Ezrah’s Plateau

Angela's head ached. Her body felt stiff. Her left palm flattened on the surface underneath her. She opened her eyes but saw nothing. She sat up. Disoriented, she held her head until it stopped spinning. Panic filled stomach and her limbs had turned to jelly. Angela bowed her head to her knees and covered her face, slowing her breathing to regain calm and stay conscious. She knew she wasn't outside. She was in a room; she couldn't discern anything in the darkness. It smelled like cold dry dirt.

Her hand fished down inside her pocket for her phone.She decided to use the same trick she had up in the attic, and with the press of a small button the screen shined blue luminescence but to her dismay there was only one bar in the upper left corner. Where the hell am I? Angela moved the phone in a slow circle around her body. The floor was smooth dirty cement and there was some dirt and loose pebbles in the corners. Angela's fingers, illuminated icy blue, walked up a wall, feeling the rough texture of its surface. She moved her hands to the left and felt different surfaces. This was no place she knew.

The floor underneath her was hard. She stood, continuing to press the button on her phone for light. The room was made of stone and cement, and as the blue light defined her her visually fragmented environment she looked up and saw the stained glass window. Its colors allowed little light into the room. A cough escaped her throat as she stirred up dust with her movements. She touhed the glass. Through it she barely saw the bay window, blurry and distorted, in the kitchen of her grandmother's house next door. She pressed the button again. She tried to push the truth from her thoughts even as the panic built up in her stomach. Angela turned. She knew what was across from that diamond shaped glass window. She could see it in her mind's eye: a pattern of vertical black lines. As she approached, she saw, she knew, the lines were actually bars on a large ornate copper door. And she knew it was locked. Vomit threatened to rise in her throat. She swallowed her panic and put the phone in her pocket to use both hands to grab and shake the door. It didn't budge. Turning to her left, Angela banged into something very hard. The end of it was pointed. She ran her right hand along its contours. Multi-leveled, elaborate desighn. Short side...long side... On the long side near her body something flashed in the blue light. She peered closer. Metal. Her fingers traced its shape and wiped away the dust and cobwebs that covered most of the metal piece. A plaque. She pressed the button on her phone. Angela could just make out the letters engraved in it: C-A-I-N-E.

She stood abruptly, eyes wide, and cursed. She moved the light around in a full circle one more time. It's true, she thought, I'm locked in Ezrah Caine's crypt!

Then something caught Angela's attention. Her fingers had slipped into a crevice on Caine' stone coffin. She shined the light closer and saw that the lid was not flush with its oblong counterpart. She held the phone near the opening and peered inside. She was gripped by queasiness and dread. The wood inside the coffin had rotted and the eerily bluish colored skull of Ezrah Caine smiled up at Angela. Her hand rose instinctively to her mouth. Breathe, she told herself, breathe; he's dead, he can't hurt you. Inhaling deeply through her fingers, Angela looked in again at the founder of the town she grew up in. She was suprised to feel a twinge of sentiment for him. For all his innovative glory here he laid, a pile of bones and a smiling skull. "Is this what you wanted for your town?" She whispered into the darkness. The light on the phone went out. When she pressed it again, it appeared dimmer. The battery was dying.