“There’s a lift, you know,” said the deputy, as if addressing someone he did not know on the street who needed a little assistance. “It was installed some sixty or so years ago, but he always forces new arrivals to come through the house and use the stairs.”
The attention of the deputy on Brenden suddenly made the boy feel worse as shame resulting from the man seeing him cry only added to his misery. He tried to will himself to stop, but this only made the tears flow with a new force, and for several moments Brenden just stood on the stairs continuing to cry as the deputy looked on in an awkward silence.
The deputy came to rest his hand on Brenden’s shoulder, at a loss at what else to do. The boy tried to wipe away the tears from his face with the sleeve of his pullover and settled on the view that the only way for him to stop crying was to carry on down the stairs. He now wanted to walk on, but for a while longer he remained rooted to the spot. There was no real notion keeping him there, just the fear of whatever was to come next and a preference for a deferral of everything. However, he endeavoured to rationalise why he was not moving, and he fixed upon the idea that there on the stairs, he was caught between the empty, friendless existence he had carried on at his school and the unknown world of whatever lay before him in the Tunnels. He suddenly felt at a loss to explain his conviction that entering the Tunnels was the right thing to do, and without even really thinking about it, he resumed his descent down the stairs.
A wave of relief swept over the deputy when Brenden started to move. As he did not want to risk upsetting the boy again, he kept his distance behind Brenden for the rest of the journey down into the ever cooler air as they made their way to the bottom of the stairs. This left Brenden to his own devices, and to finally be able to take in his surroundings. The stairway consisted of a single, time-worn set of steps, an arched ceiling, a metal bannister on one side of the space and a ramp – presumably for the transportation of goods – on the other. Like the house above, the walls were painted white and the whole space was lit up by a series of oval bulkhead lights, each spaced around forty feet apart from the next. All in all, Brenden counted twelve lights before he reached the bottom, leaving him wondering how deep under the ground the stairway had led him.
When Brenden reached the base of the stairs, he turned around to look at the captivating sight of the tunnel stretching back up to ground level. For a moment, it captured his whole attention and freed him from his thoughts about why he was there. But as the deputy came ever closer, so did the reality of his situation. When the deputy finally came to a stop beside him, Brenden was released from his concerns for a moment longer as he became aware of the stillness of the place, something which was broken only by the gentle buzzing of one of the lights. Finally, though, he could prolong things no longer.
“What do I need to do now?” asked Brenden.
“We just need to go through there,” answered the deputy, while pointing to a rather normal looking white door that sat at the back of the fairly small rectangular space that formed the base of the stairway. “But first, I just need to contact the man upstairs.”
The deputy strode forwards and pressed a buzzer that was beside the door. An undulating electric tone followed until a click cut it off to indicate that someone was listening.
“We’re here,” stated the deputy, flatly, into the little plastic grate above the buzzer. A loud crack emanated from the door, which then opened to reveal a corridor that extended about one hundred feet further into the earth. As they left the stairway behind, Brenden found the room beyond it to be much wider and higher than he expected. How wide this happened to be, though, he could not see as the place was filled with containers of different sorts, many of which were stacked, one on top of the other. Many of these containers were also for refrigeration, as suggested by the chorus of humming generated by the machines.
“What’s all this for?” asked Brenden, who did not even try to hide the surprise in his voice.
“For those in the Tunnels. Some who have ended up down here who still have the means to supply themselves with a little of what they need. It prevents, well, what comes after the hunger goes away. I wish it were otherwise, but I’m afraid you’ll become familiar with what I’m referring to all too soon.”
For the first time that he could remember, Brenden truly met the gaze of the deputy and tried to understand what the man was telling him. Though no one had ever told him so, Brenden had come to believe that coming down here would provide some sort of escape from what it meant to be a vampire. Why else would anyone choose to hide away if this were not the case?
“There’s usually a number of ex-students working here, but they’re always kept away for new arrivals. Some are on the other side as well. We keep them in supply to ensure things are orderly down there. You may even want to consider such a position for yourself once you cross over, though you needn’t worry for a little while as the school will provide you with some blood for
