A bonfire in the basement.

(Continues from "Rubble at the bottom of the shaft.")

The place had to be abandoned for some months, at least, so that arm must have been done rotting, I thought. I took a better look at the shaft. No way it ended on the first floor, it must have gone deeper… maybe there was a basement somewhere. I didn't find the entrance on the first floor or outside the building, though I saw a strange patch of plaster. I started kicking it, and the plaster came off immediately. Certainly, that wasn't originally part of the plan. There was a narrow door under the plaster, which was locked, but so rusted I could kick off a chunk of it, kneel down and crawl into a little room that led to a staircase. I found the basement!


I turned on my flashlight and climbed down. I felt a chill; the place was colder than the rest of the building. It was strange how in this isolated environment I could hear the echoes of laughter, couldn't be anybody but the kids, but they sure didn't sound childish. I closed my eyes and took a good deep breath. I smiled at how silly I was being, scared of nothing important. I saw the elevator doors almost entirely open, rubble coming out of it, at least 3 foot in height. I got closer and looked for the arm and whatever else could be attached to it, interrupted by a sneeze caused by all the dust flying around after my footsteps. The echo of my sounds felt so loud, I suddenly felt tiny and hopeless, half buried in darkness. I shrugged it off and pointed the flashlight to inside the shaft, there was the metallic reflection. I stepped forward to se… To see that it was a shirt with a glove holding the wrench. I lifted the fabric, there was nothing inside. Who the hell does that? I dug around the rubble, there was nothing there either.


I turned around and checked out the rest of the room, light in hand. Mostly empty, not painted, just rubble… no spider webs on the corners. Across from me, near the wall I saw a pile of stones. Upon closer inspection, I realized it was the aftermath of a bonfire. I shook my head and headed back up the stairs but the hole I came in through had been covered from the outside with what I guessed was a rock. A friggin' rock. I tried pushing it away and hitting it to no avail. I went back to the basement to see if I could find a pipe or a tool that would help me move the boulder, but instead I found another door that escaped my previous scan of the room. In my defense, I had a terrible little flashlight. Also, in my defense, I am cooler than you.


Anyway, this door wasn't locked, and led to a very narrow staircase, dark too. When I stepped in, I heard a faint voice coming from outside, saying "the ghost loves you". It was high pitched and it made my back feel like a bucket of ice water was just poured on it.


I hurried up the thin metal stairs, holding on to the rail, the metallic sounds hammering my ears, heart racing in my chest. I had lost all sense of time by then, so I had no idea how far I had climbed, when I saw the stairs lead to a tarp. I pushed it with all my force and climbed out. The sun was setting but by contrast, it felt incredibly rude shining on my face. I was in the roof, which had no rails, just a couple of water tanks installed. I still hadn't decided what to think of the voice I heard, but since the feeling of claustrophobia had passed, I decided to explore some more. One of the tanks had been broken on the side and filled with all sorts of rubbish, wrappers, bits of glass, plastic, scraps, a thing that looked like a ball of fur and I did not dare find out what it could be… there were also leftovers from the construction, broken safety gear and a couple of rusty tools. I had enough and decided to go back. By this time it was no surprise that access to the service stairs was blocked by wood, wires and a couple of bricks. It was easy to kick them away, though, and I went down... until I saw light coming from one of the rooms that had no windows, on the third floor. Curiosity won over self preservation, and I went to see what was going on.