Chapter 5: The Catwalk of Ghosts

Chapter 5: The Catwalk of Ghosts

The last twenty feet were an eternity. Every muscle in Hensley’s body was a lit fuse of agony. The humming had long since died, replaced by a symphony of ragged gasps and the scrape of worn boots on cold steel. The light from the top of the shaft was no longer a distant star but a tangible halo, promising an end to the vertical hell they’d endured.

Ann, powered by a core of pure, unadulterated grit, was the first to arrive. She hauled herself over the lip of the shaft, collapsing onto the metal grating with a grunt that was equal parts exhaustion and triumph. She didn’t offer a hand, but she didn’t have to. The sight of her, safe on solid ground, was a beacon.

Hensley was next. She hooked an arm over the edge, feeling the rough, cold grid against her skin, and dragged her protesting body out of the suffocating confines of the shaft. She lay there for a moment, cheek pressed to the metal, just breathing. One by one, they emerged, a single, shattered person crawling from a well. Hope’s hands were raw, June’s face was a pale mask of fatigue, but they were here. They had made it.

This catwalk was different from the one below. It was wider, more robust, a true walkway that encircled the entire circumference of the tower. It was suspended in an even greater void, a black so profound it seemed to drink the very light from their eyes. Across the chasm, other structures were visible—dark, skeletal towers like their own, silent and dead. They were in a graveyard of giants.

“We did it,” Hope whispered, her voice hoarse. A small, watery smile touched her lips. She looked at Hensley, her eyes conveying a fragile, newfound respect. “You did it, Hensley. You got us here.”

A flicker of something warm, something like pride, sparked in Hensley’s chest. For the first time, she felt like the Core in more than just name. She had held them together. “We did it,” she corrected, pushing herself into a sitting position.

Before them, set into the tower wall, was another door. It was thicker than the one below, reinforced with heavy bolts and bearing the same stylized kingfisher logo. The keypad beside it was just as dark, just as dead.

Ann was already on her feet, prybar in hand. “Don’t get comfortable,” she grunted. “We’re not in until we’re in.”

She jammed the sharpened rebar into the seam, just as she had before. She put her weight into it, her muscles bunching. The rebar groaned. The door remained immobile.

“Help me,” she ordered, not looking at them.

Hensley and Hope joined her. Together, the three of them heaved against the bar, their combined strength focused on that single point of pressure. The rebar began to bend, the metal screaming in protest, but the door didn't give so much as a millimeter. With a final, sharp crack, the tip of the prybar snapped off, skittering across the catwalk and vanishing over the edge.

Ann stared at the broken tool in her hand, then at the unyielding door. A look of complete, baffled fury crossed her face. Her one, reliable solution—brute force—had failed.

Despair, cold and familiar, began to creep back in. All that climbing. All that pain. For another sealed door. The whispers of the abyss, which had quieted during their final exertion, began to stir in the back of Hensley’s mind. Mausoleum… cage door…

“There’s… something…”

The voice was so quiet they almost missed it. It was June. She wasn’t looking at the door, but at the wall beside it, just to the right of the dead keypad. She was pointing with a trembling finger.

Hensley followed her gaze. At first, she saw nothing but grimy, weathered steel. But as her eyes adjusted, she saw them: scratches. Deep, deliberate gouges in the metal, letters carved with what must have been a tool, or a rock, or a piece of broken bone. It was a message, left by the last soul to stand where they were standing now.

Hope knelt, her fingers gently tracing the rough edges of the letters, wiping away years of grime. She read the words aloud, her voice growing thinner, more horrified with each one.

“KINGFISHER LIED.”

A cold knot formed in Hensley’s stomach.

“SEAL ISN’T TO KEEP US IN.” Hope’s voice cracked. “IT’S TO KEEP IT OUT.”

The words hung in the cold air, twisting their reality into a horrifying new shape. This wasn't a prison. It was a barricade.

Hope continued reading, her voice barely a whisper now. “HE DIDN’T ESCAPE. HE FED IT THE OTHERS. NOW HE FEEDS IT HIMSELF.”

The full, monstrous weight of the revelation crashed down on them. Shae Kingfisher hadn't just abandoned his team; he had sacrificed them. He had sealed this door not to trap his "specimen," but to try and contain the thing he had lured out of the abyss. The thing he had fed his own people to. And in the end, it had taken him, too. They hadn't just been abandoned as bait for some random creature. They were a fresh offering, delivered to the doorstep of a monster so terrible that a team of scientists had sealed themselves in with it, choosing a slow death over facing it again.

Hope choked back a sob, her hand flying to her mouth. Ann stared at the words, her rage momentarily eclipsed by a cold, calculating dread. Even her cynicism hadn't prepared her for this level of monstrous betrayal.

June was the one who read the final line, her voice a reedy, terrified breath that was almost carried away by the silence.

“DON’T MAKE A SOUND. IT HEARS.”

As if her words were a trigger, a profound silence fell over the catwalk. The four of them froze, every sense screaming. They held their breath, listening not with their ears, but with their entire beings, straining to hear past the blood pounding in their heads.

For a long moment, there was nothing. Only the vast, empty hush of the abyss. Perhaps the message was old. Perhaps the thing was gone. Perhaps—

A sound.

It wasn't the chittering, scuttling noise of the creature from the cliff. This was different. It was a wet, dragging sound, like heavy meat being pulled across rusted metal. It came from somewhere above them, from the darkened upper levels of the tower.

Then came another noise, a low thrum that vibrated through the soles of their boots, a deep, resonant hum that felt organic and wrong. It was the sound of something immense shifting its weight, something that had been sleeping, or waiting.

They weren't bait left in a trap. They were the key, turning the lock on a cage from the inside. And the thing Kingfisher had trapped in here with his own team, the thing he had fed his own life to, was awake. And it heard them.