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TUNNEL VISION

Pember

“Ready?” Isla said, tightening the strap around Pember’s headtorch.

He nodded, glancing up at Blake. The alpha’s face was pulled tight, worry lines creasing his brow. Patting the small bag of sample kits on his belt, he said, “I’ll see you on the other side.”

With that, he dangled his feet over the edge of the trapdoor and slowly lowered himself onto the first rung of the ancient iron ladder. It groaned beneath the ball of his foot, but somehow it held. Giving everyone the thumbs up, he slowly descended into the pit below.

Regret spiked through him almost immediately, but he only took a breath and tried to hold his nerve. It got cold quick, and his teeth were already chattering by the time he was two thirds of the way down. The lower he got, the more cramped the chute became, and soon the wall was grazing his back.

Then the dust hit him, making him cough despite his mask as centuries-old wool fibres drifted into his eyes and through the folds of the blue fabric.

It was breathtakingly unpleasant, and he had a horrifying thought that it might have the same lasting health implications as asbestos.

Pinching the bridge of his mask, he shook his head and tried to steady his thoughts.

He could do this. He could do this.

Suddenly, his boots hit the cold ground and he realised he was at the bottom. More dust swirled around his ankles, the floor coated in a powdery substance.

Wasting no time, he dropped to his haunches and ran a gloved hand around the edge of the opening.

It was small—way smaller than it looked from up above—and the tunnel was roughly fifteen feet long.

He pointed his headtorch into the narrow tunnel, groaning quietly when he saw the soles of Samantha’s feet. She only had one shoe on.

Letting out a shaky breath, he lowered himself onto his belly.

“I’m going in,” he said, pressing the button on the radio strapped to his chest.

“Received,” came Blake’s voice on the other end. Calm. Steady.

Pember swallowed, then bent his knees and pushed himself forward. The light changed immediately, his body blocking out the small amount of natural sunlight that had reached his side of the shaft. Then, it went quiet. So quiet that he couldn’t even hear the footsteps of the officers above.

Putting one hand in front of the other, he crawled on his belly through the dust and grime. The light from his headlamp cast everything in an eerie blue glow, making him shiver.

Keeping his eyes on Samantha’s feet, he eventually drew level with her ankles.

They were crossed, making her leg jut out at an awkward angle.

Then her abdomen, partially exposed under her police uniform.

No signs of trauma, but flecks of blood were splattered across her white cotton shirt.

Crawling up to her arms, he let out a soft gasp.

Reaching for his radio, he said, “Her wrists have been cable tied, and there’s—oh.”

As he lay alongside her body, his warm, hers cold, he saw that there was a black binbag next to her head. And blood. Lots of it.

“She’s face down,” he continued. “And there’s a bag. It looks like it came off her head on the way down. She—” He swallowed. “—she has a head wound. A big one next to her left temple.”

Squeezing an arm between him and Samantha, he used two fingers to brush her hair away. “Throat looks like it’s slit.”

“Received,” Blake replied. Still calm. Still steady. Which was good, because if he started comforting him, whatever mental block his brain had thrown up to stop him panicking would quickly dissolve.

It was a job.

His job.

Get in, get out. Totally fine, just another day at work. Normal. Normal. Normal. Normal.

Clenching his teeth, he rolled onto his side and unhooked the bag on his belt. He drew out the first sample kit and began swabbing her left hand and fingernails. In their position, he didn’t think he’d be able to reach her right, but was willing to try.

Reaching over her, he felt around for it. It was under her body, and as he tried to free it he realised it was pointless.

“Rigor’s set in,” he said, pressing the back of his hand between her shoulder blades. “Body’s completely cold. Not surprising, given how chilly it is down here.”

“Received,” came the Falkington officer’s voice. “Are you ready for the camera?”

Pember drew in a shallow breath. “Not yet. Just a few more swabs.”

“Pember.” Blake’s voice came over the radio. It was low, strained.

“I’m fine,” he said back, but he could not disguise the growing tremor in his words. With what little space he had, he collected as many swabs as he was able to and placed them in the narrow chute above Samantha’s head.

Twisting his head to look up, he saw Blake staring down at him from the second trapdoor.

Blake nodded, the tightness in jaw obvious.

“Okay, camera!” he called up to them, voice cracking a little. “Send a bag down and I’ll send the swabs up to you.”

Within thirty seconds a camera was lowered on a long red strap that he recognised from the water safety kits.

They did a swap, and he sighed with relief when the swabs slowly ascended the chute.

Gripping the forensic camera to his chest, he wriggled back down the tunnel and began photographing Samantha’s body.

The suit hood was beginning to chafe around his face and neck, and he was fairly certain he was drenched with sweat beneath it. The click, click, click of the flash made the tunnel light up, and Pember screwed his eyes shut for a moment to put the horror-movie-esque thoughts out of his head.

“No obvious defensive wounds,” he relayed, letting out a breath. It suggested she’d been hit in the head first, then had her throat slit. Brutal. Efficient. Cold.

But maybe not?

A head wound suggested she’d been taken down unexpectedly. The killer had little time to act, so whacked her as a means to subdue her. And why put her body here? Hidden? No spectacle. Shame?

Letting out a shallow breath, he pushed himself to the top of the tunnel, dragging his legs forward until he was able to stand up in the chute.

“Alright?” Blake finally called from the trapdoor.

“Yeah!” he called back, wiping a hand over his brow. Fuck , he was red hot, even though the ground was freezing. If he hadn’t of checked his temperature again before they left, he’d have assumed he was still in heat.

Bending down, he took several photographs of the back of her head before carefully feeling beneath her for any other wounds.

“Sorry, my girl,” he whispered, and had no idea why he was talking to her in the same way he talked to Bailey. “You’re alright. Nearly done, and we’ll get you out of here.”

When he was satisfied, he turned off the camera and stood up in the chute. “Okay! Okay, I’m done.”

Two sets of winch straps were lowered into the hole.

He looped one around Samantha’s torso, the other around her legs.

The Falkington officers lowered another down to him, his plan being to climb back up.

However, as soon as his boots touched the brickwork, the disturbed dust and wool fibres turned to a slippery paste.

“It’s no good!” he called. “Too slippy. I’ll have to come back the way I came.”

Blake was shouting something at the Falkington officers, but Pember’s mind was too focused on getting out to pick up on the words.

Bending down to face the narrow tunnel, an overwhelming sense of doom settled deep in his belly.

It was done. His task was complete. There was no goal, no more swabs, only crawling back through the hole.

So why was his body shaking uncontrollably?

Why were his teeth chattering? He’d done it once, he could do it again.

Red bricks. Dusty grime. Moving lights. A rush of hot air. “ You’ll remember me, won’t you, Pem? ”

“ Of course I will, you silly thing. You’re my sister! ”

Pember blinked, his tongue dry behind his teeth.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. I was taking her out. We were going swimming. She was leaving the house. She never left the house. The train was running late. The train.

The train.

The train.

The train.

Blake’s face reappeared at the trapdoor. “Pem? What’s wrong?”

Pember blinked rapidly, running a shaking hand through his hair. “U-um, n-nothing. Nothing. I… I’m good, I’m good, I’m good?—”

As he dropped to his knees and got ready to crawl, he realised just how little space there really was. He’d have to climb back over Samantha’s body, because they’d never be able to lift her with him still in the chute.

The primal side—the prey side—of his brain suddenly registered that there was a corpse.

A body. There was a dead fucking body right there.

Cold. Murdered. Throat slit. It wasn’t normal.

Not normal. Not normal. Not normal. Oh shit , he couldn’t do it.

He couldn’t make that crawl again. What kind of drugs had he been on?

Where the fuck did his courage go? Gone. It was all gone now. He couldn’t?—

“Pem? What’s wrong?” Blake repeated, clutching his chest as he leaned over the hole.

Pember’s eyes were glued to the tunnel. He couldn’t move. “I-I-I-I… O-oh, oh no.”

“Pem, look at me.”

Pember’s eyes flicked up to the alpha.

“I want you to press the square button on the side of your radio. It’ll switch to an open channel so you won’t have to hold the button to speak. I’m going to talk you through it, okay? Pull up your hood and mask so you don’t get any more fibres on your face.”

“R-right.” He swallowed, pulling up his hood.

“Good, now squat down and lie on your front.” So he did, trying not to think about Samantha’s corpse lying beside him. “That’s good. You’re doing really well. Push yourself forward and start moving. That’s it.”

Pember closed his eyes, skin crawling as every line of his body touched Samantha. The adrenaline must have worn off. It was the only logical explanation.

The dark. So dark, despite the torch. Cramped. Walls. Closing in. Train, coming.