Page 16
Story: Seeing Red (The Codex #1)
The tunnel swallows the light from outside. It extends on for miles into the ground, and my head spins, flinching at the tiniest sounds. Water drips and scuffs of feet on dirt make me punch the air. No, it was just my own.
I swear I can hear more in these tunnels—something in here, breathing, alive, watching. The hairs on my neck stand and even when I try to tell myself it’s the brain’s reaction to the quiet, I keep instinctively reaching for a gun I don’t have every time I think I hear someone laughing in the dark.
They could be gone already…
Or they could be watching me with sadistic satisfaction as I walk to my death.
Shut up. You’re not going to die. A bomb couldn’t kill you, a couple of terrorists is nothing. Find them. Kill them.
I crack my glowstick, and the dark tunnels come to life in a bright red hue. It’s faint, only allowing me to see the pitch black in front of me.
At least I can see my feet now.
The frigid walls freeze my hand and goosebumps prickle along my arms as I venture further inside. Soon, a sour smell fills my nostrils, and I cover my mouth just in time to stop myself from vomiting. A gas mine.
Great.
I stumble forward, moving blindly within the caves until I see the tiniest dot of light shining ahead. It’s a tiny pinprick, like holes stuck in a box to let air through, but as I move closer, the light gets bigger, reflecting brightly off of the metal at the end of the tunnel.
The mine converges around the metal globe and the glass ceiling reflects more than just the bright fluorescent lights as the sun beams between the clouds.
A voice makes me jump and I shrink against the tunnel wall.
“Should’ve brought a fucking camera with me,” Baron muses. “That’s not a sight you see every day.” He’s resting carefully on top of a large crate, his toes barely touching the ground as he calmly cleans his gun.
Castor stands nearby, eyes carefully watching him as he leans against a small office between two tunnels.
“Good way to get caught when you keep torture porn on your phone,” he grumbles.
“I’d love to see them try,” Baron adds, aiming his gun. “Seems people can’t stay away from us even when it gets their head blown off.”
Castor shakes his head in disapproval, before pulling a silver flip phone from his pocket. He offers nothing more than a glance towards Baron before his rifle is slung over his back and they disappear down the forked tunnels.
A rock settles deep in my chest. I didn’t think this through. I should’ve gone back for my gun or searched the cabin for one. Now, I finally have the two terrorists responsible for my thousands of deaths cornered in the mines, and I have no weapon and no plan.
Way to go, Helena.
I stay to the shadows, moving from one spot to the other until I step inside the tunnels. My movements are quieter, but even the soft sounds of my feet sweeping across the dirty concrete makes me flinch.
Find a weapon, first, then kill them.
I keep a slow pace, just enough to hear their faint voices echoing down the stone tunnels while I glance in the empty rooms I pass.
A shiver runs down my spine when my shoe scuffs, an echo reverberating through the walls. I freeze, waiting for their footsteps to return, but slowly, the echo dies out, and so do their voices.
Focus.
The next room is different. Where the others were empty and covered in layers of dust, this room is warmer, lived in. A small bed rests against the wall, made neatly with a single blanket and pillow draped over the wooden bedframe. A small matching dresser rests on the opposite wall, filled with clothes and supplies.
But no weapon.
I groan. There’s no fucking way two men managed to kill fifty people with a single gun.
My eyes fall on some papers hidden in the back of a drawer.
The stolen files.
I hadn’t paid any attention to the intel stolen from the two men in the storm. Survival has a funny way of showing someone’s priorities and the only thought coursing through my head was to eradicate the Codex before they have a chance to kill me or Bane. Government secrets weren’t on my agenda at the time.
I rifle through the appears, words scribbled in German but no military files.
Then another paper slips from my grip, drifting onto the dresser. It’s a photo, four people standing on the deck of a small farmhouse. The woman is young and vibrant, her smile bright and happy as her arms wrap around the small child in front of her. The man next to her is bigger, his hair dark, contrasting to her and the child’s bright blonde hair. His smile is worn, his eyes crinkled in captured laughter at the young boy’s goofy pose as he clings to the last figure’s leg. The last man is tall, his hair thick and curly, shaved at the sides. His arm hugs the woman, but body is distorted. The rest of the picture is smooth and carefully handled, but the man is different. Cutting him out of the photo wasn’t even. He is scratched out, clawed from the picture until he’s completely unrecognizable.
The hairs on my neck stand and that feeling comes back along with a tightness in my muscles that want to spring me into a sprint.
I’m being watched.
Before I can move, a knife points to my back and a gruff voice growls in my ear.
“Drop it.”
Table of Contents
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 4
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- Page 7
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- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 16 (Reading here)
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 29
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- Page 37
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- Page 39
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- Page 51
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- Page 53
- Page 54