Darkest Night

by Will Hill

  He just wasn’t sure that was the case.

  Two hundred metres ahead, Greg turned left at an intersection; he was strolling along, his hands in his pockets, headphones in his ears, his eyes fixed forward. Pete pulled over, counted thirty seconds in his head, then followed his friend round the corner.

  Greg was gone.

  The road stretching out in front of Pete was long and straight, but there was no sign of his friend on either pavement.

  Lost him, he told himself. Lost him after barely two minutes. What a bloody awful spy you’d have made.

  He slowed the car to a crawl, peering desperately out of the windows on both sides. As he passed a newsagent’s, the shop door opened and Greg emerged, his attention focused on the chocolate bar he was unwrapping. Pete froze behind the wheel; there were less than ten metres between them, and if Greg looked up, they would be staring straight at each other. He fought back the urge to stamp his foot on to the accelerator; a revving engine and squeal of tyres would be guaranteed to draw his friend’s attention. Instead, Pete forced himself to maintain his speed, hoping that a nondescript car passing by on a main road would not qualify as noteworthy. His heart thumped as he rolled forward, his eyes locked on the rear-view mirror, through which he could see Greg stuffing chocolate into his mouth as he resumed his stroll. Pete took the first left he came to, accelerated, took two more lefts, and turned back on to the main road, a safe distance behind his friend again.

  He kept up his slow surveillance for the next fifteen minutes, during which his friend did nothing to suggest he was doing anything other than enjoying a walk in the cool evening air. As the shops and commercial buildings began to give way to suburban streets, Greg finally turned off the main road, and walked across the forecourt of a pub called The Red Lion.

  What a waste of time this has been, thought Pete. He’s going for a bloody drink after work.

  But as he parked his car down the quiet street at the side of the pub, a question occurred to him.

  Who with? Greg spends more time than anyone in the office, and he’s never mentioned any friends in Lincoln. So unless he’s come three miles away from his flat to have a drink on his own, who’s he meeting in there?

  Barely fifteen minutes later he got his answer.

  Greg emerged from the pub at the centre of a group of men, laughing and jostling and pushing each other like teenagers on a night out. Pete watched them carefully, waiting for them to pass beneath the street light outside the pub, and drew in a sharp breath when they did.

  There were eight of them, including Greg. He didn’t recognise three of them, although he instantly didn’t like the look of them; they looked like hard men, their heads shaved, their jaws square, their bodies thickly muscled. The other four he knew; three were SSL volunteers, all of them men in their twenties who had joined in the past month, as the charity had expanded as fast as it could. The final man, who was walking beside Greg and chatting to him like they were old friends, was Phil Baker, the security guard Pete had dismissed from the blood drive in Peterborough.

  I knew there was something going on, he thought. I bloody knew it.

  The men turned on to the road where Pete was parked, and a burst of panic raced through him. They were still fifty metres away, but were walking directly towards him; he didn’t know whether Greg would recognise his car, but he was absolutely certain that he would recognise his friend sitting behind the wheel. He huddled low in his seat, ready to duck down and squeeze himself into the footwell, his eyes peering over the black plastic of the dashboard, his heart pounding.

  Barely thirty metres away, Greg stopped and unlocked a car that Pete had never seen before. Baker opened the doors of a jeep parked behind it, and the eight men folded themselves into the two vehicles; it looked like a tight squeeze, even from Pete’s unorthodox vantage point. He watched as the two vehicles pulled away from the kerb, and sat up in his seat as the tension in his chest eased. He started his car, waited thirty seconds, then followed them back out on to the main road.

  Twenty minutes later, Pete pulled to a halt behind a low-lying sprawl of industrial units on the outskirts of Lincoln.

  The vehicles he was following had stopped outside a warehouse at the end of the road while one of the men got out and rolled up a wide metal door, then disappeared inside the building. Pete got out of his car, made his way slowly down the side street until he reached the corner, and peered round it.

  The rolling door was still raised, and he could hear the noise of engines. He squinted into the dark warehouse, desperate to know what was going on, then shrank back as headlights blazed into life, seeming to point directly at him. He pressed himself against the wall, crept forward again, and looked back round the corner in time to see four black vans drive out of the warehouse and on to the road, one after the other. Three immediately accelerated away while the fourth stopped by the open warehouse door, its engine rumbling. Pete shielded his eyes against the glare of the headlights and saw Greg hop down from the driver’s side. He lowered the metal door, locked it, and walked back to the van.

  Pete’s heart stopped dead.

  Greg had changed clothes while he was inside the warehouse and was now wearing all black. But as he climbed back up into the van, Pete had clearly seen the crude white outline of a wolf’s head on his friend’s chest.

  Night Stalker, he thought. Oh, Greg. What the hell have you done?

  The van roared away from the warehouse. By the time Pete got back to his car, fired up the engine, and reached the main road, it was barely more than a black speck in the distance. He put his foot down, his insides churning with worry.

  Even now, as he chased after the van, he did not believe that Greg Browning was a bad man. But he was easily led, and easily manipulated, and possessed of a wellspring of frustration and a rage that was never far below the surface. Pete had not known him before the darkness had reached into both their lives and laid waste to them, but he was sure that, knowingly or not, his friend had retrospectively idealised that time; to hear Greg tell it now, his had been a life of domestic bliss with a wife he adored and two kids who idolised him. What was undoubtedly real, however, was his bitterly held belief that the subsequent unravelling of his existence and estrangement from his family was due to vampires, to Blacklight, to bad luck and bad timing; in short, that it was everybody’s fault apart from his own.

  Pete had thought their ordeal at the hands of Albert Harker had softened his friend, had shown him that violence and intimidation were futile; he had believed that was what had led to the founding of SSL. But now, as he closed the gap on the van, he wondered whether the truth was exactly the opposite; that Greg’s anger and hatred had been solidified by their experience, that his world view had been twisted far more radically than Pete had realised.

  I have to do something, he thought. I need to stop this before it’s too late.

  He knew he should call the police; he should have taken out his phone and dialled 999 the second he saw his friend emerge from the warehouse with what was very clearly the Night Stalker logo emblazoned on his chest. But he hadn’t, and until he knew why Greg was doing it, until he could look him in the face and ask him to stop, he wasn’t going to.

  Part of him was thinking about SSL. If it got out that one of the charity’s founders was also part of a vigilante group who were responsible for the murders of at least a dozen vampires, it would ruin them, and all the good they had done would be for nothing. But even though there could be no possible way to justify what Greg and his fellow Night Stalkers had done, a larger part of him simply wanted to give Greg the chance to explain himself; he felt he owed his friend that much.

  On the edge of Lincoln, where the city bled into the countryside, the van turned down a narrow lane. Pete slowed, saw a postbox on a pole at the turning, and swore heavily. He had been hoping the road led to a village, but the lone postbox suggested that all that was down there was a single house; if that was the case, there was no way he could follow witho
ut giving himself away. He drove past the turning, looking for a place to pull over and wait for the van to re-emerge. After barely two hundred metres, his headlights picked out a lay-by; Pete pulled gratefully into it, turned off the car’s engine, and got out.

  For long minutes, he stood at the edge of the road, listening for the telltale growl of an engine over the chirping and rustling of the woods and the thudding of his heart. On two occasions, he thought he heard it, only for a car to sweep past him and disappear into the darkness, its headlights blinding. Eventually, as the tension threatened to overwhelm him, he heard a distant rumble. He froze, holding his breath and straining his hearing, until there could be absolutely no doubt.

  The van was coming back.

  Pete got into his car and waited to see which way the van would turn when it reached the main road. After thirty seconds, surely long enough for it to have come past him if it was going to, he pulled out, accelerated over a low rise, and saw brake lights disappearing round a bend in the distance. He put his foot down and followed Greg back towards the city, a frown etched on his face.

  The van led him into Lincoln’s grimy industrial district, until it finally came to a halt on a patch of waste ground beside the canal. Pete pulled into the shadowy car park of a factory half a street away and got out of his car.

  Then everything began to happen very fast.

  He crept along the road, sticking to the shadows and watching the ground for anything that might creak or crack underfoot. As he reached the corner of the last building, the spot that marked the limit of his cover, the van’s rear door swung open, and Pete clamped a hand over his mouth so he didn’t cry out.

  A black figure – wearing a balaclava so he couldn’t tell whether it was Greg or one of the others – jumped down from inside the vehicle and hauled an old man out on to the ground. The man’s arms and legs were limp, his head lolling back as he was dragged away from the van, but his eyes were open, and Pete could see the naked fear that filled them. Near the edge of the canal, the Night Stalker lowered the old man and positioned him on his knees, like he was arranging a doll. The limp figure almost overbalanced, but the masked man grabbed his shoulders and set him upright.

  “Sit still, you old fart,” said the Night Stalker, and Pete felt his stomach churn as he recognised Greg’s voice.

  The driver’s door opened and the second Night Stalker got out. The dim glow of security lights on the surrounding buildings illuminated them, and Pete realised that the two men were armed; guns hung from their belts, alongside ultraviolet torches. He stood in the shadows, terrified by what was happening in front of him, but equally terrified of revealing himself; he didn’t think Greg would hurt him, but he wasn’t sure enough to force his legs or his vocal cords into action.

  “Jacob Hillman,” said Greg. “Look at me.”

  For a long moment, nothing happened. Then the other Night Stalker stepped forward, and roughly pushed the old man’s head back.

  “That’s better,” said Greg. “You preyed on desperate and vulnerable boys and men for more than two decades. You confessed to your sins, and the time has come for you to be held accountable for your crimes. Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

  The Night Stalker shook the old man’s head from left to right, and the two black-clad figures laughed.

  “Good,” said Greg. “I’ve no time for excuses. Take a moment to make peace with whatever you believe in.”

  The second Night Stalker released the old man’s head and let it flop forward. Greg drew a metal stake from his belt, and Pete felt himself move, his legs carrying him forward seemingly without any instruction from his conscious mind, his hands raised, his face ashen. The Night Stalkers didn’t notice his approach; their attention was entirely focused on their victim.

  “Greg,” he said, his voice high and wavering. “Please stop this. Please.”

  The Night Stalkers jumped as though an electric current had been passed through them, then spun round, drawing their guns from their belts. They pointed them at Pete, who raised his arms even higher.

  For long seconds, nobody moved. Then Greg reached up and pulled his balaclava over his head.

  “Pete?” he said, an incredulous frown on his face. “What the hell are you doing here, mate?”

  “I followed you.”

  “Why?”

  Pete had no response; the circumstances seemed so insignificant now that he was faced with the reality he had discovered. He merely stared at his friend.

  “Turn around and walk away, Pete,” said Greg.

  The other Night Stalker turned towards him. “What are you—”

  “Shut up,” said Greg. “I’m serious, Pete. Go home, right now, and keep your mouth shut. This doesn’t have to change anything.”

  “I can’t,” said Pete, his voice trembling as he spoke. “You know I can’t. What are you doing, Greg?”

  His friend grimaced. “You wouldn’t understand,” he said. “That’s why I didn’t include you. I knew you wouldn’t understand.”

  “Understand what?” asked Pete. “What in God’s name is there to understand about this?”

  “Don’t worry about it, mate,” said Greg, lowering his gun so it was no longer pointing at Pete’s chest. “It’s going to be all right. Come over here where I can see you.”

  Pete walked across the litter-strewn ground, aware that the second Night Stalker had not moved his weapon so much as a millimetre, and stopped beside the open rear doors of the van. From his knees, the old man looked up at him with tears brimming in his eyes.

  “There’s a war going on,” said Greg. “That’s what you don’t understand, mate. The vamps we take out are scum. They’re the worst of the worst, they say so themselves. They brag about it. This, what we do? They know it’s what they deserve. They’re glad when it comes.”

  An awful piece of the puzzle slotted into place, and, for a moment, Pete thought he was going to throw up.

  “Oh God,” he said, his voice thick with horror. “The SSL helpline. The vampires who call in and confess what they’ve done. You’re using the helpline to pick your victims.”

  Greg shrugged, the faintest flicker of a smile on his face. “There’s no room for morality in war,” he said. “We do what needs doing. That’s why the public backs us, because they get it. They know that every dead vamp means a world that’s a little bit safer for them and their families. They thank us, mate.”

  “You’re going to kill this man for things he confessed on the helpline?” said Pete. “How do you know he even did them? What if he was lying?”

  “Maybe he was,” said Greg. “It doesn’t matter either way.”

  “So you’re just going to execute him?” he asked, his voice rising as anger overwhelmed his fear. “No trial, no evidence? You’re just going to put a stake through his heart?”

  Greg didn’t respond, but his eyes had narrowed, and he was staring at Pete with an expression that looked a lot like disappointment.

  “Have you forgotten about Albert Harker, Greg?” he continued. “Have you forgotten how scared we were, how helpless we felt? How can you do the same thing to someone else?”

  “I haven’t forgotten anything,” said Greg, his voice low and dangerous. “Not a bloody thing, mate. I remember exactly how it felt, and I’ll die before I let anyone make me feel like that again. I don’t care whether this piece of shit did the things he bragged about on the helpline or whether he made them up. He’s a vamp. That’s enough. If there were no vamps in the world, Matt and Kate would be safe at home right now.”

  You bastard, thought Pete. Oh, you hateful bastard.

  “Don’t you dare use my daughter to justify this,” he said. “She’d be appalled by what you’re doing, and so would Matt.”

  “Maybe,” said Greg. “Maybe not. But we can’t ask them, can we? And that’s the point.”

  “So what’s the plan then?” said Pete. “You and your friends kill every vampire on earth, one at a time?”

 
“No need,” said Greg. “We’re a lightning rod, mate. We show people that they don’t need to be afraid, that they can take matters into their own hands. We lead, the rest follow.”

  “You’re talking about a civil war,” said Pete. “Humans versus vampires. Is that what you want? For thousands of people to die fighting each other?”

  “Want has nothing to do with it,” said Greg. “It’s inevitable. Human beings can’t share the world, mate, we’ve never been able to. It’s obvious. We’re at the top of the food chain, and when another species threatens us, we take them out. This is no different.”

  Realisation struck Pete like a bucket of cold water. “That’s why you refused to help after the Prime Minister’s announcement,” he said. “You don’t want them cured. You want them destroyed.”

  “Damn right,” said Greg. “An amnesty? So animals like this can be let off the hook for everything they’ve ever done, and be allowed to be normal again? To be like us? Does that seem fair to you?”

  “Yes,” said Pete. “It does.”

  “Not to me,” said Greg. “Not to the rest of us. And not to our backers.”

  “Backers?”

  “You think I can afford all this on my SSL salary?” asked Greg, and laughed. “You sign the payroll every month, just like I do.”

  “So who’s backing you?” asked Pete.

  “Haven’t you figured it out yet?” said Greg, a cruel smile on his face. “The same people who’re backing you, mate. The SSL board.”

  Pete stared at his friend.

  No, he thought, his mind reeling. It can’t be. It can’t all have been about this.

  “Greg,” said the other Night Stalker. “We’ve been out here for too long. Let’s finish it.”

  “Shut up,” said Greg, shooting a narrow-eyed glance in the masked man’s direction, then looking back at his friend. “You shouldn’t feel bad, Pete. You’ve done good work, you and the others. You really have. You just didn’t know the whole story.”