She climbed down carefully, straddling the pipe. If she fell in by mistake, she would take her chances with the afterlife, because there would be no washing that stink and shame away. The pipe ran underneath the ground by a few feet, and hovered over the cesspool it emptied into by another handful. Ren carefully lowered herself over the edge of the pipe, holding on for dear life until her feet found solid purchase. She reeled herself inside and was happy to find that she only had to lower her head slightly to navigate the tunnel. Walking was at best an awkward shuffle as she kept her feet to the sides of the curved path, keeping her shoes out of anything slick that she might slip in.
Step by step, Ren moved further into the tunnel, listening to the sound of her own breath growing heavier and more anxious in the choking stench. The darkness pressed in around her the farther she moved from the opening, continuing on one step at a time, her hands pressed against the cool metal walls for support.
She continued to shuffle forward. Whether fifty paces or a hundred and fifty, she never bothered to count. Her focus was on each moment in turn and her anxious shallow breaths as she tried with all her might to fight down the urge to throw up with each continued step. The stench seemed to grow, if that was even possible after what she smelled outside. She made a note to contact someone in the EPA when this was all over.
Ren was certain that she must have passed under the exterior of the structure by now. But without any indicators, she had no idea how far she was in either direction. It was still dark enough outside that she had lost the opening to the outside world, and apparently dark enough inside that she couldn’t see the end of the tunnel. It was a sudden surprise when she realized that she could actually see her hands moving on the rounded walls. The light was faint where she was, but it was enough to give her batteries a jolt. She continued forward, focused on moving as quietly as possible, the tunnel getting lighter as she moved, reflecting an orange glow from somewhere ahead.
As she surged on, the smells changed. The rotten stench combined with a charred smell. Something was definitely burning. She could hear the roar of fire growing and assumed it was the source of light as well. Each new step brought another onslaught of sensory information. Around her, somewhere above or below the roar of the fire, there was a rumbling. It was deep and constant, but she couldn’t feel it when her fingers touched the tunnel walls. She could hear run off; that same sickening noise that invited her on this journey also harkened its end, or vice versa. And then came the icing on the cake: a choking swarm of flies here at the end of the line.
Ren covered her mouth and shut her eyes, the swarm so thick they couldn’t help but pelt her as she tried to pass through them. The buzz of a multitude of wings was deafening, it seemed to drown out all other noises. She continued to stumble forth, feeling the insects bounce off her. She could only pad blindly forward, forcing her way through the blizzard of pests. She couldn’t bring herself to touch the walls again. Putting a hand out in the thick of the insect tornado around her resulted in the soft squish of who knows how many frenzied creatures. To her benefit, Ren’s careful shuffling allowed her to kick the wall that signaled the end of the journey, before she actually ran headlong into the oozing mess.
She opened her eyes to slits, noticing that the flies were less congested here. It helped that the grating above her allowed them to move into the open air, but the grating was going to be a problem for a human-sized intruder like herself.
Ren pressed her face up, trying to look around. All she could see were tall slick piles of refuse, what she assumed was the source of the stench in the first place. While this meant much more deep scrubbing when this was all over, it also meant that she could possibly emerge completely unseen.
She listened carefully, trying to hear above all the ambient sounds that demanded her attention. Beyond the sounds of the fire and the earth and the insects, Ren was almost certain she heard nothing else nearby. Her fingers slid into the spaces in the grate, cringing as those same spaces squished between her fingers and she closed them around the metal. She pushed upward and for what it made in stench and mess, the viscous runoff made an excellent lubricant for the metal grate as Ren lifted and slid it to the side. It moved without so much as a squeak and she was able to settle it with little more than a soft thud before sliding it across and causing a cascade of sick to rush into the hole above her.
It took everything in her power not to scream as the cold ooze weaved through her hair and slid down her neck. She clenched her jaw and shook it off, reminding herself why she was here. She couldn’t sense Joe now and tried not to panic. Her surroundings were too dangerous to divert any of her concentration toward their link; she would have to find her the old fashion way.
Her head popped up through the hole carefully, spying around all of the objects around her. She couldn’t make out much; the fires making shadows dance as much as the light itself changed from moment to moment. But as she concentrated, she saw nothing that looked like it was standing guard. It was enough of an incentive to try to get out of the hole.
She ignored her brain screaming for her not to touch anything. She didn’t come all this way to just give up because she was going to get dirty. So, it was more than just dirty, it was probably a health hazard for anyone who was behind on his or her vaccinations. There might even be some new biological threat being born in this mess as she waded through it, but there was no time to worry about that now. The needs of the many would have to wait.
Ren hoisted herself up, kicking her legs out and rolling onto her back to save herself the misfortune of pressing her face into the runoff around her. She raised herself slowly, peering around the piles that guarded her. She saw nothing new, just the fires and piles of… remains? She didn’t want to think about it.
It must be some sort of dumping ground, but whose?
She got to her feet, slipping around the small piles that hid her escape route, and darted to a wall. She clung to it as she got a handle on her surroundings. The ceilings looked much higher here than on the outside. And though it may have appeared to be three stories out there, inside it was one open structure in this part. Catwalks moved here and there overhead, chains and rails hanging in places where other parts of the structure may once have been, but they had come down some time ago. Ahead of her, the building appeared to open up more. Walls seemed to go only as high as necessary in here, as she could see the top of the wall she was leaning against, though she could never reach it to climb up. The wall, and what she assumed was it’s adjoining room, had to be fourteen feet tall. She looked along the area she could see in the dim, dancing light, but there was no way up the wall that she could tell. She was going to have to stay low and hope for the best.
Ren moved carefully, unsure if at any time, someone might step around a corner, or – if the fates were truly unkind – spot her from above. She moved with low even paces that kept her along the wall and, thankfully, away from any further puddles and piles of mystery meat.
Things might be looking up…
Secretly, she knew better. As her eyes crept around the corner, Ren realized she needed to start keeping her mouth shut. Ahead, an area had been carved out of the debris and industrial leavings. Barrels and steel racks and dusty old miscellanea had been thrown outward at all angles from this place and in the center of it, they had built a mountain of death.
At least, that was Ren’s guess. In the dim light cast by fires all around the pile, she could see that it was definitely remains. Two figures stood side by side, their arms outstretched, chanting in low unintelligible voices to the mound. The mound shuddered, that same low earthly growl she’d heard earlier. Whatever they were doing was calling forth an earthquake. Ren didn’t like this. She thought maybe if she could distract them, it would stop the ritual and the earthquake would cease.
Before she could convince herself to step out of her hiding place, the mound shuddered again and a part rolled down from the top, flopping to the outer ring of the pile. She looked at it
with some curiosity until she realized that it was an arm. She looked at the mound with new eyes and those eyes were quick to point out other parts they could recognize now that they had something to look for: fingers, toes, knees, shoulders, hair and a couple of faces; all bloated, slick and melting into one big pile of nastiness.
She shook her head; unable to fathom that this many people could be killed and no one had noticed. There were no warnings, no curfews, and no extra police on the streets. They were just suddenly all dead and no one seemed to care. There had to be dozens of bodies butchered and piled up here. And to what end?
She gripped the wall; uncertain she could handle the darkness suddenly pressing in. What if Joe was among the victims? What if they hadn’t bothered to wait for me?
Ren was pulled from her thoughts by the chanting. It had grown louder, more insistent. It sounded like they were issuing commands in an old language, one Ren had never heard. The mountain of gore shook, and in an instant, Ren knew something inside it was clawing its way out. It fumed and huffed from within, a wet thick growl echoed through the room as the pile shifted over it.
An arm emerged, long thin and utterly black, clawing at the ground and trying to pull itself free. Ren thought she recognized the arm and felt the darkness creep in a little tighter, the hope drifted further from her. The hand played as it pulled at the ground and she knew that Joe’s hands were not that big, but she had already seen something like that once tonight. They were raising another one of those creatures.
It pulled itself from the bottom of the pile, the rest of the mess collapsing to the side as it shook itself and rose up on wobbling legs, like a baby monster. Its skin shimmered in the wavering light; slick with the leavings of the terrible cocoon it had emerged from. It was definitely not human, and still, very different from Mother Wight’s brood. Its musculature was taut, wiry, and wrong in every sense of the word. Ropes of muscle stretched along its limbs; tendons pulled hard at every joint, as if they were the secret to holding it together. It was almost completely folded over on itself, growling and hacking, spitting up on the ground around it.
She felt her head shake slowly, not believing her eyes at all. Somehow they had not only targeted all these people, not only trapped another race of creatures, they had destroyed every one of these being in favor of creating a handful of ugly beasts.
Wasteful doesn’t begin to cover this; it’s -
She turned around, to the refuse around the hatch she’d crawled up from. Each of these was a withering pile that had been cast over here. She counted the piles and the higher the number, the harder her brain fought to keep its hemispheres together. Did Tau lie about how many they made? Or did they really try that many times? So much death. So much pointless death.
She was ripped away from her thoughts by the roar of the beast. It had finally found its lungs. The sound startled Ren to the point of losing her footing and she stumbled, falling clumsily out of her hiding place. She scrambled back, but one of the hooded figures spotted her. She could hear the sick, satisfied smile without having to see it.
“Ah, you found the place!” Tau stepped forward, pushing the hood back. The other figure twisted in her direction, but did not move. It was hunched, shorter than Tau. Small, sharp shoulders poked out of the robe; thin, bony hands were the only feature visible. The person inside this robe was considerably aged, and Ren glared, almost certain she knew who was hiding under the hood. As Tau closed in, the second figure receded from view, though Ren was certain she would face them too. She was almost looking forward to it. “Give me the dagger, and you can have Joe.”
Ren stepped into the open, jaw and fists clenched tight. Tau shook his head, making a display of his disappointment.
“I really did expect you to pull it off. Of all people, you were the one I put my faith in to get the job done.”
Ren could feel the furnace of anger within her stoking back up. If she could lay a finger on him, he was going to feel every ounce of that fire.
“So sorry to disappoint you. Send Joe home and we can talk about this over tea.”
“Talking’s done, Ren.”
“That’s unfortunate, it means you don’t have a lot of time left.”
He raised an eyebrow, making a show as he turned around the room. “Oh? And what are you going to do? I have an army, remember?” He clapped and called out something in that same unknown language and the beast reared up.
Ren stepped back, kicking at stones beneath her feet. The beast lumbered forward, surprisingly quick. It stopped a few feet shy of mauling her and sniffed at the air, searching. Ren took a step back carefully and started easing her way around objects, trying to put some space between her and it. Tau yelled again and it roared, swiping at the debris around it and sending some of it flying. Ren covered her face and yelped; her footing lost beneath her as she pitched over strewn metal. She gashed her arm on something jagged, though tetanus was the last of her worries at this point.
She pushed herself to her feet and only had a moment to leap out of the way as the beast came crashing down on where she had just fallen. It tore into the metal, giving her time to get to her feet and cross behind it again.
Tau cried out again, making her spin. Blood spattered from her wound onto the side of one of the burning barrels, sizzling and smoking. Ren leapt the other way as the creature lunged, howling as it tightened its grip around hot metal. It rolled and howled but couldn’t get free from the barrel that had fused itself to the beast’s flesh. It continued to writhe, dumping coals on itself, until finally, it stopped moving entirely.
She stared at her hand, seeing the blood flow from the wound and amazed that she could hardly feel it. Mother Wight had come through after all. The creature had been hunting her blood, but only when it touched something else.
It smells the blood!
Ren stood up, feeling a tinge of sadness creep up on her. Hell spawn or not, it didn’t deserve that. But there would be plenty of time later to sort out feelings and mourn nightmare abominations. Right now, she had eyes for the only man in the room.
His eyes were leveled on her, scowling.
“So you killed a fledgling, good for you.” His voice echoed loudly off the high walls and two more rose up from the far end of the warehouse.
“I hope they are smarter than the last one. You did forget to give them the basics, like sight.” Like trained beasts, they came when called. They were surprisingly agile for blind creatures, and she could only hope that they were as blind as the last one. They were closing the distance quickly. She looked around, trying to find something to inspire a plan.
“It’ll be a pleasure to see that smile fade as you bleed out.”
She looked at him and could almost feel the blood dripping a small pool from her fingertips. She blinked slowly, almost wishing she had a better idea, but she knew this was really the only one she needed. Even if it didn’t work perfectly, it would buy her some time.
She reached down, grabbing a chunk of jagged concrete in her hand. He looked at her, almost unbelieving as she stood there, and then she lunged. He didn’t react for a moment, still lost in surprise. His brain caught up and he surged forward, teeth bared as he growled. But Tau wasn’t a fighter; he was a sometimes-thief and some kind of spell-caster. The only thing he had going for him in a fight was his physique, but he didn’t know how to use it.
Ren became aware of this as she brought her fist around, connecting in mid-run and taking him off his feet. He scrambled, trying to get away from her, but she was already on top of him, holding him down.
She punched him again, watching his eyes dilate as she let him go, running the ugly stone across her arm, feeling it tear a ragged opening, but the pain was somewhere else. All she felt was the sting of a paper cut as she opened her arm over him.
It might have been a concussion, but as the beasts lumbered down, roaring and growling toward the scene of the fight, he stared almost curiously at her as she pressed an open palm onto his chest, holding h
im down, the blood spreading across his robes. Rivulets ran up, pooling in the cleft of his collarbone before forking and running down the sides of his neck. She looked up, watching the monsters bear down on her, trying to estimate how many seconds before she needed to move. Calculations were cast aside as Tau’s gears found traction and he began fighting against her leverage. She used the moment to her advantage and quickly jumped to her feet, scuttling back.
Tau stumbled, trying to get his feet beneath him. He raised his arms and opened his mouth to speak, but the first one was already on him. He screamed as they pounced, ripping into him. As much as she wanted him to deserve it, Ren looked away and tried to shut out the sounds.
She skirted around the scene, trying to keep her focus ahead of her, looking for an answer to where Joe might be. Again, there was a pang of regret. She should have taken more time. She should have gotten answers, but she pushed the ifs back down. Joe wasn’t safe yet, and neither was she, she could question her choices later.
At the far end of the building, she could see doors. They must have been guarding the entrance into the next room. Ren could only hope that it was where they were keeping Joe. Speculation would have to do for now, however. As she stepped forward, one of the creatures behind her bellowed. It huffed and strode forward quickly. She lifted her hand and saw the trail she had left behind her.
Oh no. This is going to be bad.
The second beast was suddenly very interesting in the hunt as well. They shoved and snapped at each other as they followed the trail right up to where Ren had raised her arm up, stopping the trail cold. Or mostly cold. She held her arm tight to her body, trying to staunch the flow, but it was spreading across her chest, and she knew that was going to make her scent stronger. She tried to back away, moving toward the doors. If she could get inside, maybe she could lock them out. Maybe she would be all right.
There was no getting away, though. They raised their faces up, scarred maws sniffing at the air. They wandered together, slowly following the trail, closing in on their prey. She continued to serpentine her way toward the doors, keeping as much of the dwindling distance as she could between them.
House of Thirteen Page 19
