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I tried sensing for hollows, but there were too many faces, too many shadows Luck, if we had any left, would have to sustain us for a while

Nohat?

We needed directions froeon, but it seemed briefly confused--like me, it was probably overwhelmed by the crowd--so we stood and waited, the breaths and snores andweirdly around us

After a eon stiffened and fleard the tracks, then reached the end of its leash and bounced back into Melina’s hand like a yo-yo

We tiptoed around the bodies to the edge of the platform, then hopped down into the pit where the tracks ran They disappeared into tunnels on either end of the station I had a sinking feeling that our future lay soabout in there," said

Olive

"Of course we do," Enoch said "It isn’t a proper holiday until we’ve plumbed every available sewer"

The pigeon bopped rightward We started down the tracks

I hopscotched around an oily puddle and a legion of rats scurried away fro Olive into Bronwyn’s arms with a shriek The tunnel yawned before us, black andIt occurred to ast Here there’d be no walls to climb, no houses to shelter in, no toht and lit only by a few red bulbs, glinting feebly at scattered intervals

I walked faster

The darkness closed around us

When I was a kid, I used to play hide-and-seek with my dad I was always the hider and he the seeker I was really good at it, primarily because I, unlike most kids of four or five, had the then-peculiar ability to be extre periods of time, and also because I suffered fro claustrophobia: I could wedge myself into the smallest rear-closet crawl space and stay there for twenty or thirtythe time of my life

Which is why you’d think I wouldn’t have a proble Or why, at the very least, you’d think a tunnelelse would be easier for me to handle than one that was essentially an open ce out along it And yet, the farther into this tunnel alked, theentirely apart fro And so I hurried us through as fast as the slowest of us could go, prodding Melina until she barked atwalk and several Y-shaped tunnel splits, the pigeon led us to a disused section of track where the ties had warped and rotted and pools of stagnant water spanned the floor The pressure of trains passing in far-off tunnels pushed the air around like breaths in soullet

Then, way down ahead of us, a pinpoint of light winked into being, s fast Emma shouted, "Train!" and we split apart and pressed our backs to the walls I covered ine at close range, but it never cah-pitched whine, which I was fairly certain was co the tunnel, its white glow surrounding us, I felt a sudden pressure in ht disappeared

We stumbled away from the walls in a daze Now the tracks and ties under our feet were new, as if they’d just been laid The tunnel s it had gotten brighter, and instead of giving a steady light, they flickered--because they weren’t electric bulbs at all, but gaslamps

"What just happened?" I said

"We crossed into a loop," said E like that"