Avengers

by Brian Lumley

  “What, this ‘we’ll all be in it together at the end’ shit?” said Trask.

  “You can’t argue with the future, Ben,” said the precog.

  And again for long moments Trask looked at his team, especially at Garvey. Until finally he said, “Okay, in the few hours we have left you can think about it. But for God’s sake…for God’s sake think straight! They’re your lives, people—they’re your lives…”

  The Perchorsk schematics were now up on the screen. Looking at them, Trask shook a fist. “We’ll be coming for you soon now, Nephran Malinari,” he growled. “You’re not there just yet, but when you do get there we’ll be waiting.”

  Millie said nothing, but shielded herself and thought: That old scar of yours, Ben? Still itching, is it? I understand. And anyway I refuse to be jealous of a dead woman. Zek Föener was a wonderful person. You’re right to want revenge.

  But Trask hadn’t stopped with Malinari, and continued, “And you, Vavara, you hag! I want you for Liz’s sake. But especially you, Szwart! If everything else fails me, I’ve just got to have a crack at you!” Then, turning from the screen—and apparently unconscious of what he was doing—he glanced at Millie. Hiding her embarrassment and a smile she would not otherwise have been able to conceal, Millie’s sunglasses saved her. And if only for the moment everything was all right.

  Everything that mattered, anyway…

  “Cold-weather gear!” Trask snapped his fingers. “Winter-warfare kit.” And to Goodly, “Get on to the Minister Responsible. We’ll be needing three sets of white parkas and trousers, our sizes.”

  “That will be seven sets, then,” said the precog. “And yes, Ben, I really do have a great deal of faith in my talent. While it can be miserly in its details, rarely showing me everything, still I can rely on what it does tell me.”

  “Have it your own way,” Trask answered, gruffly. “Just make sure that stuff’s delivered within the hour.” And then, nodding to himself, he muttered, “Which leaves one other item I want to take with me.”

  He used the intercom to speak to John Grieve. “John, are we in contact with David Chung?”

  “Yes,” came the answer. “I have his telephone number. He’s in Glasgow, scheduled to be airborne again about an hour and a half from now. Chung and his ecological chums, they think they know where their quarry is.”

  “And we know where ours is going,” Trask answered. “Try to get David on the blower for me, will you? Patch him through to me in Ops?”

  “My pleasure,” said Grieve. “And Ben…is there anything I can do for you? I mean, I really don’t give a damn about the situation. I don’t think any of us do. It looks like the world is going to hell anyway, quite apart from any other, er, local complications.”

  For a moment Trask was silent, then said, “Thanks, John. I want you—I want E-Branch—to know that we’re on it. Everyone in here is on it. We can’t say what problems we’ll experience further down the line, but right now we’re all on track.”

  “Hell, we know that!” said Grieve, his voice breaking up a little. And then, on afterthought: “Oh, and there is one other thing. Tell Turchin we had a message come through for him. The thing’s a bit esoteric and goes like this: ‘Nest ransacked, as expected. Egg in second nest hatched at five P.M. Moscow time, and by eight P.M. the birds had flown.’”

  “And that’s it?”

  “That’s it,” said Grieve.

  Trask passed the message on to Turchin, and by the time he was finished Grieve was patching David Chung through.

  Trask took the call.

  “It’s a funny thing,” said Chung, “but a little while ago I was checking out tonight’s flight, looking at a map. I had this feeling—a kind of premonition—and checked up on E-Branch, too. I stuck my finger on the map, London, the City. And like I said, it’s a really funny thing…or maybe not?”

  “Not,” said Trask. “Not from where I’m standing, anyway. So what did you locate, David? Mindsmog?”

  He sensed Chung’s nod, and the locator said, “I don’t suppose it’s much good my asking if everything’s okay down there? I mean, you know, with Jake and all?”

  “Everything is…just fine,” Trask answered, knowing full well that his tone was speaking volumes for him, telling a very different story. “With Jake, and with Millie, and with me, too. We’re all just fine. For the time being, anyway…”

  And after a long pause: “Anything I can do?” said Chung.

  “Just do your job,” said Trask, “and pretend it’s the most important thing you ever did, even though it mightn’t feel like it right now. I mean, when there’s a storm blowing up, even the little hatches are important—perhaps even the most important. Every-damn-thing gets battened down, right? And anyway, we have all the help we can use at our end.”

  “I’ll be thinking of you,” said Chung huskily.

  “I know you will,” said Trask, “but while I appreciate your concern, it’s not why I contacted you.” And he told the locator what he wanted.

  “Sure,” said the other. “It’s in my room right there in the HQ. You’re welcome to it. And there’s really no need to explain why you want it. Good luck, Ben.”

  Then Trask called John Grieve again, and had a certain item taken from Chung’s room and delivered to Ops…

  While these things were in progress, Premier Turchin spent time explaining something to Jake.

  “I had fake documents ‘leaked’ to all three of the militarist animals who would like to unseat me,” he said. “The letters hinted of a secret location—a source of untold wealth in gold—that General Mikhail Suvorov had discovered; also that Suvorov was there right now, busily amassing incredible riches while these former ‘close colleagues’ of his were barely surviving on cabbage soup and cheap vodka in Moscow.

  “I knew, of course, that as soon as my defection, or rather my disappearance from the Earth Year summit, became public knowledge, then that my three enemies would begin hunting down this alleged EI Dorado; and also that since this false information—this ‘red herring,’ you might say—had been leaked simultaneously to each of them, they’d be obliged to join forces on this wild-goose chase. Not one of them would dare let the others out of his sight, you see, so they’d all have to be in it together. Hah! The terms we use, eh? Red herrings, and wild geese? Still, I’m sure you understand.

  “And where wild geese are concerned, it appears these three birds are now in flight. That message I received just now? Yes, you are correct. My apartments in Moscow have been subjected to a very thorough search. Nothing was found—because nothing was there! I didn’t want to make it too easy for them, too obvious. Ah, but a man of mine in Zhukovka has been keeping an eye on my dacha there, and earlier today, about five P.M., that, too, was searched. This time they found what they were looking for.”

  “Your dacha at Zhukovka?” Jake frowned. “But didn’t you say you’d hidden the bomb there?”

  “Indeed.” Turchin nodded. “And the bomb is still there, for if they had found it my man would certainly have reported that, too. But that’s not what they were looking for! My leaked documents had mentioned all kinds of improbable things—El Dorado, yes, but also a modern scientific marvel, a means of converting base metals into gold, the philosopher’s stone—hidden away in a secret laboratory somewhere in the Urals. The only thing that was missing was the location.”

  “Perchorsk,” said Jake.

  “Correct! And in a wall safe, hidden behind a picture in my dacha, was a set of schematics very similar to the ones you see up there on that wall screen. But why did I keep them secret in a safe in a dacha in Zhukovka, eh? Finally all the links in the chain that I had forged had come together, and these enemies of mine had suddenly remembered Suvorov’s connection with the Perchorsk complex: the fact that he’d been responsible—or rather that he had assumed responsibility—for the cleanup operation when that place was finally shut down.”

  “And the birds have flown,” said Jake. “At eight P.M. Mos
cow time, they left in an aircraft—”

  “A military aircraft,” said Turchin, “probably an air force jet-copter.”

  “—heading for Perchorsk,” the Necroscope finished it off.

  Turchin nodded. “Which means that by now they are there.”

  “Where they’ll have come face-to-face with the hoodlums who run the place,” said Jake.

  “They will have met them, certainly,” Turchin agreed. “They could hardly avoid it. But a confrontation? I think not. For my enemies are clever schemers no less than General Suvorov before them. Instead, they will join forces with Perchorsk’s convicts, at least for the time being. But while they are greedy, dangerous men, these hawkish militarists, they’re by no means stupid. When they see the Gate, they will doubtless recall that Mikhail Suvorov vanished a long time ago, and still has not reappeared. Gone to the alleged El Dorado? Well, perhaps. Gone to his grave? Ah! An equal possibility. So then, what to do?”

  “You tell me,” said Jake.

  “But isn’t that obvious?” Turchin replied. “They will send men who are stupid through that Gate, to discover what lies on the other side.”

  “They’ll send the convicts themselves,” said Jake. “All of them very heavily armed.”

  “Exactly,” said Turchin. “And Nathan and his people in Sunside will have another battle on their hands, more Szgany blood spilled. But while the Wamphyri were monsters, as I’ve now seen for myself, they were not armed to the teeth, and they were not driven by the entirely human lust for gold. So then, surely you can see that my plan is the only way? This way we can close the Gate forever, and at the same time rid the world of three ruthless militarists who—especially in the current circumstances—are an additional threat to peaceful coexistence, and therefore to the entire planet’s security.”

  “And,” said Jake, “We’ll also be blocking Malinari’s, Vavara’s, and Szwart’s bolt-hole.”

  “That, too,” Turchin answered. “And perhaps we’ll even trap them, under a million tons of settling mountain…but only if we get there in time.”

  “But not too early,” said the Necroscope. “Surely it would serve our purpose far better to let your ‘ruthless militarists’ and Perchorsk’s ex-cons join forces and have a go at the Wamphyri together before we get there? Maybe we could arrive in the middle of the fighting, stand off and watch the fireworks, and step in at the last minute when there’s less to be done.”

  “Excellent!” Turchin clapped his hands. “But how very logical! You have a sharp mind, Jake Cutter.”

  “I have a very clear mind, for once,” said Jake, narrowing his eyes behind his sunglasses. “The cold, devious, and calculating mind of a vampire, eh?”

  “Ah yes,” said Turchin, but far more quietly now.

  “And that’s something I must watch very closely,” said the Necroscope. I can’t afford to let the cold overcome what’s left of the warmth in me. So I suppose I’ll have decisions to make—choices, of which this is the first—about lesser and greater evils.

  He turned to Ben Trask who was studying the schematics, and said, “I think you’d better let me go and get Premier Turchin’s bomb, if only to have it in reserve as a last resort.”

  Trask looked at him. “I’ve come to the same conclusion,” he said. “But I was listening to your conversation, and I can only hope it’s me thinking and speaking.” And:

  “I know what you mean,” said Jake…

  In Zhukovka the night was chilly and overcast.

  Jake and Turchin had emerged from the Möbius Continuum some hundred yards from the latter’s dacha on a wooded track. It was the same place—the selfsame coordinates—that the original Necroscope, Harry Keogh, had used all those many years ago when he’d come here to visit the murdered Gregor Borowitz, then head of the Soviet Union’s E-Branch.

  And now…Jake “remembered” it well.

  “You are very cautious,” Turchin whispered as he recognized the location from his own frequent visits.

  “So was Harry Keogh,” Jake answered, “when he came here.”

  “That’s all very well,” said Turchin, “but we’ll risk being seen, out walking in this wood in the dead of night. You should have brought us a little closer than this.”

  “No,” said Jake, shaking his head. “We’re close enough for now.” And then, putting a finger to his lips: “Keep very still, and very quiet.”

  Removing his dark glasses he lifted his head and sniffed at the air, and his eyes were feral, wolfish in the night. Then he looked all about, at the leaden sky, the silhouetted trees, the gravel path winding away, lapped at by the ground mist. And finally—as once again Jake drew on the night air, and held it in his nostrils—so his head turned in the direction of Turchin’s dacha.

  “Well?” said the Russian Premier, very quietly.

  “A cigarette,” Jake whispered. “He rolls his own, this one. He uses inferior tobacco, and he smokes them down to the tip.”

  “He?”

  “Whoever he is, on guard outside your dacha.”

  “Damn!” said Turchin. “I hadn’t anticipated this.”

  “That the authorities would be on the lookout for you?”

  “Bah! This has nothing to do with any authorities!” Turchin replied. “Something I perhaps didn’t mention: that I made provision for my cabinet to be informed that I’m not a defector but merely spending time in England where I’m avoiding the possible consequences of a death threat. Meanwhile, special forces under my control are tracking down the would-be assassins here in Russia. Therefore, since this information was restricted to senior cabinet members, whoever is waiting for me cannot possibly know it else he would not be waiting! Ergo: he is not of the authorities but obviously an underling or hireling of the three.”

  “This is something new,” said Jake. “Does Trask know you’re covering your backside like this, playing both ends against the middle?”

  “It’s…possible I forgot to mention it.” Turchin shrugged. “But Trask is Trask; he would have known I wasn’t telling all of the truth. Anyway, what has any of that to do with what we’re doing here?”

  “And of course the entire assassin story is so much bull?”

  “Yes. Yes, it’s bull!” said Turchin. “I’m not under threat except by these three who are on their way to Perchorsk—and we are wasting time!”

  Jake nodded and said, “Okay, but you are the Russian Premier, after all. And this fellow at the dacha…can’t you talk him down?”

  “He isn’t here to be talked down,” Turchin answered. “He’s here to ensure that if I send someone to retrieve those schematics—that if anyone goes near that dacha—he won’t survive to talk about it!”

  “Russian politics?” said Jake.

  “Yes—no—perhaps,” the other replied. “And sarcasm is the lowest form of wit!”

  “And Ben Trask knows what he’s talking about when he calls you a fox,” said the Necroscope. “But you’re right, we’re wasting time. So wait here, and only come when I whistle.”

  Leaving the path, he moved silently into the shadows under the trees, gradually disappearing into the darkness there. And before Turchin could even begin to work up an anxious sweat…Jake’s whistle sounded!

  The Premier hurried along the familiar track, slowing down a little when he saw saw the dacha looming in the trees. There in the shadows under projecting eaves, the Necroscope was waiting for him. And at Jake’s feet, crumpled to the boards of the porch, a figure in an overcoat lay partly obscured by swirling tendrils of mist. His cigarette, a mere stub, was glowing fitfully where it had rolled away from him.

  Turchin looked at Jake—his gleaming eyes, his thin lips smiling in a certain way—and drew back a pace.

  But Jake only shook his head. “No,” he said. “No puncture, Gustav, just a punch. But I reckon he’d passed out even before I hit him, maybe half a second after I appeared out of nowhere right beside him! Now then, where’s the bomb?”

  “Behind the dacha,” Turc
hin answered, “in a ramshackle old woodshed built into the hillside, a bolt-hole that Borowitz had dug for himself a long time ago. I discovered it in the winter a few years back, after letting the pile of wood get very low. I went to lift a log and it wouldn’t come. Then, when I tugged harder…but you’ll see for yourself.”

  They went round the dacha to the back, where Jake saw that indeed the woodshed was a ramshackle affair. There was no lock on the door, and it creaked on rusted hinges when Turchin dragged it open. Inside, at the back, an untidy pile of handy-sized logs was covered with moss and toadstools.

  “You left a nuclear device in here?” said Jake.

  And Turchin nodded. “Even if anyone knew I possessed such a thing, this is the last place he’d think to look,” he answered. “There is nothing here to attract the attention of thieves, and even the lowliest tramp wouldn’t sleep here.”

  “So where’s the bomb?” said Jake.

  “Help me,” Turchin answered, “and you’ll see…oh, and by the way, there are two bodies back here.”

  “Bodies?”

  “The Chechens who helped me carry the thing,” said Turchin, unconcernedly. “In the end they, er, attempted to overpower me. Yes. Which left me no choice but to shoot them.”

  Taking a deep breath, the Necroscope said, “Now tell me, is there anything else you’ve forgotten to mention?”

  “No.” Turchin shook his head. “I don’t think so. I covered them with lime, and the last time I looked in here there wasn’t much of a smell.”

  Jake helped him shift the upper layers of logs to one side, to about halfway down the stack. The three bottom layers, however, were all bolted together.

  “And now pivot,” said Turchin, dragging the false woodpile away from the sloping earthen wall at the rear. The entire façade pivoted on the left, revealing roughly concreted steps that descended into the ground.

  Below, the walls were of stone under a low ceiling propped up with timbers. The floor was a crazy-paved mixture of broken garden slabs and gravel. Central, on a trolley, stood the bomb—a cylinder of shining metal some two and a half feet long by twelve inches in diameter—connected to a timing device with windows showing hours, minutes, and seconds.