In the days following their swift victory over the Raiders things at Haven once again began to quiet down. The primary focus remained on farming, but for everyone else life more or less returned to normal. July was the exception. With every passing moment he feared that Leonard was becoming a greater threat. What was Leonard telling the Royalists? What were they planning?
It was with great relief that he received word from Jodie that the weapons dealer – operating from the old metro in the city – finally wanted to meet. The weapons and ammunition were built in factories to the south and shipped across the country in secret via the metro for distribution to Anarchist and Raider territories. These same factories also happened to belong to the Nazis producing the majority of the metal sold within the Valley. The metal and weapons trade funded the Nazi campaign against the Royal-Communists.
July established a team consisting of himself, Tom, Charlie and Alister, and they set out in one of the trucks towards the abandoned city to the west. Alister explained that despite the secrecy provided from operating within the metro, living underground was unspeakably dangerous, though he didn’t bother to mention why. From July and Tom’s travels alone, including the incident they faced in the caves when they first returned to Haven, they had a pretty good idea of what kind of dangers Alister meant, and yet they could still only imagine the manner of creatures that inhabited the dark labyrinth of tunnels beneath that rotten city. Thus, traders navigated the metro in armoured caravans, never staying in one place for more than a couple of weeks.
When Jodie had first reported that the dealer wanted to meet she delivered a scrap of cardboard with an icon representing an ammo cartridge within a shield. “He gave me this,” she said, “and told me, ‘three weeks’.”
As they approached the dishevelled skeleton of the city, Alister driving, keeping to the backstreets, and Tom and Charlie consulting a map of all the metro entrances, July stared at the weapon dealer’s emblem and pondered its meaning. They passed several run-down signs bearing symbols similar to the cartridge and shield. It appeared that these emblems indicated the location of the caravan at any given time, and the message ‘three weeks’ indicated how long July had to find them before they moved on to a new location.
Alister risked driving across an open street in order to inspect one of the final metro entrances. The emblems matched. “Here,” July announced, waiting for Alister to stop the truck and then hopping out and gazing down the entry stairs as they disappeared into the darkness below. A line where the dust had been cleared away by the constant passing of feet indicated that this tunnel was frequently being used.
“This must be the place,” said Tom, whistling for Biscuit to heel.
Alister groaned. “Don’t let your guard down.” He collected a sawn-off double barrel shotgun from the back of the truck.
There was no overhead lighting in the tunnels. The group could only see using their torches. As they delved deeper, descending the stairs onto the metro platform, the light of day faded until only a subtle glow could be seen behind them. The beam of July’s torch ascended one of the platform pillars and he examined the spider webs on the ceiling. “They look like regular spider webs to you?” he asked the group.
Charlie followed his gaze. “Must be some big fucking spiders in here.”
Biscuit whined.
Alister, undisturbed by the spiders’ presence, jumped onto the train tracks. “Webs are old, can’t smell anything either, spiders haven’t been here in a long time. Look.” He shined his torch at a cardboard sign with an arrow pointing right.
“Guess we should follow it,” said July. He followed Alister onto the track.
ns 172.70.174.77da2