A pulling engine and several cars lay overturned and broken inside the tube trench. The cargo had been jettisoned by looters—or survivors, depending on when the action had taken place—and covered the ground. There wasn’t much use for electronic equipment after the invasion. Food and medicine had become everything.
Just as it was in the redoubt, he reminded himself grimly.
“We’re not going to stand out here all night, are we, mate?” Nathan asked.
Simon waited a beat more, scanning the area one more time. “No.”
“So which do you least want to run into?” Nathan asked. “Templar from the Underground? Or demons? I mean, if we get busted by the Templar, there’s all that embarrassment to factor in.”
“I want to get in and out quietly,” Simon replied. “No muss, no fuss. I just hope the supplies are still there and in good shape.” He waited just a moment more, then gave the order to close in. Once they were moving, some of the indecision and worry went away.
Long, quiet minutes passed as they sifted through the wreckage inside the tube station and cleared the underground section. They used their armored hands like miniature steam shovels to dig through the wreckage. Once they had the way cleared, they crept deeper into the tunnel. Simon shoved buttoncams into the walls and ceiling at regular intervals. He linked them to the HUDs of the team and used them to mark the distance.
Five hundred seventeen yards into the tunnel, Simon turned to the wall and scanned the surface. Neon-bright graffiti stood out on the concrete. A broken skeleton lay at the bottom. Another was scattered across the tracks.
“Let’s put up a Node there,” Simon said, indicating a tube section fifty yards away. “That should give us breathing room enough. And I want buttoncams, heat sensor, and motion detectors a hundred yards farther on from that.”
The team moved into position and started working. The security alarms were in place before the Node generators were. They’d gotten faster at implementing them.
When everything was in place, Simon turned his attention back to the wall.
“Doesn’t look like anyone’s been this way in some time, mate,” Nathan said.
“No.” Simon struck the slab surface with an armored fist. Concrete plugs concealing bolts shattered and fell out of the holes. “This supply dump was set up as an auxiliary. A way station for anyone that got locked outside the main areas. Or if the main areas were lost.”
“So what kind of swag are we hoping to find?”
Simon had the suit form and ID Spike and rammed it into the six bolts. Trying to get at the hidden door without properly releasing them would trigger an explosion that would destroy everything within.
“Dry goods. Cereals. Powered milk. Powdered eggs.”
“Any chance of those little sausage tins?” Nathan asked. “I’ve missed those.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers,” Danielle told him. “You may just have to forgo that pleasure a little longer.”
Once the ID Spike recognized Simon as a member of a Templar House, the bolts released. He grabbed hold of the wall section and pulled it away. A gleaming security door lay beneath. The steel oblong looked like a submarine hatch.
“How did you know about this storage facility?” Nathan asked.
“My father made me memorize the locations of all of them,” Simon said. “At least, he tried. He knew them, all of the lords did, but I could never remember them all.”
“Good thing you remembered this one. We’ve got meat and water to last for a time, but the dry goods will help.”
Simon agreed. They’d still been taking deer, but he feared they’d already overhunted the area and that the herd might not recover. That didn’t agree with the conservation the Templar taught.
“But I’d kill for some cheese, mate. And a bottle of wine.”
The door unlocked with a series of rapid-fire clicks. An automated voice sounded inside Simon’s HUD.
“Welcome, Lord Templar.”
Simon pulled and the heavy door opened on a sheen of frictionless metal liquid. Lights dawned inside the hallway. He stepped inside.
Danielle grabbed his shoulder and halted him. “This isn’t the only way in and out, is it?”
“It’s a Templar storage facility,” Simon said. “There are two ways out once we’re inside.”
“Oh. Okay. I was just checking. How big is this place?”
“Two stories.”
“There should be quite a lot of supplies in here.”
“If no one’s gotten to them—”
“Which I doubt,” Nathan said. “Going by the shape of the concrete wall.”
“—there should be enough to help us for months,” Simon finished. He strode down the hallway.
“Then why haven’t we come here before?” Danielle asked.
“I didn’t want to take anything from the Templar.”
“We’re the bloody Templar, mate.” Nathan slapped the wall. The metal-on-metal contact reverberated through the hallway. “Not those people still in hiding.”
“Not all of them want to hide,” Danielle said.
“So far,” Simon said, “we’ve been able to work things out for ourselves. We haven’t asked for anything.”
“We’re not asking now,” Nathan said.
“And we haven’t taken anything that we haven’t earned, either,” Simon went on.
“Sometimes, mate, you play it too straight and narrow. If my father had been a lord of a House so that I knew about a place like this, we’d already have been here.”
“Simon’s right,” Danielle said. “If we’d taken this straightaway, Booth and some of the others would have had cows over it. They’d have reduced what we’re doing to thievery, not survival.”
“It’s not thievery or survival,” Simon said. “It’s taking care of the innocents that rely on us. We’re not going to break that faith.”
He stopped at another door, fed it his ID, and opened it. Beyond a two-story vault sat filled with packaged cereals, powered milk, powdered eggs, pastas, and canned goods.
“Bloody brill,” Nathan whispered, and the relief in his voice sounded strong. “We need bigger lorries, mate.”
Simon hated stringing the Templar out on a supply line, but trying to move everything together would have taken far too long. They were already
