Read Tunnels 06 - Terminal for Free Online Page B

with a different feel to it. There were no shops here, but rather austere terraces of five-storey buildings, many of which appeared to be offices or government departments from the engraved brass nameplates at their entrances.
    As Will and Elliott progressed down yet another of theseunremarkable streets, they both heard the tapping sound. The rhythm wasn’t regular, but as they drew to a halt and listened, it didn’t let up. In this eerie place, it was more than enough to put them on their guard.
    As Elliott pointed up ahead, Will acknowledged with a single nod of the head. She was right that the sound seemed to be coming from their side of the street, although it was difficult to pinpoint precisely where as it reverberated off the buildings opposite. As Elliott silently cocked her rifle, edging cautiously along the pavement, Will kept his distance, his hands tight around his Sten.
    Elliott reached the second-to-last building of the terrace, then crouched and brought her rifle up. Discarding his Bergen, Will had stepped off the pavement and into the road, where he was using the discarded vehicles as cover, all the time keeping an eye on the facade of the building. He realised how efficiently he and Elliott worked together; there was no need for them to speak as each knew instinctively what the other was going to do in any given situation. The first time Will had witnessed that level of empathy was as he’d watched Elliott and Drake out on patrol in the Deeps. Will suddenly thought of their friend, who had to have perished when the nuclear device exploded, and the pang of grief was so intense that it made him take a sharp breath.
    As Elliott heard it and turned towards him, Will avoided her gaze. He took up position at the front of a car, then concentrated on the upper windows of the buildings where the sound seemed to be originating.
    There was no sign of anybody there, but the tapping didn’t let up.
    Just as Will expected her to, Elliott now moved from thepavement, stepping slowly backwards as she trained her scope on each window in turn. Will was covering her with his Sten when, all of a sudden, she stopped and gave a small chuckle.
    ‘What is it? What can you see?’ Will whispered.
    ‘Top floor, two windows in,’ she replied.
    Squinting, Will located the sash window, then spotted the movement through the open section at the top. At that height the faintest of breezes was enough to ruffle the blind drawn halfway down the window. And it was the pull cord on the bottom of this blind which was swinging repeatedly against the window pane below. As Will watched, there was no doubt that it was the source of the tapping.
    ‘False alarm,’ he said. ‘It’s only the wind.’
    They both relaxed and straightened up.
    ‘We’re seeing ghosts,’ Elliott said, as she ejected the round from the breech of her rifle to make it safe.
    ‘Well, what do you expect?’ Will replied with a shrug. ‘This place is enough to make anyone freak. They’re all dead – the New Germanians, the Styx, even the bushmen back in the jungle. All of them.’ He glanced disconsolately up at all the ranks of dusty windows, then at the Sten in his hands. ‘I don’t know why we’re even bothering to bring weapons with us. There isn’t a single animal left that can hurt us. Apart from the fish, birds and the bloody flies, we’re all there is.’
    Elliott cried out, but Will didn’t catch what she’d said.
    ‘What is it?’ Will gasped, only now noticing that she’d moved to the end of the street. He lost his hat as he broke into a run to catch up with her.
    As he reached her at the corner, the huge plaza opened up before him, in its centre the government building constructed in the form of a colossal arch. He’d spotted the top of the archon a previous expedition into the city, but had never been this close to it before.
    In the roads that bordered and intersected the plaza, there were numerous crashed cars and lorries, while others had