Chapter 26
Tamsin
Eamon peeled off first, already turning down the narrow service corridor that led deeper into the facility. From Nox’s prior reconnaissance, we knew stocks of the drug were kept a few levels down.
Bishop took off after that.
One second, he was beside us, the next he slipped through the side stairwell that fed directly into the security control room.
If Bishop did his job right, no one was leaving this place the way they’d come in.
That left four of us together, and the deeper we went, the more I felt the weight of what we were about to do.
Not fear exactly.
Responsibility.
We passed one of the lab doors and behind it I heard voices. A man’s laugh, too relaxed. A woman explaining something in a clipped tone. The sound of paper being shuffled. Someone’s shoes scuffing against the floor.
People working.
People who went home at some point.
People who knew the truth and still chose to do what they did here.
Nox stopped at the next junction and held up two fingers, signaling that there were a pair of guards ahead. He didn’t speak, just angled his head slightly.
Elias met my eyes.
We slipped through an alternate corridor, ducking behind a pipe housing as the guards passed by the other end.
“Ashcroft wants the figures by morning.”
“…he’s here tonight, right?”
“Yeah. Dr. Voss is presenting her work this evening.”
The sound of voices faded after that.
Nox’s gaze flicked to me, a silent question in his eyes.
I nodded once.
We reached a steel door tucked behind a bank of gauges. The lock looked newer than the surrounding metal, which meant someone had upgraded it recently.
Nox crouched, worked the lock by feel, and it gave with a soft click. The door swung inward, releasing a wave of warmer air that smelled of animal musk and dried blood.
Griff’s shoulders tensed behind me. Elias’s posture went rigid.
I stepped inside first.
The room was long and low-ceilinged, lit by lanterns mounted at regular intervals. Steel cages lined both walls. Too many to count at first glance. Wolves pressed against them, pacing, snarling, and slamming their bodies into the metal with a violence that made the whole space shudder.
They were all feral.
Not the chaotic kind you ran into in the wild, scavenging and starving. These were fed. Maintained. Kept here for science and whatever other plans they had for them.
I swallowed hard.
I’d seen ferals before. I’d killed them. But seeing them here like this made my stomach turn. One of the wolves lunged at the bars as I passed, jaws snapping, froth on its lips. I didn’t flinch, but my hands tightened into fists at my sides.
Griff moved ahead, scanning. “There,” he indicated.
At the far end of the room was a glass panel and another door. A crank mechanism sat beside it, bolted into the wall, with a metal plate above it that read Containment Release—Manual Override.
My pulse kicked into overdrive.
Elias tested the door. It was unlocked. Apparently, they didn’t expect anyone who wasn’t authorized to make it this far.
We slipped inside.
The room was small, cramped, and hotter than the corridor. The crank mechanism was attached to a central shaft that disappeared into the floor.
I ran my hand over the crank handle. The metal was cold.
“You think this opens all cages?” I asked.
Griff nodded, examining the linkage. “Looks like it.”
“Good. But we lay low for a minute, and we wait. Ashcroft will make his rounds before long.”
We didn’t have to wait long.
Voices echoed from somewhere deeper in the lab. Then the sound of footsteps coming closer and closer.
Elias rolled his shoulders. “We ready?”
“We’re ready,” I said.
The footsteps grew closer, and we moved out of the field of view. I leaned my head forward just enough to see him.
Through the bars and gaps, I saw figures approaching. There were guards first, then white coats, then the man himself.
He looked immaculate even down here, his expression composed like he was touring an art gallery instead of a prison. Dr. Voss walked beside him, talking quickly, gesturing toward a door further down that led deeper into the lab.
Ashcroft nodded at something she said, barely listening, already scanning the containment room like he was proud of what he’d built. He stopped near the center of the space and looked at the ferals with faint disdain, as if their suffering bored him.
One of the wolves slammed into its bars hard enough to rattle the bolts. Ashcroft didn’t even flinch.
“Keep them agitated,” he directed calmly. “I want the council to see the effect at peak.”
I grabbed the handle with both hands.
Griff braced beside me, ready to help if the mechanism stuck. Nox stood at the doorway, watching. Elias stayed close, eyes on my hands, on my face.
“On three,” I whispered.
Elias nodded once.
“One,” I counted.
My grip tightened.
“Two.”
I could hear my heartbeat louder than the pipes.
“Three.”
The crank resisted for half a second, then the shaft engaged, and the mechanism began to move, metal groaning deep in the walls like the building was waking up. I kept turning, arms straining as the central release engaged with a heavy, rolling clunk that vibrated up into my shoulders.
Out in the corridor, iron bolts began to slide.
One.
Then another.
Then a chain reaction: gate after gate unlocking in rapid succession, the sound building into a rising chorus of metal on metal.
The ferals paused, confused for a heartbeat.
Then the corridor erupted.
“What the fuck is happening?” Ashcroft shouted, his voice laced with sudden panic.
Snarls turned into motion. Bodies slammed into opening gates. Wolves poured out, claws scraping tile, eyes wild, moving toward where voices and heat and human scent concentrated.
“Move,” Elias said.
Shouts rose. A scream cut off abruptly. Doors slammed. Boots pounded against the floor.
We slipped into another maintenance corridor, avoiding the main flow. We moved to the next junction where Eamon was meant to rejoin us. He appeared out of the shadows a minute later, breathing hard, eyes bright.
“It’s done,” he said immediately. “I found the feral drugs stocks. They’re completely destroyed. There’s no chance they’ll be able to salvage any of it.”
Relief hit me like a wave.
“And the exits?” I asked.
Bishop’s voice drifted through the corridor as he emerged from the stairwell. “They’re all sealed. Every gate except the one we came through.”
Griff exhaled slowly. “So they’re trapped.”
“Yes,” Bishop said. “They’re trapped.”
We didn’t stand there to watch. We didn’t need to.
We’d done what we came here to do.
We moved back the way we’d come, fast and quiet, slipping through the maintenance hatch as screams echoed behind us like a rising tide.
No one followed.
No one could.
When we finally emerged and the sound of London’s normal nightly hum returned, it felt almost unreal, like the city had swallowed up what we’d done and moved on without a fuss.
Griff checked my face briefly, his eyes searching mine. “You all right, Tam?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
We moved back into the city streets, leaving the lab and the horrors it contained behind.
As we walked, I let myself believe one thing: Ashcroft wouldn’t be walking out of there. In fact, none of them would.
And I was perfectly fine with that.