Growling and shaking of the door wakes me back to my terror, but the door is still holding, so I am able to calm myself down. I wonder if the bear might try to come through the wall. I know a pen penetrated the drywall, but is there just a hollow space between the rooms or something more? Are there studs that would stop the bear even if it did rip out the gypsum? I haven’t seen any holes all the way through to the other side even where there were large sections of drywall removed. At least nothing on this side indicates the bear is going through the wall.

  My head hurts a lot, not just a headache, but a burning sensation. I wish I had a mirror to take a look but seeing it probably wouldn’t inform me of anything different I could do, so I conserve phone battery by not looking with the selfie camera. There is dark caked blood in my hair and down my chest and arm, but I do not seem to be actively bleeding. I touch around the area gingerly and look at my finger. There’s no fresh blood. I don’t know how much I lost, but it doesn’t seem to be a dangerous amount.

  I consider what I could do about the injury, but decide it is still probably best to let it scab over as is. Nothing has changed since I fell asleep. Maybe the bear and I are a little hungrier. I drink the rest of the watered-down smoothie and open one of the other two bottles.

  Could I possibly cut a hole in the wall opposite the doors, sneak out, go a hundred rooms, and return? The bear would probably detect me and run me down. I’d have to break through the wall again when I got back if it is even possible to go through. It would be a last-ditch strategy.

  The best idea I can think of is to try to outlast the bear by rationing my two smoothies. How long can a bear go without food in the summer? It wouldn’t be at its hibernation weight. How much did it get from the bodies it found? Regardless, I do need to address the water situation, or I’ll go through all my food just for hydration. That means getting up to the ceiling and tampering with a sprinkler.

  As I attempt to stand up, I realize how battered I am from being sandwiched between the doors when the bear charged me. My left leg and right arm and side are all stiff and swollen. I lift up the sweatshirt and see giant bruises. I may have a cracked rib. I try not to think about it. There’s nothing I can do. I just need to fight through the pain.

  I get up and designate the corner to the right of the doors as the restroom. I peel back the carpet and pad and then replace them when I am done. It’s the best I can do and once I get out of here, I can reset the room.

  I estimate the drop ceiling is about ten feet high. There are four sprinklers in the room. Stretching my arm up and standing on tiptoe, I can probably add a little more than twenty inches to my height, which still leaves me at least two and a half feet short. I know I cannot touch the rim on the basketball court, so I don’t even try running and jumping. My injuries would likely take a few inches off my jump making it even less of a valid solution. I pick up the empty smoothie bottle and throw it the sprinkler head to the left of the door. It deflects off of it, careens into the wall, and shatters leaving broken glass scattered around the floor. Maybe I could try again after I finish the next bottle. I take off my shoes and target the sprinkler head to the left side of the counter. Retrieving them and throwing them over and over again, I score multiple hits, but nothing leaks out. I put my sneakers back on.

  What else can I do? I don’t think the carpet and padding in this room would be enough to make up the height I need even if I fold them into small squares. Bringing in additional carpet from other rooms isn’t an option. The sprinkler heads are about eight feet in from the walls, so climbing up on the counter does not help me even though it is a yard high.

  I might be able to hang from the drop ceiling grid and traverse hand over hand to the sprinkler head, lifting the ceiling tiles as I go. I’ll need gloves to protect my hands, and the swinging motion would pull on the grid. Would it support my weight? Doubtful. Or maybe I can crawl up above the drop ceiling? I remember there is about a two-foot gap between the tiles and the cement ceiling. Lying flat and spreading my weight, it seemed likely it would hold me if I were careful.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  I also have to bring something to trigger the sprinkler and I’m not really sure how to do it. Holding a lighter below it always works in the movies, but I don’t have one and that might not even be something that works in real life. I can pound on it with my shoe when I get there or maybe it will be as easy as unscrewing it a little? I wish I had access to all of the resources Amy had collected.

  My body is aching, but I know I will be even sorer and stiffer if I wait longer and I’ll possibly be very thirsty by the time the soreness goes away. I bind my hair into a bun to keep it out of the way, then go over to the counter and climb up on top of it. With the extra height, I am able to reach up to the drop ceiling. I line myself up with the sprinkler, remove the three nearest tiles above me, and drop them down to the floor. The counter runs under the short side of the tiles, and the sprinkler head is just two tile lengths away.

  Facing the sprinkler, I reach up and grab the two bare metal runners exposed by removing the ceiling tiles near where they meet the wall. I pull myself up, so my head is above the drop ceiling level. Holding tight and pressing my back against the wall, I manage to lift my legs up through the four-foot by two-foot gap between the runners and the cross tees. With my legs supported on the grid, I get my right arm above the ceiling and then my left so that I am in a kind of crab walk stance. I scoot my legs around so that I am lying up against the wall across three runners and roll over so I am face down.

  The grid of the drop ceiling feels a bit flimsier than I would like. It is suspended from the ceiling by wires at each tile intersection. There are a variety of pipes, wires, and ducts running above me, nearer the true ceiling. Everything is surprisingly clean from dust and grime. True this room had recently reset, but even in the rooms with bodies that had not reset in decades, there had been no sign of dust. I put that thought aside and plan my course.

  I carefully start to crawl out towards the sprinkler. I distribute my weight over two runners and inch my way along, squeezing between the first two wires. I lift the three ceiling tiles ahead of me and let them drop to the floor. I can see the T-junction of the pipe that leads down to the sprinkler. I keep crawling until my face is about half a foot from the pipe. It looks like the sprinkler head is made of brass and just screws into the pipe. It has a base and two arms that reach down around a glass bulb of dark red liquid that sits on top of a shiny copper cone. Where the two arms meet below the cone, it has a disc with a dozen or so tabs sticking out from it, like a kind of metal flower. I drop the ceiling tile the sprinkler head passes through to the floor as well as the ones to either side of it.

  I rest my elbows on the suspended ceiling runners and try to twist the sprinkler head loose from the base. Righty tighty, lefty loosey, I recite in my head to make sure I’m turning it the correct way. At first it won’t budge but then I move my hands and try pushing on one of the metal arms around the vial and pulling on the other with all my strength. Soon it starts spraying me in the face and gushing down to the yellow carpet. Mission accomplished, I start to scooch back the way I came, when the right runner gives out. I feel myself starting to fall and grab tight to the other runner. The momentum swings me around, facing upward and then the other side gives way under my full weight, making me fall straight down ten feet flat on my back.

  I can’t breathe and I can’t move. I gasp for breath as water pours down on me. I start to panic and think I’ve broken my back. I hear the bear back at the door probably drawn by the noise of the ceiling crashing down. The parts of the ceiling grid I had been crawling on are now hanging down into the room, but still partially suspended on the far side. My stomach feels like it is spasming as I am only managing to take short shallow breaths, not even pants. I try to move my legs after a few minutes and discover I am able to. That calms me down some. I can also move my arms. I think I have just had the wind knocked out of me. I have never had that happen before and now that I am experiencing it, I hope never to have it happen again. After about ten or fifteen minutes, my breathing starts to become more normal. With great difficulty, I roll over on my side and then crawl over the debris of ceiling tiles and metal cross tees to a part of the room where I am not being rained on. I pass out.