The Man Who Crossed Worlds (Miles Franco #1)

Chapter Seven

I think I must have passed out for a while, because when I came to the rain was easing and the first fingers of light were spreading over the horizon, like God reaching over Bluegate to crush the last of the life out of it.

My arms were still bound. I tried to reach into my pockets before I remembered Ugly had taken my knife. I glanced back at the strip club, but even the bouncer was gone now. It was just me, alone, in the damp parking lot. I tried to get to my feet, but the world spun and I stumbled back down again.

It was hopeless. I had fucked up. I had really fucked up. For a moment I was filled with rage, rage at the cops, at Todd for his dumbass plan to talk to Peterson. But I was too tired and sore, and the anger quickly burned out. It had been me who’d stumbled around like the drunkest man at the party, picking fights and saying dumb things.

It wasn’t like this was my fight, not really. This sort of shit was what the cops were for. They got money, they got guns, they got support. Me, I was just their damn dog.

John Andrews had been scared of the cops. Maybe I should be too. Screw this Chroma rubbish. So what if there was another drug out there? Bluegate was a goddamn graveyard already, full of the skeletons of abandoned buildings. Maybe it’d be kinder to let it die.

Not for the innocent ones, a little voice whispered. Not for people like Tania. My job led me to see the bad side of Bluegate, but that wasn’t all there was to it.

Not that it mattered now. I’d failed. Andrews knew something about Chroma, but I hadn’t even been close to getting it out of him. I supposed I should be thankful I got out of there alive, but given the way my ribs ached, I wasn’t exactly in a grateful mood.

Part of me was tempted to lie here. I could barely think, I could barely move. Hell, the smart thing to do was sit tight and wait until the pain went away. If that meant the big sleep, then so be it.

But I couldn’t. I wasn’t finished yet. I couldn’t wait here for John Andrews and his gangsters to come out and finish me off. I’d tempted fate enough tonight.

I said before that a Pin Hole needed Kemia to operate. That’s not entirely true. Kemia is a powerful catalyst, but it is possible to open a Pin Hole without any. Trouble is, it’ll be weak, and it won’t last long before collapsing again. If I was much further from the Bore, it would be totally impossible, but I was close enough to see the blue light peeking between the buildings alongside the river, and I thought I could just manage something.

Making a Pin Hole isn’t hard once you’ve got the hang of it, at least not the physical construction of it. The coins in my pocket—the ones I’d had to hassle the cops to get back—all had premade Pin Holes scratched into their surface, but nothing that would help me now. Scratching the circle into stone or metal works best, but you can draw the circle using chalk or viscous fluid in a pinch.

I used my blood. It seemed poetic. And there was certainly an abundance of it trickling down my fingers, ready to use.

Just as each Tunnel has to be specially constructed for the people using it, each Pin Hole is designed to serve a certain purpose. It’s not really about memorizing the right design to use, it’s about crafting each component of the circle with a specific intention. Like the old cliché goes, it’s an art.

I may be broke and prone to getting the shit kicked out of me, but I’m a damn good Tunneler. I applied for a job at Immigration when I first left university, with my brand-new Tunneler’s license ready to be framed and nailed to the wall. I got through every interview, every shortlist.

Sure, I got turned down by Human Resources at the last minute, but it was probably just because all my competitors were so well dressed it looked like they’d even ironed their hair, while I showed up smelling of whiskey and wearing a trench coat that was outdated the day I was born.