“They w-won’t let me out,” she says, answering my thoughts.
I’ve been hoping for a challenge that relies on the mind, but now that it’s here, my spine is stiff with tension. I can’t fail. Farrah hasn’t been in here an hour, and she’s hypothermic. I don’t want to think about what another hour will do to her. To us.
“You have to get up,” I tell her. I’m freezing in my pants and T-shirt, and all she has on is a floaty dress. “You need to keep moving to stay warm.”
“I c-can’t move.”
I bite my lip and test the door handle. Locked. I type 1-2-3-4 into the keypad. A red light flashes before the main screen is restored. I type 4-3-2-1. Red light.
I turn back to the room, hugging my frigid arms around myself.
The answer must be here.
There’s a clipboard hanging from a wall. I cross to it and scan the single sheet of paper. It’s some sort of spreadsheet with nine empty blocks. There’s an equation at the top of the sheet: 3?4+9=X. I quickly do the math: 8. Too short for the keypad code. Still, I run to the door and type it in. The screen waits for me to enter the three additional numbers, then beeps three times and goes back to the main screen. I try typing 8-8-8-8, then the individual numbers 3-4-9. Red light. I try it backward. Red light. Dammit. The equation means something. It has to. But what?
There’s a rumbling noise overhead.
“Not again.” Farrah groans as air puffs out of the vents. My neck and shoulders tighten against the cold, and a violent shiver racks my body.
You don’t want to use all your time.
It all makes sense now. The room gets colder the longer you take. It’s our motivation.
I turn to the stainless-steel cart. It’s not completely empty. On it I find a single box of chicken strips and a tin of Folgers coffee with a handful of stale grinds inside. There’s a calendar bolted near the top right corner of the wall behind the cart with the date February 9 circled in red pen. I flip through the rest of the calendar, my fingers already stiff and clumsy with cold. No other dates are circled. I run back to the keypad and type 9-9-9-9. Red light. February is the second month of the year. I try 0-2-0-9. Nothing. 0-9-0-2. Red light. I hit the keypad. Of course it wouldn’t be this easy. I turn to the cart.
“T-t-tried that,” Farrah says.
I ignore her and think. There are so few items in here, all three racks empty save for the tin of coffee and box of meat, that it feels pointed. I pick up the tin of coffee and spin it around. The only numbers anywhere are the expiration date: November 2019. It seems like a long shot, but I type all variations of 11-19 into the keypad. Nothing. I rub my numb fingers together for warmth and turn my attention to the box of meat. Someone’s written TO BE DELIVERED MARCH 5TH across the top of the box in thick black marker. I try every combination of 3 and 5 too. Nothing.
I’m doing it wrong. I know it. I’m thinking small when I need to be thinking big. It’s not meant to be impossible. The answer is probably right in front of me.
The air vents open, hissing out more cold air. It bites into my windburned skin with razor-sharp teeth. I can no longer feel my legs.
“Farrah?”
She doesn’t answer.
“Farrah?” I move in painful slow motion, my muscles reacting sluggishly to my commands, and fall to my knees to take her pulse. It thumps lightly under my frigid fingers. She’s alive.
“Farrah, you have to get up and move.”
I try to pull her up, but her stiff body has contracted into a freezing ball. She’s going to die. And then I’m going to die. I can’t let that happen. Not now, not like this.
I leave her and bang on the door.
“Open the door!” I scream. “Help! Farrah needs help! We quit! Open the door!”
No one comes.
“Goddammit!” My teeth chatter uncontrollably. Breath freezes in my lungs like a hunk of ice.
I face the cart again, beating back my crippling desperation. It’s not going to help me crack this code.
Hartley figured it out. Lyla did it in less than ten minutes. It isn’t impossible. I need to stop panicking and think.
The cart. The equation. The spreadsheet. The coffee, the meat, the spreadsheet. The cart.
Something clicks. I step back until my back touches the wall. The cart. The goddamn cart. Three horizontal racks, separated by two vertical supports. Nine blocks. It’s the exact same shape as the spreadsheet on the clipboard.
Nine blocks. 3?4+9=X.