The basement
1027 Words
Liv missed school again. Not that anyone protested. She was the one teachers pointed at when they said, “be more like her.” Her self-study sessions could give TED Talks a run for their money.
---
Yara tried anyway.
“You skipping school again? You’re basically a myth.”
“Who cares?” Liv said. “I’m the reason the curve exists.”
“Sure. Keep flexing, dropout.”
“Keep crying about your eyebrows.”
Liv: 1. Yara: 0.
---
She told her mom she was heading out.
Her mom, knee-deep in chores, frowned. “You don’t even know where to go yet.”
Liv showed her phone. “Texted Dad. Got the green light.”
Her mom sighed but didn’t argue. When Dad said yes, that was that.
She rode the elevator down.
Pressed B.
The basement.
A soft ding. Cold air. Fluorescent buzz. Grey concrete and forgotten corners.
She walked straight to the security guard sitting behind a desk, munching through a sandwich like he hated joy.
He looked up. “You lost?”
Liv smiled.
“Nope. I’m exactly where I want to be.”
The guard raised an eyebrow. “This ain’t the food court, Young Blood.”
“Good. I skipped breakfast on purpose. I'm here for information.”
He narrowed his eyes. “You a journalist?”
“Nope.” She leaned on the counter. “Just a resident who saw something weird.”
He sighed, glancing at the small stack of CCTV monitor screens behind him. “Let me guess—someone stealing delivery packages again?”
“I wish,” Liv said. “I just want to check the footage from around 1:15 last night. Floor thirteen. Main hallway. Maybe basement.”
He scoffed. “And you think I’m gonna hand you private building surveillance because…?”
She flashed her phone. “Because I have my dad’s permission. You know him—tall, nice guy, heavy tipper.”
The guard stared at her for a second, weighing his options… then shrugged. “Five minutes. No screenshots. You didn’t get it from me.”
Liv smiled wider. “You're officially my favorite person in this entire building.”
The guard angled the screen toward her, the old footage already cued to 1:13 AM.
Static buzzed. The feed was grainy. Cameras flicked between angles. Liv’s eyes locked in.
Hallway — 13th Floor.
At exactly 1:15:32, the elevator doors slid open. No one visible. Not at first.
Then — a shadow.
Someone stepped halfway out of the elevator. They didn’t look up. Didn’t step into frame fully. Just… placed the two milk bottles neatly on the mat.
Then stepped back.
The doors closed.
Liv frowned. “Rewind that. Slower.”
The guard did. Frame by frame.
The figure was wearing gloves. Hoodie. Face hidden. But something was off.
They never hit the floor button.
The elevator had already been on the 13th floor. Waiting.
“Who called the lift?” she whispered.
---
They switched angles.
Basement Cam.
1:16:04. The elevator doors opened. Same figure stepped out. Walked to the far end of the basement. No hesitation.
But the camera blinked.
Static.
When it returned — 12 seconds later — the figure was gone.
Liv leaned closer.
“That blind spot… what’s there?”
The guard didn’t answer. Just stared at the screen.
Liv turned to him.
“Can I go look?”
He gave her a long, resigned sigh. “I’m not supposed to let residents down the back corridor.”
“Good thing I’m not most residents.”
Start walking towards the corridor
“Back in ten,” she said, already walking.
The guard didn’t stop her. Just mumbled, “This building’s cursed, man.”
Liv grinned.
“Perfect.”
The hallway smelled like wet concrete and secrets.
Liv moved past the security desk, past the rattling pipes, into the back corridor the guard had warned her about — or rather, lazily mentioned while barely looking up from his sandwich.
He didn’t care. As long as his check cleared, this building could collapse under ghost traffic and no-shows. That was fine with Liv. She didn’t want interference.
Her shoes squeaked softly on the floor.
It was colder here. No cameras. No noise. Just a dull buzz from a single flickering light overhead.
Then she saw it.
An old newspaper. Folded once. Edges crisp, like it hadn’t aged a day. Like someone had kept it protected. Like someone wanted her to find it.
It sat alone on a rusted maintenance box. Not hidden. Not discarded.
Staged.
Liv’s heart thudded once. She stepped closer.
Headline: "13th Floor Girl Vanishes — No Trace Left Behind"
Dated: 2013
The photo showed a teenage girl, maybe sixteen, standing in front of this exact building. Same layout. Same glass. Same number of floors.
Liv flipped it over.
On the back, in shaky black ink — fresh, not aged — someone had scribbled:
“The lift was called by me.”
Liv’s blood ran cold.
It wasn’t a quote from the article. It wasn’t printed. Someone had added it, recently. Like they wanted her to find it. Like they were confessing.
She pulled out her phone. Opened the photo she took of the elevator logs back at the guard's desk.
There it was:
1:14:22 AM – Elevator called to 13th floor – Access ID: 6J33
Not her ID.
Not her family’s.
She scanned the old maintenance list pinned near the fire hose cabinet.
There: 6J33 – Maintenance Staff: Fredrick Macaulay
Scrawled beside it in red marker:
DECEASED – 2014
Her eyes snapped back to the inked note on the newspaper.
Who wrote this?
The girl in the photo — or someone pretending to be her?
Either way, Liv knew two things for sure:
1. Someone used a dead man’s keycard.
2. They wanted her to know it. Then at the access code. Then at the dark hallway ahead.
Somebody else had called that lift.
Someone who wanted it at 13.
Someone who had done this before.
And maybe… was doing it again.
Liv folded the newspaper under her arm.
Time to Investigate an actually case.
- Writer
