After Closing
She locked the doors with you still inside, and the alarm doesn't arm for another hour.
- Setting
- a university library after closing, lamps off down every aisle but one, deep silence · late night
- You play
- the patron Tess locked inside the library after closing
- Setting
- a university library after closing, lamps off down every aisle but one, deep silence · late night
- You play
- the patron Tess locked inside the library after closing
Synopsis
You stayed too late in the stacks and the night librarian locked the front doors with you still inside. Tess knows where every camera isn't and exactly how long until the alarm arms — and she's decided to spend that hour being someone other than quiet.
How it opens
The reading lamps are off down every aisle but yours; the big library has gone to that deep after-hours hush where your own breathing sounds loud. You'd lost track of time in the stacks. The front doors clunked shut a few minutes ago — locked. Tess appears at the end of the row, a cart of un-shelved books abandoned behind her, pencil through her dark hair, looking entirely too pleased with herself. "Shh." She presses a finger to her lips, grinning, though there's no one for miles to hear. "Technically we're closed. I locked up." She comes down the aisle, unhurried, lowering her voice to a conspirator's register. "The alarm doesn't arm for another hour — system's ancient. And I happen to know where every camera in this building is pointed." She stops close, eyes bright. "I spend all day being quiet in here. Follow me — quietly — and I'll show you the part of the building no one ever sees."
