The sun hovered on the roof of the library, casting a deep golden glow over the campus lawn. Jonah put the car in park, staring intently at the door without saying a word. Ash rubbed her stomach tenderly, doing her best not to make eye contact with him. Jonah pressed his hands tightly on the wheel, gripping it to the point of turning his knuckles white. She noticed but tried not to. The car’s empty idling was the only sound between them for several minutes. Ash cracked her door and stepped out of the car, slightly startling Jonah in the process.

“You coming?”

“Yeah just give me a minute,” he said hoarsely.

“Come on, they are going to close soon,” she said with a hint of annoyance in her voice.

“He was here, Ashlyn. In Boston, and he didn’t want to see me. Perhaps the last time we could have ever seen each other. Either that or I am off on a wild goose chase, and I can’t decide which is worse.”

Ash sighed and returned to the car, slamming her door as she sat down.

“Did you ever consider he knew you wouldn’t believe him? That maybe he came to Boston to plant the book and knew that if he told you about the hulking figure in the black cloak you would have thought it was just another ploy to return to the church?”

Jonah nodded.

“If I am being honest, I would have likely told him to “Go to hell.” The irony.”

Jonah placed his head on the wheel trying to keep his nose away from the horn. Ash tapped his shoulder.

“Don’t let his work be in vain then.”

Jonah nodded and stepped out of the car. They slowly crossed the street, both of them looking over their shoulders for the dog. The vigilance was for nothing as the dog was nowhere in sight. They pushed open the large glass doors that wedged deep into the façade of the red brick building. The main lobby had a thin atrium no wider than a one lane highway that climbed up four stories. The rest of the lobby was a large out stretching, one story atrium filled with rows upon rows of bookshelves creating a dense forest of books. Unlike a natural forest there’s was structured and organized. At the far end of the thin atrium was a large wooden spiral staircase that climbed up and through the stories. It was quite large, so much so that its natural spiraling cascading down through four floors looked like a mahogany tornado setting down in the center of the library. Immediately to the right of the main doors was an “S” shaped dark oak wood desk with several staff sitting behind it. The “S” shape wound itself through the wall creating a natural flow of the wood with the structure of the building.

Jonah approached the desk where a small, portly woman sat. She was dressed entirely in soft robin’s egg blue that even included her fingernails. Her hair was gray, trimmed quite short, almost appearing to resemble a flat top on the top of her skull if it hadn’t been carefully tucked behind her ears. She had her lips pressed tightly together as she squinted at the monitor. He quietly knocked on the desk to get her attention but even the small clatter of the knock startled her. Her surprise was quickly changed to joy as soon as she saw him.

“Doctor Abelien! I thought you were taking a sabbatical,” she squeaked in a quiet whisper.

“I am, Gretchen, I just need to collect something from the basement, and I will be out of your hair.”

She caught his wrist and pulled him into an awkward hug over the desk that smooshed them both into the wood.

“You doing alright sweetheart? You know, with everything?”

“Um yes,” Jonah responded confused, “did Dawn say something to you?”

“She said you had a death in the family, those are always hard. Were you close with them?”

Jonah grimaced.

“Not as close as I would have liked to have been. Do you have a key to the basement archives I could borrow?”

“Of course, sweetie.”

She reached under the desk and began rummaging through the drawers. The fact that her head was under the desk did not deter her from talking.

“I lost my husband to a heart attack six years ago. So, I am glad to see the death wasn’t your wife.”

“My wife?” Jonah responded still confused.

Gretchen poked her head up again from the desk, stuffing the key into his hand.

“I assume this pretty lady you come waltzing in with is your wife. Makes sense since you got family out west.”

“We-” Jonah began before Ash cut him off.

“We are grateful every day for our blessings. It is so nice of you to remind us of that,” she said with a sincere smile. “We won’t take too long,” she continued, hooking Jonah’s arm and leading him away.

“Well alright we close in an hour, so I will need the key back before then,” Gretchen said sweetly.

The two nodded and headed for the staircase.

“Why didn’t you correct her?” Jonah asked when they were out of earshot.

“Because then we would be talking to her for the next half hour explaining how we know each other, and I don’t think either of us want that.”

Jonah nodded as they moved past the first spiral. Once on the staircase it was clear that it didn’t stop at the ground floor but kept spiraling and spiraling downward for another three stories. Ash began her descent when Jonah caught her and brought her back up.

“Samson said you were not to go downstairs.”

“That is him being overly protective. I’m fine.”

“Please Ashlyn. I still don’t know why I believe this, but if Samson didn’t want you downstairs, there had to be a reason. What that reason is, I don’t know but if it is fine, I will call for you. Just please head upstairs and check the trout room.”

Ash shrugged and started up the stairs.

“No, you two aren’t alike at all,” she mumbled, heading out of sight.

Jonah stared down the stairs. He had made this descent several times throughout the years not thinking much of the tight corridor that hugged into itself, slowly rounding out with each step until you reached the solo steel door at the bottom that led into the archives. Sometimes, usually towards height of finals season they would leave the door open to allow students to study in the several study room that populated the east wall, while the steel filing cabinets, shelves of paper envelopes, and books blanketed the rest of the basement. He remembered a month ago wishing he had the ability to just stay in the basement for the rest of the semester. Tucked away from the rest of the universe with nothing but the pages of the history books as his friends. He growled to himself for his selfishness. Finally reaching the bottom of the last step and made it to the ever-familiar steel door. He couldn’t decide why but the door seemed sinister at that moment, as if he was about to walk into the bowels of hell itself. Thrusting the key into the door, he put all of his shoulder into his shove, knowing full well it would drag its base coarsely against the floor, digging into the carpet. He was not disappointed as the fibers were sliced and ripped as the door pushed back on its hinges.

Entering the room, he looked around. He pondered how Samson could have talked himself into this room even if he had made up some lame excuse like he was the professor of theology for ASU and he was visiting some professor. Then again, he might have been honest and said he was Jonah’s brother and that he was meeting him down in the archives before they went to dinner or whatever brothers who get along do. He let the door go and it slowly dragged against the carpet, not having the momentum to make it to the jam leaving it slightly ajar. He paged over all the rooms. Carp, pike, muskie, rock fish. The organization was nonexistent. It seemed as one of the library staff had a book on fish and just flipped through the pages for any fish that sounded interesting to name the rooms after. He wished that they had put more effort in. He knew this area was tucked away, but it was still a place of education and learning and what were they teaching the students if the organization was haphazard and didn’t have some structure. He reached the salmon room. A small little hovel with an old wooden door with a freshly polished gold knob. Jonah turned the knob and entered the room. There was nothing special about it. A simple study room with a long table in the center and five chairs placed poorly around it.

Jonah shut the door and let out a big sigh, trying to not leave any air left in his lungs. He didn’t know what he expected. Perhaps some laptop with a video from Samson telling him that he was hiding from the devil in the Vatican and that he, Jonah, was the world’s last hope. He pulled out one of the chairs and slumped into it. This whole ordeal was a waste of time he thought, delaying his trip, and screwing with his head. He pulled his phone out to call Ash. As he clicked on the screen the obvious no signal icon made him even more exhausted. He stood up and began to walk out when he noticed the inside knob had been freshly polished as well. He stopped, staring intently at the knob. Why was it the only thing in the entire room that was freshly cleaned, he wondered. The bright glimmer of the knob reflected on another freshly polished spot of the table.

Taking his chances with curiosity he walked over to the second glossy spot on the table. Faintly carved into the table in letters so small they could line up perfectly on the graphite of a pencil was one word, “Up.” Jonah was amazed that such small words could be written by hand and still be legible. Following the command, he craned his head up and looked at the ceiling. It was a solid wooden ceiling with evenly linked boards that resembled a wooden floor. He thought it looked normal if it wasn’t for a small dark sliver, flesh with one of the boards. He stood on the chair and reached for the sliver. It was just out of his reach. He stepped on the table, arching his arm as high as it could reach, pinching the sliver. It was soft as if was made out of fabric. Jonah pulled a little harder revealing it to be a piece of thin black corded rope. With little effort, he tugged on the rope, and the panel snapped open, flinging a large mass out of the ceiling. The shock made him lose his footing and he fell to the table, rolling off onto the floor, taking down one of the chairs as he did.

As his body hit the floor the lights went completely out, plunging him into complete blackness. He laid there for a bit. Clenching his fingers deep into the carpet and keeping his head low. He made sure his glasses were still affixed to his face. Inhaling deeply, he stood up, and brushed the soot out his hair. He fumbled the walls for a bit till his finger met the switch and he flicked it on. The switch went up and down, but no light came on.

He could hear the rumbling of footsteps heading down the giant staircase. He wasn’t certain how he was going to explain this to whoever it was, but he guessed it would be better than being alone. He found the door and exited to the main archive’s basement. The footsteps clambered closer. He turned on his phone to give him a bit of light. The weak screen gave him enough to see where his foot was about to step but nothing beyond that. As he approached the door the familiar grind of the steel against the carpet fibers began to sound as the door scraped against the floor.

Jonah rushed for the door hoping to grab it, but the hinges rang out the usual creak, and the door slammed shut. He reached for the knob, pulling at the door with all his strength but it was no use the door had locked the moment it was closed. He pawed at his pockets for the key. Every pocket his hand traveled there was nothing. Realizing he must have dropped the key in his fall, he stared blankly into the darkness to find the salmon room again. As he made his way towards the room, a loud echoing pounding boomed behind him, nearly making his heart stop. He froze, clenching his phone in an unrelenting fist. The pounding let out again coupled with a shrill shout.

“Jonah!! Jonah!! Let me in!”

He let out a gasp of relief.

“Ashlyn, I lost the key and the power went out down here. Given me a minute and I will open the door.”

“Jonah the power is out for the whole building. What did you do?”

“Nothing, it must be the block they-”

His words were cut off as the click clack of steps filled the basement. He lifted his phone. The weak light poorly lit up the large stacks of file cabinets. There was nothing there. Jonah lowered phone.

“Jonah?” Ash called out him again.

“Ashlyn, I think-” he stared.

The words were taken from him again as the sound of clanging against two of the file cabinets filled the basement. He frantically lifted his phone, shining them on the cabinets. There was nothing. Yet as he ran the weak light across the room, he saw the faint moment of one of the file cabinets slowly rocking back and forth like a tree blowing in the wind. He voice was caught in his throat, his heart skipping every other beat. Without another word he rushed back toward the salmon room, ripping up more of the carpet as he fled.

“Jonah! What is going on?” Ashlyn cried out again, her voice fading weakly as he ran.

Still gripping his phone in his vice of a grip, he again was plagued with the poor organization of muskie and rock fish. He screamed in his brain as he moved from room to room. The creaking bellows of the cabinets rang out again, sending his heart into his throat. He spotted the salmon room and picked his feet up into a full-on sprint. He made it to the door, slamming it shut, nearly breaking the frame. Without stopping, he grabbed the first chair he could reach and wedged it up under the knob that glistened with a harsh glow in the light of his phone. Once the chair was in place, he sank to the floor, doing his best to hide under the table.

He held his breath. Waiting for the next creak and slam of the cabinet. Running though his mind of what it might be. The creaking stopped. The slamming stopped. The whole room went quiet. Jonah peered his head up from his hiding spot, slowly spinning the phone’s light under the base of the door to see any movement. There was none. He moved the phone’s light throughout the room and landed on a wooden box that was under the table. He guessed this was the thing that had fallen from the ceiling and knocked him off balance. He reached out and grabbed the lid, slowly dragging it towards him. He unclicked the top and a tattered book tumbled onto the floor. It was black leather, bound with the same thin corded rope as the one he had pulled from the ceiling. Wrapped tightly around the book it cemented all of the pages in place. The pages looked worn, as if they had gotten wet then dried and then wet again. Jonah unbound the book and opened to the first page.

These are the final days of Samson Abelien. Father, priest and child of God.

To my brother Jonah,

Every horrific word is true, and I pray you do not suffer the same fate.

Samson