by Will Hill
“Let’s wait and see who else turns up,” replied Jamie, a broad smile on his face. He was thrilled to see two of the Operators he respected the most in Department 19 answer his call. “I’ll tell you all about it then.”
“OK,” said Jack, and sat down next to Angela. She smiled at her squad leader, and the two of them began to chat, as Jamie watched the door.
Larissa was the next to arrive, floating rapidly through the door. She threw a look of concern towards Jamie, then saw Angela and Jack looking at her, and slid to the ground. She walked over to Jamie, and leant in close to his ear.
“What’s the emergency?” she asked, her voice low, her breath hot in his ear. “I came as soon as I could.”
“It’s Frankenstein,” he whispered. “I’m going to find him.”
“Then I’m coming with you,” she said, firmly.
He smiled at her, a thin curl of his mouth that seemed full of pain, rather than happiness. “We’ll see,” he said. “Go and sit down. I’m going to give it five more minutes to see if anyone else turns up.”
She regarded him with a look of concern, but did as he suggested; she crossed the large semi-circular room and sat down, slightly stiffly, next to Angela and Jack. There was an initial icy moment, but then Angela said hello to her, and she was absorbed into their conversation.
The door opened again, and two Operators he recognised but didn’t really know walked through it. The first was a woman in her early twenties called Claire Lock, a former marksman with the Metropolitan Police’s elite SO15 unit whom Jamie had chatted to in the mess once or twice. Behind her was a tall, handsome man in his late twenties, who Jamie knew was named Dominique Saint-Jacques.
The quiet, dark-skinned Frenchman had been a legionnaire before Blacklight had recruited him; it had been quite a coup, as the elite soldiers of mainland Europe almost always joined the FTB, the German equivalent of Department 19. But Dominique had an English grandfather, and that had swayed his decision. He had given Blacklight many reasons to be grateful for the quirk of ancestry that had brought him to the Loop; Admiral Seward had once told Jamie that he considered Dominique as fine an Operator as any currently serving in the Department. The fact that he was a native French speaker only made his presence in the Ops Room all the more enticing for Jamie.
That’s one, he thought. Without a doubt. Three more to pick.
The door opened again, and Kate and Shaun Turner arrived through it at the same time. Kate smiled at Jamie, a look that was not quite convincing, and seemed to him to be shot through with concern. Shaun nodded respectfully at him, and he returned the gesture. They made their way over to the others, sat down and joined in with the low murmur of conversation as Jamie checked his watch.
Ten minutes since I sent out the message, he noted. Can’t wait much longer.
He managed to force himself to wait five more minutes, before he locked the Ops Room door and addressed the seven Operators who had responded to his call.
“This briefing refers to a Priority Level 1 Operation,” he said. “You all know what that means. What I’m about to tell you doesn’t leave this room; you can assume that anyone else who needs to know already knows. Clear?”
There were a series of nodded heads and low murmurs of agreement.
“OK,” he said, and continued. “Yesterday, Admiral Seward despatched a Field Investigation Team to the north-east coast, with a single objective: to ascertain whether Colonel Frankenstein may still be alive.”
Larissa and Kate both gasped, and looked immediately at each other. Jack Williams’ eyes widened, as did those of Claire Lock. Dominique Saint-Jacques smiled at Jamie, while Shaun Turner and Angela Darcy remained completely impassive.
“I know what you’re thinking,” said Jamie. “Why now, right? The team was despatched following the discovery of a body in a cave at the rear of a beach at a place called Bamburgh, in Northumberland. A body that has since been confirmed to be that of a lycanthrope, and which was washed ashore less than ten miles north of Lindisfarne island.”
“My God,” said Kate, softly. “Is it the—”
“We think so,” said Jamie. “For those of you who weren’t there, or haven’t read the reports, Frankenstein fell to what was assumed to be his death while fighting a werewolf that was a follower of Alexandru Rusmanov, a werewolf that fell with him. The body that was washed ashore had a broken neck, and human fingermarks on its throat; it was killed after it, and Frankenstein, fell over the edge of the cliffs.”
“Wait a minute,” said Jack Williams. “If Colonel Frankenstein was alive, why wouldn’t he have made contact with us?”
“I don’t know, Jack,” replied Jamie. “And I don’t know whether he’s alive or not. The Field Investigation Team tracked eyewitness accounts of a man matching his description from a small fishing port in northern Germany, where witnesses claim the man in question came ashore from one of the boats that work the North Sea, as far south as Paris, where the trail ended. The last confirmed sighting of this person, whoever he is, was on Christmas Eve.”
“So what’s the plan?” asked Angela. Her voice was even, the voice of a professional.
“The Director has authorised me to lead a team to Paris to investigate the whereabouts of this person, to try and locate him. I will be conducting this operation on the assumption that the man we’re looking for is Colonel Frankenstein, and that he is in considerable danger from the vampire he was sighted in the company of, a Priority Level 2 vamp called Latour. The primary objective will be to find him and bring him home. All other considerations will be secondary. If that doesn’t sit well with any of you, then thanks for listening, and no hard feelings. You know where the door is.”
It was a gamble, he knew, exposing his personal interest in the mission, and the conclusion he had already reached, without remotely adequate evidence. He would not be offended if any of the Operators in the room were uneasy at volunteering for what he had essentially just admitted was a personal crusade, but he would also not have any of them risk their lives without being in full possession of the facts.
Nobody moved.
Jamie waited for a long moment, then sighed.
“Thank you,” he said, meaning it. “I’m sure I don’t need to fill any of you in on my personal history with Colonel Frankenstein, or the circumstances that led to his apparent death. So for me, it’s as simple as this: if he’s alive, I’m going to find him. I don’t care if I have to destroy every vampire in France to do it. Is that clear?”
There was a second chorus of agreement, and Jamie felt his heart lift as he looked at the seven faces staring coolly back at him.
I would walk into the fire with any of them, he thought. Gladly too.
“It’s a five-man team,” said Jamie, and felt a stab of guilt as the seven Operators glanced around at one another. “I’m sorry it has to come to this, but I had no idea how many people might show up, with all the squads so flat out at the moment. There’s nothing personal in my decision, I want you all to know that.”
He saw smiles break out on the faces of Kate and Larissa, and felt a stab of pain at what he was about to do. As far as they were concerned, it was going to be the two of them, plus two of the others. He didn’t blame them for thinking that, but they had no true understanding of the rage that was burning inside his chest when he thought about the possibility of getting Frankenstein back, and he didn’t want them around if things in Paris went the way he expected them to.
“Dominique, I’d be grateful if you would be my second on this operation,” he said. “How about it?”
He saw Kate and Larissa’s smiles falter, just a fraction, as the tall Frenchman eased himself to his feet. He strode over and clasped Jamie’s hand.
“I’m in,” he said. “Let’s bring him home.”
“Thank you,” said Jamie. “I appreciate it.”
Dominique nodded and stood beside Jamie, who looked out at the remaining Operators.
“Are you up for this, Jack?” as
ked Jamie. “I’d love to have you if you are.” His friend leapt to his feet, and Jamie felt a grin threaten to burst across his face. He pushed it back, and gripped Jack’s outstretched hand.
“Cheers, Jamie,” said Jack, in a low voice, then took his place beside Dominique.
Jamie looked at the five remaining Operators, and felt his face flush with heat. Angela was looking at him with a curious expression on her face, as though she was more interested in what he was doing than whether or not he was going to pick her. Claire Lock was watching him with an even look, in which Jamie believed, or wanted to believe, at least, that he saw encouragement.
Shaun Turner was openly scowling at him, their conversation in the corridor the previous day clearly now long forgotten. And Kate and Larissa were staring at him with the colour draining from their faces, as though they had just entertained for the first time the reality that he might not choose them.
Don’t do this to us, their expressions appeared to be saying. Please don’t. Not like this.
“Claire,” Jamie said. “I could really do with your help.”
The former marksman shone a quite lovely smile in Jamie’s direction, and got to her feet.
“You’ve got it,” she said, shaking his hand briskly before joining the others.
He faced the four men and women who were left; faced three faces full of rapidly rising anger and one of complete detachment.
Do it, he thought. Get it over with.
“Angela,” he said. He heard a tiny gasp emerge from Larissa, and watched as Kate put her hand over her mouth. The eyes of his two closest friends shone with betrayal; those of Shaun Turner merely blazed with anger. “What do you say?”
“I say yes, sir,” she said, and slid slowly to her feet. She walked over to him and leant in beside his ear, so close that he could feel her warm breath against his skin. “You just made your life really, really difficult. You know that, right?”
“I know,” replied Jamie, his voice barely audible. “Believe me, I know.”
She pulled away, gave him the kind of smile that men spend their whole lives hoping to see a beautiful girl give them, and went and joined the rest of the team that Jamie had selected. He turned to face them, and they stood immediately to attention.
“Weapons and tactics briefing in the hangar in fifteen,” he said. “I want wheels up within half an hour. Dismissed.”
The four Operators filed quickly past him, and out of the Ops Room. He took a deep breath, and turned to face the three black-clad figures who remained in their seats.
“What the hell was that?” hissed Shaun Turner. “You told me we were cool, that you’d put Wallsend behind you, and you treat me like that?”
“Shaun—”
“I’m the best Operator in this room,” spat Shaun, either not noticing or not caring about the look of hurt that appeared on Kate’s face. “I’m twice the Operator you are, you spoilt little prick. You think your name gives you licence to behave like this? Well, to hell with that.”
Turner bounced up out of his seat, and made as if to launch himself at Jamie.
He never got the chance.
Larissa was out of her seat quicker than any pair of human eyes in the room could follow, and was between the two men before Shaun even had the chance to tense his muscles to leap, her eyes blazing crimson, her fangs bursting into view.
“Don’t even think about it, Shaun,” she growled. “Just sit down next to Kate, there’s a good boy.”
Fury, naked and ugly, burst across Shaun’s face, but he did as he was told. For all his confidence in his own abilities, confidence that was normally well justified, he knew he was no match for Larissa; the vampire girl could have killed him with one hand tied behind her back, without breaking a sweat. He sat back down heavily in his seat. Kate reached out a hand towards him, and he pushed it angrily away. The look on Kate’s face broke Jamie’s heart, and he heard Larissa growl again, a clear rumble of warning. Then she spun away from Kate and Shaun, and faced him, her eyes raging with dark red fire.
“After everything we’ve been through,” she growled. “Everything we said to each other, you, me and Kate. You do this. How could you?”
“I’m sorry,” said Jamie. “You have to know there’s no one I’d rather have on my side than you, than both of you.” He leant round Larissa and looked at Kate, who was staring at him with open pain on her face. “You have to believe me when I say that. But I don’t want you to come on this mission with me. I meant what I said; if he’s still alive, there’s nothing living or dead that is going to stop me from bringing him home. I don’t want to put the two of you in that position. And if things go bad over there, which I am fully expecting them to, I want to know that the two of you will look after each other. I want to know that you’re safe.”
Later, when the dust settled, Jamie would have given anything to be able to go back in time, and choose his words differently. But by then it was far too late.
“Shaun, the same goes for you,” he continued. “If something happens to me, then I know you’ll look after Kate. That’s more important to me than whether or not you hate me right now. I’m sorry, but it just is. I don’t expect you to understand.”
The anger on Turner’s face dissipated slightly; the deep red that had risen in his cheeks paled, until it was merely a virulent pink. He got up from his chair, and walked stiffly towards the door; as he passed Jamie, he paused and stared at him with a look that seemed to mostly be full of pity.
“You’re making a huge mistake,” he said, softly. “I don’t think you realise it now, but you will. I promise you that much.”
Then he strode across the room, and was gone.
Kate got to her feet, looking frantically between Jamie and the door.
“Go after him,” said Jamie. “It’s not you he’s angry with. And I really am sorry, Kate. I just can’t bear the thought of anything happening to you because of me, because of something I have to do. I hope you can forgive me one day.”
A look of desperate misery flickered on Kate’s face, and then she was moving, across the room and out of the door, leaving Jamie and Larissa alone.
“I know you think you’re protecting me,” she said, her red eyes looking at him with enormous affection. “But you’re not. You’re just hurting me. And I think you know that, deep down.”
“I’m sorry,” he replied. “I really am. I just need to know that you’re going to be here when I get back, whatever happens. I need to be able to rely on that.”
Larissa sighed, and the red disappeared so quickly from her eyes that it might never have been there.
“I’ll be here,” she replied, softly. “You know I’ll be here. Go do what you have to do.”
Jamie leant in and kissed her, hard. For a moment, there was no response from Larissa, but then she gave in; her lips parted, and she kissed him back, fiercely.
“Thank you,” said Jamie, breaking the kiss. Three different words had screamed in his mind, but he pushed them away, for now at least.
“So what now?” sighed Larissa. “What happens next?”
“I go to Seward for final authorisation,” said Jamie. “Then we fly to Paris, and I start destroying vampires until someone tells me something useful. After that, I don’t know.”
“All right,” replied Larissa. “Go.”
Jamie leant in and kissed her again, a hard, fast kiss full of passion. Then he pulled away from her, and strode across the Ops Room. As he put his hand on the handle of the door, Larissa called his name, and he turned back to her.
“Come back to me, Jamie,” she said, softly. “OK?”
“I will,” he replied. “You can count on it.”
42
VISION QUEST, PART IV
LINCOLN COUNTY, NEVADA, USA
Julian Carpenter, the man who had been calling himself Robert Smith, sipped water from the glass the waitress had brought him. His dinner lay untouched in front of him; the burger looked good, but he had realised as soo
n as it had arrived that he had no appetite. His stomach was squirming at the thought of what he was about to do.
The quest he had embarked on more than a year before, the quest that had occupied his every waking moment since he had slipped unseen on to the Newark docks with a single small bag over his shoulder, had suddenly been rendered unimportant by the vision he had shared in the desert with the man he had crossed the country to find.
His desire to find a cure for vampirism, a cure that could return his wife to normal, that could bring an end to the cursed condition that had destroyed his life, had given him a single-mindedness he had come to rely on; he had allowed nothing else to matter, for what felt like as long as he could remember.
The sporadic information he had been able to gather, from still-loyal friends in the supernatural Departments around the world, by using old aliases, old dead-drops and long-forgotten back doors, had reassured him that his son was safe, or at least as safe as it was possible to be when you were responsible for the death of the second oldest vampire in the world. But at least he was with Blacklight, and Julian was certain that Henry Seward would be looking after him.
And Marie as well, he thought. I know he’ll have looked after both of them.
He had been in Savannah when word had reached him of his son’s triumph on Lindisfarne. For the first time since the world had believed he had died, Julian Carpenter had got drunk: roaring, falling-down drunk, his heart pounding with pride and relief in equal measure, burning with the desire to break his cover, and go home. He had forced himself not to do so, but it had been touch and go.
He knew that Thomas Morris had been exposed as the true betrayer of Blacklight, and as the man who had framed him for crimes he had never committed. But he had let his friends and his family believe he was dead, and he couldn’t predict with enough certainty how the Department would react to his reappearance. He wanted to go home, more than anything, but he could not take the chance that his welcome might be hostile, at least not until he had found what he was searching for.
