Part 4: Beyond the Storm
Throughout the remainder of our journey through the madness of what lay beyond Alberson Bridge, I filled Grant in on how I had gotten myself lost, along with what I had to fight against to reach him again. It would seem that once we got through what he called the worst of it, the rest was pretty easygoing. The fog finally dissipated completely, as did the raging storm. I could still hear the thunder and see the flashes of lightning illuminating the world around us, but I felt my feet clapping against the concrete again before I knew it.
Though I was tempted to pry more, I chose not to ask what else may be out there in that place, as I planned to not take my eyes off him on the return trip. We walked side by side, as opposed to the follow-me technique that didn’t work out so well, and though my heart was still in overdrive from what I had experienced back there, I felt so much more at ease now that I was with Grant once more. Even before I knew who he was, I still felt more assured when I was around him. I suppose that’s just the effect of being in the presence of a dear and trusted friend.
When the sky began to darken as though we had strolled into the middle of a moonless night, Grant fished his cigarettes out of his pocket once more. I took that as my queue that it was safe to light one up myself, and that alone inspired my pulse to regulate a little more. Not at all am I endorsing smoking, boys and girls, but for a nicotine addict, it’s like a damn breath of fresh air, and God knows I needed it after what I’d been through.
“We’re close now, mate.”
“Yeah? Close to what exactly?”
“That,” he said, pointing towards the almost Scooby-Doo-inspired mansion on the hill, off in the distance, “that’s the end of the road. If Orchid is out here, that’s where he’ll be.”
“So, any ideas of what to expect when we get there?”
“Not sure, but don’t fret, mate. We got this, yeah?”
“If you say so.” I gave a fairly forced chuckle, to which Grant returned that cocky smirk.
If nothing else, his demeanor didn’t seem tense or scared, but he was a hell of a lot less breakable than I. Still, he’d brought me back from the brink of death before, so that wasn’t for nothing. Yes, I was pretty fucking terrified. I won’t even attempt to lie about that fact. If someone chose to live in a place that could only be accessed by going through whatever the hell that was back there, I could only assume they were more intimidating than anything that surrounded us during that storm.
I can’t deny that the little voice in the back of my head was quite pissed at me for not jumping at the chance to let Grant do this alone, but I knew it was the right call. No matter what power he possessed, nor the fact that I had none, except for being quite adept at kicking some ass, nobody should have to face something like this alone. He was the best friend I ever had, and I would be damned if I would let him face this without me by his side.
As we drew closer to the large and ominous building, the fairly wide-open space narrowed down. Blackened and almost foreign-looking trees lined the paved road we walked on. With Grant’s nod, we moved closer to the treeline which gave me a better view of what we were facing. The mansion itself looked to be about three floors tall, not counting any potential lower levels. The walls were jet black; not indifferent from the very place we were seeking answers to, though they were not that same glossy and almost organic in appearance. There was a tall, ironwork fence surrounding the wide-open area of the house, with a fair amount of armed guards patrolling back and forth.
It would seem the senior Mr. Orchid was somewhat paranoid, especially given the unique location in which he lived. I couldn’t help but think that such extraordinary security measures were put in place to protect him from the very man whose company I shared. I found myself wondering how much Orchid knew about the being who sentenced his son to early damnation, or the circumstances of how he left this world. Well, the world we left behind when we entered Alberson Road.
I assumed he may not have any actual idea of who truly sought him out, as he had only sent a handful of hired guns to deal with us, but that could’ve been no more than a trap. Maybe he was well aware of the true identity of Grant Bailey; having sent a few pawns to essentially make us think we had the upper hand. Of course, it could very well be that I was overthinking things again, as I tend to do. Admittedly, I was quite paranoid myself with everything the Orchid family had already put us through, so I wasn’t about to let my guard down; not with the eleventh hour approaching.
We crouched down only fifty feet or so from the tall and hauntingly elegant gate. While I studied the movements of the guards, as well as any potential openings to reach the building, I noticed Grant was acting strangely. I had to cover my mouth to prevent the gasp from escaping when I turned to see him with the forefinger and thumb of his right hand pierced through the flesh of his left forearm. Before I had the chance to inquire as to what the hell he was doing, he pulled a bloodstained key from under the skin.
As he wiped the blood from the small, simple key across the leg of his shorts, I watched the hole in his arm seal back shut. No matter what I had witnessed since I met him, those were sights I didn’t think I’d ever get used to. Once the stains had been cleansed from the treasure he had pulled from his flesh, he held it out towards me. I gave him a puzzled look but held my hand out nonetheless. I was quite surprised when the metal didn’t feel remotely sticky when he dropped it into my outstretched palm, considering where it had been previously located, but I was still very uncertain what this was all about.
“If anything goes wrong in there; anything at all,” he said, gesturing towards the house looming over us, “slide that key into any lock. Doesn’t matter if it’s a door, a closet, or a bloody cabinet. As long as you can fit through it, it’ll take you back to the pub. You get me?”
“Grant, I’m not gonna leave…”
“Please, mate! I need you to agree to this!”
The expression he wore while he stared deeply into my eyes was one I had only seen maybe once before. There was fear behind his gaze; something that instantly caused my heartbeat to quicken once more. I still couldn’t quite find the words, as I could not imagine any scenario in which I would flee from not only my friend but the only person who had a chance of protecting me against the things I could not wrap my mind around.
“Michael,” he said, defaulting back to his business voice again, “I have no idea what we may face in that place.”
My words were still frozen in my throat. I was already scared, but seeing the anguish in Grant’s face escalated that fear tenfold.
“I cannot and will not put you in harm’s way; something I have exposed you to far more than I ever wanted to. I need your word, mate. That was the deal, yeah? You do what I say when I say it.”
I just nodded my head, though I can’t exactly say I fully intended to do what he asked. That was until he gripped his hands around my shoulders; something that still flashed my mind back to the day my father tossed me through my bedroom window. The fact that my friend knew all about that only made me realize how serious he was about this.
“If I tell you to run, please Michael, I need your word that you will find the nearest lock. Use the key, get to the pub, and don’t look back. Make sure you remove the key and close the door behind you.”
I cut my eyes from him to stare at the key I held. It felt like an excuse to look away for a moment.
“Do you trust me, Micheal?”
I lifted my head again, seeing the intensity having left his face, replaced by that all too familiar smirk.
“With my life,” I said with an accepting nod. “What you say, when you say it. You have my word, brother.”
“Good man,” he gave me a wink, accompanied by a click of the tongue; one of those things that felt like something only the English could pull off the right way.
I slipped the key into my pocket, which I would pat or grope regularly to ensure it remained in place over what was to come. I still hoped it would not come down to it, but I had given him my word. That was something I would never break; not to him. My skin was still trembling, but I had more faith in my friend than I ever had in anyone. I imagine that may yet seem bizarre, considering who he is, though even to this day, I can’t see Grant as anyone other than the strong and kind-hearted person I knew. Nothing would ever change that. Not to me.
“So,” I said, staring out at the security staff pacing back and forth, “what’s the plan? How do we get in there?”
“Front door, mate.”
“You’re not serious. What about the guards? You’re not gonna…”
I felt my words catch in my throat once more when I turned to see Grant with his eyes tightly shut. His jaw was clenched while his fists were both balled into fists. When I heard the first one drop to the ground, I whipped my head around once more, I felt my jaw droop almost lifelessly as every one of the guards fell out, one after the other.
“What!? Did you…I mean…they’re not…”
“They’re not dead mate, just sleeping it off.”
He was panting heavily while he spoke, which; given the fact I had witnessed him snapping forty fingers backward without so much as breaking a sweat, left me a little perplexed.
“Just gimme a minute, yeah?”
“You ok, man?”
“I’m good. Ironically, it would’ve taken far less a toll on me to kill the buggers,” he said with a laugh, still breathing heavily, “much more tricky to knock ‘em out for a bit…more focus, y’know?”
“Nope!” I said, returning his chuckle, “I don’t know, but I’ll take your word on it.”
After a few minutes, his breathing regulated, he rolled his neck and climbed back to his feet. I followed his lead again as we casually strolled towards the tall gate before he convinced it to open with a simple flick of his wrist. The hinges screamed, causing a chill to run from the base of my spine to the top. As strange as it may sound, I was almost hoping for some stealthy maneuvering or even something of a fight with the guards to get in.
No, I wasn’t exactly rooting for any potential harm to come to either us or the ample security team, but I was in favor of it taking us some time to find a way into the house. Even if more delays would have inevitably led to my body growing considerably more exhausted than it already was, I wasn’t entirely prepared to come face to face with whoever, or whatever we would meet within those quite eerie-looking walls.
As we approached the twin doors that led into the building, I craned my neck up to truly take in the size of the place. Though it appeared to be a good-sized mansion from where we hid behind the trees, there was most certainly a sense of dread taking root in the pit of my stomach as I took in the sheer magnitude of it. Sure, it was little more than a ratty old shack compared to the gargantuan behemoth of a building the old factory led us to, but I still couldn’t shake the foreboding of entering such a place of our own free will.
Once more, Grant waved the double doors ajar, and I found my eyes meeting another wide-open room with a winding staircase on either side of the back wall. It almost appeared as though the owner of this house had modeled its design on that maddening place we almost lost our lives to. Even the inner walls were painted a similar glossy black, though they did not seem to harbor life; not as far as I could tell anyway.
“Well, this is unsettling,” Grant said, giving me a sideways look.
I just nodded, finding my voice hidden behind my thumping heartbeat.
“So,” Grant said with a mischievous smile, “up or down?”
“No idea,” I said, “but this guy seems like a top floor kinda fella.”
From what I could tell from the lobby area, there appeared to only be two or three floors above us. I exhaled a grateful sigh when my eyes met the ceiling of the house and not an endless stream of upper levels. I found the place almost unnervingly quiet, as though we were its only occupants at the time. I knew better than to allow myself that false sense of security, but given the abundance of guards on the exterior, I was quite surprised to find nobody awaiting us inside; not on the ground floor anyway.
The floor creaked beneath my soft footsteps; something that caught me off guard, given the vast wealth of who I assumed to own the place. Even Grant wore a puzzled look while we crept towards the staircase on the back left, with the floor panels lightly squealing with every step. We were only halfway across the room when a voice bellowed from a speaker somewhere above us.
“Welcome, Mr. Bailey, and Mr. Bourdon…”
I could’ve been imagining it, but I swear the voice sounded identical to that of Jensen Orchid; someone I knew could not be here. Of course, it’s not hard to believe that a father and son could have similar mannerisms, but I suppose I had expected the senior Orchid to have a much more aged and weathered tone. If anything, he sounded almost lively and carefree in the way he spoke.
“Quite the impressive job with my exterior guards, I must say. It would seem that at least some of the rumors are true, though I am well aware you are not who you claim to be, Mr. Bailey.”
“You ain’t seen nothin’, Orchid!” I yelled out, far more arrogantly than I had a right to be.
Grant just wrapped his fingers around my arm, along with a subtle nod. I just shrugged and returned a slightly ashamed smile.
“And who is it that I claim to be?” My friend asked aloud, having reverted to his business voice again.
“You tell me. Is it Grant Bailey from Liverpool, England? Or is it Lucifer himself? Either way, if you will forgive my crudity, you’re full of shit on both counts!”
“Is that right?” Grant asked.
“You have gifts, my boy. I cannot deny that, but you are no Devil.”
“And what makes you so sure, Mr. Orchid?”
“Silly boy,” the voice said with a condescending chuckle, “I happen to know the real Lucifer quite well. She is a close friend of mine, as a matter of fact.”
“Perhaps you could introduce us then? We could clear all of this up face to face.”
There was no response; not yet anyway. Grant had that same intense look on his face that he wore when studying the friendly goon; Mr. Green some years back. I knew this expression was not one of mild curiosity, but desperation to get to the root of something; deep into the guts of the mystery at hand. My heart was still jackhammering behind my sternum, while my thoughts were all over the place.
Why, if he knew we had rendered his security team unconscious, would he allow us to just walk right through the front door? For what reason was he essentially shooting the shit with us over an intercom? If he was so certain that my friend wasn’t what I knew him to be, why was he just casually throwing that out there? I could barely focus on one question before another leaped from the back of my mind to the front.
“Tell you what…” the disembodied voice said after a short delay, “if you can make it to the top floor, where I happen to be located, I’ll introduce you.”
“She’s here then?” Grant asked, with a slight smirk.
Again, there was no response.
“Mr. Orchid!” Grant shouted out, but there was still no reply.
“He’s fucking with us,” I said.
“If nothing else, at least we have an answer to the up or down debate,” he said, gesturing towards the steps.
“With him being so damn cocky, you know he’s gonna have some traps set up or something.”
“Nothing we can’t handle, just stay behind…”
My friend did not have a chance to finish asking me to keep to his rear before the floor fell out from beneath us. In that split second of feeling my body become weightless as it soared downwards, I just knew that this was the end for me. I was so mentally checked out that I had no idea how far we had fallen before Grant wrapped his arms around me, allowing his body to take the full force of the quickly halted descent to the hard ground below. Even with my friend providing life-saving padding for my far more fragile frame, I blacked out as soon as we hit.
“You alright, mate?”
I was still incredibly dazed when I came to, with my friend’s worried face being the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes again.
“Yeah, I’m good. Thanks for saving my ass yet again,” I chuckled as I sat up, straightening my back while trying to gather my bearings.
He just gave me a wink, reaching his hand out to help me back to my feet.
“How long was I out for?”
“Just a couple of minutes. Had me worried though.”
I looked around to take in the new and unfamiliar surroundings. We stood in the center of a drab and dank, wide, circular room, with four simple, wooden doors; one to the front and rear of where we were facing, and one on either side. The rounded walls looked to be constructed of smooth rock, while the ground beneath our feet was no different from the concrete pavement we had walked barefoot across what felt like so many hours before. The ceiling was high above, and I couldn’t see any sign of the opening we had dropped through, only more seamless grey slightly hidden behind the darkness. There was no direct source of light, but it was bright enough for us to see our surroundings clearly enough.
“Fucking Orchids love their damn games, don’t they?”
“Probably the only way the pompous tossers can get their bloody rocks off.”
With the uncertainty of which, if any of the doors would lead us to where our host was located, I absentmindedly reached into my pocket for my cigarettes. I offered one to Grant, and we lit up while we debated which theoretical exit to attempt first. With how our surprising drop from somewhere above had caught us both off guard, neither of us had any idea which direction we were facing in relation to where we had entered the house.
Were we to be able to decipher which way was which, it would likely aid us in finding our way back up top, while any other direction could end up leading us away from the house. Of course, those were real-world ideas and not those of wealthy nefarious madmen. I couldn’t help but laugh as my inner monologue came upon those very words, as they sounded like tropes that belonged in a James Bond movie, rather than the life of a regular person. Of course, many aspects of my personal history were far from regular, but you get what I’m saying, right?
“Maybe we should open all the doors, take a peek in each, and go from there?” I suggested.
“Can’t hurt. One at a time though. No telling if there’s something nasty waiting directly behind any of ‘em.”
“Good call.”
I can’t say I wasn’t nervous when we pulled open that first door, with my mind’s eye picturing some pack of wild animals lurking behind or even thousands of gallons of water waiting to be unleashed. When there was no more than a vacant hallway lined with the same smooth concrete walls, I allowed myself to release the breath I had been holding. When the remaining trio was opened to reveal the same thing, I let out another sigh as this had brought us no closer to our goal.
“Bugger me,” Grant said, heavily exhaling himself.
Each hallway looked to stretch farther than either of us could make out, revealing absolutely nothing to differentiate one from the other. After some back and forth, along with one more smoke for the road, we just decided to begin walking down one at random. As soon as we were only a few feet away from the door, it slammed shut behind us, echoing the sound around where we stood.
As I walked back to make a quick check if it may have remained unlocked, I practically fell back to the hard ground again when a thick concrete slab swiftly dropped down before me, sealing any of the other doors away from us indefinitely.
“Welp,” I said, after spilling a mass of profanities at the top of my lungs, “guess we’re going this way whether we’re right or wrong.”
So, we walked on. We may very well have been headed back towards Alberson Bridge for all we knew, but with any choice in the matter having been locked away behind a damn concrete slab, we could only soldier onwards. If nothing else, it didn’t take too long for us to reach the first obstacle in our plight to reach Orchid senior, as well as whatever secrets he may hold about his good friend ‘Lucifer’.
“You’re taking the sodding piss,” Grant said aloud, glaring at what lay ahead.
The gap in the concrete floor looked to be about forty to fifty feet long at first glance. The closer we got to it, the grimmer our circumstances appeared. I don’t know if it was the long and jagged spikes that lined the base of the pit before us that caught my attention first or the handful of bodies in varying states of decomposition impaled upon several of them. The gaping hole looked just as deep as it did long, making me wonder if we had made the worst possible choice after all.
As I stared at this impossible task with my jaw hanging open once more, Grant was hard at work trying to put a plan together. When he turned his head up to the ceiling, I followed his gaze to see a series of small, hand-sized rings dangling some six or seven feet above us. Each looked to be spaced a good five feet apart, but I couldn’t help but feel they were some sort of red herring. I knew all too well how much the Orchid family loves to play with lower life forms, such as ourselves. I somehow doubted there would be such a simple solution to this.
Without a word, Grant pulled off his belt, slung it towards the first hoop, and pulled back right when the buckle wrapped around it. With his first tug, the ring detached on one side, with the other still holding firmly in place.
“Maybe the one side would be enough to hold us,” he said with a shrug.
“Or it’s just hanging on by a thread too,” I replied.
It didn’t take us long to rule out scaling the pit from above. When I noticed the ladder reaching out of the far end of the hole, I gave my friend a nudge, gesturing towards it. We both got down on all fours, peering over the side to see if there was another on the side we were on.
“Of course not,” I said with another aggravated sigh.
“Maybe we could drop down on this side, work around the spikes and climb out the other?” Grant replied.
“I don’t know, man. Even if there is any space between the spikes, that’s a hell of a distance to drop and hope for the best.”
We both glanced down into the pit again, seeing that there was some space in between, but with the angle we were looking from, as well as how deep and dark the very base of the hole was, we had no way of knowing for sure. The last thing we needed was to somehow work our way down there and end up trapped with no way out. Again, we began to puzzle this out, though our options were quite slim. Of course, when the rumbling came from behind us, I grew far more aware that we may well be shit out of luck on this one.
As soon as I felt the ground shake, we both spun in place to see the concrete slab that hid our other options away from us, steadily creeping in our direction, effectively giving us maybe minutes to figure out something before we would be pushed into the pit.
“Shit!” I said, “what the hell are we missing!?”
“Maybe the simple fact that bugger wants us dead,” Grant said almost nonchalantly.
“No, they like their games. Even as sick as those bastards are, they wouldn’t put us in a no-win situation. They’re fucking with us, man. There’s always a punchline.”
“Or a test…”
“Huh?”
“He believes his associate to be the devil, but he has his doubts, I suspect. What would you think to be the one defining aspect of Lucifer to someone such as our dear Mr. Orchid?”
“I don’t know, um, what? Horns? Forked tail? Pitchfork?…”
“Ok, A: that’s racist, and two: Everyone knows the Devil is evil.”
“So, what? Are you supposed to, like, throw me into the pit to get by or something?”
He just shrugged as though this was such a simple and easy solution to our problems.
“Come on…seriously!?”
“No, mate, I’m not throwing you into the bloody pit, but I do believe it is a sacrifice scenario.”
With the slab edging steadily closer and my brain feebly attempting to wrap itself around what Grant was saying, I found my thoughts interrupted when my friend pushed me up against the wall. He had me pinned by the arms and I found myself momentarily freaked out by the fear that he may indeed have to toss me over to get by, until,
“We have to put on a bit of a show, mate…” he whispered into my ear while I fought to get free from his grasp.
“You think he’s watching?”
“Of course he is. I don’t see any cameras, but I have no bloody doubt he’s well aware of every move we make.”
“You better pull your punches,” I said, trying not to chuckle at the absurdity of having to stage a play for our overseer.
He just gave a slight wink before slugging me in the gut. Fortunately, he had indeed held back, but it still caught me by surprise. After I buckled over, falsely choking and gasping for breath, I reared my hand back and punched him across the face. He backhanded me, almost causing me to lose my balance for a second, as we were still close to the edge. Grant instantly reacted when he noticed my foot slip a little, pulling me back by the collar and head butting me, just as any self-respecting Manchester United fan should be able to do.
I stumbled back to the wall, thrusting my foot up to meet his midsection, causing him to hunch over and ram his head into my stomach. We were making sure to echo a resounding ‘oof’ or ‘argh’ with each hit and every swing. In my head, it felt like a poorly choreographed fight scene acted out by some amateur improv group, but I hoped it looked real enough to our audience. Of course, I still wasn’t entirely sure what the point of all of this was until Grant tackled me, landing us both on the floor, right beside the ledge.
“When we get back up, you gotta push me over the side,” he whispered.
“What? No! I can’t…”
“I’ll be ok, mate. One of us has to go in, and no offense, but I bounce back a lot better than you do.”
Honestly, I couldn’t argue he had a point. I’d watched him get drilled full of bullets without even losing track of what he was saying, but I still winced at the idea of throwing him to what would surely be certain death for any normal person. My whole body was beginning to shudder at the very thought of what he told me to do, but I had no doubt he knew this was what had to be done.
“Ok…but…”
“I’ll be fine, mate. You trust me, yeah?”
“Always.”
With that, we wrestled back to our feet while Grant spun me in place with his back facing the gaping mouth of the pit. We still gave false jabs at one another, even with the concrete slab only ten feet or so from where we stood. He gave me a subtle nod to let me know the time had come. Though my back was as tense as the wall that was edging closer by the second, I couldn’t help but take such a rare opportunity to have a bit of fun with the morbid act I was being forced to commit.
“This…” I said, allowing a slight smirk to creep across my lips.
“Don’t!”
“IS…” I felt the laugh attempt to rise within me, but forced it down behind the intense and angered expression I gave my closest friend.
“Mate, don’t you fucking…”
“SPARTA!” I screamed out as I stepped back with one foot, thrusting the other into his gut, sending him careening over the side.
“Wankeeer…” was the last thing I heard him say before I watched an especially thick and jagged spike breach from his chest, spurting blood across the walls and onto the floor on which I still stood.
For a moment, I felt my heart stop. My breath caught in my throat while my head felt dizzy. Even when Grant ever so slightly raised his middle finger from the arm that hung limp beside him, my guts still churned at the sight of him just dangling there with his chest cavity spread wide. The vibration of the ground fell still as the slab stopped in place, maybe four or five feet from my back. A moment later, I felt another shuddering beneath me as a slender bridge began to work its way from my side of the pit to the one we had quite literally fought to reach.
My legs were still trembling as I carefully paced across the slim walkway, but I felt the tension in my neck begin to release when I saw Grant pulling himself up the spike that ran right through him. By the time I got to the other side, he was already reaching from one sharp prong to the next, having freed himself from the one that would’ve surely laid anyone else to rest.
If Orchid was indeed watching from some monitor up in his tower, I imagine he would be quite befuddled by the sight of the man he thought to be an imposter climbing up the ladder to stand beside me once more. That alone gave me just as much satisfaction as seeing what was once a grizzled and bloody, gaping hole in Grant’s chest having sealed itself back shut.
“Sparta?” He said, nudging me with his elbow wearing an expression, not unlike that of an exhausted parent.
I just shrugged, unable to quite locate the words while he patted down his shirt as though he were wiping dust away, as opposed to adjusting the giant rip down the center. We both gave one final glance at the large pit while lighting a fresh cigarette, before moving onwards once more. We couldn’t know what little surprises the elder Mr. Orchid had in store for us next, but I was certain our seemingly endless day was far from reaching its conclusion.