The endless stretch of the rooms was seriously starting to unnerve Sasha. He was no newbie, terrified of dangers behind every corner, but despite what most colleagues thought of him, he also wasn't a fearless, adventure-chasing bastard. He just had an image to maintain – being the only foreigner in Shijiazhuang turned a lot of eyes on him, for better or for worse. Time was a murky thing inside an anomaly, but by his approximation, an hour or so had passed.
"Prepare yourself, we're entering an anomalous, unexplored structure," announced Wǔ Wěidōng, when their trio initially gathered around an entrance of an abandoned building. As if Sasha (who was entering first, by the way) needed a reminder.
The reality rippled as Sasha stepped inside, feeling like he just passed through a waterfall. A sensation of pressure that disappeared as soon as it came. Behind him, his two colleagues — Wǔ Wěidōng and Lán Yuè — passed through the doorway as well, anti-anomalous knives clutched at their fists. The door behind them slammed shut on its own, signifying that there was no turning back.
"For the love of Go- I mean CCP, why does it always happen?" Sasha muttered under his breath. Lán wheezed at the remark, while Wǔ sneered, disliking his co-worker's humorous attempt.
"Look at that, Sa-ha!" Lán opened the wardrobe doors, curiously peering inside. His face set into a wide grin, and he whistled. The old-fashioned coats, from what Sasha assumed to be natural fur, hung in a surprisingly pristine condition. "Ooooh, free stuff~ Wanna try that on?"
"Eh, no, thanks," Sasha shrugged, doing everything in his power to act nonchalant. Because, once again, personal image.
"It will either disappear as soon as we leave, or you'll get cursed. Do you want your remains to paint the living room? No? Then drop it." Wǔ was as snappy as usual.
The further inspection of the room didn't lead to finding anything paranormal, aside from the lack of windows or other doors. Sasha tried to push the entrance door a couple of times, which was as unsuccessful as he expected; Wǔ documented the inner structure of the anomaly, while Lán mostly messed around, turning every piece of furniture upside down. A previously untouched Persian carpet under their feet was now caked with the dirt of three pairs of military boots.
He surveyed the room for any details that might hint on the escape from the anomaly. The initial reports could misclassify anomalies, sure, but emergency dispatcher marked it down as "Effable" class, and so far, it seemed fairly in line with the assumed danger level. A bed, a night pot under it, one carpet on the floor and one on the wall, an empty table with no chair, a landscape painting in fake golden frame, a lamp hanging on a single wire from the ceiling-
"I found the door!"
Both Sasha and Wǔ spun around, seeing Lán enthusiastically waving from inside the closet. They hurried, peering over the shoulder of an overjoyed man. The flashlight that pointed inside caught the claustrophobically narrowing walls of a tunnel. The Bulgarian man let out a raspy breath, squinting, trying to see its end. Somebody had to check it, and from their shared experience, they all deduced that it could easily be a trap, which the first one to go check would become a victim of. Lán's unserious demeanour was one thing, but Sasha knew that it was just how the man dealt with the enormous mental strain of their job.
Sasha hated the words coming out of his mouth, but he knew that there was nobody better to scout the tunnel. He pulled out a rolled twine and started to tie it around his midsection. "Lán Yuè, keep watch over the rest of the room. Wǔ Wěidōng, hold the end of the rope."
The stern man nodded, wrapping his end of the rope a couple of times around his palm. Even without words, Sasha knew that Wǔ Wěidōng was grateful that he wouldn't have to be the one putting himself in extra danger.
Sasha crawled on all fours, aware more than ever of sweat dripping down his chest. With a flashlight in the left hand and a knife in the right, he pushed through the tunnel that was becoming narrower the further he went. The only reassurance was a taut twine, which was going to reach its limit soon. It would be a relief – he'll turn around and report that he did what he could without violating safety guidelines (which were lax enough in their line of work). However, when he was about to turn back, boxed by walls on all sides, the flashlight caught something at the end of the tunnel. It was a wooden trapdoor with some sort of intricate carvings. The rope was pressing against his skin extremely tightly; perhaps Wǔ had to put his whole arm in the tunnel just to extend it for a little bit, and pulling on the other end demonstrated that Sasha ought to head back.
Four short tugs came with the pause of a second between each, and even before three long ones followed them, Sasha immediately understood these tugs for what they were – a Morse code. One short, two long, two short, one long. 'HOW U'.
With his own tugs, Sasha quickly replied: 'OK'. As he passed the message, he slowly untied the knot, now only holding rope in his sweaty palm. After closer inspection of the trapdoor, now at arm's reach, Sasha noticed that it was not closed. If he pushed a bit more, it would open fully, and so he did it — against sensibility and better judgment. Maybe it was an adrenaline rush that pushed down any common sense, or the influence of something dark and slowly stirring awake, dwelling inside of him, but he peeked through the gap with bated breath, ignoring frantic tugs from Wǔ.
There was another room on the other side of the trapdoor. It looked like an abandoned kid's room: the floor was littered with broken toys, the sheets had some sort of cosmos-themed prints, the walls were covered in crude crayon strokes, and the red chair in the corner was small, fit for only a child. Granted, it felt more in a state of disarray than the previous room, Sasha would go as far as to call it more unsettling. He nearly screamed like a little kid himself, when, upon turning, he was met with Wǔ's aggravated face centimeters away from his own face.
"What the fuck?!" Whisper-shouted Sasha, instinctively moving away and nigh falling through the now open trap door in the room.
"I should be the one to ask that!" Replied Wǔ in a matching quiet yet incredulous tone. "What was I supposed to think when the rope one moment went limp?"
"Well, the door was so close, and it would have been a pity to make all the way back without opening it."
"You can't put twenty minutes of your time over the safety protocol!"
To that, Sasha was tempted to answer, "Just did", but instead he mouthed: "Shhh, we're in an unexplored anomaly, and you're very loudly drawing attention to our location. Don't you remember safety protocols?" Wǔ went pale, then red, and parallel to that seemed to go through all stages of grief.
"I'm going back for Lán Yuè, stay here and don't you dare try to explore the room on your own." Mouthed Wǔ before hurriedly heading back. Crawling through claustrophobic tunnels was easier when you were not head taller than everybody around you. Not that short stature was going to help Lán's claustrophobia – the guy's fear of small spaces was going to prolong a twenty-minute trip through the tunnel and back by at least an extra ten minutes. God, that sounded like something straight out of a logical puzzle – there's a limited amount of time, people with different speeds that can only move solo or in pairs, at the speed of the slowest member.
It's dark, and Sasha isn't scared, he's far from being afraid of trivial things like dark, but lack of any natural light source make it feel like an infinity had passed before two Chinese men finally approach. Wǔ looks in need of a prolonged vacation and Lán is uncharacteristically humorless, clutching his colleague's sleeve as if it's a lifeline. Poor guy, claustrophobia is a pain in the ass in missions akin to this.
With Sasha leading the exploration, they step out of a trap door onto the creaky wooden floor. They start to look around, backs to each other, so there were no blind spots. Seemed like these room unsettled not only him far more than the last, as both other men were jumpier than before. This time, Lán doesn't jokingly offer to take a souvenir, going straight to searching for the next door. He was always the best in escape room type anomalies. Considering tunnels, he probably silently hopes that the next room is the last. What do they say? Third time is the charm?.. Not that it's really about the saying — just the number 'three' is considered mystical, and it appears along with 'seven' or 'nine' in a lot of anomalies. And it's better to have a three-room anomaly than a seven or nine-room one.
"Seems like an anomaly does not cause physical harm, instead amping up psychological pressure with every room, making the targets act erratically." Commented Wu, simultaneously scribbling in the notebook. Did he imagine it, or was the last part of the phrase directed at Sasha? No, surely not.
"Another tunnel, guys," Lán was not thrilled by his discovery of a narrow pathway behind a carpet on the wall. "Is it… even more narrow than the last?"
"Haven't you heard, Lán? This place amplifies fear and stress – the tunnel is the same as the last one." After a pause, Sasha decided to add: "If it makes you feel better, you can go in the middle – that's statistically speaking the safest place."
This time, instead of boxing them more, the tunnel widened with every meter, until after five or so minutes of moving along they could get back up on legs. This time, there was no embellished trap door at the end, instead the way organically morphed into the next room. Two previous ones were bedrooms; the third one was the living room. It was also exceedingly large. With bated breath, Sasha slowly walked ahead, inspecting the room. Besides him, two other men were saying something to each other, but Sasha wasn't listening, transfixed by the object on the fireplace. A charred cross, and an orthodox one at that. When he gently brushed it with his fingers, its fragile form immediately disintegrated into a pile of charred wood splinters. He took a deep breath before looking inside the pitch-black fireplace, half expecting something to jump from out there.
Seemed like he found the hopefully last pathway. His neck was aching from only the thought of crawling once again through the narrow corridors. Besides that, there was a gnawing feeling, as if he had seen these rooms before, way back when he was a child. Which sounded preposterous – why would an anomaly in China resemble the Bulgarian countryside in any way? Still, it felt important to share his thoughts with the team.
"This feels strangely nostalgic. You think it's this place's effect as well, or no?" Idly commented Sasha in a heavily accented Mandarin Chinese, clasping palms together to crack fingers. The approaching steps from behind and faint gasps for breath were the only answer he received.
Time continued to stretch, but no response from the pair standing behind came. Were they giving him the silent treatment? As if feeling something ominously wrong with the situation, he turned around to check on his colleagues… And not a single soul was behind.
"Oh, shit!" Was his first thought, as puzzle pieces fell in place. One, his companions disappeared without him even noticing. Two, someone was walking behind and breathing over his shoulder just a moment before he turned his head.