mud, then removed the lens cap and turned the camera up toward the light. I could see specks of dirt all across the green-tinted lens, countless dots of black, marring my precision optics. I let out a deep sigh and replaced the lens cap. There was no way I was going to try to clean my good glass with a dirty shirt. I had a cleaning kit upstairs. I’d give it a good working over tonight, before I went to bed.
After I finished inspecting the camera, I turned on the viewscreen and flipped back through the pictures I’d taken in the tunnel. Most of them were worthless. They were blurred, out of focus, or showed nothing but deep brown dirt. The pictures of the junction box, while technically fine, were incredibly boring; they were nothing but industrial detail with absolutely no hint of mystery or art. And the pictures of Floyd in the hub were too dark, his pale face floating in a sea of black, staring off into even more black. He could have been standing in any dark room, cave, or midnight forest.
I zoomed in on the last couple of shots, trying to figure out what he’d seen in those brief camera flashes, but the pictures showed nothing new—just his face, contorted in sudden horror.
I shook my head and scrolled back to a picture of the junction box. “Do you know what this is?” I asked Charlie, holding up the camera for him to see.
Charlie glanced up from his notebook. His eyes swam for a couple of seconds—out of focus, as if he’d just surfaced from a dream—before he finally managed to lock in on the camera. He took it from my hand and studied the image. “It’s a networking hub.” He found the navigation buttons and began zooming in on different parts of the picture. “I don’t recognize the product number. PDL-0001A—I’m not sure what company that would be. It certainly doesn’t look like a consumer model.”
“What does it do?” I asked. “What would somebody use it for?”
Charlie shrugged. “Standard stuff. Connecting computers in a network.” He held up the camera and pointed at the image. “Those wires are heavy-duty coax, so this setup could potentially cover quite a bit of ground. And the LEDs on top? Each indicates a live connection—a computer, another hub, a printer—so there are at least eight nodes on this network. Possibly more if they’ve chained together additional hubs.”
“Would it work for audio? Voice traffic?”
“Sure. You could send pretty much anything down this type of line. As long as it’s digitized.”
I nodded. I’d already guessed at most of these answers; it was all pretty standard stuff. It was this next bit I really wanted to know: “Let’s say you were able to get your hands on one of these lines, in the middle of a network. Would you be able to listen in? Would you be able to hear what’s going down the wire?”
Charlie paused, a concerned look on his face. “Yeah. At least theoretically, you’d be able to sniff out all of the information flowing over the network. You might not be able to understand it if it’s encrypted, but you’d be able to get it.”
I nodded and smiled.
“What is this, Dean?” Charlie asked, moving uncomfortably in his seat. “Is this part of the military’s setup here in the city? Did you take this picture at the courthouse?”
For a moment, I was tempted to tell him the truth. I was tempted to tell him all about Devon’s radio, and the tunnels, and the network hidden beneath the city. But finally I decided against it. He had enough to worry about. Besides, I wanted Taylor to hear it first. When it came to this house, and the people in it, she was in charge. She would know what to do.
“It’s nothing to worry about,” I lied, forcing a smile onto my lips. “There’s abandoned computer shit all over the city. I was just wondering what it might be worth back home.”
Charlie managed a surprised flurry of blinks. Then he offered up a sly smile. “Hell, if that’s your scam, don’t waste your time with
There was a wide, boyish grin on his face as he got back to work. It was good to see him smile. For a time, at least, he actually looked his age.
Taylor and Danny showed up a little after sunset, carrying a cardboard box filled with booze. Bottles of Wild Turkey and Bombay Sapphire.
“Some guys in my unit went AWOL for a couple of days,” Danny explained, flashing a lopsided grin. “I covered for them, and they were so grateful, they brought me back some gifts. I thought I’d share the spoils.”
We built a fire in the living room and sat around drinking bourbon and gin out of mismatched glasses. Amanda and Mac joined us, but Charlie stayed in the kitchen, finishing up work on the thumb drive.
“Where’s everyone else?” Taylor asked.
“Sabine’s with Mama Cass,” Amanda said. “I think they’re working on something. Some type of project.”
“And Floyd’s upstairs, brooding,” I added. “As for Devon …” I just shrugged. For all I knew, the tunnel had swallowed Devon whole.
I stared down at the bourbon in my glass. It glowed gold in the firelight, shining like liquid honey. Those first few sips had hit me hard, heightening the effects of the oxycodone in my blood. I flexed my hand and felt the skin tighten around my wounds. The pain was still there, but distant, a tickle up and down the length of my forearm. Distant, as if I were experiencing a wound on someone else’s body.
I glanced up and caught Amanda midsentence: “—so hard. I thought he was dead for sure!”
“Yeah,” Danny said. “Fucker’s lucky to be alive. He fell three stories and walked away with nothing but a bad bruise and a sprained foot.” Danny paused, and a thoughtful look came across his face. “Of course, he hasn’t said anything yet, and we can’t figure out what happened. He’s in some type of … waking coma. The medics have to keep him sedated all the time; otherwise he tries to get up and walk away. It’s like that’s the only thing he knows how to do anymore. Walk. Like that’s the only thing left in his head.”
I shivered, remembering how it had looked: the soldier plummeting from the hospital window, hitting the ground hard, then getting up and lurching away.
“They aren’t planning any more expeditions into the hospital,” Danny said, shaking his head. “Everyone’s frustrated. We aren’t getting anywhere, running into walls and cliff faces everywhere we turn. And we have no idea what to do next.” After a moment of thoughtful silence, he raised his glass and smiled. “Let’s drink to the military —science and religion, but with guns!”
Amanda laughed. “Hear, hear!” she said, raising her glass.
I took a small sip from my drink. I was already feeling tipsy, and if I wanted to stay conscious, I knew I’d have to take it easy.
Taylor scooted over to my side and clinked her glass against mine. She smiled at me. It was a warm smile, but there was a hint of a question in her steepled brow. “So tell me,” she said, keeping her voice low. “What happened with Floyd? Why’s he brooding?”
Before answering her question, I cast a quick glance around the room. Amanda, Mac, and Danny had moved closer to the fireplace; they were warming their hands and laughing, their voices rich and loud in the first flush of intoxication. Charlie was still in the kitchen. For the moment, Taylor and I had a certain amount of privacy. We’d found our own little world here, seated at the foot of the sofa.
“We followed Devon across the street,” I said, glancing over toward the living-room window. Right now, the window was nothing but a dark square blacked out by the night, but I remembered the view from across the street. Standing at his perch, Devon would have a clear view of our conversation. “He’s been spying on us, spying on the house. With binoculars.” I didn’t mention the radio. “But that’s not what bothered Floyd … We found something over there, under the house. Tunnels.”
Taylor nodded. There was concern on her face but no surprise. She skated right over the part about Devon’s spying, making me think she already knew, or at least suspected. “What did Floyd see?” she asked instead. “What did he see down there?”
The question caught me off guard. I’d been expecting questions, but nothing that direct. “I don’t know,” I said when I once again found my voice. “He wouldn’t tell me.”
She read the confusion on my face and patted me on the forearm. “That’s just what happens,” she said. “That’s what the city does. To each of us.”
She nodded toward my drink and smiled coyly. “Now drink up. Tomorrow we can worry. Tomorrow we can
