The Sky Beneath Us (on hold)

TEN

Day 3. 00:15.

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Searching for somewhere to sleep, Eve and Brady crawled down into the basement - hoping beyond anything that it was unoccupied. There was dusty medical equipment strewn all over the place, a hospital perhaps? That would mean they were sure to find survivors.

"Alright, say we get down there, find some people, what then?" Brady asked sceptically, "we need a way to get back up. And then what? Traverse the sewers again?"

"We could stay, I guess, even here in the basement. But if buildings are collapsing, the sewers are still our safest option" Eve responded thoughtfully. She overturned a desk and sat down, contemplating. She ran all genuine options through her head, trying to distinguish the best course of action hidden somewhere in their possibilities.

"It's late, we should get some rest" Brady yawned as he cleared out a space amid the chaos and broken equipment. He lay down on his jacket and put his hood up.

"It's late", Eve mimicked, "but it's bright outside" - she indicated the small window that cast the room in half-light - "any theories?"

"Yeah, a few, but right now...wait, aren't morgues usually located in the basement?"

"Yeah...so?"

"So, I don't wanna sleep with dead bodies just down the hall" Brady replied, his voice rising worriedly.

Eve laughed heartedly at him.

"What are you, superstitious?"

"Hey there's a lot of crazy shit happening recently, I for one am not ruling out the possibility that-"

A clatter from behind a set of heavy double doors.

"That was a sound" he said voice low, fully serious. He got to his feet slowly, unsheathing the metal bar from inside his belt.

He advanced cautiously, Eve behind him, taking her father's old hunting knife from her bag and carrying it preciously. Her pocket knife sat comfortably in her free hand.

Another clatter.

Brady reached the doors, crouching low and peeking through the square panelled windows.

"I don't see anything", he turned back to Eve, "we almost went to sleep with someone else in here, are we that tired?"

"Shut up and concentrate, are we going to check it out or what?" she hissed.

"Fine, fine, get behind me".

At a snail's pace, Brady opened the doors and crept over their unpainted head, Eve not far behind him. They walked down the tiled corridor, in near-total darkness. Another set of solid double doors near the end revealed a fraction of light through its cracks.

A third clatter, this time louder.

Brady looked at Eve uncertainly, but faced the door and called nonetheless.

"Is someone in there?"

No response.

"If someone is in there, we're coming in" Brady called to the door, then to Eve "let's go".

Weapons raised, they entered together.

Every cold, lifeless body was pulled out of its resting place and piled in the centre of the room. A man stood with his back to them, his hands on a metal tray. He picked it up, before dropping it onto a slab - creating the clatter they'd been hearing. Judging by the pale green gown he wore, and the fact that he was barefoot, the man was a patient. So what was he doing in the morgue? And what had he been doing with the damn bodies?