Instead of opening it up into an A shape, he kept it closed as he placed it by the hole. Slowly, he lowered it down, letting it slide along his hands, careful not to accidentally let it land on the man below. He adjusted the angle of the stepladder so that the base would be close to the wall. Soon, he could feel the ladder’s rubber feet touching the bottom of the hole. The top of it was just below the lip, but that was good enough. As he had expected, it was long enough to let someone climb up from the bottom of the hole to where he was standing.
Brushing away the white dust that slowly rose up from the bottom of the hole with one hand, Mitsuhiro bravely turned his body and put one foot on the stepladder. He pushed hard, embedding the ladder into the ground a little, and checked to make sure it wouldn’t tip over with his weight before putting his other foot on it. He went down a few steps, grabbing the sides with both hands. Careful not to pinch his fingers or hands between the closed sides of the ladder, he made his way down until he was standing at the bottom.
This ground was softer than expected, reminding him more of sand than soil. The hole felt almost conical in shape, as though an enormous antlion would be waiting for him at the center of it…which was silly, of course. That concrete block would’ve sunk into the sand long ago, to say nothing of the man chained to it. The thought was terrifying, but he quickly put a stop to it.
He pressed on, flashing his headlamp side to side as he kicked aside the trash in his way, and finally reached the man leaning against the wall. Mitsuhiro peered at his face. The man, exposed in the light, had thrown his head back, blocking it with both hands.
“What the hell, man?” came a high-pitched voice. “Stop shinin’ that in my face. I’m just sleepin’ in here.”
The tone was completely normal. He seemed so at ease it was almost anticlimactic. He certainly wasn’t desperately calling out for help or struggling for his life after being brutally assaulted.
“Sorry.”
Mitsuhiro changed the angle of his headlamp so it shone over the man’s head. For some reason, it occurred to him that he should be recording this. He thought about going back to get his tablet, but instead he removed his right glove and took his company phone out from his jacket pocket. Turning on camera mode, he pointed at the man.
“Excuse me one second,” he said, and then he took a picture of the man quizzically looking up at him, hands lowered. He then took some shots of the ring on the man’s left leg, the chain, and the concrete block.
“What’re you taking pictures of?” the man asked. He sounded a bit agitated at being treated as a curiosity.
“Oh, I’m sorry. This is part of my job.”
Mitsuhiro didn’t really think it was. Attempting to parse this bizarre situation was more his boss Takenaka’s job. This was more a self-protective impulse, motivated by not wanting to be blamed for any problems that might arise later. But this suddenly drove the man into activity, startling Mitsuhiro.
“Job? I can still work, y’know.”
“Um… Huh?”
“As long as I can eat, I can work. I can work…”
The sad desperation in the man’s high-pitched voice was more than irritating. It was frightening. He claimed to be able to work, but how could he, chained up like this? It was almost like punishing him for not being able to work. It was cruel.
“All right, all right. Calm down, please. What are you doing in a place like this? Did someone bring you down here?”
“Ahh, I dunno anymore.”
“…You don’t know?”
“I dunno why, but I have to be here, don’t I? Ugh! What a pain in the ass. I just wanna go to sleep!”
The man sadly flailed his legs around, making more noise with his chain. The sound was still hard to put up with. His voice, and the jingling, echoed inside the hole, stirring up Mitsuhiro’s emotions from every possible angle—as pathetic as it was irritating and impossibly creepy. The man’s rotten body odor wafted through the air. Mitsuhiro almost wanted to spit and yell at him to shut up.
“Please calm down. I’m going to take this off now. Come outside with me and tell me what happened.”
He was more quieting down his own mind as he said it, putting his phone in his pocket and examining the lock on the ring. The man stopped ranting for a moment, suspiciously eyeing Mitsuhiro, who was adjusting the angle of his headlamp to illuminate the keyhole. He said he’d take it off, but if the key he brought along wasn’t a match, there was little he could do. He’d have to return to ground level and call for backup or borrow some kind of saw to cut the chain with.
Praying that he was right, he inserted the key into the chain lock. He wanted to get out of there as soon as possible…and he hoped he would never have to come back.
The key fit perfectly. He twisted it. With a click, the lock came off the man’s leg. He took a deep breath, his relieved body suddenly slick with sweat.
“Ohh? You got it off?”
The man flashed a contented smile.
“Yeah. Let’s get out of here.”
“We’re leaving?”
“Yes. C’mon, let’s go. Here.”
Mitsuhiro couldn’t hide his frustration. He was getting angry with this man who couldn’t explain why he was here, and he didn’t want to waste any more time. This newfound forcefulness pushed the man to shrug, stand up, and stagger toward the stepladder. Putting on his work gloves, Mitsuhiro watched as the man opened up the ladder, secured it so its sides were flush with the wall, and easily climbed up. After all that doddering, Mitsuhiro had feared they’d be down here for a while, so this was a great relief as he grabbed the ladder himself.