Chapter 5 - The Hunt in the Steam Tunnels
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“Go!” Leah forced herself to her feet, clutching the newborn against her chest with one arm while gripping the rusted handrail with the other. The pain of her torn tissues was blinding, but the adrenaline of sheer survival overrode every nerve ending in her body.
Mae shoved open a heavy, dented metal door labeled BOILER ROOM 3 - AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. Inside, the air was thick with the suffocating smell of coal dust, hot iron, and boiling water. Massive steel pipes hissed overhead, vibrating with the pulse of the hospital’s heating system.
“Through here!” Mae pointed toward a low, square aperture near the base of the brick wall where an old coal chute had been sealed off with rusted corrugated tin.
With a frantic wrench, Mae pulled the tin sheet away, revealing a dark, brick-lined tunnel that sloped downward into absolute blackness. A draft of cool, damp air drifted up from the depths, carrying the distant scent of the city’s underground storm drains.
“Enter first,” Mae urged, shining her penlight into the opening. “Crawl on your hands and knees. Keep the baby’s face pressed against your chest so the dust doesn’t get into his lungs.”
Leah didn’t hesitate. She dropped to her knees, wincing as the sharp gravel of the tunnel floor bit into her skin, and crawled into the dark, clutching her newborn like a fragile jewel. Mae slid in right behind her, pulling a stray piece of canvas over the opening to mask the aperture just as the heavy iron door of the boiler room was blown open with a crash.
“Check the steam lines!” a gruff, unfamiliar voice echoed across the concrete floor. It was Greg. “Doreen wants this sweep completed before the morning shift arrives. If that bitch is down here, she’s freezing without shoes.”
Leah pressed her face into the damp earth of the tunnel, holding her breath. Her newborn stirred against her chest, letting out a tiny, high-pitched squeak that sounded to Leah’s hyper-sensitive ears like a siren wailing in the night.
She clamped her hand gently over the baby’s mouth, tears streaming down her cheeks as she whispered soundlessly into his hair. I’m sorry. Please, baby, don't make a sound.
Footsteps crunched on the coal dust just feet away from the sealed chute. The beam of a heavy-duty flashlight swept across the exterior of the tin sheet, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the air.
“Nothing here except old boilers,” a second voice muttered.
“Check the drainage grate by the laundry exit,” Greg barked back. “She couldn’t have gone far. She doesn't even have shoes on.”
The footsteps retreated, the heavy iron door swinging shut with a dull clang.
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Leah exhaled a breath she felt she had been holding for an eternity. Her whole body shook uncontrollably, a mixture of postpartum shock, blood loss, and sheer terror.
“They’re gone for now,” Mae whispered from the darkness behind her. “Keep moving. The tunnel branches in fifty yards. We need to take the left fork toward the old subway maintenance exit.”
