Dread Operator by Chuck Loyola

Author:Chuck Loyola [Loyola, Chuck]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-06-26T00:00:00+00:00

28

Saarland strasse was my stop. The closest metro stop to Arnecke strasse. I got off and hit bright daylight, coming up from the earth on the central reservation of a dual carriageway. I crossed over to the other side, narrowly dodging a cyclist in the cycle lane who skimmed past me and swore as he streaked off.

According to the map, Arnecke strasse was just down the way a bit as the road curved westwards.

Police sirens wailed in the distance. Lots of police sirens. My god, was there a massacre on the metro? No. There had been just one gunshot. Only one. Then Bulle had chased after me.

But maybe one shot had been enough. Maybe the student girl who’d saved me was lying dead on a subway train, and now the police were looking for the crazed gunman on the loose.

Maybe they’d be looking for the Black man fleeing the scene.

No, surely there were so many witnesses to Bulle being the gunman, and me being the victim.

I slowed to a brisk walk, casting glances back over my shoulder. No sign of pursuit by Bulle or the police. Not yet. But I needed to get off the street. I needed to process everything that had just happened.

Rodge Waten was clearly involved in something dangerous, mixed up with Das Auge and whatever this blasse Hexe was. Wasn’t hexe a curse of some kind? Was that what he’d been rambling about?

But now Rodge Waten was dead.

They’d wanted him silenced.

And me too.

So, why hadn’t Das Auge thrown me off the tower when they had the chance? They’d only wanted to scare me. And then an hour later they wanted me dead.

What had changed their mind?

Was it that I’d stumbled onto Ramona Kerzenmacher and Rodge Waten? Was it just that?

Rippe had come and threatened Ruth at the language school, and then he’d led me to Das Auge. I’d fallen for it, like an idiot. Thought I was clever tailing him, when he’d been walking me on a lead.

They’d threatened me, told me to get out, roughed me up, tried to scare me. But they hadn’t killed me.

Then only an hour later, Bulle had gone to Rodge Waten’s apartment and shot him dead, maybe on fresh orders to clean up.

He’d murdered Rodge, then hunted me across the city and maybe even shot God knows how many students on the metro.

Maybe he would head back to the language school and finish off business with Ruth.

I had to warn her.

A call box sat a block down and I jingled the change in my pocket as I pulled open the glass door. It was a phone card payment. No coins. Damn.

There was a newsagent nearby. I rushed in and pointed to the phone cards behind the counter and, mangling the language, said, “Eine phonecard, bitte. Zwei mark. Ja. Bitte. Danke.”

I took the card, shoved it into the slot and punched in the number of the language school.

Ruth’s voice answered with a curt, “Hallo.”

I sighed. She was alive. For now. “Rodge is dead,” I said.

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