Chimay tower was an extravagant waste of money, mostly made
of glass and architecture that by all rights shouldn’t have been able to stay
standing in any adverse conditions. The tower had 111 floors, with the top most
tiers overwhelmingly tall with vaulted ceilings. Just barely out of sight from
the ground, one might be able to make out the gothic theme at the top, it was
rumored to have over four hundred gargoyles fighting an eternal battle. I was
once told it even had heated sidewalks around the building, talk about ridiculousness.
It was all owned and built for one Carlo Reservoir, my guess
is they guy I was delivering the package to, he was a slippery as they come.
Everyone knew he was deeply vetted in the criminal underworld, but no one could
pin anything on him and no one was quite sure how far his reach went. Many
people knew him from the news where he was commonly seen doing ribbon cuttings or
doling out grants brilliant underprivileged souls. In the limelight he looked a
perfect saint.
I pushed my way through the large revolving door and was immediately
met with the security stand on the other side. The guard on the other side of
the desk didn’t look particularly intimidating, but then again I’ve been around
some pretty interesting characters in my time, so it usually takes a lot to
impress me. He took a solid look at me, noted my Styrofoam container, and typed
something into a computer terminal out of my sight behind the desk.
A look of approval flashed across his face and he pointed to
the left of the desk. I looked over and saw a batch of elevators. Well, at
least this was going to be pretty easy. I started walking to the first one I
found and was stopped short by the first sound I had heard since I entered.
“You’ll want to hit the first and last buttons.” I looked
back at him as he was finishing the sentence. There was nothing to read on his
face, he just pointed my attention back to the now opening elevator. What an
odd man, I thought as I entered the space. As the door closed understanding hit
me. Didn’t this place only have 111 floors? And sure enough, there were only
111 buttons in front of me. How was I supposed to drop off a package to the 112th
floor?
First and last buttons, I thought. Heh, a simple trick, I
pushed the 111 and 1 buttons at the same time. The lights in the buttons
flashed a few times then a panel opened up to the right of me. There was a green
glass plate with the outline of a hand imprinted on it. Fancy! I guess the only
way I was getting anywhere would be to place my hand there, so I did. The panel
locked around my wrist and the elevator snapped into action. I was stuck, held
in place, as the lift picked up massive amounts of speed. I didn’t really have
anytime to consider options before the box came to an abrupt halt and the doors
started to open.
-V-
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