John Hawks - The Dark River

A call came in on the sat phone, and a former British soldier named Summerfield whispered into Boone’s ear. The response team had arrived at the Vanderbilt entrance and had parked behind the van. For this operation, the team was comprised of mostly the same men who had worked in Arizona. The New Harmony operation had been good for morale; the necessary violence had unified a group of mercenaries with different nationalities and backgrounds.

“Now what?” Summerfield asked.

“Break into small groups, and then enter from different doors.” Boone looked up at the schedule board. “We’ll meet near track thirty-the train going to Stamford.”

“I thought they were getting on the shuttle.”

“All Maya wants to do is protect her Traveler. She’ll hide as quickly as possible. That means going down a tunnel or finding a maintenance area.”

“Is the objective still the same?”

“Everyone but Gabriel is now in the immediate-termination category.”

Summerfield switched off his phone, and Boone picked up another call from the Internet team. Maya and the other fugitives had reached the shuttle area, but they were lingering on the platform. Boone had killed Maya’s father, Thorn, in Prague last year, and he felt an odd personal connection to the young woman. She wasn’t as tough as her father, perhaps because she had resisted becoming a Harlequin. Maya had already made one mistake-and the next choice would destroy her.

Naz had guided Maya and the rest of the group through a warren of stairs and passageways to the Times Square shuttle. The platform was a brightly lit area where a shuttle train departed from one of three parallel tracks. The gray concrete floor was dotted with blackened pieces of chewing gum that formed a random mosaic. A few hundred feet away, a group of West Indian men with steel drums pounded out a calypso tune.

So far, they had avoided the mercenaries, but Maya was sure they were being watched by the underground surveillance system. Now that their presence in New York had been discovered, she knew that the full resources of the Tabula would be used to find them. According to Naz, all they had to do was walk down the subway tunnel and take a staircase to the lower level of Grand Central Terminal. Unfortunately, a transit policeman was patrolling the area and, even if he disappeared, someone might tell the authorities that a group of people had jumped onto the tracks.

The only safe route into the tunnel was through a locked door labeled with the tarnished gold lettering KNICKERBOCKER. In a more convivial era, a passageway once led directly from the subway platform to the bar of the old Knickerbocker Hotel. Although the hotel was now an apartment building, the door remained-unnoticed by the tens of thousands of commuters who walked past it every day.

Maya stood on the platform feeling very conspicuous as commuters hurried to board the shuttle. When the train clattered out of the station, Hollis approached her and spoke in a quiet voice.

“You still want to get on the train going to Ten Mile River?”

“We’ll evaluate the situation when we reach the platform. Naz says there aren’t any cameras there.”

Hollis nodded. “The Tabula scanners probably detected us when we left the loft and walked through Chinatown. Then somebody figured out we were using the old subway station and hacked into the transit computer.”

“There’s another explanation.” Maya glanced over at Naz.

“Yeah, I thought about that, too. But I watched his face in the subway car. He really looked scared.”

“Stay close to him, Hollis. If he starts running, stop him.”

A new shuttle train arrived, took on a new crowd of passengers, and then rattled west toward Eighth Avenue. It felt like they would be standing there forever. Finally the transit policeman got a call on his radio and hurried away. Naz ran over to the Knickerbocker door and fumbled through the keys on his ring. When the lock clicked, he smiled and pulled the door open.

“Special subway tour goes this way,” he announced, and a few commuters watched the group disappear through the doorway. When Naz shut the door, they stood close together in a short, dark passageway. He led them past a manhole cover and then down four concrete steps to the subway tunnel.

Everyone stood between one set of tracks as Naz pointed at a third rail filled with electric current. “Be careful with the wooden shield that covers that,” he told them. “If it breaks and your body hits the rail, you’re dead meat.”

The tunnel was black with soot and smelled like sewage. Water trickled down the drainage channel; it oozed through the concrete wall and made the surface glisten like oil. The City Hall station had been dusty, but fairly clean; the tunnel to Times Square was littered with trash. Rats were everywhere-dark gray ones nearly a foot long. This was their world, and they weren’t afraid of humans. When intruders appeared, the rats continued to rummage through the garbage, squeaking at one another or scurrying up the walls.

“They’re not dangerous,” Naz said. “Just watch where you’re going. If you fall down, they crawl all over you.”

Hollis stayed close to their guide. “Where’s this doorway you were talking about?”

“It’s right around here. Swear to God. Start looking for a yellow light.”

They heard a low, rumbling sound, like distant thunder, and saw the headlights of the approaching shuttle. “Next track! Next track!” Naz shouted. Without waiting for the others, he leaped over the third rail to the adjacent track.

Everyone but Sophia Briggs followed Naz. The old woman looked exhausted and slightly confused. As the lights of the shuttle got closer, she took a risk and stepped directly on the wooden cover of the third rail. It held her weight. A moment later, she passed through the gloom and joined the others.

Naz darted up the track and then came back looking excited. “Okay. I think I found the door to the stairway. Just follow me and-”

The shuttle train on the next track absorbed the rest of his words. Maya saw quick flashes of different passengers framed within the windows-an old man with a knit cap, a young woman with braids-and then the train was gone. A candy wrapper flew up in the air and drifted downward like a dead leaf.

They kept walking to a juncture that led off in three different directions. Naz took the track on the right and then led them to an open doorway illuminated by a single lightbulb. He climbed up three metal steps and entered a maintenance tunnel, followed by Alice and Vicki. Hollis reached the top of the steps and shook his head. “We need to slow down. Sophia is getting tired.”

“Find a safe place and wait for us,” Maya said. “Gabriel and I will bring her along.”

Maya knew that her father would have betrayed the rest of the group to save the Traveler, but she couldn’t fall back on this strategy. Gabriel wasn’t going to leave anyone behind in the tunnels-least of all the woman who had been his Pathfinder. She looked down the tunnel and saw that Gabriel had taken Sophia’s knapsack and placed it on his own shoulders. When he offered his arm to Sophia, the old lady shook her head vigorously, as if to say, I don’t need anyone’s help . Sophia took a few steps forward and then a red laser beam cut through the gloom. “Get down!” Maya shouted. “Get-”

There was a sharp cracking sound and a bullet hit Sophia in the back. The Pathfinder fell forward, tried to get up, and then collapsed. Maya drew her revolver and fired down the tunnel as Gabriel scooped up Sophia and ran toward the steps. Maya followed him, pausing in the open doorway to fire again. The laser beam vanished as four dark shapes retreated into the shadows.