Kara stayed within reach of Matt as they navigated the cluttered hall until they reached the end of what appeared to be a T intersection. To their right was near-complete darkness, to the left a faint green light over metal doors.
Matt reached for her hand and squeezed it. “We stick together. Down there?” He gestured toward the eerie glow to the left.
“The green light is like a beacon, pulling us there, as if we’re being led.” She glanced right, frowned. “But I don’t like the dark. We can’t see where we’re going, and after you nearly fell down the stairs...” She was torn. She hated being indecisive.
“Let’s go right, slowly, stick close to the wall, and hold hands.”
She nodded, let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. “Okay.”
The corridor stretched ahead in dark shadows, littered with the broken bones of furniture, their shoes crunching on glass and scraps of metal. They stepped carefully, the last thing either of them needed was to slice their foot open. They couldn’t see much, just dark shapes, so they tentatively felt their way through the maze of debris. The previous corridor had some junk, butnothing like this, as if someone had pushed all the furniture from every office into the hall.
Matt had the depressing thought that they were in a tomb. The air thick, old, and heavy. It had a taste, like dust saturated with mildew, like something that had been sealed in too long.
He shivered. Kara squeezed his hand tight, perhaps sensing his apprehension.
Just when Matt thought they had picked a dead end and was about to tell Kara to turn back, he saw a faint flicker of light, like the earliest dawn. A way out? A door? A balcony? A window?
“Did you see that?” Kara asked.
“Yeah,” he said, his voice rough, his throat dry.
They had to scale what felt like a broken desk with concrete mixed in as they turned the corner. There, a dim, steady golden light cut through the dark. It was daylight. Not the eerie, artificial glow of the elevator or odd green lighting from the opposite hall, but outside. Freedom. It was a way out, it had to be.
Sticking close to the concrete walls, they steadily moved toward the light and discovered the source: a tall factory window, boarded from the outside. Light filtered through a jagged crack in the planks, thin and sickly. Matt ran his finger along the window; someone had painted the glass to block the light, but a section of the paint had been scratched off, letting in the morning sun.
He pressed his face to the glass, trying to see out. Though his vision was blurry, he saw something... but it didn’t help.
“What?” Kara said.
“I see green. Fields, trees, that’s it. There’s no one out there. No buildings, no houses.”
No one to help, he thought, but refused to give up hope. If he lost hope, Kara would, too. He had to be strong.
“No way out,” Kara said.
“We’ll find a way,” he said firmly.
Matt felt around for a window latch. Maybe they could open the window—break it if they had to—pry off the boards.
“What’s that?” Kara said.
Matt looked over his shoulder, his gaze moving to where Kara had squatted only a foot behind him. At first he didn’t see anything, but as he shifted the thin ray of light hit the floor and reflected off something shiny and metal.
Kara picked it up. “It’s a bracelet. Diamonds and gold. I don’t know, they might not be real, but it seems odd to find this here.”
She pocketed it, looked at Matt. “Can we get out this way?”
“No,” he said. He didn’t want to give up, but this wasn’t the way out. He pushed on the latch at the bottom of the window. It didn’t budge. “It looks like we’re three stories up. We could break the window and possibly remove the boards, but it’s a long drop.”
“It’s worth the risk,” she said.
“Breaking our necks?”
“Just—break the window. Maybe we’ll see someone. We can scream for help.”
It was a desperate move, but they were desperate, Matt thought.
“Step back,” he said. He squatted to pick up a broken drawer. He closed his eyes, turned his head away from the window, and hit the glass as hard as he could. He heard a crack, but it didn’t shatter—the paint offered some protection. He hit it again.
