The Getaway God (Sandman Slim 6)

“Watch your language,” says Wells. “What do you see?”

“I think it’s a light switch. And wires. There’s power in there.”

“Who has functioning night vision?” Wells shouts.

A few seconds later a marshal comes over and hands Wells a set of goggles. He puts them on. I try to see past him into the dark.

“You’re not going in there alone, are you? I just said there might be Diggers around.”

“No,” he says. “You’re coming with me. If you’re that het up about it, you can go first.”

A marshal hands me a set of goggles.

“Thanks. But you can go in first. I have this thing about getting my head bitten off.”

I reload the Colt and put on the goggles. The world goes green and flat and very bright.

“You ready?” says Wells.

“Hell no.”

Wells gets down on his knees. The hole is only waist-­high, like something crawled out of it. He goes through and I follow. The bite on my neck hurts like hell. The last time I got bit by a dead man bad things happened. Like I almost went zombie. This time I’m going to see Allegra before anything interesting happens.

The inside of the cave is extremely nondramatic in the sense that nothing comes out of the shadows to eat our faces. Wells finds the light switch and turns it on. The cave fills with light and we take our goggles off.

He was right. The subway line runs right next to one of the old walking-­dead tunnels. The area where we’re standing is about fifty feet across and stretches into darkness at both ends. The walls are hacked out of raw stone. The lighting fixtures are made of human bones. Skulls and other bones are cemented together on the walls,

making elaborate shapes. Thirteen of them. Angra sigils, I’m guessing.

There are a ­couple of hospital gurneys on one side of the room along with the same kind of gory surgical scene like we saw at the hospital. Only this one is old. The blood on the instruments and ground is dry and dusty. The body parts are shriveled and so far gone they don’t even smell bad.

“Still think I’m Saint Nick?” I say.

“Odds are you’re not.”

“What would be my motive?”

Wells looks around the tunnel.

“You’re insane. The pressure of the Angra threat has pushed you over the edge, so you’re acting out your murderous Hell fantasies.”

“The Shonin doesn’t think I’m Saint Nick.”

“He doesn’t know you like I do.”

“I’m a bastard. I’m not insane. There’s a difference.”

“We’ll see.”

“Sir?”

It’s Sola’s voice.

“Is everything all right?”

“Send in the forensics team. I want this place examined down to the micron. Record the scene, then bag every single piece of evidence and bring it back with us.”

“Yes, sir.”