Claire stands by the ladder. She turns towards me with her hands over her mouth, except there’s something different about her eyes. They’re calm. Determined. Slowly, she lowers her hands and places them by her sides.

I step back, swallowing hard. Her lips have been sewn shut, just like Beth’s. Claire stares at me, that incessant ringing quaking in my brain. I fight the urge to run in the other direction as her small frame bends backwards, crab walking down the hole into Herman’s world.

Heading to the ladder, I see Claire is now standing in the basement, looking up at me. When I don’t move, she walks into the shadows. Knowing what I have to do doesn’t make this any easier. If I want to save my brother, I don’t have any other choice but to keep going.

I slide over the floor on my belly, and then swing one leg, and then the other, onto the ladder. At first my shoe slips, and I hang precariously over the edge. Once I find my footing again, I climb into the darkness one rung at a time. That putrid, rotting smell is the first thing that hits me, though now it’s mixed with the sweetness of wet grass and mud.

When my feet touch the concrete floor, Claire appears beside me. She steps to a fetid mattress strung up on the wall and then ducks behind it. I follow her, pushing the mattress away from the wall. A small pitch-black corridor’s hidden on the other side.

“Claire?” I whisper, my voice frayed. Wind rustles down the corridor. It seems deep and narrow. Without being able to see, I’ll be exposed, unable to fight back.

Glancing around the small basement, I look for anything I can use as a weapon, but find something better: Elliot’s night-vision camera. It lies on its side, forgotten from the earlier hustle to get up the ladder. I flip it on.

Holding it up to my eyes, the night vision mode illuminates the dark corridor in a green tint. I slip behind the mattress, trying to be quiet as I follow the grainy green outline of the narrow concrete walls. My shoes kick up dirt. I can make out the faint imprint of Herman’s large work boots on the dusty ground.

Sweat slides down my forehead, tickling my skin. Each groaning pipe causes me to jump. My breath comes out in heavy, trembling gasps. Calm down, I think. Calm down.

Inching my way through the darkness, rusty squeaking erupts in the shadows. I slow down. Listening. SQUE-EAK. SQUE-EAK.

Tammy. It has to be Tammy. But where is she? I round a corner and the corridor tightens. I have to crouch to keep going. SQUE-EAK. I halt. Waiting. Holding my breath.

SQUE-EAK. Wherever she is, Tammy’s getting closer.