Department 19, The Rising, and Battle Lines

by Will Hill

  “Re-run the search, overriding the security protocols. Use my access code, 69347X. Do it quickly.”

  Almost instantly a single name was read to him.

  Seward swore. “I need an immediate current position,” he said. “Run his chip.”

  Agonising seconds passed. Seward had stopped in the middle of the corridor, and was holding the phone to his ear with knuckles that were gradually turning white.

  Not him. Please not him.

  The voice on the end of the line reappeared, and described a location.

  “Any other Operators with him?” asked Seward.

  The voice answered.

  “Thank you,” said Seward, and hung up. He swore heavily under his breath, dialled a second number, and waited for Cal Holmwood to answer. The Operator picked up after the third ring.

  “Cal?” Seward said. “It’s Henry. I need you to bring Mina to Russia, immediately. To SPC Central Command. Apologise to the Americans and take off, right away. We’ve got trouble.”

  Holmwood sounded surprised, but immediately told the Director that he would do as he was ordered. Seward thanked him, hung up, and dialled a third number. He was about to punch the CALL button when the phone rang, vibrating in his hand. He looked at the screen and saw the same number he had been dialling. He pressed ANSWER, and pressed it his ear.

  “Listen to me,” he said, interrupting the voice on the other end. “I need you to tell me where Jamie Carpenter is. His life may be in danger.”

  There was a pause, and then the voice answered him. The colour drained from Seward’s face.

  “He’s walking into a trap,” he said. “Call—”

  But the person on the other end of the line was gone.

  Chapter 42

  UNHOLY ISLAND

  The picnic area at the end of the causeway that linked the island of Lindisfarne to the mainland was deserted. The last tourists had packed up their blankets and hampers the previous evening, climbed into their cars and caravans and left, leaving behind overflowing rubbish bins and drifts of litter, floating lazily in the damp mist that covered the ground like a funereal wreath. The wooden tables and benches were empty, and the children’s playground was dark, the swings creaking back and forth, the carousel revolving gently.

  A low rumbling noise punctured the silence.

  Anyone standing in the picnic area would have felt it before they heard it, a trembling beneath the ground, gathering strength as it approached from the southwest. Then it became audible; a steady thump, regular as clockwork, that grew louder and louder until it would have sounded like they were standing beneath a hurricane. The wind picked up, and the litter sped around the picnic area in rapid circles. One of the bins toppled over, depositing its collection of polystyrene containers, drink cans and empty crisp packets on to the grass, where it was sucked into the spiralling air, creating a miniature tornado of rubbish.

  Two blinding white lights pierced the night sky, illuminating the picnic area. The beams were wide, and bright, and they grew as something descended from above, their circular fields spreading until they merged into one, until, with a bone-shuddering roar, an EC725 helicopter emerged from the mist, sending the wet air spinning into columns and tunnels as it was displaced by the aircraft’s rotors.

  The black helicopter descended quickly, its huge wheels bouncing hard on the worn grass of the picnic area as it touched down. Then a door slid open in the side of the vehicle; five figures jumped down and ran across the grass until they were out of range of the blades.

  Jamie Carpenter looked around at his companions, dust and litter thumping against the purple plastic of his visor. Morris’s face was visible beneath his raised visor; he was looking at Jamie with worry creasing his face, but there was a determination in his eyes that Jamie was heartened to see. Two more Operators stood in black and purple, their hands hanging loosely at their sides. Their names were Stevenson and McBride; they had been waiting in the Loop’s hangar with Morris when he arrived with Larissa, and he was glad to have them. The vampire girl was staring steadily at him, encouragement on her face. He smiled at her, and she returned it instantly.

  “I don’t know what we’re going to find on the island,” he said, raising his voice above the howl of the rotors. “I’m going to assume that Alexandru knows we’re coming, and you should too. He told me he had killed a lot of people, so you should also expect bodies, lots of them. You’ve seen the layout of the island; it’s one small village rising up a hill, with a dock at the bottom. The rest of the island is wilderness, except for the monastery at the north end. I think that’s where we’ll find my mother, but I could be wrong. So we’re going to go through the village first, and look for survivors.”

  Jamie looked around at his team. The faces that looked back at him were calm.

  They’re looking to me to lead them. How did this happen?

  “Any questions?” he asked. It was something he had heard army officers in films say before they led their troops into battle, and it seemed appropriate.

  Everyone shook their heads, and he nodded. “Then let’s go,” he said.

  They walked steadily across the causeway that led to Lindisfarne. The mist had closed in, and it was impossible to see more than ten feet in any direction. Jamie heard invisible water lapping on both sides of him, and he shivered.

  If they come for us in this mist, we won’t even see them until it’s too late.

  They followed the white line in the middle of the road, walking single file. Jamie was in the lead, followed by Larissa, the two Operators, and Morris, who was bringing up the rear, his T-Bone wedged hard against his shoulder. Every few minutes Larissa reached out and brushed the back of his neck with her cool fingers, and his stomach fluttered.

  The mist began to thin, and the island appeared in front of them, a dark looming shape that rose into the dark night sky. They walked on, the sharp clatter of their boots on the tarmac the only sound, until two tall, thin shapes emerged at the sides of the road, and Jamie stopped, holding a hand out behind him.

  “Oh my God,” said Stevenson. His voice was low and tight, as though a hand was gripping his throat.

  On each side of the road was a flagpole, a white metal tube rising from the sediment at the edge of the water to a height of twenty feet. The flags that had fluttered in the sea breeze were lying on the ground, torn to ribbons; one was a Union Jack, the other the yellow and blue flag of the European Union.

  In their place, impaled on the sharp points of the flagpoles, were two of the residents of Lindisfarne, their teeth scraping on the flagpoles as they twisted in the air.

  “I don’t understand,” said Jamie, his voice thick with horror. “Why would he do this?”

  “Dracula used to do it,” said McBride. “When he was still a man. He would impale prisoners of war and stand them where opposing armies could see them. It’s a warning not to go any further.”

  “It’s not a warning,” said Larissa. “It’s a welcome. He knows we aren’t going to turn back, so he wants Jamie to see what he’s capable of. He wants him to be scared.”

  Jamie stared up at the impaled bodies.

  Were they alive when he did that to them? I hope they were already dead.

  “Come on,” he said, with more conviction than he felt. “Let’s keep moving.”

  There were three more pairs of flagpoles, all decorated in the same terrible fashion, but Jamie kept his eyes focused on the island, which was now taking shape in front of him. He could see streetlamps rising up the hill, and squares of yellow light that were the windows of houses. At the foot of the hill, to the right of the causeway, he saw waves breaking on the grey concrete of the dock, and a small fleet of fishing boats bobbing up and down on the tide.

  The team walked on, and after five minutes or so the water that surrounded them receded, and they were standing on solid ground. The road wound to the right, and they followed it, their weapons drawn. They reached the bottom of the hill, and Jamie looked around him, u
p the two narrow roads that led up the hill to his left, along the dock to their right. The team stood still at the dark junction, and he listened for any signs of life.

  The island was silent.

  Dead. It’s dead.

  “Check the dock,” he said. Morris and Stevenson set off towards the fishing fleet. He looked over at Larissa, who returned his glance with a nauseous expression her face. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “It’s this place,” she replied. “It stinks of death. Can’t you smell it?”

  Jamie sniffed the air. He could smell the salty residue left behind by the seawater, and the oily stench of gutted fish, but that was all. “No,” he told her. “I can’t smell it.”

  She looked at him with resignation in her eyes. “Just wait,” she said.

  They watched Morris and Stevenson make their way back towards them, their weapons hanging by their sides, their heads lowered as they examined the ground. They stepped off the dock and walked over to the rest of their team.

  “Anything?” asked Jamie.

  “A teenage girl,” Morris replied. “Dead about three hours, by the look of it. And blood. Lots of blood. No sign of any survivors.”

  Jamie looked up the hill.

  Two roads. Maybe forty houses.

  “Let’s split up,” he said. “McBride, you come with me. We’ll take the road to the left. Morris, Stevenson, take the one to the right.”

  He looked at Larissa.

  “Will you take a look from the air?” he asked. “You can see things we can’t.”

  She nodded.

  “OK,” he said. “We’ll meet at the top in fifteen minutes. Leave the bodies where they are. Survivors are all we’re interested in.”

  The team went their separate ways. Morris and Stevenson jogged quickly across the junction and made their way up the right-hand road. Larissa rose gracefully into the air, smiling at Jamie as she did so, and disappeared into the darkness, leaving him and McBride alone.

  They found the first bodies immediately.

  Blood ran thickly between the uneven cobbles, pooling in the drain entrances and against the wheels of the cars that were parked outside the large, neat houses. They followed the river of crimson to the second house on the right, and found a couple lying facedown in their driveway. The woman’s long blonde hair was matted with blood, the man missing the fingers on his left hand and one of his ears. Behind them, electric lights blazed out of broken windows, and the front door of their home hung limply from its upper hinges. The wood panels had been splintered, and the lock was lying on the front step.

  “There’s nothing we can do for them,” said McBride, pulling gently on Jamie’s arm.

  Jamie was standing at the open gate that led into the driveway, staring at the corpses. He was sickened by the casual brutality displayed by Alexandru and his followers, unable to comprehend the violence that had been unleashed for no reason.

  Those poor people. Oh God, those poor, unlucky people.

  “Come on,” urged McBride, hauling on the teenager’s arm. “They’re dead. There might be someone up there who isn’t.”

  The thought of survivors broke Jamie’s paralysis, and he started up the hill again. He took the left-hand side, McBride the right; they checked the bodies that were strewn across the cobbled streets, shouted into houses and listened for any response, followed trails of red that led to atrocity after atrocity. Jamie felt light-headed, as though he might faint, but he persevered; door after door, victim after victim.

  Near the top of the hill he heard music emanating from a house, a classical piano piece he was sure he recognised, and followed it to a house set back from the road. He checked the woman who was lying on the path outside the front door, and moved on, past a house that stood open to the night, a rectangle of warm yellow light glowing out on to the street.

  At the top of the hill, where the houses curved round to meet the top of the street that Morris and Stevenson were making their way up, he stood with McBride in the middle of the road.

  “Nothing?” asked Jamie.

  “Nothing,” confirmed McBride, pushing his visor up. His face was pale and drawn tightly, as though it had been stretched. “You?”

  “Nothing.”

  Then they heard a high wavering cry behind them, where the road ended and the thick woods that covered the heart of the island began, and Jamie and McBride turned and ran towards it.

  They crashed through the undergrowth, snapping twigs beneath their heavy boots as branches whipped against their visors, running between dark trunks and over banks of earth and ridges of shrubs. They got turned round; the trees were dense, and the darkness was thick. The cry came again, but it sounded like it was all around them, like a hundred voices crying in unison. Then suddenly Larissa was next to them, grabbing their hands and lifting them into the air.

  She soared between the trees, banking effortlessly left and right, holding Jamie and McBride beneath her as though they were weightless. They came to a clearing, and she swooped down and released them; they hit the ground rolling and came up pointing their T-Bones into the middle of the clearing, where a man in his twenties was squirming in the grip of a vampire woman who could have been no more than twenty herself. She had the man’s arms pinned behind his back, and was stroking his throat with the long fingernails of her right hand; she either didn’t notice the appearance of the two black-clad figures, or didn’t care.

  Jamie levelled his T-Bone, and shouted ‘Hey!’ at the same moment as he pulled the trigger. The vampire dropped the man and reared up, snarling, to her feet. The projectile took her in the middle of the chest, punching a hole through the white vest she was wearing, sending blood gushing into the air. A second later she exploded, sending a spiral column of crimson into the sky. It pattered to the ground, coating the grass.

  Jamie and McBride stood up and walked over to the man, who was cowering on the ground, soaked with blood. He looked up at the two men as they approached him, his eyes wide with terror, and backed away, pushing himself backwards with his hands, his feet digging long furrows in the grass. A thick trail of something dark covered the ground where he had been sitting, and McBride swore loudly.

  “He’s bleeding,” he said. “Grab him, Jamie.”

  Jamie strode forward and scooped the man up from the damp grass. His hands slid into something wet; the man screamed, and Jamie almost dropped him. He stumbled, threw the man’s arm around his shoulders, and ran with him back to where McBride was standing. He lay him down; the Operator flipped him gently over, then recoiled.

  There was a wide hole high on the man’s back, a deep conical wound covered in dirt and flecked with tiny chips of wood.

  “Probably a branch,” said McBride. “Turn him over.”

  Jamie did as he was told, rolling the injured man on to his back as carefully as he was able. McBride laid his head on the narrow chest, listened for several seconds, then pushed himself back up to his knees, a helpless look on his face.

  “There’s blood in his lungs,” he said, in a low voice. “There’s nothing I can do for him. He needs a hospital, right away.”

  A terrible sensation of being trapped swept through Jamie.

  It’s this man or your mother. You know that’s the truth. If you take him to the mainland, your mother will be dead by the time you get back here.

  The wounded man spared him the decision.

  He looked up at the two men with terrified eyes, his chest rattling up and down as he took shallow panic breaths. Then his heart gave out, and he died of shock in Jamie’s arms.

  “Jesus,” whispered McBride, then lowered his head and crossed himself.

  Jamie just stared at the man. His last moments on earth had been full of pain and fear, and he had done nothing to deserve it, except be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  You did this. Alexandru did this because you tried to find him.

  A great wracking sob escaped from Jamie’s mouth. Behind the purple visor, tears spilled down
his cheeks and dripped on to his Blacklight uniform.

  It’s your fault. It’s all your fault.

  He slumped on to the grass, and lowered his head to his chest. It felt heavy, too heavy for him to go on. He was suddenly more tired than he had ever been in his life, and he fell backwards, towards the cool grass.

  He didn’t get there. Two hands caught him lightly under his shoulders, pulled him up to his feet, and turned him round. Larissa was looking at him with an expression of absolute anguish. Then she reached up, lifted the helmet from his head, and kissed him, tenderly.

  Jamie kissed her back, acting on pure instinct. The dead man lay behind him, McBride was weeping gently on his knees beside him, and he kissed her, sure that he would go mad if he didn’t find a way to feel something.

  She gently pulled away, and looked at him.

  “You won’t give up,” she said. “I won’t let you.”

  Jamie looked inside himself, and saw that she was right. He would not give up; he would see this nightmare through to its conclusion, even if it meant his death. He owed it to everyone whose lives Alexandru had ended before their time.

  He gave her a weak smile, and she returned it. Then he reached down, pulled McBride up by his shoulders, and looked the Operator in the eyes.

  “We go on,” he said, as firmly as he was able, then gestured towards the man lying on the grass. “We finish this. For him, and for all the others.”

  McBride looked at him, his eyes red.

  “Yes, sir,” he said.

  Larissa floated back into the air, promising to keep watch. Jamie and McBride were about to make their way back towards the road, to where Morris and Stevenson would be waiting for them, when McBride suddenly stiffened.

  “Someone’s watching us,” he whispered. “Don’t look. Your three o’clock. Behind the tree.”

  Jamie waited five seconds, then slowly, ever so slowly, turned his head in the direction McBride had indicated. At first he saw nothing, just the black outlines of the trees. Then as his eyes focused on the spot, he saw the pale face of a girl staring at them. He turned back to McBride, just as slowly.