‘Morning, Big Marge,’ I said, cheerily. Big Marge greeted me with a grunt, not looking up from her magazine.
‘Not really a morning person, are you?’
‘I’m not really an any-time-of-day person, Joe,’ she replied.
‘Mary Tyler,’ I said, ‘is she okay for a visit, d’you think?’
‘Let’s say she is; why would she want to see you?’
‘I saved her life, remember? I don’t like to throw the word “hero” around, but, you know, I have heard others use it. About me.’
‘The people you see in the mirror don’t count, Joe.’
Early morning banter seen to, I headed up to Mary Tyler’s new room. After the aborted attack, and the broken window, she’d been relocated to a new private room at the other end of the hospital, with two uniformed officers sat outside, bored out of their minds. I thought I might need to talk my way past them, but it turned out they knew who I was. Most officers around here knew about me. The mystery man. The bloke in the clapped-out car with all the questions. They waved me through.
As the door swung closed, Mary sat up, startled.
‘Who are you?’
‘It’s okay, I work here. I’m sort of a caretaker.’
‘Oh. Okay, sorry.’
‘Not to worry, I’d be a little jumpy if I was in your shoes. What happened to you was…’
‘Not good.’
‘Very not good.’ I grabbed a chair and sat beside her.
‘What is it you want?’ she asked, still a little unsure of me.
‘My name’s Joseph Lake.’
Her eyes widened. ‘Oh, it’s you. You’re the one who found me.’
‘Yes. I’m sorry I was too late to do anything about Janet.’
Mary bit her lip and nodded, her eyes turning to shimmering pools.
‘Oh, God. I just don’t understand it. It’s so crazy. So horrible. How can Janet be dead? She’s the most alive person I ever met. I know that sounds stupid.’
‘No. No, it doesn’t.’
A smile twitched at the corners of her mouth for a moment, before the grief pulled them back down again and a tear slipped down her cheek.
‘Mary, I’m sorry to ask, but… what do you remember about that night?’
Her hands gripped the covers, knuckle-white, and she chewed at her bottom lip.
‘Was there anything… anything at all that seemed, off?’
She looked at me again, a realisation dawning.
‘You know, don’t you?’
‘The person who attacked you. Who attacked Janet. It wasn’t really what you’d think of as a person, was it?’
Rivers ran down each cheek now. She shook her head. ‘You saw it?’ she whispered, her breath ragged.
‘I saw it. More than once.’
‘Monsters don’t exist, Joseph. Monsters don’t exist. I’m not some stupid little girl afraid of things under the bed, but that monster that attacked me, that…. that did that to my friend... that monster exists.’
‘What did you tell the police?’
‘Something that wouldn’t make me sound insane. I just, I’m so sorry, Janet. So sorry. But I couldn’t say the truth of it. I thought…. thought maybe it wasn’t even true. But you’ve seen it too.’
There was no point pretending I was mad anymore. No point in trying to brush this aside, or tell myself I was, I don’t know, hallucinating this conversation or something. It was real. It was all real. I only had to look in Mary Tyler’s eyes to know that.
Monsters were real.
I placed my hand over hers. ‘Don’t worry. You’re okay now. You’re safe.’
We spoke a little more and I tried to distract her from thinking about how scared she was. I think maybe it even worked a little. I left, promising to pay her another visit, loaded with chocolate and a book or two to keep her busy. If almost-deadly encounters with monsters weren’t enough to drive her insane, being trapped in a hospital bed and suffering a non-stop diet of daytime TV definitely would.
I’d worked in the hospital long enough to know the computer logins that I shouldn’t, and so after leaving Mary Tyler behind, I found the nearest unmanned computer, slipped behind the desk, and gave myself access to the hospital’s medical records.
I had a sudden, sure feeling that the attack on Mary and Janet couldn’t have been the first of its sort. Searching for anything that looked similar, I soon found at least two cases in the past couple of months that might fit the bill. A man first, Geoff Smith, forty-two, dead three months ago. And there, Angela Carter, nineteen, died seven weeks back. Both had suffered severe throat lacerations.
I wondered if that would be all, or if there were more. More that hadn’t been found. Dead bodies taken someplace else. Some “monster’s lair,” or even just dead out of view of any common foot traffic. Dead bodies surrounded by strange, occult symbols, painted in their own blood, waiting to be stumbled upon by a holidaying rambler in the hills. Here to take in the best sights the country had to offer, only to find the worst kind of sight anyone could see.
A hand gripped my shoulder and span me round.
‘What on earth do you think you’re up to?’
Doctor Neil, the Lord of Wank-ville, stood there fuming, his usually pallid skin a trembling puce.
‘I was only browsing for porn, I swear it, Doctor Neil,’ I replied, quickly closing the session so he wasn’t able to see what I’d been up to.
‘You’re not authorised to access these systems, you’re only authorised to push a mop across a shit-smeared floor.’
‘I’m sorry, I’ve seen you using the hospital’s computers and just assumed that meant any old arsehole could have a go.’
Doctor Neil’s face moved rapidly between many different expressions as he took in what I’d just said. Doctor Neil and I had always had this sort of antagonistic relationship, though I couldn’t say for sure why. Sometimes another person just rubs you up the wrong way. At times I did think it might have something to do with the closeness of mine and Chloe’s relationship. Perhaps he was jealous. That would make sense. I’d seen the way he looked at her.
A flurry of noisy activity caught our attention as a trolley holding a body burst through the double doors at the far end of the corridor. Doctor Neil switched instantly into work mode and left me behind.
Chloe and Jim, one of the nurses, were working frantically on a body as they moved. Blood poured from a wound on the patient’s neck. As they passed me by I got a closer look at the person on the trolley and recognised him at once.
It was Detective Sam Samm.
18
I found Chloe in the car park half an hour later.
I sidled up and leant against the wall next to her, and she passed the half-done cigarette she’d been smoking. I took it, inhaled, and handed it back.
‘You did everything you could,’ I offered, quietly.
Chloe rested her head against my shoulder and continued to smoke in silence. The number of times I’d comforted her when she’d failed to hold back death numbered in the hundreds at this point in our years together. It never seemed to get any easier for her. I’d heard most doctors manage to somehow step away from it, from the reality of all that death, for the sake of their own well-being. I don’t think Chloe had ever learned that trick.
Detective Sam Samm was dead. That nice, odd man had been murdered and every part of me was screaming that it was connected to what had happened to Mary and Janet, what had happened to me. The octopus creature. It had gotten to Detective Samm somehow. Either the creature had somehow renewed itself, or there were more of the things out there. Neither option was appealing.
‘You know,’ said Chloe softly, breaking my chain of thought, ‘I don’t remember everyone who I’ve failed to save. It happens, you know? That’s part of the job, death. Happens all the time. All the time. Sometimes more than once a day. One goes after the next and you’re just there, frantically trying to hold onto their hand as they slip under the water. There goes anot
her one. And another. And another. And I’m just desperately trying to keep hold of them as they’re dragged away. There have been so, so many. But I still remember the first person I lost on the job.’
She paused, stomping out the butt of her smoke before pulling a fresh one out of the packet, lighting it, and carrying on, her eyes focussed on something I couldn’t see.
‘It was my second day at work. I’d been allowed one death-free day, then a few hours into day two, in she came. Seven years old. Alice Madders. She’d hit her head playing at the park and her parents had brought her in. Over-cautious is what I thought. She seemed fine. Kids fall, they hit their heads, they shake it off. I did a cursory examination, gave Alice some sweets from the vending machine, assured the parents that everything was fine. Their daughter was just going to have a little bruise on her temple. I even felt vaguely annoyed. Annoyed that they were wasting resources and time that could be better used elsewhere, all because they were nervous parents, wrapping their child in cotton wool. Five minutes after telling the parents everything was fine, Alice Madders began fitting. Her body bent back like she was trying to snap her own spine. Her eyes rolled into her head, her mouth started foaming. I didn’t know what to do. The whole world slowed to a crawl. Just a blur. I found out later that the knock on the head had caused a bleed on the brain. There was nothing I could have done about it. The moment she’d hit her head, she was dead. Alice Madders. Red hair in pony tails and her front two teeth missing, a gap for adult teeth that never got to grow.’
We sat and smoked in silence after that, her head on my shoulder, our hands clasped together.
I had no intention of visiting the morgue, but my feet took me there anyway.
I pushed quietly through the double doors and the lights flickered on, triggered by my presence. The room was empty and the chill of the place prickled at my skin. Against one wall were twelve metal doors, hiding gaps long enough to slide a body in. Detective Samm hadn’t been placed in one of the drawers yet, his body lay on the mortuary slab in the middle of the room. I approached his body slowly, placing each foot gently in front of the other. A childish fear bubbled up that if I were to make too much noise, I’d disturb the corpse. It would sit up sharply, its eyes black, dead hands reaching for me, clawing at my throat.
I looked down at the poor man. Like Janet Coyle, his neck had been severely damaged. Having seen the creature up close, I had to assume it was the large beak that had done the damage. But why? Why were they murdering people? They didn’t seem to be eating them. They weren’t draining them of blood like a vampire. They were just killing them and leaving their bodies surrounded by strange, cultish symbols. For what purpose? What was the point in it all? Just for the thrill of killing? Some gut instinct told me it had to be more than that. There had to be some reason behind it all.
At first I didn’t even realise that my hands were moving to touch the deceased Detective Samm. It wasn’t until the tips of my fingers connected with the chill skin of his temples that what I was doing became clear.
I wanted to see.
It was like a locked door in my mind had opened a crack and muscle memory was taking over. I didn’t quite understand what was happening, but my body did, as sure as I could tie my shoelaces without thinking about it (most of the time).
I held my breath, and—
I feel fear.
Fear so strong I can taste it. Smell it. Hear it, beating in my ears. A tribal drum beat telling me death is near, death is near, death is near.
I am Detective Sam Samm and I am afraid. I am Detective Sam Samm and I am Joseph Lake. I am both. I can’t hear Detective Samm’s thoughts, but I feel what he feels, the emotions at war within him. I see what he sees.
I am in a house. This is my house. Detective Samm’s house. It judders past like a film with frames removed. I can hear my breath, the air sucked rapidly into my lungs and expelled.
I am scared.
Terrified.
I am prey and I am being hunted.
I know this without seeing who’s doing the hunting, without hearing Detective Samm’s thoughts. The way my heart is beating, my eyes pinned, unblinking, the pure fear powering my limbs; these things tell me everything.
I am prey.
I am being hunted.
They will catch me and I will die.
I’m upstairs, in a bedroom, looking desperately to escape. The way downstairs is cut off. Only one option; the window. As it stutters towards me, my fingers reach for the handle, but then, as though the window had suddenly, impossibly, been pulled away from me, it retreats. I realise then that I am the one who has been pulled away. Something cold and strong is wrapped around my ankle and is pulling me from my exit point.
I twist, a scream on my tongue, to see the black shape of a monster, its beak clicking and screeching, its octopus limbs twitching, ready, eager, desperate. I’m going to die, I’m going to die, I’m going to—
I staggered back, pulling my hands away from Detective Samm’s forehead, gasping for air. Falling to my knees, I clutched at my heart, convinced I was about to die. Which was not the most pleasant of feelings.
‘Hail, Magic Eater!’
I fell back with a yelp at the sudden intrusion. I looked up to see the fox, its axe held high and proud, stood upon Detective Samm’s chest.
‘Saviour of the Dark Lakes! Eater of worlds!’
‘Shut up,’ I replied.
The fox blinked twice, then lowered its axe. ‘Bit rude.’
‘How are you back? I thought that woman with the red hair tore your head off.’
‘Well, aye, she did.’
‘Then…?’ I gestured at his head, which was very much attached to his body.
‘She’ll let my death stick at some point, so she will. It’s just I have yet to fully make amends for my past errors, that’s all.’
I stood, shaking slightly from what I’d just experienced. From what Detective Samm had experienced.
‘What’s happening to me?’
‘How d’you mean?’
‘When I touched that dead body—Detective Samm, the man you are standing on—I felt things. Saw things.’
‘Course you did. The doors are starting to open, y’see? Open they go and the real you’s peering out.’
I was past the point of questioning this creature’s existence by now. What had happened just then, that was no delusion. I’d touched Detective Samm’s corpse and been given a glimpse of his final moments. That was real. I knew it was. I remembered the flash in the alley before I’d stumbled across Janet Coyle’s dead body. The moment of insight into the creature as it had brushed past me, our bodies briefly touching, before I’d discovered Mary Tyler.
Wait a gosh darned moment—
The fox waved, I could see his face smiling back.
‘I saw you!’ I cried. ‘When this all started, just before I found Mary Tyler. I had a… feeling. An episode. Like I could sense what the monster was feeling, and then I saw you. Just for a moment. I saw your face.’
‘Finally, a flare shot into the dark,’ replied the fox. ‘I’ve been trying to find my way to you for so very long. I was starting to think I never would. But I’m patient, me. I wait. And I wait. And I keep these eyes peeled and my axe sharp, so when the moment comes, I can use it to chop my way through to you. Ten years, it took. Ten years before you finally used your powers again. And there I was, eyes as sharp as knives, waiting on behalf of the Red Woman. And now here I am again.’
Ten years? Ten years since I woke next to Derwentwater with no memory.
‘You know who I am.’
‘Of course I do. All of the Dark Lakes knows you. All hail our saviour! All hail the Magic Eater!’
I lunged at the fox, grabbing him by the scruff of his neck and shaking him. ‘Tell me who I am!’
‘What are you doing in here?’ asked a voice.
I turned in surprise to find Detective Maya Myers. I turned back, but the fox was gone. Only Detective Samm’s corpse rem
ained.
‘I said, what are you doing in here?’ Myers demanded.
‘Nothing. I’m just, working. Cleaning.’
She grimaced and walked towards me. For a moment I thought she might be the second woman in as many days to punch me in the face, but at the last moment she stepped past me to look down at her dead partner.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘For your loss.’
She snorted once.
We stood in silence for several heavy seconds.
‘Do you think…’ Detective Myers started, then hesitated, then carried on, ‘do you think death can follow you?’
I went to answer, then found myself unable to think of anything.
‘Doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘Now get the hell out of here.’
Perhaps I should have told her. Told her about what it was that had killed her partner. But what would be the point? Why would she believe me? She’d just lost her second partner in the force – for me to suggest the culprit of poor Detective Samm’s demise was a creature with octopus arms would be insensitive at best.
‘Really, Maya. He was a good one.’
I wanted to say more, to console her in some way, but I felt there was only one thing she wanted from me at that moment.
I walked for the exit and left her alone with her dead partner.
19
I had planned to find Chloe, to suggest we go out and eat something fatty and drink liquids designed to render your brain a trainwreck the next morning, but before I could find her, my phone rang.
‘Where’s my Boris!’ screamed Mrs Coates.
‘Ah, yes, fear not, I am on the case. Boris is my number one priority.’
‘You found him once, find him again. Today! Or you’re off the case. I want my puss puss back!’
I opened my mouth to reply, but she’d already hung up.
I carried on looking for Chloe, but Big Marge informed me that she was in one of the nurse’s rooms having a nap, so I decided to leave her to it and find Mrs Coates’ damned cat once and for all. Yes, the world was tilting on its axis, but I was a man of my word. I’d been hired to do a job, and I couldn’t afford another bad review. My service was already down to two stars on Yelp.
Uncanny Kingdom: An Eleven Book Urban Fantasy Collection (Uncanny Kingdom Omnibus 1) Page 87
