by Derek Landy
“Wallabies,” said Valkyrie. “Lambay Island.”
“That’s it, yes!” Clerihew said, pointing at Valkyrie. “Abyssinia wanted it close in case anything went wrong! She’s going to leave it there while everyone goes and does this American thing! Please, for the love of God, will you let me out now?”
“Of course,” China said. “I am nothing if not a woman of my—”
She stopped talking. The bomb had started to hum.
Clerihew stared at it, pressing his back against the force field. “Let me out, please,” he said quietly.
“China,” Valkyrie said, tugging at her arm, “let him out.”
“I’m afraid I can’t,” China said.
Clerihew spun. “You said. You said you’d let me out if I told you and I told you so please let me out!”
“The bomb is armed,” said China. “It could go off at any moment.”
“Drop the force field,” Valkyrie said. “It’ll just take a second.”
“And, in that second, the bomb could go off. Mr Montgomery, I’m dreadfully sorry, but it appears I won’t be releasing you today.”
Clerihew stared. “You said. You said!”
“Dreadfully sorry.”
The bomb went off.
There was no sound. There was just a flash that made the force field turn a bright blue, and Clerihew stopped panicking. He just stood there, mouth open, eyes open, and then he crumpled, like he was a collection of scaffolding that was falling in on itself. The force field burned like that for another moment, struggling to contain the forces that had been unleashed, before it returned to normal.
Valkyrie stared.
Skulduggery stepped forward, examining the force field. “It held,” he said.
“You doubted me?” China asked.
“I doubt everyone. We’re lucky it held.”
“I knew it would.”
“You hoped it would.”
“He died,” Valkyrie said quietly.
They looked round at her.
China hesitated. “I did intend to let him out,” she said at last.
Valkyrie nodded. “I know.”
“It was just unfortunate timing.”
“OK.”
“We’ll talk about this later. Right now, we’ve got to find out which naval base Abyssinia is going to attack. I can send a team of mages and a Cleaver squad to Coldheart—”
“We can get there quicker,” Skulduggery said. “Valkyrie, are you with me?”
Valkyrie pulled her eyes away from Clerihew’s lifeless body. “Always,” she said.
Coldheart was almost empty.
There were maybe thirty convicts remaining. The others had been left behind somewhere. Omen didn’t know where, but from the snippets of conversation he’d been able to piece together, their plans had not been working out and some of the convicts were worrying.
Also, the “weirdo with the scars”, who Omen assumed to be Caisson, had walked out. Abyssinia, apparently, was not happy about any of it.
First Wave were still here, unfortunately. Jenan came up with Lapse and Gall to shackle Omen’s hands and take him down to where everyone had congregated. Mr Lilt was here, and so was Razzia. She gave Omen a smile and waved to him. He didn’t know what to make of that.
Jenan shoved Omen ahead of him and Gall stuck his foot out. Omen tripped. Gall laughed. Omen got to his knees and Jenan cuffed the back of his head.
“Stay,” Jenan said.
Omen stayed.
Abyssinia and Nero walked in. First Wave, and the remaining convicts, went quiet.
“My children,” Abyssinia said, then paused, her eyes downcast. When she continued, her voice was softer. “And you are my children. Each and every one of you makes me proud. We have been through so much in our short time together that you are now family to me – and you know the lengths I will go to for family.”
There were smiles and nods all round.
“We have suffered losses,” Abyssinia said. “As you know, the raid earlier did not go as planned and the bomb … they must have found the bomb. The Supreme Mage still lives and the High Sanctuary still functions. Many of our friends have been captured. For this, I blame myself. I beg your forgiveness.”
Omen watched Nero. He was sweating. He looked sick. More than that, he looked like he was in pain.
“But we will see them again,” Abyssinia said. “We will free them from their shackles, and they will take their place by our side in the sun. It is time, my children. The night is finally upon us.”
There were cheers.
When they’d died down, she continued. “You know that we shall be targeting an American naval base. Whitley is a quiet little peninsula in Oregon, and what they do at the Naval Magazine there is they stock battleships and submarines with food and fuel and munitions, and they send them off. There are twenty-seven active duty personnel stationed there this very night – and the brave members of First Wave are going to kill every last one of them.
“The watchtowers, sentries, and the boat patrols have already been eliminated, and communications and alarms have been cut. Most of the sailors are already asleep in the barracks. You will go in. You will kill whoever you find there. You will let the security cameras see you. This is important. I want your powers on full display. When this gets broadcast around the world, I want the mortals to quake in fear at what a few teenagers can do. If the children can do this, I want them to say, what can the adults do?”
Everyone Omen looked at was beaming at the thought. It was insane.
“Mr Lilt,” Abyssinia said, “do you have any words of encouragement for your students?”
Lilt stepped forward. “Tonight is a special, special night,” he said. “It is the night you’ve been waiting for. It is what you’ve been building up to. It is the first step towards war, and the first step towards our great victory. And it all starts with you. I’m so proud of each and every one of you.”
The members of First Wave were hugging and holding hands. Their chests were swelling.
“The Dead Men, the Diablerie – history will forget them all,” Abyssinia said. “History will never forget First Wave. You will be the heroes of the new world. You will be legends.” Her eyes found Omen. “And you, little boy, you will have your role to play also. Your name might not be remembered in years to come, but your face will strike fear into the hearts of mortals everywhere. You will be the one they interrogate. The one they dissect. You are, in your own way, vital to our cause. My throne will be built on the bones of my enemies, but it will be built from the sacrifices that will be made at Naval Magazine Whitley. So thank you, Omen Darkly. And thank you all. Now go, and know that my love goes with you.”
Nero and Lilt came forward, and they all waited to teleport.
But something was wrong with Nero. He vanished without them, then came back, frustrated. It was clear that he hadn’t meant to do that, but no one said anything.
“Link hands,” he snapped. First Wave did so, and Jenan grabbed a handful of Omen’s hair. Omen scowled in pain, and, after a few more seconds of trying, they finally teleported.
They flew through the cloaking field, and Coldheart Prison appeared before them.
Valkyrie landed, ready for gunfire, for alarms, for shouting, at least. But there was only the sound of the wind and the sea beneath them.
Skulduggery led the way to the Beast, the biggest and ugliest of the buildings on the hovering island. The door was open. Once inside, Skulduggery raised his hand to the air.
“It’s impossible to say for sure,” he murmured, “but it would appear the prison has been evacuated.”
“We’d better search quickly, then,” Valkyrie said, moving past him. “Once the Cleavers get here they’re likely to stamp anything resembling a clue to dust.”
They started with the control room.
“You’re quiet,” Skulduggery said as he skimmed through computer logs.
Valkyrie went through a handful of files left out on one of
the desks, looking for anything related to a military base. “Am I?”
“Is everything all right?”
She glanced up. “Can’t this wait until after we’ve saved the world?”
“Of course,” he said. “Of course.”
He went back to searching. She frowned at him. “How are you doing?”
“Me?” he said. “Fine. Why?”
“You sound angry.”
He looked up. “You answer me, I’ll answer you.”
She sighed. “I’m still kind of reeling over that guy China killed.”
“In her defence, it was an accident.”
“Yeah,” said Valkyrie. “Maybe. OK, now you. Why are you angry?”
“Why wouldn’t I be angry? You were almost beaten to death in that cell and I was nowhere around.”
“You were trapped in a time-slowing thing.”
“I should never have let them arrest you.”
“You didn’t really have a choice. We may be super-cool Arbiters, but we’re not above the law. China had every right to arrest me, and there’s no one to blame for what happened in that cell except for Yonder and his friends. I’m quite looking forward to seeing him again, actually.”
Skulduggery stood. “We’re not going to find anything here and we’re wasting time.” He went to a diagram on the wall beside the door. Valkyrie joined him.
“What are we looking for?”
“Somewhere comfy,” he said.
“In a prison?”
“The most comfortable area in a prison will be the guards’ quarters. Abyssinia will have commandeered them for herself and her lot, so they’d all be in the same area … here.” His gloved finger jabbed the diagram, and Valkyrie didn’t even have time to figure out where that was before he was stalking away and she was following along behind.
“That wasn’t what I meant, by the way,” she said as they walked. “When I asked how you were doing? I wasn’t talking about how you felt about what happened to me. I was talking about Caisson and the whole … Mevolent being his father thing.”
Skulduggery didn’t look back. “I told you he wasn’t my son.”
“But there had been a possibility.”
“You’re wondering if I’m upset about it. I’m not.”
“That’s cool,” she said. “It’s just … it was a chance at having family again.”
“I already have family. I didn’t need the possibility of a son I never knew about.”
Valkyrie frowned. “What family do you have?”
“I’ve got over four hundred and fifty years of family,” he answered as they went up metal stairs, “provided to me by siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles. For all I know, I’m surrounded by family at all times.”
“But do you have any, like close family members?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Who?”
“An older brother.”
Valkyrie came up alongside him as he walked. “You have an older brother? Who’s still alive? And you haven’t mentioned him before now?”
“You’ve never asked. I ask you questions about your life all the time, but, once I’d answered what it was like to be a skeleton, you seemed to lose interest.”
“Oh, God. Oh, God, you’re right. I’m a terrible friend.”
He patted her shoulder. “You’re just a little narcissistic, that’s all.”
She gaped. “Coming from you, that’s horrible.”
“I know,” he said happily. “But of course you’re narcissistic. Why wouldn’t you be? You’re as unique as I am. I’ve never heard of anyone doing what you did when you healed yourself.”
“And now China wants to do experiments on me. She’s not going to, is she? I mean, she wouldn’t. I know she’s, like, one hundred per cent China Sorrows at all times, but she’s my friend, too. She does actually care about me – ignoring the time she had me arrested.”
“She does seem to care,” Skulduggery admitted. “But you can expect her to try to persuade you to do a few blood tests, a couple of scans, some chopping off of body parts …”
Valkyrie waved her hand. “I’m fine with all that, it’s the written work I’d have objections to.”
“That’s just what I told her.”
They got to the guards’ quarters. The rooms were pretty bare, but they started to search them, one at a time.
“It must have been weird for her to see Caisson again after all this time,” Valkyrie said loudly as she searched. “Do you think it registered on whatever emotional scale she uses?”
“I’d say so,” came Skulduggery’s reply from another room.
“I know we joke about it a lot, how we can never trust her, but I think she’s proven herself. I mean, hasn’t she? She tends to do right by us.”
“Are you sure about that?”
Valkyrie checked under a bed, then straightened up. “Oh, come on. You can’t doubt that the three of us are on the same side.”
“I’ve thought China was on my side so many times over the years,” Skulduggery said, “only to be corrected by China herself. I should have learned it by the time I was thirty. I should definitely have learned it by the time I was a hundred and ninety. By the time I was three hundred—”
“OK, I get your point.”
“I could go on.”
Valkyrie went to the next room. “You knew her when you were a young man, then?”
“Her and her brother,” Skulduggery responded.
“Mr Bliss scared the hell out of me.”
“Really? I always thought he was funny.”
She raised an eyebrow at the wall. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me. What age were you when China joined up with Mevolent?”
“Thirty,” he said. “Her family were prominent worshippers of the Faceless Ones, so she had always flirted with joining Mevolent’s cause – but I was thirty years and five months old when she made it official.”
“Your memory is that precise?”
“I had just met my future wife a few months earlier. That year sticks out.”
Valkyrie smiled. “Fair enough.”
“Five years later, we were at war, and China and I were suddenly enemies.”
“But then flash forward four hundred and something years, and look at you now! Trust has finally been established!”
They both emerged from doorways. There was only one room left to search.
“China still has secrets,” Skulduggery said.
Valkyrie shrugged. “Don’t we all?”
Skulduggery folded his arms. “What do we know about Solace?”
“Well, from what China told us, she was one of Serafina’s handmaidens. She fell in love with Caisson and ran off with him. Serafina found her again, dragged her back, and Caisson went to rescue her. In doing so, he – unknowingly – killed his own dad.”
“After which, Serafina went straight to China,” Skulduggery said, “and China surrendered Caisson, a boy she had raised as her own son, without a fight.”
“Which is weird.”
“And, once Serafina grabbed Caisson, China had Solace committed.”
Valkyrie frowned. “She what?”
“China’s the one who put Solace in Greymire Asylum,” Skulduggery said.
“Why?”
“I haven’t been able to find that out yet.”
“Well … Solace must have had a breakdown or something, right? Her boyfriend has just been taken away from her, so I suppose it’s understandable that she’d be upset.”
“I imagine Caisson was more than a boyfriend,” Skulduggery said. “As near as I can work it out, they got together in 1770, when Caisson was twenty-five.”
“But … but he didn’t kill Mevolent until, like …”
“1929.”
“So you’re saying Caisson and Solace were together for, uh, wait, let me—”
“A hundred and fifty-nine years.”
Valkyrie slapped Skulduggery’s shoulder in annoyance. “I would have got it.”
“Of course you would.”
“Caisson and Solace were together for a hundred and fifty-nine years. Well then, no wonder Solace went crazy. Anyone would have. She found someone she could love for a hundred and fifty-nine years and then this arrogant cow who wears a human skull as a headdress swoops in and takes him away to be tortured.”
“There’s more to it,” Skulduggery said. “I don’t know what it is yet, but there is something more.”
“With China, there always is.”
Skulduggery moved to the last room, and froze. Valkyrie frowned, and joined him.
A small table was filled with machine parts. There were shoes under the bed. A toothbrush in a glass.
“These are Destrier’s quarters,” Skulduggery said. “Every other cell has been cleared out because they were evacuating. But not this one. Why is that?”
Valkyrie looked round. “Because he’s still here.”
Omen wasn’t very impressed with Naval Magazine Whitley so far but, considering the fact that the only thing he’d been able to see had been a map on the wall of this little office, that was hardly surprising.
According to the map, Naval Magazine Whitley consisted of a 1,750-foot pier, a load of warehouses, a bunch of military and administrative buildings – one of which he was currently in – and a hundred or so dome-like structures dotted across the peninsula. Also, a lot of trees and hiking trails.
Omen had expected gun emplacements on the outer edges of the base. What he was seeing instead was a visitor’s centre and a souvenir shop.
Lapse let the blinds fall back against the window, and turned to Omen. “Won’t be long now,” he said.
Omen didn’t respond, and Lapse’s face soured.
“Fine,” he said, “don’t say anything. Sit there and sulk.”
“What would you like me to say, Lapse?” Omen asked.
“I dunno,” Lapse said. “Something. Anything. That’s the first thing you’ve said since we got here.”
Omen shrugged. “I’m just not used to talking to you. We never really chatted much in school.”
“Well, this is different, isn’t it? We’re about to attack a frickin’ naval base.”
“If you can call it that.”
