“What?” Jack whispered. He stepped closer to Rosemary, and the others all turned to look at the old woman. Their eyes were wide in the darkness, glittering with strange yellow light. “Rosemary, what?”
“Dogs,” Lucy-Anne whispered.
“Yes,” Rosemary said. “I met them on the way out, but they were much further back, just beneath the Exclusion Zone.”
“And?” Jack asked.
“They're wild, Jack. From London. There are packs in there, big packs.”
“We've heard about them,” Jenna said. All of them had drawn close, subconsciously shielding Emily from whatever danger approached.
“Some of them went down beneath the city,” Rosemary said. “The Tube, tunnels, sewers. Dog, and…”
“Other things,” Jenna finished for her.
Rosemary nodded. Lucy-Anne knew what “other things” meant, because they'd had a series of reports left in the drops close to Camp Truth a few months before. Much could be put down to hearsay and exaggeration, they'd agreed, but it also seemed likely that some of what they read was true. Alligators, snakes, poisonous frogs, deadly spiders, and even a pride of lions, all of them escaped from various zoos and private collections in and around London following Doomsday.
But dogs…
“I dreamed this,” she whispered, and she was aware of Jack's torch shifting as he turned to look at her.
Another growl came, much closer than before, and there seemed to be cunning there, and purpose.
Jack stepped in front of Emily, a four inch folding knife in his hand. Jenna also shielded the girl, and Sparky already had a knife in each hand, torch tucked in his back pocket.
“How many were there?” Jack asked the old woman.
“Five,” Lucy-Anne said.
“Yes,” Rosemary said, surprised. “But I think I broke one of their legs.”
“Four's still enough,” Sparky said. “Shit. Shit! Why didn't you tell us?”
“Would you still have come?” Rosemary asked.
“Yes!” Sparky and Jack spoke at the same time, and the woman looked down at her feet.
No, Lucy-Anne thought, and when she blinked she saw a flash of her dream, a dog snarling with her own meat hanging from its teeth—
—and when she looked again, the growl was real.
The first dog emerged from the tunnel into the large basement, dodging their torch beams, darting from column to column as it came for them.
News from London is contradictory and confusing. Official sources talk of at least nine separate terrorist attacks, including explosions at the London Eye, the Houses of Parliament, London Bridge, Leicester Square, and Buckingham Palace. A source at Scotland Yard has said that several terrorist cells are being actively pursued through London, and that more attacks are feared. There is still no clear news of which chemical or biological agent has been deployed. Eyewitness accounts tell of military roadblocks, bulldozers piling bodies in public parks, and execution-style shootings to contain certain areas of the population. Whatever is true, it's certain that this is a tragedy of extreme magnitude, and CNN will, of course, be broadcasting throughout the day to bring you updates as and when they become available.
—CNN: Tragedy in London, 12:42 p.m. EST, July 28, 2019
Sparky crouched down low, a knife held in each hand, relying on the light from everyone else's torches to give him sight. Jack stood beside him to the left, but Sparky took a step forward, insisting that he be the first.
Jack had once seen his friend get into a fight with someone twice his age and a foot taller than him. The man had stormed in with fists waving and a shit-eating grin, catching Sparky one on the chin. Sparky had staggered back, ducked down, kicked him in the nuts, and when the guy fell over Sparky put the boot in. Thirty seconds later the man was out cold.
Sparky was not one to mess with, and he'd never been afraid of the sight of his own blood. Jack knew what Sparky's brother had become, and sometimes, like now, his friend actually scared him.