The Demi-Monde: Winter
Page 38
She could alter the Demi-Monde!
Taking a deep breath, she brought her finger over the ‘Y’ button and pressed.
THE DEMI-MONDE® IM MANUAL
OPTIONS:
1. LOCATE DUPE
2. ADD DUPE
3. DELETE DUPE
4. AMEND DUPE CHARACTERISTICS
5. AMEND DUPE PERCEPTIONS
6. AMEND CYBER-MILIEU CHARACTERISTICS
Eureka!
She swallowed hard, her mind buzzing with possibilities. Using the IM Manual she could find out if Norma Williams was still alive and she could help the people of Warsaw. If she could manipulate the Demi-Monde there was no end to the possibilities of what she could do.
‘We’ve got to go, Ella,’ she heard Vanka whisper urgently in her ear.
‘Just a few seconds more.’
‘No … now!’ He pulled her around so that she was facing back towards the hall.
What she saw chilled her blood. There on the floor of the Bank were four black-uniformed SS troopers pointing up towards them.
‘That bastard Louverture has sold us out,’ snarled Vanka. ‘I should have known better than to have trusted a Blood Brother. Come on, we’ve got to run for it.’
Ella barely had time to stab a finger on the keyboard’s ‘CANCEL’ button before he dragged her away from the booth and was racing her back along the walkway.
They nearly made it.
That there were only four SS officers and miles of interlinked walkway to run along made escape almost too easy. It was like a life-or-death version of snakes and ladders, with Vanka and Ella running up and down between the levels, dodging among the press of customers, while the SS officers scurried after them shouting and yelling and all the time trying to anticipate which way the fugitives would go.
They were out-thought by Vanka. He managed to get himself and Ella to a walkway only ten feet or so above the floor of the Bank and then, grabbing Ella by the hand, jumped to the floor below. The manoeuvre was so unexpected that just for an instant the SS were flummoxed, and an instant was all that Vanka needed. He hauled Ella to her feet and together they raced to the Bank’s exit.
Vanka’s smile of triumph was short-lived: the pair of them ran straight into two large SS troopers who were standing guard at the door. Even as Vanka turned to yell a warning to Ella, he was felled by a savage smack from a blackjack.
‘Up you get, Comrade Maykov, an’ you an’ the Shade move nice an’ easy towards that black steamer parked over there by the pavement. His Holiness Comrade Crowley would like a word.’
With a quick look to Ella, Vanka climbed painfully off the floor, rubbed the bump on his head and then the pair of them were pushed and shoved into the steamer. The SS sergeant clambered in after them and shut the door firmly behind him, the black-tinted windows and the heavy steel body of the steamer sealing them away from the outside world.
A sour-faced Crowley was seated waiting for them. He used the revolver he was holding to wave them into the seat opposite his. ‘Have they been searched?’ he asked.
‘Yes, Your Holiness: we frisked both of them. They’re clean.’
And you enjoyed every second you were doing it, you pervert, added Ella silently. But fortunately you weren’t perverted enough.
Crowley relaxed. ‘So I finally manage to track down the elusive Vanka Maykov and his mysterious PsyChick, Mademoiselle Laveau. I cannot tell you how happy I am to have found you. At last we have an opportunity to resume the acquaintanceship that was so abruptly interrupted by your disappearance from Dashwood Manor. You should know, Maykov, that your abduction of the Daemon has caused me some considerable embarrassment: I was heavily criticised by the Leader for not recognising you for the villain you are.’ He took a long suck on his cheroot and then blew smoke into Vanka’s face. ‘Yes, capturing you and Mademoiselle Laveau will be quite a feather in my cap. The Leader is very anxious to meet her again.’
‘How did you find me?’ asked Vanka.
‘A little bird whispered in my ear; a little bird who is very anxious that Mademoiselle Laveau stops dabbling in the Dark Arts. But really, Maykov, I’m not here to answer your questions, you’re here to answer mine. Firstly: what were you doing conniving with that black wretch Louverture? And please don’t dissemble: Karl, the doorman of the Resi, is a loyal Party member.’
‘I was trying to buy blood.’
‘I suspected as much. I have had you investigated, Maykov, so I know you are a reprobate with a history of blood trafficking.’ Crowley flicked ash from his cigarette over Vanka’s knees. ‘Unfortunately for you this is one deal which will remain unconsummated. By tonight Louverture and the rest of the black trash performing at the Resi will have been declared personae non gratae and thrown out of the ForthRight. But a question arises: what were you doing in the Bank?’
Now this, Ella realised, was a bloody difficult question to answer. That the money to pay for the blood had come from the coffers of the Ordo Templi Aryanis was not, she guessed, an answer that would be popular with His Holiness. Vanka seemed to be stumped for an alternative and believable answer and therefore opted to stay silent. It was a silence that provoked Crowley: he slashed the barrel of his revolver across Vanka’s face.
‘Answer me!’ he snarled as he raised his hand for a second strike.
‘No …!’ Ella blurted out.
With a thin smile of triumph dressing his mouth, Crowley turned his attention to Ella. ‘My, my, a cross-racial show of affection. My cup really does runneth over. This will make my work at Wewelsburg all the more delicious. The Leader has evinced a great deal of enthusiasm to meet you again, Mademoiselle Laveau, but what condition you are in when he meets you …’ Crowley glanced back to Vanka and gave a sardonic laugh. ‘I presume you are aware of the punishment for the Race Crime of Miscegenation, Maykov? It’s gelding.’ He shook his head in mock dismay. ‘I am disappointed in you, Maykov, it’s never advisable to mix business with pleasure, though I admit your slattern of a PsyChick has a certain appeal.’
‘I’m no slattern …’ began Ella but her protest was stymied by a slap across the face.
The pain was worth it. Despite the difficulty she had in reading Crowley, in that instant she knew what he had planned for her and Vanka and it was an insight that made her blood run cold. But she had learned other things too … important things.
All she had to do now was get away from this monster.
‘Be quiet! I will not be interrupted by a primitive such as you. Remember I have seen you perform! No woman other than a trollop would disport herself in such a lascivious manner. Your kind should know their place, and in your case that is on your back.’
It was the gleam in the man’s eye that gave Ella an idea. ‘Dat’s right, Sir,’ she said, mumming her NoirVillian accent. ‘Ah would sure like to perform on mah back for such a fine man like yous.’
‘Disgusting,’ muttered Crowley, but his interest in Ella seemed to ratchet up a little.
‘An’ then maybe you’d get to feel mah fine, long legs around yous.’ And to the astonishment of the three men crammed in the steamer’s cabin she began to slowly draw the hem of her long skirt up over her legs. ‘Dey says ah’s got the prettiest ankles in all ob de JAD.’ As though to emphasise the point, she wriggled her foot around. ‘But ah tinks dat it’s mah calves that are de nicest.’ She pulled the skirt up over her knee and hooked her leg around so that Crowley could get a view of her silk-stocking-encased calf. ‘Den dere am some gentlemen who am ob de opinion dat it is mah thighs dat am de fings dat makes paying for me to service dem worthwhile.’
Ella artfully drew the skirt over her thighs. Three sets of eyes were locked in stunned appreciation of the succulent flesh she was displaying. Then she started giggling. ‘Ob course it might be de ting hidden between mah legs dat dey find most exciting.’ With an evil little wiggle she delved her hand under her skirt. When it reappeared it was holding the small but very businesslike revolver Rivets had procured for her just t
he day before, a revolver that she was pointing straight between Crowley’s eyes.
‘I would be obliged, Your Holiness, if you would lower your weapon … the one you’re holding in your hand, that is.’ All trace of the NoirVille accent had vanished; now her tone was much more threatening. ‘I shall count to three and if you haven’t surrendered your weapon by then I will shoot you through the eye.’
‘My dear young lady, don’t you realise that my colleague here has a pistol jammed in the ribs of your friend Vanka Maykov?’
‘One!’
Crowley swallowed hard. ‘This is ridiculous. Shoot me and you won’t get ten yards.’
‘Two!’ Ella decided not to count to three.
Screw playing fair.
Instead she shot Crowley in the shoulder, the impact of the bullet causing him to pull the trigger of his own weapon. The gun exploded, the bullet smacking with a wet thud into the SS sergeant’s leg. Vanka didn’t need a second invitation: he smashed his elbow back into the thug’s face.
‘Out!’ he shouted as he pushed open the steamer’s door and jumped into the road, kicking the second SS trooper standing guard there squarely between the legs as he did so.
All Hel broke loose. A steamer that had been trundling along Blumenstrasse swerved to avoid the door that Vanka had thrown open, crashed into a dray cart hauling a shipment of potatoes coming in the opposite direction and demolished two stalls standing by the side of the road. In seconds the street was reduced to a shouting, cursing, fighting chaos and it was a chaos that Vanka, dragging Ella behind him, used to escape Crowley’s goons.
They reached Vanka’s rooms a breathless ten minutes later. Immediately he was sure they hadn’t been followed, Vanka sent Rivets off to reconnoitre the Resi and to see what was happening there.
The boy was back in less than an hour. ‘By the Spirits, Vanka, you’ve really gorn an’ done it now. The streets is swarming wiv Checkya. They say there’s bin an assassination attempt on His Holiness Comrade Crowley by some Shade bint who’s a WhoDlum crypto. From wot I’ve bin told they’re puttin’ guards outside every Blood Bank in the ForthRight and at every mooring point along the Rhine and the Volga, and they’re searching every cart and steamer leaving the ForthRight.’ He shook his head. ‘Yous an’ Miss Ella ‘ere are a couple of really ‘ot potatoes.’
‘Fuck.’
‘I fink there’s more bad news as well, Vanka. I sees that black item Louverture bin led away for questioning by the SS.’
‘There goes our chance of smuggling you out of the ForthRight, Ella. Our best bet is to stay hidden until the SS get tired of looking for us.’
‘I can’t do that, Vanka, I’ve got to save Norma Williams,’ said Ella quietly. ‘When Crowley slapped me’ – and here she brought her fingers up to the four red welts that decorated her cheek – ‘I read him … not clearly, his mind is too well shielded for that, but well enough. Norma Williams is alive and Crowley has her held in a place called Wewelsburg Castle.’
‘Then the cow might as well be dead,’ snorted Vanka. ‘Lots of people go into Wewelsburg Castle but I’ve never heard of any of them coming out. It’s the headquarters of the SS. We’ll never be able to rescue her from there.’
‘I know,’ admitted Ella. ‘But the other thing I learned from Crowley is that he’s having her moved soon. They’re taking her somewhere to use her in the Rite of Transference. I couldn’t read where – Crowley had blocked that piece of information – but I know she’ll be moved on the last day of Winter. That’ll be our chance to rescue her.’
‘First you’ve got to find where Crowley’s taking her.’
‘To do that I need to get into a Blood Bank again. Once I’m there I’ll be able to find out about Norma and I’ll be able to help the people of Warsaw. Working the IM Manual has given me an idea as to how I can have the Varsovians escape Heydrich.’
‘What? Have you gone crackers? You won’t be able to get within half a mile of a Blood Bank without the Checkya spotting you.’
‘Which is the last Bank that Beria and his crew would think I would use?’
Vanka thought for a moment. ‘Oh fuck … the one in the Ghetto.’
31
The Demi-Monde: 82nd Day of Winter, 1004
I regret to inform you, Comrade Leader, that my Ministry has received a communication from Venice, endorsed by Doge Catherine-Sophia, stating that until ForthRight troops have been removed from the Warsaw Ghetto all trades handled by the Rialto Bourse with respect to the ForthRight will be suspended. It should be recognised that a full ninety per cent of intra-Demi-Mondian trades are conducted through the Bourse and that almost seventy per cent of the ForthRight’s blood bonds and promissory notes are held by Venetian financial institutions. Without the loans raised on the Bourse it will be difficult for my Ministry to finance the longer-term ambitions of Operation Barbarossa. The ForthRight Guinea will also, effectively, be off the Blood Standard, which will have major – negative – repercussions in terms of its rate of exchange vis-à-vis other Demi-Mondian currencies.
– letter written by Comrade Commissar Horatio Bottomley, ForthRight Chancellor of the Exchequer, to Comrade Leader Heydrich, dated 82nd Day of Winter 1004
When, six hours later, the three of them – Rivets had insisted on coming along to protect Vanka and the ten thousand guineas he’d been promised – finally emerged, foul and stinking, through the manhole in Zapiecek Square in the centre of Warsaw’s Old Town, Ella made the silent pledge that that was the very last time she would ever travel by sewer.
This was reinforced by the experience, when she first poked her head out through the manhole, of having a rifle shoved in her face by a ragged boy who looked barely old enough to shave. That the boy had a piece of tattered cloth with the words ‘Lieutenant: WFA’ scrawled on it pinned rather crudely on the sleeve of his filthy jacket only confirmed to Ella just how desperate the plight of the Varsovians was.
‘Who goes there?’ the boy squeaked.
‘My name is Ella Thomas, and I am the girl who, if you prod me with that rifle one more time, is going to jam it up your ass and pull the trigger.’ The cold fury in Ella’s eyes persuaded the boy to back away.
‘Gor … I’m sorry, Miss Ella. I didn’t recognise you, wot wiv yous bin covered in all that shit.’ He paused as though waiting for some reaction from Ella. ‘Don’t cha know me, Miss Ella? It’s me, Lieutenant Michalski.’ He stepped as close to Ella as the smell coming off her would allow. ‘You ain’t bin down in those sewers for four days, ‘ave you? No wonder you smell so ripe.’
Ignoring him, Ella eased herself out through the manhole and spent a few minutes trying to massage some warmth back into her hands and her ass. Finally, feeling vaguely human again, she gave Lieutenant Michalski her best effort at a smile. ‘It’s good to see you again, Lieutenant, and congratulations on your promotion. I would appreciate it if you would have someone take us to the headquarters of Colonel Dabrowski. It’s vital that we meet with him right away.’
Dabrowski looked up when the three of them entered and gave a tired smile. In the few days since she’d last seen him he seemed to have deteriorated terribly: his face was gaunt and his skin the colour of old parchment. His voice trembled when he spoke. ‘Now here are some bad pennies. I never thought to see either you, Colonel Maykov, or your friend Miss Thomas again.’ He peered into the gloom towards Rivets. ‘And who’s he … re -inforcements?’ He laughed at his own weak joke. ‘So you made it, eh? I thought when I heard that you’d been ambushed in the sewers that that was the end of you. Pull up a seat.’ He nodded to three oil drums. ‘Aren’t you going to welcome our visitors, Captain Dashwood?’
Trixie stared at Ella with a look of real dislike on her face. ‘Did you organise the delivery of the blood?’
There was no point in sugar-coating the pill. ‘We organised it and I paid for it,’ explained Ella, ‘but our contact has been arrested by Beria. As we understand it, there’s no chance of the blood being delivered.’
Ella felt Vanka move closer to her: he was obviously as nervous of Trixie as she was. The girl seemed borderline out of control.
‘Please … Captain …’ the Colonel pleaded. ‘You must forgive the Captain. These have been difficult days.’ He looked at Ella and gave a wan smile. ‘You tried, and for that I am grateful. But now it is over. We lost control of the Warsaw Blood Bank to the SS this morning.’
‘How bad is the situation?’
‘We have two weeks … possibly less. There are close to three million civilians crowded in the Industrial Zone and without blood we are finished.’
‘I might have another idea,’ began Ella. ‘Another idea about how we can save the people of Warsaw.’
‘My, my, Miss Thomas, you Daemons are very devils for ideas, aren’t you?’ The sarcasm in Trixie’s voice was palpable. ‘What will it be this time? Will you use your Daemon’s knowledge of the Demi-Monde to fly all of us out of the Ghetto on winged horses?’
No one spoke, but the silence was almost audible. So far as Ella could judge, Trixie seemed to be on the brink of a nervous breakdown. The savage fighting had finally taken its toll.
‘You’re quite right to be doubtful, Captain Dashwood,’ Ella began, ‘and you’re equally correct in believing that, as a Daemon, I know things about the way the Demi-Monde works that you don’t.’ She took a deep breath. ‘It may be possible to alter the Demi-Monde so that your people can escape the Ghetto.’
‘How?’ said Trixie quietly.
‘Actually it isn’t my idea: it’s Colonel Dabrowski’s. I think I might be able to open the Boundary Layer.’
‘Oh, stuff and nonsense,’ said Trixie scornfully. ‘No one can do that.’
‘I think I can,’ said Ella simply. ‘Not permanently, but long enough for your people to escape.’
There was a stunned silence. Even Vanka seemed shocked by what she had said.