The Crawling Terror

by Mike Tucker

  As the corporal hurried away, Dickinson leaned back in his chair, pursing his lips thoughtfully. ‘What do you think, Captain? Resistance inside the village?’

  Wilson shrugged. ‘There are enough farmers with shotguns so it’s hardly surprising that someone would let fly at one of these things eventually.’ He paused. ‘If I’m honest, I’m surprised we haven’t heard more.’

  ‘Which suggests that there has been some kind of suppression of the locals.’

  ‘Possibly. Assuming that the rest them aren’t dead.’

  The colonel was quiet for a moment, then he got up and shut the door to the command centre.

  ‘Captain, what I am about to tell you is confidential. It concerns a Wunderwaffe.’

  ‘Sorry, sir.’ Wilson shook his head. ‘Languages were never a strong point.’

  ‘A Wonderweapon. A top-secret Nazi technological device known as Die Glocke.’

  Captain Wilson looked at him blankly. ‘Die Glocke?’

  ‘The Bell.’

  ‘The Bell?’ Charlie Bevan looked puzzled. ‘What the devil is that?’

  Robin Sanford got unsteadily to his feet, crossed the kitchen and pulled a battered and ancient-looking mug from a rack, dropping a teabag into it and setting it down next to an equally ancient-looking kettle.

  ‘During the Second World War, the British army intercepted a coded radio signal. At the time they were trying to break the German U-boat cyphers, and everyone assumed at first that it was just some new ultra-complex encryption. The problem was that the signal didn’t come from the North Atlantic, it originated in deep space.’

  ‘You’ve got to be joking!’ huffed Charlie dismissively. ‘German propaganda, surely?’

  ‘A lot of people thought the same at the time, but then they started to get reports from agents inside Europe indicating that the Germans had detected this signal too, and they were close to translating it.’

  Robin watched the kettle boil, lost in his memories for the moment. The Doctor sat and waited, quite happy to let him tell the story in his own time, but Charlie was impatient.

  ‘Well? What did it say?’

  ‘It took the best minds months to get even a rough translation. Turing, Welchman, Knox … They all had a crack at it. They even had Judson working on it for a while.’

  The Doctor stiffened at the mention of that name. ‘Judson?’

  ‘Yes, before he got whisked off to work on the ULTIMA project.’ The kettle turned itself off with a click and Robin poured the boiling water into his mug. ‘It was a set of instructions for building a machine, a huge metal bell, about twelve feet tall. Nobody had the slightest idea what it was for, but the Germans had already started construction, so we had no choice other than to start building one too.’

  ‘You must have been very young at the time,’ said the Doctor.

  Robin nodded, sipping at his tea. ‘I was 18. Denied active service because of a hereditary heart defect. Was made a private in the Home Guard here in Ringstone, though.’

  ‘I thought that the Home Guard only defended beaches and things,’ piped up Kevin.

  ‘Quite right, young man. But they also guarded important military installations.’

  ‘Like Ringstone,’ said the Doctor quietly.

  ‘Yes, Doctor. This is where the British Army constructed and tested their version of the Bell.’

  Colonel Dickinson sat back down at his computer. ‘Once I started asking questions about Ringstone it started all sorts of alarm bells ringing higher up the chain.’ He gave a wry laugh. ‘No, pun intended.’

  He brought up a series of files showing plans, blueprints and grainy, black-and-white photographs.

  ‘Die Glocke was the most secret of the Nazi weapons programmes, conducted in the dying months of the war. Code-named “Project Chronos”, it was under the command of an SS General named Hans Kammler. The Nazis were getting desperate by this point, and were convinced that this was some kind of super-weapon, or new kind of aircraft, or antigravity device.’

  He enlarged a series of aerial pictures of a factory complex set in a barren, mountainous area of northern Europe.

  ‘They built their device in what is now Poland, at the Wenceslas mine in the Sudeten Mountains. A local dam was used to generate hydro-electric power for the experiments and inmates from a nearby concentration camp were used as workforce for construction of the test site.’

  Wilson leaned forward and pointed at an indistinct circular shape on the aerial image. ‘What’s this? It looks for all the world like …’ He broke off, suddenly feeling foolish.

  ‘Yes?’ The colonel looked at him expectantly.

  ‘Well, it looks like Stonehenge.’

  ‘Quite right, Captain Wilson.’ Dickinson tapped a key and another picture flashed onto the screen, a modern-day image of a huge, circular, concrete structure, standing in the centre of an overgrown tarmac expanse. ‘The Germans called this “the Henge” or “the Fly Trap”. It was where Die Glocke was tested and is all that’s left of the Chronos project.’

  Captain Wilson sat back in his chair, his face a mask of confusion. ‘I’m not sure I understand, sir. Nazi super-weapons and stone circles?’

  Colonel Dickinson closed the laptop. ‘The Nazis had fundamentally misunderstood the nature of the machine. Hitler was delusional, convinced that it was some ultimate weapon bestowed upon them by aliens to help him win the war. A lot of people were killed because of that belief. Several scientists died on the first operation of Die Glocke. Even with refinements to the machine and protective clothing, five of the seven scientists who conducted later experiments died from their exposure to it.’ His expression hardened. ‘And that doesn’t even start to cover the number that were exposed to it deliberately, or the workers who were murdered by the SS at the end of the war to keep it secret.’

  ‘I’m assuming that the British experiments were more successful?’

  The colonel nodded. ‘Apparently, it wasn’t just a question of building the machine, it was a question of finding the right kind of energy to power it. In the end it was Aleister Crowley who solved the problem for the Allies.’

  ‘The occultist?’ Wilson struggled to keep the incredulity from his voice.

  ‘He was working in counter-intelligence at the time, and suggested that our experiments were having more success that the German’s because they were conducted in proximity to ley lines.’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ Wilson rubbed at his jaw. ‘I’m having a hard time believing all this.’

  ‘Quite agree, Captain. Took me quite a while to get to grips with it myself. The point is Crowley was right. The experimental results did significantly improve when the machine was placed along ley lines. The Germans must have come to that conclusion themselves towards the end, but because of the location they had chosen for their test site they had no means of testing that hypothesis. There is some evidence of a possible incursion made by an SS commando squad to a Neolithic circle in Scotland with a much smaller Bell prototype sometime in 1944, but I’m not cleared to view those files.’

  ‘So, our machine was located at Stonehenge?’

  The colonel shook his head. ‘Too obvious. The Allies knew that the Nazis were keeping tabs on the experiments, so they needed to find somewhere a little more off the beaten track. Ringstone was chosen as the British test site. Code name “Project Big Ben”.’

  ‘Using the local stone circle? The King’s Guards?’

  ‘Exactly.’ The colonel leaned forward. ‘The machine wasn’t a weapon, Captain. It was a teleport device. And it worked.’

  Chapter

  Ten

  Clara watched the man carefully as he stepped into the circle, trying not to show how taken aback she was by the mask that he wore. Made of a semi-translucent white plastic material, it fitted tightly to his scalp, completely covering the left hand side of his face, and continuing down beneath the collar of his shirt. The skin visible at the edges of the mask was red and puckered and, just visible through t
he translucent material, she could make out dark, twisted patterns.

  The man’s left hand was clad in a black leather glove. It, like everything else about him, reeked of expense.

  ‘Nice suit,’ said Clara, trying to recover some composure.

  ‘Thank you.’ The mask half obscured the smile that the man gave her, but Clara could tell that it was without warmth.

  She held out her hand. ‘I’m Clara.’

  Clearfield ignored her proffered hand, keeping the pistol levelled. ‘I know who you are, Miss Oswald. I had a background check run on you as you as soon as you showed up on our security cameras.’

  Clara lowered her hand. ‘Of course you did.’

  ‘You’re a very enterprising young woman. Avoiding the insects in the village, breaking in here with such ease, sending my colleagues off on a wild goose chase.’

  ‘Colleagues?’ Angela gave a snort of derision. ‘Surely you mean slaves?’

  ‘Please.’ Clearfield winced theatrically. ‘Slaves is such a disagreeable word.’

  ‘So is Nazi,’ said Clara looking pointedly at the swastika emblazoned on the side of the bell-shaped machine. ‘Wartime souvenir or family heirloom?’

  ‘If you think that I have any sympathies for the Nazis or for what they stood for, then you are quite mistaken,’ said Clearfield, his voice hardening.

  ‘So the trappings of the Third Reich are just a fashion statement? A decorative decision?’ She wandered over to the machine, rubbing her chin with her hand. ‘I’m not so sure, red and black are so last year …’

  ‘Don’t try and pretend that you are stupid, Miss Oswald.’ Clearfield snapped. ‘I might not approve of the Nazis and their sickening regime but, like the Americans in the post-war years, I am more than happy to put my scruples to one side on order to take advantage of their scientific expertise.’

  ‘All right. So you’re a fan of German engineering.’

  ‘A very specific example of German engineering. Only two of these devices have ever been made. One was destroyed, a very long time ago. The other …’ Clearfield placed a gloved hand on the machine, caressing the surface gently. ‘The other has taken years of research, and a lot of money to track down.’

  ‘So this was built during the war.’ Angela watched as Clara walked around it slowly. ‘What does it do?’

  ‘It’s a gateway.’

  ‘A gateway?’

  ‘To another world.’

  Angela gave a nervous, laugh. ‘You have got to be joking …’

  Clara shot her a quick look. ‘Angela …’

  ‘Interesting …’ Clearfield regarded Clara carefully. ‘That concept doesn’t completely surprise you.’

  ‘We are wasting time, Clearfield!’

  The voice that boomed around the cavernous space was low and sibilant, a wet, burbling hiss that made Clara’s skin crawl.

  ‘Yes, of course.’ Clearfield was immediately contrite. ‘I’m sorry.’

  Clara stared at him in horror. ‘What was that?’

  Clearfield took a deep breath. ‘That, Miss Oswald, was the voice of the Wyrresters.’

  ‘Aliens?’ Charlie Bevan stared at Robin in disbelief. ‘Aliens from another planet?’

  ‘Coool!’ Kevin’s eyes were shining with excitement. ‘I wish you’d told this story when you came to talk to us at school.’

  ‘Quiet, both of you!’ The Doctor leaned across the table eagerly. ‘What happened when you turned the machine on? What came through?’

  ‘Something … horrible.’ Hands trembling at the memory, Robin took a sip of tea, spilling some of it down his shirt.

  ‘Describe it, man!’

  ‘Huge … Savage … We never stood a chance!’

  ‘I have to know!’

  Robin’s eyes suddenly widened as the Doctor leaned close. ‘Oh, my God … It’s you …’

  The mug slipped from Robin’s fingers, shattering on the flagstones. Clutching at his chest he lurched towards one of the kitchen cabinets, reaching for a bottle of tablets.

  Charlie scrambled from his chair and hurried to help him. ‘Leave him alone! You’re going to give him a heart attack!’ He shook several of the white tablets into Robin’s hand, and filled a glass of water from the tap.

  Robin took it gratefully, slumping back into his seat and gulping down the tablets, his eyes not leaving the Doctor.

  The Doctor had launched himself from his chair and was pacing around the kitchen. ‘I have to know the species! Planet of origin!’ He stopped, eyes narrowing as a thought struck him. ‘There’s no other choice,’ he muttered to himself. He spun to face Robin once more. ‘Can you remember the date? The exact date this happened?’

  Robin stared at him, disbelief on his pale face. ‘The twenty-first of March 1944. It’s difficult to forget the day all your friends died.’

  ‘The vernal equinox …’ The Doctor snatched a quick look at the calendar handing on the wall. ‘And it can’t be a coincidence that today is also the equinox. That’s what all this is heading towards …’ He turned to Charlie Bevan. ‘We need to get to my TARDIS, right now.’

  The policeman just looked at him, uncomprehending.

  ‘A blue box,’ explained the Doctor. ‘On the other side of the village …’

  Charlie wasn’t listening, instead he was staring past the Doctor’s shoulder, his eyes widening. ‘I don’t think that’s going to possible at the moment.’

  The Doctor whirled around to see a huge, grey bulk creeping slowly across the kitchen window. With a crash, the kitchen window splintered inwards and a huge leg probed the room.

  The shots and raised voices had drawn attention to them.

  The spider had found them.

  Captain Wilson sat in silence as the Land Rover sped through the narrow country lanes. He had had a lot to take in over the last fifteen minutes or so. Nazi super-weapons, secret wartime experiments. An alien invasion of Ringstone, for God’s sake! But it was the news that followed that had really scared him.

  It had puzzled him as to why they hadn’t just made a concerted effort to breach the perimeter. Giant beetle or not, he was certain that with the Spartan, and some of that experimental insecticide that he’d had delivered from the barracks at Warminster, they’d have little problem securing a defendable position within the village with relative ease.

  The colonel had made it quite clear why not.

  Dickinson had received direct orders from the MoD that if a Bell device was found to be operational in Ringstone, then he was to evacuate the surrounding area, pull his men back and call in an airstrike. A nuclear strike was out of the question, but permission had been given to deploy the latest generation of thermobaric tactical weapons.

  An Apache attack helicopter was already being fuelled at Andover and fitted with two of the new variant Hellfire AGM-114N missiles. A cold sweat prickled over Captain Wilson’s skin. He’d seen first-hand the effects that just one of these weapons could cause. The effects of detonating two of them over a village like Ringstone …

  He consoled himself with the fact that for anyone still trapped inside the perimeter it would at least be quick.

  The Land Rover pulled to a stop, and Wilson followed the colonel to a lay-by that gave an elevated view of the southern part of Ringstone. A squad of half a dozen men was deployed along the low wooden fence running along the edge of the roadway, their attention focused on something happening in the field below. Wilson was pleased to see that Private Arnopp was amongst them.

  The colonel noticed him too. ‘Glad to see you back on your feet, Private. How’s the leg?’

  Arnopp saluted stiffly. ‘Bearing up, sir. Dobby – I mean Corporal Palmer – patched me up fine.’

  The colonel nodded in approval.

  Wilson stepped forward and peered over the fence at the farmhouse that nestled in the fields below them. ‘What have we got here, Private?’

  ‘Shots heard about ten minutes ago, sir. Civilians spotted at the farmhouse down there. Then the bug show
ed up.’ He handed Wilson a pair of binoculars. ‘On the roof.’

  Steadying his elbows on the wooden fence, Wilson adjusted the focus. The huge spider was crouched on the roof at the far end of the farmhouse, long bristle-covered legs probing at the windows and doorways as it sought to gain entry. ‘And I thought Iraqi camel spiders were bad,’ he muttered.

  He straightened, handing the binoculars to the colonel. As he did so, another shotgun blast echoed across the fields. Immediately each of the soldiers raised their weapons in anticipation. There was a blood-curdling shriek of pain and anger from the spider and it jerked backwards, sending roof tiles tumbling into the cobbled yard. Then, enraged by the things inside the building that had hurt it, it started to batter at the building with its forelegs.

  ‘I think that we should give a bit of help to whoever is inside there, don’t you, Captain?’ said Colonel Dickinson.

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Glad to finally have a chance to engage the enemy properly, Wilson turned to Private Arnopp. ‘Private. Seems only fair that you should get a bit of payback. Spider on the roof down there. Fire at will.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’ Arnopp grinned at him. Stepping forward he brought his SA80 assault rifle up to his shoulder and squinted through the sights. Seconds later semi-automatic gunfire shattered the late morning air as Arnopp unleashed a hail of bullets at the spider.

  The Doctor, Charlie, Robin and Kevin dived for cover as the spider thrashed outside the window, sending shards of glass and timber flying.

  Charlie struggled to bring the shotgun to bear again, but before he could fire there was the distant chatter of rifle fire, and the farmhouse shuddered as the ancient walls took the impact of high velocity shells. The spider fell away from the window shrieking in pain.

  The Doctor sprang to his feet. ‘This is it! This is the only chance we’re going to get.’

  Between them, Charlie and the Doctor dragged Robin to his feet, hauling him out of the kitchen and towards the front door. ‘No, wait … My pills. I need my pills.’

  Kevin darted back into the kitchen and snatched up the old man’s bottle of pills from the wreckage strewn across the floor. As Robin leaned on the banisters for support, Kevin ran back and handed the bottle to him.