Felix the Shark Read online

  He whooped. This was the place! The design on the bottom of the pool was a perfect match to the strange ornate drawing in The Dogged Dogmatist!

  Dirk grinned at the design. For several minutes, he ran his fingers over the whole design, searching for some kind of hidden handle or something. Nothing. He pulled out the list of clues he’d scribbled down and looked at it.

  The flow of water. Next must be the flow of water.

  He looked at the design again. Could water flow from here? Maybe at one time, but …

  Feeling like an idiot, Dirk lay down on the ground and put his ear against the decorated tiles. If water was anyplace near here, it had to be under the pool. Maybe he’d hear it.

  Stilling his breath, he listened.

  And he smiled.

  He could hear the faint sound of running water. But how to get to it?

  Dirk pushed up to a sitting position and looked around the bottom of the pool. Was there a trap door or something he could go through?

  He knelt and started pawing at the dirt again. He brushed it farther and farther back from the middle of the pool, but he didn’t find anything.

  Shifting to his butt again, he frowned. How could he follow the water?

  Dirk rubbed a filthy hand over his sweaty face and studied the pool again. He couldn’t see anything that suggested a way to follow the water. Changing positions, he looked at the drain in the middle of the pool floor. It was only eight inches or so in diameter. Not nearly big enough for a person to fit through.

  Dirk crawled toward the drain. Something about it looked weird, like it was asymmetrical or something. Had it been installed wrong? It looked thicker on one side than the other.

  Dirk reached the drain and ran his hand over it. Maybe there was a latch or something that would reveal a trap door under the drain or …

  Wait a second.

  Dirk changed positions and hunched over the drain. He pressed his fingers hard against the metal on one side. Was he imagining things?

  No. He didn’t think so.

  He used his now-filthy fingernails to scrape out more dirt. He grinned. He wasn’t imagining things! There was a depression in the metal at one side of the drain, a depression shaped exactly like the pendant in Dirk’s pocket!

  Dirk’s breath came in eager gasps as he jabbed his fingers in to his jeans pocket. He pulled out the pendant, and holding his breath, he pressed it in to the depression in the drain.

  At first nothing happened. He pressed the pendant down more firmly.

  He was rewarded with a loud metallic click … and part of the drain lifted upward. Dirk leaned over and peered in to the tiny metal compartment that was revealed.

  “Yes!” he shouted.

  He was looking at a key.

  With shaking fingers, Dirk reached in to the compartment and pulled out an ordinary-looking key. As soon as he did, the compartment snapped closed and the pendant popped free.

  Dirk stared at the key in his hand. “The butterfly revealed the key.” How cool was this?! He was in his own real-life treasure hunt!

  The key had to open a building that would lead him to the flow of water. But which building?

  Dirk picked up the pendant and returned it to his pocket. Then he held the key, feeling its grooves for a minute while he thought.

  Abruptly, Dirk jumped up and brushed himself off. “Idiot! Where would you go if you wanted to follow a flow of water?”

  The pump house!

  Dirk ran the length of the bottom of the pool and up the slope of the shallow end as fast as he could. At the edge of the pool, he stopped for a second to get his bearings. Then he turned down a path to the left of the pool, and he ran toward the pump house as fast as he could.

  Just as he knew it would, the key he’d found fit the pump house dead-bolt lock. It took a couple tries to get it to turn—his fingers, sweaty from his run and his excitement, kept slipping off the key—but it did turn, and the door to the pump house opened.

  Dirk pulled out his flashlight and stepped in to the murky space crammed full of dirty metal pipes. He turned on his light and closed the door behind him.

  Then he stood still to quiet his breathing. He listened.

  After just a few seconds, he took a couple steps and felt one of the bulging pipes. It was cool. He put his ear to it. He smiled. A flow of water was moving through the pipe.

  Dirk looked down at the key he still held. If he hadn’t found it, there was no way he’d have been able to get in this building.

  Good thing he was good at clues and puzzles.

  Now all he had to do was follow the sound of the water.

  Dirk shined his light at the bottom of the pipe, and he saw that it and all the other pipes in the room dropped down through the pump house floor. He played his light back and forth over the dusty concrete. There had to be a way for maintenance workers to get down to the pipes.

  He spotted an opening that held a metal ladder bolted to its concrete sides. Dirk aimed his light down the opening and saw that the ladder disappeared in to oily darkness. The pipes must run through tunnels below the park. Taking a deep breath and praying the ladder would hold, he descended.

  When he hit ground again, he found himself in a labyrinth of pipe-filled tunnels. Again, he was quiet until he identified the pipe that had water flowing through it. Then, putting one hand on the pipe, and clutching his flashlight with the other, he began following the pipe through the blackness.

  The flowing water took Dirk on what felt like the longest walk of his life. With just the narrow beam of his light to see and just the faint sound of the water and his hand on the pipe to guide him, it seemed like he journeyed for an eternity through a twisting and turning tangle of concrete and metal. It was a journey that tested his nerve as he never had before. There was a sharp terror at the edge of every sight and sound—terror that he wasn’t the only one in the tunnels and, at the same time, terror that he was the only one in the tunnels (and would never be found if he somehow got lost). Dirk’s exploration took more courage than he thought he had. Without that flow of water, there was no way out of this complex maze of pipes, and he couldn’t be sure the water would keep flowing. More than a half dozen times, he thought about turning back and giving up.

  But Dirk wasn’t a quitter. And he was sure he was on the right track. The very fact that this serpentine trail of pipes existed told him he understood the clues. Aaron Sanders had liked mazes, and this was a maze. As long as Dirk could hear the water, he knew it would lead him to the destination he sought.

  And he was right.

  Just when Dirk’s legs were turning to rubber and his nerve was diminishing to the point of nonexistence, the pipe he was following ascended up through an opening in the concrete ceiling above him. And next to it was another metal ladder.

  Dirk didn’t hesitate. He quickly climbed the ladder.

  He found himself in what looked like one of the maintenance buildings he’d dismissed on his first night of exploring. Oh no. How could Freddy’s fit in here?

  He felt so let down that his legs nearly gave out. Had he been wrong?

  Aiming his light in a circle around him, Dirk caught his breath when the beam landed on the front door of Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza.

  Not just any Freddy’s.

  The Freddy’s.

  He hadn’t been wrong!

  Dirk waved his light back and forth on either side of Freddy’s door, and he could see the moatlike glass enclosure going both ways. He’d found Felix’s swimming tube!

  “Who’s the man?!” Dirk shouted.

  Thankfully no one answered him.

  Dirk’s legs reenergized, and he leaped in joy. He did a little dance of triumph. He’d done it!

  He stopped and frowned. The water looked murky, a kind of greenish brown, which made sense. The water probably hadn’t been treated in a decade, but it was moving. Dirk could see variations in the dirt that suggested a flowing current. He looked for Felix and didn’t see him, so he walked over
to Freddy’s double doors.

  Grabbing the handles, he pulled, and the doors fell back.

  “Yes!” Dirk shouted. His voice echoed down the hall and he followed the sound, grinning.

  The wooden floors were warped and mushy with age, so Dirk was careful to keep his flashlight aimed downward and his gaze on his feet. If he broke a leg, he wasn’t sure how he’d get back out. Dirk watched his footsteps scuff aside dust that had to have been accumulating for at least ten years. No one had been down here in a long time … probably since Aaron Sanders had died.

  Dirk could feel his pulse accelerating with each step he took. He couldn’t tell if that was from excitement or anxiety … or maybe both.

  When he reached the bottom of the stairs that led to the main lobby, Dirk looked up at the swim tube. Again he tried to spy Felix. He didn’t see the shark, but that was okay. The encircling tube was big. Felix could have been surfing some other part of it.

  Dirk took the black-checked stairs two at a time, leaving footprints in the dust as he went. He couldn’t believe he was so close to his goal!

  In the lobby, Dirk’s flashlight cast creepy shadows across walls painted with murals featuring Freddy, Chica, and Bonnie. Dirk paused and turned in a circle, thinking about the man whose pain had led to creating this place, creating Felix. Dirk had thought about it, and he was sure Felix was a memorial for Lonnie. That was why Aaron had loved this place so much he’d sacrificed his remaining money to get it hidden and have the pipe maze built. Dirk could understand that kind of grief and obsession. He thought he would have liked Aaron Sanders. He was sorry he didn’t get to meet him.

  Dirk shook his head. Aaron Sanders didn’t matter right now. What mattered was that Dirk had known this Freddy’s existed, and he was right! He felt the thrill of vindication, and of his quest nearing its completion. He wasn’t sure he’d ever stop riding this high.

  Dirk continued on through the lobby, expecting to end up in the dining room. He stopped. The dining room wasn’t there. Dirk frowned and shined his light around him. This was definitely Freddy’s, but it wasn’t the whole pizzeria.

  No wonder Freddy’s could fit in the maintenance building! The only parts of Freddy’s that were here, besides Felix’s swim tube, were the entrance, the lobby, and a portion of the old arcade.

  Dirk flashed his light in to the gloom, filled with dusty games. Goose bumps sprang up on his arms as the flashlight beam reflected off the metal and plastic surfaces. The old machines looked like frozen giants waiting to be thawed out and reanimated.

  Dirk shook his head and redirected his light toward the back of the arcade. The stairs leading up to the swimming tube hatch should be there.

  As Dirk followed his flashlight’s glow, he heard a humming sound that grew louder as he got closer to the tube’s entrance hatch. That had to be the water pump, still chugging along, still coursing water though Felix’s domain.

  And there! He spotted the stairs leading up to the hatch on top of the swimming tube.

  As soon as Dirk saw the hatch, he began to strip off his jacket. He dropped it and his flashlight to the ground, and he pulled off his shirt. Goose bumps immediately sprouted on his arms. It was cold in here. He hoped the water was as warm as he remembered it. He frowned, worried that the water might be cold. Should he check the heat pump? He cocked his head and listened to the humming. Now that he was here again, Dirk remembered the sounds from his past—a kind of layered rumbling, one hum—the water pump—a bit more bass than the other—the heat pump. Yes, there it was! Good. The water would be warm.

  Dirk rubbed his arms and grinned. He climbed the stairs and touched the cool surface of the circular handle on the hatch. The handle was called a dog, he remembered now. How could he have forgotten that?

  He hadn’t forgotten Felix, though. He hadn’t misremembered or made it up! He’d been sure this swim tube existed, and it did. He also knew Felix was still in there, and he was about to prove that he was right about that, too. Not that anyone was in here to see that he was right. But that didn’t matter. He would confirm he was right, and he’d have the satisfaction of knowing all his stupid friends who hadn’t believed him were wrong.

  Dirk looked around the area near the hatch. It was dark with mildew, but the face mask and breathing hoses were there.

  Dirk remembered that, at this point, an attendant always helped to get you hooked up, but amazingly, he remembered what to do. The face mask was cloudy, so Dirk spit in it and wiped it as clean as he could with his discarded shirt. Once he had it clear enough, he tried to put it over his head. It was too tight, so he took it off and loosened the strap. He put it back on, and this time, it felt fine. He reached for the mouthpiece attached to the breathing tube, wiped it with his shirt, too, and then put it in his mouth. Immediately, oxygen began flowing in through the tube. Good. Everything still worked.

  Dirk couldn’t smile with the mouthpiece in, but if he could have, he would have. This was it! He was about to be reunited with Felix!

  He reached out and turned the dog on the hatch door. It turned easily, and he was surprised; he’d expected it to be rusted.

  Taking a deep breath to calm his heart, which was practically doing jumping jacks, Dirk lowered himself in to the tube. As soon as he did, the hatch slammed closed with a clank, and the current pulled him along the tube, away from the hatch.

  Dirk flipped over and looked at the hatch as he was drawn by the flowing water away from the door and farther in to the tube.

  He frowned. What was bothering him about that door? Something …

  Before he could think through whatever it was that was niggling at him, he was carried toward another hatch—a few feet down from the one that he’d used to get in the tube. This one was on the side of the tube, instead of the top.

  Dirk was a little nervous about the closed hatch he’d just come through, but he was also excited about seeing Felix. Would the shark come out of the second hatch? Dirk couldn’t remember.

  The second hatch opened. Beyond the portal, it was dark. But enough light reached though the hatch doorway to reveal slow movement within.

  Dirk strained to see through the gloom. At first, he couldn’t make out anything. Then, suddenly, a huge blunt nose appeared, and Felix glided silently through the hatch.

  Startled, Dirk flapped his arms in the water. He half spit out his mouthpiece and he had to quickly shove it back in before he swallowed dirty water. His heart rate shot up, and he could hear it thrumming in his ears.

  After all this time, Dirk had thought he’d be so happy to see Felix. But he wasn’t happy at all. This Felix wasn’t the Felix he remembered!

  Dirk’s Felix had been a sleek, beautiful shark with shiny and smooth blue-gray rubbery skin. He had warm dark eyes that seemed to communicate both the sadness Dirk remembered and the desire to connect with whoever came to swim with him. The Felix of Dirk’s memories had a mouth full of teeth, yes, but the mouth always appeared to be upturned, smiling, and benign—not menacing.

  This Felix wasn’t benign.

  Time had not been kind to the lonely shark stuck in this dirty water. Felix—even though he wasn’t a real shark—appeared to be decomposing. His skin was no longer shiny or sleek. It was mottled, hanging in strips that fluttered out behind Felix as he swam. The ragged openings revealed Felix’s corroded endoskeleton.

  Dirk thrashed in the water as Felix’s toothy snout brushed against his side. He flailed to get away from the shark. In seconds, Dirk’s eagerness had degenerated in to full-blown terror.

  As Dirk struggled to swim away from Felix, Felix turned to look at him … with his one working eye. The other eye was dangling out of Felix’s face, a black orb bobbing in the water.

  Dirk almost spit out his mouthpiece again when a scream burbled up his throat and tried to erupt out in to the water. This wasn’t what he’d expected. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be!

  He turned away from Felix’s one-eyed gaze, but before he did, he tried to find s
ome of the friendly playfulness he remembered in Felix’s expression. It wasn’t there. Felix’s stare was empty and dead.

  Rotating away from Felix and swimming hard now, using his feet as flippers, Dirk squinted though his face mask, determined to get back to the entrance hatch as quickly as possible. He had to get out of the tube.

  Dirk was three-fourths of the way around the tube when his brain supplied the answer to what was bothering him about the entrance hatch. He saw the hatch in his mind’s eye, and he knew what his subconscious had already figured out: The hatch had no handle inside the tube. There was no way to open it.

  Dirk again wanted to scream but couldn’t.

  Why hadn’t Dirk remembered that the attendant was the one who’d stopped the current and let the swimmers out after a lap or two? Why had he believed he could do this by himself?

  As soon as Dirk had this thought, he noticed he was moving faster through the water, and before he could react, he’d whipped past the entrance hatch again. Looking back over his shoulder, he saw that Felix was closing in on him.

  Sucking in air through the mouthpiece, Dirk turned and tried to swim harder, but he felt something snag on his pants. He looked back again, and his eyes widened in panic. Felix’s teeth were caught in the waistband of his pants. Dirk kicked his legs, but he couldn’t get free. He grabbed at the material to try and rip it loose, but all he did was cut his hand on one of Felix’s corroded teeth.

  Pulling back his hand, Dirk noticed he and Felix were getting close to the entrance hatch again. He prepared himself to try to grab it before he shot past.

  There. Three, two, one … Dirk reached for the hatch and tried to find something to grip. His hands slid across the metal, and he and Felix continued to whoosh through the tube.

  As the current carried Dirk and Felix forward, Dirk had to face the truth. Like the dogged dogmatist had in Louisa’s novel, Dirk had found what he’d searched for, just as he’d said he would. He’d been right. But no one would ever know it.