The Tomb of Valdemar

by Simon Messingham

  Yet a nagging doubt remains, even in his selective mind.

  The cult isn’t smashed, not entirely. And the strongest of those he had slain had still died with the word ‘Valdemar’ on their lips. The downfall of Paul Neville, this Magus of a little obscure cult – a cult that stubbornly refuses to die, the symbol of all that opposes the New Protectorate – is all that he feels he has left to achieve.

  Well, Hopkins himself will parade that grey-bearded head on a pole through Earth Parliament if he has to. Because Hopkins is better. Because Hopkins knows that nothing matters, that out here in the stars there is no one to judge.

  Paul Neville murders in the name of evil, in the name of Valdemar, always failing to understand the true perspective.

  Let him do that, let him do those things. Hopkins knows better. He murders in the name of the only true universal law. He murders in the name of nothingness.

  The intercom beeps. Hopkins realises he is soaked in sweat. The logbook is crushed in his hairless hands. He will have to wear the hairshirt to keep himself calm.

  ‘Report!’ he barks into the brass cylinder.

  ‘Citizen Hopkins,’ comes the voice of Carlin. ‘We have broken orbit and are commencing descent. We should reach the coordinates obtained from the tracer in one hour.’

  ‘You sound worried, Carlin.’

  ‘Sir, sensors indicate that acidity levels contained in the atmosphere will cause severe damage to hull integrity. We will not be able to remain there for long...’

  Hopkins flicks the ‘send’ command. ‘We will remain as long as is necessary. I will not flinch from my duty.’

  ‘Of course, Citizen.’

  ‘Where is the Doctor?’

  Carlin pauses. Hopkins listens to his breathing.

  ‘On the bridge. We felt it would be wise-’

  ‘What? How dare you! I’m coming up immediately.’

  ‘Sir.’ His cousin fails to keep the disappointment out of his voice.

  Despite himself, despite all his knowledge, Robert Hopkins raises his head to the ceiling of his metal cage and looks up.

  Without even realising he is doing it, he prays. Give Paul Neville to me, he hisses at the cold void outside. Give him to me!

  Chapter Eleven

  It’s funny, thinks Miranda Pelham, but before Hopkins arrived, the bridge had almost seemed a relaxed, normal place to be.

  The crew had been silent and efficient, just as a crew ought to be, only speaking when they had important information to relate. This Lieutenant Carlin seemed a humane and sensible officer, overseeing the ship’s descent calmly and carefully.

  The Doctor watched, to Carlin’s right – a Gonzalo to his duke

  – as they entered the maelstrom. For a while Pelham had the impression that the cavalry were on their way to kick the stuffing out of the bad guys.

  Hopkins’s arrival changed all that.

  For a start, as the hatch to the bridge opened and he strutted in, the ship lurched suddenly. As he opened his mouth to shout something unpleasant, Hopkins was totally caught out, flying over and smacking his head on the navigational consoles. Terrified officers helped him to his feet, pulling his captain’s helmet up from over his eyes.

  Now, the whole atmosphere has changed. The crew is nervous, over-enthusiastically studying their instrument readouts.

  ‘Captain on deck!’ bellows Carlin, and all stand to rapt attention. Hopkins smooths out the ruffles in his silk and leather uniform, then falls over again as the ship lists.

  ‘Hull breaches on decks three and six, Lieuten-Citizen Hopkins.’

  ‘Get men down there and get them sealed,’ barks the inquisitor, looking around, daring his men to laugh. Carlin vacates his seat and Hopkins settles himself in, neatly avoiding humiliation in the subsequent lurch.

  When the ship has righted itself, he starts to look around.

  Pelham knows exactly who he is looking for and attempts to shrink back into some non-existent shadows.

  It does no good.

  ‘You’d better have a damned good explanation for their still breathing, Carlin,’ Hopkins hisses.

  ‘Oh, he has,’ says the Doctor, much too flippantly for Pelham’s liking. ‘He has. Tell him, Carlin. He’s all ears.’

  Carlin coughs. Before Hopkins turns too red he speaks up.

  ‘Well, they are the only people with any idea what’s inside this palace, Citizen. I thought it best...’

  ‘Leave the thinking to me.’ Hopkins glares at them. Any excuse, Pelham realises, any at all.

  ‘We’re one hundred and twenty kilometres into the atmosphere, Citizen, descending at ten kps.’

  Thank you, bridge technician person, she breathes, thank you.

  ‘Activate sensor equipment,’ orders Hopkins, snapping into the job. The buffoon has gone, replaced by the sinister figure she knows only too well. Hopkins is back on the hunt.

  ‘Problems with the sensor array, Citizen,’ says Carlin. ‘The acid is attacking our probes.’ He bends over, squinting at the sensor terminals. ‘But I think we’ve found it. Large metallic object, some unknown elements, could be your palace.’

  Hopkins looks up at the Doctor, who confirms: ‘It is the palace. I would be very careful if I were you.’

  ‘Hull breaches occurring on nine decks now, Citizen.’

  There is a tearing sound overhead. A sudden bump of turbulence sends them all scrabbling for handholds.

  ‘Visual, give me a look at the damn thing!’ Hopkins orders.

  The crew swarm over their controls, trying to find a spectronic reading that can penetrate these clouds. Infrared reveals the column of vast heat from the planet’s core, supporting the structure.

  ‘My God...’ whispers Carlin.

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ Hopkins warns him. ‘It’s a building, that’s all. There’s nothing supernatural about it. Forget the docking bay, Neville will have thought of that. Take us over the top of the thing. We’ll burn our way in.’

  Yeah, right, thinks Pelham, nothing supernatural at all.

  She is feeling the same unease, the same background ice she felt the first time that she approached this ancient structure.

  There is something unreal about it, a sense of ancient... what could it be... ancient evil?

  ‘There! There it is!’ Hopkins loses his cool. He leaps out of his seat and jabs like a maniac at the viewscreen.

  Indeed, through the acid clouds, the clouds that even now gnaw at the New Protectorate cruiser, the bulbous shape of the palace emerges, dark no longer.

  The doubts return, unbidden. It is as if the palace has become sick.

  The air on the bridge has become hot, thick. Compensators whine deep under her feet as they attempt to cope with the atmospheric conditions. Pelham is drawn to remaining silent as she stares, and she realises she is not the only one. All gaze silently at this thing towards which they are driving.

  The column of superheated air that sustains the palace’s position high above the surface, is almost visible, glowing with an obscene light. The palace itself seems to throb with its own unearthly breath. It glistens. Nothing she can specify, it is just wrong. Something that shouldn’t exist here.

  She thinks of herself caught in this sticky structure, the life drained from her. She sees her own face, her own dead face staring sightlessly back at her. The palace makes her think of night and a dark, earthen crypt.

  ‘It... it’s alive...’ she mutters, after an eternity.

  ‘No,’ says the Doctor. ‘Not life, not in the sense that we know it. Not even an “it” as we know it. Just something that can shape matter, objects, minds. Remember, we are seeing this with the benefit of the vaccine. These others, and Romana, will be affected and they won’t even know it. They won’t be seeing what we can see. What this palace has become is what everything will become, if the gateway is opened.’

  ‘Whatever you say...’ she replies. ‘I can’t go there again. You have to stop Hopkins going there. We’ll die, I know it.’ She
looks at him, knowing the mask that fear is making of her face.

  ‘I’m sorry, Miranda, I can’t do that.’

  ‘Don’t, don’t say that. You have to.’

  ‘I’ve made a terrible mistake and the consequences will be catastrophic unless I can stop it. There will be nowhere to go to unless we prevent Neville opening the tomb.’

  She feels like stamping her feet. ‘Do you always get so high and mighty in the face of certain death?’

  ‘It’s a living.’

  ‘Prepare an artisan team,’ says Hopkins. His voice is hoarse but – and Pelham groans once more – dreadfully expectant.

  ‘And fetch Redfearn,’ he continues.

  Carlin nods and, unable to tear his eyes away from the growing palace, flicks the intercom switch. ‘Calling Mr Redfearn. Mr Redfearn to the airlock please.’

  The ship clangs on to the roof of the palace. Hopkins selects a retinue and they all shuffle down to the airlock. The artisan team – well, some stripped-to-the-waist thugs and some welding apparatus, anyway – are already there, filling the small chamber with smoke and sparks. The work turns the cramped space into a furnace. Pelham has been kitted out in a kind of makeshift, iron clad outfit, without the iron, which doesn’t help. The shirt is too rough, the breeches too tight and the boots too hard. The Doctor, meanwhile, gets to keep his mad professor’s outfit, down to that stupid scarf.

  Pelham can feel the buffeting of this mad atmosphere. The metal plates of the hull buckle and twist with the violence of the storm.

  Mr Redfearn, it turns out, is a small, pale, rather rakish-looking man in his early forties. His main distinguishing feature, if Pelham is forced to allocate one, would be his brightly coloured, expensively tailored waistcoat, which he wears beneath a smart grey jacket. That, and the black wide-brimmed hat which he raises to the boarding party.

  ‘Mr Hopkins. Gen’lemen,’ he states formally, in an accent that has to originate from the Presley colonies. ‘Ah trust y’all have a reason for disturbing mah three-card stud? Ah was in possession of a peach-like hand capable of stunning mah opponent into foregoing the game.’

  ‘Your opponent?’ asks Pelham, stunned by such an inappropriate figure.

  Mr Redfearn places a hand on his waistcoated chest.

  ‘Mahself. Worthy adversaries are so rarely to be found in this day and age.’

  Mr Redfearn sees her with his hawkish eyes and smiles. He bows. ‘Ms Pelham. Delighted t’make yoh acquaintance. Mr Niles Redfearn at your service.’

  Hopkins, like the rest of his boarding party, is buckling armour and weapons all over himself. He holsters his pistol.

  ‘Mr Redfearn, your task will be to oversee this man...’ he indicates a bemused-looking Doctor, ‘and Pelham.’

  ‘Why, that is not a task, that is a signal pleasure. Ma’am.’

  ‘Never leave their sides. Not even for a moment.’ Hopkins loads his shotgun and snaps its breech closed. ‘Nothing must get between Neville and myself, and I don’t want those two running around causing trouble.’

  The Doctor snorts. ‘And what do you do, Mr Redfearn, that makes you so special?’

  White teeth gleaming in an ever-so-friendly smile, Mr Redfearn stretches. His jacket opens to reveal the two bandoliers draped around his shoulders, and the two holstered pearl-grip pistols strapped to them. ‘Ah win,’ he replies.

  Hopkins looks the Doctor up and down. ‘Mr Redfearn is a phenomenally accurate pistol marksman. His reactions have been genetically augmented. An “amusement” for the now defunct Elite. He has never missed a shot. Much to their eventual regret.’

  The waistcoat closed, Mr Redfearn looks small and insignificant again. ‘That’s not quite true, suh. There was that time when ah was two yeahs old...’

  The Doctor nods impatiently. ‘Yes, yes. Can we get on with this?’

  Mr Redfearn raises an eyebrow. Pelham presumes that if you’re an expert marksman, you don’t like being interrupted.

  ‘Ah look forward to furthering our acquaintance, Doctor,’ he says politely, and stares.

  ‘Enough,’ Hopkins barks. He looks around at the assembled company. Apart from himself, Mr Redfearn, the Doctor and herself, there are eight men including the tall figure of Lieutenant Carlin. To Pelham, this does not seem nearly enough.

  Hopkins tightens the straps on his helmet. ‘Keep your eyes open, men. Anyone we meet is to be considered an enemy and executed on the spot. The only exception is Neville himself. He is mine. Any man taking any action against him will be shot. Do I make myself clear?’

  The company nods. Hopkins slams a gauntleted fist on to the shoulder of one of the welders. The poor man winces.

  ‘Nearly done,’ he manages through the pain.

  The artisan team step away. Outside, Pelham hears the storm redouble its attack on the ship. Sledgehammers are produced and the already sweating drones start to bash and pound at the smooth metal roof of the palace. It’s tougher than this, Pelham prays, no way could these people hammer and weld through its skin. Just as the first hole appears.

  Well done, Miranda, good to see the old luck holding out.

  The airlock is a hell of echoes and metallic clamouring. The artisans kick and smash their way through to widen the hole.

  At last a huge plate is worked loose and it drops down, into total blackness beneath. Seconds later, too many seconds, Pelham hears it hit the floor inside.

  ‘Ladders,’ Hopkins orders. Seconds later, the ropes drop.

  ‘After me.’ Hopkins slings his shotgun over his shoulder and commences his descent.

  ‘Let battle commence,’ says Mr Redfearn as Pelham realises it’s her turn.

  Hopkins can feel adrenaline pumping him up. As he hits the floor, the lights come on. Immediately, he unsheaths his shotgun and swings round. This must be done efficiently. For a second, he is on his own. He can hear the others clambering down above him but there is something, something that seems to slow the moment down.

  The room, or chamber or whatever, is circular. A quiet circle that seems to be waiting for something. Perhaps it was once an observatory; there is a large, inexplicable machine staring up at the ceiling from the centre. A hatch points the way down into the depths. He senses that this is where it lurks. It? What does that mean?

  The source of the decadence that is the cult; that’s what it means. Not surprising really, because if all that rubbish has a source, it stands to reason it’s here. He can feel Neville’s influence. All these arcane colours and symbols daubed over the walls, all this burnt-orange metal.

  It’s breathing down there, waiting for him. Well, don’t worry my friend, you don’t scare me. I’m coming for you. I’m coming. Time speeds up again and Carlin hits the floor behind him, helmeted and formidable. His cousin is a fine man. The others follow, readying weapons.

  ‘Standard formation,’ Carlin orders. ‘Interesting.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘These markings. Cult runes.’

  ‘Are they really? Well, don’t bother with them. We need to keep moving. Surprise is everything.’

  The Doctor has swung down, performing his usual theatrical antics as he tries to disentangle his foot from the rope ladder. How Hopkins would love to work on him. First Neville, then him. Remember that.

  ‘He’s gone,’ the Doctor says, sniffing the air.

  ‘How can you tell?’ asks Carlin.

  ‘He can’t!’ Hopkins snarls. ‘He’s as much a charlatan as Neville.’

  The Doctor grimaces. ‘If you say so. I say there’s no one here.’

  ‘All right, clever man,’ says Hopkins, ‘which way?’

  With a smile, as if to a child, the Doctor nods at the hatch in the floor. ‘Well, I’m no expert but at a guess...’

  ‘Don’t push me,’ Hopkins barks.

  Mr Redfearn is helping Pelham from the ladder. ‘Careful, my dear,’ he says politely. ‘Lest you entangle yourself further.’ Pelham falls into his arms and immediately pushes herself away. ‘It’s too la
te for that,’ she says sardonically.

  ‘Keep together, move quickly and quietly. I want two men at point looking for booby traps.’ Hopkins moves theatrically, on the alert for danger. ‘Remember,’ he whispers chillingly, ‘this is the Magus’s lair.’

  The pause makes him start. They are all looking at him.

  ‘What?’ he asks, ‘What is it?’

  Carlin looks at the Doctor. He doesn’t like the way those two are getting thick together. ‘Did... Did you say “the Magus’s lair”, Citizen Hopkins?’

  Did he? Why would he... ? ‘Of course not. It’s just Neville’s bolthole, that’s what I said.’

  ‘Ah.’ Carlin does not seem convinced.

  ‘I should be very careful,’ warns the Doctor. ‘All of you. This structure will affect your minds. You won’t even know it’s happening.’

  ‘But I presume only you and Pelham are immune to these

  “effects”, Doctor,’ Hopkins sneers.

  ‘As it happens, yes. You see, we found this vaccine...’

  ‘Shut up. As you know it all, you can be one of our point men. Open that hatch.’

  As Hopkins indicates, the Doctor looks mournfully at that which he has been asked to unlock. ‘Well,’ he shrugs, ‘if that’s what you want. I think it would be better if we all went back to your ship and –’

  ‘Open it! Or I’ll kill you where you stand.’

  Even now, even with that threat, the madman keeps playing the fool. He looks at each of his hands, as if weighing up the possibilities.

  ‘Do it,’ Hopkins warns.

  ‘I’ll open the hatch,’ says the Doctor, nodding.

  The palace opens up for them, a cross-section for searching, and it appears that the Doctor is correct. The iron clads bob and weave, and poke their guns into many a deceptive corner, but find no creature, living or dead.

  Once the Doctor has shown them how, they descend the levels via the anti-grav shafts. He is intrigued by the sense of awe and wonderment that Hopkins and the others display at the alien construction. They seem overwhelmed by its colonnades, its vast halls of decorated stone, its baroque, over-embellished decor.