Invaders From Beyond

by Colin Sinclair

  “Indigo?” That wasn’t in the briefing.

  “Indigenous operatives,” he says. “Five to ten individuals visible at the far eastern edge of the parking area, moving along the scrub line—”

  Kelvin had a map. Abandoned construction projects to the west—the long looping route we took to get here—an attempt at forest clearance to the north and east, another stalled project. The south of the map was Garden World, and beyond that lay Brackett’s.

  “—I can’t see what they’re up to at this range,” Jost continues. “Looks like picking up rubbish. Bend, pick, drop.”

  A stupid thought crosses my mind. “Like catching the spiders?”

  “It’s...”

  Light thump of a fist against my shoulder.

  “I knew there was a reason I brought you along,” he says.

  “They’re collecting something?”

  “Could be,” Jost says. “Maybe something got loose.”

  If I don’t move soon, I’m not sure I ever will.

  “They’re too far away to see you,” Jost says. “Go.”

  He doesn’t have to tell me twice.

  I keep to the shadows and start moving.

  I SEE GREY islands of kerbstones and paving slabs laid out across the car parking area, each one with a cluster of tall lamp posts. None of the lamps are lit—there’s enough light spilling from Garden World for me to see where to put my feet—and some of the posts have been gutted, the curved metal doors twisted off to one side, coloured entrails hanging down and out.

  Flowers and weeds and grasses have run riot here, pushing up through fractured tarmac and crumbling concrete.

  Can’t hold back the march of nature, can you? We’ve got barrels of weedkiller—fuck-off-lethal concoctions—back at Brackett’s, but it doesn’t matter what you do. Left to its own devices, the greenery will overthrow whatever’s in its way.

  I reach the back of the nearest truck.

  The wide rear doors are open enough for me to see that it’s empty. Whatever they were carrying here, they’ve already moved it. White light—beaming down from lamps high on the wall of Garden World—falls through the murky fibreglass roof of the truck’s trailer and illuminates some sort of dark, slimy substance. Rich earthy smells are burning at the back of my throat. My nostrils are clogged with it. Whatever it is, I don’t touch. Even with the gloves, I’m not going near it.

  The left side of the building ahead is the shop floor area I was in on Saturday morning. There are windows, but the interior is not well lit; I can dimly make out shapes and colours moving around in there.

  I check around for anyone about outside—the Indigo people that Jost spotted earlier—and, seeing nothing, I head for the far end of the building.

  21

  HIGH WALL OF red brick, small unlit windows with frosted glass, grey security doors with warning signs.

  I’m creeping along a narrow strip of pavement between the building and the parked vehicles. Kelvin was right; this place looks more like a wholesale distribution centre than a retail warehouse.

  Maybe I shouldn’t skulk? If I’m doing the where-is-my-dog thing, I better be bold-as-brass about the place, pretending everything is fine.

  The brightly lit entrance welcomes me from beneath the rolled up shutters.

  Here’s the moment of truth. The crossing point. I could walk away now and know nothing about what Garden World is all about. Leave it to someone else.

  What would Jost say if I sulked back to the wire? What would Etty think?

  More important: what the fuck is going on here?

  Look, I’m not saying I’m buying into the whole narcoterrorista outpost theory that Jost and Kelvin have been cooking up, but these Garden World folks are cranking the weirdness meter real high.

  Got to find some sense in all of this. Some measure of closure before I go back to my shit job and wonder where on earth my life went wrong.

  Oh yeah, that…

  A quick breath. I settle myself. Find myself. Centre.

  I wonder if Jost is keeping watch? This could be an elaborate joke on his part, couldn’t it? A televised pranking? An online comedy clip show. Look what we made him do, LOL.

  So much for focus.

  Fuck it. I step into the light.

  “I THOUGHT I heard barking,” I’m muttering under my breath. Holding the dog lead high for emphasis. Or like a talisman. “Charlie’s like that, you know? She’s attracted to the light. Moth to the flame…”

  I’m babbling.

  I stop that and have a proper look around.

  It’s an IKEA-style stock room. Massive racks of shelving towering up and stretching away into murky distance.

  I mean, not exactly like IKEA. The interior blazes with light near the doorway, but that doesn’t last. The further you go into the building, the dimmer things get. I don’t see anyone wandering about.

  And there are no boxed stacks of flat-pack furniture on the shelves. Just row on row of identical silver cylinders.

  I don’t know what they’re doing here.

  Maybe it’s a power source?

  Some kind of green-energy eco-friendly hydrogen fuel cell malarkey?

  The cylinders have panels of blinking lights at one end; everything is fine, assuming green means good. They all seem to be connected by wires, thick bundles of flat cabling, clear plastic tubes carrying a dark green liquid.

  I start taking pictures. The panels of lights have tiny symbols I don’t recognise. Some language that’s new to me. Which, to be fair, is most of them.

  The bundles of cable and tubing—

  Wait. Was that a sound? Voices, maybe?

  I’m over by the wall. I put my back to the bricks and slide my way along until I reach a small door with a circular glass porthole in it.

  Through the round window, a store more shadows than light, and a bunch of shop staff frozen in place whilst Pleasance stands before them with his palms out, head bowed.

  Some corporate meditation bullshit.

  What kind of company is this?

  I back away, slow and quiet, take a few more pictures.

  Another door, another window, this one is sparsely lit and full of—

  Takes a moment to figure it out.

  Looks like a hairdressers’ kind of set up—rows of chairs, people in the chairs, heads high—but instead of those bulbous dryer things plonked down on their heads, they’re looking into white lights. Each person has a glowing circle almost pressed against their faces. Like a tanning salon? Building that all-American glow, perhaps?

  Won’t be opening that door, anyway.

  More wandering around, taking pictures of this and that.

  It occurs to me—at last—to follow all the cables and tubes to their destination. I feel a bit of an idiot.

  Don’t know what I’m expecting. What I get is a big… machine, I guess?

  It looks like a collection of boxy modules, around waist height, connected by more wires and pipes. They look like chest freezers, but more rounded at the edges.

  Signs and warning stickers:

  NO NAKED FLAME

  CAUTION

  NO SMOKING

  There are a lot more blinking lights here, some meaningless dials, a dull thrum of activity.

  The central module has a hatch in the middle of its top section. A handle I can pull. It’s cold to the touch, and there’s a sucking sounds of rubber seals giving way as the hatch comes up.

  The stench of it hits me and I reel back.

  It smells like graveyards. Damp earth and cut grass and rotting flowers, and a sharp undercurrent of death and decay. It’s like that stuff from the buckets I found earlier, in a more concentrated form. I’m thinking, some sort of mulching process?

  I press my jacket sleeve across my mouth and nose; risk a look inside the container.

  It’s a murky olive drab soup. Almost up to the level of the hatch.

  It’s cold, but there are bubbles floating and popping on the surface. Large thing
s rising, turning and sinking again to the depths, like there’s a stirring mechanism at work. It’s basically a large vat of broth.

  I see something long, tubular, with a wider flat section at one end, terminating in four shorter tubes and a stubbier fifth—

  Okay, I get it, that’s a fucking arm.

  22

  I’M OUT OF there.

  I’m running.

  I am the wind.

  I realise I’m still standing staring into the container.

  Staring at hell soup.

  I force myself to step away. Turn. Walk in the direction of the exit; left-foot, right-foot, stick to the simple things.

  Sound of a door opening, followed by voices and footsteps. I sneak a look and spot some staffers stepping out of the sunlamp room I checked out earlier.

  I stumble behind the nearest shelving stack and think about having a little cry.

  No. Don’t panic.

  Work through it.

  I manage some shaky ragged breaths, and then start shuffling down the aisle. Heading for the doorway best I can, hoping to see no-one, praying that no-one sees me.

  Step, step…

  I’m pressed up against the end of a shelf-stack, keeping low to the floor, edging out for a quick look around.

  I spot Dram.

  He’s checking stuff on shelves, poking at the buttons, checking cylinders.

  I throw myself back into cover. Stupid.

  My head catches the end of a cylinder on the shelf beside me and it rings like a gong.

  The cylinder I mean, not my head.

  I’ve got black dots floating before my eyes.

  Dram turns and moves towards me. Another step, a spark of recognition—

  He raises a hand to—

  A forklift truck smashes him into the floor.

  There’s a dull wet snapping sound as a wheel rolls over his head.

  I turn away and vomit. Bitter black coffee and too much chocolate and crisps. Clean-up on aisle six.

  Fuck.

  Dram is dead.

  If I hadn’t been pissing about in the spooky warehouse of doom he’d still be alive.

  Yes, he had been working for a bunch of industrial-scale serial killers, but still, it was his first or second day and I don’t—

  I—

  This is too much to process.

  I need to escape. Should I get more pictures?

  Get out of here.

  I risk another look. I don’t want to see.

  A crowd has gathered. There’s no panic or shouting or sounds of concern or alarm. Just a bunch of Garden World staff, standing in a semi-circle and looking down at the crumpled mess that used to be… what was he called?

  I think Etty or Kelvin called him Andrew. His name was Andrew, right? In death, the least I can do is use his proper name.

  The staff are still staring, silent, unmoved and unmoving.

  One of them is Dram.

  He’s right there. Looking at his own fucked-up corpse.

  Live Dram is looking good in his matching Garden World trousers and jacket.

  I’m fucking leaving.

  I start by staggering into the nearest shelving, scattering a heap of metal junk onto the floor before dashing away up the aisle.

  Smooth.

  I go right, then left, then I’m scampering down a long row of stacked boxes at the back—normal garden centre stuff this is, not more weirdness—and there’s the exit. And there’s a clump of Garden World staff moving towards it.

  They’re weirdly unhurried; there’s no urgency in them.

  They’re heading to cut me off, but if I pick up the pace I can get there first, get to the door and—

  There’s a clanking rumble as the roller shutters begin to slide down.

  Oh, right. Yeah, they don’t need to rush themselves.

  Head down, arms flailing, I’m scrambling like a maniac, as the gap between the shutter and the floor vanishes, inch by inch.

  I run, ignore everything, legs pumping as I sprint past the knot of Garden World staff; they don’t even grab at me as I throw myself onto the dusty concrete and slide through the gap. The door closes behind me.

  I’m out.

  And I’m on the ground and looking up at a circle of faces. The Garden World people, surrounding me.

  Dram is here as well.

  They’re saying nothing. Not even moving yet. But they will, won’t they? I grab the not-a-torch that Jost gave me. Twist and twist and throw and—

  There’s a crump and a rush of bright white noise and the whole world goes away.

  I’m struggling and shouting. Another thud and a bloom of heat washes over me. A gloved hand covers up my mouth; a heavy grip drags me away.

  23

  “FLASH BANGS.”

  Jost’s voice is distant, remote; happening way out there somewhere beyond the ringing in my ears.

  We’re back at the wire, out of immediate danger. Possibly.

  Jost’s given me a bottle of water to sip and spit. Take away the acid taste of throwing up.

  “I home-brewed them out of fireworks, so there’s a touch of blowback that you have to watch out for.”

  “They did the job,” I say. “Outstanding wo—”

  Fuck me, my legs are on fire.

  I duck and roll or something like that. Jost is patting out the flames on my combat trousers. Sticky lumps of burning chemicals.

  “So I was saying,” he continues. “The mix is a wee bit volatile. You need to be careful.”

  I need to be careful?

  I EXPLAIN WHAT I saw as we’re circling back around to Brackett’s.

  We’re not even bothering with the night vision at this stage. We’re old hands, we know the way.

  Jost doesn’t say much. Lot of nodding.

  I’ve still got plenty of crazy shit roiling around in my brain.

  I’m telling him about the arm in the soup, linking it to the buckets of slimy clothing I found on Saturday morning— a lifetime past—and conjecturing that maybe—

  I lose my line of thinking.

  I can remember the sound that Dram’s head made when the forklift ran it over.

  Except that wasn’t Dram, was it?

  Dram’s gone. Or something.

  They’re making copies of people. “Building an army.”

  “Looks that way,” Jost says.

  I must have said that part out loud.

  “You saw them?”

  “Glimpses, during that rescue I pulled,” he says. “Kept eyes on the situation whilst you were lurking around inside.”

  “What do you think?”

  “Putting together what you told me, and what I witnessed myself, I think we need to get back to Brackett’s.”

  “Yes.”

  “Warn the others, and figure out a plan.”

  “It’s that serious?”

  He doesn’t dignify that with an answer.

  We walk in silence for a while.

  Pretty soon we’re back at the last piece of cover, the final patch of waste ground on the Garden World side of the road, the place where we cross back over to our side. The normal side.

  “We’re into it now,” Jost says.

  “I can’t believe things like this exist in the world,” I say. “It just upsets the whole notion of what the world is like, doesn’t it?”

  “I’ve seen the world out there.” Jost has that thousand-yard-stare you hear about. “Heard war stories, lived through a fair few of my own.”

  “I can imagine,” I say, like an idiot.

  “One night,” Jost says. “Second tour in the Afghan mountains, second tour so you’re sand happy, in the groove, not stressing over trivial shit. We end up circling this watering-hole out at… well, you don’t need to know where it is, do you?”

  I say nothing.

  “A United States special forces team waves us in. Handshakes and hellos. Get some grub, get a brew on. It’s all good.” Jost rubs a hand across his face. “Something not quite on the
level about them. You can feel it. Fair enough, operators are a breed apart in any case, so you expect a bit of edge, yeah?”

  I nod along.

  “First off, I’m thinking an Israeli black-ops squad; badged up as Yanks and up to no good for some poor bugger in the region. It’s not that, though. There’s a stillness about them…”

  “Aren’t these guys trained up for just that sort of thing?” I ask.

  Jost shakes his head. “Not like this, no. This wasn’t like keeping close watch and biding your time. This was being absent altogether. Like whatever ran the show had stepped away from the controls. Slithered off into the background.”

  “So what you’re saying is—”

  “I’m saying nothing. I’m just telling you what I saw. And seeing those folks tonight reminded me of all of that. That same deep-down wrongness to it.”

  “What happened to them,” I ask. “After all that, you just walked away?”

  Jost checks his gear, gets ready to cross the road. “Couple of hours in the night and the Tallies stomped us hard. Fighting withdrawal for Crown Forces and we lost sight of the so-called Yanks. Dunno what happened to them after that.”

  He could have been mistaken, of course. Maybe it was just the wacky American training that made them seem so out of it. Not that they were robots or aliens or who-knows-what. There are other explanations, aren’t there?

  “We need to get back,” Jost says.

  Back to real life.

  Stock takes and till rolls and cups of tea.

  BRACKETT’S LOOKS NORMAL. Ordinary.

  Hard to believe the things I’ve seen across the road. Hard, for that matter, to imagine the world in which such things exist.

  We head through the back doors and up to the front of the shop. What’s left of the staff is there, lined up around Brackett.

  “Good news, everyone,” he’s saying. Beaming false-face smile.

  “I’m upping sticks,” he says—ignores the gasps of surprise—waving his hands awkwardly. “I’ve decided to take the money. Take their money and—”