by Pat Kelleher
They lifted Mathers’ body from the tank with as much dignity as they could, given the cramped space, strapping the Subaltern’s turtleshell helmet to his head to keep what was left of his skull intact. Suicide or not, he was their commander, and as such he deserved their respect. Not wanting to leave his body to predators and scavengers, they used the entrenching tools from the Ivanhoe to dig a shallow grave at the edge of the clearing.
Wally collected the lieutenant’s paybook, a couple of letters from his inside pocket and the metal identity disc from around his neck.
They laid the body in the grave and Norman said a simple, improvised prayer. They stood for a moment round the fresh grave, lost in their own thoughts. Then they buried him, enclosing him in the clays of a cold alien world. At the head of the mound of fresh dirt, they marked his resting place with hastily-cut boughs lashed into the form of a cross and hung Mathers’ splash mask from it.
Despondent, the tankers mourned the loss of their commander, but Nellie could not mourn. All she could do was hope.
“Where’s Alfie? Where is he?” she asked each of them in turn, trying to hide her rising panic. They shook their heads and would not meet her eyes. “He could be out there, injured,” she insisted. She wanted it to be true, although she knew there were other, more likely possibilities on this world, possibilities about which she didn’t want to think. “He could be out there. We have to find him, Napoo,” she said, desperation seeping into her voice.
Napoo regarded her solemnly. “I cannot give you that hope. On this world, the likelihood of an injured man not falling prey to a predator is small.” He bowed his head and turned from her.
Unwanted tears pooling in her eyes, Nellie watched horrified as pale tendrils unfurled from the stems of ebony corpsewood and felt their way towards the body of the small fallen animal before burrowing into its flesh, almost as if to illustrate Napoo’s point.
It wasn’t the only thing attracted by the small, broken carcass. From a puckered fruiting body, a fibrous white fungus spread slowly, weaving a cobweb of filaments across the soil as fine white mycelia quested through the humus towards it. The fungus wasn’t fast enough. The corpsewood was already desiccating the carcass.
Nellie turned her head away, unable to watch.
Around the tank, the creaking continued, punctuated every now and again by sharp reports that they initially took for gunfire.
Moving so slowly she wouldn’t have noticed had she not been still, it was possible to see the large pallid creepers that draped everything, gradually entwining themselves round the trees, seeking to choke and leach the life from them.
As she watched, it became clear to Nellie that there was a battle going on here, a battle she and the others were ill-equipped for. Two sets of competing flora were in a struggle for dominance: the forest and something else. Down here, the trees were engaged in a slow war and they seemed to be losing. Nellie felt uneasy being caught in the middle of it.
A SHOUT FROM Napoo roused her from her maudlin thoughts. He had found footprints.
They were human-like, but they weren’t the distinctive hobnailed bootprint of the Tommy. These were smooth, less defined and deeper.
“Someone else has been here,” he explained. “They arrived here. See? Lighter.” He pointed out the shallow footprints across the clearing. “They left carrying something heavy.”
Nellie stared at them. “Alfie?”
A continuous cracking sounded through the clearing. This wasn’t the slow vegetable conflict she had begun to realise was all about them. This was something altogether faster and heavier. Something that was crashing through the undergrowth towards them, and gathering pace. “Into the tank. Look lively!” cried Jack.
Without waiting to see what was coming, they scrambled through the sponson hatches, Nellie and Napoo with them, the Urman more than a little unwillingly. Once inside, they slammed the hatches shut and sat panting in the dark.
The crashing stopped. There followed loud low snorts and several heavy thudding footfalls. A low wet sniffing proceeded around them. The tank juddered as something large butted it.
The tank’s crew glanced at each other in the semi-dark, came to a silent consensus, then loaded the guns and machine guns and flung themselves to the pistol ports, peering out, looking for their assailant.
“We can’t drive this, there aren’t enough of us,” said Wally, scrambling into the driver’s seat, trying to ignore the dried viscera that once belonged in Mathers’ head.
“Yes, there are,” said Nellie.
“But you’re a woman,” said Norman.
Nellie raised her eyebrows. “Yes. And this is the starboard track gear. This is the first speed. This is neutral,” she said, showing him the gear levers.
Across the starting handle, Reggie grinned.
“Do you want me to tell you how the differential works?” she asked defiantly.
“I can see why Alfie likes you,” said Reggie.
“All right!” said Wally. “Start the engine. Norman, get up here. I need you to operate the driving brakes.”
It took four of them to turn the giant starting handle between the Daimler engine in the middle of the cramped compartment and the differential in the rear. The engine coughed unwillingly once or twice until it caught and roared into life, and the electric festoon lights flickered on.
Nellie couldn’t stop the broad grin from spreading across her face as she took hold of the gear lever and waited for Wally’s command. The thrill was muted when she saw the love heart hastily drawn in the grime of the engine casing. The heart she had once drawn for Alfie. She tried to ignore the dried blood at her feet. Was it Mathers’ or Alfie’s?
Napoo sat by her feet, hunched by the sponson door, his hands over his ears. She wanted to comfort him the way he had her, but she had a job to do.
She heard the two bangs from the wrench Wally wielded to communicate above the engine’s roar and put the lever into neutral. The tank began to turn clockwise, presenting a broadside to the creature.
Cecil struggled to bring the six-pounder on the port side to bear on the thing as it paced round the tank. He squeezed the trigger. The loud report filled the compartment, contained and echoing off the metal walls.
Nellie gasped at the noise, loud even over the roar of the engine directly in front of her. It was beginning to get hot in there. She could feel the perspiration prickling her hairline. And that smell. Was that the petrol fruit fumes? She wondered what effect it would have on her.
The tank rocked again under the beast’s charge.
To Nellie’s left, Cecil let loose a burst of machine gun fire, the cartridge shells clattering to the floor and rolling out through a slot in the gangway.
The engine spluttered.
Jack leapt forwards and began working the manual pump for the starboard petrol tank by the commander’s seat. Reggie did the same on the other side. The engine coughed a couple of times and died for good.
“We’re out of fuel,” he said in disbelief, his voice loud in the sudden silence.
Outside, they heard a thrashing in the undergrowth and a howl of frustration and pain that receded into the distance.
“It’s gone,” said Wally.
Nellie breathed a sigh of relief, her ears ringing. “Is this—is this what it’s like all the time?” she asked Reggie, not sure whether she was drunk on the exhilaration of battle or the fumes.
“Mostly?” asked Reggie.
“Mm-hmm.”
Reggie shook his head. “It’s worse.”
They clambered out of the dead tank. The ground was churned where the ironclad had turned. Black ichor dripped down the side of the sponson. It looked like Cecil had hit the creature. Jack grinned and rubbed his finger knuckles across Cecil’s head as the lad beamed with pride.
They had used the last of Ivanhoe’s fuel to fend off the attack. It had survived the fall into the crater, but without fuel the Ivanhoe was twenty-eight tons of scrap.
“So what do we do now?”
asked Reggie.
“We find Alfie,” said Nellie decisively. She looked around at the crew, an iron determination in her gaze, almost daring them to challenge her. None did. Even Norman, if he had anything to say, kept it to himself.
Taking what supplies they thought useful from the tank, they took a last look at the Ivanhoe and set off into the crater to find Alfie.
IN THE SHADE of the abandoned ironclad, the pale feeding tendrils of the ebony corpsewood saplings inched towards Mathers’ freshly dug grave. The fungus, too, stretched out a fine filigree of threads towards it and this time reached the prize first, its mycelia spreading out over the mound, like a hoarfrost blanket, as they began probing down through the newly turned soil for the freshly buried remains...
CHAPTER FIVE
“One Grim Shadow...”
“IT WANTS WHAT?” said Everson in disbelief as he looked up from the daily reports.
Sergeant Hobson stood before the desk and winced in apology. “Petrol fruit fuel, sir. The Chatt asked for it quite specific, it did, sir.”
“Did it now?” Everson sighed heavily and strode impatiently along the familiar trench route to the Chatt’s dugout cell. He was trying to impose his authority after the mutiny and he resented the fact that he was here on terms other than his own. He saluted the guards, descended the dugout steps and peered into the makeshift cell. Chandar stood in the middle, facing the door, as if it expected him.
“Petrol fruit?” demanded Everson.
“This One had been thinking,” said Chandar.
“Evidently.” Everson slid the bolt on the door and dragged it open. “So enlighten me.”
“The Urman called Mathers, he ingested the liquid. He was able to see what no Urman ever could. He was able to read the odorglyphics, divine the sacred scents. He sensed the prophecy of the last of the Nazarrii.”
“So I believe.”
“You said this One had to choose which scent to take. It is this One’s belief that this liquid could help restore this One’s ability to read the scents. This One could divine which would be most useful to this One’s interpretation, one that will be of benefit to us both mutually, Khungarrii and Tohmii alike.”
Everson considered the proposal before shaking his head. It was a big risk. “I don’t know. It’s made our men mad, killed others. We have no idea what effect it would have on... one of your kind.”
Chandar hissed. It stepped forward, arms out, its two long fingers on each hand flexing, pleading. It swallowed a great gulp of air and regurgitated it into words: “For too long the Odours of GarSuleth have been denied this One. This One will take the chance. Would you not do as much for your clan, for the Tohmii?”
Everson pursed his lips. He had to admit it could be a solution to their stalemate, and he couldn’t see any other way forward. He just wasn’t very happy about it. “Very well,” he said. “But only under medical supervision. I don’t want anything happening to you.”
AS THE CHATT watched from across the cell, Captain Lippett poured a measure of petrol fruit fuel into a small canteen sat on a small Tommy cooker, under which he had set a short candle stub.
“I’m not going to let you drink it,” he told the thing. “This stuff has killed people. If you must persist in this madness, then breathe slowly and deeply as it vaporises.”
He turned to Everson. “I don’t know what help I can be if anything happens. Dissecting them is one thing, keeping them alive is another.”
“Well, I hope it won’t come to that, Doctor.”
Atkins arrived with a selection of stone amphorae and clay vials rescued from the ruined edifice.
Chandar studied the sealed containers. “This one. This. That one.”
Having made its choice, Atkins placed the selected jars on the floor.
“I want everybody out before I light this,” said Lippett by the Tommy cooker.
Everson and Atkins withdrew from the cell.
Nurse Bell stood by with a tray of medical supplies Lippett thought they might need if the worse came to the worst. Her lips curled in disgust. “What’s it doing?” she asked.
Atkins shrugged. “It seems to think that the petrol fruit fuel will restore its ability to smell.”
Edith’s eyes narrowed. “Is that possible?”
“With them? Hard to say. Killed a man, though, and damn near killed me; drove Mathers mad and made his crew paranoid.”
Despite her revulsion, she forced herself to watch, lost in thought, as Lippett lit the candle with a Lucifer and stepped sharply from the cell.
Everson pushed the door shut. He watched through the judas hole for a moment as Chandar arranged the jars in front of him. The small candle flame guttered under the bowl of liquid, casting high shadows and imparting an almost demonic quality to the Chatt.
Chandar began fingering the knotted tassels on its silk wrap as if it had never seen them before. It lifted another tassel, looking at it. Then another.
It breathed deeply of the vapours rising from the bowl and reached out for one of the amphorae. With its two fingers and thumb, it drew the stopper from the jar and swilled the contents. It tilted its head back, its gaze following the imperceptible whorls and eddies of the rising vapours, as if watching the emergence of an invisible genie from the bottle. Occasionally it swirled the contents of the bottle to refresh its perception. It stoppered that bottle and repeated the same performance with the other two.
Slowly, it rose up to its full height, its mandibles clicking as its mouth parts smacked rapidly in its own speech. It seemed excited. It turned to face Everson, almost belching out the words “It is GarSuleth’s Will,” before staggering sideways and collapsing against the wall.
Everson yanked the cell door open and Lippett was first in. He blew out the candle and handed the bowl to Atkins. “Dispose of this,” he said, “out in the open.”
Nurse Bell hung back, unable to bring herself to enter.
“Nurse, we have a patient,” Lippett chided.
Hesitantly, she entered the dugout cell. Everson pushed in past her.
Chandar stretched out an arm towards Everson. “This One has been blessed. GarSuleth speaks to it once more.” In its excitement, its speech dissolved into the harsh smacking and clickings of its native language.
“It was a success, then?” Everson said.
Chandar cast its arms open, its vestigial limbs following suit. “It was... different, strange. This One saw nuances and connections it had never noticed before. It will take practice, but in time this One could once more sense the text as this One has always done. Perhaps better.” It picked up a jar. “This,” it said. “This One will take this scent back to Khungarr. It contains the Commentaries of Chitaragar. Khungarr has not possessed this essence for generations. The original has long since evaporated. Only fleeting notes of it exist in other distillations.”
It reached out to Everson, grasping his sleeves with its long fingers. Everson fought against the reflex to pull away.
“This One shall return to Khungarr,” it said. “It is GarSuleth’s Will.”
The Chatt had put the ball back in his court. He couldn’t allow the threat of the Khungarrii to loom over them for much longer.
Everson knew he had to keep his word and let the Chatt go, but he didn’t trust it, not completely.
“Then I want someone to go with you to make sure you stick to your side of the bargain,” he said.
“Very well,” it said.
Now all Everson had to do was find a volunteer.
PADRE RAND HAD already forgiven the man who hit him. However, since the assault, the visions he suffered had begun to plague him with greater frequency, fraying the edges of his faith. They were shades of the vision he had experienced in Khungarr, when along with Jeffries, the Chatts forced him to undergo a cleansing ritual. Since then they haunted him, just beyond the edges of his perception. He would wake up in a cold sweat, the visions receding faster than he could recall them, leaving only the memory of terror.
>
A pulse of pain built and flared, hot and sharp in his skull. He touched his bandaged head as his vision darkened and the world tilted. He reached out to balance himself against the wall of the trench; in the momentary blackness that swallowed him, he felt something waiting for him, in the heart of the pain. Then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, the pain faded and his sight returned to normal.
He looked around as he recovered his composure, to see if anyone had noticed, but there was no one else in that stretch of trench. He was distressed to find the vision plaguing him even during his waking hours. Was there to be no relief from it?
He prayed to the light for guidance, but he knew what he had to face was hidden in the dark.
“I BELIEVE YOU need someone to accompany the Chatt to Khungarr,” the padre told Everson.
“How did you know about that?” Everson asked.
The padre was in an aid post, sat on a barrel, having his wound redressed by Nurse Bell. The bruising on his still swollen temple was now turning a dull green. It throbbed.
“Secrets of the confessional,” said the padre, glancing absently at Nurse Bell. “Never mind how I know, John. Is it true?”
“Yes. If there is a possibility of some armistice with these creatures, then it’s a chance I have to take. I need someone who can be diplomatic, who can advocate for us. I can’t pretend it won’t be risky. I can’t assure the safety of anyone who goes.”
From the moment he heard of Everson’s dilemma, the padre knew with certainty what he had to do. He had been looking for a sign. Surely, this was Divine Providence at work. A return to Khungarr. There, where it all began, he might uncover what dark revelations his vision harboured. He drew himself up, grimacing as his head pounded.
“Then I will go,” he said. “As commanding officer you can’t go yourself; you can’t send a soldier, you can’t spare the officers. I’m the logical choice. They might hold you responsible for the damage caused to their edifice, but a priest? I might be more acceptable as an observer.”
“I’ll go with him,” said Edith, taking a step forward before she knew she was saying it.
