The atmosphere inside the Music Hall changed completely. Everyone was apprehensive when a scream cut through the room. The orchestra stopped playing out of sync as the conductor looked toward the door from where the scream came. Lélia was the first to get up from her chair and cross the hall quickly as the screams continued to come through the door. Richard, Vaughan, and Mila followed Lélia, who opened the double doors, entering a large Games Room with several different tables and armchairs scattered randomly.
With a snap of her fingers, Lélia made all the lights in the venue turn on as part of the audience left the Music Hall to see what was happening, and some of the kitchen helpers arrived at the Music Hall, also trying to understand what was happening. The screams grew quieter, and when Lélia opened the door of the Games Room, leading to the hall that housed the floor of the Atrium in the main corridor of the East Wing of the Asturian Manor, she could see several drops of blood falling.
Mila took the lead, heading towards the drops of blood, when Lélia pulled the girl's arm, restraining her from advancing into the open part of the atrium. An unexpected loud thud startled everyone already out the door of the Games Room and into the Atrium Hall. A body fell headfirst to the floor, a crackling noise and squishing flesh echoing throughout the empty room and through the upper floors of the Atrium.
Mila screamed in horror as blood sprayed her clothes and arms, just like Lélia's: they were less than four paces away from the misshapen, bloodied body. Mila hugged Lélia, hiding her face in her friend's shoulder and crying desperately. Everyone started screaming and running back to the Music Room.
"Everyone, out of the manor, now!" Richard shouted. "Towards the subway!"
The guests dagged some chairs around, making way through the Music Hall. Musicians abandoned their instruments on the stage and began jumping over the small stage, joining guests and helpers heading to the doors. The shouting in the hall was general.
"Mila!" Shouted Marta. "Mila, where are you? Mário, are you finding your sister?"
"No," Mário said, holding firmly on the hand of his mother and Scarlet, who in turn held Nair's hand. "Mila!" He yelled.
"Mário! Here," Mila shouted, approaching together with Lélia, Richard, and Vaughan.
"Guys, go to the Vidde that connects to Ástur. I'll guide the people to the yacht. Let's evacuate the island," said Richard.
"I will not leave you," Lélia said.
"Lélia, you need to go with them to the Vidde," said Richard. "I will ensure that everyone leaves here safely and then I'll use Endora or the plane to reach you in Ástur."
"No way," Lélia said.
"Don't argue, Lélia. Please do as I asked," Richard's voice was full of uncertainty.
Lélia was crying and confused as the Music room began to empty.
"Lélia," Anna's voice came from the other side of the door.
"Anna!" Lélia said. "Come with us. Richard will guide the people to the yacht. We'll go to the mainland via the vacuum train."
"I'll run after the people so they don't split up," said Richard.
Lélia pulled Richard by the arm and gave him a quick kiss.
"Take care!" She said.
Richard ran through the Music Hall and entered the Ballroom with some overturned tables and food scattered on the floor. He could hear the screaming outside the Manor while running across the Hall and down the outer stairs towards the manor's south garden.
"Guys!" He yelled. "To the subway, just beside the road."
He reached the lagging part of the group and noticed that some women had dropped their heels back and walked barefoot across the lawn. With a simple wave, Richard made every room in the manor light up. The spotlights outside the building were activated, and the street lamps connected to the manor intensified, improving the visibility for everyone at night.
Inside the manor, Vaughan was tossing an enormous painting with a heavy gilt frame and an oil painting of a blonde woman on the floor. As soon as he removed the painting and exposed the elevator door, everyone tried to open it, but without success.
"What is going on?" Anna asked.
"Someone must be using the elevator," said Nair.
"What?" Lélia asked.
"Someone must know that the elevator exists and is trying to escape the same way we are," said Nair. "This elevator is not really a secret passage. The island's frequent guests know it exists."
"Is it safe to go down?" Lélia asked when Richard, running outside the manor, turned on all the lights.
"Do we have another option?" Marta asked.
"Endora can only be accessed also by this elevator. We can go to the airport by car," said Nair.
"No, let's try here," Lélia said. "It's probably some guest."
Several floors below, inside the wide elevator, a well-dressed gentleman paced back and forth as the mobile room descended to the base connected to the vacuum train station. He noticed when the button for the ground floor, which connected to the Asturian Manor's first floor, lit up: someone in the hall had called the elevator. He pondered for a few seconds whether he would wait for the new people to descend and then take the Viddwagon out to the mainland.
"Fuck them," he said when the elevator speed began to decrease.
As soon as the elevator doors opened, the gentleman limped into the rectangular room. With a wave, he made the weak indirect light emitted by the walls intensify. He descended the steps carefully and happily sighed a pod parked.
Snorting, he finished descending the steps and headed towards the waiting Viddwagon with the doors open. He noted that the Viddwagon could not accommodate more than twelve people.
"No one will steal my place," he said. "I know these situations well. They always leave old people behind to die."
When the old man approached the Viddwagon, the doors closed automatically. The old man stopped abruptly facing the closed door and, with a wave, tried to open the passage without success. He continued to repeat the movement but to no avail.
"Shit," he said right before hearing a slight crack.
The old man turned his back to the closed doors of the Viddwagon and looked back but had no time to do anything. The killer approached with abnormal speed, carrying a massive sledgehammer in hand. The sledgehammer was raised in the air in a split second and hit the elderly victim's left temple hard. The old man immediately fell to the ground with a huge opening in his skull, leaving much of his brain mass in plain sight.
As soon as the elevator reached the first floor of the Asturian Manor, Lélia, Marta, Mila, Mário, Scarlet, Nair, Anna, and Vaughan entered quickly, commanding the closing of the doors.
"We have to prepare if there is someone down there," Lélia said. "Vaughan and I will be on the front line," she spoke as she positioned herself in front of the elevator doors. "As soon as the doors open, we'll go out and see who's at the station. You stay inside. OK?" Everyone nodded.
The thirty-five-story descent was in complete silence until the elevator reached the vacuum train station, and the doors opened. Lélia and Vaughan didn't even leave the elevator when they saw the old man's body lying on the floor. Lélia and Vaughan didn't express anything. The two just waved quickly for the elevator door to close.
"What happened?" Marta asked, but before she had her answer, everyone in the elevator screamed.
The killer appeared on the left side of the station when the elevator doors were almost meeting, and by putting the sledgehammer they had used to open the man's head in half, they managed to prevent the door from closing completely. Except for Lélia and Vaughan, everyone else pressed against the opposite wall of the elevator, screaming. Lélia and Vaughan used their own hands to hold the elevator doors and stop them from opening again. Watching her friends struggle, Mila waved and aimed right at the center of the sledgehammer attached to the elevator door, and a bolt cut through the small space and hit the sledgehammer squarely. As soon as the blue bolt hit the sledgehammer, the killer holding it outside the elevator was thrown through the air, landing beside the old man's corpse.
Lélia and Vaughan pulled the sledgehammer into the elevator and closed the door quickly, watching the killer rise back up and run towards the elevator door. Still, before he could reach the group, the elevator began to climb back to the first floor of the manor.
"You all, get a car in the garage and run to the airport," Spoke Vaughan. "The assassin is trapped down there. They have two options, take the vacuum train to Ástur or go to the Ancient Continent. There's no way they can get out without the elevator. I'm going to go down there and get this over with."
"No!" They all shouted at the same time.
"Vaughan, let's go with us to the airport," Lélia said.
"No! I just didn't get into the station because you were all in the elevator, and I won't involve you in this. But I'm going back there, and I'm going to get that person."
The elevator reached the first floor of the manor, and Vaughan was the only one who remained inside, returning to the station while the rest of the group made their way towards the garage.
A few meters in front of the Asturian Manor, guests clumsily huddled in the small subway station, everyone was sweating, and they could hear moaning and crying as they waited for the train to arrive.
"I have scheduled a new train to arrive every two minutes," said Richard.
As soon as he finished speaking, all the lights in the subway station went out. The screams returned, and a disorderly rush caused some people to fall to the ground. A few lights started to come on from the MC of some guests, and Richard could see a desperate crowd trying to climb at the same time the narrow stairs that led back to the road that connected to the manor.
"What is going on?" Richard questioned himself.
He waved in vain, but the entire station was off, so he grabbed his MC and accessed the Asturian Island systems to see that there was a warning message:
Power systems are interrupted due to unexpected failure.
"Shit," said Richard. "Guys!" He yelled. "Guys, we'll need to take the road to the port."
"What do you think we are doing?" One of the guests shouted amid the fuss.
Richard ignored the rude comment and started up the stairs, being practically carried by the other guests. As he left the narrow staircase, Richard noticed that all the lights were off: the lights of the manor, the floodlights, and the street lamps connected to the manor entrance. His heart sank: if the power system had gone down, it was very likely that Lélia and the others were trapped inside the vacuum train station. He then ignored the mission he had taken on to guide the group to the yacht and started running towards the Asturian Manor.