Year-old? God, I hope it’s only a year old.
Her heart was racing at double its normal speed, and she could hear every single breath she took like aftershocks against her earlobes. She snapped her eyes shut and fought for control, willing herself to slow down, to let the mask’s filter do its work, and pretend she was somewhere else at that moment.
“Gaby.”
She opened her eyes to the sound of Blaine’s voice behind and slightly above her. “Yeah.”
“You went quiet there for a moment.”
“Sorry. What did you say?”
“What’s the verdict down there?”
“It stinks. What do you think?”
Blaine chuckled. “I’m coming down.”
“The more the merrier.”
She took a couple of steps forward and swept the narrow passageway with the M4, the laser pointer underneath the barrel providing an exact guide of where the bullet would go if she fired. She tuned out the clank-clank of Blaine’s boots moving down the rusted metal ladder behind her while getting a better look at her surroundings.
The only saving grace to standing in a major city’s sewer system was the size—the round-shaped tunnel was over ten feet wide and tall, like a giant straw made of brick and concrete, except the floor was flat against the soles of her boots. Condensation drip-drip-dripped around her, the plops that landed adding to the filth like drawn-out raindrops. Despite the generous size of the place, she would have still felt a stab of claustrophobia if not for the fact she could see every crack and puddle of water thanks to the NVG.
“Sorry, kid,” Blaine said when he hopped the last rung behind her and splashed parts of her clothing with the water.
“It’s okay; I can’t smell it.”
“You sure about that? Even with this thing on, I’m getting some serious whiffs.”
“Sure? No, but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.”
Blaine chuckled again, and she smiled. The levity helped to ease her mind somewhat. She remembered all those times when Danny and Will joked their way through a bad situation. This definitely qualified as one of those, though no one was shooting at them and there was nothing hiding in the darkness.
There you go. Jinx it, why don’t you?
“Where did he go?” Blaine asked.
He had gone on ahead of them after coming down first and ensuring there was nothing waiting down here. The last time she saw him was almost two minutes ago when he disappeared around a bend in the tunnel in front of her.
“Scouting ahead,” she said.
“He’s good at that.”
“It’s what he does.”
“I should have spent more time with you guys back on the island. One of my biggest regrets.”
“You can always ask Danny when we get back. He’s already training Jolly.”
“Yeah, I’ll do that,” Blaine said.
Soft sloshing sounds from in front of her broke through their chatter, and Gaby lifted her rifle, as did Blaine, who had moved to stand beside her. She sneaked a quick look over at him, at the single lens protruding out from in front of his face like a freakishly long third eye, complemented by the breathing apparatus over his mouth. The only thing on Blaine’s face (and hers) that was still exposed to the climate was his forehead, and it was already damp with something that looked like dirt and soot and…other things.
Her finger tightened against her carbine’s trigger, and she thanked God for silver bullets when he appeared around the bend, his movements so light and effortless that if not for the trench coat, she didn’t think he would have created any ripples in the water at all. Gaby still couldn’t decide how to feel about seeing him in that black leather getup, with the hoodie covering most of his face and those glowing blue eyes peeking out at her.
He carried the remaining duffel bag—the heavier of the two—behind his back as if it weighed little more than a feather. They had left the other bag behind since she and Blaine were now wearing its contents.
Gaby lowered her rifle. “Anything?”
“Nothing,” he said (hissed).
“How far?” Blaine asked.
“Far enough,” he said, and turned back around.
Gaby exchanged a quick look with Blaine, but all she could see was his NVG lens staring back at her. He looked a bit like a bipedal insect, albeit one with a rifle.
“Ladies first,” Blaine said.
Will had begun moving again, and she fell in behind him. Blaine carried the radio in his pack, the bulk making him look like a hunchback. If he was having trouble with the extra weight, he hadn’t said a word.
The mask that covered her mouth had a fleece portion that extended all the way down the length of her neck. It was comfortable enough to wear for long periods (and it was going to have to be) and although she told Blaine she couldn’t smell the (mostly) liquefied waste around her, it was very much a lie. There was simply too much of it to ignore completely, and it probably didn’t help that her eyes had begun to sting and the exposed parts of her face continued to tingle, a constant reminder of where she was.
God, if I never have to do this again in a hundred lifetimes…
She picked up her pace until she had caught up to Will. From behind, with the trench coat dragging over the water’s surface, she wouldn’t have been able to tell that he wasn’t the Will she remembered. Even his hands were covered in tight black gloves, and there was absolutely nothing about him to give away that he wasn’t human. At least, from the back. Every now and then she heard the distinctive clanking of the objects inside the duffel bag slung over his back.
“Will,” she said.
He didn’t answer verbally and didn’t stop, but she caught a slight turn of his head in response.
“Why aren’t they down here?” she asked. “It’s pitch-dark. Sunlight doesn’t even know this place exists.”
“They don’t need it,” he said. “The city is theirs.”
So even the monsters don’t want to come down here. So what does that make us, exactly?
Filthy, that’s what.
He didn’t say anything else, and the only sounds were her breathing and the drip-drip-drip around them. After a while, he pulled slightly ahead of her.
She slowed her pace until Blaine caught up. “Is it me, or is he going slow on purpose?” Blaine asked.
“Maybe,” she said. “But if he wanted us to move faster, I’m sure he would have said so.”
“Any idea where we’re going, exactly? Which part of the city?”
“He didn’t say. I guess we’ll find out when we get there.”
Blaine sighed. “If I knew we were going to be down here literally walking in people’s shit, I’m not sure I would have volunteered. What about you?”
“I probably would have still.”
“Yeah, who am I kidding? I would have, too.”
“I guess we’re both idiots.”
“Yup.”
They walked on in silence, the filthy water displacing and reforming around them and, gradually, she became aware of what sounded like animals moving on the other side of cracks along the walls. Condensation continued to drip-drip-drip in front and behind them, and the only thing louder than her filtered breathing was the thump-thump-thump of her heartbeat.
“If this works, you think they’ll give us medals?” Blaine said after a while. “Maybe write songs about us?”
“Songs?” she said, smiling behind the mask.
“I’d like a song about me,” Blaine said wistfully. “That would be cool…”
She wasn’t sure how long after they climbed down into the sewer system that she started to notice the air had gotten warmer and sweat was starting to form around her temple and drip down the corners of the NVG and mask. It was so quiet down here, with the only sounds coming from their breathing and movements—and the occasional scratching noises from behind the curved walls—that it was difficult to tell how much time had passed.
Gaby snapped a quick look at her
watch every now and then, but time seemed to be standing still and didn’t explain why her legs were getting tired and she was moving slower. She didn’t fully grasp just how much her pace had flagged until Will began putting more distance between them, even though he didn’t seem to be moving any faster than before. If anything, he was holding back just to ensure he didn’t outwalk her and Blaine.
She wanted to ask him to stop so she could rest, but she didn’t. She refused to do so because Blaine wasn’t complaining, and he was carrying more pounds on his back than she was. But at least there was one benefit to her growing fatigue: her shoulder wasn’t giving her any problems, either thanks to having numbed over or the result of Zoe’s painkillers. She wasn’t going to be throwing softball pitches with her left arm anytime soon, but this was the next best thing.
Finally, Will began to slow down before stopping completely ten feet in front of them.
Gaby said a silent prayer, but also reflexively tightened her grip around the carbine. “Something wrong?”
“No,” Will said. “We should rest.”
“Are we almost there?”
“No.” He pointed to his right. “I’ll be back.”
He continued on, disappearing around another turn in the tunnel.
Gaby walked over and glanced at where he had pointed. It was another raised platform carved into the side of the tunnel, about five inches above the water line, similar to their original point of entry. There was also a rust-covered ladder at the back.
“Where’s he headed off to?” Blaine asked as he appeared next to her.
“He didn’t say.”
“So he can see in the dark, huh?”
“You didn’t know that?”
“I figured they had good night eyes—because, you know, that’s their natural environment and everything—but I didn’t know it was that good.”
“Now you know,” Gaby said, and climbed up the platform.
Once up, she was reaching instinctively for her mask when she stopped herself just in time.
Right. The sewage.
She kept the mask on but took off the night-vision goggles. There was just enough light inside the tunnel to see the thick films of filth dripping from her pants legs. She didn’t even want to think about how badly she was going to smell for days to come, or how many showers it was going to take just to get enough of the stench off her to be bearable to herself, never mind to others. She pictured Nate laughing at her discomfort, her punishment for leaving him behind in the middle of the night.
She walked all the way to the back of the narrow platform and glanced up at the manhole covering above them. It was sealed tight, but there were small holes (for fingers or tools to remove the metal lid, if necessary) all along it that allowed slivers of morning sunlight to rain down on them, but not enough to brighten the tunnel.
Blaine unslung his pack and let out a loud sigh of relief as he settled on the damp concrete floor next to her. Like her, he reached for his mask, but thought better of it and left it on, and only removed his NVG. She sat down next to him and didn’t know how tired her legs were until she wasn’t standing on them anymore.
“You think he told us to rest because he knew we were tired?” Blaine asked.
“Maybe. Were you tired?”
“Hell yeah. My legs are killing me. But at least I’m not lugging around that thing he has over his back. I didn’t know he was that strong, either.”
“They all are.” She thought about the farmhouse in Louisiana. “And fast. You need to remember that if you ever come face-to-face with one of them.”
“How fast?”
“However fast you’ve made them out to be in your mind, increase it by a hundred times and you’ll come close.”
“You’re kidding…”
“No.”
“Noted, then.” Blaine leaned his head back against the wall and shook his pants legs and watched the thick sludge dripping off the fabric. “You’ve seen them—fought them. What’s it like?”
“It’s…not something I want to ever do again, if I can help it.”
“Silver doesn’t do anything, but a bullet to the head is all it takes?”
“Yes.”
“Crazy how that works. All that speed and strength and night vision, and all it takes is one bullet to the head to put them down.”
“It’s not as easy as it sounds, Blaine.”
“Right. Because they’re fast.”
“They’re really, really fast.”
“Fast,” Blaine repeated. “Gotcha.”
I hope you never have to find out for yourself, Gaby thought as she stared into the pitch darkness of the tunnel and wondered if hell was being trapped down here without night vision, and alone.
Time had a way of slipping by when you were moving through a dark tunnel lit up in a sea of green fluorescent. After a while, she started ignoring the scratches coming from between the cracks to her left and right (and she swore at one point, above her) and the constant stirring of sewage around her ankles. The brief rest had done her legs good, and they walked the next few hours without stopping.
It was difficult to judge if they were making good time without being able to see where they were at any given moment. Even the occasional presence of platforms to their right wasn’t much help since they seemed to show up at almost random intervals. The only upside was the presence of sunlight raiding the tunnel from the manhole coverings above the platforms, so each time they reached one it was an exhilarating reminder that there was a world beyond this hellhole she was currently trapped in.
Will continued to come and go, and once he vanished and didn’t return until almost thirty minutes later, which was about twenty-five minutes more than his longest previous disappearing act. She had spent most of it trying to decide whether to retreat or race ahead in search of him, and each time she thought she had made a decision she had to remind herself that this was his plan, that he knew what he was doing, that God, I hope he knows what he’s doing or we’re all going to die down here, and I do not want to die down here.
But then he would come back, and she would breathe a sigh of relief and was glad the mask hid most of it. Even though, when she thought about it, he probably heard her reaction anyway, given his hypersensitive hearing.
Another time the green colors of her NVG found him standing in front of them. He was so still she thought it was a mannequin at first…until he moved slightly. She had no idea what he was doing—maybe he was listening for something.
Each time he left them, the tunnel seemed to get smaller and more claustrophobic, and the water colder and tougher until it was like fighting through mud. When he was with them, Will kept his position in front the entire time, the bottom half of his coat growing thicker as it sponged up more of the tunnel’s contents. Not that the extra weight slowed him down even a tiny bit. But as his coat became more and more bloated, she was reminded that she was also knee-deep in the same disgusting filth, and no wonder her own pants were starting to feel heavier, and heavier…
Blaine stayed silent for most of the trek, and she only knew he was still back there at all because she could hear him moving around. The big man never lagged too far behind, but he was more active than her, mostly because he wasn’t always walking forward; he occasionally turned and walked backward to make sure nothing was sneaking up on them. She could always tell when he did this because the ripples around her increased noticeably.
Eventually, after what seemed like half a day, Will indicated another platform in front of them before disappearing up ahead into the shadows.
“I think that means we get to rest again,” Gaby said.
“He’s a prince, that guy,” Blaine said.
They climbed up the platform, and this time both she and Blaine had to pull off their masks in order to eat and drink from their rations. She did the best she could to breathe through her mouth the entire time, but that was a tricky thing when she had to bite and swallow, too.
She was gaggin
g by the time she gratefully slipped the breathing apparatus back on, thinking, Never again. Jesus lord, don’t ever let me do something this ungodly stupid ever again.
Blaine, next to her, let out a large breath as soon as his own mask snapped into place. “Jesus Christ. Let’s make a pact to shoot each other in the head if we ever decide to do something like this a second time.”
“I don’t think we’re going to have to. Either we make this work the first time, or there won’t be a second time.”
“I didn’t say to bum me out, kid.”
She smiled at him before realizing he couldn’t see with the entire lower half of her face covered up. “I’ve been meaning to ask: What did Sarah say when you told her you volunteered?”
“She told me good luck.”
“That’s it?”
He shrugged. “We’re not really seeing each other anymore.”
“You said that before. What happened?”
“We grew apart, that’s all. It happens. We’re both adults, so no point in living in misery if it’s not going to work.”
“I’m sorry, Blaine.”
“Hey, it was a good run. We were good for each other…until we weren’t anymore.” He stared off at nothing in particular for a moment. Then: “What about you and Nate?”
What about me and Nate? Good question, and I wish I had a better answer.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I guess it’ll depend on whether he shoots me on sight for leaving him in the middle of the night when I see him again.”
Blaine chuckled. “The only thing that kid’s going to do when he sees you again is run over and grab you in a big bear hug.”
“You think so?”
“Trust me. I know guys. I’m one of them.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“Yeah, the kid loves you. That’s not the kind of thing that comes every day. You should hold onto it.”
Gaby nodded. She knew about Blaine and his own past. Before Sarah, there had been another woman whom he had found after The Purge, only to lose.
We’ve all lost something. Someone. But we keep going. That’s what makes us survivors.
The Purge of Babylon Series Box Set, Vol. 3 | Books 7-9 Page 104