Silence Falls

“Alright you guys, this vent widens more down there so it’ll be less claustrophobic but 10x darker.” Bert notified them as he turned around and commenced to climbing down into the dark hole that dropped completely down. “We got to take the ladder down a little bit so hold on, and try not to slip. Wouldn’t want to fall through the vents on your way down and end up…god knows where." Lifting his head after putting enough distance between him and the others, Bert softly called up to his friends that were waiting patiently for his next instructions. “Let’s go, Bam, you should have enough room to come down now. Cris, can you shine the flashlight down, so he can see where he's going?”

“Here goes nothing.” Bam mumbled to himself as he turned around to face Cris who had the flashlight shined past him to where the vent drop. He nervously glanced over his shoulders as he carefully scooted himself closer to the dark opening, barely being to see anything despite his night vision kicking in. Dangling one of his foot down over the edge, Bam felt around with it for the ladder. Once he got a good footing on one of the steps, he began to cautiously go down. Cris scooted closer to the edge to help shine the flashlight down into the hole below so he could now see his every step and would have less of a chance to slip and fall. Now with his surroundings illuminated, Bam looked down over his shoulder at how far he was until he reached the ground, and was surprised at how far he had to go. Not only that, but somehow Bert was already down at the bottom looking up at him. How did he get down there so damn fast, Bam wondered to himself in thought as he continued his journey down the ladder?

“There we go. Now, that wasn’t so bad, was it?" Bert asked Bam with a smirk once he had finally reached the bottom, and turned around to face him.

“Yeah, whatever, man.” Bam grumbled before they were once again drowned in darkness. His blues eyes widened before snapping up along the ladder. Through his night vision, he could see Cris making his way down to join them with what Bam guess was the flashlight tucked in his back pocket. Finally, when they were all situated at the bottom together, Cris turned the flashlight back on before Bert led them through another smaller vent like before, except this one guided them into a dark room that echoed with drops of water and appeared very damp.

"Alright, before you both start jumping to conclusions and freaking out on me, this is NOT the sewers, ok? It's more of where the dirty shower water gets filtered out and stuff. The sewer is the type of place I don't ever plan on going to ever again." Bert assured everyone quickly, making Bam and Cris feel a whole lot better that this room wasn’t a sewer and that a sewer wasn't at all in their route tonight. “But still, if I were you guys, I’d stay close to the wall though.” Bert could feel Bam and Cris’s eyes snap towards his direction in a rising panic, but he was once again quick to calm them down. “Look, I’m just saying! If it makes you feel better to know that fight that happened earlier on today during breakfast was a blessing in disguise because we could be fighting waves of disgusting water right now.” Bert then looked away to focus on stepping along the concrete path, keeping his back to the walls. The others following close behind him. “The staff members make sure to drain the tanks of all the used waters at night when the patients are off to bed though tonight conveniently happens to be an exception, I suppose…”

"Jesus Christ, man, do you know everything that goes on in this fucked up place!?" Bam couldn’t help but ask. It was crazy how much knowledge Bert knew. One would think the guy worked here with how much he knew.

"Pretty much. I mean, there isn't exactly that much to do down here except to learn this place like you’d learn the alphabets by memory, am I right?" Bert leaned forward to looks past Bam at Cris with an arched brown, expecting his support in this.

Cris nodded in agreement. “He's right, Bam. There really isn’t any form of entertainment down here unless you plan on losing your mind, but then again, even the thought of losing one's mind is rather terrifying, I would think.”

As the group continued their way along, a huge tunnel finally came into view, but the entrance was completely blocked with thick impenetrable bars. That didn’t matter to Bert, he simply turned to face the wall he kept his back to and ran his hands over it until he felt the cold wet metal of another vent.
Jiggling the grate vent a bit until a soft pop echoed the tunnel, Bert placed the cover down, and used the flashlight Cris offered to him to peer into the vent.

"Quiet from here on out now, guys, ok?” Bert firmly ordered them, earning an obedient nod from both Cris and Bam. Holding his breathe, Bert climbed into the vent first, making sure to extra quiet just in case the creepier guards were on patrol tonight. Not the muscle head bodybuilders that looked like they’ve never know life outside of a gym before, but the creepy scrawny fast and lethal patrollers that only guards the Solitary Confinement floor from time to time on the days their mentally was more on the stable side of the coin. Those guys alone were the worthiest opponents Bert had ever faced.

As they continued to crawl forward, Bert began to slow his pace down as they neared the end of the vent. He had turned off the flashlight and listened in closely. Within seconds he could hear the loud thuds of heavy combat boots hitting the linoleum floor. On tonight’s menu was another serving of muscle heads. Closing his eyes, Bert sent God a silent prayer in thanks, before slipping his fingers through the openings in the vents and pushed it off. Bert's eyes peeked between the small opening he made to see the only guard that was on watch duty this evening had fallen asleep in a matter of seconds of sitting himself down in his chair in the security box. His big head was leaning back with loud obnoxious snores already pouring out of his mouth like a faucet. Bert softly whispered out loud enough for Bam and Cris to hear him. “Guard fell asleep in the security room. If we move fast enough we can get past the cameras.”

"Wait what? What did you just say!? ‘Fast enough to get past cameras’, you’re out of your fucking mind, man!” Bam hissed at him him, not seeing that at all being a possibility and so there was no need to go any further on their little adventure. “How in the fuck can we be faster than a security camera!?"

"Dude, the cameras down here are slow, okay? The fucking employees never bothered to upgrade these because no one would ever be quick enough to escape past them undetected due to the amount of torture they put you through down here in Solitary Confinement.” Bert explained to him impatiently before laying down the rules so Bam wouldn’t have time to argue with him. “Anyway, this is how it’s gonna go, boys. I'll go first, and get under the cameras before they can spot me. Since taking out the cameras would cause too much noise because these are the more older models, I'll just tell you when the coast is clear. One at time, each of you will quietly run to the nearest door and hide by flattening yourself as best as you can against it. Now this is important, you guys, do NOT try and go inside any of these doors because you won’t be able to get in and you’ll just end up waking up the inmates and in turn, waking up the guard. If we’re caught, we’re stuck here. If we’re stuck here, we may not survive. Are we clear?”

“I think I'm gonna be sick, Bert.” Cris whined, scared out his mind because he's never been this far down before, and the tales of Solitary Confinement are enough to make your skin crawl and make you suffer from paranoia.

"Look, you can stay if you guys want. You don’t have to come with me. Just know that I can't guarantee how long I'll be gone. So, I’m leaving this all up to you guys how this is gonna go. Make up your minds now and be quick and sure about it.” Bert whispered back, impatience laced in his voice.

“I-I’ll go.” Cris whispered, nodding quickly to himself thought he was still fearful of being caught, or worse, left alone without Bert, who hasn't been caught yet after all these years.

Bam nodded too thought he was too scared to speak in case his voice cracked and gave him away. He couldn’t believe what he got himself into in joining them on their little nighttime adventure! Why did he ever leave the safety of his room for this!?

“Bam is too.” Cris said for him, catching sight of Bam's nod from behind him. Before anyone could say anything Bert, whose eyes hadn’t left the security camera, shot out of the vent like lightning, closed it and ran down the hallway towards the camera that had turned away before he dropped to his knees and slid down the rest of the way. As the camera paused and stopped turning, Bert leaned back a bit in mid-slide as he sailed towards the small security office before drifting onto his side, then turning midway so his back ended up softly meeting the wall outside of the security watch room before the cameras could even catch side of him. Now Bert was sitting directly under the camera, he even glanced up over his head to confirm it. He had made it safely. The camera hadn’t caught him in time to detect him. Calming his breath, Bert waited a few moments before whispered out to group waiting in the vent, being mindful to not wake the sleeping security guard.

"Bam, get ready to go next, it your turn. Don't panic, okay? You should get to the nearest door before the camera even begins to fully turn, unless you're a fucking sloth and can’t get fucking anywhere without it taking days.” Bert whispered, mumbling that last part to himself as he watched the camera start to turn away from the wall where the vent was. “Get ready…now go! Go now!" Bert whispered much louder, watching Bam jump out of the vent, then stumble a bit before picking the first door on the same wall as the vent to hide at, which Bert was hoping he would pick because it was the easiest one to get to for certain. Bam pressed his body flat against the cold metal door and waited for Bert's next order.

“Good job, Bam! Now, I want you to stay just like that until I turn the camera off.” Bert ordered him from where he sat under the security camera, out of it’s sight.

“Hold on, turn the cameras off?” Bam whispered back to him incredulously. He waited for answer but didn’t get one, and so was only left to wonder to himself how Bert was going to accomplish that goal of turning off the security camera.