Department Zero

by Paul Crilley

  Then she turns and runs.

  We watch the two of them sprint toward their comrades, trying to reach them before the hound does. As they draw closer, Teshani skids to a stop, leans back, then throws her spear. It sails through the air and hits the hound in the face, lifting the creature from its feet with the force of the impact.

  The clan members cheer. But the cheer falls away as three more hounds claw their way over the lip and straighten up to sniff the air.

  The girl who is holding the lantern shoves me in the back.

  “The name’s Tal. You listen to me now, yes?”

  I nod.

  “Good. Let’s go.”

  “But . . .”

  “What did I just say? We have our orders.”

  I reluctantly tear my gaze away just as Teshani glances over her shoulder. She salutes us, then turns back to face the hounds.

  We move quickly up the ramp and find the split in the rock face about thirty feet from where Teshani had thought it was.

  To my eyes the entry looks like the shadow cast by an outcrop of stone, but Tal pushes the lantern inside, enabling us to see rough walls leading into a thin fissure.

  We move into a narrow passage. The eldritch screams of the hounds follow us as we move forward. My heart thuds fast in my chest. How are we going to get away from these things? Five fighters with years of training could barely keep one of them at bay. What chance do we have?

  The opening soon narrows so much that the sharp stone digs into my back. Finally, we can go no deeper. We’ve reached a dead end.

  Tal swears. “Wait here,” she says, and turns back to retrace our path. I peer around Graves’s shoulders and see that she’s knocking the end of a dagger against the wall. She disappears around a bend in the tunnel, but I can still hear the clink-clink of the metal on rock.

  We wait. My breath sounds ragged and uneven in my ears, but not as bad as Graves’s. The guy is wheezing and coughing, sounding like he’s in pain.

  “You all right?” I ask.

  Graves says nothing.

  “Seriously, it sounds like you’re about to throw up a lung. You’re not having a stroke, are you? Because I’m not giving you mouth to mouth.”

  Graves just glares at me, and I shut up. The sounds of fighting outside filter into the tunnel. Shouts, cries of pain, the snarls of the hounds. I think they’re getting closer.

  A moment later I hear rock crumbling to the floor. My head snaps back, and I stare at the roof, making sure it isn’t collapsing on us. But the sound came from somewhere else.

  Tal appears around the bend and gestures for us to follow. Graves leads the way back, and we find the girl standing before a hole in the wall. Dust swirls thickly in the air. I wave it away and peer through the gap. It leads into a huge tunnel, this one twenty feet across.

  “Bore worms?” I ask.

  Tal nods and steps through the tunnel. She holds her lantern up, moving in a slow circle as we follow her in.

  “Are these safe?” asks Graves.

  “I think safe is something of a relative term right now, don’t you?” says Tal.

  “Fair point, well made,” says Graves.

  We follow Tal up the slope of the passage. Pebbles and loose rocks shift underfoot, forcing us to move slower than we’d like. At one point I trip and throw my arm out to steady myself. My fingers brush the rock, and a whole section of wall detaches itself, spilling down toward us like an avalanche. I barely have time to dive out of the way before the rock piles up where I was standing.

  “Be careful!” snaps Tal.

  Graves shakes his head in mock disgust, wagging a finger at me.

  I make sure not to touch anything else after that.

  Half an hour later, I’m thinking we might just get out of this alive when I hear the noise. It comes from far behind us, the sound of grinding rock, then stone falling. Everyone freezes.

  The howl of a hound echoes up the tunnel toward us.

  “Run,” says Tal.

  We sprint as fast as we can along the passage, trying to keep from sliding on the loose stones. But it’s a waste of time. The approaching hound sounds like a galloping horse. We’ll never outrun it. Never.

  “Stop!” I shout. “It’s too close.”

  Tal puts the lantern down to our left, lighting up the small area of tunnel. Then she and the other fighter spread out in a line across the passage.

  I lick my lips. Tal passes me one of her swords, and the other clan member does the same for Graves. The hound is getting closer, scrabbling across the rocks, its breath hissing and gurgling in its throat.

  “Get ready,” whispers Tal. She has her spear gripped firmly in her hand, the back end resting on her shoulder. I focus on the bend in the path. The light from the lantern flickers up across the smoothly worn stone, arching around to the roof. But the tunnel beyond is just a dark circle.

  The sounds grow louder. I strain my ears, trying to judge how many are coming. One? Two? More?

  We wait. The seconds move at an agonizing pace.

  Then everything happens at once.

  A shadow slides around the corner. The hound’s face is revealed, eyes narrowing in the lantern light. Tal throws her spear directly at the creature’s head. The hound sees it coming and jerks back, bringing a clawed hand up to bat it away. The blade enters its gray flesh and keeps going. The creature’s hand disintegrates in a mist of blood and pulp as the wide spear pushes out the other side, leaving the hound staring at a stump that pumps black ichor against the wall.

  I leap forward while it’s distracted and bring the sword clumsily down on its raised arm, severing it at the shoulder. The creature howls in pain, swinging for my head with its remaining hand. I duck and lunge to the side, rolling to my feet just in time to see the hound’s head flying through the air to thump up against the wall.

  Graves lowers his own sword and grins at me. “Did you see that? How amazing am I?”

  Tal shoulders him aside and retrieves her spear from where it fell beyond the light.

  “Sliced and diced!” says Graves. “Right through its neck.” He holds the sword up to the lantern light. “Maybe I should get one of these for official ICD business. I like the feel of it.”

  “Quiet!” commands Tal.

  “I was only—”

  “Silence!”

  Graves clamps his mouth shut. We wait. The silence stretches.

  Then the howling starts up again. My heart hammers in fear. They’re close. The first one must have been a scout, to see where we were. The sounds of scrabbling and falling rocks echoes toward us, the eager snarling and snapping of the creatures loud in our ears.

  Tal turns to face us, the light crawling across the left side of her face. The defiance and anger is gone. Now she just looks defeated. “We can’t—”

  She doesn’t say anything more. A hound lunges from the darkness and swings its black claw, slicing the top half of her head clean off.

  Her fellow clan member screams in rage and rushes past us, thrusting with his own spear. The hound barely even looks at him. It swings a backhanded blow that sends him flying through the air to crash against the wall. Rocks and stone fall on top of him, dislodged by the impact of his body.

  Graves and I rush forward, swinging our swords before the hound can turn its attention to us. Graves drops to the ground and slices his weapon into its leg. The creature stumbles forward, its arms flying out to steady itself and dislodging more rocks in the process. The rocks tumble into the tunnel, smacking up against the hound’s legs, pushing the creature to its knees. Graves darts in and stabs it in the chest while I swing my own sword as hard as I can, cutting its head from its body.

  We stumble back away from the falling rubble. The sounds of the other hounds approaching are growing louder.

  “We can’t fight them all,” says Graves.

  He’s right. We’d die if we even tried. I look around for something to help us, my gaze coming to rest on the wall, where a large pile of rocks has
fallen. The same thing has happened on the opposite side, where the clan member hit the wall.

  “Help me here,” I say. I put my sword away, then move the lantern back about ten feet. I pick up Tal’s spear and position myself close to the hound’s body.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Come here. I need to get on your shoulders.”

  Graves looks at me as if I’m mad, but he crouches down and helps me climb up. He slowly straightens, staggering and groaning.

  “My God, how much do you weigh?”

  “When the roof starts to fall, move us back,” I say.

  “Fine— Wait, what?”

  I ignore him and ram the spear into the rock ceiling. Dust sprinkles my face. I ram again, harder this time. I hear something shift, stone scraping against stone. A howl comes from just ahead. I glance down and see the first hound round the corner, galloping on all fours. Shit, shit, shit. I thrust the spear up, again and again. Stones fall onto my head. Graves moves back a step. I force my eyes to stay open against the dust and push again.

  This time a huge chunk of rock drops down. Graves lets out a yelp and falls backward. I tumble from his shoulders, landing on my back and hitting my head hard on the ground. Stars explode across my vision. Waves of sharp agony pummel my skull, getting stronger and stronger. I stare dazedly at the clouds of dust billowing around us, noting how the light from the lantern makes them glow. Everything sounds distant and muffled.

  Then someone grabs my arms, and I’m sliding back across the ground. My hearing sharpens suddenly, and I hear a terrific crashing noise from somewhere, and screams of pain and rage. I shake my head, trying to clear the cobwebs.

  I stop moving.

  “Really,” gasps Graves. “You need to lose some of that weight! I must insist. In fact, I’m going to bring it up at your first review.”

  I push myself into a sitting position. Dust swirls everywhere, but I can just see the collapsed ceiling that now blocks the tunnel.

  “You nearly killed us,” says Graves accusingly.

  “I saved us,” I respond.

  “Possibly. But you nearly killed us in the process.”

  Graves stops talking as a chunk of collapsed rock is displaced from the mound blocking the tunnel. It rolls to the ground, followed by another, then another.

  The dust clouds are slowly dissipating, drifting up the passage. Graves and I stare at the spot where the rock fell.

  A black claw punches through. The front of the rock wall shifts, then slides away as a hound lurches into the open. I can just see a small tunnel inside the rockfall, where larger pieces of stone have kept a passage open beneath the collapse.

  The hound puts its head back and howls. It spots us and starts running the twenty feet in our direction. I look frantically for the spear, but it’s gone. I try to yank the sword from my belt, but the hound is already ten paces away. Graves lurches to his feet, searching for his own sword.

  There is a sudden rush of movement behind the creature.

  My mouth drops open as Teshani emerges at a full sprint from the collapsed tunnel. She darts to the side, and actually uses her speed to run up the wall until she is the same height as the hound. Then she shoves off with her feet, sails through the air with two stiletto blades extended, and slices them through the hound’s neck.

  She lands in a crouch as the hound’s body drops to the floor. The severed head hits the ground and rolls to a stop directly in front of me. I stare at it in amazement.

  “Badass!”

  “Which one of you bastards just brought a roof down on top of my head?” demands Teshani.

  Graves and I quickly point at each other.

  The three of us trudge up the tunnel, relief at being alive tempered by the deaths of those who had been sent to protect us. The clan members gave their lives to make sure we survived. It makes everything so much more real. So much less fun. I know that sounds like a shitty thing to say, but what I mean is it brings the consequences of everything home. Makes me realize this isn’t just about me getting home to see Susan. This is real. Nyarlathotep is responsible for people dying. Which means we have to take it a lot more seriously.

  “Lucky I came back,” says Teshani. “You two would have been dead without me.”

  Graves snorts. “Please, woman. We were fine. We’d just killed about half a dozen of those things in hand-to-hand combat before you came along.”

  “How many?” asks Teshani.

  “Er . . . a few.”

  “How many?”

  “Fine! Two!”

  “That last one would have got you, though.”

  “No way. I was ready,” says Graves. He holds up his hands. “These are lethal weapons. Registered in five states.”

  “Five what?” asks Teshani.

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  I shift my gaze to the path ahead. A gray light is filtering in from somewhere.

  “We’re here,” says Teshani.

  We quicken our pace and soon see the light outlining thick thorn bushes that block the way out of the tunnel. Graves enthusiastically hacks and slashes at them with his sword, shouting like a kid.

  We emerge on the slope of a rocky hill. Behind us, the hill rises up until it merges with a range of mountains, but in front of us the ground drops away to meet a craggy rock plain covered with human-sized boulders.

  Teshani points into the distance. “That’s your destination. It’s called the Chalice. Good luck.” She turns away.

  “Aren’t you coming with us?” I ask.

  “I was told to escort you to the surface. I have done that. Now I must return and see what other damage the hounds have wreaked.”

  Without another word she turns and ducks back through the opening.

  Graves and I turn back and stare into the distance. We can just see a small jumble of buildings and a tower piercing the gray clouds.

  “Well,” says Graves. “You got your fantasy, your magic, your mad priests, and now you’ve got your temple.” He glances over at me. “Aren’t you lucky?”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Eight hours later, Graves and I are sitting behind a massive rock watching the sun drop below the distant lip of the pedestal. It throws shafts of light up past the distant edge of the plateau, illuminating the undersides of a few stray clouds in gold and red.

  It has been a long day, let me tell you. We had to stay out of sight the entire journey, picking our way across the desert-like landscape while keeping the larger boulders between us and the temple.

  I’m sweaty, irritable, thirsty, and hungry, and all I want is a cold beer and my cheap plastic patio chair and to say good night to my kid. This isn’t what it’s like in the books. In the movies. There’s never any mention of the chafing from so much walking. The painful rash that develops between your legs. No mention of searching for a suitable place to relieve yourself. No mention of the hunger, the headaches from dehydration.

  But I suppose we’re here now. That’s the important thing. We’re only going in when night falls, though. More cover then.

  The sandstone wall of the temple compound stands about a hundred yards away, the gates standing wide open. The massive building Teshani called the Chalice towers into the sky, lanterns and candles flickering in the windows. What was it the Oracle said? A labyrinthine complex of halls, passages, rooms, scriptoriums, and cells. I don’t know what a scriptorium is, but I’m kind of looking forward to finding out.

  “How long?” I ask.

  “Another hour or so,” says Graves. He leans back against the massive stone and folds his arms across his stomach, closing his eyes.

  “What are you doing?”

  He squints up at me. “Taking a nap. You have to get rest when you can in this job.”

  He closes his eyes and is soon snoring away. There’s no way I can sleep. I watch the sun vanish, the sky turning from blue to purple to black. The stars come out, bright and clear, unfamiliar constellations strewn above me. I wonder what we’re actually
going to do if we get this jewel. Do we destroy it? Can we destroy it? And what about the spear? How do we get that back? Because it can’t be left in the hands of the cult. It’s obviously too dangerous.

  How does it even work, anyway? How do a spear and a jewel unlock a million-year-old prison? How will it release the Old Ones?

  Questions for another time. It’s dark now so I nudge Graves’s foot. He blinks and looks around, yawning hugely and scratching his balls.

  “Time to go?” he says.

  “Reckon so.”

  He pulls open his satchel. I do the same and take out what I assume is my disguise, a neatly folded square of charcoal gray material. Graves has one too. We shake them out to reveal one of those robes I’d seen the priests wandering around the city in when we first arrived. The Oracle also supplied two daggers each. Small enough to hide but wicked sharp.

  I slip my robes over my head, pulling the hood up to conceal my features. I turn to Graves. “What do you think? Neutral evil or chaotic evil?”

  “What are you talking about?” asks Graves.

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  “If you’re finished messing around, follow me. And remember, the key to a good disguise is to act like you belong. Become your subject. Be the person you are pretending to be.”

  “You want me to pretend to be an evil cleric?”

  “Yes.”

  “Cool. I’ve read enough Robert E. Howard. Let’s do this.”

  We hurry across the rocky ground, coming to a stop against the wall just to the side of the gate.

  I peer into the church grounds. A flagstone courtyard, empty. Marble stairs that lead into the temple structure itself.

  Graves straightens up and makes sure his hood is positioned correctly, then casually walks into the courtyard, heading straight for the huge doors.

  I follow, and we enter the Chalice building. The atrium is brightly lit, revealing a mosaic in the floor that depicts some sort of epic battle with lots of fireballs and lightning and stuff. We climb the stairs leading to the second floor. Graves pauses by the wall and peers into the corridor beyond.