the touch. I rubbed my hand roughly on the side of my coat, and pushed the door open with the tip of my shoe. It fell back easily. Inside, there was only an impenetrable darkness, and not a sound anywhere. Joanna pushed in beside me, staring eagerly into the dark. She opened her mouth as though to call out to Cathy, but I stopped her. She glared at me again. There was an urgency in her now. I could feel it. Suzie produced a
flashlight from some hidden pocket, turned it on and handed it to me. I nodded my thanks, and played the bright beam back and forth across the hallway before me. Hardly anything showed outside the beam, but the hall seemed long and wide and empty. I moved slowly forward, and Joanna and Suzie came with me. Once we were safely inside, the door closed behind us if its own volition, and none of us were a bit surprised.
Ten
In the Belly of the Beast
The house was dark and empty, utterly quiet and almost unnaturally still. It was like walking into a hole in the world. It felt like something was holding its breath, while it waited to see what we would do next. My back and stomach muscles tensed as I walked slowly down the wide hallway, anticipating an attack that somehow never came. There was danger all around me, but I couldn't put a name to it, couldn't even tell what direction it might come from. I hadn't felt this nervous in the future Timeslip. But some traps you just have to walk into to get to where you're going.
Shadows danced jerkily around me as I played the
beam of my flashlight back and forth. For all its brightness, the beam didn't make much of an impression on the dark. I could make out the hall before me, two doors leading off to the right, and a stairway to my left that led up to the next floor. Ordinary, everyday sights made somehow sinister by the atmosphere they were generating. This was not a healthy place. Not for three small humans, wandering blindly in the dark. The air was thick and oppressive, hot and moist, like the artificial heat of a greenhouse, where great fleshy things are forced into life that could not normally survive. Suzie moved silently along beside me, glaring about her. She hefted her shotgun and sniffed heavily.
"Damp in here. Like the tropics. And the smell... I think it's decay ..."
"It's an old place," I said. "No-one's looked after it in years."
"Not that kind of decay. Smells more like ... rotting meat."
We exchanged a look, and then carried on down the hallway. Our slow footsteps echoed hollowly back from the bare plaster walls. No furniture, no fittings; no carpets or comforts of any kind. No decorations, no posters or paintings or even calendars on the walls. Nothing to show that anyone had ever lived here. That thought seemed significant, though I couldn't for the moment see how. We were, after all,
in Blaiston Street. This wasn't a place where people came to live like people ...
"Have you noticed the floor?" Suzie said quietly.
"What in particular?" I said.
"It's sticky."
"Oh, thanks a bunch," said Joanna. "I really didn't need to know that, thank you. The moment I get out of here I'm going to have to burn my shoes. This whole place is diseased."
She was right back at my side again, staring almost twitchily about her. But she seemed more ... impatient, than anything else. She didn't like the house, but it was clear the setting wasn't disturbing her anywhere near as much as it was getting to Suzie and me. Which was ... curious. I assumed being this close to finding Cathy at last had driven all other thoughts aside. We stopped in the middle of the hall and looked around us. Suzie lowered her shotgun a little, having no-one to point it at.
"Looks like the last occupants of this dump did a moonlight flit, and took everything with them that wasn't actually nailed down."
I just nodded. I didn't trust myself to say anything sane and sensible, for the moment. I was feeling increasingly jumpy. There was an overwhelming sense of being watched, by unseen, unfriendly eyes. I kept wanting to look back over my shoulder, convinced I'd find something awful crouching there, waiting to spring; but I didn't. There was no-one there. Suzie
would have known. And you don't last long in the Nightside if you can't