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We had to walk up and out into the fourth floor to find the way. The stairs to the roof turned out to be an old ladder that was hidden in the ceiling. Blake found it, and had to break the handle to open the door and allow the rusted old ladder to come down. It dropped with a screeching clank. It appeared it’d fall apart the moment anyone stepped on it.
“Ladies first,” Doyle whispered.
Uh, no. I nudged Doyle toward it.
He dug in his heels. “No, no,” he said, starting to talk a little louder. “I’m not going up there.”
“I’ll go up first,” Blake said. He passed over something small into my palm, and I realized it was the pocketknife. “Hang on to this.”
“How did you get that?” I asked. “That was in my pocket.”
“I found it in the car floor,” he said. “You must have dropped it.”
I wasn’t sure if that was true, but I’d passed out and forgot about it, so I was glad he was able to grab it, steal it, whatever. I wasn’t used to carrying tools.
Blake went up, the ladder creaking and shaking the whole time. Hobos nearby rustled, probably drunk asleep and stirred by the noise. I hoped they weren’t angry drunks.
I stepped between the ladder and Doyle. If a hobo approached, I wanted to be able to shimmy up, or at least hide behind Doyle.
“Ugh,” Blake said somewhere above our heads.
“What?” Doyle asked. “Is it locked?”
“Spiders,” he said. “Come up here.”
“No,” Doyle said. “I don’t do spiders. That’s Karen’s job.”
“Kayli,” Blake said. “Her name is Kayli.”
“Are you sure?” Doyle asked.
“Sssh!” I hissed at them both.
In a few minutes, Blake had the top opened up. I could see sky and some light and that was about it. Blake disappeared onto the roof.
I caught movement in the corner. There was stirring and something rose up in the darkness. Fear motivated me enough to face spiders and whatever was upstairs simply to avoid the zombie drunken hobo ghost.
Doyle was on my heels. He scampered up, pushing on my ankles. “Hurry or I’ll throw you off,” he said.
I kicked out below me, hitting him on the arm, but then hurried up.
The fresh air outside was welcome to the musty and rotten odors from below. I didn’t want to have to go back through. I thought jumping from the roof was a more viable option this time.
Blake was over by the satellite dish, examining it. As I approached, I caught him scratching his head and checking out the base of it.
“Doyle,” he said. He did a come-hither motion and pointed to the base. “Come look at this. Does this look like—”
Doyle shoved him aside before he could finish. He got down on his knees, looking at the wiring and the box that was beside the dish and then angled his head more, nearly putting his ear to the ground to check it out. “What is this?” he asked.
I stood aside quietly, keeping an eye on them and the ladder behind us. I worried one of the hobos would climb it, or put the ladder back and lock us up here.
“You tell me,” Blake said. “How do we turn it off?”
“It is off,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
Doyle picked up his head and dusted his hands off on his jeans before he raked through his hair. “This isn’t it,” he said.
I fully turned now, looking at him. Blake stared too. “What do you mean?” Blake asked. “You said this was it.”
“So?” Doyle said. “I said the biggest signal was coming from this...general vicinity. It’s the most logical place to put it.”
“Atop an abandoned building?” I asked. “You thought the best place to put an antenna that was supposed to be a secret to be on top of a building filled with hobos, with no security and rusted ladders and spiders everywhere?”
“Well, when you put it that way,” he said. “But how was I supposed to know about the rustiness of the ladder? But will you look at this dish? It’s a perfectly good dish. I’d use it for an underground cell phone service. If I had one. I wouldn’t start one though. That’s a lot of work. And apparently people named Amanda come after you.”
“Alice,” I said. “And she’s already got to the first one. We need access to another antenna before she figures a way in, and Axel and Marc and Brandon get killed.”
“Well, we’ll have to find the next one,” he said. He stood up and continued to wipe his jeans and look around. “If it isn’t here, it’s like a false signal or something.”
“Or it isn’t this building,” Blake said. He walked away from us, toward the edge of the roof, looking out toward the church and the churchyard behind it. “You just need something tall, right? Something high enough to send out a signal?”
“Something to bounce signals off of, yes,” Doyle said. “And a lot of them.”
Blake stared out at the church, and I wasn’t connecting it until I caught the cross on top of the steeple, the tallest thing for miles.
That’s when it struck me. Brandon had said that an antenna didn't have to be obvious. It could be anything. It was just large metal...with the right sort of signal behind it, anything could act like a cell phone tower.
And then I remembered the large observatory with the telescopes that overlooked a stretch of church towers amid the trees.
“Ethan,” I breathed out, stepping up beside Blake and staring off at the church. “The man that started the core. He’s a religious man. He’s gotten a bunch of emails from church people.”
“So no one would think it odd if he happened to come out to church, and did a little fiddling in the steeples,” Blake said. He turned to me, smiling big. “That’s brilliant. That takes the cake. Using church steeples as antennas system. It’s in your face and yet it’s hidden.”
“Should have figured,” Doyle said behind us. “Happens all the time. I mean, churches are evil, aren’t they? What with the crosses and the rituals and the singing.”
A CHURCH STEEPLE AND A PRAYER
There was a debate as to going down the ladder again or jumping off the side of the roof, when Blake pointed out there was a fire escape. It was rusty, and creaky, but we were outside, and it didn’t fall apart on us.
Once we were on the ground, we crossed the street, heading for the church. The garden had a concrete path among low hedges and the occasional late blooming rose bush and a fancy fountain in the center
. It was probably better looking during the day, but for the moment, there were shadows, and I kept picturing hobos sleeping in the bushes.
“It’s midnight,” Doyle said. “Isn’t the church closed?”
I’d been wondering the same thing. “How do we break into a church?”
“Are you both heathens?” Blake asked. “This is a church. It’s never closed and you don’t break into one.”
I blinked at him, a little stunned. Churches closed, didn’t they? I mean, no one was here this late. Wouldn’t someone come in and like loot the tithing box? Steal the gold crosses? Did they even have gold crosses anymore? I was guessing based on every movie or TV show I’d ever watched about churches.
While there were lights on, they were minimal, making the church appear foreboding. It was Catholic, according to the sign, although I didn’t catch the name. The steps up to the front doors were empty, with lights focused on the engraved wooden doors and the shiny brass handles.
I lingered back, intimidated by the building. The grounds had been scary enough. The church itself terrified me. Would a priest see me, know me for what I was, and kick me out? Would I have to go into a confession box? Wasn’t I supposed to put holy water on myself at some point?
Blake pulled on the door handle. I held my breath, thinking there was no way this church was open and worried we’d set off some sort of alarm.
But the door opened easily, and with barely a creak.
I swallowed. If it hadn’t been open, we’d have had to break into it, but even now, I was expecting fire and brimstone for stepping through the front door.
Nothing happened as I followed the guys inside. The front area, whatever it was called, had a marble floor and high ceilings and lamps that looked like candles. There was a table nearby with pamphlets, one advertising the history of the chapel, and the others about religious services.
I scanned the area, but didn’t see anyone. Yet there was a feeling that we weren’t completely alone. The place smelled of old wood and an undertone of lemon, like furniture polish.
Blake led the way further in, seeming more comfortable about where we should go. We passed the front entryway and then walked into a chapel. The inside of the church had even higher ceilings, with columns and statues. Stained glass windows were lit up. Every inch of the place was an artistic bible reference in an artifact, name, or picture. I couldn’t see the confession boxes at first, but I spotted a couple of dark doors beyond the podium, to the very right of the large room.
