The Heartless (The Sublime Electricity Book #2)

by Pavel Kornev

  "Dog's weather," Ramon grumbled.

  "They came around to my house last night," my hulking partner mumbled out and started getting out from behind the wheel, but I stopped him:

  "You drive."

  The gloomy rainy weather was having a bad effect on me. I felt as if my head was filled with cotton, my eyes were stuck together, and even the cold rain wasn't able to chase off the remnants of my dream. I wanted devilishly to sleep.

  Ramon didn't argue – it was five hundred francs per day! – just wound the engine. Meanwhile, I found a more comfortable position in the seat. My eyelids were already closed, and I fell asleep before we were all the way down Calvary.

  I woke up from a jolt as we went past the pond from yesterday. With a bark of the engine, Ramon steered the armored vehicle around a cart and asked:

  "Where do we go from here?"

  I just nodded.

  "Leo!" My hulking partner objected.

  "Straight!" I waved a hand and tried to stretch out my numb legs, but the front seat was not made with my dimensions in mind. "Did you read the papers this morning?"

  "No," he shook his head. "I wasn't feeling up to it."

  "Alas."

  Forty minutes later, I noticed a familiar monument sign and asked him to turn down a country road. Then, Ramon himself saw yesterday's hill and turned his head, looking for the grass we'd crushed down with our tires. The massive armored car clunked heavily through a shallow ditch and rolled directly over the uneven field with its whole frame shaking.

  "Straight into the basement, then?" Ramon asked.

  "No," I shook my head, "first, let's check the catacombs. You can get into them from the other side of the hill. What do you think?"

  "Doesn't seem like a coincidence," my friend shared my doubt, steering the armored vehicle up to the very edge of the cursed estate. He confidently drove around the hill and choked the engine, not wanting to try driving up the gentle, but severely overgrown slope.

  The door thrown open, I slipped out and looked thoughtfully at the bushes. In their green cover, I couldn't make out a single gap.

  "There!" Ramon suddenly shuddered. "The ravine!"

  "Let's check it," I decided and pulled out the single-use flamethrower backpack from under the seat, followed by the semi-automatic carbine.

  My hulking partner grabbed his Winchester and got out after me. After locking the armored vehicle, we headed into the ravine Ramon had noticed and soon discovered it was no ravine at all, but a rain-washed road. The tall bushes growing up along the edges had intermittently interlocking tops, forming real arches, but between the massive stone slabs there grew only sickly grass.

  "We could park the armored car here if you want," said Ramon with a heavy pant in the middle of the slope.

  "We could," I agreed, in that the slope was in fact quite gentle. "But what's the point?"

  "I mean, I just," my hulking partner shrugged his shoulders. "Technically..."

  A few minutes later, we were out on a little square set with stone blocks. On its far side, there was a black cave entrance looming.

  "Wanna go back for the flamethrower?" Ramon asked, looking around cautiously.

  "Wait," I asked him, taking a hand grenade from my pocket. "Cover me!"

  The hulking man got his Winchester at the ready, then I walked up first to the cave in the hillside, slunk in and immediately took a step back, having discovered a practically sheer drop underfoot. The grenade back in my pocket, I worked the torch hanging off my belt free and pointed it down. The bright beam showed just uneven walls made of unhewn stones. The light didn't reach the bottom, though, leaving me to wonder just how deep the pit went.

  Ramon threw a small stone down, listened and hazarded:

  "Fifteen meters, no less."

  "And how should we get down there?" I asked, perplexed.

  Though the hole went down at a shallow angle, the uneven stones could serve as decent hand- and foot-holds. But with the gigantic tanks on my back, the risk of falling off surpassed all reasonable bounds. Climbing down with just a single-use flamethrower, though, seemed a most dubious undertaking.

  "Do you really think we should be poking around down there?" Ramon snorted. "We've got a box of grenades in the trunk. Let's blow it up and just end this!"

  "There are other entrances."

  "Let's find them, then."

  "Ramon," I sighed, "your optimism brings me unspeakable joy, but the catacombs might be dozens of kilometers long for all we know."

  My hulking partner spat in disappointment and asked:

  "How did they even get here?"

  "Christians used to bury their dead in them."

  "Right under a fallen one's nose?"

  I shrugged my shoulders, turned off the torch and walked down the hill.

  "What now?" Ramon asked, approaching me.

  "There should be a rope in the trunk. Let's try going down."

  "What are we gonna tie it onto?"

  The bushes growing on the hillsides didn't inspire confidence, so I decided to bring the armored car up closer.

  "There's a hook on the back. We can tie it to that."

  So we did. We did not have the wherewithal to back the vehicle up the hill, though. First, we drove onto the stone square before the cave and there turned the self-propelled carriage to face away. Thankfully, there was plenty of room to execute such a maneuver without a hitch.

  After that, I helped Ramon strap into the flamethrower as he doubled over in pain and pulled out a bundle of strong rope from the vehicle.

  "Do you think it's long enough?" I asked my partner, lifting the carriage back shut.

  "We're about to find out," replied my hulking partner, tying a heavy spanner to the end and chucking it down the hole.

  Before the metal clanged out on the stones below, just a third of the bundle managed to unravel, so I calmly stretched out the other end of the rope to the armored vehicle and tied a knot around the low iron hook.

  "It's ten meters," Ramon said, refining his initial conclusion. "Listen, Leo, what if we lowered down the flamethrower separately?"

  I thought over the suggestion and nodded:

  "Let's!"

  We pulled out the rope, freed Ramon of the tanks and slowly lowered the huge device into the catacombs.

  "Go!" I hurried my partner, handing him the torch.

  The hulk hung it on his neck and confidently slid down after the flamethrower. I waited for the rope to go slack and came down after him.

  "Everything alright?" I called down to my partner.

  "Yes, come down!" Ramon called back in a rolling echo.

  Then, I grabbed the rope and leaned over the hole. The tips of my boots slipped over the damp stones, but I soon found a place to rest my feet and slightly support myself. It got easier from there. I latched onto the rope and pushed off the uneven wall as I slipped down.

  "It'll be easier on the way up!" I declared, jumping onto the stone floor as the hole above suddenly lit up with the crimson spot of a burning cigarette. It smoldered in the darkness for a moment, then flew downward, past me, erupting into sparks on the stone floor.

  I lifted the hand-rolled cigarette butt, caught the aroma of the leprechaun's preferred tobacco and caught my breath with relief. I looked over at Ramon, pressed into the wall in terror, and said with a wave:

  "Pay it no mind."

  "Who was that?"

  "Do you remember the midget from the opium den? The one you chased down the hall?"

  "Why the devil has he followed us?!" gasped my stocky partner.

  "He works for me," I said, slightly overstating our relationship.

  "You must be joking!"

  "Forget it!" I demanded and started saddling up the flamethrower tanks on Ramon's back.

  "Devilry!" my partner sighed. "This is gonna tear my back off soon!"

  "Need I remind you of your wages?"

  "Are you going to hold that over my head for the rest of my life?!" Ramon flared up. "Com
e on! Find someone else to help you!"

  "Don't shout," I replied, and shined the torch at the passageway under the hill.

  The stone walls here were cut smooth. The ceilings were three meters high, and the walls contained no empty niches or doors. If dead had once been buried in these catacombs, it had been somewhat farther from the entrance.

  "Go!" I ordered Ramon.

  He got the flamethrower ready for combat, and went first down the passageway. I stepped off after him. I supported the grip of my Winchester in my left elbow, and held the torch in my left hand. The pointer finger of my right hand was at the trigger. I was ready to open fire with no delay whatever. I even removed my dark glasses in order not to miss a thing, no matter how minor; in any case, the beam of the electric torch gave away our approach much earlier than the glowing of my eyes.

  "It's empty here," Ramon whispered.

  I went silent.

  The underground labyrinth had already begun to affect my nerves. The paths stretched out farther and farther under the hill; from time to time, we found ourselves at an intersection and turned left every time. Ramon, meanwhile, was also making marks on the walls with a piece of limestone he'd thought to bring. However, the upper level of the catacombs wasn’t all that bewildering. I remembered the path perfectly without any markings needed.

  We hit upon a stairwell going down ten minutes later; Ramon sighed noisily and went first down the stone steps. I lit his path from behind.

  The second level down was palpably different from the one above it. The wide passages were replaced with tall narrow slits. The ceiling got lost in the darkness. The light of my torch didn't even always reach it. There were grave niches in the walls everywhere; the broken stone tablets that once covered them were lying around underfoot.

  The ancient burials had been looted with a particular carelessness.

  Often, we came across incomprehensible messages on the stones. From time to time, Christian symbolism met the eye; most often, it was carved fish in the walls and conjoined chi rhos. Often, they were deformed by relatively fresh cuts.

  "Nothing was left untouched here, huh?" Ramon asked, his voice muted to a barely audible whisper.

  "I guess not."

  "Well, where are the bones, then?"

  "I have no idea," I answered, not having any clue. "The catacombs could have been demolished centuries ago."

  "And yet, something isn't right here," my partner muttered out, glancing at a small space to the side with niches one over the other. The highest of them was in the form of an arch. "Family tombs?"

  "Yes."

  We went further, and started encountering such rooms more and more often. Then, the hallway led to another stairwell.

  "Should we go down, or finish checking this floor first?" Ramon asked.

  "Down, down, down," I answered decisively.

  Under my boots, the wet stone steps started to get slippery. The air seemed incomparably mustier, with some kind of very unpleasant smell.

  "Do you think this is some underground gas?" Ramon said in alarm. "If this is methane, we'll blow up!"

  "And if it isn't, we'll suffocate," I snorted. "Drop the panic! Follow me!"

  And again, we found ourselves going down narrow passages with countless rows of empty niches. It was cold and melancholy here. The hair on the back of my head moved not even from fear, but from the expectation of an inevitable death. I wanted to drop everything and run back up and out. Though it was drizzling up above, and you couldn't see the sun from behind the clouds, it was better to have bad weather and a cold wind in your face than the terrifying must of the subterranean.

  We soon started to see bones. Their white surfaces shone up at us here and there, until we discovered a whole pile of remains in a spacious underground room. And it would have been nothing, but the floor there was covered in a bone dust as if someone had been breaking open joints in an attempt to get to the marrow.

  "Quite a lot of bones," Ramon whistled when the light of the torch hit on a gnawed shin.

  "These must be from long ago," I decided and walked further.

  After that, there were bones lying around everywhere, and it became clear that the upper floors had been cleaned out not at all by raiding marauders, but some creature that resided in this very structure.

  Bhuts!

  "Devil take those grave robbers!" I muttered to myself, but Ramon didn't hear me.

  "I hope these burials were dug up long, long ago," he whispered out. "And they all died peacefully, from hunger."

  "Better to hope for the flamethrower," I suggested.

  "Have you noticed that there aren't any skulls?"

  "Yes."

  And in fact, the light of my torch had hit upon fallow ribs, spines, radiuses, tibias, and other bones, but from the skull, only lower jaws. We hadn't seen a single cranium.

  "I don't like all this," Ramon sighed.

  The terrifying atmosphere of the catacombs was making an impression on him as well. But to be honest, all these narrow little passages, countless niches and ceilings getting lost in the darkness, the confusing labyrinth of pleated passages and bone-filled rooms could have brought anyone to a panic.

  Then we found the skulls. There was a huge, lovingly constructed pyramid of them towering in a spacious room.

  I was blatantly thrown off. What was this for?

  Was it a reminder of the inevitability of death, or clear confirmation of the madness of the creatures that dwelt here?

  "Let's get out of here!" Ramon rasped out. "Fast!"

  I walked around the edge of the room and turned down the next narrow passage. And just then, a raw-boned creature ran down from the ceiling, its appendages splayed out. The bhut was unnaturally thin and had smooth skin stretched out tight over its joints and ribs. Its dry lips didn't come all the way down over the scavenger’s powerful teeth. Its eyes shimmered with a sullen flame.

  I made this all out in one moment, and then my left arm jerked the barrel of the Winchester up all on its own and a heavy leaden bullet slammed right into the charging beast.

  The bhut flew off to the side. It latched its sharp claws into a niche, somersaulted and gracefully landed on its feet. It crouched down in preparation for another jump, and I hurriedly plunked another bullet into him. The scavenger flew back.

  A moment later, it threw me back. Ramon grabbed me by the collar and pushed me behind him, then blasted the bhut with a stream of burning kerosene. It hadn't the slightest chance to dodge in the narrow passage. The flame reached it instantly and lit it on fire like a bundle of dried twigs. A piercing howl rolled through the basement then died down. The scavenger was filled with agony, almost immediately deprived of strength, and went silent. It burned away completely. Not even bones remained.

  While it burned away, Ramon and I stood back to back, getting prepared to deflect another attack, but none followed. It seemed, if anything was still living in these catacombs, it wasn’t tempted by the opportunity to sample fresh human meat.

  Strange.

  "Was it alone here, or something?" Ramon asked in surprise when he'd calmed down and was able to judge the situation more or less clearly.

  "They say, if you put rats in a barrel and don't feed them, only one will remain alive," I answered with a nervous chuckle. "It must have run out of dead bodies long ago. Who else was it supposed to eat, if not its own?"

  "I sure hope you're right," my partner said with a shiver. "By the way, you owe me a thousand, now!"

  I shot him an expressive look, but didn't say anything and kept walking. But the passage came to a dead end. I had to go back. We looped around the human-bone-filled hallways for ten minutes, then came out into another room, just slightly smaller than the first; in the middle of it, we found a stairway down.

  "This just never ends!" Ramon moaned out in sorrow.

  I pointed my torch at my timepiece. We had spent just over two hours down here, but it felt like the beginning of our third day in a row. My nerves were on the v
ery edge.

  So, I didn't get into it with my partner, just commanded him curtly:

  "Follow me!" I said, and started down to the next level of the catacombs.

  Down there, to my surprise, instead of another narrow little corridor, we were met with a wide passage lined with columns. And, on the walls, there were no longer burial niches, just complex geometrical patterns carved into stone. The air grew drier and the stench grew stronger.

  "Do you think this is it?" Ramon whispered with an incomprehensible expression, looking reckless and at the same time confident.

  "Let's see," I said, not wanting to guess prematurely. Just then, the torch beam passed over a cave-in.

  Then again, it wasn't so scary here. A few of the stone columns were leaning, and a few were fallen, but they didn’t collapse to the ground, just stayed propped against the wall, leaving just a small slot below.

  "Don't start me on fire," I warned my partner, ducking and walking to the other side of the cave-in. Ramon crawled through after me with untold effort. But he made it.

  Right after the cave-in, we stopped to catch our breath, and I checked the grenades I had in my pockets, loaded up my Winchester and changed out my torch's electric jar.

  "Are you ready?" I asked my partner after he was done fiddling with the flamethrower.

  "Yes!" he called back, and we walked on.

  Ramon was aiming the tip of his flamethrower from side to side in agitation. I was carefully checking every little shadow behind the columns that stretched down along both walls of the underground corridor. Then we came out into a small room, and I had to strain to hold back from delighted cursing: in the middle of the room, on a small platform, there was a stone sarcophagus. A stone sarcophagus lined with time-darkened lead leaf!

  We found it! Had we seriously found it?!

  I stuck a finger to my lips, giving Ramon the command to keep quiet. Then, I walked up first to the sarcophagus and got out a grenade.

  "Get ready!" I exhaled nearly silently to Ramon, who was standing next to me. I dug my hands into the unyielding stone lid, applied some effort and, in one sharp burst, moved it half way off and jumped aside.

  I immediately cursed out loud, but now without any elation. Insofar as I could tell, the sarcophagus was empty.