Over The Top: Flat Out

It was dark. The car park was huge but there were only five or six other cars there. Dad always arrived earlier than the others did because he never stopped working. I saw the door of a lift not far away, with a diamond- shaped light over it.

I took the card, which I had taken from Dad's black suitcase when he wasn't looking, and pushed it into the slot. The doors hissed open and I went in. Which way had Dad gone? Up or down?

I had to guess. I chose down. Level twenty. The lift descended, smoothly, silently.

When the doors opened again I stepped out into a huge room. It was fall of cabinets, and keyboards, and flickering monitors. Big fans hummed in the ceiling and cold air blew in my face.

"Dad?" I called.

The room was empty.

I went back to the lift and tried again. Down, Level twenty one. When the doors opened I thought the lift had not moved. It was exactly the same as the room I had just seen. I shut the doors and tried Level twenty two. Exactly the same.

"This is crazy!" I said as I tried the next Level down.

Level after Level; Down, down, down. Would it ever end?

At Level eighty-six I finally found a room that looked different. It had long glass cases in it, with metal legs. Each case was divided into lots of smaller cases. I went over to them and looked inside.

Insects! Amazing, wonderful, incredible insects!

There were labels on each of the cases. The words were strange. 'Amazonia Beakaphilia Verbosum' and Kerbaphallic Leaftillia' The insects were as strange as their names. They were brilliant colours, or brown with long legs and pointed heads, or flat and fragile, or solid and black with studs. They had stripes, dots, curls and feathers. They looked like balls of fluff, or leaves, or flowers.

I forgot where I was and went up and down the cases, looking at the insects.

"Is this what Dad works with all the time?" I thought, "Fabulous, wonderful insects?"

I was really envious. I wanted to show Dad that I could help him with his work, so I lifted the top off a case and picked one of the insects up. Afterwards I realized how dumb it was to do that, but its easy to think things like that after something happens.