The Sector

Chapter Eleven

Seth held his breath as he waited for the sound to recede, then waited a minute longer, just to be sure.

Darbee continued to tap frantically at his desk.

Seth's heart hammered at the thought of what he was about to do. He took a deep breath, reminding himself that if he was ever going to find a way out of here, his only chance was to get help from someone on the inside.

Darbee, it seemed, was the only person in this place with an ounce of sense, and as of now, Seth planned to take full advantage of that.

He closed his eyes, resting a palm on the cool concrete wall and preparing himself, then poked his head around the corner.

"Darbee," he hissed.

Darbee's tapping stopped. His timid eyes flicked around the room, trying to determine where the sound had come from.

"Darbee," Seth hissed again, and Darbee's eyes landed on him.

His face dropped, the colour draining from his cheeks in seconds.

"Seth?" he whispered, his eyes wide and his hands visibly shaking. He half rose out of his seat, clearly unsure of what to do. His eyes darted around the room, checking each of the corridors it joined onto. "What in the world are you doing?"

"Darbee, I need your help," Seth said as loud as he dared. "Please... It's the only chance I have..."

Darbee gawked at him. "I-I can't," he whispered back. "They'll kill me; I can't... I-I'm sorry, Seth."

That caught Seth by surprise. This was his only shot and if it fell through, he knew he was as good as dead. "Darbee, please," he begged. "Please, you know what they'll do to me. You know what they already did to Patrik—"

"And I know what they did to Frasier and those Officers now too," Darbee finished. "Gianna will do whatever it takes to save her program. She put them in the pit and she'll put me in there too if I don't do as she says." His eyes flitted about the room in a frenzy.

Seth steadied himself on the wall. He couldn't do this on his own. He didn't know how. "Please, Darbee," he repeated. "Please, you have to help me. I-I can't... I can't... Please..." he stumbled over his words, his mind racing and his heartbeat thumping in his ears. His breath rattled in his chest, sharp and shallow. 

Darbee moved from his place at his desk to meet Seth where he stood at the end of the corridor. He took Seth by the shoulders and shook him. 

"Calm down," he hissed. "Calm down, someone will hear you."

"Please," Seth whispered, tears welling in his eyes. "Please, I don't want to die. You must know that what they're doing here is wrong. You must have some way to help me get out. I don't want to die..."

Darbee stared at him for a long moment, then finally he gave in.

"Okay," he whispered.

Seth's shoulders convulsed as he tried desperately to hold back his sobs. His hands flew to his mouth and his eyes scrunched shut as an immense wave of relief washed over him.

"Thank you," he breathed, almost collapsing into Darbee's arms. "Thank you, Darbee."

"Don't thank me yet," Darbee said as he released him, his nervous eyes scanning the room once again. "They may still very well kill us both."

Seth nodded, wiping the wetness from his cheeks. "What now?" he asked.

"First of all, we need to get you somewhere safe... Come with me."

Darbee turned and went back to his desk, tapping a few more keys before checking again to make sure all the adjoining hallways were still empty.

He signaled to Seth.

Together, they hurried down the corridor that led to Frasier's office. Seth supposed that it wasn't really Frasier's anymore—it would belong to someone else now.

Before they got to it, Darbee swung open one of the doors along the left-hand wall of the passageway. It led to another small office, much like the one Seth had hidden in the night before.

"I'd take you to Frasier's office since it's no longer occupied," he said with a certain tang of bitterness in his voice, "but they'll be cleaning it out. This one will be safer instead. It belonged to one of the leading Officers in the program; he left us a few months ago. Gianna never thought it important to replace him since she took full control, so it's been empty ever since."

He ushered Seth inside, telling him to stay hidden and stay quiet. Everyone was on the lookout for him and if even the slightest thing was out of the ordinary, it would all be over before it ever began.

Seth nodded, thanked Darbee again in hushed voices, and blended himself into the shadows.

"I'll be back to get you tonight, once everyone else has left," Darbee told him.

"Okay," Seth said as Darbee swung the door shut and hurried back to his desk.

Unsure of what to do with himself until Darbee returned for him later that night, Seth tiptoed around the room. Most of the furniture had gathered a fine layer of dust over the months it had been left untouched. A desk still sat towards the back wall, as with almost every other office Seth had seen in this place. Careful not to make a sound, he sat behind it and tested the computer.

Pressing the power button, he held his breath and waited. Nothing happened. He sighed, his eyes falling to the floor, where he noticed a cable running out from under the desk. Following it, he found that it was the power cable for the computer.

That was why it hadn't started.

Quickly, he plugged it into the socket on the wall and tried again. This time, the screen lit up and the computer hummed softly.

The first screen loaded and Seth found himself stumped again. The computer was password protected.

Sighing, he pushed himself away from the desk and went instead to the bookshelves lining the room's left wall. He sifted through the books in it, reading each title and author, checking the blurbs of the ones that stood out. They were all fairly mediocre—books about "How To Achieve Success" and genetics, biology, and everything else Seth would expect to find in a place like this. He couldn't say he was surprised.

Reaching the last bookshelf—the one closest to the door—he found one book that seemed particularly worn. He pulled it from its place and scanned the cover to find that it had no title whatsoever. His brow furrowed, carving gouges in space between his eyes. 

Seth let the book, with its yellow pages and faded cover, fall easily open in his hands, to find what seemed to be journal entries scrawled in messy handwriting. 

The breath left his chest in a rush. 

***

Hey guys, I'm so sorry it's taken so long for me to update this again! Since getting back home, I've been flat out and if I'm honest, I hit a bit of a wall with this chapter. I'm doing my best to get back into the swing of things though, so I hope you'll bear with me in the meantime. 

Don't forget to vote and comment if you like the story so I know I'm doing something right! I appreciate any and all support so much more than you realise and I want to interact with you guys as much as possible! Regardless, thank you for reading. :)