Tearha: The Number 139

Chapter Forty-One: The Waiting Girl

Steam pipes hissed and whistled. Humid air smoked the bricked lined walls and misted the small maintenance tunnels. Running along the centre line of the city, The Watcher followed behind Nadier, Adelaide, and Tinarya, walking the mile long final stretch towards The Tower. A familiar wave rushed over his body and The Watcher felt the tingle of energy run down his spine. His hair stood on edge as he whipped his body around to find the source of power, only to be faced with the path he had already walked.

"What's wrong?" Adelaide asked from the front.

"Did you feel that?" he replied.

"Feel what?"

Time. He wanted to say it. The trace of chronal energy had swept over the surrounding in a powerful burst. A much more powerful level of energy than he could summon in one moment. For him, it would take a few seconds to build up that amount of energy.

Instead, The Watcher replied, "Nothing. I'm just imagining things."

They continued down the tunnels for what felt like ages. The walls blended into a single view of brown bricks and grey concrete shadowing by. The copper and steel pipes started to look like a video running on repeat. Finally, they reached a T-Junction, where a ladder in the centre led straight up into another tunnel to climb. Tinarya led the way up.

He climbed after Nadier. The moss at the corner of each step of the ladder made for slippery grips, so he proceeded slowly. The silhouette of the dark elf above disappeared as he climbed out of the tunnel, the light at the end a flickering yellow. The Watcher ascended into the glow.

Lit by two incandescent lamps at opposite ends of the room, the small space was filled with water heater tanks and pipes that ran around the room into what looked to be a generator with a whizzing pressure gauge. Clanks and hisses were more prevalent in the room than they were in the tunnels.

Tinarya gleefully announced, "This is generator room thirty seven!"

Nadier added, "We're right next to the portal room. How did you know this was where we wanted to go?"

"I'm smart like that!" The girl danced on her feet laughing. Nadier nodded with a smile and ruffled her hair.

"Alright. We're going to take a look. Stay in the tunnels. If we're not back in half an hour, just leave without us."

Tinarya nodded and gave Nadier a playful salute. The trio of "adults" left the room, stepping out into what seemed to be an empty hallway. The sudden quiet they walked into was almost deafening. The noise of steam pipes clunking and whizzing that was rife in the generator room was muted in the corridor. A clunk of metal echoed from far down the passageway and continued on down a bent.

Adelaide and Watcher looked quizzically to Nadier, who returned the expression with a confused hike of his shoulders. None of the three had expected the abandonment the place held. Nadier held gaze with Adelle, pointing to his eyes and followed by gesturing to the pathway down. Adelle nodded and teleported to the end of the hallway. Peeking around the bend, she paused and surveyed the area before teleporting out of their sights.

Moments went by as the two men stood at where she had left them. The silence was starting to mess with The Watcher. He hated long periods of quiet. They never boded well in movies and had almost always followed with someone being picked off by a serial killer. Luckily for him, it was usually the black man. The steam pipes hissed again. He wanted to make a fart joke.

Then, Adelaide jogged back from around the corner. "It's empty," she announced confidently. "There's not a single person on the entire level. Are you sure we've got the right place?"