The Gender Plan (The Gender Game #6)(75)

“I’m sure she didn’t miss on purpose,” I replied, pulling out my gas mask and screwing down the filter valve until it was sealed shut. I couldn’t use it to breathe, but it would help protect my eyes and allow me to see underwater. I looked up at the volunteers and gave them a quick rundown of what we were doing and how to use the bags to protect their weapons.

“Here,” Mags said when I was finished, holding out a mesh bag with ten objects in it. I lifted them up, inspecting them closely. They weren’t really round, as I had first thought, but rather rounded out by a trick of geometry, small alternating black and white pentagon shapes. I recognized them immediately. They were wharf-markers. The white pentagons contained bulbs that would flash every few seconds to mark the path for a dockworker on days or nights when the fog on the river got too thick to see through. And they were waterproof, at least for a little while—it was a useful quality when you were working on the docks. “And here, I made sure the other men took these instead.”

She held out a pistol, this one with a silencer on it, and I quickly unwrapped mine, exchanging it with hers and then putting it into one of the bigger pockets on my pants. “Thanks,” I said, looping the strap of the bag containing the wharf-markers around my bicep. “They’re going to be coming soon. Make sure you have a team ready in the back, in case they try to flank you.”

Mags gave me an odd look and patted me on the shoulder. “We’re gonna clear out and take position in the building Alejandro’s against,” she said. “It’s not as tall as theirs, but it will give us an advantage. And the stairs are easier to control. I’ll get a second team on the roof across the street to help out, and send a few people to the next checkpoint to play watchdog. I got this, so don’t worry. And I’ll keep a close eye on Tim.”

She bent over and picked up my vest and backpack, adding them to the pile of heavy gear the rest of the swimmers had dropped. I couldn’t take the vest—none of us could—because the armor would sink me in the water. “Be careful,” she called over her shoulder as she moved back to the building.

Positioning the cinched-down gas mask atop my forehead, ready to deploy, I sat down on the edge of the manhole, dangling my feet into the water. I felt my pockets, double checking that my pistol, ammo, and comms were in place, all tucked in the waterproof bags, and then handed my rifle to Gregory, several more dangling from straps over his shoulder. It was painful having to leave my rifle behind, but given that this gang had been known to stockpile weapons, I was betting there would be plenty of larger guns for us to filch inside.

“Thirty seconds between each person,” I said to the group of swimmers. “I’ll drop a wharf-marker at every breathing spot, so you won’t miss it, but there will also be a left turn, and I will drop one there at the junction, okay?”

“Do not worry, my friend,” said a voice from behind me, and I turned to see that the first person lined up to swim with me was Cruz, crouching behind me, his gear ready to go. “We are going to be big heroes after this, no?”

I rolled my eyes and turned back to the cold water that was already trying to suck me down through my pant legs. Alejandro moved over to me and knelt next to the hole. “I’ve been meaning to ask you—where’d you pick up Cruz? He seems a bit crazy, even for how you folks operate.”

I shook my head, and my mouth began moving before I realized what I was saying. “It’s a long story, Alejandro. I miss Owen.”

Alejandro patted me on the shoulder, and then I sucked in a deep breath, lowered my mask, and slipped into the dark water.





27





Viggo





Where the hell is the damn manhole? I swung the flashlight around while desperate thoughts taunted me, screaming that I’d already swum past it, and now I was trapped, suspended in this watery tunnel until I couldn’t take it anymore and I breathed in the murky water—I felt the pressure build in my throat, my body fighting with my mind to convince it to exhale, and I applied logic to the primal fear, going through the options in my brain.

It was possible that I’d missed it. The water was dim, and in spite of the flashlight in my hand, everything down here seemed a lesson in gray. Colors were muted, shadows exaggerated. And always, just behind the light beam lurked the slow, heavy press of the darkness. It loomed, a reminder that the only thing keeping me from certain death was the flashlight I held in my hand.

And it was hard to gauge distance down here. Thomas had given only an average when we had talked about the distance, but that didn’t mean each gap had been three hundred and fifty feet exactly. Which meant I might not be as far down as I thought.

I kicked, shifting myself so that I was more on the left, so I could see the branch off to the building we were headed for. Swimming on this side, I might risk the next surface point, which was more in the middle of the tunnel... But I had to find this turn. My heart pounded hard in my chest, reminding me that oxygen was essential for life, but I was fine. Safe for just a little bit longer before I would even contemplate panicking.

Even taking painstaking care, I almost missed the turnoff. It was a narrow passage just behind a section of protruding wall, but the shadow the wall cast as I swam by it made it almost disappear. If I hadn’t looked back twice, needing to know for sure, I might have missed it entirely. I swiveled around in the water, making for the opening, my lungs feeling compressed and my motions seeming impossibly slow. Reaching into the mesh bag, I scooped out one of the few remaining wharf-markers and switched it on. The halogen lights pulsed brightly, and I dropped it just past where the wall jutted out.