The Gathering Dark

by James Oswald

  ‘It’s just. Well, you looked a bit zoned out there, sir. Can’t say I blame you, what with all this.’ She shook her head gently from side to side as if not wanting to see the carnage. ‘Reckon I’ll have nightmares for months, and I’ve just been working the cordon.’

  As she spoke, so McLean felt the weariness wash over him, pricked around the edges with a headache that might have been dehydration or might have been the noxious fumes that had burned off the overturned tanker truck until the fire crews had arrived with their foam. The smell was still there, rasping the back of his throat.

  ‘It’s … I don’t really know.’ Talking hurt, a soreness that reminded McLean of the early stages of the flu, and he had a raging thirst. He tried to scan the area for the mobile incident truck that always turned up at things like this, then stopped as his vision dimmed. ‘Anyone got a brew on, do you know?’

  Gregor had been reaching out to give him a steadying hand, but she turned on one heel and pointed to a café a short way up the road. A gaggle of uniforms clustered around its doorway; no other customers this side of the cordon.

  ‘Luigi’s been keeping us all fed and watered. Don’t think he’s taking any money off anyone either. There’s not many’d be so generous.’

  McLean nodded. Tragedy brought out the best in some people. He set off towards the café, then stopped, remembering something.

  ‘The young lad over there by the railings. He get checked out by the paramedics?’ As he spoke, so he turned to look for the man. He’d seen him, hadn’t he? It had the quality of a dream, but he was fairly sure of it. White-faced and wide-eyed with shock, sitting with his back to the low wall and railings, curled in on himself but unhurt. How he’d survived unscathed in the middle of such carnage, McLean couldn’t know. Must have had the luck of the gods with him.

  ‘Young lad?’ Gregor looked around the pavement. Only the dead remained, covered with blankets to protect what dignity they had left from the prying eyes of the press. Helicopters had been circling overhead like vultures within minutes of the crash. ‘Don’t recall anyone, but the walking wounded were all shipped off as soon as possible.’

  McLean shook his head, then wished he hadn’t as a wave of pain broke over him. Too much of that smoke fogging his thoughts. Christ, he really needed that tea. A shower, too, probably. The chance of that happening any time soon was minimal.

  ‘You’re right. He’s not here, so he’s either gone to the hospital or home. Either way I’m sure he’ll be fine.’

  ‘Where the bloody hell have you been, McLean? Don’t you ever answer your phone?’

  Not exactly how he’d been hoping to be greeted, but McLean wasn’t entirely surprised. Cadging a lift across town from the crash scene in a squad car had meant he’d been able to check his phone, the endless messages and texts from his new boss. Chief Superintendent Tom Forrester wasn’t a bad officer, really. A far cry from Brooks and a breath of fresh air compared to Duguid, but his Glaswegian accent sounded alien in this most Edinburgh of stations. That he was uniform rather than Specialist Crime Division had changed the dynamic in the team even more. Then again, the fallout from the Chalmers case was always going to be messy, and McLean couldn’t blame the Chief Constable for bringing in someone he knew and trusted to steady the ship.

  ‘Major incident over at Tollcross, sir. Didn’t Control notify you?’

  Forrester pinched the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger as if trying to staunch a heavy nosebleed. McLean was growing accustomed to the gesture now, knew that it meant the man was trying to suppress his natural tendency to the sarcastic.

  ‘Are we so short-staffed that uniform have to go stealing inspectors from plain clothes now?’

  ‘Sorry, sir. It’s just that I was first on the scene. Accident over the other side of town tied up most of the ambulances and paramedics, so I stayed to help with triage until they got there.’ McLean hadn’t really processed the incident until he said the words. He’d been so busy he’d been blissfully forgetful of the horrible noise of the crash, the screams of the injured and dying. ‘Actually, I was there when it happened.’

  Something in Forrester’s features softened. He still looked like a rat in a black uniform, but a kindly rat who might only chew at your dead fingers rather than gnaw out your sightless eyeballs.

  ‘Fuck are you doing back here, then? You should be at home, man. Look like you could do with a shower and a change of clothes if nothing else.’

  McLean shrugged. He’d thought about knocking off early, but there was the small matter of an investigation into counterfeit goods he was meant to be co-ordinating with Trading Standards and HMRC that was going nowhere precisely because it was split between three different organizations. That was a meeting that would have to be rescheduled. If they’d even noticed he’d not turned up.

  ‘Control’s already handed over the preliminary investigation to me. Thought I’d get things in motion before the anti-terrorism squad get here. Set up a meeting with the senior officers and take it from there.’

  ‘Anti …’ Forrester had been standing in the doorway that led through from the front of the station to the ground floor admin offices and the nicer interview rooms. Now he stepped into the reception area, letting the security door click closed behind him. His face was a picture of thoughts cascading into place like a landslide. ‘You think this is a terrorist attack?’

  ‘My gut says no, but we can’t ignore the possibility. Tanker truck took the corner from the Western Approach Road on to the Lothian Road too fast. Could have been deliberate, could have been an accident. Driver’s dead, along with at least fifteen others.’

  All the blood had drained out of Forrester’s face. His mouth hung slightly open, eyes staring into the distance as the implications began to mount up. ‘Fifteen?’

  ‘At least. I’d be very surprised if that figure didn’t go up by the end of the day. It was carnage sir, and that’s another problem.’

  ‘Another?’

  ‘Press were there in minutes. There’s been a helicopter hovering over the scene all morning. And you know what people are like. Everyone with a phone was taking pictures, filming the whole thing. We did our best to contain it, but there’s going to be footage all over the internet already.’

  Forrester leaned against the wall beside the security door, drumming his fingers against the fake wood, thinking fast. ‘The scene’s secure now, though?’

  ‘Fire crews are still dealing with the truck, paramedics have done what they can. We’ve at least a hundred uniform officers keeping the public away. More being drafted in from the regions. Surprised no one told you already, sir.’ McLean glanced at the clock above the unmanned reception booth. ‘It’s been three hours since it happened.’

  Forrester pushed himself away from the wall, turned and tapped out the code to unlock the security door. ‘I’ve been in strategy meetings all day. They told me there’d been an incident, but it was under control. Think I might have to have words. Come.’

  McLean followed the chief superintendent as he strode past the admin offices and up the stairs. The station felt empty, almost like school at the end of term. Hardly surprising given how many constables and sergeants had been drafted in to deal with the crash. He’d assumed that Forrester was leading him up to his office on the third floor, but instead the chief superintendent headed for the CID room. It wasn’t much busier than the corridor outside.

  ‘At ease, Constable.’ Forrester waved down Detective Constable Harrison before she could stand. Looming over her like a giant, Detective Constable Blane was the only other person in the room. ‘Where is everybody?’

  Harrison tapped twice at her keyboard, blanking out the screen before answering. ‘DCI McIntyre’s over at Fettes today, sir. She’s got DC Stringer and DS Laird with her. DI Ritchie’s up in Perthshire on Operation Fenton. Not sure what the other teams are up to but there was a big briefing this morning and then everyone left. Oh, and there was a traffic accident over Lothian Road
way. All the uniforms …’ She trailed off, eyes widening as she saw McLean standing behind the chief superintendent.

  Forrester let out a weary sigh. He’d only been in charge a few months, but McLean could guess the pressure he was under. Dropped in from on high to clear up the mess left by his predecessor, dealing with the twin demands of uniform and plain clothes in a station that was seriously undermanned and with a budget under constant review. It couldn’t have been much fun.

  ‘OK. Get in touch with everyone you can. I want them back here as soon as possible. Senior officers’ meeting at four. Press conference at half five.’ He turned to McLean. ‘Tony, I’ll need a full briefing for everyone, then. As much detail as possible.’

  McLean suppressed his own weary sigh, instead just nodded his understanding. What he wanted to do was go home and stand under the shower for the rest of the day. No chance of that happening any time soon.

  5

  Police have cordoned off the area and are keeping the public well away. Reports of toxic fumes suggest this may be the first terrorist attack on Scottish soil since the Glasgow Airport bomb in 2007. As this footage from a member of the public shows, fire crews in full hazmat gear –

  McLean clicked off the television that hung from the wall in the corner of his office, dropped the remote onto his desk. He wasn’t sure he liked this new room, two floors up and at the front of the building rather than the pokey-wee broom cupboard he’d used for so many years. It was on the way to too many other places for one thing, the major-incident rooms and the chief superintendent’s office among them. People dropped in all the time, which was both distracting and disconcerting.

  On the other hand it was a big room with a large window, the view marginally better than the stone wall he had become so used to. His new desk was at least twice the size of his old one, which meant it had taken twice as long to disappear under the mountains of paperwork that followed him wherever he went. Over by the far wall, under the television, a small conference table was strewn with reports, printouts and other collected information as Detective Constables Harrison, Stringer and Blane did their best to make sense of the morning’s accident and distil it down into a useful briefing paper. Only half an hour to go until the senior officers’ meeting, and they were still waiting on a call from forensics.

  ‘Sometimes wonder why we bother with press conferences these days. It’s all over the internet the moment anything happens.’ McLean picked up his phone, thumbed at the screen until it lit up. He’d been expecting a call all afternoon but it hadn’t come. Soon enough he was going to have to make it himself.

  ‘Aye, but that can be helpful, sir. Some of our best intelligence comes from Twitter.’

  McLean couldn’t really tell whether DC Harrison was being sarcastic or not. She had a dry wit far too well developed for one so young.

  ‘Your flatmate use it?’ he asked. ‘Only I could really do with something from forensics before I have to speak to the top brass.’

  Harrison pulled her laptop towards her, tapped at some keys and stared at the screen. It was DC Stringer who spoke next, though.

  ‘Email just pinged through now, sir. You want me to send it to the printer?’

  ‘Executive summary’ll do.’ McLean hauled himself out of his chair and walked over. The space between desk and table was about twice the size of his old office, bare carpet tiles with no stains on them at all.

  ‘No obvious evidence the crash was deliberate. Looks like the driver lost control. Maybe heart attack? He’s one of the dead, anyway.’

  ‘What about the fire? The smoke?’ McLean could still feel it in the back of his throat, the burning sensation and a metallic taste that made everything unpalatable. His head had cleared a bit, but the dull ache still lurked there, squat and evil behind his eyes.

  ‘Truck was carrying some kind of industrial solvent waste, apparently. They’re still waiting on analysis to find out exactly what.’

  ‘They don’t know? Surely it was carrying a manifest? There should have been hazardous-chemicals notice panels on the bowser.’

  ‘Aye, there was. We’ve been in touch with the hauliers, too, and they don’t know what’s happened. Should have been transporting digestate from an anaerobic digester, whatever that is. Nothing toxic at all.’

  McLean thought of the chemical reek, the acid burns on the skin of the victims, the melting tarmac. Rotted down green waste it certainly wasn’t. ‘So we’ve got an illegal transportation of hazardous chemicals through a built-up area, a truck that’s not carrying the correct plates for its cargo. Anyone been on to Health and Safety?’

  ‘They’re in the email trail, sir.’ Stringer tapped away at the keyboard on his laptop as he spoke, two industrious fingers doing the work of ten. ‘SEPA are involved, too. Pretty much all the agencies, actually.’

  ‘OK. Make sure they’re all copied in on the initial report.’ McLean leaned forward, rubbing at his face to try and ease his exhaustion. He’d washed as best he could manage without going home and changing, but his skin felt taut and dry with whatever foul chemical had spilled from the tanker. That it wasn’t sewage effluent was scant consolation. A mislabelled cargo meant corruption at best. Could this actually be a terrorist attack? It didn’t feel right, but then nothing about the whole incident felt right. Twenty dead at the latest count and dozens injured, how could it? He glanced at his watch, time to go. Pushed himself to his feet and breathed in deeply.

  ‘Right then. Let’s get this over and done with.’

  ‘Gentlemen. Lady. I don’t really need to tell you just how serious this situation is. We’ve a dozen and more innocent people dead, the press going nuts over a possible terrorist attack. I’ve had the First Minister breathing down my neck all day, and while some people might enjoy that kind of thing, she’s really not my type.’

  McLean couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen this office so full of top brass. It might have been Chief Superintendent Forrester’s room, but he had wisely ceded authority to the chief constable. The ACCs from all the regions had gathered together like some ancient cabal, accompanied by their personal entourages. There wasn’t an officer lower in rank than superintendent there apart from DCI McIntyre – also the only woman present – and himself. As a lowly detective inspector, he should have felt overawed; instead he was reeling at the thought of just how young some of them were.

  ‘McLean. You were first on scene, I’m told. Co-ordinated with fire and paramedics. Got everything under control. That’s good work, man. Top work.’

  ‘Right time, right place, I guess, sir. Or wrong time, wrong place. Depends on your point of view.’

  ‘You witnessed the crash, is that true?’

  McLean didn’t know the chief constable at all. He’d met the previous one a few times but had largely kept out of the way of the machinery that ran Police Scotland. Looking around the room, he only really knew Jayne McIntyre and Deputy Chief Constable Stevie Robinson, once known as Call-Me-Stevie, but now more universally Teflon Steve after he’d come out of the last embarrassment seemingly squeaky clean. The rest of them were from the west. Strathclyde boys. Foreign.

  ‘I was there, sir. I saw … something. I know it’s a cliché, but it all happened so fast. I was just turning the corner, maybe a hundred yards away. The first thing I was really aware of was the explosion.’

  ‘Explosion you say? So it was a bomb?’ The dark-suited man in the far corner was from the anti-terrorism task force. McLean didn’t envy him his job, even if Scotland had never been high on the target list for most terrorist organizations. Even so, there was something unnerving about the look in his eyes. An eagerness bordering on excitement.

  ‘Perhaps explosion is the wrong word. Have you ever seen a car crash? Heard the screech of twisted metal and the sound of breaking glass?’ McLean didn’t wait for an answer. ‘Well, imagine that magnified tenfold. The truck was going too fast, only just started to turn before it rolled and hit the bus stop.’ As he spoke, so the image unfu
rled in his mind as if it were being played on a cinema screen. Things he didn’t remember seeing began to slot into place. Little details like the group of Asian tourists with their matching bright-yellow backpacks and calf-length boots. An unusually tall man in a loose-fitting grey pinstripe suit, iPhone clamped to the side of his head with a giant’s hand. A Morningside lady in tweed and pearls, being dragged towards the Usher Hall by two tiny dachshunds on extendable leads. A young man –

  ‘So what you’re saying is you didn’t actually see anything.’ Chief Superintendent Forrester broke through McLean’s flashback before the truck could complete its roll into the bus stop.

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘You were there but you weren’t observing the scene. Just a passer-by. Is that correct?’

  ‘Of course I wasn’t observing the scene. Nobody was observing the scene. It was an accident. Happened in an instant.’

  ‘An accident? You’re sure of that?’ the chief constable asked. McLean felt the heat of a dozen pairs of eyes bearing down on him, the prickling of skin as the blush crept up his neck.

  ‘If you’re asking do I think this was a terrorist attack, sir, my instinct is to say no, I don’t think it was. I’m not up on what the current threat level is for the city, or whether we’ve been following any particular groups.’

  ‘Robert? You care to add anything at this point?’ The chief constable nodded towards the officer from the anti-terrorism task force, who leaned forward, resting his arms on the table and pausing a while before he spoke.

  ‘We’ve nothing on our radar beyond the general threat level, and that’s always been more focused on London and the south.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘We can’t rule it out yet, and I’ve no doubt the press will be running with it until we can, but I’m inclined to agree with McLean here. It looks like a tragic accident. We need reports from the fire crews and forensics, full background and post-mortem on the driver at the very least before we can be sure. I don’t think this was a deliberate act, though. Not that it’s going to make the families of the dead feel any better.’