by Andy Hyland
“Damn right,” I said. He smiled faintly.
“Right. It was over near the playground. Always worth checking those places. See if someone saw anything. Wave a few pictures around. Sun had set, it was pretty dark. Usually a few teenagers hanging out, but not that day. Something moving on the edge of things, so I walked in, thought it was worth checking out. Still can’t…can’t…”
“It’s okay,” said Arabella, reaching out and taking his hand. I felt the energy pass between them, strengthening him.
“Gray. Giant gray rat. Impossible to get that big, but it was there. But that wasn’t all. There was this thing – huge thing, treating it like a pet. Feeding it…something. He was tall, stripped to the waist, built like Stallone, but it was the heads. I know you won’t believe me -”
“We believe you,” Arabella whispered.
“Three heads, right?” I said, prompting him but needing him to say it himself. “A human one in the middle?”
“Human? Maybe. Twisted freak, he was. And on one side a bull, wide horns, dripping snot. On the other side, some kind of - a ram, that’s what it was. Ram, with curled, flaking horns, mean eyes. I ran. God help me, I ran.”
“You had to,” I assured him. “They’d have killed you otherwise.”
“I went in the next day, into the station, put a report together. Even did this pencil sketch. Knew they’d think I was crazy or on something, but the kid was missing. Got to think of the kid. They laughed, told me to shut up. No, I say, I’m filing it. Deal with it how you want, but I’m filing this. It was that night they came for me. Got me in the kitchen. Did the business, then this guy leaned down. Gold tooth, bad breath. Told me if I said anything again they’d be back, but they’d bring the rat and let it go upstairs.” A tear formed in his eye and rolled down his cheek.
“How is he?” said Mrs Jenkins, bustling in with mugs on a tray. “Oh dear. I’m so sorry. He has these bad spells. For hours, sometimes.”
“It’s not a problem, really. We only wanted to see him.” I took a coffee, sipped it and made a face. “Sorry. Any chance of some sugar in this? Should have said.”
She hurried out, embarrassed not to have asked, and I knelt back down. Didn’t have much time. “Listen, Ray. You imagined that thing, that thing and the rat. You were tired, stressed. You’ll go back to work and joke about it. And those guys who came, they’re never, ever coming back. Your family are safe. Be happy. Enjoy them. Live well.” I reached forward, touched his eyes, and released him from the mesmer.
He looked at us curiously. “Hey,” he said. “Sorry. Must have been asleep there. Do I know you two?”
“Just checking up on you,” I said, smiling, and turned to leave. We met Mrs Jenkins in the hall and apologized profusely, telling her we had to go but that her husband seemed well. She trotted in to see him and got a pleasant surprise, while we closed the front door behind us and made our way out. The cab didn’t wait and the streets were quiet, so we headed along the road until we found one. Didn’t make it far.
“Problem,” said Arabella, noticing it before I did. The streetlamps were flickering, and it was getting worse. I threw up a ward. Another rat attack, and we’d be overwhelmed in a hurry, but surely that wasn’t on the cards. Too public. Too open. They moved in shadows. I was right. It wasn’t the horde. It was so much worse.
Anyone looking out their windows, wondering why their televisions, lights and other electrical equipment had suddenly gone haywire, would have seen three normal-ish looking people. Me, Arabella, and a tall, broad guy in a blue suit, well-tanned with hair swept back, grinning with perfect teeth. Even at this distance, a few meters away, I could see the human guise ripple and change, shifting subtly in the breeze. He wore it lightly, contemptuously.
“Balam,” I said.
His grin widened, wolfish. “My Sem’ki. How long has it been? Six years, since you ran? We recovered the others, but not you. I paid dearly for that. And here we stand, all this time later. Me. And you.”
“I doubt you came all this way for me.”
“Of course not. You would not justify the time and energy. But now that I’m here…to return back with you in chains, to present you before our master…I think that would be delicious.” His tongue flickered in and out, caressing his lips.
“You won’t take me again.”
“Oh, I will take whoever I want. You. Her, maybe. Too close in age for a daughter. Your lover, then? Oh, I say, is she the escapee from this afternoon? She nearly fits the description – though she’s wisely toned things down. And here you are, dragging her around like a lapdog. This is too easy.”
He stepped forward. I raised my hands, letting flames dance over them.
“You were never a match for even the lowest guards,” Balam snickered, circling to my left. “Do you think in all this time I’ve grown weaker? Grown old? You will find yourself sorely mistaken.”
My flames danced higher, twisting into the air. He raised his eyebrows. “I’m sure you’re much as I remember you,” I said, trying to keep my voice even. “But you’ll find that I have changed.”
“Petty tricks,” he spat. “If I want you, I’ll take you.”
“You move against me and we’ll all die here.”
“I won’t.”
“Well, maybe not you. But you won’t take me or her. And I’ll make some noise that nobody’s going to be able to ignore. Your little raid is going to be shut down before you’ve got going.”
He stopped. Smiled slowly. “Little raid? Oh, Sem’ki, you’re mistaken. Those days are past. Look at this world you have. You churn out more children than you need, than you can feed. More than you want, certainly. We take some, the parents mourn for a while, and then they breed again. Remarkable how they bounce back. I have made the case to the master that what we need is not a raid, but a base of operations. For a continuous supply. He, naturally, agreed.”
“You’ll never pull it off.”
“On the contrary, it’s all going rather well. All it takes is the money to smooth the wheels. And some other, more direct, persuasion.” He winked at Arabella. “You’re remarkably compliant as a species when it comes to corruption. What’s the phrase you all use – fish in a barrel?”
“I’ll stop you.”
“You won’t. In the end, you will come with me when I return. You will be the icing on the cake. The cherry on the cream.”
“Been eating out a lot while you’ve been here?”
He licked his lips again. “You could say that, yes.”
Shouts came from the up the road. Neighbors calling to each other, seeing how far down the street the electrical problems went on. Balam looked over at them, turned back and gave a short bow. “Be listening for me. I’ll be calling for you soon.”
He turned and walked away, slowly dissolving into mist until there was nothing that remained. The streetlamps sprang back into life and the blare of televisions and radios came from the houses once more.
“Move,” I said to Arabella, and she fell into line. I walked down the center of the roads where it was well lit, flicking off the drivers who didn’t like it. I wasn’t about to go touching the shadows.
One car that had been patiently tailing us for a block pulled forward, drawing level. “You going to get in,” asked Larry Dialgo junior, “or are you walking all the way back to Manhattan like this? Cos if you are, I’m going to have to flick on the blue lights and provide an escort.”
He was riding alone, so I let him have the whole story. Arabella sat in stunned silence, looking at me. “So this Balam, he’s bad news?”
“He’s worse than bad news. He’s a nightmare. He’d peel the skin from your kids while you watched, just to see the look on your face. Seriously. I’ve seen him do it. Twice. Back in the camps. He’s the highest of the Moth’rai, next in line to Molech himself.”
“Can you take him down?”
“Before, never. Now? I don’t know. He’s sacrificed a lot of power to move this close to the borders, even
more to shift Earth-side. Even so, he’s ancient and mean and smart and cruel.”
“So what’s the plan?”
“Go home. Drink heavily. Try to get so far gone that the edges come off and I can sleep without dreaming.”
Larry pulled the car over, and turned round to face me. “I get that he’s thrown you. I get that you have a major problem here – not just the one we’ve all got, but with you.” He jabbed a finger at my chest. “In here. Right here. But you’ve got to get past that, because you, personally, are all that’s standing between him and the new Manhattan slave trade.”
“You need to find someone else. Quickly.”
“Who, me? You said it yourself. He said it – the force is dirty. Haven’t you got anyone you can go to?”
“Mercy,” whispered Arabella, giving me a nudge. I glared at her.
“Maybe,” I said. “Maybe not.”
“Make your mind up and do it quickly. Then let me know what the plan is. I won’t be able to give you any men, but I might be able to give you some space. Make sure that at the right time, in the right place, nobody’s looking. You get me?”
He dropped us a bit down from Julie’s place. We walked the rest of the way, circling round the block, making sure nobody was tailing us. In the elevator I turned to Arabella. “Julie was right. You should have stayed here.”
“No, you were right,” she said, taking my arm.
“It was dangerous.”
“It was real. It wasn’t about money, or hitting people. It was about doing the right thing and facing down the bad guys. Thank you.”
“He’s seen you with me. He’ll come after you too now. Hurt you, because he knows that will hurt me. It’s how he works.”
“I’m standing here with the guy who took down the Aleph. I’m not worried.”
The elevator pinged and the door slid open. “Then you’re a bloody idiot,” I snapped. “Because you should be worried.”
“He’s here, in town,” I said to Zack as soon as we got in. Paced up and down the room. Julie looked at me, concerned, and dragged Arabella off to the side.
“Who? Not Molech?” Zack guessed, reading my face.
“Next worst thing.”
“Him. Oh shit. Oh shit.”
“We’ve got nothing, Zack. Nothing that can touch Balam and the horde. Hell, he doesn’t even need to come after us personally. He can give the order and every bent cop will be out on the streets hoping to be the one to drag us in and pocket the cash.”
“So?”
“So what? Why’s everyone looking at me? What the hell do you all think I can do about it?”
“Malachi, sit down,” said Julie, walking over to me.
“I am not -”
The slap came out of nowhere, knocking me sideways, echoing round the room. “I said, sit down,” said Julie. “We have a problem, and you being a hysterical bitch isn’t going to help, is it? Sit.”
I did as I was told. Julie sat on one side of me, Arabella on the other, taking an arm each. Zack popped the top off a beer and passed me the bottle.
“So, as I see it,” he said, grabbing one for himself. “This is what we’re going to have to do.”
Chapter twenty-one
Mercy was waiting, patient and poised, when we walked into her cavern. Liberty was there, brown coat and hat, licking an ice lolly. Three others, two men and a woman, were off to the side. I’d never seen them before and didn’t care who they were.
It was nine in the morning. Zack had made the phone calls the night before while I attempted to get wasted on beer and Julie did her level best to stop me. After a lengthy fight, she won, and I spent the night pacing beside the windows. Everyone else gave up and went to bed. At one point the gargoyles appeared outside the window and tried to get me interested in a game of rock, paper scissors. In the end even they got bored of me, and they’re gargoyles, for pity’s sake.
Come the dawn I was beginning to be grateful that my intended drinking spree had been curtailed. There was stuff to do, and even though I had no idea what that stuff was, I was the closest thing anyone had to an intelligence source on Molech’s operations and methods. I was also going to have to find a way of keeping Arabella out of harm’s way without her realizing what I was doing. That would piss her off and make her think I was pushing her to the sidelines all over again. Bloody hell, isn’t life simple until people get involved?
“So,” said Liberty, officially getting things underway. “I understand there’s a situation.”
“Slave run,” I said. “Happening now.” I gave them the overall details, leaving the big announcements for the end.
“It’s unfortunate, but these things happen. It’s beyond anything we can do, to police and prevent small operations like this.”
“It’s Molech”s operation. The ratten horde are on the other side of the veil. At least one has passed over already. He’s upping his game, setting up a permanent, unlimited supply of humans running to the hellplains. And Balam is here overseeing it.”
That got their attention. I’m almost sure that, technically, the blood couldn’t leave Mercy’s face anymore, but she sure as hell looked like it did. Liberty dropped his ice lolly on the floor and walked over to one of the men stood to the side. They whispered furiously, then Liberty stepped back. Closer to me now. Intense. “Are you sure about this? We’ve heard nothing.”
“He’s bought off the police. He’s silencing anyone who’s seen anything. And let’s face it, you’ve had your mind elsewhere lately.”
“Even so, to miss this…”
“Why didn’t you tell us earlier?” Mercy demanded. “This isn’t something you’ve only just stumbled across, is it?”
“We’ve known for a few days,” admitted Zack.
“I was working for them. I didn’t know it. Honestly,” said Arabella. Julie patted her arm.
“And you didn’t think it was worth mentioning?” said Liberty. I’d only ever seen him calm and relaxed before, even in the middle of some pretty serious shit. His demeanor now was something entirely new to me.
“No. Because let’s face it, the Union hasn’t exactly covered itself in glory lately, has it? Or been effective at, oh I don’t know, anything? At all? You sold out the human race and stood back with your hands tied while the Aware were being picked off one by one. So you’ll excuse me if you’re not my first port of call when it all goes down.” I took a breath, lowered my voice – I’d been on the verge of shouting. “Look, I trust you, Liberty. I have no problem with you personally. And you, Mercy. But those guys?” I pointed to the two men and the woman. “I don’t know who they are. I have no reason to trust them and what they stand for.”
Liberty closed his eyes, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Yeah, I get that. But still. You’ve got to talk to me, Malachi.”
“Well I’m talking to you now. What can you do? I can tell you how he works. The type he goes for. Transport patterns. What can you give me in return?”
Liberty looked at Mercy. She looked at the floor before speaking. “Not much, I’m afraid.”
There was absolute silence for a few seconds, before I said, “What?”
“The Union is being…reorganized,” said Liberty. “We’ve had the core cut out of us with the Carafax betrayal. We’re recruiting, re-training, re-focusing. Why do you think I came to you with that list of names that I needed following up? It’s because I had nobody of my own I could use. Not that I trusted to get the job done like I trust you.”
“What about the Host?” asked Zack. “They’re handy.”
“The Host have departed,” said Mercy. “They’re not permanently based here. But we’ll ask.”
“That’s it?” said Arabella. “You’ll ask?”
“We’ll ask nicely,” said Liberty. “The whole point of the Union is to stop the Host having to run in every five minutes. No, stop.” He held up his hands as I prepared to kick of again. “You needn’t bang on about that – you’ve made your point already.”
“If it’s any consolation,” said Liberty, walking right up to me and taking my shoulder, “whatever resources I had at my disposal, if someone else had told me about this, I’d be coming to you.”
“Help us, Malachi Wan English,” muttered Zack. “You’re our only hope.”
“We’re truly in the shit, aren’t we?” I asked.
Liberty turned away, beckoning to his colleagues. “Mercy, keep me up to date.”
“This isn’t going as well as I’d hoped,” said Julie as the four of them walked out. That was as good a summary as any of us could have come up with.
“Balam,” said Mercy. “Oh my. Sitri was one thing. A monster, a proud, brutal thug. But Balam.”
“Is a sadist,” I said. “They’re not even in the same league.”
“Think,” Mercy demanded. “We must have a way in. This plan of Molech’s is ambitious. It can’t be invisible.”
“No, it can’t,” I agreed. “It needs infrastructure. Buildings for storage. Lines of supply. Men on the ground. Money passing hands. None of that is invisible when you get up close – only when you’re looking from a distance.”
“So where do we start?” asked Julie.
I thought about it. “Zach, Arabella, go and find Larry Dialgo the younger. He knows both of you, shouldn’t have any trust issues. I want two or three names. The most senior corrupt cops he can put his fingers on. I’m going after Valen. He’s the only one we know on the inside. He has to talk.”
“And me?” said Julie. “I sincerely hope you’re not about to tell me to go home and get on with the decorating?”
