34: Meanwhile, Down in the Basement

Garry is travelling down in the lift. The music is battering at the small bones inside his ear. As the lift moves downwards he becomes more and more certain that he is right: the music is coming from down there.

He's not worried about Restricted Areas. He's not worried about Unemployment. For Garry, this is a chance to be a hero.

The lift stops and the doors slide open. It's dark out there, very dark. As his eyes adjust to the gloom he can see something. It isn't the hidden orchestra he expected. It's a woman. A woman who can't possibly be as old as she looks, with long, long hair that is swirling around her like a cloud.

He can't see how she is making the music, but her eyes fix on him, he can see them shining like two bike lamps. It isn't possible that they are glowing with a light of their own, Garry thinks, and then he realises he is staring, coughs, and steps out of the lift.

Something falls from the woman's hands and rolls away over the floor. The music stops as suddenly as it started. It feels like Garry has been leaning against a wall and it has suddenly collapsed. A wall of sound. And now it has been taken away he wobbles, and feels small and naked in the silence.

Garry walks towards towards the woman.

'Hello,' he says, 'do you work here?'