The Butcher of Oakhaven

Beneath the Regency

The heavy diesel motor of the Foundation supply truck roared as I forced the manual gear shift into third. Water sheets sprayed off the front tires, splashing against the high concrete walls of the Sector Seven exit ramp.

Gideon Pratt held onto the dashboard handle with both hands, his eyes wide as the truck lurched through the broken iron gates onto the main boulevard. "The utility access is three miles south. Near the old canal locks."

"We do not have time for the lock entrance," I said, wiping salt spray and rain from my face with my sleeve. "The Foundation patrols will lock down Southside within twenty minutes. We use the storm overflow grate behind the boiler building."

Pratt looked at me, his fingers turning white against the plastic trim. "The overflow tunnel has been sealed since the flood five years ago. It is five feet of stagnant water and rusted iron."

"Then we wade," I said.

The drive through the North Docks was quiet, the rain blurring the sodium streetlights into yellow streaks against the windshield. I kept the truck five miles under the speed limit, blending with the early morning freight traffic moving off the piers.

My head throbbed with a steady thrum, but the blinding retinal pain had cleared to a sharp itch behind my eye sockets. I pulled the stolen ledger from my coat pocket and dropped it onto Pratt's lap.

"Find the page for the Grand Regency," I said. "Sterling does not host keynotes without a fallback plan."

Pratt fumbled through the damp pages using the green glow of the instrument panel. His thumb stopped near the bottom of a hand written sheet.

"Here," Pratt said, holding the book closer to his face. "Building accounts for the Regency installation. He signed off on a secondary lease for the sub basement six months ago. Listed under Foundation Medical Equipment Supply."

"What is in the room?" I asked.

"It does not say," Pratt said, turning the page. "Just a dedicated power tap from the main grid and a separate freight elevator key."

I knew what was in that room. It was the same setup he had used at the North District hospital six years ago. A mobile synthesis lab to process Compound B into field doses before public distribution. He was not just holding a keynote at eight o'clock; he was launching the first live distribution under the guise of a charitable medical demonstration.

And Nia was sitting in the middle of it with a press camera.

I pulled the supply truck onto the gravel shoulder behind the abandoned Southside pumping station. The high brick facade of the Grand Regency Hotel rose three blocks away, its glass tower disappearing into the low gray clouds.

I cut the engine. The silence inside the cab was sudden, broken only by the steady drum of rain on the metal roof.

"Stay with the truck," I told Pratt.

Pratt reached into his pocket and pulled out the brass key ring he had taken from his desk. "You will need the double notched key for the sub basement service grate. The hotel maintenance staff keeps it padlocked from the inside to keep vagrants out."

I took the keys and slipped them into my coat beside the two glass vials of Compound B and the stolen nine millimeter handgun. Four rounds left in the magazine. No spare ammunition.

"If I am not back by seven thirty," I said, "take the ledger to the precinct captain in the Central District. Do not go to the media. Sterling owns the news networks."

Pratt looked at me through the dim light of the cab. "He has twenty private guards inside that hotel, Vance. You are walking into a vault with four bullets."

"I only need one for Sterling," I said.

I opened the driver door and stepped out into the pouring rain.

The access hatch behind the boiler house was covered by a heavy cast iron grate, green with moss and salt rust. I used the butt of the handgun to clear the mud from the keyhole, slotted Pratt's double notched key into the tumbler, and turned it until the iron latch popped with a dull metallic click.

Thick, cold air rushed up from the dark opening, carrying the smell of wet concrete and stagnant river water.

I lowered myself into the shaft, pulling the iron grate shut overhead until it locked back into place.

The tunnel was narrow, built a century ago out of red brick that was now slick with black algae. Water ran knee deep, pulling against my legs as I moved forward through the dark. I did not use a flashlight. I relied on the faint gray outlines of my natural vision, keeping my hand trailing along the right wall to count the junction markers.

After ten minutes of wading through the dark, the brick tunnel gave way to smooth, poured concrete. The hum of heavy building machinery echoed through the floorboards above my head.

The main boiler room of the Grand Regency.

I reached the foot of a vertical iron ladder mounted to the wall. Above it sat a square steel access hatch stamped with the hotel crest.

I held my breath, listening through the steel plate.

A high pitched hum vibrated through the metal, accompanied by the steady rhythmic clatter of automated glass bottling machinery.

Sterling’s mobile lab was active.

I set my foot on the bottom rung of the ladder, reaching up with my left hand to unlatch the hatch.

My vision flickered. A hot spike of pain drove deep into my optic nerve, and for a fraction of a second, the gray concrete around me shifted into translucent layers.

Through the steel plate above, I saw three glowing heat signatures moving back and forth across the service room. Two were static, holding long weapons near the door frame.

The third figure was standing near a stainless steel workbench, leaning over a glass apparatus.

A man in a white lab coat.

I took the nine millimeter pistol from my waist, checked the action with a soft click, and pushed the steel hatch open one inch.