Elevator music.
Shibuya by Witness playing, bouncing around the metal walls of the elevator illuminated by white light. Blurry reflections on every side, the bright blue numbers on the black screen floor indicator stuck at 00. The closing door pad, beneath the numbers, losing its white light only now that the doors are closed.
Matthew steps forward as his personally contracted demon settles in on his left with folded hands. Pressing the 27th floor button, the white light comes back at the same time a snort echoes behind him.
“Something funny?” Matthew looks back for a moment, meeting orange animal eyes before turning right back around. The numbers slowly begin to tick upwards, agonizingly slow.
“Nope,” A small smirk is still on her face, head turned to study the cloudy reflections. Colors seeming to be the only thing recognizable, eyes not even shining through. The trash bag and black dress look practically indistinguishable in the reflection if not for the height difference.
Moving his trenchcoat further up his arm and switching hands, he studies the back of his left palm. Nothing. Not even a scratch left, just the same old scar beneath the knuckle of his pinkie. Nails cut short, whatever white that had been grown is now stained brown with old blood. Clenching his fist, he can feel the nails dig into his palm for a moment before releasing pressure.
With a screech, shaking immediately takes hold of the metal box, both of them losing balance for a moment. The lights go out, drenching them both in darkness as the blue numbers flicker in and out the number 23, glitching as they begin to race from left to right.
The deafening roar of a thunder crack echoes down the elevator shaft as it stops shaking. The number continues to flash as the lights flicker back on with a buzz. Music drowned out by glitches and skipping, the buzzing bulbs the only constant in the elevator.
His nails dig into his palm, fists shaking and almost drawing blood as he straightens himself up, “Fucking of course this happens,” brushing his hair back and dropping the plastic bag to the ground. The dull slush echoing throughout the enclosed room.
“Well this isn’t ideal,” says she. Hands running back through his hair, looking upwards to the ceiling. Leaning back against the gray wall, picking at the dirt beneath her stiletto nails, “So, any ide-”
“Not ideal?” With a sardonic laugh, his fingers begin to grasp at hair.
“These past few days haven’t been fucking ideal!” The bubbling pot finally overflows, the apathy no longer there as rage makes it way through. Hands no longer in his hair, clenched in fists as he turns on her. Two steps forward, no steps back. Only a tilted, curious, head.
“I got fired! My mom’s house got broken into! I almost lost my damn car! I’ve been pulled in so many goddamn directions these past few days I barely know which way is up!” Stepping back and starting to pace the room, the bag gets kicked to the side, beneath the numbers, “Then I sell my fucking soul! And for what! Cause a colleague needed to get rid of some fucking evidence?!”
The floors are an odd color of yellow, she notices. For such a pristine building, it’s expected that they would be a clean white, not stained by daily foot traffic. Then again, the night shift might not cover it, probably the early day job for the janitors.
“I have barely gotten a wink of sleep in who knows how fucking long! Worked to the fucking bone just to get fired by that asshat, who sits on his ass every day just watching porn on company computers!?”
It is likely that it's more of the day job for them, the edges of the walls that meet the floor have a small layer of grime to them. Maybe they only clean the elevators once a week, besides it's only Thursday. The bottom of the trash bag looks even worse than first noticed, pointed edges in odd places, white specks and grime somehow sticking to the stretchy plastic.
“My fucking car’s tires popping! Fucking all of them!”
The walls are surprisingly clean, though. And there’s the trechcoat being thrown against the wall. The people here probably just need a quick in and out, likely the same busy jobs that take them away from their homes. And this guys’ ranting.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“And some douchebag who stole all my mom’s fucking books!? Who the fuck does that?! Breaks in and steals all the books! Is it a personal vendetta or some shit?”
Oddly enough, the ceiling only has eight lights out of the nine tiles, the middle one missing the light fixture entirely. A security thing of mission impossible proportions most likely. Rudely bright however are the white lights, were they stolen out from heaven itself?
“And you!” Moving her gaze as the lights flicker again for a moment, maybe only one bulb this time, “I made a fucking deal out of desperation for something I don’t even know anymore!”
“Taking dead documents past a dead bird, and writing out goddamn blood sigils just for a shoddy deal!”
“Shoddy?”
“Yeah, fucking shoddy! A shoddy deal with a bitch who refuses to leav-”
Before any more insults could be thrown, the back of his neck is cold against the wall. Nails digging into his throat, feet no longer touching the ground.
“Oh, trust me. If I could leave your little bitching fest, I would. I don’t want to be stuck in this elevator any more than I want to deal with your shit.”
His hands are stuck punching and pushing on her arms, attempting to remove her hands proving futile as her nails sink deeper. Legs kicking out for any stability or recourse.
“You made your bed, now lie in it babes. There is no getting out of this deal for either of us, no take backsies,” A small chuckle rips through her throat as he lands a pathetic kick on her side, “Unless of course, you want to try to kill yourself. Now wouldn’t that be fun?”
Orange eyes flicker like flames, akin to looking into the eyes of a predator, large iris overpowering over white sclera. Head tilted just barely, a taunt. Smirking face and bared teeth.
He can barely breathe.
He’s dropped to the ground, white light flooding back into foggy eyes. Black heels stepping back together in front of his head, bottom of a black dress coming into view. Coughing, racking his figure, shaking beneath her.
Looking up, his hair almost blinding him before being pushed away by clawed hands, “Now, either stop complaining and figure out a way to open the doors, or I use a broken bone as a crowbar.”
Silence envelops the two, his labored breathing being held behind a red throat. Silver eyes shaking as they are stuck on leisurely honey.
Hands shaking as he pushes himself up, “I don’t-, I, I don’t have anything, anything that I can use.”
A head tilt from her figure, eyes lingering on his form refusing to look at her. A glance at the ceiling, “Would you like to make use of your deal?”
“What?”
“The deal? The one that lets you use an unlimited bag of items and objects? The one you sold your soul for?”
Another pause holds the room. The one thing that had him almost dead, the exact thing that can get him out of the suffocating room.
“And I would-?”
“Be able to use a crowbar? One made of metal? Yes, obviously.”
“How would I do that? I don’t-”
“Finally asking the right questions! Open your hand, palm facing upwards. Think about what you want, and you’ll have it.”
Matthew hesitates, he already sold his soul in a fit of sleep deprivation, is this just a continuation? His aching throat disagrees with the notion of it all being fake, nothing more than an illusion or a hallucination.
He holds his hand out, closing his eyes. His eyes snap open, she’s still in her place at the wall, leaning. Closing again, he imagines a crowbar, black metal with barely any rust on the edge. Silver poking through the chipped paint on the nail puller edge.
A metallic smack rings through the room, eyes snapping open, “The fuck was that?”
The crowbar falls to the ground with another clang, the ceiling closing back up. The blank square without a light slipping back into its place on the ceiling. The crowbar itself leaving a barely noticeable dent from where it bounced.
“And that’s a wrap! How you feel? No tingling in the arms?” She hits him on the arm, stepping back and picking up his coat from the floor, “Welp! Get to work!”
Dumbfounded again, the threat of violence from this woman with a dopey smile on her face almost seems unreal in the moment. Going back to her relaxed posture against the wall, picking at the dirt beneath black nails.
Turning back around, he gets the crowbar between the doors. Pulling it open, metal creaks and screams, barely budging. His hands start to sweat after a good two minutes of pulling the metal apart. Finally, the doors pull apart just enough for the gears to kick in and pull the doors apart.
The next set of doors are the exact same color metal.
Again, at it again. Constant pulling of metal apart, almost an impossible task, made to feel impossible by everything else. Nails scraping against each other, plastic bag shuffling from the air draft, sweaty hands, now warm black metal, blood rushing past his ears-
Two hands reach through the minor gap in the elevator doors. Pulled open, a man with striking red dyed hair peeks through, blue meeting silver. A red flag falling behind him, going ignored.
“You guys alright?”