Akeldama | lrh

fifteen - polarize

Nobody volunteers.

"Don't look at me." Zay holds up his hand. "I'm a cripple, remember?"

"I'll do it." Georgia speaks up, a grimace on her face. She's holding her newborn in her arms, wrapped up in one of the only clean blankets we have left. She walks over and stands on the edge, looking passive.

Ivy agrees as well, and copies her actions. Michael is the last to step on, and the second he does a loud click is heard and the thing starts to sink.

All of them jump off. Then the platform rises, opening up into a large hole with ladder rungs down the right side of it.

"Bingo." Luke smirks, and moves to sling himself over the edge. His muscles flex as he grabs onto the rungs, climbing down just enough to see just his face.

"We'll send a signal when we get to the bottom, to tell you all if it's safe or not." Luke says, and jerks his head in Michael's direction. "Come on."

Three, four, five minutes pass of us all standing in silence as Michael and Luke make their way down into the strange hole. Then three sharp whistles ring out, and Ivy quickly gives out instructions on how to navigate the rungs safely and two at a time. Me and Xavier are the first ones to go, and the second my whole body is submerged into the hole it's like I'm breathing in new air. Fresh, and clean air. That's even more strange.

We reach the bottom fairly quickly to find a long hallway lit by lanterns, the walls, ceiling and floor all concrete. There's a huge set of double oak doors at the end. Luke and Michael stand at the beginning of it.

Luke's eyes flit over me for half a second before he shifts his gaze to Xavier pointedly, and a spark of anger moves through me. He's being so damn cryptic and I have no idea what to do about it.

One by one everybody else makes it down the hatch. When we're all standing in the hallway, breathing hard and sweating, Luke rips a lantern off the wall and begins to lead us down to the set of double doors.

There's a strange symbol burned into the wood, one I haven't seen before. Luke barely spares it a glance, too interested in what we're about to do, and draws two knives before bracing himself.

"Ok guys." He says. "We don't know what's behind this door. It could be cash, or it could be something else. Just be prepared."

With that, he uses the heel of his boot to kick the doors apart. 

I don't bother to hide the gasp that rises in my throat. Nobody else does either, apparently, because in all honestly I'm pretty sure this surprises all of us.

"Well, this is definitely not a bank vault." Michael observes, ever the calm one. 

The room is massive, hexagonal in shape. There's a large table sitting in the middle, with a dozen chairs seated around it. Hallways branch off each divided section on the wall, with doors lining every one. A huge chandelier rests in the center of the ceiling, illuminating the room in a blue light. My jaw drops. I don't know what I was expecting, but this was definitely not it.

Luke's eyebrows seem to almost touch his hair line. "What the-"

"Hell." Ivy mutters, swallowing. "What the hell is this?"