Kid awoke.

The first thing she noticed was that her whole body was covered in a strange white powder. Something to absorb the oil, probably. She moved to sit up, but couldn’t. A pounding pain shot from her skull to her knees. She laid on whatever the surface was—a bed? And waited for the torment to subside.

However, it didn’t. When she moved her head, everything she saw doubled. The room spun too fast to make any sense of, and something dripped down her forehead. She opened her mouth, panting, and tasted bitter, acrid oil. After swallowing, it turned sweet in her stomach, and the spinning stopped.

She sat up, feeling relieved, and wondered if there was any permanent damage. A moment later, she stood, and examined herself. No injuries, it seemed. Her pockets still had a couple coins, including her lucky silver penny. Thank goodness! Without that penny, her luck would have gone down the drain.

The room was made of well-lubricated metal, with little rust. A cube of about fifteen feet, it contained nothing but a bed and a tiny table that held a huge diary. She couldn’t find a door. The whole room seemed to sway, and then fell still.

With nothing else to do, and an unusual calm enveloping her, she sat down to read the diary. Careful not to get the pages too oily, she opened it. A few entries caught her eye, at the very end.

Day 14517

He’s angry. Always angry. Irked, irritated, and with questionable mores. Couldn’t he see that Axeblade was nothing more than a vaporous phantasy? I’ve gone beyond what I should say—but he has no knowledge of this room, or the machine. He will never find these words.

Day 14518

Not much to say. We need to burn this whole place to the ground. Forty years—and for what? The Catalyzer is still absent. Without it, what can I do?

Day 14521

It’s good. She’s brave. She’ll wake up any moment. I ought to leave. I don’t want to spook her. Kid, if you’re reading this, turn to day 9001. I have something for you.

She flipped through the pages.

Day 9001 was missing, and someone had carved out a little space in the pages, big enough to hold a brass key. In the margin was a little smiley face and a note that said:

Kid, you can do it. Don’t forget to shut the doors behind you. With care: Snaggletooth.

As she picked up the key, her stomach rumbled. Without food and water, there was nothing she could do. What did Snaggletooth expect her to accomplish, anyway?

First, it was time to get out of this wretched place. She stood up, and a little residual grease slid down her back. Scanning the walls, she found a small keyhole at head level. The key slid inside and the tumblers fell into line. She pushed and a door opened. However the key wouldn’t come back out of the keyhole, and once the door shut she didn’t see a way to open it again. In fact, the door had been so seamless that she couldn’t find it again at all!

Darn. Maybe I should have taken a nap before leaving? Her head was beginning to vibrate with pain. In front of her was another small room. A vending machine towered in the left corner, and a table littered with cigarette butts sat to the right. One of them was still smoldering. Another note rested on the table. It read:

Wait here. I’ll come find you.

She felt unsettled. Surely she could find her own way out. Advancing on the vending machine, she fumbled around for her coins. There was only one item in the machine, in every row: a red can. In the dimness of the space, it seemed to glow. The price below it read 1 cent.

Ah, yes. That’s something I can afford. But the machine wouldn’t take her coin. The slot was too small. She felt around her oil-soaked pocket for the silver penny.

“Looks like it’s your lucky moment,” she whispered to her favorite coin. “Snack time!”

The machine took the coin, whirred, and dropped a red can to the bottom. She fished it out and took a better look at it. It was glowing! She peeled the top off and spilled some in the process.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

Great, more grease! But this one tasted sweeter than the last, in a subtle way. She sipped. A long time ago, when she was even younger, she had looked at the nutrition facts of oil. It did have a lot of calories, even if it was hard to keep down. After hearing the health benefits of olive oil, she had put it in a water bottle and brought it to school, much to the confusion of the teachers. They never understood. At least that had given her some experience in holding down large quantities of nastiness.

A little drink of this and she should be good to go.

It tasted fuzzy, in a way. Hard to explain, but it reminded her of candy corn, once she got past the initial wave of nausea.

After a minute, her ears began to burn with unbelievable pain. She dropped the can and its contents gushed all over the metal floor. A ringing sound, warbling and roaring, kept rising in pitch until she couldn’t stand it. Then, just as suddenly, the pain and ringing stopped.

Her hunger and thirst, miraculously, were gone. And she no longer had to use the bathroom for some inexplicable reason. It was like she was three years younger and radiating vitality.

Voices came from somewhere. It sounded just like Snaggletooth, along with a couple others, and a soft sniffling like her best friend Bowker made when she was afraid. Did… did Bowker end up here too? She followed the sound to the wall and pressed on it until another hidden door opened. She shut the door behind her and stepped into darkness.

She held her silence. It was the only reasonable thing to do—who knew where she was or who was out there? Ignoring the blood rushing in her ears, there was another noise like waves crashing and humming machinery. Above it was the chirping of something like birds.

Some of the absorbent white powder tickled her nose and she sneezed, unable to restrain herself. The sound echoed. She fumbled around and pulled out her cellphone. The phone, waterproof, still worked and she turned on the flashlight. There was a railing, down a long walkway over darkness. She grabbed it.

A distant crashing sound startled her. Her slick hands couldn’t hold onto the phone and it fell into the darkness beyond the walkway. A moment later, it splashed. Awesome. Could things be going any better?

Feeling along the railing and using a foot to probe in front of her, she continued to walk. Several minutes later, a flickering light cut through the gloom. It read EXIT in bright crimson. She ran toward it, careful not to slip.

After opening the door, she found another walkway with a second EXIT sign. So, it wasn’t the real exit, after all. How deep underground was she? And why the heck did Snaggletooth put her in that room when he could have set her free?

Her heart caught in her throat when she saw a stout man advancing toward her on the walkway.

“Hello?” she called. “How do I get out of here?”

He stepped up and crouched to get on her level. “Let me smell your breath.”

“Uh? That’s no way to greet a stranger.”

When she spoke, he inhaled deeply through both mouth and nose. “You drank processed lard. What the hell is wrong with you? Where did you find it? Where did you come from?”

She refused to glance behind her. Perhaps the man wouldn’t know. He pulled a control tablet from his pocket and clicked a button. Lights came on above them, twinkling like stars in the expanse above. Looking around, she saw dozens of crisscrossing walkways. There was no way the man would find where she had come from, if she didn’t tell him.

“One question at a time. And watch your language.” She pretended to not be afraid, though her whole body quivered in terror.

“I don’t need lectures from a kid!” He grabbed her by the collar of her jacket and dragged her, kicking and screaming, down past the second EXIT sign. “I ought to get rid of you. Did someone put you up to this? Why are you here?”

“Again with the questions,” she said, stammering.

“Fine. One at a time. Play along and no one gets hurt. Why are you here?” He released his death-grip on her collar and pushed her. “Walk.”

“Just adventuring.”

“What?”

“I… saw this cool sandstone thing, and I wanted to take a photo. I found a little hatch…”

“Why are you hesitating? Is it because you’re lying?”

“No!”

They walked in silence for a moment. The sound of crashing waves and clicking got closer.

“Right. That’s what they all say. Everyone’s a liar. If not to themselves, then to me.”

She crossed her arms. “You’re suspicious of a kid?” She choked out the words and instantly regretted them.

“Everyone deserves suspicion. Especially the lard drinkers.”

She didn’t know it was liquid lard. Wasn’t lard solid? It was rather hot underground, so maybe it melted. Piecing it together, she reflected on Snaggletooth’s story about the lard bats. Something in the lard must have revitalized her, and given her stronger hearing. Maybe if she had drank more, she could beat up the guy and escape. But it was too late for regrets.

“You’re silent,” the man said. “Must be thinking. I can hear it, you know.”

“Uhhh…” The man was absolutely batty! “What am I thinking then?”

“Nothing. You’re too scared to think. You can hear it, don’t you?”

“Hear what?”

They came to a beat-up, stained door. He whistled. “The abattoir. It’s processing time.”

He unlocked it and forced Kid inside. Below them ran a conveyor belt loaded with bright red blobs. She squinted. The dead bodies of hairless bats! The conveyor carried them to a drop off where they fell into a crunching mess of grinding gears.

She turned to run, but the man blocked the way. She bounced off his big belly.

“Goodbye! Stupid meddlesome munchkin.”

He picked her up like she weighed nothing, and threw her onto the belt. The door slammed above, but she couldn’t see it.

She scrambled to her feet in a panic and sprinted, nearly tripping over the bodies of hundreds of bats. With a burst of energy, she ran faster and faster. The conveyor belt ended at a steaming chute. When she touched it in an attempt to climb up, it burned her hand. So there was no escaping that way…

Glancing around, she saw a drop off into blackness below the belt. What was better? To break her legs falling or to be sucked into the machine?

With a leap of faith, she fell into blackness.