P Deutermann - Darkside

“Half hour, max,” Jim said. “I want to make a quick tour, see what I see. I’ll back out as soon as possible.”

“You back out if you think the structure is giving way. Don’t stop. Don’t think. Run like a striped-assed ape.”

“I think you’re scaring me.”

“That’s the idea. And good luck.”

Jim took the end of the air hose in hand and went down the stone steps into the left-hand tunnel. Behind him, the PWC crew unreeled the hose for him. By the diagram, the right-hand tunnel led directly out toward what had been the original banks of Spa Creek, which in turn fed into the Colonial harbor of Annapolis. Subsequent landfills to expand the Academy grounds had long since buried the original shoreline, but Fort Severn’s foundations were supposedly still there, along with these underground facilities.

The left-hand tunnel, on the other hand, branched back toward Bancroft Hall. If their runner was using it, this would be the one. The diagrams might not be that accurate, so there could be a tie into the basements.

The Maglite threw bobbing shadows along the brick walls as he walked forward. The arched tunnel ceiling was barely an inch above his head, increasing the feeling that he was taking a walk in a burial vault. The air was musty, smelling of old lime. Tiny little avalanches of mortar dust trickled down from between the odd-shaped bricks in the side walls as his footfalls disturbed the silence. He shuddered when he realized the entire massive weight of Dahlgren Hall was pressing down on all this crumbling ancient brickwork right above his head.

The floor appeared to be hard-packed dirt until he scuffed it with his toe and uncovered more brickwork under an inch-thick layer of white dust. Mortar dust, he realized. Good deal. The joints between all the bricks were recessed at least a quarter inch. He thought about testing one to see if it was loose, then thought better of doing that. Hate to find out I’m right, he thought. He kept tugging on the air line until he reached the first intersection, about two hundred feet from the alcove entrance. One tunnel went left and sloped down. The other, presumably the gun pit tunnel, went straight ahead and then branched left. He stopped fifteen feet back from the intersection, squatted down on his heels, and examined the dust.

There were regular depressions in the fine dust. Not exactly footprints, but spaced at about the right intervals. He realized he should have come down here sooner. The mortar dust was the consistency of confectioners’ sugar, so it didn’t hold the definition of a footprint or the ridges of a sole or heel pattern. But the depressions in the dust were regular, about two feet apart. He put the Maglite down on the tunnel floor, but that didn’t help. Still no definition.

Just then he heard a low, ominous rumble echoing down the tunnel, and his heart jumped. But then he recognized it: thunder. The storm must be overhead. As he worked to control his breathing, there came another clap of thunder, louder and more pronounced. He shone the light back down the tunnel. The tiny metal bands that bundled the air hose and the phone cable winked back at him through a fine mist of falling masonry dust. A third thump of thunder, and the mist thickened momentarily. He swallowed and wondered if he ought not to give this shit up right now. But there had been thunderstorms before, and the tunnels were still standing. He decided to go on.

Then he realized that the intersection was actually a three-way junction. The left turn went down to the magazines. Straight ahead were the blocked-off gun pit tunnels. To the right was another oak door, smaller than the main entrance. He pushed on it, but it was locked. He tried the keys, and one worked the lock. This had to be the cross tunnel. He relocked it, turned around, and took the left turn down toward the magazines. The tunnel floor sloped down noticeably, and he wondered how far underground he was. He should be beyond the massive granite bulk of Dahlgren now, and approaching the right-hand edges of either the sixth or the eighth wing of Bancroft Hall. Or maybe even the tennis courts. He voted for the tennis courts. The air hose was getting much harder to pull, and he was tempted to leave it. The magazine doors were visible twenty feet away, framed by an arched alcove. It looked as if they were made of cast iron, not steel, with rivet heads visible in the harsh white light of the Maglite. There were wheels under the doors, and, based on iron semicircles embedded in the floor, they apparently swung outward against the alcove walls. He checked for more depressions in the dust, but they weren’t as obvious on the sloping floor of this tunnel.

When he reached the doors themselves, he found the manometer to one side. It was a thin vertical glass tube about four feet long and an inch in diameter. It was supported by a bracket at each end, and there were tiny brass valves above and below the brackets. Small pipes led through the masonry at top and bottom so that the water level in the tube would always match the water level inside the magazine. And there was definitely water, right up near the top of the manometer.

Okay, so much for that. Based on where the manometer was mounted, the magazine was flooded at least eight feet up from the bottom sill of the doors. So nobody could be in there. He’d have to ask the PWC manager if the water level varied, but it probably didn’t. The magazines were simply sealed underground chambers that had been abandoned for over a hundred years. Okay, then what were those depressions? Then it hit him: They said they inspected the tunnels every five years or so. Those were the footprints of the last inspection team. There had been nothing to disturb them once the men had backed out. Another rumble of thunder echoed down the tunnels. More mortar dust. He imagined he felt the earth itself shifting under his feet. Then the steel doors in front of him moved.

Again he froze. Had he imagined it? He hadn’t actually seen them move, but he had heard them stir on their ancient iron rollers. A trick of the acoustics down here. He waited, and then remembered to breathe. He stared at the doors. Another boom of thunder, the sensation of movement, a slight pressure in his ears, and, yes, by God, the door moved. Less than a fraction of an inch. Air pressure. Somehow, the storm was modulating the air pressure down here, and the doors, being at the end of a tunnel, were being affected. While his logical brain worked that out, his lizard brain was beginning to sound a repeating refrain: Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go. Great damned idea, he thought, and, dropping the air hose, he started back up the tunnel.

Another thump and boom from the storm up above, and the answering veil of mortar dust streamed out of the arched ceiling.

I will not run. I will walk. If I run, my footfalls could disturb the brickwork even more.

I will not run.

But I can trot. Or do a fast shuffle, maybe?

And he did, keeping his footfalls minimized, trying not to make any big vibrations, wiping the perspiration off his face and realizing it was gritty, fixing his eyes on the beam of white light ahead of him as he followed it back up to the intersection. He was terribly aware of the tunnel roof right above his head, and he stepped out and picked up the pace. Eighty feet from the entrance, he heard a crack from the brickwork, somewhere behind him. I will not run. I will not run.

A moment later, he bounded up the steps past the two crewmen who were watching with knowing grins. A boom of thunder let go that sounded as if it had gone off down here in the main tunnel, but the sound was obviously just coming down from the various gratings in all its beautiful fury.

“All done today?” the older of the PWC guys asked him as the other one began to crank on the reel of the air hose. “Look a little white around the gills.”