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I’d seen my fair share of treasure hunter movies and knew a booby-trap when I saw it… and this was a textbook example of one. With a shrill scream, I tossed the vase-of-doom onto the mound of fluffy dusting rags in my cart. I didn’t want to break it, which would cost me my job, but I was definitely finished holding it.
My movements were quick, but not nearly quick enough. As the tiny hidden compartment sprung open, it released a puffy cloud of black ash, directly in my face. Since my mouth was open in horror, I sucked in a lungful of the ominous ancient dirt. To make matters worse, more of the soot blew into my eyes, temporarily blinding me.
Coughing and retching, I staggered backward, straight toward the shelf filled with delicate antiquities—extremely breakable and utterly irreplaceable on my meager budget type of antiquities. I blinked like my life depended on it, trying to clear the grime from my eyes. At the last second, I managed to push away from the shelf.
I wheezed out a sigh of relief over avoiding a catastrophe I could never financially recover from. That relief, much like my ex-boyfriend’s ejaculations, was extremely premature and destined to leave me disappointed.
As I shoved my body away from the shelf, my foot caught on the handle of the broom I’d left propped against the tiny cleaning cart. Arms spinning like a windmill, my body careened toward a large crate with all the light-footed grace of the dinosaurs whose bones now filled said crate.
In desperation, I tried to grab something to stop my fall, but my efforts were futile, and I landed in the center of the crate with a bone crunching—whether it was mine or the dinos’ bones, I couldn’t tell—thud.
The force of the fall sent my body sinking beneath the layers of fossils. That was followed by a sickening sound of vanilla wafers breaking, except it wasn’t cookies breaking; it was the more delicate fossil pieces. A thick cloud of sand billowed around me, merging with the heavy dust cloud the creepy little vase had blown in my face.
I sat in stunned silence, half-buried in assorted fossils, all of which used to have tags displaying names I wouldn’t dare attempt to pronounce. What a mess that was going to be to sort out. Rubbing the last of the gritty dirt from my eyes and reaching out, I grabbed the sides of the crate to haul myself up, only to wince when a searing pain shot through my wrist.
Gingerly turning my arm, I bit my lip to hold back a cry. A three-inch-long cut traveled the length of my flesh from wrist to elbow. Thankfully, nothing vital had been slashed, so I wouldn’t bleed out. Probably. The wound was still leaking enough blood to make me queasy, and I didn’t need to be a psychic to know that stitches were in my near future. I whimpered, more at the thought of spending the evening at an emergency clinic than from the pain.
A soft glow flickered to life, bathing the crate in a beautiful orange glow.
“Aw, heckity-heck-heck!” I yelped, not caring if I spoke out loud. With Pete gone home, there was no one in the museum to hear me. “You do not see a light, Arizona. You abso-freakin-lutely do not see a light.”
My mind-over-matter skills were clearly lacking because instead of the light fading, it blazed brighter until it lit the entire storeroom. It was beautiful, comforting, and weirdly enough, it seemed friendly.
Nice try, mother trucker.I knew the drill, and I wasn’t about to go toward the beautiful light, no matter how welcoming it tried to make itself seem. I resisted the urge to stick out my tongue. Barely. One day I would die, and I didn’t want to tick off the pretty light… just in case it held a grudge.
Slowly reaching out to grab the edge of the crate, I prepared to pull myself free, bracing for the sharp sting in my arm. My chest tightened in anxiety as my body moved far slower than my brain was commanding it to. In fact, everything seemed to have crept nearly to a stop for me.
The second hand on the wall clock moved slower than molasses, and my uneven breathing grew slow enough to make even the most skilled yoga teacher jelly. I wondered vaguely if I’d entered the twilight zone. Was that even a thing? Or was it just an old TV show? Maybe I was unconscious, and this was a dream. The last option was the best out of my available options, which honestly sucked. I didn’t have to ponder the weirdness of time, or the reality of, well, reality, for long. The deafening roar of an explosion brought everything back into sharp focus with a burst of speed that was second only to the speed of Black Friday shoppers spotting an open door.
The impact blew my body from the crate with enough force to launch me through several time zones. I began wishing it would launch me into next week because I was beyond ready for this night to be over.
My ears weren’t just ringing. Oh, no. Alarm bells banged into the sides of my muddled brain as my body smacked against the cold concrete floor.
With immense effort, I struggled to open my eyes. Horror dawned on me. My eyes were open.
I just couldn’t see.
Icy terror washed through me, taking with it what little that was left of my courage with it. Violent coughs threatened to pull every muscle in my chest while my mouth filled with the acrid scent of something burning.
Was something on fire? Had it been a bomb? That would explain the eardrum-bursting roar and the explosion. I wondered how much damage the bomb had done. Would the roof collapse on me? Without being able to see, how would I escape?
Adrenaline coursed through my body, giving my confused mind the hard shove it needed to fight for survival. As I tried to heave myself off the floor, the cold of what could only be steel pressed me down, pinning my body to the concrete. Over and over, I pushed against the metal. It didn’t budge. Switching tactics, I tried to wiggle out from under the mess. My eyes burned with tears as the gravity of my predicament settled on me, heavier than the twisted metal cutting into my flesh.
It was useless. I wasn’t strong enough to free myself.
I should’ve taken the heavenly light up on its offer because that would have been a far more pleasant way to bite the dust. Far better than suffocating or being burned alive. Still not able to see the situation around me; l didn’t know which was likely to come first.
The crash as something massive collapsed onto the floor near my head had me screaming in fear. I screamed until my throat was raw, all the while knowing there was no one to hear my pleas for help.
Another roar shook the building, and I nearly peed myself from the shock of it. Was this a terrorist attack? How many bombs had been set in the museum? Drywall fell from above, knocking the wind from my lungs and forcing the metal to cut deeper into my body. I tried to cry, to move… to breathe. But it was all in vain.
So, death by crushing it was.
The floor beneath me shook as chunks of the ceiling continued to fall, slamming into the shelves and sending them crashing to the floor. I was being buried alive. Instead of my past flashing before my eyes, all the exciting things I’d wanted to experience before I died popped into my mind. I’d lived an okay life, but it had been far from an adventure. I fought back a sob as I thought about my apartment and my mini pig, Albert, who was waiting patiently for me to come home. And then there were my parents. They were going to be devastated by my death. A pang of guilt twisted my insides. I was supposed to have lunch with them tomorrow, but I wasn’t going to make it.
Closing my eyes, I gave up trying to regain my vision. I relaxed beneath the layers of debris, no longer fighting. My lungs strained with each shallow breath, and my head swam from lack of oxygen. Burning tears leaked from the corner of my eyes as I did the one thing I’d never done in my life.
I gave up.
