by Ryan Casey
The dog hopped up the step. Sat beside him. Rested its bony head on his torn black trouser legs.
Jack stared at it, stunned. “Wow,” he said. “That’s… that’s a first.”
He wanted to give this dog a name. But again, that was just attaching himself to something else. Something else that he’d lose. Because this world was no place for dogs anymore. And just looking at its missing fur, its red raw bald patches, the scar over its eye… it wasn’t doing too good out here in the sun.
But hell. He was dying. He figured he’d die with a companion.
“Blofeld,” he said. “Like the bald guy in the Bond films. ‘Cause of the scar, you know. Just need to find you a little cat to sit on your lap. Although I’m not sure you’d like that.”
The dog just kept its head on Jack’s lap. Its eyes wandered along the road.
Jack wished he could pat the head of this dog. Wished he could ruffle its fur. At least then, he’d have some real attachment. Something to comfort him while the end sped along. But it was like it had been all his life: he was so near yet so far from attachment. So near yet so far from commitment.
So near yet so far from love.
Blofeld moved its head away from Jack’s lap. Trotted down the steps. Wandered to the right, sniffed away at the ground.
“Oh so now you’re leaving me too,” Jack said. “Sorry I’m… I’m too boring for you.” God, he couldn’t believe himself. Kids lost, him stuck and left for dead, and here he was talking to a dog.
But it was helping. It was keeping him calm. Keeping his mind off everything.
The dog walked away to the right, then it came back, sniffing away at the ground then licking at the road, then sniffing again and looking at Jack.
“What is it, boy?” Jack asked.
He felt this world had got so crazy he half-expected the dog to reply.
He stood up as the dog kept on sniffing at the road. Looked like it was getting excited about something. Getting het up. He made his way down the steps. Squinted at the road where Blofeld was sniffing, trotting around.
“I don’t see anything,” he said. “Catch a scent or something?”
Blofeld moved a little further along the road. Moved over to a circular rusty metal manhole closure. Sniffed at that, then sniffed at the road, then at the enclosure again.
And then like the clichéd lightbulb in the head, Jack understood. He saw it and he understood.
The tiny, almost invisible trail of blood leading to the manhole cover.
And the way the manhole cover was slightly, ever so slightly, out of place.
“You smell something down there, boy?” Jack asked. Heart picked up. Smile shook on his face. Felt tears welling in his eyes. “You… you’re a genius. A genius dog. A little badass genius like Blofeld. Come on and help me with this.”
Jack crouched down. Sat with his back to the manhole cover, attempted to get a grip on it with his tied hands.
He tried to lift. Tried, but it tugged at the sore muscles in his chest, the no doubt cracked ribs.
He took a few deep breaths. Calmed himself, readying himself to go again. Blofeld sniffed around the opening, stuck his nose in the smallest of cracks.
“Come on. We can do this.” He sniffed. Already feeling bunged up being around this dog a few seconds. But being bunged up was a sacrifice he was delighted to make. “We can do this.”
He closed his eyes. Tightened his jaw.
Lifted.
The manhole cover took a push, made him sear with pain all over, but it budged.
It budged slightly, Blofeld sticking his nose in the widening crack, the smell of rotten shit emerging from the hole in the ground.
“One more now. One more.”
Jack went to lift the manhole cover again when he saw the figures up the road.
They were coming from the bottom of the country lane. Walking, very fast. He wasn’t sure if they’d seen him, but he figured they’d caught a glimpse, or a scent, or whatever the hell it was they noticed.
Runners.
His stomach turned as he tried to keep his cool. He just had to push this cover aside completely. Just had to push it aside, then drop down into the sewer below. Ranger, his kids, they had to have gone that way. There was no other explanation for it. No other logical reason why they’d just disappear.
It was genius, really. The sewers were always dark, albeit plagued with disease and germs. Not a place he wanted to spend too much time around, and definitely not a place he wanted his kids to call home.
“One more push,” he said.
Counted down from three in his mind. Breathed rhythmically.
And then he pushed back and the manhole cover slipped away from the hole.
The next things happened all at once. The runners got closer, picked up the pace. Blofeld sniffed at the manhole cover, then threw himself into it, a splash sounding as he made contact with the stagnant, shitty water.
Jack dangled himself over the edge. Stared down into the darkness—the awful, putrid darkness.
He could break a leg. Crack his pelvis. Break his spine.
He looked back. Runners getting closer. Still curious, like they knew he was around but couldn’t figure out quite where.
If he didn’t make a move, he knew he’d definitely die.
It was a choice between probable death and certain death.
“Fuck it,” he said, butterflies raging around his stomach. “Fuck it.”
He held his breath. Cleared his mind of thoughts.
And he dropped.
FORTY-SEVEN
The fall felt like it lasted forever, and Jack never thought he’d be relieved to be soaked in sewer water in his life.
He submerged under it. Got it in his mouth—the taste of piss, shit, but a whole lot worse. He wriggled his head above water, flopped around like a fish with his hands still behind his back. Threw up, right there and then without any control.
He was in the sewer. He was down here. No bones broken. No pain.
He was filthy, but he’d made it.
He looked up at the manhole opening. Looked up at the light peeking down through it. He could hear the patter of the runners’ footsteps as they headed in his direction. Saw them run past, making the light flicker.
They didn’t crawl through after him. They ran on.
He waited until he was absolutely sure the runners had run on before shimmying himself up onto the shore of the sewer. The place smelled even worse than he’d imagined. He’d been in a sewer a few times when he was younger, especially when he was a kid. Used to hang out in sewers with two of his friends, Sticker and Bodge. Smoked down in the sewers until they got dragged out by the police one day.
Dad gave him a clip around the ear for that. One of the many clips around the ear he gave him, none of them forgotten.
He spat away some of the horrid-tasting water and squinted into the darkness down the river of sewerage. The place was silent but for the dripping of water, the squeaking of small rodents. He was disappointed to see Blofeld had gone, but then he couldn’t blame him. He wouldn’t like his own company anyway, plus there was probably a load of old food scraps down here, plenty of rats to catch.
He stood up. Knees clicked as he did. He was stuck in the same predicament as he had been above ground. Left or right. Save your children or lose your children.
He started walking to the left. It led away from the direction they’d come in, so it made sense. Unless that was just part of Ranger’s plan. A way of diverting him. A way of dropping him into the middle of nowhere in hope that he’d go wandering in the complete wrong direction to find his children.
He was in the middle stepping from side to side and pondering which way to go when he felt something soft underneath his foot.
He looked down. It definitely wasn’t the same texture as the rest of the solid ground.
He moved his foot away.
His heart picked up.
It was a little pack of Kleenex tissues. One
of the little pink rectangular packs with a bunny on it. Jenny had insisted on taking them from the caravan because she liked the rabbit. Packed them in her rucksack.
And now they were here. Dropped on the sewer floor just to the left of the manhole opening.
Jack stood back up. Peered down into the darkness. He wanted to say something—shout something—but he knew he’d do better to use the darkness. Use it as his friend.
After all, the darkness was much more of a friend than the light was now.
Before he headed off, he squinted around in the water. Looked for something sharp. Looked for something to cut him free of his ties. He could run faster if he got rid of them. And he could use his hands, too.
Using hands would come in handy as soon as he reached Ranger.
He nudged his shoes off. Found the sharp object he needed right in the middle of what could only be a few messy lumps of sloppy shit. He fished a pair of thick scissors out with his blistered toes. Pulled them out of the squelchy faeces, lifted them towards himself. Helped that he’d been blessed with double-jointed toes. Always knew they would come in handy one day.
He pushed the scissors over behind his back with his feet and pressed right up against the wall. Struggled to get a grip on the scissors, his fingers almost tearing out of their sockets. When he finally got a grip, he fumbled around with them, tried to get a proper grip, but kept on missing the wire.
“Come on,” he said. Jack started to worry about losing Sam and Jenny. He had to hurry for them. He had no idea how far Ranger was planning to travel. No idea when he was going to step out of this sewer.
He had to take this opportunity. He couldn’t let it slip.
He forced his hand into an awkward, inhuman position and got a grip underneath the wire binds.
He almost slipped in the excitement, almost fell back-first onto the scissors, but he managed to compose himself just in time.
He pushed himself back up against the greasy wall. Pushed as hard as he could against the scissors, against the wire, again and again.
They came loose.
And then they came free.
He pulled his hands in front of him. Looked at them as they shook away just to check they were real, just to check he’d really got himself out.
He wiped the sewerage from between his eyes. Picked up the scissors and folded them out so they were more like a knife.
He crouched down. Picked up the pack of Kleenex that Jenny had dropped.
“I’m coming for you,” he whispered, trying not to think about whether it was her finger or Sam’s he’d seen in Blofeld’s mouth. “Daddy’ll be with you soon.”
He gripped the scissors tightly. Took a deep breath of the rancid air.
And he ran into the pitch-black darkness.
He was finding his children. He was saving them from Ranger and his goons.
And darkness was going to help him.
***
They hear his footsteps in the darkness the nasty dark darkness and they run.
Run like they always do.
Run like they’re born to do.
Run.
FORTY-EIGHT
Jack ran without shoes even though it sent stabbing pains through his blistered feet.
He ran into the darkness. Felt surrounded by it, blanketed by it. And yet, in a strange sort of way, he felt comforted by it. Like it was protecting him. Protecting him from the monsters of the light.
And the monsters of the light weren’t just the runners. They were the people too.
The smell of the sewer was rotten but Jack was adapting to it. He’d dealt with worse. This whole situation, this new world, that in itself was worse than any smell a sewer could produce. He listened to the sound of his own feet pattering through the putrid puddles. Heard rodents scuttle even further into the darkness as he kept on running, kept on heading through the tunnel, kept on searching for his kids.
He’d find them. He knew he would.
He had to find them.
He gripped the scissors tightly in his hand. His hands were so sore from gripping them. Or maybe they were sore from something else. He’d lost track. Lost track of what was causing his pain, of why he was hurting in so many different locations.
But not anymore. Not after today. Today, this ended. Today was the day the world stopped beating him down, that he took some responsibility and fought it back.
Stared it in the face and told it to piss off.
Moving through the darkness, completely stripped of light, he started to feel like he didn’t even exist at all. Horrifying image in his mind of just how irrelevant he was—just how irrelevant any human was. Because that’s what the runners had made them. That’s what this whole world had made them: vermin running through darkened tunnels, pointless, aimless, sentimental.
He was revelling in that sentimentality. He’d been denied that his whole life.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been running when the stitch crippled his stomach. When he had to stop, leaned over the bath of shit and piss and threw up into it. His throat stung with acid as he stared into the pitch-black abyss. More fear worked up inside his stomach as he stared down into the complete and utter darkness. What if he never found a way out of here? What if he got lost?
Dying in the pitch darkness with not even a final vision to go away with.
The worst death imaginable.
He heard the scraping from the direction he’d come from and right away he knew it wasn’t any rodent.
They were footsteps. Gentle patters, just like his. Echoing around the sewer. Rats scurrying away, animals making the water sound as they fled from whatever was disturbing their awful haven.
For a moment, staring into the blackness, Jack wondered whether it might be Blofeld coming to catch up with him.
When he heard the scratching noises, the dreaminess of them, his stomach tensed and he stood back up.
Runners. In the darkness. Only they weren’t running, not yet—they were drifting, like they always did in the dark. Drifting so peacefully, so songfully. Hypnotic and Medusa-esque.
Like Sirens luring in their prey.
He turned around and jogged as fast, as quiet as he could down the sewer path. He still heard the scratching behind him as his stitch crippled his belly, made him want to hurl some more.
Scratch, scratch.
Getting closer.
Somehow, getting closer.
He tried to squint into the darkness but it didn’t help. Breathing picked up. Heart pounded, sweat dripped down his cheeks. Stuck here. Stuck in here in the darkness with no way out.
Breathing getting harder.
Scratching and footsteps closer, dreamy, soft.
It was like a dream. Or a nightmare. A nightmare where he was trying to get away from something chasing him but no matter how fast he ran he just couldn’t.
It always caught him, no matter how fast he ran.
Always caught him, and that’s where the nightmare always ended.
He was so disoriented he wasn’t even sure he was going in the right direction until he saw the glimmer of light up ahead.
He slowed down. Knew it was foolish because the scratching was getting closer, but this light—what was it?
And then he heard voices. Heard whispers echoing around the sewer.
He squinted ahead. Jogged some more. Got closer and closer to the light, did all he could to stay quiet.
The torch glimmered in his direction and Jack heard the scratching get louder all of a sudden. Heard the footsteps pick up, the gasping screech against the walls.
Standing in the light, he did the only thing he could think to do before the torch-holder saw him, the runners caught him.
He threw himself into the wretched sewerage water.
The taste of a thousand shits on his tongue begging him to open his mouth, he moved through the silky blackness, swam through it fully submerged and holding his breath.
He heard nothing of the outside. Nothing of the runners. Di
dn’t know where they’d got to, or whether the light was still shining. He was oblivious. Blissfully oblivious in a stream of filth.
He almost laughed at the irony.
He waited as long as he could before bobbing his head up for air.
No light, but talking. Talking close ahead.
“…Definitely saw something…” A voice he recognised. Travis, one of Ranger’s men.
“…All sorts of rats ‘n shit down ‘ere. Won’t be nothin’.”
Ranger himself. Definitely Ranger’s dumbass northern drawl.
Jack submerged himself in the water again. Swam some more, scissors still in hand, in the direction of the voice.
He swam as far as his breath would take him and he bobbed his head up.
Footsteps, right beside him. Grunting. So close. So close and they didn’t even know.
And then one of them stopped. Sound of the ground scraping. “Ranger, I don’t fuckin’ like this.”
“Well you better get fuckin’ used to it if you want to get these kids to Barrow. It’ll pay in power in the end. Swear to you.”
Jack kept still. Held his breath as the footsteps passed.
As two voices distinctly recognisable as his children whimpered.
The urge to call out for his kids, to tell them everything was going to be okay, was strong.
Strong, but not as strong as the urge to stay silent.
To bide his time.
To wait.
He let them move a little further forward. Let them get just far enough ahead so they wouldn’t shine their torch and notice him stalking them.
Lightly in the distance, he heard the scratching, and he knew the runners were coming.
He knew, eventually, they’d come.
And when they did, he had to time it right. Time it perfectly.
He took in a deep breath and stuck his head back under the water.
He stalked his prey.
FORTY-NINE
Jack swam through the sewerage and kept close to Ranger and company as they walked beside him.
The sewerage tasted and smelled disgusting as it got up his nose and in his mouth, as it stung at his wounds, but it was becoming more bearable. He was accepting it more.