Hearing a metallic rattle and cringing at its volume, I turned the way we headed to the temporary fencing around the construction compound. Tall lamps climbed into the air from generators at their base, but they lay silent, producing no power to glow through the lights at the top and leaving us only with the eerie white illumination from the moon.
Cassie slipped the chain wrapped around the gates, sliding them open.
Shrugging off why there was no lock, I pushed away the nagging feeling it was too easy to get inside the compound. Taking a step, my foot knocked against something in the mud and I turned down to see the brass bullet casings scattered across the ground.
Rushing past Alex, I joined at Cassie’s side just as Shadow came level and I scanned the rifle around the view. In amongst the yellow construction vehicles and shipping containers were grey temporary buildings, which we ignored, instead staring at the raised ring of concrete in the centre of the site surrounded by another fence.
Creeping forward, the ring with a dark centre was as wide as the length of a long van. Slowing our pace, we edged towards the strange structure and what seemed to be the focus of the construction.
With a break in the inner fence line, not barred with a gate, it led to scaffolding, the only object taking up space inside the concrete ring. As we edged closer, I saw scaffolding steps at the side, leading down through the shaft.
Sharing a look with Cassie and Alex, I was surprised when Cassie leaned over the edge before turning back towards us.
“There’s light coming from down there,” she said, raising an eyebrow.
It seemed obvious enough from Thompson's short words; this was where we needed to go. Cassie must have thought the same, as without pause she hurried on down the steps and I followed her lead, as did Alex behind.
Taking hold of the cold metal uprights, I stopped to lean over the edge and peer at the soft glowing light above two arched openings opposite each other, around ten storeys down the shaft.
We lingered for a moment, still taking in the view, but when Shadow pushed past my legs, we followed his way down, turning around level after level. I glanced up as we descended, but saw no one peering over the edge.
Shadow arrived at the lowest level first. With his nose in the air and his tongue lolling out of his mouth, he stood on the fresh concrete floor, not looking to us or waiting for anyone to arrive by his side before he headed through the archway to the left and out of sight.
I called his name in a stage whisper, but he’d gone before the echo died.
Cassie arrived at the concrete soon after with Alex and me following at her back.
The archways were formed into the shaft wall, one roughly facing the direction of the fort and the other the opposite way. Turning back to the arch to our left, I saw Cassie heading in Shadow’s wake.
“Wait,” I called, keeping my voice light and, with surprise, she stopped before entering the tunnel, turning back with her eyes wide and face as pale as the moon as if scared and excited at the same time.
With Alex at my side, I pointed the rifle down each of the doorways.
“Which way?” I whispered.
“This way,” Cassie said, pointing the way she’d been about to head. “It takes us closer to the fort, I guess.”
It was as good a reason as any and I nodded.
“Why are there no soldiers here?” Alex asked.
I stood tall. She was right. We knew from what Thompson had said that this was at least in part a military complex, or would be when they’d finished building it. We’d seen the soldiers out on patrol, just as Thompson had said. So why hadn’t we seen any guarding this place? Could it be this lightly guarded, or were the scattered bullet casings above a sign of what had happened?
Perhaps there were none of them left. Maybe they’d all been bitten. Had they all turned and left their posts?
“We haven’t got time to think about that,” Cassie said, but from her look and Alex’s too, I guessed they’d come to the same conclusion.
The sound of metal hitting against metal echoed from the corridor ahead and before we could question what to do next, Cassie moved off and we followed.
“We need to find Shadow,” I whispered at Cassie’s back, and looked to Alex nodding at my side as I tried to keep my footsteps light to dampen their echo.
The smell of fresh paint and concrete dust filled the air as the tunnel headed on with building materials and tools lining the rounded walls. Evenly spaced lights glowed from the ceiling and the tunnel soon split with routes going left, right and straight on to the sound of Shadow’s claws echoing on the concrete.
At the junction, I looked left and right, despite Cassie not pausing and heading straight on. With what I thought was the sound of Shadow’s claws on the concrete floor, I looked again to the left, now certain I’d seen his tail disappear around a corner.
“Stay with her,” I said, looking to Alex for a moment before jogging down the left corridor.
Arriving at the bend where I thought I’d seen Shadow, the corridor continued on after the slow turn, with doorways to the right; none of which had doors, but metal frames and fittings as if they were yet to be installed.
I heard voices, two men in light conversation. I edged forward and looked through the shallow angle
