Recently, I had an idea for a new novel.  Although I have several other projects that have priority on my attention, this new idea left me excited enough to take the time to sit down and type out a potential first chapter.  I do not know exactly where this story will take me, but I can tell you that there will be aliens, mayhem, and people are gonna die.

What I am asking from all of you is this: Please take a moment of your valuable time and read this first chapter.  I have printed it below for your (hopefully) enjoyment and opinion.  This is still a first draft, but I think it is a good start.  I would like to hear from you as to whether or not you would like to find out what happens next.  Does this sound like the beginning of a story you would like to read?

Let me know your thoughts.  I would really like to hear from you.  You can leave your comments in the comment box below or, if you would rather not post them publicly, click on the Contact Me page and shoot  me an e-mail.

Without further ado:

TESTING GROUNDS

 

Chapter 1

 

The stairs and the elevator were only a few feet away, but the vehicle ramp looked much more inviting.  Leon slammed the door of his car closed, pressed the lock button on his key fob and pocketed his keys.  Shrugging his backpack strap over his right shoulder, he set off for the paved car ramp spiraling down to the ground floor of the parking structure.

The twisting roadway was meant for vehicles only.  Leon knew that.  Even if he didn’t, the square metal signs mounted on the wall clearly stated in bold block lettering: No Pedestrians.  He wasn’t supposed to be walking here.  Drivers racing up the ramp to find the last few available parking spots would not be expecting some person on foot to suddenly appear in front of them, and would more than likely not be able to react in time to avoid running him over.  Leon was taking his life in his hands, but he knew that, too.  He also knew that he would be able to hear those same cars coming from a mile away.  The echoes of their engines and the squeak of tire rubber turning on smooth pavement would give him plenty of warning to hug the wall and get out of the way.

Besides, if he spent his whole life avoiding things he was not supposed to do, he never would have made it this far.  His father had died when he was twelve, blown up on some sand dune in Afghanistan, and his mother had to pick up a second job just to pay for groceries and keep a roof over his and his little brother’s heads.  They were the only Mexican family in a mostly white neighborhood.  Caldwell, Idaho might be considered an idyllic little town, but nobody could claim it was racially integrated.  Besides his brother, Leon was the only brown face at his high school.  Nobody expected the Mexican kid to get anywhere or accomplish anything.  He certainly wasn’t supposed to get straight A’s and finish number one in his class.

Yet here he was now, at San Jose State University in California, finishing up his fourth year of study in Physics.  And, between the scholarships he had earned and the little bit of  “sorry we got your dad killed” money from Uncle Sam, he had ended up with a full ride.  He was proud of that.  He was glad that he had gotten accepted into the college, but especially proud that he could come here without causing any more financial hardship to his mom and little brother.

Leon paused briefly before stepping onto the parking structure ramp, listening for any cars making their way up from the bottom.  Cars travelling down would take a different ramp, so any noises above him did not concern him overmuch.  It was all quiet.  He started forward at a brisk pace, each step along the steep downward slope jolting and bouncing the backpack slung over his shoulder.  He glanced at another sign posted on the wall to his right.  It announced, “Vehicles Only Past This Point.”

“I’m exploring,” Leon laughed.

He told himself his parents would have wanted him to push the boundaries.  After all, when he was born they had christened him with the name of their favorite Spanish explorer.  His birth certificate read: Juan Ponce De Leon Alvarado.

Growing up, his parents had called him Juan, but when he started school he already felt different enough from all the other kids.  The name Juan only made him feel more foreign.  More isolated.  One day, during roll call, he had raised his hand.

“Yes, Juan?”  His teacher had asked.  Her name had been Emily Walcott.  She taught at his school for two more years before she got married and moved away.  He remembered her as being very nice to him.

“Miss, Walcott,” he had replied.  “Can you please call me Leon?”

She had smiled.  “Of course.  Leon.”

And that was it.  From that day forward, he had been Leon.

A large, black, painted number five passed him on his left as he continued his winding march down.  About half a minute later, he passed the number four, emblazoned on the wall in a similar manner.  As the number disappeared past his left shoulder, Leon noticed for the first time something extremely odd.  On the inside wall of the spiral ramp, bolted to the wall approximately three and a half feet from the ground was a polished, brass hand rail.  The circular rail started in what appeared to be a more or less random location, appearing to grow out from the concrete wall from a metal disk bolted to its smooth gray surface.  The rail bent in ninety-degree angle and ran parallel to the floor, winding along the wall on its way down the ramp until it disappeared around the next curve.  Thick brass brackets, attached to the concrete every couple of feet, braced and supported the handrail along its length.

Leon paused a moment to observe the odd addition.  He had never noticed it before and, frankly, it made no sense being there.  Who in their right mind, he mused, would bother to post signs to keep pedestrians away, then add a railing to assist anyone who decided to ignore the warnings?  He didn’t have an answer to this riddle, other than perhaps stupidity, or some obscure governmental regulation.  Perhaps both.

He shrugged before resuming his walk.  It wasn’t the dumbest thing he had ever come across.  It probably wouldn’t even be the most ridiculous thing he encountered today.  The world was full of examples of people doing things that made no real sense.  If you hire a contractor to build a boat with more holes in it than a swiss cheese, as long as he’s getting paid he’s not going to refuse.  He’s going to build that boat.  The same was true about a handrail along a roadway designated for vehicle use only.

Leon had only gone a few feet further down the ramp when a second surprise caught his attention.  On the wall, above the new railing, someone had added some graffiti.  In black, box lettering, stenciled over a sprayed white background, there was a short message.  Or rather, a short poem:

 

WHY STRIDE WHEN YOU CAN GLIDE?

TRY THE SLIDE AND TAKE A RIDE.

 

A goofy grin spread across Leon’s face.  Take a ride?  Well, why not, he thought.  The rail looked shiny and clean.  Hell, it looked brand new.  And Leon hadn’t done anything like this since he was fifteen and he would slide down the stair bannister at a friend’s house when the boy’s parents weren’t around.  It sounded like fun.

Leon turned his back to the rail, then shifted his pack so it wouldn’t get pinned between him and the wall.  He didn’t actually expect the experiment to work.  He figured as he picked up speed, because of the curve of the slide, centrifugal force would push him off before he got very far.  Still, he was game to try.  He hopped up on the rail and, raising his legs out in front of him for balance, he slipped along the length of the brass bar.

It worked surprisingly well.  The descent was shallow enough that he never built up enough speed to launch him off his perch.   Still, it was fast enough that it was fun.  He was making good time, faster than if he had walked, and he was having a blast.  Leon laughed.  He wished a car or another pedestrian would pass him so he had a witness to this impromptu ride, but the ramp remained empty.

A large number three appeared on the wall across from him.  It glided along to his left and was quickly past.  Only a few seconds seemed to tick by when the number two came chasing after it.  One was not far behind.

Leon laughed once more.  He was going to have to do this ride again.  He briefly considered jumping onto the elevator on the ground floor just to go back to the fourth floor and hop back on the handrail, but he discarded the idea just as quickly.  He had to get to class and didn’t have time to waste on games right now.

A massive letter “G” appeared as Leon reached the ground floor of the garage.  The ride was over.  He kicked his legs forward and pushed with one hand against the rail to dismount.  Nothing happened.  He continued to glide along the wall as if he had never attempted to climb off.  He kicked again, this time with more effort, but the result was the same.  The seat of his pants never lost contact with the rail.

Confused by his inability to pull free of the wall, Leon flashed back to a video he had seen several years ago.  It had been filmed by visitors at a zoo in China.  The video showed a man sitting on a curb directly in front of a Panda cage, unaware that the bear in the cage had moved up behind him.  The Panda grabbed the man’s jacket, pulling him backward and pinning him to the bars of the cage.  Leon remembered the look of surprise that had entered the man’s face as he realized for the first time that he was stuck and could not pull away.  There was no fear in his eyes.  He did not yet realize the danger he was in.  There was only the surprise of suddenly finding he could not move.

Leon felt that way now.  Shocked, but not yet fearful.  He was for some reason unable to stop his slide, but he also knew that he was on the ground floor of the garage and the rail had to end somewhere soon.

Only, it didn’t.

The ramp continued its downward spiral and Leon remained trapped on his journey.  The concrete wall across from him, shifted past inexorably, unable, or unwilling, to cease.  Then, to Leon’s horror, a massive number one, applied to the wall in a garish red paint, slid across his vision moving steadily from right to left.  As it disappeared around a curve, Leon choked out a startled curse.  Now, the panic began to set in.

This is insane, he told himself.  This garage doesn’t have underground levels.  I should have stopped by now.  He thrashed desperately, slamming feet and elbows against the wall to dislodge himself, but completely without any noticeable effect.  He was like a magnet placed on a metal bar; free to slide from one end to the other, but unable to break the connection that bound them together.

When the red number two rolled past, tears had begun to well in Leon’s eyes.  Fear and anger overwhelmed him, coupled with the frustration of being helpless to save himself from whatever he had stumbled into.  Leon cried out.  Not words, only an inchoate howl of misery and despair.

The number three appeared.

Then four.  Only, it wasn’t really a four.  It loosely resembled the number four, but it was twisted and malformed somehow.  Like a young child had seen a picture of a four once long ago, and was now trying to repeat what it had seen.  The five was even less recognizable.  And … was it closer?

Leon’s eyes widened in realization.  The wall across from him had gotten closer.  There was less roadway between them; barely wide enough for a motorcycle to travel through, much less a car.  In addition to the closing space, the light was beginning to fail.  There were no artificial lights in the walls or ceiling, and the further Leon travelled down, the less natural lighting was able to penetrate to illuminate his path.  The tears began to flow in earnest.

By the time Leon reached what should have been the seventh level down, the opposite wall was inches away, but he could no longer see it.  If he kicked his foot forward, he could feel it pull at his shoe as it swept along in front of him.  He never stopped moving.  Leon felt the rail gliding under his left hip and the wall at his back as it brushed against his sweatshirt.  If he concentrated, he could also feel a slight breeze against his cheek generated by the speed of his progress.  He was making good time.  But to where?

A terrible thought came to him.  What if he wasn’t going anywhere?  Maybe sliding ever downward into the complete darkness was all he had to look forward to.  He would continue riding this damned hand rail right into Hell, or die of hunger and thirst.  Neither option was terribly appealing.  Leon did not know which one he hoped would come first.

Time passed, and Leon continued to slide.  In the unchanging darkness, he had nothing with which to gauge its passage and he had no way to know how long he had been on this unplanned journey.  As a game, and as a simple way to mark the time, he began tapping his foot against the opposite wall every time he estimated ten seconds in his head.  He counted his kicks, and in this way he guessed at how many levels down he had travelled.  At about three-hundred, he began to lose count.  By around five-hundred, he gave up completely.

He wasn’t hungry or thirsty, so he decided it had only been a few hours at most.  But whether it had been several hours or several days, it didn’t really matter.  In truth, Leon had stopped caring.  Fear and adrenaline had long since burned themselves out, leaving only a resigned acceptance of whatever would come.  If anything.

Then he saw light at the end of the tunnel.  Literally.

A pinprick of light appeared in Leon’s peripheral vision in the direction he traveled.  He turned to face it, but it was still to dim to see if he stared directly at it.  He glanced aside and waited, anxiously, hoping it had not just been wishful thinking.  And there it was again!

He watched it out of the corner of his eye and not only did it remain this time, but it stayed in the same place.  Apparently, at some point in the past hours he had stopped spiraling and his direction of travel had straightened out.  That or the light was really just a tiny spark a few feet away and travelling along with him at exactly the same speed.

Leon reached out a hand to touch it, but was unable to reach far enough.  The fact it was beyond his grasp gave him hope that he would soon escape this blackness.

The speck of light steadied, intensified and, finally, began to grow.  Leon could now stare directly at it without it fading from his view.  As the circle of white brilliance widened, it began to burn his eyes, causing them to water.  His time in absolutely darkness had left his light-starved senses extremely vulnerable.  Before he could be blinded, Leon was forced to glance away.

In the instant he looked aside, the light was on top of him.  The railing came to an end, launching him through the opening and into the dazzling white radiance.