The ghoul studied Jane with cold indifference, its dead eyes sharply focused, waiting for a reply. “What are you working on?” It asked again, annoyance creeped into the edge of its voice, its grip clenched on the pipe wrench in its hand.

  “Well, uh-” Jane stammered. “I was just about to ask you about that.”

  The ghoul looked at him for a moment. “Follow me.” It turned and walked away, moving with a fluid grace, not looking to see if Jane was following it. He was.

  “We need some hydronics run and gas lines piped. We need somebody to un-fuck all these water lines, and we need it done in the next two weeks.” The ghoul rattled off the list of things needing done. huh, some things never change. “The Boss told me this morning that the General on this job is moving the deadline up by four months, if you can believe that. And… Ferguson never showed up this week, so you’re gonna have to scrounge for most of your materials.” Yep, aside from the threat of dying and the zombies, this is definitely a job site.

  Jane thought through the list of jobs, then looked down at the two pipe wrenches he held. “I can get going on those gas lines, but I’m going to need some pipe dope. Where’s our material?”

  “New guys.” The ghoul sighed, shaking his head. “Over here.” The ghoul quickly led Jane through the twisting, turning corridors of the pipe nightmare as if they hadn’t recently shuffled themselves. The tunnels led further and further away from Jane’s home base. Each turn formed another barrier between him and his tools. Each new direction seemed to pull him further away from his base until suddenly they came to an abrupt halt, the ghoul putting up one hand to stop Jane.

  “Here, put this on.” He said, handing Jane a tangled mess of buckles, straps, and tether. Jane examined the item while he worked at untangling the mess.

Fall protection harness

This full body fall harness is made out of industrial nylon webbing and designed to distribute weight throughout the body in the event of a fall, particularly to the thighs and pelvis. While uncomfortable to wear, it is much more comfortable than the injury sustained in a long fall. The Tie off hook on the back could also be used as an improvised weapon if a long enough tether is used.

It's not the fall that kills you, it's the sudden stop at the end.

  Jane hurriedly put on the harness, cinching it snug. “If it feels comfortable, you’re wearing it wrong,” Jane quoted. Eric always seemed to have a saying for everything. Some of them were even clever. He looked over at the ghoul, who was wearing a similar harness and waiting impatiently.

  “Took you long enough. This way.” The ghoul led him around another bend before the floor suddenly dropped away from them. Jane stared out over a large chasm, its inky darkness called to him, enticing him to jump. He quickly took a step back, pressing himself into the safety of the tunnels, his eyes never leaving the great maw yawning open in front of him.

  “Scared of heights?” The ghoul taunted him, “well, that’s what the harness is for. Come over here.” Jane hesitantly crept towards the edge near the ghoul. As he got closer, he noticed a small ledge running along the outside walls of the labyrinth.

  “Here, hook on to one of these pipes,” He stated, pointing at a number of pipes running parallel to the ledge. “I marked the safe ones with sharpie, don’t use the other ones.” He threw the rebar hook over one of the marked pipes and sidled out onto the ledge, facing the wall of pipes and holding onto the tether to stay upright. With his other hand, he motioned for Jane to follow him. “Come on, daylight's burning.”

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  Jane hooked his pipe wrenches onto his belt, and hooked his harness onto one of the marked pipes, following after the ghoul. As he sidled out onto the ledge, he glimpsed across the cavern, his eyes barely making out the natural stone face of the inside of a cave. “What’s over there?” he asked.

  “Dunno,” the ghoul replied honestly. “but I’ll tell you what’s not over there. Plumbing. Now stop asking stupid questions, we’ve got a long way to go.” Jane followed closely after the other plumber, watching as the relative safety of the hallway slowly disappeared around the slight bend of the wall. This dungeon must be circular. They traveled like this for sometime, the ghoul leading, Jane following, the chasm waiting.

  Eventually, Jane’s pipe ran out. It turned, travelling back into the dungeon. “Hey guy,” Jane called out, realising he never asked the ghoul for a name. “I’m out of safety pipe.” The ghoul sidled back over to him, looking at the pipe, then at Jane.

  “I thought I told you to put the hook on a marked pipe.” The ghoul said, unamused. “Unless- shit. An engineer must have updated the print.” He started pulling on nearby pipes, bending some of them out of the wall, but not breaking any of them. “You’ll have to find another one to hook on to.” He found one that didn’t move, even after giving it several progressively harder tugs. He nodded, then took out a sharpie and marked the end of it. “Hook onto here. It doesn’t have to be perfect, just good enough. We’re almost there.”

  Jane hooked onto the new pipe, continuing towards their destination. Soon, a narrow opening came into view, appearing as a crack of light several hundred feet away. A fluttering sound filled the void above him. The ghoul paused, looking up, then at Jane. “We need to move, now.” The fluttering grew louder. The ghoul leaned out from the wall, holding onto the tether below his harness’s hook, and began sprinting, his body at a 45-degree angle to the wall. The pipe he had tethered himself to bowed dangerously out of the wall, threatening to betray the ghoul’s trust in it. The pipe held as the ghoul made his way towards the opening. Jane imitated the ghoul, leaning out and sprinting after him. The pipe bowed. He ran. The fluttering became deafening. The pipe bent. He sprinted. He was almost there. The pipe broke.

  The pipe had broken behind him, his weight pulling it further and further from the wall. The fluttering was behind him. He kept running, trying to keep ahead of the pipe. Trying to reach the alcove. He heard his skin sizzle as he felt a burn lance into the back of his leg. He stumbled. He fell. The entrance was near. He reached out for the loose pipe and kicked off the wall. The pipe swung out, dangling him over the pit, then it swung back, placing him in front of the alcove.

  Rough hands grabbed him by the fall harness as the ghoul dragged him into the alcove, taking only a moment to unfasten the hook. As soon as Jane was tucked safely into the tunnel, he spun around, drawing his pipe wrench in one hand, and conjuring a ball of fire with the other.

  “C’mon! come get some!” he yelled, taunting the creatures that were just now making their way into the corridor. Jane looked at them as he quickly stood. Two bat-like wings sprouted from the ends of a plastic spool wrapped in silver wire. Solder. They were literally flying rolls of solder. He drew his aluminum pipe wrench, gripping it like a baseball bat, ready to swing for the fences. A stream of the flying creatures poured through the opening. The ghoul threw its fireball at them. Pain lanced into Jane’s ears as the piercing shrieks of dozens of creatures cried out as the flames hit them. The fire clung to their bodies, melting them down, and reached out to grab onto others. The untouched ones fled, leaving the melted pile of tin and silver behind.

  “What were those things?” Jane asked.

  “Solderlings.” The ghoul replied. “We need to move. Solderlings scare easily, but they always return, and in greater numbers.” The ghoul led Jane away from the alcove, taking time to remove his fall harness, and leaving it around the corner from the chasm. “Always think about the next guy,” the ghoul said, hastening down the corridor.

  They walked until they came to a large black X on the floor, drawn in sharpie. The ghoul stepped onto it, lining his feet up with two of the arms. Then, taking carefully measured steps, he moved forward, to one side, forward again, and turned, facing the wall. He pulled a tape measure off of his belt, and measured off of the floor right in front of his boot. When he found the height he wanted, he grabbed a pipe, lifted it, and pulled. The wall swung out into the hall. The ghoul beckoned Jane into the hidden passage before closing the door carefully, and continuing into the new passage.

  “Well, here it is,” the ghoul said, sweeping an arm in front of him as the passage opened into a large room. “Material storage.”