Hell on Earth

by Mike Wild

  Magister sighed. "That is so. But we were all scarcely ourselves at the time and we felt we had little choice. Believe me when I say that it was something we came to regret."

  "Regret? I know what you're capable of in the Department. You told me yourself, remember?"

  "I have been culpable of great evil, yes, along with my colleagues, who sanctioned most of it. I ask you to understand, however, that the evils of that day were not of our making."

  "What are you saying?"

  "That Scratch Tor exerts an influence on people. That it twists minds, taints souls. Makes them ripe for harvesting. Cecilia Bird and I tried to defend psychically against it but we were... not up to the task. Protected more than most but-"

  "But we're not really talking about Scratch Tor here, are we?" Brand interrupted. "We're talking about what lies beneath it - a being that bested Department Q and caused you to devote years to suppressing what you did as a result. Murder the innocent."

  "We had a... reputation to protect," Magister said. "Imagine what the Nazi propaganda machine would have made of the news had it leaked out."

  "Nothing as bad as what's happening because you swept the problem under the carpet," the academic countered. "So let's talk about the problem you left us to deal with... let's talk angels."

  Magister leaned back in his chair, both temples throbbing palpably, and for a moment Brand feared he had stepped over the line. But Magister only smiled and nodded slightly.

  "Adramelecanmaelarmenauzabaraqel, Barbatosbata-rjalbylethcaim, Carniveandagon," Brand recited without pause. "Ezekeelgaaphananelharut, Iuvart jetrel-kokabellauviah..."

  "You have admirable recall, doctor. Of course, you know what it means?"

  "It doesn't mean anything," Brand declared, "as well you know. I made the mistake of treating it as a language at first, and then as some form of cypher. But it isn't either of those things, is it? It's nothing more than a list of names."

  Michael Magister nodded. "Adramelec... Anmael... Armen... Auza... Baraqel-" he began.

  "Barbatos... Batarjal... Byleth... Caim," Brand continued. "The true names of angels. To be more accurate, of fallen angels."

  Again, Magister nodded. "Plucked from the sub-conscious of Abaddon by the good Miss Simmons."

  "Abaddon?" Brand repeated, a little thrown. It was a name he knew all too well. That of the so-called Angel of the Bottomless Pit - or sometimes used simply as another name for hell itself. The devil himself, in some philosophies. "Magister, you're not actually suggesting that what we have here is-"

  "No, Dr Brand," the little man cut in, "I'm not. But it is an appropriate term of reference, considering the creature's current circumstances. The name derives from the Hebrew abad, you know, meaning to be lost, something our friend has most definitely become. Over time, it has also been confused with the Greek abaton, which means a no-go area, or a place difficult to reach. And if I remember the collapse I wrought correctly..."

  "I don't understand," Brand said. "Why use the term of reference at all? Are you telling me you don't know which angel this is?"

  Magister smiled. "You miss the point, doctor," he said. "For one thing, it is the angel itself who does not know. For another, I do not believe it can truly be called an angel anymore."

  "What the hell are you talking about?"

  Magister finished his cigarette and immediately lit up another. "Did you know that it took nine days for the angels to fall from heaven? Imagine it, Dr Brand - nine days. Fully one-third of the heavenly hosts, according to Revelations. An utterly meaningless figure, of course, unless it can be quantified." Magister inhaled deeply, his gaze on Brand unwavering. "Here we have a degree of dichotomy. The Book of Enoch informs us there were some two hundred fallen angels, while other sources place their figure in the thousands. But one source goes further than that. According to the writings of Alphonsus de Spina, there were a hundred and thirty three million, three hundred and six thousand, six hundred and sixty eight of them."

  "Fortalicium Fidei," Brand said. "Fortress of the Faith. De Spina imagined a world overwhelmed by devils. Your point being?"

  "My point being, doctor, that perhaps de Spina was the one who got it right. But that a great many of those millions were simply lost along the way."

  Brand couldn't mask his incredulity. "The Fall interpreted literally is a concept I have always had difficulty with. And now you're expecting me to accept, what, that some of them burned up in the atmosphere?"

  "Why not, doctor?" Magister persisted. "People from your organisation have encountered angels - you know they are beings that can be killed. And if so, why not injured? So severely traumatised in their fall that upon landing they simply crawl beneath the earth to die?"

  "That would make it a dead angel, not a lesser one."

  "It would indeed. But self-evidently it is not the case here." Magister paused. "I remember it even now, the psychic stench, the hunger beneath Scratch Tor. Abaddon has been changed, doctor - confused and corrupted by something that kept it alive."

  "You're suggesting what?" Brand said. Ness and Verse's report again sprang to mind. The Boswell Wyrm. Aliens. "That Abaddon fused with a second entity? Under the tor? Or during its fall?"

  "I do not know," Magister admitted. "Only that it has become something that it should not be. Something very dangerous indeed."

  "Do you know what it wants?"

  Magister took a drag on his cigarette, exhaling its smoke quickly. "Exactly what it looks like, Dr Brand. Abaddon has become convinced that it should engage in jihad against the human race. It wishes to bring about Judgement Day."

  Brand took a moment to study Magister once more and collect his thoughts. "Why should I believe any of this? You still haven't explained the ley pulses. Have you any idea how much havoc they've caused? Magister, why are you feeding it?"

  The little man sighed heavily. "I do not need my talents to sense your scepticism, doctor," he said. "But tell me: what would an angel require from Earth energy?"

  Brand reeled with sudden realisation. "My God, you haven't been feeding it, have you? You've been torturing it."

  Magister smiled more broadly than ever. "Call it revenge, if you wish. But actually it served a practical purpose too. It kept Abaddon subdued so that you could finish the job we started." He slumped suddenly, the throbbing of his veins less distinct than before. "But there are limitations to even my abilities. I am tired, doctor, and so I suggest you get on with it. I suggest you find the second half of the Eyes."

  It was Brand's turn to sigh heavily. "I really should have guessed. Jenny experienced a two-way psychic bond during the ley pulse. Find the Eyes originated from you." He leaned across the desk. "So where is it, Magister? What is it?"

  "I can answer only the latter. The artefact is a dedicated angel killer, Dr Brand. Perhaps the only thing capable of dispatching this freak of supernature at this juncture. With regards to the former - the where - I know little more than you do. All I can tell you is that I sensed it back in 1944, somewhere very near. It never left the monastery, and remains where it has been for many hundreds of years, hidden in a place between heaven and hell."

  Brand shifted in his seat, exasperated. "So it comes down to riddles, does it?"

  "I have every confidence that you will work it out, doctor," Magister said. As he spoke, veins in his head pulsed strongly once more and then simply seemed to deflate. "And now, if you don't mind, my energies are expended and I should like to return to my cell."

  Brand faltered. "Your cell?" he said, thoughts returning to his descent to this potential death-trap. "Magister, you're controlling the facility - why don't you leave?"

  Magister stood, looked at him, confused. "Did I not make myself clear, Dr Brand? I cannot overemphasise how dangerous the creature beneath Boswell has become. And it remembers me. Should it emerge victorious from your coming battle then I really cannot think of a better bunker in which to hide than this one." He cackled. "Ironic, is it not? I sit here in one hole in the ground a
nd advise you on a beast that waits in another, and neither it nor I truly knows whether we will ever see the light of day again."

  Magister gestured, reminding Brand bizarrely of Sir Alec Guinness employing the Force in Star Wars, and there was a sudden lessening of tension in the air. "There will be no more ley line pulses," he said. "This facility has been returned to the control of Major Briggs and the destruct protocol aborted. It will be some time before the guards recover - so while they do, give me your hands."

  "What?" Brand said.

  "Your hands, doctor - hold them out."

  Brand eyed Magister suspiciously, then after a moment did as he'd been asked. Magister laid his own hands on Brand's and the academic felt a warm electricity suffusing his damaged flesh; a gentle massaging in his brain. After a few moments, the little man withdrew his hands and sighed. "Those bandages can come off now," he said.

  Brand hesitated, and then unravelled the bulky dressings. Where previously there had been ugly patches of necrosis from his freeze burns, there was now fresh, undamaged flesh, and his injuries were completely gone.

  "A simple technique, nothing more. Stimulation of the body's natural healing mechanism," Michael Magister said.

  Brand stared. Magister hadn't been lying when he'd said he'd been learning. The ramifications of what he had just seen were staggering. "Good God, with an ability such as that you could-"

  "Help people, doctor?" Magister finished. He laughed. "Please don't let my actions shake the foundations of your so naively black and white universe. Rest assured, there is nothing good in me. Nothing soft. Nothing grey. I have healed you because I wish you to make the world safe for my own purposes, that is all."

  Magister turned and began to trudge slowly back to his prison. It was surely no coincidence that at that very same moment Glenn Miller's Moonlight Serenade reached the end of its play and a stylus bumped over blank vinyl with a repeating dac-dac-dac. Brand gazed at Magister's back, blinking as the most dangerous man in the world's last words were planted telepathically in his mind.

  It begins, Dr Brand.

  Judgement Day...

  Hell on Earth.

  SIXTEEN

  Boswell was cordoned off within minutes, the army forces who had been waiting on standby mobilising from hidden positions in the surrounding countryside and appearing suddenly everywhere. A number of jeeps skidded from fields, blocking off access paths, a gunboat roared into view off the shingle beach in a crescent of foaming sea, and, over the town, twin medevac helicopters came thrumming through the clouds, ready to service the injured and the dead, and maybe the somewhere in between.

  Kneeling in position at the bottom of the steps into town, a young, green-looking soldier rapidly charged his fieldphone. Already he could feel a dull tugging in his mind - the first utterings of the strange Voice he had been briefed about - and his own quavered as he relayed a pre-assigned code-phrase to his fellow operators. "The Piper has begun to play. I repeat, the Piper has begun to play."

  Mikey Ness, in no mood to ponce about with code-phrases after a night shotgunning his way across a moor filled with dead things, yanked the handset as he walked past and barked, "Wha' he means ta say, lads, is grab your ammo, 'cause the shit jus' hi' the fan."

  Lawrence Verse shook his head, grabbed the handset and calmly passed it back. He continued on, unaware of the soldier staring after him at the pieces of dead animals still stuck to the back of his leather coat.

  "Give them a break," Verse said to the Scotsman after a second. "They're professionals."

  Ness spat. "Aye well, ah jus' hope all a these aspirin' Bodie n' Doyles ken wha' they're dealin' wi', 'cause 'tween you an' me the last few hours were a pain in the bloody arse."

  "Abaddon did seem somewhat intent on taking us out of the game," the ex-priest agreed. He used the name Brand had when he'd updated them both by phone. "Seems our angelic friend has become a little more proactive since '44."

  "Exactly mah point. Simple fact is, we dinnae know wha' to expect."

  What Ness said was true, but those preparations that could be made, had been made. The makeshift car park above the town was filling now with truck after truck disgorging soldiers, and as they left the vehicles they checked their kits, racked guns and rifles, and assembled into neat lines waiting for their orders. The Brigadier strolled through the ranks, his swagger stick in hand. His orders were unequivocal.

  "Do NOT listen to the Voice. Do not RESPOND to the Voice in any way. Should any member of your unit APPEAR to be listening or responding, employ this-" The Brigadier held up a small dart that contained a neurotoxin capable of paralysing the nervous system whether it was mind-controlled or not. Brand had been insistent on its use. "Live ammunition is NOT to be used unless as a matter of ultimate recourse. Do I make myself clear?"

  "Sir!"

  "Probability is high that the population of the town WILL be adversely affected by the Voice. DO NOT attempt to interfere if such an event occurs - your role here is containment and control. The Voice may render said population HOSTILE but ONCE AGAIN the B3 toxin ONLY is to be used in defence. Your live ammunition should be employed SOLELY on any deceased reanimates you may encounter."

  "Sir!"

  "The CAVES, ladies and gentlemen, are the focal point of this whole sorry affair," the Brigadier finished, slapping his swagger stick in his palm. "The caves and what lies within them. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should the population be allowed to access these caves during this operation. Keep them AWAY from Scratch Tor, ladies and gentlemen, keep them away from the PIPER."

  The Brigadier waved his swagger stick and boots thudded heavily and seemingly endlessly down the stone steps, their owners deploying themselves at strategic points around the town. Verse and Ness watched them come, and as they did they heard the first complete intonation of that which they'd so far investigated but not encountered. It was the Voice, insinuating itself into their psyches with that invidious and persistent demand that had not been heard in over sixty years.

  SHOW ME YOUR SINS.

  Ah dinnae soddin' think so, yer heavenly harpy, Ness thought. Together with Verse he collected a selection of weaponry from a munitions point and began to march up toward Leidenbrock's Ledge. It seemed the Brigadier's specialist demolition team had already started their work, and a large cloud of dust exploded out of the cave mouth. Och, he was looking forward to this.

  Operation Hamelin had begun.

  I just hope it works, Jonathan Brand prayed as he approached Boswell in the Iroquois that had collected him from Smallpox Island. The academic stared from the cockpit at the bursts of activity below with a growing frown.

  "Are... er... they all right, Dr Brand?" his pilot queried, tipping his head back towards the passenger compartment. "Only they seem to be talking to themselves..."

  Brand turned to the other passengers, collected from various locations en route on his orders. A more unlikely group aboard a military chopper was unlikely to be seen. Two men and three women, it appeared they were on a Darby and Joan charabanc outing rather than descending into a warzone on a mission to help him save the world. All of them far beyond pensionable age, one sat puzzling over a sudoku while another knitted, two played snap, and one appeared simply to be asleep. And they were indeed talking to themselves, nodding gently as they did so. These were not signs of senile dementia, however, and the words they spoke were no geriatric babble. Brand overheard one or two of them - forbidden words - and they chilled him to the bone.

  The fact was, Operation Hamelin didn't have any chance of success without someone to counter the telepathic influence of the angel. Even Magister had admitted that he and Cecilia Bird's psionics had not been adequate defence in their encounter with the creature - it was simply too powerful by far. What was needed was a gestalt intelligence, and these spell-mumblers provided it. They were the last of a network of such people who had once been conscripted by Department Q, helping the war effort by using their cabalistic mantras to guide Luftwaffe pilots off course,
disrupt the paths of doodle-bugs and the like. Now they'd been asked to run interference against the Voice, but they only had the strength to do so for the soldiers and his own people.

  In effect, Brand was buying himself time. Time to locate the second half of the artefact. If he could...

  The Iroquois set down gently in the town graveyard, its tombstones flattened now, and Brand and the pilot helped the mumblers out of the machine, dipping their heads to avoid the revolving rotors. Brand had chosen the church to use as a base for them because of its central location.

  "Get them inside," the academic ordered one of the soldiers. "Mount two guards."

  "My, my," said Jenny Simmons. "Lover-boy's gotten butch all of a sudden. Impressive."

  Brand stared at the woman he no longer knew. A flash of anger was suppressed. Ravne stood by her side, and together with Verse and Ness on the tor it meant all but Hannah Chapter were present. It was disturbing that the American hadn't called in but right now it could not be a concern. And for the same reason, he refused to play games. "The artefact," he said. "Do you have it?"

  Jenny Simmons slapped her half of the Eyes into his palm. "You owe me a blouse."

  "Armani," Ravne added, smiling.

  "We don't have much time," Brand said, ignoring them both. The fact that he didn't even examine what would otherwise have been an object of great fascination for him was a sign of the urgency he felt. "We need to get in that monastery and find the other half, fast."

  "Easier said than done, by all accounts," Ravne commented. "Or do you think Ms Earth will simply allow you to walk in?"

  Helen Earth, Brand thought. Oh yes - they knew the truth about her now. Because the Hacman disk with which Hannah had accessed the sect leader's PC contained more than just decryption software - there was also an infiltration programme that had slaved her system. All he'd needed to do on the flight here was establish a wi-fi link and files had fallen over themselves to enlighten him. The Centre for Celestial Truth, de Spina Investments - just two faces of some very old friends indeed.