by Adam Browne
Now it was Themba’s turn to pat Nurka on the neck. “Rest, chief,” he said fondly. “Save your speeches for those that need to hear them, not us.”
Nurka looked up at him.
“We’re with you,” Themba swore, raising Nurka’s paw to the ceiling like a boxing champion, “Jua-mataaaaaa!”
*
Ivan Donskoy stepped from rank sewers to fresh air; or as fresh as air came in Lupa. He checked the immediate area and found nobody. He hurried down the jetty and looked out across the dark, foggy river, his brooch still shining red, illuminating the mist and passing raindrops, turning them to blood. There was no sign of the hyenas, or Rafe.
Suddenly, bubbles.
Ivan followed the bubbles with his eyes and ears as they broke the surface of the black water, heading past him and with a definite purpose for shore. The Howler swore he could see a white light wobbling deep beneath the waves.
Was it some kind of angler fish?
The bubbles converged by a rusty iron ladder set into the river wall and up popped a massive metallic wolf in a sodden black mantle.
Rafe!
Hardly believing his eyes, Ivan watched Rafe pull himself from the river and back onto dry land without much ado, water cascading from every crevice.
“I TOLD YOU TO STAY BACK THERE,” Rafe said, brushing a little red crab from his shoulder.
Ivan found his tongue amidst his astonishment. “I… I don’t take orders from ALPHA,” he maintained, rolling his neck and tugging at his cloak. “Where’d THORN go?”
“SAILING,” Rafe hummed, feeling his massive metal chest, specifically a large, fresh, silvery crater surrounded by soot which wasn’t there before. “I’D SWIM AFTER THEM IF I COULD, BUT… I CAN’T.”
“Not in that getup,” Ivan observed, adding, “Were you walking on the riverbed just now?”
“YEAH!” Rafe chirped, tipping water from his sieve-like ears. “PRETTY NEAT, EH?”
“How’d you breathe?”
“BACKPACK HAS AN AIR SUPPLY. IT’S GOOD FOR FIFTEEN MINUTES, DOCTOR JOSEF SAYS.”
Ivan cocked his head, “Josef? Not Josef Grau?”
“YEAH,” Rafe confirmed. Then he cupped a paw to his head and laughed like a hyena hiding in a barrel. “HAHAAAAHAHAAA! HO BOY IS JANOAH GONNA BE MAD. I’VE SCREWED UP AGAIN.”
Josef and Janoah.
Ivan frowned beneath his Bloodfang helmet as he slotted the pieces together; the size, the power, the voice – it was all adding up in his mind.
“They didn’t,” he mouthed.
Rafe’s metal ears squeaked round to Ivan, then his head and torso followed, as if delayed by their sheer heft. “SORRY, WHATCHA SAY?”
Ivan swallowed and gathered himself beneath that blank, yellow-eyed gaze. “You’re an Eisenwolf, aren’t you?”
Rafe wrung out his ribbon for a tail. “NO SCHMUTZ.”
Nodding, Blade-dancer looked at Rafe’s symbolic, silken prosthetic. “What happened to your tail, Eisenwolf?” he asked, in an obviously calculating manner.
Ivan’s insincerity was lost on Rafe. “JOSEF HAD TO CUT IT OFF. CAN’T HAVE ANY HOLES IN AN EISENPELZ, HAS TO BE HERM… HERMETICALLY SEALED. YEAH, THAT’S IT. HAVING A TAIL STICKING OUT IN A BAG OR SOMETHIN’ IS A WEAKNESS.”
“He’s a butcher, that cat,” Ivan tutted.
“NAH, HE’S ALL RIGHT. I DON’T MISS IT, YOU KNOW, MY TAIL THAT IS. PART OF THE JOB.”
“Pinned up in a frame is it?”
“HA! NAAAH, IT WENT IN THE BIN, MATE.”
Huffing, Ivan suddenly growled, “You do realise, of course, that as an Eisenwolf you’re a dangerous and illegal abomination?”
Rafe’s ears swivelled, “OH YEAH?”
“I didn’t write the law, but as a Howler I must uphold it.”
“RIGHT, RIGHT. SO WHAT’RE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT, ARREST ME?”
“I should; that or kill you.”
Rafe instantly raised a snapping, popping, plasma-charged metal fist. “COME ON THEN, HAVE A GO!”
Blinking slowly, Ivan turned his nose in disgust and looked out across the water, “It won’t last, Eisenwolf.”
Rafe’s paw dropped a little.
“You’ll rot faster than a corpse left in the sun the rate you’re going,” Ivan explained. “Believe me, I know of what I speak-”
“YOU DUNNO NOTHING ABOUT ME!”
With a grunt, Rafe turned to leave, arms held off his body with a slight, unnatural stiffness.
“Thank you,” Ivan blurted, almost in pain.
Rafe stopped, head and ears turning just slightly.
It was difficult, but for honour to be upheld Ivan persevered. “You got that centipede off me. I’d be dead if you hadn’t. For that I’m letting you go, but if we ever meet again, I won’t be able to.”
The Eisenwolf laughed, “CHARMING, ‘EN YER?”
“Rafe!”
Prefect Janoah dashed from the sewers, sword drawn, and with a couple of obliging Bloodfang Howlers at her back. Giving Ivan a passing glance, she came to a stop by Rafe and looked all around.
“Well?”
Rafe shook his head, “SORRY, JAN. THEY GOT ON A BOAT. I TRIED TO STOP ‘EM.”
Janoah tramped down the jetty a way, “Where?”
Ivan dismissed, “Forget it, Janoah. We won’t find them in this fog. They’ll be smuggled from the district before we can even get word about.”
“Schmutz!”
“SORRY,” Rafe said again. “I SCREWED UP.”
“No, you did your best,” Janoah said, returning to slap Rafe’s arm. In doing so she noticed the crater on his chest and placed her paw there. “What happened?” she gasped.
Rafe looked, “EH? OH! IT WAS A PEARL, I THINK.”
“Pearl? You took an imperium pearl to the face? You’re joking!”
“WELL I DUNNO, JAN. I’M ONLY GOING BY WHAT YOU TOLD ME ABOUT ‘EM. SOME RABBIT POPPED UP ‘N’ SHOT ME WITH IT. KNOCKED ME OVERBOARD INTO THE RIVER. I THOUGHT I WAS A GONER, BUT THE SUIT NEVER EVEN SPRUNG A LEAK.”
“Rabbit, you say?”
“YEAH.”
Nodding, then laughing, Janoah looked to Ivan, then patted Rafe’s cavernous chest. “Rabbits can’t fire pearls, Stenton,” and started back down the jetty. “Come on, they need us back there.”
“WHAT FOR?”
Janoah was already away, climbing some slimy steps to take the overland route back to the refinery. She stopped long enough to reply, “We’re going on a bug hunt.”
*
Removing the wrench that barred the rusty door, Rufus pulled it open and shone his brooch down the steps, beating back the darkness with a blood-red light and revealing dozens of little beasts dressed in coveralls; rabbits, rats, moles and the like, all squinted back at him.
The hostages.
“I’ve found them!” Rufus shouted to the left, before saying to the trembling beasts, “It’s all right everyone. You’re safe now. Is anybody hurt?”
Werner joined Rufus at the doorway, his pink face enclosed by a gas-mask since the air in the refinery was thick with pollution. “Well done, sir,” he praised, his voice muffled by his mask. “How’d you find ‘em? This place is like a labyrinth!”
Rufus glanced sideways at the hog, surprised the word labyrinth was amidst his lexicon. “Doors aren’t generally secured with wrenches, Werner,” the Howler explained, throwing the hefty tool aside. “Get these beasts clear of the building; with a centipede on the loose it’s too dangerous for them to linger.”
“Leave it to me, sir.”
Rufus did so, hurrying down smoky corridors, passing red-shirted Politzi of every race made somewhat anonymous by their similar gas-masks. Happening across a hyena slumped against a wall, Rufus knelt down and checked for life.
He was disappointed.
Linus came barrelling down the same corridor. “Sir!” the youth said, skidding to a halt. “Vladimir wants you, sir!”
“Tell him I’ve found the hostages,” Rufus huffed, standing up and a
sking, “Any sign of that centipede yet?”
“No, sir, but-”
“How’s Uther holding up?”
“They’re putting him on a stretcher, sir.”
Patting Linus’s sturdy shoulder Rufus made to leave, “Stay with him. I’m going to find Jan. I shouldn’t worry about her these days, but I do-”
“But we’ve got a hyena cornered upstairs!” Linus blurted, adding, “Sir.”
Rufus whirled on him, but said nothing.
“He’s alive, sir,” Linus explained, “but, well… unhinged, you might say. Vladimir was wondering if you wouldn’t try talking him down, what with you being uh… well….”
“A hyena-lover?” Rufus guessed.
“Versed in hyena ways,” Linus tactfully corrected.
Managing a chuckle despite everything, Rufus looked this way and that, before nodding, “Lead on, Mills.”
Linus beckoned his superior through the innards of the refinery, past more bodies, some hyenas, some Politzi, but mostly the former. They hurried up some metallic stairs, boots thumping, and through a door into a relatively fog-free series of nicely furnished offices – this is where the administrators worked, evidently.
Linus slowed to a walk, his boots softened by a red carpet. With Rufus in tow, he picked his way through an office, past several Politzi, to Vladimir’s side.
The lofty Grand Howler was stationed by a door, pistol in paw. He turned to his fellow Howlers, Rufus in particular.
“He’s in there,” he whispered, trusting Linus had filled Rufus in on the situation. “He’s got a capsule in his mouth but not the guts to crunch it.”
“Yet,” Rufus said.
Vladimir nodded, “He’s armed too, so watch yourself. We’ve got one of the Chakaa in custody already, so don’t take any unnecessary risks.”
Rufus was surprised, “Is that one going to live? I thought he was bitten.”
Vladimir tapped his armoured nose, “I brought a sting, just in case of an emergency. He’ll live now.”
Surprised, Rufus nodded.
It took Linus a moment to work out what Vladimir had just said. “White-imperium?” he gasped, appalled. “You gave venom to a… a THORN terrorist, sir?”
“We need him alive if we’re to interrogate him,” Vladimir explained. “Now keep your voice down.”
“But we’re dying from the rot left right and centre; we can’t justify wasting venom on criminals. What’ll Elder Amael say when he finds out?”
Sighing, Vladimir played his card, “Keep it to yourself, Mills, and I will let your disgusting display of insubordination earlier go unpunished. Or would you prefer being tied to a pole and flogged with an imperium whip?”
Linus dipped his chin, “I-I-I was just concerned, sir.”
Smacking his lips, Vladimir turned to Rufus. “He’s got a lot to learn, this one,” he said of Linus.
Rolling his eyes, Rufus brushed Vladimir by, and peered round the open door, catching sight of a youthful hyena sitting in the corner of a plush office.
“Stay back!” the hyena snarled at Rufus, waving a pistol in his general direction “I’ll shoot!”
Rufus drew away. He looked at Vladimir and Linus, then, to their combined tiny gasps, boldly stepped into the open, paws raised.
“Get out, Howler scum!” the hyena howled at once.
“I’m not going anywhere, dear boy. I just want to have a word with you-”
“Get oooouut! Get out, get out, get ouuuuhouhout!”
Rufus waited, paws raised, heart pounding, whilst the hyena’s hysterics passed. He was only a cub, sandy cheeks wet with tears, broad nose running, big paws trembling. There was no danger of him shooting straight in his condition, of that Rufus was convinced, taking a surreptitious step closer.
“I’m… going to remove my helmet, so we can talk face to face,” Rufus told the hyena, adding with a disarming Rufus-brand chuckle, “These silly old helmets of ours are rather intimidating, I know.”
Slowly, Rufus unbuckled his helmet and slipped it off.
The hyena stared at him, mouth slightly agape – Rufus spied the glimmering glass imperium capsule resting on the youth’s tongue. By Ulf, how could he bear it? The mere thought of a black-imperium capsule resting on his own tongue made Rufus queasy.
“Perhaps you recognise me?” he said with a gulp. “I’m Rufus Bloodfang.”
The hyena nodded a little. “You… you’re the one… the one who… who helps us.”
“I speak up for your people when I can, yes,” Rufus clarified, spreading a paw. “If that small gesture helps at all then I’m glad. I wish I could do more.”
The hyena said nothing.
“What’s your name?” Rufus asked him.
“My name?”
“Yes.”
“Who cares?”
“I do,” Rufus insisted, but moved on. “It’s wrong how the tribes are treated. If I had my way things would change tomorrow. But I tell you now, my young friend, that this is not the way to go about changing anything. Killing and bombing isn’t going to-”
“I’ve not killed anyone!” the hyena protested. “I never killed anyone! Please, you must believe me!”
“I didn’t say you had,” Rufus soothed. “But there are beasts lying dead in the corridors below me, beasts on both sides, and they wouldn’t be but for THORN. It’s a tragedy for us all, it really is.”
The hyena wept afresh, “Ohohohoooow.”
Rufus took the opportunity to shuffle a little closer, to get within range, he hoped. “I can see you’re just a young lad,” he reasoned. “It’s not your fault. You got sucked into this mess before you even knew what was what. It all looked very romantic from the outside, didn’t it? I bet your leaders told you how glorious it is to die for their cause. Now you’ve seen what death is like you know better.”
“It was a monster!” the hyena wailed, cupping his paws over his head and rocking back and forth. “It killed them all. It killed everyone!”
Rufus frowned in thought, “The centipede?”
The hyena looked up, baffled, “Centipede?”
“The hundred-legs,” Rufus clarified, using hyena terminology. He changed tack, thinking to give the cub a reason to help, to talk, even to live, “We’re trying to find it, you see, before it kills anyone else. If it gets out into the city it might kill hundreds of innocent citizens and I know you don’t want that. Did you see where it went, perhaps? Did it go back down the sewers? Can you tell us?”
The hyena shook his head, his features screwing up with fresh grief. “It was… was one of you, wasn’t it? How could you do that to one of your own?”
“What?”
“Your monster wolf. I s-sss-saw it. I did! It killed everyone at the doors!”
Rufus realised the cub hadn’t seen a centipede, but an Eisenwolf. Best to skirt round that, he thought.
“Just put the pistol down and for Ulf’s sake spit out that dreadful capsule,” he implored. “Don’t do this to yourself. I can help you. I want to help you.”
“How can you?” the hyena wept.
“I’m a Grand Howler. I can take charge of you. I won’t let anyone hurt you-”
“They’ll torture me on the rack!”
“I won’t let them.”
“You lie! I know it’s true! They k-k-killed our Prince on the rack. I won’t let you humiliate me that way! I won’t! Do you hear?”
Before Rufus could think of another avenue of attack, he heard a dreadful, dull crunch from the hyena’s mouth.
“Gagh!” he choked. “Grrrgh!”
Rufus grimaced, “Foolish pup,” and drew his pistol.
Outside, in the corridor, Linus and Vladimir heard the bang of an imperium round going off.
Crack!
“Rufus!” barked Linus, fearing the worst.
He hurried into the room with Vladimir whereupon they found Rufus still standing – thank Ulf – looking down on the hyena. The terrorist was slumped in the corner of the room, the
wall splattered with blood, the carpet beneath his shattered head turning a darker shade of red. His mouth and lips were blackened, as if burnt.
Odd, Linus thought.
Rufus covered his nose and backed off. Linus wondered why. Surely Grand Howler Rufus, a war veteran, had seen death up close before?
And then it happened, the hyena’s mouth started to smoulder, to wither and blacken. The gums curled away from the mighty canine teeth as the flesh shrivelled and ‘smoked’, the face altogether peeling away from the red-raw bone like a ghoulish mask.
“Oh by Ulf!” Linus gasped, nearly falling over backwards.
“Out!” Vladimir barked, grabbing the stocky Howler by the scruff of his neck and yanking him back through the door. “Everybody out!”
Donning his helmet, Rufus calmly shut the door behind him, whilst Vladimir ushered Linus and the gathered Politzi down the corridor and stairs, back into the smoggy refinery proper – smoggy, but not deadly like the office they had hastily evacuated.
Linus removed his helmet and leant against the stark refinery wall. He heaved, but nothing much came up – he and Uther hadn’t been able to stop for lunch, thankfully.
Howler Mills felt a paw on his back; Rufus.
“Oh, sir, how c-ccc-could he?” Linus howled at him.
“It’s all right, dear boy,” Rufus hushed, patting the young Howler’s shoulders. He winked at Vladimir, “The poor chap shot himself before the capsule took any real effect. He didn’t suffer. Not for a second.”
“It’s monstrous.”
“Yes. I know.”
Allowing Linus a moment’s grace, Vladimir urged everyone back to work, “Come on. There’s a centipede on the loose and I want it found!”
Chapter 19
The rain beat down on Linus as he helped load Uther into the back of the chugging field ambulance, lifting the stretcher onto his shoulders and sliding him in. With a glance back at the refinery, Linus climbed inside the ambulance and stood over his partner as the Howler medic strapped a respirator to his muzzle.
The battered Uther had lost a lot of blood and breathed in a toxic cocktail of imperium from several broken pipes, some of it yellow-imperium. He was coughing and spluttering something awful.
“Don’t die,” Linus told him.
