Thrill Seeker

Half of tonight’s full moon lay hidden behind a thin tendril of cloud as if it was trying to claw away from the large thick body to the west, reminding me of a shot of the moon in a B-rated werewolf movie right before an attack or a transmutation from human to animal. That merely sent my thrill level up another notch as I made my way south from Calgary’s Victory LRT station following the tracks towards the downtown core.

No, as much as people might think if I was noticed, I am not a bum, a druggy or even an alcoholic. I am perfectly sober and in my right mind. I am, however, a Thrill Seeker—one of those people who try to get into a place for the fun—the thrill of it—and nothing more, kind of like the hacker that wants to breech a security system just to say he could do it, trying not to cause any damage. My destination is inside the tunnel leading towards South Calgary about three or four minutes ahead of me. Inside the tunnel is a branching tunnel leading to a blocked off area with a small metal door. That is my destination. As far as I understood it, the train was supposed to be fully underground in the downtown core but for one reason or another—I heard rumors that it had something to do with the cities water table, which wouldn’t surprise me since all of Calgary is in a riverbed—they had it above ground on seventh avenue instead.

Just call me Devon the Seeker, as a few buddies at the University of Calgary call me.

The tunnel between the last outer-city LRT station and the downtown core overtook me removing the sky from my view. I looked down at my watch and knew I had to hurry. The next southbound train was due in five minutes, which meant it could come at any time—Calgary Transit charges an arm and a leg for unreliable service that doesn’t even go twenty-four hours a day—I reached to my hip and grabbed my flashlight, brought it out in front of me and flicked it on. The light pierced the darkness swallowing me whole, and I quickened my pace down the side of the tracks towards my destination.

I heard the train long before I saw it coming around the corner. A low whooshing sound reverberating through the rails and lightly echoed off the cement walls. My heart sped up, if I didn’t make it to the branching tunnel—I could see it in front of me about a dozen meters away—my night would be cut short. I might get away with it by running back out and down McLeod Trail, but if I was caught it would mean some sort of fine I didn’t want to afford. I was in no danger of being run down by the train what with about ten feet between the train and the cement wall.

Bolting as fast as I could for the other tunnel, darting my hand down to my waist to keep my digital camera from accidently coming off my utility belt, I saw the bright lights of the c-train appear, cutting through the darkness like my flashlight—my flashlight! I managed to turn it off and slam myself against the far wall of the tunnel just as I heard the train rushing the last few meters between the bend and the start of the tunnel. The white three car train sped by me, most of the cars were empty and those occupied seats did not seem to be looking out the window. After the train passed, I peeled myself from the dull gray cement wall, turned my flashlight back on and turned to the metal door leading into my prize.

I slipped the blue backpack from my shoulders beside the door, surveying the door and finding an old and small Master Craft padlock locked around a reinforced metal latch, oddly an unused one right below it, and a simple doorknob and lock combination. Setting my trusty pack on the ground, I opened the top flap and pulled out a pair of bolt cutters, quickly placed the business end around the small flap of reinforced steel (still much less thick than the lock) and shut the metal jaws using all of my strength. It took a few moments and a long, almost constant grunt, but finally the metal snapped in two. I repositioned the pair of glorified scissors and snipped another piece off, that metal piece flung into the air and landed somewhere behind me while the lock dropped uselessly to the ground. I set the bolt cutters aside and dived back into my pack and brought out a set of lock picks my grade ten automotive teacher taught us to use—just in case we ever got locked out of our homes or cars—and went to work.

That part took the longest. I knew how to use the picks, but I was not great using them. As soon as the lock clicked open I heard a northbound train starting to run down the rails, grabbed my pack and dove to the north wall and waited. After the two-car train vanished out of sight I pulled away from the wall, leaving the bag there, and walked back up to the door.

I reached out and grabbed the door feeling my heart ready to explode out of my chest with the thrill of getting into places I shouldn’t, even though I had done a bit of damage tonight. My other places—Devonian Garden’s (at night after hours) and the roof of the Petro Canada and TD Canada Trust buildings—were absolutely destruction-free. I had been caught at the TD building, and the security guard asked what I was doing and I told him the truth, which probably got me off of a trespassing charge. A lot of the times, explaining what I am doing in a certain place and proving without a doubt there wasn’t any damage, I got off. I had one trespassing charge that was dropped, thankfully. Even if it had been brought up to the court system and I was found guilty, it was only a fine-offense. No criminal record for me, though this time could be different—except there was no one to catch me. In my twenty-four years of life I have never seen a security patrol away from the stations.

I opened the door and aimed my flashlight inside. It was exactly what rumors said it was, definitely not a closet of some sort. In front of me is a platform made from cement, raised about four feet from the solid floor. Further in, on the platform, I saw a crate, a garbage can and even a small shelter.

And then the smell came. I didn’t creep up into my nose so much as assaulted it like a brutal right hook across my face. I gagged and forced myself to stumble to the left away from the door gasping for fresh air. Take the worst smell of rotting food left in the sink, couple it with something like rotting vegetation under a deck in the middle of the hottest summer you could think of, and then add the scent of an unclean pussy with a dash of that white stuff that can form under the foreskin of a man’s unkempt penis and you might come close to what I smelled in there!

“Jesus F’ing Christ!” I muttered and shuddered. “What the fuck is that?”

That had to be the worst smell I have ever had the displeasure of encountering. I think I would rather shove my face into a bowl of three week old pasta sauce (with a healthy dose of pasta in it) that had been left to rot on a counter in a warm apartment building, rather than be subjected to that smell!

It occurred to me that it might be stale air. I’ve heard that when opening the pyramid of a pharaoh or a new-found Mayan ruin that it has to be aired out first because of a build up of noxious gasses, but those were thousands of years old, this place was not. Two decades, maybe three at the most, and I doubt the metal door is air tight. Plus, someone other than me had to open this door or maybe another, sometime in the last few years.

My cell phone vibrated and started ringing, startling me enough to utter a soft cry under my breath. I quickly dug into my pocket and picked it out, not quite believing that I could gain reception here. In one quick glance I saw it was my wicked (Wiccan) girl Shyra—Shy for short—and I only had a single bar for reception which would undoubtedly vanish the moment I walked through that door into the fowl smelling underground C-Train platform.

I answered it and placed it against my ear. “Hey, babe!”

“Hey hun.” She said, breaking up a little bit. “Your recept…is bad. Where…you?”

“Exactly where I said I would be at ten.” I said, checking my watch. Actually it was only nine fifty-two. “In the tunnel between Center Street station and Victoria.”

“Between First…Victoria stat—?” She said, cutting in and out. “Oh, yah, I fo—”

“I’ll be at the bar at ten thirty or eleven, maybe before.” I said.

“Okay.” She stated, clear as a bell.

“Have your phone with you in case I need help.” I stated. I always make sure I have someone to call just in case I have an accident with no one around, in this case I have half a dozen people who know where I am and what my itinerary is. I told two people, one being Shy, to call me if I don’t check in by eleven, and then the police if I don’t check in my eleven thirty.

“Gotcha, I’ll have a beer waiting.” She said, a little choppy but I got the drift. “Love you!”

“Love you too.” I said and hung up.

I slipped the phone back into my pocket and returned to the door, shining the flashlight into the utterly black area. The smell was still there, still noxious as hell, but a little deadened. Or maybe that is my senses being a little damaged by the foul smell.

The platform was about ten feet away, as far in as I could see and about fifteen feet wide, maybe a bit shorter or a little longer, rough estimate. I grabbed my camera, turned it on and took a quick picture making sure I had the door and the platform in view, using the flash of course, and kept it turned on as I clipped it back to my belt.

Crossing the distance between the door and the platform was actually a bit nerve wracking: not a sound was uttered in the dark enclosed space beyond my excited heartbeat and the sound of my shoes scuffing on the pavement echoing off the walls back into my ears, but even that sounded distant and somehow dulled.

What was I expecting? The sound of a working air conditioner in a place completely closed off from the public? Actually, with the waste brought on by this city, and city workers of course, I doubt I would have been surprised. At least in the Devonian Garden’s I did hear the whisper of the air conditioners and the traffic on both sides of me, even a (terrifying) chirp from a bird or two.

This place? This place was devoid of everything, except that awful cloying smell.

Setting the flashlight on the floor of the platform, I hoisted myself and stood up (taking the flashlight up with me) and looked around from the edge. The first rule of Thrill Seeking that I have learned is stay very close to the entrance at the beginning, wait and watch for a while just in case. A surprise can take the exhilarating trip down to crash instantly but sometimes, when I find there is someone very close by, knowing you are that much closer to being caught, takes the thrill to a brand new level. A Brand Spanking New level. The second rule went hand in hand with the first rule: while waiting, if you can have your flashlight on or see the area in front of you, look for any potential hazards.

I stood very close to the middle of the platform, if not in the dead center, leaving the floor beyond the edges to my imagination, but what I could see astounded me! The station was whole and could easily be opened tomorrow, if someone came down and swept the place up and turned on the electricity—okay, this place is old and definitely needed a few new signs and probably a new paint job to match the Calgary Transit new “hip” style. The cement on the top is cut into squares about a foot long and wide, covered in a thick layer of dust. I could not see a single crack anywhere. A long metal bar hung down from the fifteen foot ceiling and held a bank of florescent lighting every three or four feet—that would definitely have to be rethought—with signs I could not yet read dangling down. In front of me sits a wooden bench about two and a half feet up off the ground and about six feet long, followed by the shattered remains of a light brown wooden crate.

As it stands, the crate is three feet wide and about three and three quarter feet tall, possibly four feet if the top wasn’t in pieces scattered over a radius of two more feet. The crate is nothing more than a bunch of plywood nailed together, held in place by a reinforced base section and probably a top section as well. Something breakable must have been in the crate, after peering at it for a long moment I noticed hay, or something like it, sticking out from the shattered remains, and littered about the surrounding area as if a child grabbed the stuffing and flung it everywhere.

Beyond the bench and the shattered corpse of the crate stands one of the old-style shelters once dotting the landscape of Calgary’s streets: silver aluminum alloy with plastic windows (I burned holes in my fair share of them during my junior and high school years until they were replaced with glass windows and black metal frames), a blue painted stripe just below the windows and an entrance on the long sides facing the two walls surrounding me. I had to think when the last time I saw one of these shelters had been. I think it might have been the 80/81 bus stop at Heritage Station, but I can’t be sure.

I took a snapshot of the bench, crate and shelters and a snapshot of the roof. As soon as the flash went off I noted a number of pipes running deeper into the underground establishment. My watch beeped, alerting me to the fact that I only had an hour and some odd minutes to traverse as far as this could go.

The crate was the focus of my attention, but I stopped at the wooden bench and flashed my light over the entire surface. Though dusty, I could see it still had the lustrous shine from the lack of people’s fat asses sitting and wearing it away; even better, I couldn’t find any graffiti on it at all. I tried to pull away and walk those few feet to the crate, but as soon as I tried my eyes and the flashlight returned to the sheen, dusty and unmolested wooden surface. Again I tried pulling away, only to be forced back to the wooden surface.

“Fine.” I whispered, reached into the left side pocket of my bag and pulled out a long screwdriver.

Quickly, neatly, I broke the cardinal rule of Thrill Seeking for the second time: I carved my name into the virgin wood and wiped away the shavings, damaging the property I didn’t want to damage. My name would forever be lost in the sands of time, and the bowels of Calgary.

I slipped the screwdriver into my pocket and continued on with my journey, stopping at the crate. Indeed, the insides of the crate must have contained something breakable, filled from the base to the top with hay. I almost walked away when something sparkled under a thin layer of stuffing. I swept the top layer away and found a ring. Scooping it up, glancing at it with the flashlight beaming down on it from a diagonal direction, I realized it was a U of C Engineering graduate ring. The inscription put it to four years old, flipping it over I saw the inscription of B.T Laurence on the inside.

Why did that name ring a bell?

Absently I slipped it into my pocket and walked over to the shelter and glanced to the far wall, stopped and looked around the way I came, and then up to the cement ceiling. If there was a camera following me, I would have turned and blinked twice. “Why the fuck is there a shelter in an underground station?”

I shrugged and almost entered the shelter when that rank smell wafted up from inside the shelter. I turned away, grimacing and held back another gag. “Damn. What the fuck is that?”

Well, I guess I’m about to find out.

I took a deep breath of the barely breathable air and poked my head in. Just cement, aluminum and plastic with a strange discolored spot in the corner closest to me on my right. I look out my camera, stepped back and took a quick snapshot of the shelter inside of a roofed station, walked inside and took another snapshot of the left and the right, and then remembered the white ceiling that was very susceptible to burning.

“I wish I had a lighter.” I whispered, grinning to myself and looked up. My eyes instantly saw something darker against the silver and white backdrop. “What the hell?”

For a long moment I didn’t know what it was. It was black and papery with a puncture wound near the far wall in front of me. I shined my light on it and froze, swallowing hard. If there was something every boy shared during their youth, it was breaking apart the white silky egg sacks made by spiders. The last time I did that turning me off of spiders, I broke one open with a small twig and watched as dozens, maybe even hundreds, swarmed out of the nest.

Drawing out of the shelter, sweeping the ground around me, in front and behind me, and up to the ceiling I waited for them to start pouring out of the woodwork as if I was in some B-rated movie. Nothing moved, not even my heart, and I heard only my panting breath. I reached up and rubbed my right temple, chucking a little and finally letting out a deep sigh.

“Dude, the silence is getting to me.” I whispered, shining the flashlight ahead of me.

The light dimly illuminated a metal frame surrounding a dirty glass window, drawing back and forth I realized the doors were probably let to what was supposed to be one of the upside entrances. That had to be one of my stops, even if that was the last one. Walking towards the nondescript building, also seeing that the platform continued passed it via a six foot wide corridor beside where the tracks should be, I took a slight detour to the edge and looked down.

Even the tracks were set in place and drilled into the concrete, all that was different between the stations in place and this one (besides the obvious time warp) was the lack of rocks between and surrounding the tracks. I shot my flashlight up the tracks and grinned, realizing I couldn’t see the far end. I checked my watch, ten fifteen, and though I didn’t have too much time. I knew I was coming back, soon.

Tick tick tick tick

“Oh shit!” Someone must be down here!

It sounded like something tapping against the cement from my right. I turned off the flashlight for a long moment, looking around through the impenetrable darkness surrounding me. Could there actually be security guards patrolling this area for people like me, the vagrants looking for a place to stay, or the crack heads looking for a safe spot to smoke a large rock? I almost expected a beam of light to hit me directly in the face, or someone asking who I am and where I am.

Nothing. Nothing at all.

Flicking on the light again, I pulled away from the edge and glanced all around the underground C-Train station, walking towards the entrance and/or exit way, I felt something wrong. Something bugged me. I reached into my pocket and felt the ring I had swiped from the crate, it felt utterly too heavy. I flashed the light against the doors, instead of seeing stairs or even an empty room behind the windows all I could see was a thick swirling mist. I pulled the light down to where the door meets the floor expecting to see the strange opaque mist, nothing out of the ordinary, but on my way there I did see something unexpected. I drew the flashlight back up to the silver handles leading into the room, and saw they were barred with thick, heavy metal rods.

Tick tick tick tick

“Fuck!”

Quick like a scuttle. To my right again. The wall showed nothing, the floor of the platform showed nothing and a quick glance over the ceiling also showed nothing. I grabbed the camera pointed it up at the doors and took a picture—something slammed against the door sending staggering backwards, screaming.

Tick tick tick tick

It came from inside the room enclosed room. “Screw th—”

Two flashes of memories ripped through the back of my eyes and showed me two utterly different scenes: The first was the news, a brown haired lady anchorwoman telling about a local man having gone missing after starting a project for the city; she said his name: Brett Thomas Laurence. The second flash was every above ground station in the city: the platform is like a T with the long line running straight ahead to both exit/entrances, the cross part of the of the platform runs left-right with a space underneath beside the tracks.

“Son of a—”

The doors slammed behind me again, metal squealed against metal. I turned around and—

Tick tick tick tick

—saw the doors draw back slowly, and saw a dark shape pulling back into the mist. There was no way to tell what it was from the sliver I saw, all I knew was the approximate height: three feet? Even before I stopped turning to the door, I swiveled on the balls of my heel towards the right, where I heard the strange ticking sound. Nothing visible.

The abhorrent stench filled my nostrils at that moment, it took everything I had not to double over and puke my dinner of Wendy’s chicken and chili. The smell was concentrated there, even more so than the black papery substance in the top right corner of the shelter, and twice as powerful as the moment I opened that door.

Time to get the fuck out of dodge. How many paces? At least thirty meters, possibly up to fifty.

I darted forward towards the strange shelter, the crate, the vandalized wooden bench, the drop off and finally the metal door, and that’s when I knew all hell broke loose. Whatever the metal bar protected me from on the other side of the doors, slammed itself against the door—whatever it was squealed and thumped to the ground.

Tick tick...tick tick

And then I heard it: for more ticks all at once right behind me. I glanced over my shoulder throwing my light hand behind me and illuminated what was making those noises. I turned away screaming, pushing myself as fast as I could towards the metal door.

A spider! A mother-fucking four legged huge red spider with black stripes!

I shrugged my shoulders and unstrapped my lucky backpack knowing it was only slowing me down. As soon as I hit the edge of the shelter I twirled around—I could feel it watching me running on the sharp points of it’s blood red legs—and threw it as hard as I could. The spider-thing easily dodged right, hitting the ground ticking with it’s four fuzzy and pointed legs—I don’t know how to describe them better than that. They looked like blood red sticks with black pointed tips like daggers, and it had gained on me.

“Fuck!” I screamed, turning around knowing I was running for my life.

I heard two more sets of ticks and then nothing, instantly I glanced over my shoulder and threw myself to the left, seeing it screaming silently through the air. Searing pain ripped through the back of my calf, feeling part of it’s horrid body piercing through skin and muscle. Shrieking, feeling something wiggling in my wound, I hit the ground and felt skin rip and something else snap from inside my leg—the spider shrieked and collapsed beside me and started withering about, pulling at my leg.

Blood oozed from around the wound—my blood—pain shot up my leg every time it moved, the wretched creature as injured as it had made me, a sudden and extra bend between two of it’s four joints. I reached out and—

Tick tick tick tick. Tick tick tick tick

I didn’t dare look. I hoped it missed bone. I grabbed it’s leg—pain flaring like bright red tendrils up and down my leg—It’s spines digging into my palm, and pulled as hard as I could. I screamed as I pulled it’s dagger-like leg from mine, hearing my muscle and flesh rip from the inside out. Blood welled out around the wound, quickly soaking my jeans. Grayness quickly settled in around the edges of my vision, my heart pounded faster and harder, and finally I heard a sickening slurp as the leg finally dislodged from my leg.

“Mother!” I cried, tears drooling down my cheeks with blood burst from the wound in gouts. Without thinking I threw it’s leg to the side and forced myself back onto my feet, glancing back into the darkness. I saw a shape some distance away on my right and another a little further back to my left. “Shit!”

I ran as fast as my injured leg would allow me, hearing my blood squish under my foot as I went. I dove my hand into my pocket and brought out the screwdriver limp-running towards the edge, and glanced back: one of the two spiders stopped and fought an easy battle against the injured one. The with the broken leg. Where did the other one go?

At the last moment I saw two black daggers poke out from the darkness at the very edge of the platform. I couldn’t stop; I didn’t. I jumped at the last moment—my leg screaming in sheer pain—and twisted in the air, bringing my back to the door leading out of the underground deathtrap, ducking my head.

The spider—a three foot tall monstrosity with four legs—turned around as I flew overhead and stared at me with it’s wide eyed lidless stare through the multitude of eyes on it’s tiny round head. It’s mandibles opened and closed silently. Something oozed from it’s suckling maw.

And then it happened: I watched the doorway come into view from in front of me as I dropped to the ground. My good leg hit the ground first, and then my bad. Instantly the pain shot straight up the length of my spine to my brain; for a moment all I could see was gray as I felt the ground slam into my ass, my back and somehow I managed to keep my head up.

Tick tick tick tick

I watched my grayed vision being sucked back around the edges of my vision, returning dismal coloring of the underground tunnel, and the horrid red and black colorings of the demonic spider quickly closing the distance between me and the door. My leg felt on fire now, but somehow I managed to push myself forward—I stepped on the leg and felt myself collapsing—and tilted right, grabbed the door and threw it closed—it slammed against the red spiny leg of the fucking spider!

There’s time later to feel pain. I screamed in panicked thought, forcing myself up on both feet. I thrust myself shoulder first against the door and head the leg snap, and then heard the creature screeching from behind the door. It slammed against the metal door, leg twitching on my side of the world. I pulled back and slammed forward again watching the pinned, broken leg twitching and bleeding black icor beside me. I pulled back and slammed myself against the door again—I think I was screaming now—and again, and a third time until I heard the worst screech yet and felt the door finally close all the way.

“Fuck you!” I screamed, and managed to slide the screwdriver I held into the unused reinforced steel hook below the one I cut to enter the infested hell.

I drove my hand into my pocket sliding down the wall towards the floor, and pulled out my phone. I shone the flashlight down on it: the outside utility screen was cracked and black and prayed the larger useful screen was intact. I flipped the lip open and watched as the bright blue screen came on—instantly looking up to the small figure of an antenna on the top, it held zero bars.

“Come on!” I cried and slid myself forward until I could turn myself around, pulling myself further from the door and closer to the tracks. I stopped half way and checked the signal strength.

Finally. One bar.

“Please God…” I whispered and dialed Shy’s number.

One ring.

If I was in a place with three or more bars I would have called the police myself, but I needed to get out a fast and simple message. She could call the police for me—the fucking army for all I cared!

Two rings.

Something shattered inside the underground LRT station, glass. I heard it and then a massive screech from somewhere inside. I looked towards the door.

The mother.

“COME ON!” I screamed, hearing my echo bouncing off the cold cement walls and then a third ring. “PICK UP THE DAMNED PHONE SHY!”

“Devon! You have to get over here quickly! ” Shy exclaimed and then, even before I could say anything, I let out a ragged sobbing gasp. “Devon?”

“I’m injured!” I hissed, finally looking down to my leg with my flashlight. The damned creatures leg must have just missed my bone, the wound was no more than half an inch away and about one in diameter. “I need help!”

I could hear her loud and clear and I hoped she could hear me the same.

“Devon? What happened?” She asked.

And then it hit me: Some fucking deranged species of four legged spider attacked me inside the underground train station and stabbed me through my leg with it’s own!

“T-There was a cave-in and a piece of rebar stabbed through my fucking leg!” I hissed. “I need you to listen closely, hun, very close. Okay?”

“Y-yes Devon!” She said.

“You must tell them not to go through the door if they find me unconscious. Tell them to look to the side of the door and they will understand why. You have to do that for me, or more people could get hurt, or worse. Can you do that for me, babe?” I asked.

“Tell them not to go through the door under any circumstances. Sure thing.” She said.

As soon as she read back the message my vision went gray. This time my vision didn’t clear. This time I did fall into blackness.



Later…



The first officer on the scene was Constable David Wilcox, a burly man with a kindly jovial attitude except when it came to stupidity. He hated these calls, having to deal with more than a couple Thrill Seeker’s who had injured themselves. Normally he wouldn’t charge the person with much more than stupidity, but tonight he was just on his way to the station to drop off some paperwork, go home and start his long weekend. He had also been up this way more than once to remove vagrants who might be a danger to themselves and the light rail system.

A cave-in of sorts, eh?

He saw the injured man before he arrived at the turnoff, unconscious and lying on his side with his legs in a small pool of fresh blood. His short brown hair done up in neat little spikes that made him look “cool” to all the hippies and the freaks he surrounds himself with, calling them their friends. What ever floats his boat.

He winced. A bloody awful smell wafted from further in the tunnel outwards. “Damn!”

He walked up to the body of the young man, knelt down and felt for a pulse: slow, unsteady but there.  He grabbed the mike on his shoulder: “501 to base. ETA on that ambulance? Civilian is unconscious and bleeding with unstable pulse.”

“Three to five more minutes sir.” Dispatch told him.

“Thank you.” He said.

He shone his light to the door. The first thing he saw was the black splatter on the left side with lines of it drooling downward. His light trailed down to the floor and saw something that might have been a severed toy leg of sorts with the severed end splattered with that black stuff. He stood up and walked over to the door and peered down at the spider leg from one end to the other, freezing at the pointed base: five to seven inches of it was covered in blood. Red blood.

Something slammed against the door beside him. David Wilcox uttered a surprised cry and turned to the door with his flashlight. He heard something screech from behind the metal and watched as the door punched slightly out again, seeing the yellow handed screwdriver slightly bent near the top.

“Calgary Police! State your name and how many of you there are!” He yelled through the door.

A mighty screech was his only reply, and then another crash against the door—the bottom of the door ballooned outwards.

“Holy fuck…”

Dispatch to 501 heading come, come in please.

501 here.

Your position places you a quarter of a kilometer from a call for police and ambulance position inside the tunnel between First Street Station and Victoria Park station. We received a call from a young lady saying her boyfriend was Thrill Seeking and got through the door in some sort of tunnel. She said he called her and said there was some sort of cave-in and his leg was badly injured. Will you investigate?

I guess I can do that. Mind if I kick his ass a little bit? (with a good-hearted chuckle, of course)

Go right ahead, but she gave me a message she doesn’t quite understand: If the injured is unconscious you are not to open that door under any circumstances. She said ‘look to the left of the door’ for something.

The leg—if that is what it was.

What ever was behind the door slammed against it again—pushing more of the door outwards like the cheek of an infection ridden mouth. The screwdriver was almost at a ninety degree angle.

He grabbed the mike on his shoulder. “501 to base respond now!”

He grabbed the boy by one arm and started dragging him around the bend. He heard the screech, a moment later the stench grew.

“Base here. What’s happening David?”

“I have no fucking clue, but it wasn’t a damned cave-in!” He cried into the mike. “Something is behind that door! Something big and it wants out!”

“Funny, David.” Dispatch stated.

“I’m serious!” He yelled. “His message was a warning!”