“Very funny.”
Everyone takes off their bags and packs. All I have is a flashlight, so I go through next. I don’t want to stick around and watch Candy trying to maneuver her Kekko Kamen bag so it doesn’t get scratched up.
The tunnel is maybe twenty tight feet from end to end. Crawling on my elbows takes a minute or so to come out the other side. We’re a long way from the world now. Dug down into the earth like bugs. Even if the bridge was still intact, there’s no going back. The team following us could be around the first corner. Until I know who they are, I don’t want to take a chance on running into them. That means we have no choice but to follow wherever Hattie wants to take us, and she knows it. On our hands and knees it feels like we’ve crossed a new barrier. We’re moving forward but I don’t like it.
Candy comes through the tunnel next, followed by Vidocq, Brigitte, and Traven.
The new room looks a lot like the last one, probably just an extension of it. The same rough walls and unfinished feel.
“Where to next?” I say.
“We’re about there,” says Hattie.
There’s a grunt and a whirring sound from the other end of the room, then the growl of a generator coming to life. Bright halogen work lights come on all around us. I go blind for a few seconds.
When I can see again, there they are. I have to give it to the Shoggots. They know how to make an entrance.
The passage opens onto a wide concrete room with a metal catwalk overhead. At least twenty members of the Shoggot tribe are lined around the walls and on the walk. And they are dead-dog ugly.
Hattie and the boys pull up short. We stop behind them.
All of the Shoggots, the men and the women, are in looted designer suits. High-end stuff. But the silks and expensive wools are covered in grime and dried blood. Probably the Shoggots’ own. They’re definitely human, but they’ve been holed up down here working on their bodies for so long that at first glance they look like some peculiar flavor of Lurker. Their teeth have been filed to points. Some have split their nostrils. Others have cut off their noses or lips. Their cheeks are adorned with ritual scars and metal. Most have similar body mods on their throats, arms, or chests and many of the cuts are held open with metal hooks embedded in their skin. Some of the cuts look fresh. Others are old and infected. I see maggots in more than a few of the deeper cuts. I wish I’d quizzed Hattie on how crazy these crazies were before we came down here.
A tall Shoggot in the middle of the catwalk rests his hands on the top of the rail.
“Hattie. Lovely to see you. And you’ve brought friends.”
“Hello, Ferox. These aren’t friends. They’re travelers looking for the old Roman.”
“And what good is that old madman to anyone?”
Delon pushes his way up beside Hattie.
“If it’s a matter of payment, I have things to trade for information.”
Ferox stands up straight, scowling.
“Who was talking to you, traveler? What you want couldn’t matter less to us.”
Delon reaches into his pack and pulls out a long, thin knife.
“This is a Liston knife, once used by Robert Liston himself. Before the days of anesthetic, he was one of the most famous and fastest amputation surgeons in Europe.”
Ferox takes a step forward to get a better look at the blade. He gestures to a couple of Shoggots on the floor nearby.
“Bring it to me,” he says.
While they’re carrying it up to Ferox I get next to Delon.
“Are you stupid? Giving these psychos a knife?”
“I’m trying to make us a deal.”
Ferox takes his time looking over the Liston, holding it from different angles to see how straight it is. Moving it through the light to test its sheen. He makes a shallow cut inside one of his wrists, testing the amount of pressure needed to break the skin. He smiles and looks down at us.
“Hello, Officer,” he says. “Would you come up here, please?”
It takes a minute before anyone figures out who he’s talking to. Then Diogo takes a tentative step forward in his mall-cop shirt.