Adam Baker - Terminus

‘Always adults,’ said Galloway, contemplating the jostling revenants. ‘Never kids.’

‘I like to think parents took care of their children, as a mercy.’

Donahue rehung the curtain.

‘The chopper isn’t due for hours. Better play smart until then. We need to reinforce this entrance. I’ll look around, see what I can find.’

‘I need a piss,’ shouted Lupe.

‘Shut up.’

‘Seriously. I need a piss.’

‘So wet your pants,’ said Galloway.

‘You want me to urinate on the floor? We’re stuck down here for the rest of the day. You want to splash around in a puddle of piss?’

‘I honestly don’t give a damn.’

‘Yeah. I guess you don’t. Smelt yourself lately?’

Galloway shook his head. Weary, don’t-have-time-for-this-crap.

‘And what about you?’ asked Lupe. ‘We could be stuck here a while. What if you need a shit? Want to burn your dick off crouching over that radioactive cesspool? Find a bucket. That’s the least you can do.’

Galloway pushed open the plant room door. He hesitated to cross the threshold. Deep gloom. Nariko’s two-stroke generator supplied power to a fluttering ceiling bulb. Racks of dust-furred electrical apparatus threw grotesque shadows. Rows of porcelain insulators draped with webs. Asbestos-lagged steam pipes.

He crouched beside the generator and tapped the fuel gauge. A gallon tank. Juice to keep the station lights burning four hours, then a refill.

He switched on his flashlight and explored deep darkness at the back of the room. He found a fire bucket. He picked it up. A fist-sized rust hole in the base.

A rusted gum machine. Chiclets. Dentyne.

Stacked boxes. Cardboard turned to mulch. He lifted a box flap. Rusted tins of paint. Mildewed labels. Cans of Nu-Enamel for the radiators. Boxes of Navajo white and crimson red: the two-tone wall scheme of the office and stairwells.

Documentation piled in a heap. Curled, autumnal pages. IRT admin: staff rotas, payroll, customer complaints. If any of the team felt the need to defecate, they would have to squat over spread paper, wipe, and toss a shit-parcel into the tunnel water.

A can full of nails and screws. He shook it out. Gulf Auto Grease. Big as a cookie jar. Large enough for a piss pot.

Something caught his eye. He crouched. A bare footprint in the dust.

He looked around. He shone his flashlight into the corner of the room. Some kind of hobo camp. Scrunched paper, like the inhabitants bedded down under garbage.

He kicked the detritus aside. Beige MRE wrappers. Empty vacuum seal bags and a couple of plastic spoons. Remains of an army ration pack.

He examined the wrappers under light. Ready-to-eat spaghetti bolognese. Tongue smears: someone had eaten the meal, then ripped open the bag and licked the liner.

More sachets. They’d eaten sugar. They’d eaten coffee granules. They’d eaten pudding powder with a spoon.

An empty water bottle. He shook a drip into his palm.

He brushed aside papers heaped against the wall. Some kind of pattern etched into the brickwork. He crouched and trained his flashlight. A screaming face scratched into the mortar with a nail.

He turned and shouted towards the plant room door.

‘Hey. Hey, Donahue. I don’t think we’re alone down here.’

‘Need a drink?’ asked Donahue.

Lupe nodded.

Donahue fetched water from a bag of bottles and energy bars. She tossed the bottle to Lupe. She caught it with cuffed hands, uncapped and swigged.

‘Personally, I’d let you go,’ said Donahue. ‘Doesn’t seem much percentage keeping you chained.’

Lupe held out her hands.

‘So do it.’

‘Not my call.’

The plant room door kicked open. Galloway stood in the doorway. His nose was broken. He drooled snot and blood. He had a shotgun barrel pressed to the back of his neck.

‘All right,’ shouted a husky voice from inside the plant room. ‘Nobody move.’

‘Wade?’ replied Lupe. ‘Damn, is that you?’

The flooded tunnel.

Ancient brickwork. Arched buttresses. Calcite leeched from mortar in petrified drips like candle wax.

Corroded brace girders. Load-bearing I-beams bowed under the weight of slow subsidence.

The boat headed north. Paddle strokes and laboured breathing.

‘Where does this lead?’ asked Tombes.

‘According to the map, this passageway connects with a modern MTA tunnel about three quarters of a mile north, somewhere close to Canal Street.’

‘Doesn’t look too stable.’

‘Nobody set foot down here for years. Nobody official.’

‘What’s above our heads?’

‘Broadway.’

‘The flood water is pretty deep in this section. Must be a downward gradient.’

Nariko sat at the prow. The surface of the water gleamed iridescent gasoline rainbows.

‘Something floating up ahead.’

A body.

‘Get closer. I want to take a look.’

The corpse was floating face down. Combat fatigues. Army boots.

Cloke prodded the carcass with an oar. He flipped the body. The corpse rolled and bobbed.

‘Christ,’ muttered Tombes. He covered his nose and mouth to mask the stink.

The corpse was shrivelled by long immersion in water.

Nariko focused the beam, and inspected the cadaver head to toe. Face mottled purple. Fat tongue furred with fine needles. The side of the soldier’s face was knotted with metallic sarcomas. Fine splinters protruded from his scalp and ears.

The chest and abdominal cavity were empty, intestines and internal organs stripped by rats. Rib cage held to the spine by shreds of cartilage.

‘Give me the oar.’

Nariko turned the corpse and examined the cadaver’s shoulder patch. Black horse head on a yellow shield.

‘101st Cav. This guy was part of the platoon guarding Ekks.’

She leaned close over the rotted corpse, squinted to read dog tags.

‘His name was Donovan. Sergeant Donavan.’

‘So the mission is a bust,’ said Tombes. ‘The team got wiped out.’

‘Maybe,’ said Cloke. ‘But we have to know for sure.’

Nariko drew the pistol from her belt, disengaged the safety and took aim.

‘The guy looks pretty dead,’ said Tombes.

‘I’ve seen these bastards fragged with grenades. Three of them. Spun twenty feet, legs gone, but they kept coming, hand over hand.’

She fired through the soldier’s eye socket. The gunshot echoed from the tunnel walls.

‘Bullet to the brain. Only way to be sure.’

She tucked the pistol back in her belt.

A clump of papers floating in the water. Nariko scooped wet pages with an oar and examined smeared ink.

‘What does it say?’ asked Cloke.

‘Nothing. Requisition forms.’

‘Show me.’

Nariko held out the oar. Cloke examined the mulched pages.

‘Army mindset. End of the world, and still filling out paperwork.’

‘Maybe it kept them sane,’ said Nariko.

They paddled deeper into the tunnel.

They passed an old IRT coach laid up on a siding. Water lapped the bodywork. Flakes of paint suggested the carriage might once have been Tuscan red.

Nariko trained her flashlight on the decaying hulk as they drifted past. Warped panels. Rusted girder frame. Side doors hung from their hinges.

‘Been here a long while.’

Faint gold letters:

The beam of the searchlight shafted through vacant windows. It lit the flooded carriage interior, projecting a shimmering ripple-glow across the ceiling.

Rotted leather hanger straps. Split and buckled coachwork. Rattan upholstery peeling from corroded spring-frame seats.

Relic of a gilded age.

They paddled past and continued down the tunnel.