Halfheroes

by Ian W. Sainsbury

  "You and me both, pal," said Daniel, as he tucked the binoculars into his rucksack. "No excuse for being a scumbag. Even if your mother named you Dave Davie Davison. And Triple Dee just makes you sound like a giant tit."

  He could hear the men's voices carrying across the street as he walked away. He grunted.

  "See you tomorrow, boys."

  Daniel decided a nightcap at the hotel bar wouldn't hurt. There was something about hotel rooms he found unnerving. The carefully made beds, the hard-wearing carpets, the desk and lamp, the television. The colours. In mid-price hotels, which were IGLU's preferred choice, he would wake up, flick on the light, and have no idea which continent he was in.

  Anything uniform, or institutional, reminded him of Station. Hotels, hospitals, offices, they all gave Daniel the creeps. At least, that was the excuse for the state of his bedroom at home.

  Home, he thought. That's the first time I've thought of the farmhouse as home.

  He was still smiling when he rounded the corner of the bar.

  "What you smiling at, Harbin? You get lucky or something?"

  Daniel looked up to see Sara and Gabe at the far end of the bar, with four ludicrous-looking cocktails, all pink umbrellas and twisted straws, lined up in front of them. Daniel, still smiling, hugged them both, then put his hand on Gabe's head. He towered above the other man. He took a look at Gabe's neck. There was a tiny mark where Cole's bullet had hit him. It looked like he'd cut himself shaving.

  "Luck is not necessary when you're a looker, like me," he said, winking at Sara over Gabe's bald skull. "It must be terrible to have to shave your head so no one knows you're ginger."

  "Oh," said Gabe, "oh...I'm hurt. Or was that supposed to be funny? You're gonna have to use a codeword or something when you're trying to crack a joke, Harbin. So we know when to laugh. How about lame-ass?"

  "I think you'll find that's lame-arse. How about short-arse instead?"

  "Lay off it, love-birds," said Sara. She blew them a kiss, and the half-dozen businessmen who had been studiously pretending not to check her out felt their mouths go dry.

  Sara pointed to the cocktails.

  "It's happy hour. Two for one."

  "Half a lager, please."

  "Pussy," said Gabe.

  When the beer arrived, Sara dropped a pink umbrella into it and raised her own glass.

  "Here's to taking another scumbag off the streets tomorrow morning. Salut!"

  11

  Yusupov Palace,

  St Petersburg, Russia

  Abos waited for a few minutes outside the yellow-painted palace on the bank of the Moika river until a party of French tourists arrived. They bustled up the steps, overheating in their fur hats, far too hot for the time of year. She tagged onto the back of the group, following them through the polished, carved wooden door. As she'd hoped, once inside, the staff assumed she was with their party, even addressing her in broken French.

  The interior of Yusupov Palace was breathtaking, and Abos stood in the main lobby gazing up at the massive chandelier. The red-carpeted staircase was wide enough to take a coach party, even if they were still in the coach.

  Abos found a young woman selling audio guides.

  "Rasputin?"

  The young woman led her back to the main desk, and a few more hundred roubles bought her a different coloured ticket, a pointed finger downstairs and the words, "La, madame."

  She didn't need the audio guide because she had re-read her research notes before leaving that morning. The life and death of Grigori Rasputin, despite taking place only a century ago, still inspired pages and pages of commentary. It was difficult to separate fact, speculation, and plain fiction. The notorious Siberian mystic had undoubtedly existed, gaining the trust of Tsar Nicholas II, and the enmity of many of the Tsar's advisers. Photographs of the charismatic monk showed a long-haired, bearded figure in a simple robe, with a disturbing Charles Manson-gleam in his eyes, and a set of teeth that would keep an orthodontist busy for a decade. The teeth and his unwashed animal stench seemed not to deter the thousands of women he seduced.

  When Abos had read about Rasputin's seduction technique (he attempted to undress every woman he met, surprisingly few of whom tried to stop him), she shuddered with the recollection of her own behaviour as The Deterrent. The fact that she had been manipulated chemically and psychologically were mitigating factors, but she still saw the shadow of her own shame in the predatory sexual behaviour of others. Rasputin had risen in status and power in the Russia of the Romanovs, and he had abused that power, taking sexual advantage of others. Abos, born as a man once, and a woman twice, while belonging to neither gender, had a unique perspective. She had long ago concluded that whatever did, or didn't, dangle between your legs gave you no licence or excuse to act like evolution had passed you by.

  She reached the basement room where Rasputin was reputed to have died. Waxwork figures of the monk and Prince Yusupov—one of the conspirators—dominated the tableau. Rasputin was seated at one end of a table laden with food and wine while Yusupov stood staring at him. Well, not quite. When Abos followed the sightline of the figure, she found his attention was focussed on a pepper pot. It diminished the drama somewhat, as it looked like Yusupov had been driven into a murderous fury by a condiment.

  Abos allowed her mind to drift out of focus, like someone trying to see the 3D image in a magic eye picture. There were parts of her internal landscape that were unreachable, half-glimpsed vistas and edifices that loomed in the distance before vanishing again. This method she was exploring of untethering her mind brought her within touching distance of those hidden parts of her consciousness.

  She closed her eyes.

  Nothing. Nothing at all, for a while. Perhaps Rasputin had been human after all.

  The anecdotal evidence suggested otherwise. After consuming enough poisoned wine to kill four men, Rasputin had reportedly asked for another bottle. Yusupov had shot him in the back, twice. When he'd survived that, Yusupov and his fellow conspirators rolled him in a carpet and threw him into the river.

  Abos felt the feather-like touch she had been waiting for. It was as if a starving woman had just caught the smell of fresh bread from a hot oven half a mile away. It was faint, but it was there. Not in the building, but nearby.

  She felt fingers tightening on her forearm. Disoriented, she took a half-step back in surprise, her mind snapping away from its interior landscape and re-engaging with the world outside.

  A small, wrinkled woman was saying something in halting French with a strong Russian accent. Abos smiled down at her, confused. The woman was tiny. She looked as if you'd need to open at least three other wrinkled old women before you got to her.

  "Madame," the woman repeated. "Votre amies. Ils sont departée."

  “My friends have gone? Oh. Yes. Thank you, merci."

  The old woman still had her fingers locked on Abos's arm. It took a hundred-rouble note to loosen them.

  The sensation had gone—for now—but Abos had been sure of the direction. She hurried out of the palace and, keeping the river on her left, followed it for nearly a mile to a spot about a hundred yards short of the Krasniy Most - the Red Bridge. She slowed her pace, letting her mind drift again.

  This time, the sensation was there immediately, stronger. She stopped walking and looked out into the brown water of the Moika.

  There.

  Abos returned after dark and found the same spot. A quick scan of the quiet street revealed no security cameras. She took out her contact lenses and removed her clothes.

  Abos slipped into the cold water at the edge before diving, letting her mind guide her to the right spot. She found a place where the sensation was at its strongest, then broke for the surface, taking several long, deep breaths. When she dived again, she built up speed as she descended, her legs blurring, hands clenched above her head.

  She ploughed through a century of weeds, silt, and assorted detritus as if it wasn't there. When the sensation she was looki
ng for was as clear as if a heavy curtain separating them had been drawn aside, she stopped and waited.

  As the seconds went by, her held breath beginning to burn her lungs, she wondered if she could have been mistaken. But then, suddenly, there it was: a sliding of muscle-like slime, purposeful, covering her fists and moving onto her arms, settling there.

  She swam upwards, broke the surface of the Moika and took a few quick breaths, her heart beating like a drum'n'bass track.

  Sirens, not an uncommon sound in St Petersburg in the early hours, were getting louder. She glanced to the north-east as two police cars crossed the Red Bridge.

  Abos scrambled up the bank and retrieved her clothes, bundling them up and holding them close to her chest, the slime now covering her upper arm. Hearing a shout as one of the police cars came closer, she abandoned all hope of a subtle exit and shot into the air, climbed above the clouds, and headed back to Britain.

  12

  There's a school of thought, made popular by the police raids shown on rolling news stations, TV shows and movies that pre-dawn—raids are the best way to catch criminals unawares.

  The argument has flaws. The main one is the assumption that the person on the receiving end of these raids will be blissfully asleep and completely unprepared for a police visit. Along with the rest of us, career criminals have heard that five am is considered to be a good time to shove a battering ram through a door, run in carrying truncheons, tasers, or even guns, then stamp about, shouting and being unpleasant. Which is why these criminals, if they are planning to be asleep at five am, make sure that they have a bunch of highly motivated henchpeople who are very much awake. Dogs, too.

  The latest innovative alarm systems with infra-red triggers and concealed night-vision cameras are snapped up by thieves, drug-dealers, assassins, and extortioners. Secret rooms and hidden exits are also popular.

  No. The best time to catch a criminal is in broad daylight, when they've had a good breakfast, seen the kids off to school, and are dealing with the mid-morning dip by brewing coffee and cracking open the custard creams.

  That was what TripleDee was doing when Daniel, Sara, and Gabe took care of the two men at his gates, tying them up and dragging them into the bushes.

  His coffee cup was halfway to his lips when the alarm sounded. He flicked a switch on the TV remote, and the screen in the corner of the kitchen changed from a game show to a view of his wrought-iron gates. Which weren't there. There was a gap twelve feet wide instead. It looked like they'd been ripped off the walls and thrown away. Which was exactly what had happened.

  The triggering of the alarm sealed the house. The front door could withstand a standard police battering ram for at least twenty minutes, but, now he'd seen what had happened to his gates, TripleDee headed straight for the secret passage in the basement. He lied to his girlfriend about the identity of his visitors. No point scaring her.

  "Hinny, coppers are here."

  A female voice came from the floor above.

  "Oh, shite."

  "Dinna worry, pet. I'll give 'em the runaround. Just stay hyem and stall 'em. Plead ignorance, you're good at that."

  "Fuck you, Triple."

  He laughed. "Mind, they're plain-clothes. Just keep the busies busy, pet."

  The door swung shut behind him with a solid clunk as he hurried down the steps to the basement.

  Five seconds later, there was a knock at the front door. After a short pause, there was another knock—louder this time—and a male voice.

  "Open up."

  Tammy, the longest suffering of TripleDee's many mistresses, shuffled down the stairs, belting up a silk robe as she did so.

  "Hold up, there," she said, "I'm on me way."

  She made a big performance of sliding back four bolts and a chain before opening the door and admitting three people. The woman looked like a supermodel, the little one looked like that bloke off the Crystal Maze, and the other one was huge. Even bigger than TripleDee.

  She smiled at that one.

  "If you're looking for ma gadgie, he's not here. He'll be back later. How about a brew while we wait, eh?"

  She put a hand on the massive one's arm and smiled at him encouragingly. Then the supermodel looked at her, Tammy's mouth opened of its own accord and she heard herself say,

  "He's down there. There's a tunnel." She looked at her hand. It was pointing at the door leading to the basement.

  "How did you make me do that, you witch?"

  Daniel kicked the door off its hinges. It flew ten feet forwards and ended up at the bottom of the stairs. The three of them followed it.

  Tammy, her wits restored, shouted after them.

  "It's only wor netty down there, ye daft bastards. I was kidding about the tunnel."

  She stared after them, wondering what the hell had just happened.

  Gabe was looking puzzled as they followed the tunnel.

  "Which country was that woman upstairs from? What's a netty? I couldn't place the accent."

  "I think it was Wightish," said Sara, with a straight face. "You know, from the Isle of Wight."

  Daniel chuckled at Gabe's confusion as they jogged down the tunnel. It was lit by bare lightbulbs, hanging above them.

  "They have their own language there? Man, what the hell's wrong with just having the one language, like we do in America."

  "What, Spanish?" called Daniel over his shoulder. "Or Chinese?"

  "Funny guy!"

  "Or do you mean English?" said Sara. "Because, like Chinese and Spanish, English isn't your native language. The clue's in the name."

  "Like I keep telling you, we improved it."

  "Example?"

  "Right...yep, okay. Sidewalk."

  Daniel had stopped in front of another door, at the end of the tunnel. This one was massive, iron, flush to the wall and had no handle. It could only be opened from the other side. A small buzzer and a grille showed the preferred method of requesting entrance.

  "Sidewalk?" Sara looked incredulous. "Where's the poetry? To avoid being run over and squashed on a road, we walk on the side. Side...walk."

  "Better than pavement. What does that even mean? I get pave, that makes sense. But ment? What the hell? To avoid getting squashed, we ment on the pave? Oh, now I say it like that, I see the beautiful poetry to which you refer."

  Gabe pointed at Daniel.

  "You gonna press that buzzer?"

  "I don't think so. Ready?"

  They nodded. Sara stepped up.

  "Don't I get a turn?"

  She stared at the door. Her face didn't change, there was no obvious moment when she released the energy she had gathered, but the door buckled inwards, masonry crumbling on either side. It held. Just barely, but it held.

  Sara smiled.

  "I think we may have lost the element of surprise."

  Gabe smiled back at her.

  "Maybe we should make up for it with extra violence."

  "Sounds like a plan."

  Daniel raised a foot and leaned back, ready to deliver a kick that had once sent a parked transit van, loaded with carpets, over a road and into a field. Its owner had parked it in a disabled spot while he went to get his lottery ticket. That kind of thing really wound Daniel up.

  Just before he unleashed the kick, a small creaking sound came from the door. All three of them watched as it fell backwards and landed in the room beyond with an echoing crash and a large cloud of dust.

  Daniel shrugged, stepping onto the door and into the room. The others followed.

  It was a basement not unlike the one they had just left. They had only travelled about a quarter of a mile. As they climbed the stairs back up to ground level, and he put his hand on the door handle, Daniel surmised they would emerge into a house very much like the one at the far end of the tunnel.

  He was wrong.

  He pushed the handle down. The unlocked door swung open. That was the first surprise.

  The second was the fact that the ground floor of the hou
se the three of them stepped into had been altered. All the interior rooms had been knocked through into one large space. Concrete floor, bare walls. Heavy nets at the windows to keep up the appearance of a family home from the outside. The space looked like it was used for storage. There were lighter patches on the floor where pallets or boxes must have stood. It was probably where the drugs were kept. More discreet than the traditional warehouse in the docks, he supposed. The nets meant they were in semi-darkness.

  The third surprise was the number of people in the room. Daniel looked from left to right. Besides TripleDee, there were six men, and two women, vague shapes in the gloom. All looking relaxed, confident, and grim. All spoiling for a fight.

  TripleDee stepped forward. He was a big man, only just short of Daniel's six feet, four inches. His shaved head was tattooed with some kind of Celtic script. Daniel hoped the tattooist had written something that translated as twat.

  "Daniel," he said, nodding as he spoke. "Gabe. Sara - shit, they never mentioned your looks. Seems a shame just to beat the crap out of you."

  Daniel caught Sara's glance at him. How the hell did this guy know their names?

  One of the other men spoke from behind him. Another big guy, bearded and grinning. Some people who deal drugs can't resist sampling the product. This beefcake looked to be one of them.

  "Well, what's the rush?"

  "The man said one o'clock, ya gobshite. You know what traffic's like at lunchtime."

  One of the women joined in.

  "Yeah, and there are roadworks on the A167. Bloody nightmare."

  Gabe felt they had lost the upper hand.

  "Can we just punch them already?"

  TripleDee laughed.

  "Do your worst, ya tiny bag of shite."

  TripleDee cracked his knuckles and ostentatiously rolled his shoulders as if warming up.

  "But before ya get all cocky like, ask yourself this: what do ya know about any of us?"