The History Paper
Your argument is valid, and premises are true.
“Listen, Chase.” You started. “It’s not that I don’t trust you, but it’s dark and just because we haven’t encountered a trap yet, doesn’t mean we won’t. I think we should just walk.”
Although he looked annoyed, Chase nodded.
The two of you started walking again, your hand still trailing along the wall. You made quiet conversation, but most of the time was spent in silence. The walk was a lot longer than you expected, but at this point, you were just happy to be getting out of the corridor.
“What do you think will be down there?” You whispered.
“I’m not sure – I hope a way out,” Chase said.
“Do you think there will be other people? This might be a difficult situation to explain.”
“Don’t really care, I just want to know where we are and how w—” He was cut off by you shushing him. “Hey, don—”
You stopped walking and held up a finger, interrupting him again. “Chase, shut up.” You frantically looked around. “Do you hear that?” There was a loud click followed by low-pitched humming and awful grinding, as if something was being dragged, that reverberated off the walls of the narrow hall.
Chase narrowed his eyes and listened for a moment. “Yeah,” he paused. “It could be a good thing though, right? Like a sign there’s people up there?”
Fear and tension practically seeped from you. Ignoring his question, you scrambled to pull your bag from your shoulders. With shaky hands, you dug around in the main pocket to find your phone. Pulling it out, you turned on its flashlight. You looked around. When you noticed nothing out of the ordinary where you were currently standing, you retraced your steps. Chase, close at your heels, also had his phone’s flashlight on. You scanned the walls and floor, looking for anything that may have made the clicking. On one of the stone tiles, there was a slightly raised platform, probably only a centimeter or two higher than the rest of the floor. Bending down, you inspected it.
“Chase,” you called, “look.” He squatted next to you and reached out to touch it. You slapped his hand. “Don't! We don’t know what that does!”
“We already stepped on it. It would’ve already triggered whatever it was supposed to. Relax” He reached out again, and you didn’t stop him this time. Chase touched it lightly at first: nothing happened. He pressed on it harder and there was the distinct click you heard before.
“I really don’t like this,” you said. “What does it do?”
Chase shrugged. “Only one way to find out,” he stood and started to walk back towards the light. You hurried to follow him.
Both of you still had your flashlights on and were carefully scanning the corridor as you walked. You had no idea how far you had gotten past the point where you noticed the sound, but you quickly found what the plate had triggered. Unbelievably, the floor in front of you completely opened up. You couldn’t see how far down it went, even when shining your light over it. The pit extended down the hallway for 10 feet before the floor was completely normal (and stable) again.
Running a hand over your face, you were ready to cry. “What the hell did I get us into?” You paused, but Chase knew you well enough to recognize you didn’t want an actual answer. “I am so sorry.” There was a lump sitting in your throat you couldn’t manage to swallow.
“It’s definitely a unique night out.” His voice was surprisingly calm and lighthearted as he chuckled. “But remind me not to get you drunk again.” You nodded. “So, genius, how’re we getting out of here?”
“I have no idea.” You paced the corridor quickly and ran a hand through your hair. There was a ringing in your ears and your heart was beating so fast you were sure it’d burst.
“You’re panicking,” he noted. When you shot him a glare, he continued, “take a deep breath. You can’t think if your panicked and we both know I’m not good enough at puzzles to get us out. So,” he held up his hands defensively, “no pressure, but our lives are counting on you.”
“No pressure,” you muttered sarcastically. You did take his advice, however, making a point to slow your pacing and take some deep breaths.
Chase had settled himself on the floor next to your bag. “Go on,” he prompted from the floor while digging through your bag, “think out loud. I know you’re just ruminating.” He had apparently found what he was looking for, as he put your bag back down.
“Okay, well,” you paused, “there has to be a way to fix it. We already pressed the plate again, so that must only open it—” You looked over at Chase and saw him eating a granola bar from your bag. “Are you serious?”
He nodded. “I’m hungry. If you didn’t want me eating your snacks, you would’ve stopped stocking your bag.” He stopped to swallow. “Continue.”
You shook your head and thought for a moment. “There must be another way to close it. It doesn’t make any sense to have a pit that can’t be closed in the middle of the hallway to an elevator.” Chase nodded. “But, then again, none of this makes sense. I mean, the elevator just disappeared.”
While chewing, Chase shrugged. “Yeah, that’s true. I don’t know though; I feel like there has to be some way to fix it. How else would the person who put the pressure plate in even get back across?”
“I didn’t even think about that.” You tapped a finger against your lips and hummed. “What if there’s a different mechanism that closes it?”
“On this side?”
“Yeah. Maybe a button? Or lever or something?”
“We didn’t see anything before.”
“We weren’t looking for it. Come on.” You held out a hand and pulled him up. “Scan everything. If I were the one designing this, I wouldn’t have another plate and it wouldn’t be somewhere obvious.”
The two of you turned around, yet again, to search. You ignored the floor altogether and, instead, scanned the walls and skylights you passed. Most of it looked the same and you were beginning to grow hopeless. Nonetheless, you focused on the skylights. Just as you were passing under one, you noticed something different. “Hey! Chase!” He turned and you motioned for him to come over. “Do you see that?” You pointed. He shook his head. “Look, there’s a purple crystal.”
“So?”
“Every other one has been blue. It's different.” A wide smile broke out across your face. “Come on, can you reach it?”
He stood on his toes and stretched as far as he could. His fingertips barely brushed the glass. “Not quite.”
“Alright, boost me up.” He bent and held out his hands laced together. You stepped onto his hands with one foot and held onto his shoulder with a hand. With your other hand, you pressed your palm against the cool glass. When it didn’t budge, you felt your heart sink. You looked down at Chase.
“It’s not moving.”
“Did you actually push or just lightly tap it?”
“I actually pushed it!” You tried again anyway, pressing harder this time. When it moved the slightest bit you couldn’t help your embarrassed laugh. “Never mind.” You pushed up one final time and were able to pop it out. Carefully, you slid it to the side, so it was balanced on the inside of the small alcove. “Can you stand up?” You called down at Chase. He nodded and did so. You poked your head and upper body inside the hole. On closer inspection, the crystal looked like cheap plastic. You could see the light behind it that made it seem like it was glowing. You couldn’t find any lights anywhere near the other crystals but trying to understand how they were glowing felt like something for another time. Refocusing on the task at hand, you reached for the purple hunk of plastic. You couldn’t pry it off, so you felt around it for anything that was out of place.
“You almost done?”
“Yeah,” you said, hurriedly searching. Finally, you found what felt like a seam. You pried on it and a small compartment popped open. Inside, you felt a small but very cold button and pressed it as hard as possible. A loud tone rang out, followed by more loud grinding, as Chase dropped you down onto your feet. “Let’s hope that did something.”
When you got back to your bag (which you left a few feet away from the pit so you would know where it had been), you noticed that it wasn’t completely gone. Although not gone in its entirety, there were a series of what looked like stone steps to get across. The spacing was close enough that you didn’t have to jump to reach the next one, but your stomach still dropped. Each step was only big enough for one person at a time. Dread flooded you as you tried your best to shove down the building feeling you would fall. “Ladies first, Chase.” You swallowed hard.
He confidently walked forward and stood on the first step. After quickly crossing the set to the other side, he gave you a reassuring smile. You pulled your bag onto your shoulders, and chewing your lip, took a tentative step. You felt like you were on the edge of both puking and passing out. “You’ve got this. Just focus on me,” Chase said, his tone careful. Taking another step, you let out a heavy but shallow breath. After the first couple like that, your confidence – or adrenaline (and let’s be real it was the latter) – took over and you quickly bound over to the other side. All in all, it probably took around 2 minutes, but sweat clung to your forehead and your breathing was heavy as though you had just run a marathon. “You okay?”
“Yes,” you said, but your nonverbals screamed the opposite. You sunk to the ground and held your head in your hands.
“To be honest with you, I thought you were gonna pass out and fall.” Chase scratched the back of his head.
“So did I—”
You were interrupted by a group of people appearing out of nowhere. They were all dressed in tactile armour and quickly surrounded you and Chase. You ran a defeated hand over your face and Chase’s arms instantly went up in surrender. Looking back, you were a little frustrated having, what, just caught your breath. They were all yelling something you were too terrified to understand.
One especially large meathead grabbed you under the arms and yanked you to your feet. He was close enough that, while you didn’t have a good idea of what his face looked like, you definitely knew he hadn’t showered in a few days. It took everything in you to control the primal urge to punch this guy. Honestly, the only thing stopping you was your desire to live to finish your undergrad. When he realized you had no intention of fighting, he let go of your arm to grab the handcuffs from his belt. Despite the stress of the situation you knew would come up in the therapy you would inevitably need after this, you couldn’t help but appreciate that he was nice enough to leave your hands in front of you, not behind your back.
Another large man had Chase pinned with his face to the wall. His arms were tugged behind him and clamped into handcuffs. “Damn, could you at least but me dinner first?” The man holding you snickered, but the one dealing with Chase pulled him from the wall and pushed him forward just a little too hard.
“Let’s go, boys; Thanatos is waiting.”
“Listen, Chase.” You started. “It’s not that I don’t trust you, but it’s dark and just because we haven’t encountered a trap yet, doesn’t mean we won’t. I think we should just walk.”
Although he looked annoyed, Chase nodded.
The two of you started walking again, your hand still trailing along the wall. You made quiet conversation, but most of the time was spent in silence. The walk was a lot longer than you expected, but at this point, you were just happy to be getting out of the corridor.
“What do you think will be down there?” You whispered.
“I’m not sure – I hope a way out,” Chase said.
“Do you think there will be other people? This might be a difficult situation to explain.”
“Don’t really care, I just want to know where we are and how w—” He was cut off by you shushing him. “Hey, don—”
You stopped walking and held up a finger, interrupting him again. “Chase, shut up.” You frantically looked around. “Do you hear that?” There was a loud click followed by low-pitched humming and awful grinding, as if something was being dragged, that reverberated off the walls of the narrow hall.
Chase narrowed his eyes and listened for a moment. “Yeah,” he paused. “It could be a good thing though, right? Like a sign there’s people up there?”
Fear and tension practically seeped from you. Ignoring his question, you scrambled to pull your bag from your shoulders. With shaky hands, you dug around in the main pocket to find your phone. Pulling it out, you turned on its flashlight. You looked around. When you noticed nothing out of the ordinary where you were currently standing, you retraced your steps. Chase, close at your heels, also had his phone’s flashlight on. You scanned the walls and floor, looking for anything that may have made the clicking. On one of the stone tiles, there was a slightly raised platform, probably only a centimeter or two higher than the rest of the floor. Bending down, you inspected it.
“Chase,” you called, “look.” He squatted next to you and reached out to touch it. You slapped his hand. “Don't! We don’t know what that does!”
“We already stepped on it. It would’ve already triggered whatever it was supposed to. Relax” He reached out again, and you didn’t stop him this time. Chase touched it lightly at first: nothing happened. He pressed on it harder and there was the distinct click you heard before.
“I really don’t like this,” you said. “What does it do?”
Chase shrugged. “Only one way to find out,” he stood and started to walk back towards the light. You hurried to follow him.
Both of you still had your flashlights on and were carefully scanning the corridor as you walked. You had no idea how far you had gotten past the point where you noticed the sound, but you quickly found what the plate had triggered. Unbelievably, the floor in front of you completely opened up. You couldn’t see how far down it went, even when shining your light over it. The pit extended down the hallway for 10 feet before the floor was completely normal (and stable) again.
Running a hand over your face, you were ready to cry. “What the hell did I get us into?” You paused, but Chase knew you well enough to recognize you didn’t want an actual answer. “I am so sorry.” There was a lump sitting in your throat you couldn’t manage to swallow.
“It’s definitely a unique night out.” His voice was surprisingly calm and lighthearted as he chuckled. “But remind me not to get you drunk again.” You nodded. “So, genius, how’re we getting out of here?”
“I have no idea.” You paced the corridor quickly and ran a hand through your hair. There was a ringing in your ears and your heart was beating so fast you were sure it’d burst.
“You’re panicking,” he noted. When you shot him a glare, he continued, “take a deep breath. You can’t think if your panicked and we both know I’m not good enough at puzzles to get us out. So,” he held up his hands defensively, “no pressure, but our lives are counting on you.”
“No pressure,” you muttered sarcastically. You did take his advice, however, making a point to slow your pacing and take some deep breaths.
Chase had settled himself on the floor next to your bag. “Go on,” he prompted from the floor while digging through your bag, “think out loud. I know you’re just ruminating.” He had apparently found what he was looking for, as he put your bag back down.
“Okay, well,” you paused, “there has to be a way to fix it. We already pressed the plate again, so that must only open it—” You looked over at Chase and saw him eating a granola bar from your bag. “Are you serious?”
He nodded. “I’m hungry. If you didn’t want me eating your snacks, you would’ve stopped stocking your bag.” He stopped to swallow. “Continue.”
You shook your head and thought for a moment. “There must be another way to close it. It doesn’t make any sense to have a pit that can’t be closed in the middle of the hallway to an elevator.” Chase nodded. “But, then again, none of this makes sense. I mean, the elevator just disappeared.”
While chewing, Chase shrugged. “Yeah, that’s true. I don’t know though; I feel like there has to be some way to fix it. How else would the person who put the pressure plate in even get back across?”
“I didn’t even think about that.” You tapped a finger against your lips and hummed. “What if there’s a different mechanism that closes it?”
“On this side?”
“Yeah. Maybe a button? Or lever or something?”
“We didn’t see anything before.”
“We weren’t looking for it. Come on.” You held out a hand and pulled him up. “Scan everything. If I were the one designing this, I wouldn’t have another plate and it wouldn’t be somewhere obvious.”
The two of you turned around, yet again, to search. You ignored the floor altogether and, instead, scanned the walls and skylights you passed. Most of it looked the same and you were beginning to grow hopeless. Nonetheless, you focused on the skylights. Just as you were passing under one, you noticed something different. “Hey! Chase!” He turned and you motioned for him to come over. “Do you see that?” You pointed. He shook his head. “Look, there’s a purple crystal.”
“So?”
“Every other one has been blue. It's different.” A wide smile broke out across your face. “Come on, can you reach it?”
He stood on his toes and stretched as far as he could. His fingertips barely brushed the glass. “Not quite.”
“Alright, boost me up.” He bent and held out his hands laced together. You stepped onto his hands with one foot and held onto his shoulder with a hand. With your other hand, you pressed your palm against the cool glass. When it didn’t budge, you felt your heart sink. You looked down at Chase.
“It’s not moving.”
“Did you actually push or just lightly tap it?”
“I actually pushed it!” You tried again anyway, pressing harder this time. When it moved the slightest bit you couldn’t help your embarrassed laugh. “Never mind.” You pushed up one final time and were able to pop it out. Carefully, you slid it to the side, so it was balanced on the inside of the small alcove. “Can you stand up?” You called down at Chase. He nodded and did so. You poked your head and upper body inside the hole. On closer inspection, the crystal looked like cheap plastic. You could see the light behind it that made it seem like it was glowing. You couldn’t find any lights anywhere near the other crystals but trying to understand how they were glowing felt like something for another time. Refocusing on the task at hand, you reached for the purple hunk of plastic. You couldn’t pry it off, so you felt around it for anything that was out of place.
“You almost done?”
“Yeah,” you said, hurriedly searching. Finally, you found what felt like a seam. You pried on it and a small compartment popped open. Inside, you felt a small but very cold button and pressed it as hard as possible. A loud tone rang out, followed by more loud grinding, as Chase dropped you down onto your feet. “Let’s hope that did something.”
When you got back to your bag (which you left a few feet away from the pit so you would know where it had been), you noticed that it wasn’t completely gone. Although not gone in its entirety, there were a series of what looked like stone steps to get across. The spacing was close enough that you didn’t have to jump to reach the next one, but your stomach still dropped. Each step was only big enough for one person at a time. Dread flooded you as you tried your best to shove down the building feeling you would fall. “Ladies first, Chase.” You swallowed hard.
He confidently walked forward and stood on the first step. After quickly crossing the set to the other side, he gave you a reassuring smile. You pulled your bag onto your shoulders, and chewing your lip, took a tentative step. You felt like you were on the edge of both puking and passing out. “You’ve got this. Just focus on me,” Chase said, his tone careful. Taking another step, you let out a heavy but shallow breath. After the first couple like that, your confidence – or adrenaline (and let’s be real it was the latter) – took over and you quickly bound over to the other side. All in all, it probably took around 2 minutes, but sweat clung to your forehead and your breathing was heavy as though you had just run a marathon. “You okay?”
“Yes,” you said, but your nonverbals screamed the opposite. You sunk to the ground and held your head in your hands.
“To be honest with you, I thought you were gonna pass out and fall.” Chase scratched the back of his head.
“So did I—”
You were interrupted by a group of people appearing out of nowhere. They were all dressed in tactile armour and quickly surrounded you and Chase. You ran a defeated hand over your face and Chase’s arms instantly went up in surrender. Looking back, you were a little frustrated having, what, just caught your breath. They were all yelling something you were too terrified to understand.
One especially large meathead grabbed you under the arms and yanked you to your feet. He was close enough that, while you didn’t have a good idea of what his face looked like, you definitely knew he hadn’t showered in a few days. It took everything in you to control the primal urge to punch this guy. Honestly, the only thing stopping you was your desire to live to finish your undergrad. When he realized you had no intention of fighting, he let go of your arm to grab the handcuffs from his belt. Despite the stress of the situation you knew would come up in the therapy you would inevitably need after this, you couldn’t help but appreciate that he was nice enough to leave your hands in front of you, not behind your back.
Another large man had Chase pinned with his face to the wall. His arms were tugged behind him and clamped into handcuffs. “Damn, could you at least but me dinner first?” The man holding you snickered, but the one dealing with Chase pulled him from the wall and pushed him forward just a little too hard.
“Let’s go, boys; Thanatos is waiting.”