http://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/2w0kgd/pi_a_brilliant_scientist_goes_insane_overnight/
Three knocks on the door. Sharp raps with impetus but not impatience. You wait twenty seconds, taking a moment to fix your grasp on the box you carry. No answer. You knock again. Odd. The doctor never tallies for long when you arrive with deliveries. You check your watch, then look back to your truck, still idling at the bottom of the hill, then turn to the door again.
A quick test and you find it's unlocked, so you figure you'll just leave the box in the foyer and be on your way. When you open it, you're greeted by a draft colder even than the autumn air you're standing outside in, yet as humid as any swamp. You tighten your cap, straighten the pin with your name on your shirt breast, and step inside, trying your best not to breath in the foulness.
The lights are out, and all the doors are ajar. It's not an old house by any means; the hill was only recently clear-cut for development, with this mansion being its only construction so far. Rumor was, the doctor had purchased the entire plot and stopped others from building there so he could conduct his experiments without interference. Others thought the man merely wanted to spite certain residents of the town that wanted to use the hill for a country club. Whatever the reason, the doctor was world-renowned in some field of science you'd never heard of before him, or even knew how to pronounce. Bioarchaepaleolo...logy? From your brief, weekly conversations you had with him on your previous deliveries, you know that lately he'd been working on something huge and very secretive, even for him.
Calling out for the doctor, there's no response. Curiosity gets the better of you, and you decide to look around. Continuing to shout the doctor's name, you navigate the ground floor, a modern-styled palace furnished with antique statues, tribal masks, and oil paintings that seem to move along with you. The only thing missing from the mansion is an inhabitant. Soon you find a door, not special in any way other than the fact that it is closed. Nailed to the door--a nail almost as big as a railway spike--is a piece of thick parchment, written on in the scrawl you recognize as the doctor's when he signs off for packages. You tear it off and shake away the splinters from the door. It takes you a moment to realize it's a journal entry, dated several years ago. You set your box down and sit on it, beginning to read.
Just as a I predicted! My resonator did not lie when it pinpointed this location for excavation, and my preliminary digs told me all I need to know. I've spoken to Mister Jefferson, the man that owns these woods, and he's agreed to sell this plot. It won't be cheap, but that's what Nobel Prizes are for! Once that deal goes through, I'll set up a base of operations and begin working my way down as soon as possible.
Upon reaching a sprawl of illegible calculations, you set the page down. By the ragged edge, you can tell it was torn out of a book. Not sure what else to do, you put the page in your pocket, grab the box under your arm again, and push the door open, for now forgetting about your delivery route. The door leads to a stairway heading down, eventually spiraling left out of sight. The entire metal passageway is well lit, and you hear a faint rumbling from below. Your boots ring against the steel steps, chiming all the way down. You lose count of how many steps you traverse or how many times around the spiral you've gone, and at the bottom the passage widens and flattens up to a massive vault door, a circular seal with a turnstile to open it, busted down and hanging on its hinges. On the wheel is another piece of the journal. This one is dated several years ago.
Although it pains me, I've had to bring in outsiders to assist in this burrowing. I tell the fools to go slow, lest they damage something buried in the earth. They've told me that going much deeper than we are now could be dangerous without the proper precautions: drainage, support structures, etc. It seems there's no way around it. The resonator says we still have a ways to go. It may be a while until the excavation continues. I've already made the orders for the necessary equipment and materials. In the meanwhile, perhaps I'll take a personal vacation. Being underground all this time has been putting me in an odd mood.
You stuff the page in your pocket with the other and look past the vault. It leads directly to an vertical shaft cut into the stone; an elevator, like one found in a mine. The platform isn't there, though. You stand at the edge and look down, taking a sharp breath as vertigo takes you. The shaft is illuminated all the way down, but goes down so impossibly far that the bottom disappears from sight regardless. You consider turning back, but instead find yourself pressing a button on the control panel. UP. The ambient rumbling of before--much stronger now--is joined by the grind of chains and whirring of a motor. Five minutes later, you count on your watch, the platform comes to a stop before you. More of a cage than anything, you tentatively poke it with your foot, testing its weight. You step on, and press a button on the on-board control panel. DOWN. There's another journal entry taped to the electrical box. Six months ago.
Blood, sweat, and money, and time. Far more than I've ever needed before to get that damned drill in place. Too much of all four, but it's been worth it. For two years straight that drill dug down, until it ran into some rock that even it couldn't chew through. The resonator went off like I'd never seen it before. I'm here. I'm at the bottom. I've sent away all the contractors. Cut off contact with my colleagues. This requires secrecy. I've made orders for various tools, and filled requisition forms for certain artifacts from numerous institutions. They should all arrive over the course of the next few months. The true work begins!
Into the pocket goes this page as well. It's ink is not as faded, the parchment not as wrinkled. The elevator continues its slow descent, and you watch the various layers of rock pass by. Black, white, grey, brown, opalescent and crystal, sparkling with the iridescence of the electric lamps and alternatively absorbing the light in onyx black. The air is heavier and colder, even more insufferable than what you experienced in the house. The rumbling grows louder, now audible over the screech of the elevator. You look below through the grated floor. The bottom is not far.
The platform jolts as it hits the bottom, and you almost drop the box. You step off. The shaft has widened out to a sizable man-made cavern. A gas-powered generator near the platform sputters. The lights flicker. It's almost out of fuel. You take a deep breath, and walk towards a tunnel, the only way forward. The passageway is tight, barely tall enough for you to fit through without crouching so you don't hit the hanging lamps, and so narrow you need to turn sideways thanks to the box. The end is in sight, but first you spot another page on the floor. From two weeks ago.
Here it is! The gate! The hieroglyphics are exactly what my research indicated. It's made of some sort of alloy, black as night and harder than diamond. And right in the center are the triggers. The hieroglyphs tell some sort of riddle regarding the triggers crucial for opening the gate. Oh, how I long to see what is inside! Ancient treasures? An entirely new subterranean real unknown to us? Something far more alien? All I need is my last package, the cipher. It should be on the way...
You finally push through the tunnel, and into a massive cavern. Your breath catches in your throat. The chamber is like a cathedral, its ceiling so high the lamps stand no chance of illuminating it. Like the page describes, the floor is a black circle as wide across as your delivery truck. You call once more for the doctor, but once again the only reply is your echo. You step onto the metallic floor, and a chill runs all the way from your heels to your head, and it won't leave. At the center of the circle jut out countless pillars reaching around waist-height, each one emblazoned with different symbols you don't recognize. All around the surface of the circle itself are similar symbols, some language you don't recognize. On the pillars is another page. Yesterday.
I think I've found another way through. I know I should wait for the cipher, but I cannot contain my excitement! I've run some tests on the metal, and taken catalog of all of the symbols. The triggers are essentially a combination lock, and any lock can be forced. Assuming these calculations are correct, I can crack the gate open.
More numbers you can't follow. Below them, he continues.
I'll need a crowbar.
It ends there. You walk around the pillars and see that some of the rods are busted open, revealing empty blackness below the circle. Within that endless dark, you hear the rumbling that you followed from the surface, the groaning of whatever lurks beneath the earth. For the first time, you examine the box you're delivering. A simple plywood crate, with the name of a museum written on the top. Inside, nestled in soft wood shavings, is a dowel made from the same metal as the circle you stand on. It's icy to the touch, and covered in the same symbols as the pillars, as well as some recognizable Latin lettering. Presumably this was used to translate.
You here the distant generator cough and wheeze, and the lights flicker, and you notice something on the last page you'd just tossed aside. There's writing on the back. Today.
These are my last words. I opened the gate, and now its shadow dredges my mind. I've staved off the poison for now, but no doubt this is my last breath of fresh--sane, air. I fear if I am to be seen again, it won't be myself as I was in life. To whoever finds this: Get out. Take the cipher, and run. It's still in here. I'm sorry.
Something pummels the back of your head. A crowbar. You crumple. The last thing you see before your vision fades is the doctor behind you, grabbing you by the collar and dragging you away.
The generator putters one last time, and the circle returns to darkness.
***
Five knocks on the door. Hard, sharp, authoritative. He adjusts his coat, fixes his hat, and pats his side, feeling for his holster. The officer checks the time, then looks back at the abandoned truck at the bottom of the hill. It's owner had been missing for several days.
He opens the door, ready to draw, and immediately recoils from the thick air. He's driven by the mansion many times, and met the doctor on several occasions when he complained about trespassers. As far as he can tell, the house is abandoned. The plants have died, their leaves scattering across the floor. There's muddy footprints leading throughout the house, perhaps those of the truck driver. He follows them. They lead to a door, the only closed door in the entire house as far as he can tell. On the door a piece of paper is nailed in. A shipping report for the delivery company from several months ago, signed by the truck driver.
Recipient accepted package at door, signed for himself. Specialist excavation tools from a foreign supplier. 42.4 lbs. 2' x 1' x 1'. Note: Recipient seemed agitated about delay in delivery. Will make him first in route next time!
The officer puts the page in his coat pocket and opens the door, hand resting on the hilt of his revolver. A stairway descends before him, spiraling beyond his sight. A distant rumbling is audible. He considers calling for another officer to assist, but the thought has already passed as he descends the stairs, curiosity taking the better of him.