Mercy rolled onto her front and using her arms pulled herself out of the loose rubble creating a fresh cloud of dust. She coughed, her eyes streaming from the dust, she cursed and looked up, the eight tropes remained, swaying as before, ignoring her.
They know I’m here and they’re ignoring me—
Elation and dread coursed through her.
Am I one of them?
Mercy examined her body for fresh bites.
Nothing, nothing new— her eyes lingered over the old bite mark on her left shoulder.
Her mind raced to piece together the jigsaw puzzle.
OK, so my genetic abnormality confers natural immunity against the virus, the NSA have put this fluke thing in my liver to boost my immunity to the virus, the tropes see me as one of them. To all intents and purposes I am one of them— I can walk amongst them. That’s why I’m so valuable to the NSA, they were telling the truth, if they can harvest my antibodies they can inoculate their soldiers to provide them with temporary immunity.
Mercy looked around in frustration. She needed a weapon, she did not trust the theory, she’d lost the AR-15 and the Ruger American pistol in the fall. She spotted something in the rubble at her feet, she bent down and pulled her bayonet from under a broken cabling tray.
Thank you Kenny, for giving me this—
She looked at the tropes again.
Time to put the theory to the test.
Mercy gripped the bayonet and approached the first trope, she stopped in front of it, watching for a moment, its nostrils flared and its fingers twitched but it ignored her. She stepped around it and repeated the process with the others. They all ignored her, she made it to the stair door and tried the handle, it opened. She backed into the stairwell, bayonet in hand.
Mercy slid to the ground, leaned her back against the door and closed her eyes feeling sweat trickle down her back. Nausea gripped her stomach and she retched onto the concrete floor. It was difficult to process what she had just done.
What just happened? What the hell just happened?
Chapter 22 Secrets
Mercy snapped her head up. She was still in danger, the building was unstable, she needed to find the others. Her watch was smashed, she had no idea what the time was.
Move, get out, the whole place could come crashing down any moment—
Mercy forced herself up and felt her way down the dark stairwell keeping the wall on her right. Twenty minutes later she saw a faint light below, she concentrated on her footing and made it to the ground floor, the door had been left open a crack. She exited the stairwell and stared into the foyer ahead. An overwhelming sense of loss bore down on her; where were the others? Had they gotten out safely? Murphy was gone, he had died protecting her and Rose, then the floor had collapsed. Shards of memory cut Mercy like a knife; what had happened to brave, angry Rose?
Mercy brought a clenched fist to her forehead and closed her eyes. She had forgotten how to cry a long time ago, but new pain was always real. She felt the familiar tightening in her stomach and opened her eyes, reality washed in followed by the will to survive, as palpable as ever.
Don’t give up, never give up, the others didn’t give up, keep going—
She stared at the ground for a long moment letting her eyes drift, then she saw it, a drop of blood. Fresh. She stooped to examine the blood stain and then saw another splatter a few feet away.
Someone made it—
Hope surged through her, she stood up looking around with clear eyes. She followed the blood trail onto the street behind the tower. The sun lay in the west, it was late afternoon.
I must have been out cold for hours—
The blood trail led her up Argyle Street, into Duke Street and around into Barrington Street. She looked up Barrington Street and saw a cluster of tropes and dead standing in a square off to the left. She followed the blood splatters which kept to the middle of the road and reached the square, she stopped, watching the tropes. Something lay on the ground at the tropes’ feet but she could not see clearly.
Mercy bit her lip, she made a decision and approached the tropes trying to see through their legs. She went around, saw a gap and took a few steps forward. She recognised the shoes, it was Kenny. She stopped and stared, they had killed him, she edged forwards, he would turn, it could be minutes or hours but he would become one of them. Her view opened up, he was sprawled in a pool of blood; his neck and face a mess, his stomach had been ripped open, his guts pulled out. Mercy closed her mind to the horror, she had seen it so many times before. Kenny would live on in her memory, this was not Kenny anymore; this was meat.
Trope food—
Then she saw the gun, Kenny had dropped his AR-15, it lay by his side.
Don’t… walk away— her inner voice spoke, the voice of instinct, of reason, of experience.
For the first time in two years Mercy turned away from her instinct, she walked towards the trope circle. She stepped through the gap ignoring the swaying tropes and skinnies. She picked up Kenny’s AR-15, took his pistol, ammunition and knife. She found the map he had drawn of the Citadel in his jacket pocket. As she stood up an irrational urge swept through her; she wanted to scream, vent her rage at the virus, the real enemy, the thing that had robbed her of her life and friends, the thing that infected the swaying tropes surrounding her.
These were people once, every last one of them; mothers, brothers, fathers, sisters, sons, daughters, friends—
Mercy raised her face to the sky, lifted the rifle in defiance and screamed in rage and fury until she could scream no longer, until her voice gave out. The tropes and skinnies paid no attention, they continued swaying, looking vacantly at the bloody cut of meat on the ground that had once been Kenny. Mercy’s shoulders slumped, her reality was suspended, she had stepped out of time. She broke through the ring of tropes and stared at the street.
Eventually she remembered the blood trail and returned to the middle of the road. She scoured the tarmac and found a blood splatter further up Barrington Street. She examined it, her hand on the tarmac. Her fingers detected a slight tremor in the road surface, she frowned and looked up, listening. In the distance she heard a metallic clanking, an engine, heading towards her.
Shit that’s all I need, they’re searching the area, NSA, the gunshots must have alerted them—
Mercy went up Barrington Street looking for the next blood stain.
Come on, come on where are you? Where did you go?
Movement caught her eye and she looked up. An armoured Humvee with a roof mounted 50 calibre heavy machine gun rounded the corner of Cogswell Street on the left. The roof gunner shouted and pointed the gun in her direction, the Humvee leapt forwards.
Mercy turned and ran back down Barrington Street her eyes searching for somewhere to hide. She noticed a footprint and trampled grass on the right and another blood spatter. She threw herself into the overgrown ivy and weeds following the flattened trail. A concrete tower block rose before her, the Humvee’s tyres screeched behind. Her foot caught on something as she moved towards the building. She looked down and saw a drop of blood on a partially open manhole cover. She pushed the cover aside and lowered herself through the opening her hands finding the slime covered ladder. She reached up and pulled the manhole cover back into place.
A few seconds later the Humvee roared directly overhead. Mercy heard a door open followed by footsteps.
“Where’d she go?”
“She came through here dammit, I saw her—”
“Shit, must have gone into the tower, this area is infested with new tropes.”
“Check with base, see what they want us to do—”
The sound of a door opening was followed by muffled conversation. Mercy strained to hear but could not make out the words. A few seconds later a voice shouted from the Humvee, “Orders are to pull back and hold the area, they’re sending a squad out to check the building, they’re bringing the flame crew just in case—”
Mercy heard the Humvee do
ors close and listened as it drove away. She clung to the ladder for a moment and let her breathing settle.
Close call—
Mercy glanced down, the shaft disappeared into darkness beneath her feet. She steeled herself and began descending, she reached the last rung and dropped to the floor, the sewer was full of free flowing rainwater. Thin rays of light reached down from the slots in the manhole cover, she looked left and right.
Could they have escaped down here? Which direction did they take? Away from the city centre towards the shore or deeper into the city?
Crimson would know the city, maybe she had a safe house, a stash of supplies. Mercy closed her eyes visualising the map of Halifax, if it was her she would head back into the city, lie low, regroup, get some supplies, allow the dust to settle.
Mercy turned left and started walking, against the flow of the water. The meagre light disappeared and she found herself in darkness. Her mind returned to the time she had met Vince in the subway in Manhattan. She closed her eyes and used her fingertips against the walls to guide her way. The water was ankle deep and cold, the air was damp and musty but not offensive. She pressed on trying not to think about rats, perhaps the tropes had eaten them all. She wondered where the rats went when a city died, there were plenty of rats in New York City, but then there were plenty of bodies.
Twenty minutes passed, Mercy came to a junction, she looked both ways and froze. A light flickered a short distance away on the left, she raised her gun switching the safety off.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” a man’s voice echoed behind her. She felt cold steel against the back of her neck.
Mercy tensed. “OK, OK, I want no trouble, I’m just looking for my friends. I think they came down here to escape from the dead above.”
“Lower your gun and hand it back to me, no tricks or else—” the man replied.
Mercy nodded and lowered the AR-15 releasing the shoulder strap. She held the gun out for him to take, then kept her hands raised and waited for him to speak.
“Friends you say? Describe them—” the voice ordered.
“Three girls, two older ones, Crimson and Tawny, one younger, Rose. And a guy, Leo. We were separated, I think one of them is wounded, I followed a blood trail on the street. The NSA caught up with me so I hid down here, I think my friends may have done the same— have you seen them?” Mercy kept her voice slow and measured. She stared at the walls, calculating angles, she still had her bayonet and Kenny’s pistol in her belt. It looked as if the man behind had not seen her other weapons.
“As a matter of fact I have,” the voice replied. “What’s your name?”
“My name? The name’s Mercy, Mercy Dawes.”
“Well that’s all right then, your story checks out. I’ve got your friends in a safe place, they were wandering around down here, could hear them a mile off. Yes, one of them’s injured, Rose. But I’ve patched her up pretty good, she should be OK. You can put your hands down now—”
Mercy lowered her hands and turned to look at her captor. A wizened, older man with a long beard and wild eyes stared at her through thick glasses. He wore a peaked cap with a badge on it, Mercy couldn’t make out what was on the badge. His stare was unsettling.
“The name’s Quinn, Stanley Quinn. Museum Curator, well, ex-Museum Curator, before all this mess,” he said, his voice low. “I’ll give you your gun back when your friends vouch for you, they seem all right, they’re not NSA anyway. Anyone who’s not NSA is OK in my book. Go on ahead, follow the candle light.”
“OK mister, let’s do that. I’d be grateful if you’d take me to my friends,” Mercy replied. She turned and walked towards the light, the sewer was partially blocked, she slowed.
Quinn came up behind her. “Yes, there was subsidence in this section, the sewer wall fell down and that’s when I found the tunnel hidden behind—”
“Tunnel?” Mercy repeated.
“It’s OK keep going, you can climb over the rubble. See the candle? That’s where the tunnel’s been exposed, it’s an old escape route from the fort. Secret, never been mapped or found and I should know—”
Mercy scrambled across the remains of the sewer wall and saw a tunnel extending to the right, away from the sewer, the subsidence had destroyed the tunnel on the left. She reached the candle and crouched, waiting for Quinn.
“Where does it go to?” Mercy asked, looking at the blockage.
“You ask a lot of questions missy,” Quinn replied. “Let’s just get you to your friends first shall we?”
Mercy nodded, “Sure thing, Quinn, sorry.” He was kneeling right beside the candle, she could see words on his cap badge: FORT GEORGE MUSEUM, PARKS CANADA. A tingle of excitement crept through her.
Could this tunnel take me to Flynn?
Quinn picked up the candle and handed it to her. “Here use this.”
Mercy took the candle and progressed up the tunnel, it was hewn from the bedrock with brickwork evident at intervals. It was mostly level and straight. Mercy thought of the thousands of tonnes of rock and earth above them. How had this place survived? Then she remembered reading about catacombs and tunnels in other cities around the world.
It’s here, it’s survived, like me, that’s all that is important—
Mercy saw a light ahead, the tunnel widened into a chamber. A storm lamp gave out steady light, a figure was staring at her.
“Dawes? It’s you— we thought you were dead,” Tawny’s voice echoed.
More figures stirred behind Tawny. Mercy pressed forwards and entered the space. Tawny slapped her shoulder, Crimson and Leo came forwards and hugged her.
“Where’s Rose?” Mercy said, concern edging her voice.
“Rose’s OK, she had a bad fall when the floor collapsed, Leo found her and pulled her out, the place was crawling with tropes. How did you get out?” Tawny asked.
Mercy glanced around and saw a shape on the floor, she recognised Rose. She went over and saw a bandage on Rose’s leg, she was asleep. Mercy put her hand on Rose’s forehead brushing hair from her face. “Rose, Rose, thank you for what you did back there—”
“Here, drink this Mercy. How did you get out of there?” Crimson repeated, handing her a steaming mug of coffee.
Mercy sipped the coffee and recounted what had happened in the tower. She told them the tropes had not attacked her when she escaped from the building or when she found Kenny’s body.
“Kenny was unlucky, it all happened so fast, he was scouting ahead, looking for a safe place, he must have stumbled on a pod of them. He went down fighting, he bought us some time, we slipped by,” Crimson said in a quiet voice. “There was too many of them for us to do anything—”
“But the tropes did attack us and you, in the building,” Tawny interrupted, her face puzzled.
“Yes, well, I was with you guys, and we were all moving, running, fighting as a unit. Maybe that makes it different, or maybe they were coming for Rose and Murphy by the stair door, who knows? All I know is when I’m on my own they just seem to ignore me,” Mercy replied.
“That’ll be what the NSA did to you then—” Tawny said, her tone measured.
“Here take this back,” Quinn said handing Mercy her AR-15.
“Thank you Mr Quinn,” she said.
Quinn smiled, “No one has called me Mr Quinn since my museum days.”
Mercy looked up from her rifle. “About that Mr Quinn, you were going to tell me where this tunnel leads to.”
All eyes went to Quinn. He stroked his beard and returned Mercy’s gaze. “It goes to the fort, to the old well, deep in the well, but above the waterline.”
“Ahhhh—” Mercy said, raising her eyebrows.
Quinn frowned. “How come I feel as if I shouldn’t have told you that?”
Chapter 23 Infiltration
“So how long have you lived down here Mr Quinn?” Leo asked later.
“Don’t know exactly. I came down here when they started burning the city centre, the NSA and th
eir flamers. Bastards—” Quinn replied.
“So you’ve been down here for almost two years?” Tawny said.
“Close to, I reckon. I know where there’s food, over by the wharfs and warehouses, places even the NSA don’t know about. So I’d go out and get supplies and keep an eye on those bastards. They took over my museum, I’ve worked there for forty years, forty years, and they just walk in and destroy everything, all that history—” Quinn’s voice was taught, his shoulders hunched.
He looks unhinged, unstable— but then the rest of us aren’t exactly peachy either, Mercy reflected, a wry smile on her face.
“What are you grinning at?” Crimson asked.
Mercy shrugged. “Just thinking how messed up all this is. But we still need to stick to the plan, we have to hope the families have got their act together, there’s no way we’re going to make it back to the East Shore in time. So now that we have a way into the fort I think we should do our own thing, use the attack on the compound as a diversion. Once it starts we can enter Fort George using the well then find Flynn, Stevie and Dakota.”
“Denton was planning to attack the compound at night, so we left the oil terminal what, twenty four hours ago?” Crimson looked at her watch.
“Which means they could attack the compound tonight… or tomorrow night?” Leo said.
“So we need to be ready and in position, tonight just in case,” Rose’s voice piped up behind.
Everyone turned to look at Rose. Tawny crept over to her, “Hey tiger, how you feeling?”
Rose sat up and pulled a face. “OK, a bit tired, my leg’s throbbing,” she reached down to the bandage and looked up at Tawny.
“It’s OK Rose, you weren’t bit, you cut your leg on some glass back in the tower, the floor collapsed. We got you here, Mr Quinn over there patched you up, you were out cold which was just as well because you needed stitches. But you’ll be fine, the wound was small, he got all the glass out, even gave you a shot of antibiotics—” Tawny paused.
The Survival Chronicles (Book 2): Angel of Mercy Page 19
