Stray Voices: Crystals of Cirai, #2 by Troy Metcalf

Author:Troy Metcalf
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Troy Metcalf
Published: 2022-10-09T00:00:00+00:00

16

Sy walked down the dark corridor with trepidation. Each step echoed along the narrow hallway, making him second guess every turn. He could hear the girls chatting back in the control room, but their words were becoming further and further jumbled. Oly walked along in front of him, running his hands along the walls.

“Have you noticed Lara’s been acting weird lately?” Oly asked bluntly. His fingers traced an indentation along the concrete wall, he rubbed the fibres between his fingers. “Do you know where we’re going? I wasn’t really listening.”

“Just follow the corridor. It should lead to a big room,” Sy said with a wave of his hand. “Now that you mention it, Lara has been saying some odd stuff. You reckon it’s just the whole Newtown thing?”

Oly mumbled a response.

Shortly, they arrived at a door set ajar. Oly pushed it open to reveal a landing with a set of metal stairs leading down. The steps looked unstable and dropped into the damp gloom below. Oly shrugged and began the first step.

Sy’s footsteps made the spiral staircase wobble. The clammy bannister slipped under his hands and he recoiled, hand now smelling of rust and dirt. Growing up around unstable staircases in the Hovels had bred an innate fear into his psyche, the stairwell could collapse at any minute. An ever present vigilance flowed through him, ensuring each step was still intact before moving on.

Slowly, they made their way down. The air became thick, and drips of water resonated off the walls. Eventually, and safely, they reached the bottom of the staircase and stepped onto slippery concrete flooring.

As the room was completely made of either concrete or metal, there was no sign of rot, but the stench was almost unbearable. Mould. Mould and rust lined the walls and plastered the metal canisters pinned to them. Each canister came with a warning label and the pipes connected to them drove through the wall.

“What do you think this is?”

Oly grumbled. “I don’t know. It seems like a power room but maybe it just controls some of the other things in the building.” He moved closer to one of the canisters but pulled back sharply. “They’re super hot.”

“Let’s keep going,” Sy said. Something unnerved him about this place, and an itch lingered in his skin that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. His eyes were playing tricks, like they might move by themselves. Sy shook his head and tried to take control of the situation; it was just nerves.

At the side of the room, an open manhole led further into the depths of the hydropower plant. The stairs were covered in slick moss and looked as if they were carved from stone rather than built by a third party.

Still wary, Sy took the first step. It was uneven and he dropped a centimetre too far. A little scream escaped his throat but Sy closed his mouth before his heart followed. “Why can’t anything be easy?”

Oly swore vengeance on the Elders because he would have to come back up the stairs as well.

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