Trapped

THIRTEEN

"Marianne, what the hell is going on?"

They were riding the elevator back up to the twenty-sixth floor.

"I don't know. Let me think."

"You're scaring me half to death."

The doors opened and they stepped out into the lobby before the K&D offices.

"I'm holding the elevator here," Marianne said. She reached back inside and pulled the emergency stop button. The doors stayed open. "I've got to think."

"Why couldn't we wait there for security?" Renni asked.

Marianne didn't look at her when she answered. "I don't think they were coming back."

"Why not? Where were they?"

"I don't think they were anywhere."

"What does that mean?"

Marianne's eyes moved. She tapped her hands together nervously. When she went to hold Renni's trembling hand, it was as much for her own benefit.

"Let's just...get out of here." It was all she could think to say as she kept trying to think.

"How?" Renni asked, trying to think herself. "The electronic gate doesn't work. The night guards have all taken a hike. All the other exits are controlled by the security system."

Marianne nodded. "And now the phones don't seem to be working either."

Renni shook her head and exhaled, referencing her dream of the previous night: "I feel the temperature starting to drop."

Marianne turned to give her friend a reassuring smile when the elevator doors behind Renni opened—

A dark figure lunged out.

The man in the dark overcoat.

There was a knife—a blur of movement as things happened too fast—

The man grabbed Renni. She screamed. Marianne fell back into the elevator hard, her arm swiping all the buttons on her way down.

"Renni!"

The doors began to close.

"Marianne! Oh my God! Help me!"

Marianne flew up to put herself in the threshold, try and stop the doors—

"Oh God! No! Please! Marianne!"

The doors finished closing. Something pounded on it from the outside. Marianne lurched forward—the DOOR OPEN button—pressed it—the doors began to—

A baseball bat swung through the opening and collided with Marianne's face.

"Marianne!"

She went down, grabbing the side of her face where the bat had glanced off her cheek.

She felt blood.

The doors were still opening—

Marianne strived, pulled the emergency button, the doors stopped—

The bat whipped frantically through the gap, searching for her—

She dove to a back corner, out of striking range.

The bat was ripped back out of the elevator—

And the man in the dark overcoat appeared in the gap, reaching through, trying to wedge himself in—couldn't—

Marianne saw him only briefly before he busted his arm through. His dark coat, a white button-up underneath that was unbuttoned at the top. Balding, fifties maybe, a thick mustache—and a scar above his right eye. His coarse unshaven face twisted into a menacing scowl as he grunted, trying to break in—

His arm reached wildly for the control buttons on the side of the car, almost on them—

Marianne dove forward and attacked the arm, scratching it, biting it, pulling it away—

The man howled and ripped his arm back—it reappeared—there was the knife—

He slashed it madly through the air, the blade barely missing Marianne's face as she fell back to the corner of the car.

She thought there would be more, but just as suddenly Renni's screams returned.

"Help me, Marianne! No! No! He's killing me! He's killing me...!"

Marianne thought she could even hear the sound of a blade tearing repeatedly into flesh. Renni's screams turned into incoherent sobs.

Marianne released the emergency stop button, the doors closing as hot tears poured down her face, her own body racking with sobs.

She shrieked and fell back once more as she heard the bat return, pounding once against the doors before they could fully close, then once more as they did...

...and the elevator began to rise.

Marianne lay crying in the corner, letting her wails be as loud as she could make them, anything to drown out Renni's fading screams as the car began its ascent...