by Will Hill
Pete looked down the long room. At the far end, beside the rolling metal doors, he could see Greg Browning overseeing four men in blue overalls. Three of them were stacking a pallet with bundles of newspapers as they came off the press; the fourth was sitting in the cab of a forklift truck, waiting to load it into a waiting lorry. The driver was presumably safely in his cab, waiting for the word to go, with no idea of what was taking place less than fifteen metres behind him.
Pete wondered briefly whether he could run, whether he could hide in the tangle of machinery, but realised immediately that such a move would be futile; Harker could fly above the machines to look for him, could move many times faster than him, and could in all likelihood hear him breathing.
He was going to have to bide his time, and hope for a chance to atone for the horror he had helped unleash.
Jack Williams stood beside the open doorway of the helicopter, his static line fixed safely to the security rail. Behind him, Todd McLean, the Australian rookie who had replaced Shaun Turner, and Angela Darcy, whom he had temporarily recalled to his squad after her own had been decimated, were watching him carefully, waiting to see if he could control the anger that was raging inside him.
He was furious with Kate and Matt for going after Albert Harker, and incredibly disappointed they had not come to him and told him what was happening. He would have let them come with him, of course he would, and it hurt him to think that Kate hadn’t known that. And part of him, the ambitious part that wanted to be the Blacklight Director one day, was terrified by the thought that they might succeed, might destroy Albert Harker before he could get there.
Mine, he thought, as the helicopter swept low across the landscape. He’s supposed to be mine.
Pete Randall walked between the thundering machines of the printing press like a man going to the gallows.
Albert Harker flew easily above him, holding the bound men casually in each hand. As they reached the wide expanse of the loading bay, and Greg Browning and the four workers in blue overalls stopped to watch their approach, the vampire’s eyes bloomed a bright, joyous red. He swooped down to the ground, dropped one of the two men to the floor, then turned and threw the other over the towering machines. The stricken man spun through the air, impossibly high, and disappeared from view. A second later there was an awful thud, like a bag of cement hitting the ground.
“Continue with your work,” growled Harker, turning to face the staring, shell-shocked workers. “And you may yet live to see the morning. If you get any stupid ideas, of trying to run, or trying to oppose either myself or my companions, I suggest you think about what I just did and reconsider. There have been changes to our circumstances, but your roles remain the same. Untie your colleague, load the trailers, and send them on their way. Let nothing else concern you.”
The four men stared at him, their faces slack with terror.
“Get back to work!” bellowed Harker.
The men scattered, three of them running back to their posts with their heads down. The other lowered his head, scampered forward, and untied the man that Harker had carried down the long room.
The huge press had continued to run as Harker spoke and a number of copies of The Globe had piled up on the floor at the end of the final conveyor belt. As the workers began to scoop them up, Pete looked at the front page full of the simple, awful headline that McKenna had written, and felt nothing. This was what he had dreamt of, a daring plan to alert the public to what they weren’t being told, but the reality was awful; the papers turned his stomach to look at them.
He looked up and saw Greg Browning staring at him. The expression on his face was one of total dismay, and Pete knew that his new friend was feeling exactly the same things as him.
Betrayal. Disappointment.
Fear.
Albert Harker rose up into the air and hovered above the rolling doors, watching the men working below him. His red eyes kept glancing along the long length of the building and Pete knew why: the vampire believed they were about to have company.
Greg curled the fingers of his hand in a tiny, subtle ‘come here’ gesture. Pete walked slowly across to the conveyor belt, as casually as he was able, and pretended to examine the newspapers that were streaming past. Greg made his way to the opposite side and lowered his head, as if concentrating on the job in hand.
“Where’s McKenna?” he whispered, his voice barely audible.
“Dead,” said Pete, his voice low and trembling. “Harker killed him.”
“Why?” asked Greg. “What the hell for?”
“He rang the police,” said Pete. “Knocked me out, then rang the police from reception. So Harker tore his throat out.”
“Jesus,” whispered Greg. “Why did Kevin do that? This is his thing.”
Pete shook his head, so slightly it was barely visible. “I don’t think it is,” he said. “To be honest, I don’t think it ever was. I just don’t think McKenna realised until it was too late. This is Harker’s thing. You, me, McKenna, we’re just pawns. And I’ll tell you something else, Greg. I don’t think you and I were ever meant to get out of here.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Think about it. Why are we here? Harker doesn’t need us to do what he’s doing. He could do this on his own. And the last thing McKenna said to me, the last thing he said to anyone, was, ‘I’m doing this for you.’ I think he realised that he’d been lied to and was trying to do something about it.”
“But Harker is doing what he told us he was going to do,” said Greg. He reached out, grabbed one of the copies off the belt, pretended to examine it, then put it back. “It’s happening, Pete. The public are going to know.”
“And five innocent people are dead,” said Pete. “He’s doing it, but I don’t think he’s doing it for the same reasons as you and me, for the reasons he told us and Kevin. This is about revenge for him. He thinks Blacklight are on their way here right now and he isn’t scared, Greg. He’s excited.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” hissed Pete. “But what do you think is going to happen to us if he’s right and the men in black show up? We might not have killed anyone, but you tied those men up, and I stood still and did nothing when he tore two of their throats out. We have to get out of here.”
“How?” asked Greg. He looked up for a split second and Pete saw the naked fear in his new friend’s eye. “We can’t fight him, not the two of us on our own. I doubt the seven of us can, even if we could persuade the others to try.”
“I don’t know,” said Pete. “I don’t have a plan. But we’d better think of something, because if Albert is right, this is only going to get worse.”
The helicopter containing Kate Randall, Matt Browning and Victor Frankenstein touched down outside The Globe’s printing facility with a heavy thud.
The car park was deserted; scraps of litter, thrown into the air by the draught from the rotor blades, swirled across the tarmac, and street lights cast a pale amber glow. Frankenstein leapt easily down, then held out his hand. Kate took it and allowed herself to be helped to the ground, before Matt did the same. As soon as they were all safely clear, the helicopter roared back into the air, disappearing into the dark sky overhead.
Matt watched it go. His stomach felt as though it was filled with concrete: a painful, relentless pressure that made it difficult to put one foot in front of the other. He was scared; Kate knew it, and he was pretty sure that Frankenstein did too. That was fine. What he hoped they also knew was that he had no intention of letting them down.
The printing press loomed over them, a huge grey building with a glass reception. Even from where they were standing, perhaps fifteen metres away, Matt could see that at least one of the panes of glass was cracked and that red covered much of the small transparent area.
“Blood,” he said, pointing with a gloved finger. “Lots of it.”
“I see it,” said Kate. “Let’s move. Ready One from here on. Matt, visors at all times for
you and me. We can’t let anyone see who we are. Silent comms. Is that clear?”
“Clear,” he said. He flipped his visor down, marvelling as ever at the technology contained within the thin sheet of coated plastic. Kate did the same, then spoke into his ear. “Are you ready for this, Matt?”
“I’m ready,” he replied, with as much conviction as he could muster. “Lead the way.”
Kate did so, drawing her T-Bone as she walked and holding it before her, one hand resting beneath its barrel, the other curled round its grip. Matt did likewise, feeling the heavy weight of the weapon in his hands. Frankenstein left his T-Bone on his belt, but drew the enormous silver shotgun from its holster that ran down his long spine. They walked forward in a line, like gunslingers down the main street of an old Western town as the clock ticked towards high noon.
The reception door was controlled remotely, but Frankenstein simply pushed its handle until the lock gave way. Kate stepped inside, with Matt following close behind her. The smell hit him instantly: the rich, coppery scent of the blood that covered the floor, the desk, and ran in thick streaks down the glass walls. Frankenstein stepped round the desk and checked the security guard who was lying beneath it. There was no need to do the same for the other man; his throat had been torn wide open.
“Dead,” said Frankenstein. “Tied up first, for a while at least. His hands are blue.”
“Something went wrong,” said Kate. “I doubt the plan was to decorate this room with blood. Anyone could have seen it.”
“Agreed,” said Frankenstein. “I want you both to be very careful. This thing, whatever it is, might be unravelling.”
Matt nodded, his stomach churning. He had seen his fair share of blood, including a great spray of his own as it burst from the hole Larissa had made in his neck, but he was not as used to dealing with it as his companions.
“Come on,” said Kate. “Let’s find out what we’re dealing with.”
She crossed the blood-soaked reception and looked at the doors that presumably led into the facility proper. They were hanging slightly off their hinges, broken by a feat of unnatural strength. Matt took a deep breath, then stepped up beside her. Frankenstein brought up the rear, towering over them both.
Kate reached out, took the handle in her hand, and pushed the door open. A huge cacophony of noise rolled through the empty space and into their eardrums, and Matt winced behind his visor. Kate pushed the door wider and slipped through the gap. He followed, with Frankenstein close behind him.
The room they had entered was huge, a tangled labyrinth of metal and spinning rubber. Matt, whose heart always lifted at the sight of feats of engineering, especially on this sort of scale, stared with fascination, until Kate grabbed his arm and told him he was standing in someone’s blood; he looked down and felt his stomach lurch.
“Jesus,” he said, his voice low. He glanced around and instantly saw the source of the pool of crimson beneath his feet. Two men were lying by the wall, their throats torn open, their eyes blank and staring. Frankenstein knelt down beside them; he pressed two long grey-green fingers to each of their necks in turn and shook his head.
“Where are they?” asked Matt, his voice low. “Harker. Our dads.”
“They’re in here somewhere,” said Kate.
“Don’t tell me we’re splitting up to look for them,” said Matt. “Because that only ever seems like a stupid idea to me.”
Kate smiled behind her visor and shook her head. “We stick together,” she said. “Like we said we would.”
56
WE TAKE CARE OF OUR OWN
The heat in the warehouse office was instantly overpowering, as flames exploded across the walls and floor.
Jamie felt the air burn his nostrils and his throat, and turned back into the inferno, grabbing for Ellison through the rising hurricane of fire. She had managed to lower her visor, but she was doubled over, coughing heavily into the speaker in his ear as flames billowed round her legs. The Blacklight uniforms were fire-retardant, but Jamie didn’t think they had been designed with fire this intense in mind.
He plunged into the flames, shouting Ellison’s name. She struggled upright and reached out a gloved hand; he grabbed for it, feeling the heat beginning to seep through his suit, feeling the sheen of sweat that was now coating him from head to toe. He closed his fingers tightly round hers and hauled her forward. She staggered through the fire, a dark shimmering shape in the inferno the small concrete room had become. Above his head, Jamie heard a terrible crackling noise, as a thick, fatty smell invaded his nostrils; John Morton’s corpse was beginning to burn, suspended over the flames like a stuck pig.
Jamie grabbed his squad mate’s shoulder and shoved her towards the open doorway with all his might. Ellison stumbled over her own feet, but she didn’t fall, not until she burst into the cool darkness of the corridor. He ran for the door, feeling the heat at his back beginning to become unbearable, and slid to the floor beside her. She was coughing again, her body shaking as she wrapped her arms round her stomach. He lifted her visor and looked at her; her face was a bright shade of pink, but her eyes were clear, even as tears ran from their corners. She pushed him away, her eyes flashing with anger.
“Go after him,” she croaked. “I’ll be fine.”
Jamie didn’t waste a second checking whether she meant what she said; he leapt to his feet and sprinted away down the corridor, in the only direction Alastair Dempsey could have fled.
His boots thudded against the metal stairs as he took them two at a time. As he ran, he twisted the dial on his belt and changed his helmet’s view to thermographic imaging. There was a faint haze of residual heat floating on the air as he dipped his shoulder, smashed open the door at the bottom of the stairs, and burst back into the cavernous empty space of the warehouse.
Jamie scanned it quickly, looking for the telltale pillar of white and yellow heat that the vampire could not disguise, but saw nothing. He twisted the dial again, switching his helmet’s visual mode back to normal, and immediately saw something different; one of the metal shutter doors was standing halfway open. Rain was pouring through the empty rectangle and the dim glow of street lights illuminated its edges.
Jamie ran towards it, pressing the button that established a secure connection with the Loop as he did so. A second later an Operator from the Surveillance Division answered.
“Priority Level target Dempsey, Alastair,” shouted Jamie. “He’s moving. Tell me you’ve got him?”
“Code in,” replied the voice.
“Carpenter, Jamie, NS303, 67-J,” he yelled. “Give me his position, right now.”
“Establishing,” said the voice. “Three hundred metres south-south-west of your position. In motion.”
Jamie ducked under the half-open door and skidded out on to the street. Rain poured down from the sky and was whipped against him by the gusting wind. He grabbed his console from his belt, checked his position on the map that lit up the screen, and set off down Bridle Lane at a flat sprint.
“Give me running updates,” he shouted, his boots pounding the tarmac. “Don’t you lose him.”
Jamie ran as though his life depended on it, his arms pumping, his heart thundering in his chest.
Not this time, he thought. You’re not getting away again.
Several men and women, huddled against the rain or drunkenly embracing it, stopped and stared at him as he ran, but he ignored them; he knew he was breaching a fundamental Blacklight regulation by exposing himself to such public scrutiny, but that didn’t matter right now.
Nothing mattered beyond seeing Alastair Dempsey destroyed.
An alleyway opened up to his right and he headed towards it, his boots slipping and sliding on the wet ground. His balance shifted, and for a brief moment he thought he was going to fall, but then his momentum carried him round the corner, and he accelerated again.
“Distance?” he shouted. The alleyway narrowed alarmingly, but was open at the far end, and he sprinted towards
the tall, tapering gap.
“One hundred and ninety metres,” replied the Surveillance Operator. “Course unchanged.”
Catching him. I’m catching him, he thought.
Dempsey was evidently not hurrying; Jamie wondered whether he was assuming that they had died in the fire trap he had set for them, but doubted that the vampire would be that complacent. More likely, he was unaware of the level of surveillance his pursuers were capable of bringing to bear. He probably believed that his head start, when combined with the darkness and the labyrinthine backstreets of this section of Central London, was enough to guarantee his escape.
Wrong, Jamie thought, baring his teeth in a smile so savage that anyone who saw it would have backed away immediately. Dead wrong.
Jamie reached the end of the alleyway and sprinted out across the street without slowing; if there had been a taxi making its way down the road, his pursuit of Alastair Dempsey would have ended with him in hospital, or worse. But the street was empty. Rising from the pavement on the opposite side was another narrow opening, cluttered with discarded rubbish and the dissolving remains of cardboard boxes. He ploughed through them and kept running.
“Position?” he yelled.
“Forty-five metres,” replied the Operator, instantly. “Directly ahead of you.”
“Jamie?” said Ellison’s voice. It was raw, little more than a croak, but it was full of determination. “Where are you?”
“Surveillance,” said Jamie, as he ran down the alleyway. “Give Operator Ellison my location.”
The Operator immediately began to give his squad mate directions; he tuned them out, focusing entirely on the pursuit of Alastair Dempsey. The alleyway he was running down was long and empty, stretching all the way to the hustle and bustle of Lexington Street.
I should be right on top of him. Where the hell is he?
He twisted the dial on his belt back to thermographic, and saw him.
