13
9. 6. 22, Wednesday, 20:02
Akil Youssef: coulrophobia, fear of clowns
Akil: Hey guys, what up!
Arturo Del Moral: germophobia, fear of contamination
Arturo: Hola, amigos.
Christopher Geller: musophobia, fear of mice
Christopher: $1 million, here I come!
***
“Are you sure it’s this season?” Denver asked, craning his neck to see better.
“Pretty sure,” Lana said, unpausing the video.
***
Mystelle Duncan: nosocomephobia, fear of hospitals
Mystelle: Wotcher!
Rachel Springer: ophidiophobia, fear of snakes
Rachel: Oh wow, is this what TV stars feel like?
***
“If she’s afraid of snakes, why is there a snake design on her shirt?” Julian said incredulously.
“Brother, just let the video play,” Emma sighed.
***
Yvonne Guillen: scopophobia, fear of being stared at
Yvonne: (averts eyes) Oh, um, hi I guess…
***
“Aha!”
“There it is!”
“It really is there!”
Lana zoomed in as close as she could. The diary, the one Denver and Leo had found, was being clutched in Yvonne’s hand, as well as a black pen. This proved that the diary really belonged to an ex-contestant.
Right before dinner had started, Emma had approached one of the maids. She told her that Denver and Leo had found something in their bedroom, most probably belonging to an old user (not entirely false) and could they get the names of who stayed there before so they could mail it back to them (this part was mostly lies)?
“Oh, let me see,” the maid had said, setting down a tray of crème brulees. “So many boys and girls come and go, it’s hard to keep them straight. Let me see, Mr Stein and Mr Finley’s bedroom now, was it, Ms Vincent? Oh, it was those three lovely girls, ever so kind they were. Yvonne, Hayley and Sazana.”
And so the began the long Internet hunt for which season those contestants were from.
After a minutes of trawling, Lana finally found the introduction video and thus all Phobia Club members gathered around into a tight-knit circle, trying to get as close as possible to the device, all the while munching on the elaborate dinner subsequently provided when escaping from their dreaded Rooms ended.
“So Yvonne probably found the Trail too,” Freddie summed up. “Since her diary is full of hints to it.”
Right before eating dinner, Freddie had dashed off to her bedroom and returned with the bound book and flipped it open. Dozens of papers covered with Freddie’s untidy, looping cursive flew out in a storm and once more they wasted time cleaning it up. Showing them a few extracts had excited everyone – Yvonne’s diary was providing several useful directions as to where they should go and where the door in the passage would lead to…
“Yeah, but who else found it?” Adonis demanded. “We and she can’t be the only bloody ones!”
“That,” Freddie said. “Will remain an unsolvable mystery worthy of Scooby-Doo.”
“Not the point anyway,” Leo chimed in.
“Yeah,” Lana groaned. “Ugh, I still want to eat but there’s nothing to eat. Who took my eggs? And who drank my juice?”
Emma looked away and Freddie hastily swallowed.
Lana spun her fork in Freddie’s pasta and took a sip of Emma’s coke before continuing. “Anyway, we’re going back to the passage after this right? Even if it means skipping another night of sleep?”
“Of course,” everyone agreed in unison.
“WHO TOOK MY PUDDING?”
***
The problem of the rusted barrel bolt was solved with preparation beforehand: by using stolen vinegar by backwater means and scrubbing hard at it. The price to pay, however, was that their hands proceeded to smell like fish.
Once the door was pulled open, the seven entered the dark passage, a single needle of light the only thing guiding them.
“Oh my gosh, this is so scary. Is that AN ANT?”
“DAMNED SPIDER!”
“Woo, look my voice echoes!”
“Guys, sanitize your hands with the sanitizer I just gave you!”
“Ugh, move faster.”
“My jacket is stuck.”
“I hate corridors. Did I ever mention that? Why did I even come in the first place?”
The passage seemed to go on forever, the ceiling compressing them into shorter and shorter beings as time went on. They fervently hoped they wouldn’t have to crawl anymore after the traumatizing first part, but alas, the universe didn’t listen to them; they were quashed into crawling and complaining.
Finally, Lana (she had lost the draw this time) came to a sudden stop, causing Emma to slam into her, then Freddie into Emma and so on like a chain of collapsing buildings in an earthquake.
“Ow!”
“Jeez, don’t stop like that!”
“What’s going on?”
“There’s like some sort of…” Lana’s voice trailed off. “I think it’s a panel?”
“Then open it!”
“What are you waiting for, woman?”
“Shut up.”
Lana grabbed hold off the niche at the side of the square wooden panel. She tried to pull it at first, then push it, but none of those worked so she finally tried pushing it to the side, like what you might do with an accordion door.
The hole behind it revealed another passage-
Wait, no. It was a tiny room.
Lana crawled in. “Don’t follow guys – I think this space is too small.”
She spun her flashlight around, her head lowered as to not hit the ceiling. It rather looked like an old hiding place in her house she liked to go to when playing hide-and-seek. “Funny, it kind of looks like the old kitchen cupboard I used to hide in…”
Lana pressed her hand on the opposite wall and pushed the cupboard’s doors open.
One by one, the seven clambered out of the cramped passage and into the kitchen of Ashwood Mansion. Lana had already found the switch and turned on the lights.
The kitchen was very, very large. Wood carvings, pillars and cupboards decorated it with scenes of nature, the walls whitewashed and the floors polished pearly tiles. There were multiple stoves with pots and pans hanging here and there, silver sinks big enough to accommodate the number of dishes used in the buffet meals, which was a lot. There were absolute mammoths of fridges, and when Freddie opened them they were stocked up high with mountains and hills of food. Ovens, water dispensers and all manner of cooking items were littered everywhere. It was a kitchen worthy of any professional master chef.
“Oh my gosh.”
“How did we end up here?”
“This is so cool.”
“So this is where all our food gets made.”
“Right, so we’ve got to find something here,” Lana said briskly.
“A key, most probably,” Adonis said.
“Unless this is just a coincidence,” Julian added.
“Nah, everything we’ve done so far seems to have a purpose.”
“Fred, the diary,” Emma said, gazing around.
Freddie unzipped her sling bag, pulling out the diary. She flipped it open, muttering nonsense to herself, shifting translation notes and pointing at random symbols. “Right, so here we are. Yvonne mentions this kitchen, but apparently she didn’t crawl through the Catacombs” that was the name for the ventilation system the seven had started using “So now…uh, my translation is a little rusty here, but I think what she wrote was ‘the painting of the pointer showed us where the key was’. Not entirely sure what that meant, since Yvonne seems to like writing in puzzles.”
“Painting of the pointer,” Leo repeated. “Could it be that?”
Leo turned his head and stabbed a finger at the decorative painting nailed to the wall.
A painting of a compass.
“Pointer,” Emma said. “That must mean the compass’s needle!”
Everyone’s eyes followed Emma’s hand as she moved it towards the west side, as it trailed down to a kitchen counter, as it landed on the three decorative but useless utensils on display above the sink. Then they all ran there like a stampede.
Crowding around the sink, the Phobia Club stared at the three ornaments. A clock made out of a plate and utensils, an ornate silver spatula with leafy designs and a crystalline knife with a useless but beautiful edge comprised of fleur-de-lis.
“Which one?”
“This isn’t a key.”
“Spatula? Seriously?”
“Knife, then,” Leo said and grabbed it. He trotted to the compass and held up the knife. “Do we put it in, or what?”
“Maybe cut it up?” Julian suggested.
“NO!”
“Then what?”
“We’ll figure it out. Just don’t cut it up,” Lana ordered.
“Hey,” Emma said. She had been standing on her tippy-toes, as they say, and peering at the side of the compass. “There’s a tiny hole here.”
“Make it bigger using the knife?” Julian asked.
“Shut the heck up, Julian.”
“Fine, fine.”
“Just stick the knife in,” Adonis advised.
Leo slotted in the knife as he would a key and turned it.
And the compass swung open like a safe door, exposing…a way out of Ashwood Mansion.
Into the shadowy woods.