Taking a deep breath and turning on his most ingratiating smile, he strode over to the wheelchair-bound philanthropist and his attendant nurse, saluting Beaufort-Monsoon with his champagne glass.
“To you, Mr Beaufort-Monsoon!” Valentine said with all the bravura born of years of electioneering and political rhetoric. “Soon to be Sir Beaufort-Monsoon,” he added in a hushed tone. “How do you like the sound of that?”
“I am not doing this for the prestige or for some poxy title,” Beaufort-Monsoon growled, fixing Valentine with a withering stare from behind the bottle-bottom lenses of his glasses. His hair was swept back in a thinning widow’s peak, his skin paper-thin and dotted with liver spots.
Age had not been kind to Halcyon Beaufort-Monsoon, and Valentine found himself wondering how many years he had left. Perhaps that was why he was so keen to help the people of London, hoping that it would somehow ensure him his place in heaven.
“No, no, of course not,” Valentine backtracked hastily. “I understand that. Only it’s rare to meet someone as generous and as selfless as you, Mr Beaufort-Monsoon. London is truly blessed. The people of Magna Britannia will never forget you.”
For the first time since Valentine had been in the old man’s company, Beaufort-Monsoon smiled. It was one of the most unsettling things Valentine had seen in a long time.
“Oh, I’m sure of it,” he said. His expression was the smile of a hungry cat and it only served to bring Valentine’s reservations to the fore again. But it was too late to be having doubts now, far too late.
Uncharacteristically lost for words, wanting to be anywhere other than where he was right at that moment, Valentine turned his gaze away from Beaufort-Monsoon and his predatory smile, and gazed again out of the viewing port. And as he stared down at the dwindling towers and pinnacles of the cityscape, and the complex spider’s web of the Overground rail network, he wondered what the true cost of his premiership was to be and how he would really be remembered by the people of Londinium Maximum.
Through the lower cirrus wisps of Smog he saw the gleam of silver and watched as a car – a Rolls Royce, by the looks of it – drove into Hyde Park at speed, pulling up in front of the excited crowds. A man leapt out of the car and immediately craned his head back to watch the Jupiter’s departure.
Feeling the blood drain from his cheeks, Devlin Valentine wondered what sort of a fate he had condemned his city to, a cold knot of fear tightening in his guts.
ULYSSES QUICKSILVER OPENED the door and jumped out of the Silver Phantom before Nimrod had even brought the car to a complete stop.
He gazed up at the rising Jupiter Station, the great ring of iron, steel and glass silhouetted against the sun. It was hardly the best day to demonstrate how the Weather Machine was going to rid London of its blanket of Smog and improve the notoriously miserable weather patterns.
“Hell’s teeth!” he shouted, giving voice to his annoyance. Despite their best efforts to prevent the launch something had thwarted his attempts to signal De Wynter, who was now, Ulysses was surprised to see, pushing his way towards them through the crowd of flag-waving Londoners.
“Quicksilver?” the big man exclaimed as he elbowed his way through to the front of the official cordon holding the crowd back. “Good God, man, what do you look like?” he roared, taking the stub of a smouldering cigar from between his teeth.
Ulysses looked down at himself. “A dog’s dinner, by the looks of things, but I didn’t come all the way from Hampstead Heath for fashion tips.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
“You mean they haven’t got hold of you?”
“What are you talking about, man?”
But Ulysses was too busy examining his personal communicator to answer. He pressed a key and listened for a dial tone but, when he put the device to his ear, all he could hear was static.
“They must be jamming comm signals!” He looked up at the weather platform. “Probably from on board.”
“Look, Quicksilver, are you going to tell me what’s going on, or are we going to stand around here all day with no-one having the foggiest what you’re talking about?”
“It’s the Jupiter Station! I wanted you to stop the launch.”
“But whatever for? Has it got something to do with this state you’ve somehow managed to get yourself in?”
“You remember the cockroach from the Daedalus Clinic?”
De Wynter looked at Ulysses, his bushy eyebrows beetling in bewilderment. “Yes, of course. But I thought you said this was about the Jupiter Station!”
“Bear with me. I think I know what caused his degeneration and that of the others you’ve got locked up at Bedlam!”
“How do you know about that?” De Wynter railed.
“I have my sources,” Ulysses said, glancing at Eliza – still laid out on the back seat – out of the corner of his eye. “But the point is, what turned them is only half the formula. Dr Feelgood’s Tonic Stout has been laced with the stuff. Don’t ask me why it only turned those few, I don’t know, but there’s another component to the potion.”
“Formula? What formula?”
“That I don’t know. The important thing is I’m pretty certain the other half is on board that thing. Gallons of it. Thousands of gallons, if I’m not mistaken.”
De Wynter turned, giving a dry snap of his fingers, and suddenly the hunchbacked form of the elderly Agent Penny Dreadful came hobbling out of the crowd.
“Yes, sah?” she croaked, appearing to try to come to attention but her dowager’s stoop making it impossible.
De Wynter had his personal communicator out now. “Get someone to jam the signal that’s jamming the ether-waves and then get a message to the Jupiter. I want that thing out of the sky and back on the ground now!”
“MY LORDS, LADIES and gentlemen,” came dulcet tones over the tannoy again, many of the dignitaries breaking off their conversations to listen, Prime Minister Valentine among them.
He hoped this announcement – whatever it was – wasn’t going to take long. He was looking forward to the demonstration of the Jupiter’s power – anything to take his mind of his increasing concerns, really – and then he had to board the first dirigible-taxi off this thing, ready for a meet and greet with the great unwashed in Hyde Park, before heading off to the Palace of Westminster again for a select committee hearing on... he couldn’t remember precisely what now, but suddenly he wanted to be there more than he where he actually was.
“We are now at our operating height of ten thousand feet,” the voice went on.
The crewman’s words were punctuated by the rhythmic trotting footsteps of aeronautical auxiliary force-issue boots on the polished floorboards of the viewing gallery as other members of the crew – in their smart blue and white and uniforms – entered and arrayed themselves along the hub-ward side of the chamber.
“If you would all like to make your way over to the viewing window, we will begin our demonstration shortly.”
Valentine gazed out of the window across the curving face of the city. He realised the Jupiter Station had stopped rising. He could see the Smog beneath them, spread out like a gauzy blanket over London, shimmering with an iridescent oily sheen that clung to the looming towers of the Upper City. He felt greasy just looking at it; but all that was about to change.
Valentine looked around him, taking some pleasure again from savouring everyone’s wonder at his extraordinary achievement; his and Halcyon Beaufort-Monsoon’s. His searching eyes found the philanthropist and his striking red-haired nurse. While everyone else was gazing in awe out of the viewing window, picking out famous landmarks just about visible through the Smog, the two of them were the only ones looking into the room, at the ordered line of crewmen.
“And now, my lords, ladies and gentlemen, the moment you have all been waiting for.”
Hearing the click-clack of slides being racked and bolts being thrown, Valentine turned to observe the crewmen as well. What he saw made him feel sick, all
doubt suddenly gone to be replaced by cold realisation and abject fear.
“The Jupiter Station is now under the control of the Darwinian Dawn and you should all consider yourselves our hostages.”
“What?” one man fumed. “What is the meaning of this?”
“This is an outrage!” stormed another.
“You can’t do this!”
“You can’t treat us like this!”
“Now look here,” Colonel Russen began, turning from the window and making for the line of armed crewmen, a stern finger raised in admonishment.
Several guns pointed in his direction. Somewhere within the crowd of dignitaries a woman gave a moaning cry and swooned.
“Get back over here, Colonel!”
Valentine snapped his head round in surprise. It was Beaufort-Monsoon who had spoken.
“Leave this to me, Monsoon,” Colonel Russen persisted. “I’ll deal with this. You can’t take any nonsense from these types. Soon as I show them who’s in charge we’ll have no more trouble, mark my w–”
The pistol shot was loud in the confined cabin of the viewing gallery. Several people screamed. Valentine looked from the sprawled body of the Colonel, his head shattered like an egg, and followed the sound back to its source amidst the confused crowd of clustered dignitaries.
A gap was forming at the centre of the group and at its centre was Halcyon Beaufort-Monsoon’s wheelchair, his nurse standing behind him, one hand on a handle of his chair, the other holding the smoking gun.
Valentine stared at her, mouth open in shock. The old man was still smiling his cruel shark’s smile.
“Thank you, my dear,” Beaufort-Monsoon said. “The Colonel was becoming most irksome.”
His nurse returned the gun to a thigh-holster, revealed by a split in her skirt and, without uttering a word, rolled her employer’s chair forward to join the line of armed crewmen.
“I would suggest that no-one else tries anything foolish,” he said, peering myopically at the guests. “That would be most rash. No, it is time to face facts, my lords, ladies and gentlemen. You should now consider yourselves hostages, my insurance policy if you will. And in a few minutes we will begin the little demonstration I have planned for you and all of London.”
“THEY’RE NOT RESPONDING to hails, sah!” Penny Dreadful informed De Wynter as Ulysses listened in, appalled.
“I knew it,” he hissed. “I just knew it! Damn it all to hell!”
“Have our boffins managed to cancel out that jamming signal yet?” De Wynter demanded.
“Yes, sah! We ’ave radio communication on the ground again, but we are still unable to raise those on board the Jupiter Station itself, sah!”
“So what happens now?” Eliza chipped in, an expression of dull shock etched onto her face.
“Now, young lady?” De Wynter replied. “Now we put Plan B into action.”
“And what’s that?” Ulysses asked.
“We shoot it down.”
“What?” Ulysses railed. “You can’t be serious?”
“We cannot afford to have another incident like the one Wormwood engineered. You said yourself the city’s in danger. Besides, the British government does not negotiate with terrorists!”
“That’s right, sah!”
“But desperate times call for desperate measures,” De Wynter went on. “Get me General Templesmith.”
“Okay, so you shoot it down,” Ulysses reasoned. “And then what? If my suspicions about what’s onboard are correct and you shoot that thing down, you’re going to send a deluge of toxic chemicals of Biblical proportions down over the city, the outcome of which will make the mass breakout from the Tower of London look like a teddy bears’ picnic!”
For a moment De Wynter said nothing, fixing Ulysses with his penetrating stare as he took a deep draw on his stinking cigar.
“Dreadful, delay that last instruction.”
“Yes, sah!”
“So, Quicksilver, here’s your chance. Show us the cut of your jib, put your money where your mouth is. Let’s see if you’re all talk and no trousers, shall we? What do you suggest we do now?”
“If I could just get on board –”
“And how do you plan on doing that?”
His own words were cut short by the roar of a rocket hurtling by overhead. And then everyone – from the assembled crowd to the conspiratorial huddle beside the Silver Phantom – was looking up, only this time it wasn’t at the Jupiter, as a bat-winged shadow flashed across the park.
With a roar of retro-thrusters, and startled gasps from the crowd, the masked figure landed heavily in the middle of a bed of roses, the impact throwing up great clods of soil.
“Have no fear,” the vigilante said, “Spring-Heeled Jack is here!”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The Taking of Jupiter Station
“AND WHAT ARE you supposed to be?” De Wynter demanded, giving the new arrival a disdainful look. “Some sort of human bat?”
Before the masked man could answer they all heard a voice shout from the crowd. “All my born days, I don’t believe it! It’s Spring-Heeled Jack! I tell you, Maggie, it’s only ruddy Spring-Heeled Jack!”
“Is that right?” De Wynter challenged the vigilante.
“Some call me by that name. I prefer to think of myself as London’s Dark Chevalier, the city’s Cloaked Crusader.”
“Is that so?”
“It’s him all right,” Ulysses confirmed.
“Good Lord! Is that some sort of a rocket-pack?” De Wynter asked.
Jack followed the crowd’s gaze to the tiny speck of the Jupiter hovering high above the city.
“So, I take it that you’re stuck here, down on the ground, but you want to be up there?”
“That’s about the sum of it,” Ulysses agreed. Beneath the crust of dried on sewer filth and brick-dust, Ulysses’ eyes were ringed with tiredness, but the sustained adrenalin high of the moment was allowing him to keep going, pushing his body to the limit. A part of him knew that he would pay for it later – if there was to be a later.
“Right you are then,” the vigilante said, holding out his hand to Ulysses.
“I’m sorry?” Ulysses said.
“What are you waiting for? Tempus fugit, Mr Quicksilver.”
“You mean that pack of yours can carry the weight of more than one man?” De Wynter said.
“I don’t know, yet. But I should think so. I can cross London in less time than it would take you to drive across, so I don’t see why that thrust won’t allow me to carry a passenger as well.”
“So long as you’re not planning on taking part in an aerial stunt show or doing any loop the loops.” Ulysses said.
Something like a laugh emerged emitted from the speaker of the vigilante’s mask. “No. I was just planning on going straight up, if that’s all right with you.”
“That’ll be just fine.”
Ulysses wasn’t afraid of heights; no-one could accuse him of that after he had given such fearless demonstrations as train-top knife fights and his death-defying battle with the nefarious Black Mamba high above the jagged peaks of the Himalaya Mountains.
“All right then?” Jack asked again.
“Yes. Fine,” Ulysses said. “Let’s do this before I change my mind.”
“Very well then,” Jack stepped up behind Ulysses and took hold of him under the arms of his ruined jacket.
“All right,” De Wynter addressed the two of them. “You’ve got half an hour. Any longer than that, or if there’s any obvious sign that you’ve failed, I’ll command the Battersea Battery to shoot that thing down, hostages or no hostages. Do we have an understanding?”
“And if, perish the thought, this actually works?” Ulysses said.
“Give me a sign – a clear sign. Launch a flare or something, anything you can lay your hands on, or get this chap here to get a message to us on the ground. You got that?”
“Clear as the skies over London,” Ulysses quipped.
&nbs
p; De Wynter glowered in the face of his levity and growled something under his breath.
“Are we ready?” Spring-Heeled Jack said.
“We’re ready,” Ulysses said, feeling for the loaded pistol holstered under his arm and taking a firm hold of his sword-cane.
Eliza stepped forward, grabbing Ulysses’ face between her hands, kissing him fully on the mouth. “For luck.”
Ulysses simply smiled in grim acceptance of his fate, knowing that he may well never see her again.
“Hold on tight,” Jack said.
“Isn’t that your job?” Ulysses said, and then, before he could say anything else, the hiss of the jetpack’s pilot-flame became the deafening roar of engines igniting. With a scream of sound and light Spring-Heeled Jack blasted back into the sky, taking the startled dandy with him, and leaving nothing behind but a blackened circle on the immaculately-kept lawn.
ULYSSES HAD THOUGHT himself prepared for the rocket ride, but the reality of being fired into the air like a human missile was like nothing he had ever experienced before.
Although he had been into space, when, as a young man, he had undertaken athree-yearGrand Tour of the Solar System, seated in a luxury seat as the interplanetary liner drifted heavenward, even there one didn’t experience the tremendous G-forces that Ulysses was having to endure now.
The wind whipped through his hair, and forced him to part-close his eyes against the slipstream created by their hurtling ascent. But the voice of the wind in his ears was drowned out by the fiery scream of the jetpack. Everything was passing him by in a blur.
He looked down at the ground, disappearing at a rate of knots beneath them, the anxious, upturned faces of the crowd merged into one homogenous mass gathered upon the painstakingly kept lawns of the Hyde Park.
Having thought that he had left his stomach behind, Ulysses was surprised at how nauseous he felt as a terrifying, vertiginous feeling threatened to overwhelm him. Feeling the pinching pain of the hold Jack had on him helped him to forget about his rising gorge.
Evolution Expects Page 17
