, Angel following me, and Titania sticking with Sako as she rummages through cabinets and drawers.
As I approach the opposite wall, I see a round table with some mismatched, dust-coated furniture around it. I shine the light on the area and notice a small notebook at its center.
“Great,” I say. “I’m willing to bet that it’s someone’s diary and it shows them getting more insane with each page.”
“You play too many video games,” Angel says.
“Whatever,” I mumble, picking up the musty pad and opening it to the first page. Lo and behold, it’s exactly as I thought: it’s some dude’s diary. I swear to god, if the last page is someone’s final monologue, I’m going to lose it.
Entry 1: Those ‘things’ came from the sky. If they weren’t too preoccupied with slaughtering my neighbors, I don’t think I would have been able to save my family. We didn’t even pack up our things; we just got in our car and sped away. They thought I was crazy for having this safehouse built, but I’m glad I did.
Here we go. I’m surprised I didn’t find this notebook attached to someone’s corpse, with a convenient quill in their other hand. I flip to the next page.
Entry 2: It’s been one week. The radio broadcaster says it won’t be long before the military prevails. Bull. Shit. I’ve seen those things firsthand. How vicious and relentless they are. They’re not like any foe we’ve faced ever before. If this invasion crap is really happening around the world, humanity doesn’t stand a chance. The skies have grown dark.
If I could put money on how this notebook is going to end, I’d put a hundred bucks on ‘erratic scribbles written in blood.’
Entry 3: To think the first successful invasion of Britain in a thousand years was caused by aliens. Serves those scone-eating colonizers right. Even now, as the world crashes down, I can’t help but feel patriotic toward my country. Not that it’s going to last much longer either.
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Entry 4: Goodbye, Russia. Maybe you would have stood a better chance if not for your war before all of this. Then again, we weren’t much better.
Entry 5: The broadcaster has stopped giving updates on other parts of the world, but I can only assume it’s as bad as it is here. Also, NASA released a discovery today. Apparently, the HET have made a structure on the moon, probably their home base or something like that. Awesome, what are we going to do with this information? Get in our rocket ships and take our AKs to the moon? Fuck off.
NASA? A structure on the moon? I don’t remember hearing anything like that on the radio. Maybe it was while we were asleep, or the man in the journal was listening to a different radio station. How many were even broadcasting through all of this?
“Angel, can you tell me if something is in the database?” I ask.
“I can do a search,” Angel says.
“What kind of information do we have about the HET’s moon structure?” I ask.
“That it’s there,” Angel says. “Sadly, there isn’t anything in the Cloud more than that. I fear what you see in that notebook is the extent of what we know. Or at least, what the survivors have uncovered thus far.”
“I see,” I say, flipping to the next page.
Entry 6: America is basically gone. The broadcaster seems confused nowadays. Events don’t match up. He barely knows what’s going on. That means communication lines have been destroyed, and the only thing we have left is radio. Maybe I shouldn’t have turned away that carrier pigeon salesman.
I see that he has a sense of humor similar to mine. I feel like he and I would probably have hated each other, despite being so similar.
Entry 7: I hear scratching. Behind the walls. It’s probably nothing, but still…
Here we go.
Entry 8: The scratching is getting louder. I don’t know what it is, but I feel like this place won’t be safe for much longer.
I really don’t like this.
Entry 9: Something is there on the other side of the walls. It’s trying to break in. But how? We’re so deep underground. I’ve got to get my family out of here. Something is there, and it’s trying to get in. I don’t know if these walls can last much longer. I’m telling them to pack their things. I don’t know how bad it is up there, but we can’t stay down here.
After that, the rest of the pages are blank. Ah, I guess that makes sense. Of course he wouldn’t have a perfectly vivid description detailing the exact circumstances of his death. Angel was right. I do play too many video games. Or did.
Even so, I’ve got a terrible feeling in my chest. Like we stumbled upon something we shouldn’t have. Like we shouldn’t be here.
I turn around, and my spirit takes a gargantuan leap out of my body when I see Sako standing right behind me.
“Holy– you scared the crap outta me,” I gasp.
“Sorry ‘bout that,” Sako says playfully. “What’cha got there?”
“Just some guy's journal,” I say. “Did you find anything useful?”
“Yep! A solar-powered radio, some cans of food, and a Swiss Army knife,” Sako says. “But hey, check this out!”
I follow her over to the opposite corner of the room, where she brings me to a large hole in the wall. It looks like it’s big enough for a small deer to crawl through, though I assume whatever made it was definitely not a deer. I shine my light through to look inside and see a long tunnel going deep into the earth.
“What do you think made it?” Sako asks.
“Probably a very big mole,” I say.
“Should we crawl through it?” Sako asks.
“Hell the fuck no,” I say sternly. “I swear to God, if you go in there, I’m leaving your ass behind and never looking back. Not only is that the worst idea you’ve ever had, but I’m claustrophobic as hell.”
“I was just kidding,” Sako says, lightly punching my arm. “Hey, look! I think I see more over there.”
Further down, there are several more holes with similar widths. The only difference is that there are a bunch of things scattered around them, like there was a struggle of sorts.
I like this place less and less the longer I am here. I warily shine my flashlight around the area and notice some dark splatters painted on the floor. Sako doesn’t hesitate to squat down and touch them with her fingers.
“They’re dry,” she says. Her fingers dance around the area until she finds something else on the ground as well. As she brings it up to the light, we can see that it’s hair. Long human locks torn straight from the pores.
Neither of us says it, but it’s obvious that it’s not paint. Whatever came from those holes in the wall made quite a mess.
“I think we should leave,” I say.
“Yeah, I think you’re right,” Sako says. I was so afraid that she wanted to keep looking around. I’m glad even she has limits when it comes to this sort of thing.
“Yeah, we’ve pretty much seen all there is to see down here, anyway,” I say.
“Before we go, let’s do a quick scan of those open doors along the back wall,” Sako says. “Don’t worry, I’m pretty sure they’re just bedrooms for whoever was down here. I just want to make sure we’re not leaving anything valuable behind.”
“Fine,” I say. “But after that, we’re leaving.”
“Okay, this is the last thing, I promise,” Sako says.
There are five rooms in total against the back wall. As we look into the first one, we see a bed, a wooden dresser, and a large backpack. Inside the backpack is just a bunch of supplies like food, a water canister, a med kit, and several other basic necessities. We take the canister and med kit since we can’t carry much else, and move to the next room.
It’s the exact same, down to the backpack with a storage of identical supplies. I recall in the notebook that the man was planning to leave. Judging by the bloodstains, I guess they never made it out.
We peek into the third room, but instantly move on when it’s more of the same. The fourth room, however, didn’t have a backpack in it. Aside from the dresser and the bed, it was completely empty. Maybe someone did escape, after all.
Finally, we get to the fifth room. Unlike the other four, this one is closed. I watch as Sako puts her hand to the knob and tries to turn it, but it’s locked. Something tells me we don’t want to see what’s on the other side.
“You don’t think there’s a key lying around here, do you?” Sako asks.
“No, there definitely isn’t,” I say. “Which means that’s it. We can’t get in, and we can leave now.”
“You idiot,” I hear Angel say from behind me. “It’s an abandoned bunker during the apocalypse. Just break it down.”
“With what strength?” I ask. “I’m sorry, but even after the level-ups, I’m only slightly stronger than a diabetic poodle.”
“Use your abilities, dumbass,” Angel says.
“I believe there was an oversight in the system’s creation when it failed to include an intelligence stat,” Titania says.
“You guys just love to rag on me, don’t you?” I ask.
“Alright, alright,” Sako says. “Go on, Lily. Shoot it with your finger gun thing.”
“But it’s a metal door,” I say. “I won’t even leave a dent.”
“If you aim into the lock at point-blank range, you should have enough power,” Angel says. “Your sniper shot is stronger than you think.”
“Fine, I’ll give it a try, but if it doesn’t work after one shot, we’re leaving,” I say.
I shape my right hand into a pistol and press it into the keyhole. I then pull it back about an inch, because I don’t want to blow my fingertips off. I don’t know if it would, but I don’t want to take that risk.
Bang. I unleash the sniper shot skill, and it blasts the doorknob away, loosening the entire door.
“As I thought,” Angel says. “The structural integrity of the iron has deteriorated, and your skill was enough to break through.”
“Yeah, well, I betcha that was a waste of EL,” I say, pushing the door open. “I bet there’s a whole lotta nothin’ on the-”
I stop when my light falls onto a rotting human corpse leaning against the wall.