Crawlers

by Sam Enthoven

  Steadman’s eyes had rolled back in his head: only the whites were now showing and his mouth hung slack. Jasmine stared down at his face. Even without the Queen’s control, she would have found herself unable not to: apart from Steadman’s head, some rags of clothes and some skin and bones, there was nothing left of him.

  ‘There,’ said the Queen, with quiet pride. ‘Soon my hands will be in this city’s water supply: when the theatre’s hatchlings come and I make my escape, I will use it to spread through the whole population. I will choose more surrogates; there will be more hatchings. Within days there will be a “crawler”, as you call them, for every living human on this planet – and here is where it started. Which, Jasmine,’ the Queen added silkily, ‘brings us back to you.

  ‘I want a companion with whom to share my triumph. I offered the chance to Steadman, but he was . . . foolish. So, Jasmine,’ the Queen told her, ‘I have chosen you.

  ‘Of all our subjects so far, you are undoubtedly the best candidate. You are young: your thinking is not yet stunted by the short-sighted concerns of the adults of your kind. Indeed, while your peers had already begun to succumb to trivialities, you, alone among them, kept your vision. You care about this world, Jasmine. That makes you the perfect person to help rule it.

  ‘If I had succeeded in sixteen sixty-six, your world would be a very different place. It was never my intention to allow your species to cause so much harm to this planet. Think, Jasmine, of those billions of your kind who now consume and pollute with no thought but for themselves. You know they will not stop willingly – they love their comforts too much. Someone has to make them. That is what I offer you. As you’ve seen, most of my subjects do my bidding gladly. With your guidance and counsel to help direct them we could make this world blossom as never before. I, as Queen, would desire nothing more. The Earth must become a worthy seat from which to rule my empire.’

  Lauren’s mouth smiled. ‘My hand is upon you, Jasmine. We see what is in your mind. You may respond.’

  After all the Queen’s long speeches, the silence that came then was sudden and strange.

  How much of Jasmine’s thoughts did the Queen have access to? Jasmine realized that she had no way of knowing.

  The seconds ticked by. The Queen was waiting.

  Stamping on everything else she was feeling as best she could, Jasmine concentrated, trying to form the only answer she could think of:

  Choice, she thought.

  Lauren’s eyes blinked. ‘What was that?’

  Give me a choice.

  ‘Why?’ asked Lauren’s mouth.

  Because otherwise, thought Jasmine fiercely, all I’ll be to you is a pet, not a companion.

  ‘Ah,’ said Lauren’s mouth, with a shifty twitch. ‘Yes, I suppose that is true.’

  Jasmine concentrated again. Take your hand off me, she thought. Otherwise no choice. Then she waited.

  From across the trench, Lauren’s eyes gave Jasmine a searching look.

  Jasmine squashed her feelings. She put a lid on all her other thoughts, blanking out everything except her request. What she was asking was fair, wasn’t it? If the Queen really wanted a companion, not a slave, then Jasmine had to have a choice.

  ‘You are implacable, Jasmine,’ said the Queen, sounding amused. ‘And I would not have you any other way. Very well.’

  Jasmine felt a disgusting internal shifting sensation as the probosces were withdrawn from the inside of her skull. The movement was deliberate, careful, to prevent her from losing consciousness. The fingers at her neck loosened their grip, then the crawler that had held her dropped to the floor.

  Jasmine sank to her knees. Released, her mind’s responses to her situation poured out all over her body in a rush. Her heartbeat skyrocketed. She felt sick to her stomach. Cold waves of shock ran down her arms and the backs of her legs. But then, breathing hard, adrenaline pumping, she got up. Forcing her eyes away from Steadman’s remains and the sewer-trench’s wriggling contents, she stared up into Lauren’s face.

  ‘Well?’ the Queen asked. ‘As I believe I mentioned, this place is no longer safe. In just a few minutes now the building above us will be destroyed, together with everything and everyone in it. It is time to make your choice. Come rule with me, or you will die here. Which is it to be?’

  Jasmine’s crawler waited, crouching on the brickwork next to her right shoe. She stamped down on it, hard.

  ‘I’d rather die,’ she said.

  Then she turned and ran.

  11:52 PM.

  Voices. A dull ache at the back of his neck; a terrible sticky taste in his mouth. Then: pain. Ben’s face was throbbing. His skin felt tight from swelling: every pulse of his blood made him feel like his head was going to split. But his ears worked fine, so for a while he just lay there and listened.

  ‘Get up,’ said one of the voices.

  ‘I can’t . . .’ sobbed the other.

  ‘Can’t or won’t? Come on, Josh, he only hit you once.’

  ‘What do you want from me? Just leave me alone!’

  ‘If all you’re going to do is roll around on the floor crying, maybe I should.’ Then, more kindly, Robert’s voice added: ‘Please, Josh. I can’t do this on my own.’

  Coughing, gasping, Ben rolled onto his back and sat up. He was still on the stairs. A couple of metres away he saw Robert kneeling next to Josh, who was curled up in a foetal position on the Barbican carpet.

  Now Robert and Josh were staring at him. And that was when Ben remembered what had happened. His hands tingled with the memory of being clamped around Robert’s throat.

  ‘He’s getting up again!’ Josh gibbered, sitting up and pointing at him. ‘He’s coming back! He’s going to get us! He’s . . . he’s . . . keep him away from me!’

  ‘Pull yourself together, Josh,’ said Robert mildly. ‘Ben doesn’t mean us any harm, not any more. Do you?’

  Ben felt sick. ‘Robert,’ he said, ‘I . . . I don’t know what to say. I nearly . . .’

  ‘I know,’ said Robert, touching the livid marks on his neck and giving Ben a rueful look. ‘I was there, remember?’

  ‘You nearly took my head off!’ said Josh. ‘If I’ve got whiplash because of you, I swear I’ll—’

  ‘Shut up, Josh,’ said Robert. Then, to Ben: ‘The point is, you resisted. I saw it in your eyes.’

  Unable to meet Robert’s, Ben looked down.

  There was a short silence.

  ‘All right,’ said Robert, getting to his feet. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘Go where?’ asked Josh.

  ‘The Pit,’ said Robert, pointing at the theatre doors. ‘You saw where they went, on the monitors.’

  ‘And why should we follow them?’ asked Josh, not moving.

  Following Robert’s example Ben stood up, trying to ignore the way his muscles grated and shrieked as he did so.

  ‘Because we’ve got to help Jasmine,’ he said.

  ‘We’ve got to find out what’s going on here and stop it,’ said Robert.

  ‘We’re going to find the Queen,’ said Ben. Robert looked at him enquiringly, but Ben just nodded to himself. ‘And when I find her,’ he added, ‘I’m going to kick her arse.’

  ‘Splendid,’ said Josh, from the floor. ‘You two go ahead and do whatever you like.’

  ‘Get up, Josh,’ said Ben. ‘You’re coming too.’

  ‘Or what? You’re going to hit me again?’

  ‘No,’ said Ben, cracking another smile that hurt like hell but was worth it. ‘But if you don’t get up and by any chance we do get out of this, then we’ll be sure to tell the whole school what a snivelling little weasel you really are.’ Ben looked at Robert. ‘Right?’

  Robert smiled back.

  11:55 PM.

  I watched the girl as she ran back up the tunnel.

  ‘Don’t turn your back on me, Jasmine,’ I called. ‘Jasmine! I’m warning you!’

  She ran on.

  ‘Where do you think you’ll go?’ I asked as her footst
eps echoed around me. ‘Wherever you run, I will find you. And when I do, I’m going to make you suffer!’

  At the vault door Jasmine paused, shoes skidding on the brickwork. She glanced back at me, then vanished from sight, back into the pit chamber.

  I considered for a moment. Five minutes remained until Steadman’s bombs were due to detonate.

  My primary objective was complete. The Barbican had served its purpose. My subjects inside it had maintained a safe perimeter while my drones matured; the subjects had then continued to defend the building until those whom the drones had made surrogates reached the hatching stage. With the hatching accomplished, all I needed my remaining humans in this building to do was hold off intruders for long enough to cover my escape.

  I was free. I had enough hands to rule the whole city. I was also safe, protected in these tunnels from the coming explosion by the weight of ancient London clay around and above me. I could leave – and in perfect secrecy. As Steadman had said, the bombs would eradicate all evidence of my existence. And yet . . .

  Jasmine had rejected me.

  I had never been rejected before. Admittedly, I had never allowed the possibility before. Why would I? Your kind are my subjects. I am your Queen. It is not your right to choose otherwise.

  So why, I demanded of myself, had I granted exactly that right to Jasmine?

  I hurt; I fumed. Then I decided.

  Jasmine’s insult could not be suffered to stand. The girl would pay for her insolence.

  I set off after her.

  Five minutes. It was going to be close.

  Three minutes after passing through the door to the Pit Theatre, Ben, Robert and Josh were standing in an office. Ben was blinking, and now feeling unsure how much more weirdness he could take.

  The office was built into the wall of a secret underground chamber. He and Robert and Josh had just discovered this chamber at the bottom of a tunnel that led down from the theatre’s backstage area. And as well as the office’s extraordinary location, there were other weird things about it, too. The room was dominated by a massive desk, the work surface of which was a large panel of sheer black glass. The glass worked as a flat screen. Like a flashier version of the monitor room, hundreds of camera feeds from all over the Barbican – and beyond – were displayed in a grid across the desktop. The walls of the office were covered in expensively framed photographs, and one man was present in all of them. Ben didn’t recognize the man but he recognized some of the people with whom he was shown shaking hands: he counted two prime ministers, several presidents and even – in one – a pope.

  ‘Who is this guy?’ Ben asked, with feeling.

  ‘That’s Lionel Steadman,’ said Josh. ‘He’s Alderman-in-Chief of the Corporation of London. An extremely powerful and influential man.’

  ‘And how do you know who he is?’ Ben asked.

  ‘Didn’t I tell you?’ said Josh airily. ‘My dad works for the Corporation. Strange, isn’t it? I wonder what Mr Steadman’s doing with an office down here of all places . . . What?’ he added, when he noticed the way Ben was still looking at him.

  Ben didn’t answer.

  ‘No,’ said Josh firmly, shaking his head for extra emphasis. ‘You don’t think . . .? No! The Corporation couldn’t possibly be responsible!’ He started blinking rapidly. ‘My . . . my dad works for them!’

  ‘Um, guys?’ Robert interrupted, pointing at one corner of Mr Steadman’s desk. ‘I think you should take a look at this.’

  The area of screen/desk Robert was indicating showed a digital countdown, with (when Ben first saw it) four minutes and thirty-eight seconds left to run.

  TIME REMAINING UNTIL BARBICAN’S TOTAL DESTRUCTION, said the title above it, helpfully.

  Josh pointed and gulped. ‘Th-that doesn’t actually mean what it says it does. Does it?’

  The boys stared at the countdown. Then they stared at each other.

  The silence was broken by a sudden thump on the reinforced glass of the office’s front wall. Ben jumped. Then he gaped.

  ‘Jasmine?’ he asked.

  She was standing outside the office, panting slightly, her hands pressed against the glass, peering in. Ben ran round the desk, through the office door, and out into the pit chamber to meet her . . .

  But Jasmine recoiled from him. For a long moment she stayed in a half crouch, ready to run again, her eyes wide, assessing him.

  Ben froze, feeling sick. ‘It’s me,’ he said sadly. ‘Jasmine, I—’

  Then she did something else he found totally unexpected. She lunged, grabbed him, wrapped her arms around him – and kissed him on the lips!

  Ben was so astonished that he almost didn’t know what to do. Feeling awkward, foolish, physically sore, but at the same time utterly delighted, he kissed Jasmine right back.

  After only a second or two she pulled away. ‘Ben!’ she said, pressing her face to his chest. ‘Oh God, Ben!’

  Then . . .

  Raaaaaaaasp.

  Jasmine blinked, took a step back, but kept one hand on Ben’s chest – as if she needed to be certain he was still really there.

  ‘We need to get out of here,’ she said.

  ‘Um, absolutely,’ said Ben, wrenching his mind back to thinking about the countdown.

  ‘No, seriously,’ said Jasmine. ‘We need to start running. Right now.’

  ‘Are you OK, Jasmine?’ asked Robert, emerging from the office with Josh.

  ‘No,’ said Jasmine again. ‘I am very, very far from OK. I’ve seen what’s behind all this. I’ve seen what we’re up against. And she’s coming.’

  RAAAAAAASP.

  ‘Jasmine?’ said another voice. ‘I see you!’

  Ben stared past Jasmine, past the empty pit, to the giant steel door on the other side of the chamber. Lauren was there. She was smiling – so widely that the pit chamber lights picked out the spittle strings glinting between her open jaws. And behind her, forcing her bulk back through the door into the chamber, was the Queen.

  Ben knew her straight away. He had never seen the Queen but the aura she gave off was unmistakable: he recognized her presence at the back of his mind, remembered the dark and abject love he’d felt for her. The contrast between that and Jasmine’s kiss a moment ago made him dizzy with revulsion.

  ‘Stay where you are, all of you!’ shouted the voice from Lauren’s mouth.

  Ben swore. Robert gulped. Josh’s mouth fell open. Then they all took Jasmine’s advice, and ran.

  All four sprinted out of the other vault door and up the tunnel, back the way they’d come. To Ben it felt like he’d been running all night. He hurt all over. He was tired, he was hungry and he was scared. As he laboured up the steep concrete tube that led back up to the Pit Theatre he wondered how much running he had left in him. When is it going to end? he asked himself.

  The answer came quicker than he expected. Jasmine reached the Pit Theatre’s doors first, just ahead of the boys. She pulled the doors open: Ben saw past her, and realized they had already run as far as they could.

  The room outside the theatre – the empty space with the doors to the toilets, the stairs, the lifts – had vanished. The concrete walls, the patterned carpet, even the ceiling: all had been smothered under a tumult of tiny, pale bodies.

  Mr Steadman’s cocoon had not been the only one to hatch, Jasmine saw: so, apparently, had all the ones in the Main Theatre. The newborn crawlers – millions of them by the look of it – had made their way down here, presumably intending to use the same escape route as the Queen.

  Jasmine and the boys were cut off.

  At least a dozen of the giant-size crawlers strode across the surrounding mass. Noticing Jasmine, four of them reared up, beaklike mouth-parts open and poised to snap. The nearest was barely half a metre away: the mass of creatures had reached the doors almost at the same time Jasmine had.

  She flung the doors shut uselessly and backed away.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ said Josh with a humourless grin. ‘We’re trappe
d again, aren’t we? Well that’s brilliant. That’s just brilliant. What are we going to do now? That . . . thing behind us, those things out there, and this time – oh, yeah – the building’s about to explode!’ He turned on Robert. ‘What did you make me come down here for? Why didn’t you just leave me alone? At least in the security room I wouldn’t have known what was coming!’

  ‘It’s true,’ said Ben to Jasmine. ‘We found a timer in that office – some sort of countdown. It said that in just a few minutes the whole building’s going to blow up.’

  ‘The Queen said this place was no longer safe,’ Jasmine murmured, almost to herself. She looked at her feet.

  All night she had hidden her fear. All night she had stifled the urge to bury her head and start screaming. She had held herself together – always analysing, always working out what to do next, and whenever everyone had looked to her, which they had, almost constantly, she had always come up with answers. Even when she’d been alone, she had still come up with an answer to escape the Queen’s clutches. But after finding Ben again – after kissing him and feeling so glad to be with him, to be alive – knowing now that they stood no chance . . . it was too much.

  Jasmine had no more answers.

  ‘That’s it, then,’ she said, nodding dully. ‘We’re done. Game over.’

  Ben looked at Jasmine – her downcast eyes, the slump in her shoulders. For the four hours since everything had started Jasmine had been a pillar of strength – keeping her head in the midst of horror, chivvying the rest of the group – not least himself – into action instead of despair. Now, at last, it had happened: Jasmine had given up.

  It twisted Ben’s heart to see her like this. He wanted to say something: he wanted to come up with a brilliant plan that would get them all out of there, something that would make Jasmine smile at him again. But though he racked his brains, all he could think of was zombie films.