Catherina - Day 11

The girl and her friends had exhausted every corner of this dimly lit cabin. The five of them scattered across this classroom-sized space, knocking, touching, tracing here and there for a possible way out.

The teenagers had no idea how they ended up in this situation – being locked up in an unfurnished wooden cabin without a door, having nothing besides the clothes they were wearing. Judging from their clothes, they might have come here in summer, when denim shorts and crop tops were in fashion.

Gathering in a small circle in the center of the room, the friends shared their respective findings, starting with the girl.

"No TV, no cable, no anything modern." The girl looked over her shoulder from side to side, as if confirming her point. Her words were evident, and the other four nodded in agreement. Therefore, this was not a prank or reality show, if nothing was here to record their presence.

"Not even a bed!" The other girl, the one in rainbow strip T-shirt and baby blue shorts – let us call her "Rainbow" for convenience, added. As stated before, the cabin was unfurnished in the extremest sense, and it was reasonable to call it a wooden "Box."

"My corner over there," the next person in line spoke - a boy with dark, curly hair (so "Teddy" would be his temporary name) – pointing to where he meant, "has a sliding window. However, it's locked."

The other two people commented on the source of light – a circular lamp embedded in the ceiling seamlessly and did not convey any possibility of coming off. Then, they expressed the vacancy of their respective area, and the information sharing came to an end.

What could they do? To kill time in their indefinite period of staying here, the group decided to visit the sliding window, which stood midway up the wall and formed a rectangle of armlength.

To be precise, the sliding window consisted of two panels in between two wooden frames. The one closer to the group had hollowed out flowery patterns and stayed fixed, suggesting its function as a decorative piece. Behind this work of art was a solid plank, and it could make a slight shift under the push of a finger – although the distance it traveled allowed not even a seam to see through.

The group concluded that the sliding window could be a possible way out, even though the hope remained hope as of now. Having nothing else to do, they waited in silence. Some time had passed, and the girl decided to take a little nap. She crawled on the floor beside Rainbow and fallen into dreamless darkness.

Hunger and thirst had awakened her– how long have they been here? Starving to death could be one of the most tormenting things the girl may think of, as none of the friends here ever struggled to find food. Will we fight over one's dead body and devour like hyenas? A horrid question arose, and immediately she shook it off.

Creak – coming from the dark window was that startling sound. The friends stood up, approaching that corner in silence – well, not complete silence, as the floor also creaked under their feet.

In front of them were five metal boxes – old-fashioned, rusty on the outside, and had some letters over their lid. Whoever opened the window had gone, and the two panels – one unvarnished and another artsy- were back in their place, unshakable, blocking their desperate curiosity from outside.

The girl pushed one of the boxes with her finger, and everyone heard that sound of liquid pounding against solid. Water? Liquid bomb? Poison? The other four looked at the girl as if students who were expecting a numeric answer from the mathematic teacher.

A step back by the girl and two steps forward by the others, the group formed a semi-circle in front of the window, sharing equal risks. A trembling finger upon the lid, the girl took a deep breath in. Exhalation – the entire palm covering the top, and the five fingers clamping its edge – the girl opened the box.

A brown liquid with blobs floating in it came into view. The girl flipped a blob with her pinky and saw a familiar pattern – the lining of muscle.

"I think it's soup." Rainbow frowned at the liquid.

"Would it be toxic?" Someone whispered.

"If they want us dead, they could do so many times already. Besides, we need water, regardless." The girl responded, busying herself with opening another lid.

Soon, the group opened all five boxes, and each one of them having the same content: brown broil.

The soup did not taste bad. It was an average broil that could be supplied by any restaurant or convenience store. After they had licked away the last drop of liquid, they found that it was only one half of the box's containment. Separated by a metal plate, another half-box of vegetable and rice laid the bottom.

As of their current situation, the five friends agreed that the ration was generous. Then, the next question: what should they do with these containers? Not to haste to answer, the group decided that they should study them first.

Rectangular containers with round angels, these boxes were made of some metal – steel, as suspected by a boy who always knew all sorts of strange things, especially about history and military. Let us call him "prof" for now.

Prof stated that these boxes resembled lunch boxes used by soldiers a century ago. "If you look at these letters," he pointed to the faded maroon print on one of the lit, "it seems like some ID series."

"Ok? So what does it mean?" Teddy asked.

"Who would have five of these boxes?" Prof returned another question, "if the people who brought us here used these as containers, I should think that they had more of these than ordinary containers. At least, these are more accessible."

"I agree. The person, or persons, could've given us something more standard and featureless, you know, like plain white bowls." Rainbow nodded, recognizing Prof's point.

"Where are we then? Like an abandoned wartime bunker? Or perhaps whoever locked us here just wanted to mess with our brain." Said the girl.

"Both are possible." Prof nodded. "If our previous scrutiny of this place was complete, and that here's no cable or CCTV, the people outside can't see us -"

"Let's stay around the window!" The girl interrupted in a low voice, "remember, no guarantee they can't hear us."

"True." The others nodded, whispering their agreement.

In the next period, the five sat around the sliding window, waiting for its slightest movement. In the dim yellow cabin, time was uncalculatable. When the final words faded in midair, the girl began to hear breathings, and then, heartbeats.

The group could barely keep their eyelids separated when they no longer felt the movement of ingested food. "How long are we going to wait for?" Rainbow asked. Yawning had blurred the last few syllables.

"I – shh!" Just as she was about to answer, the girl gestured the others to be quiet and listen.

Aan almost silent creak. The outer panel shifted rightward, exposing the interior of a darker room – similarly wooden, except that it was stuffed with massive cases and furniture. Then, the artsy plank was lifted upwards ("Why hadn't we thought about that!" thought the girl) by a wrinkled hand, and its owner, an aged man, had his face came into light.

As his glassy eyeballs slowly turned, the old guard hadn't caught any suspicious movement. The five fell onto the ground to pretend they were sleeping right after they saw the hand – of course, none kept their eyes shut, each struggling in maintaining a narrow vision between the overlapping eyelashes.

Another creak. In a blurred vision, the girl saw a break in the wall – the man had opened a hidden door that camouflaged perfectly on the wall and entered. He padded as a floating ghost, casting a dark shadow upon the group on the floor. Bending over each one sleeping, he scrutinized their facial expression, from a suspicious shiver of eyelids to an unnatural frown. However, the five kept immaculate disguise – pretending to sleep had been their specialty ever since grade one.

Satisfied, the old guard slipped away to pick up the lunch boxes. Making a last scan of the group, he went through the door, locked it from outside, and shut the window.

Waiting for another segment of time, the five "woke up," yawning – half fake and half real.

"Now, we know that the window could be opened." Prof suggested, "Also, there was a door somewhere." No need for him to restate these facts; the rest four had already aggregate around the wall, examining each square inch of it.

They found several seams between planks – and each seemed equally potential as a candidate. "Who designed this room? He must be quite a genius." The girl murmured, tracing one of the seams with her index finger.

"An evil genius he must be!" Rainbow gave up, backing up from the wall. Still, she ought to do something while the others were working – and thus, she came to the window, "why don't we focus on this one instead of a chameleon door? At least we know how it works."

"Reasonable. I will help you." The girl also came by her side, assisting in exploring the more decorated inner panel. They attempted to lift it, as the old guard had done – surprisingly, it did go up.

"Well, halfway there." The two girls exchanged a smile, seeing from the other's eyes the raising hope.

Before they had even touched the outer plank, it slid open, automatically and invitingly.

"What the heck?" Teddy stared idiotically at the opening, his eyes so widened that one may worry his eyeballs might fall off.

"Perhaps there is some sort of connection between the panels." Prof attempted to find a plausible explanation, "you know when we solved the first one – the hollowed-out one – the next one immediately opened. It's like leveling up in games."

"Then what do we do next? Would there be any other connected window, another level?" Asked the last of the five, a boy that the girl could no longer recall if he was really there? Therefore, let us name him "Anonymous."

"We could try and see how it goes." The girl, while others were holding on to the two panels to prevent any sudden movements, put her upper half through the window.

She saw another room with a half-closed door – vaguely, she could make out dark green and grey colors from outside. She pulled her focus back, studying the narrow space – a walled lane as she might like to call it – filled by a table, a chair, and a set of cases in the back.

Doubling herself up, the girl passed a leg towards the other room, leaving only half of her lower body in the original prison cell. The other leg – and now, she stood a thin wooden wall away from her friends. One, two, three…Ten. She counted ten numbers, while Rainbow was anxiously holding onto one panel and Teddy the other. Nothing happened.

One by one, the friends went through the window and populated the already crowded space, and their breath became heavy when they saw the half-opened door.

"That might be the third level." Whispered Prof, "shall we?"

The door was not a product of crowd hallucination – they opened it and came to an open field, paved by grey cement. Once they went across, they could see that the building they came from was a naked concrete construction, with only a few rectangular openings high on the wall, staring at them like a monster's eyes.

An abandoned air force base. The girl had this notion in her mind, despite not knowing its source.

A grey building, under an equally grey sky, that was weathered on its façade - the last scene the girl saw.

photo credit: https://www.cnn.com/style/article/riba-international-prize-shortlist-announcement/index.html