After some time had passed since they entered the Emergency Exit, their boredom had reached a whole new level.
“…It’s late.”
After a long silence, Cooper let out a short complaint. They had been sitting on the stairs doing nothing, waiting for hours. His patience was wearing thin.
“D-Do you think they can’t find us?”
Eleanor agreed, her worry evident in her tone. This Emergency Exit was located completely opposite from the elevator. Even if the girl returned to their original spot, there was no guarantee she’d be able to find them.
“No, I’m not talking about the kid. Sure, she’s late, but…”
But contrary to her expectations, what Cooper was waiting for wasn’t the little girl.
“Anyway, what I mean is, by now, something should’ve gone off upstairs.”
He gestured with his finger towards the surface. He was waiting for a bomb to explode up top.
“Are you talking about the last protocol?”
“Yeah. It’s been a while since we’ve come down here. By now, it should’ve been executed already.”
He recalled the last time he checked the time in the Launch Control Room. The countdown was close to finishing when they fell into the underground, and if they added up the time they spent down here and the time they had been waiting, it was more than enough time for the Abnormal Phenomena Management Office to classify their mission as a failure and blow the surface to smithereens.
“Maybe it’s just too deep down here that we can’t feel anything? Or maybe we didn’t notice while we were escaping…?”
“No, according to the structure of this facility, we should’ve felt at least a little vibration. And it was still too early for the Abnormal Phenomena Management Office to activate the protocol earlier.”
Eleanor posited a few scenarios, but Cooper dismissed them all. Unless this place was completely sealed off from the surface, there were Emergency Exits that connected to the ground, and spaces for elevators, too. Plus, this was a very quiet, static place where they could hear each other’s breathing. If a massive explosion occurred above, he’d definitely detect it.
“Of course, I can’t say the possibility is zero… Tsk, I wish I could at least know the time.”
He clicked his tongue and checked his watch. It was a rugged electronic watch he purchased, advertised for its durability. But despite its toughness, it seemed unable to withstand the day’s events; the displayed time showed no sign of changing, no matter how long passed. Frustrated, he faced a completely dead watch.
“Well, we’ve been through a lot today. It’s not surprising it broke.”
Eleanor chimed in, holding up her broken watch. They had been waiting idly for so long that they decided to check their watches for the time, but maybe due to the impact from the elevator crashing, all their watches had stopped working.
“Thinking about what we’ve been through today, it’s a miracle we’re still alive—”
But what does that matter? To them, who had virtually risen from the dead, a broken watch felt trivial, almost laughably cheap in comparison to their lives.
Just then, trying to remain positive, Cooper suddenly said, “…Wait a second, show me that.”
He looked intently at Eleanor as he moved quickly toward her.
“What? What are you talking about?”
“The watch. The one you’re holding.”
Eleanor, bewildered, didn’t know what to make of his request. However, it didn’t seem to matter to Cooper. He reached her, snatched the watch right out of her hands.
“Wha—?! Hey, wait! Don’t just take it! It’s expensive!”
Eleanor protested as Cooper yanked the watch away. Bringing an expensive watch on a dangerous mission was already a bit funny, but after all, it was valuable, and having someone else take it was an unwelcome situation.
“…”
Cooper ignored her protests, completely focused on something. He scrutinized Eleanor’s broken watch and then shifted his gaze to his own. After a few exchanges between the two watches, he finally said something.
“7:28:05 PM…”
The numbers on his watch matched the frozen hands of Eleanor’s watch shockingly well.
“Dude. Was your watch broken too?”
“Yep.”
“What time is it stuck on?”
Elijah rolled up his sleeves and glanced at his wristwatch. A moment of silence passed, then he revealed his watch.
“…It’s stuck at 7:28:05.”
It showed the exact same time Cooper had mentioned.
“…”
All three of them silently stared at each other, realizing something was off about the situation. It was quite possible for all their watches to stop at the same time since they were in the same place experiencing the same events. But was it possible for all watches to stop at exactly the same moment? To be aligned to the second without any deviation?
“It’s just a coincidence… right?”
“I hope so…”
Eleanor stammered with a shaky voice, desperately trying to dispel the foreboding feeling. But in this situation, no one could assure her of anything, and Cooper was praying it was merely a coincidence as well.
Tap tap
In that moment, a sudden sound echoed from above.
“…!”
The trio’s gazes shot up towards the stairs. As if they had agreed, they all readied their weapons and held their breaths, staring at where the sound came from. But after a small rock fell, a significant amount of time passed with nothing appearing above.
Thump
When Elijah turned to look back, Cooper gave him a silent nod as if he understood something. Cautiously pressing together, the three began to ascend the stairs. But step by step, they climbed, and soon they reached one floor, then two, then three—and still, they saw nothing.
“…Nothing up here.”
After climbing a considerable amount of stairs, Elijah determined it was best they stop.
“B-But why did a rock suddenly roll down? Was there some vibration from above?”
“…I don’t know. I didn’t feel anything.”
Eleanor considered the possibility of an explosion on the surface, but Cooper remained unconvinced. If there was enough vibration to send something tumbling over, he should feel it; also, a rock wouldn’t just roll down by itself.
However, no matter how many stairs they climbed, the same landscape repeated, and sensing there was truly nothing up there, just when someone cautiously stopped to sweep their foot along the floor—
Thud, tap, thud
A larger number of rocks started falling from above.
“Something’s definitely up there!”
“Everyone, back against the wall!”
They pressed themselves close to the wall and aimed their weapons at the stairway above. This was clear evidence that there was something up there, and given their previous experiences, it was highly likely to be dangerous.
Tension held tight among them, ignoring the stillness that enveloped them once again. Finally, as silence lingered, Cooper suddenly whispered something.
“Wait.”
He quickly reached for the doorknob of the Emergency Exit.
Click
“…?!”
As the doorknob turned, Eleanor looked on in surprise. And what she saw in her view was Cooper desperately twisting the knob of the locked Emergency Exit.
“C-Cooper? What are you doing?!”
It was undeniably strange. After all, weren’t they supposed to be prepared for whatever was above? Even if he was trying to secure an exit, the door he was trying to open seemed impossible to budge. Yet, he was adamant about opening it, nearly obsessively.
Click, click, click, click!
His actions became wilder, but still, the door showed no sign of yielding. He kept turning the knob and pulling on the door meaninglessly.
“Damn it…!”
Suddenly, he let go of the doorknob, cursed under his breath, and dashed up the stairs.
“W-Where are you going?!”
“Don’t follow me!”
Without a moment’s pause, his sudden outburst took them by surprise. Eleanor called him back in a panicked voice, but all she got in return was a puzzling command.
“Stay there! I’ll be back soon!”
“What do you—”
She could only watch as he disappeared, unable to think of how to react.
Thud, thud, thud!
Without giving her time to process her thoughts, sounds of something leaping upward echoed from below.
“S-Something’s coming from down below!”
She aimed her weapon at the stairs. One member had just vanished with no explanation, and there was an unknown presence above and below. She was left perplexed about where to direct her vigilance.
Thud, thud, thud, thud, thud!
The sound of something coming up grew louder. In that moment of decision, she steadied herself and aimed downwards. When she finally heard the sound just beneath her—
“…Cooper?!”
The familiar face of the companion who had surely just dashed upstairs appeared from below, completely absurd.
“Huh? Didn’t you just go up? Huh?”
Once again, she descended into confusion. An incomprehensible situation. While it was entirely possible that the person climbing up could be a fake, she still couldn’t lower her gun. He simply looked back at her, holding his temple in pain, without saying a word.
“…No way.”
Then Elijah spoke as if he figured something out.
“Hey, let’s go down!”
Thud, thud, thud, thud, thud!
He ran past Cooper, disappearing from Eleanor’s sight. The urgent footsteps echoed throughout the Emergency Exit. The loud noise came from the direction he had just gone, but at some point, it was drowned out by footsteps coming from above.
As the footsteps from above grew closer, they soon reached just above them—
“…”
Without a doubt, Cooper, who should have gone down, was now observing movements from above.
“――――――”
Silence enveloped the air. Within the quiet stillness of the emergency exit, only heavy breathing intertwined with bewilderment could be heard.
“…Looks like we’ve fallen into quite a pickle.”
It didn’t take long for them to realize they had indeed landed in a dire situation.
