Through Glass Darkly: Episode Two

by Peter Knyte

  The first three Manstopper rounds I fired hit it squarely in the chest, knocking the thing back by a dozen yards, where it screamed and shook its impossibly twisted limbs upon the ground, before suddenly flipping itself over and scuttling almost beetle like out of the circle of fire away from us.

  My shots had injured it, and as with the other Ariel creature, as soon as it was hurt it lost its ability to remain invisible, this time moving partially back into the visible light spectrum while it screamed and thrashed, before once more blinking back into the far infra-red.

  It was long enough for several members of both groups to spot and send several more shots after it.

  Before I realised it I was through the remnants of the smoke and fire on both sides of the circle and after it again, but a part of me knew I shouldn’t leave the men, and instead of chasing it down, I forced myself to stop and go back to help the injured and terrified people that I just ignored.

  It was hunting these men, and it wouldn’t give up just because it had been wounded. If I followed the creature would have options. It could try to draw me out to where it could get close and attack me, or even just try to draw me away so that it could double-back for its prey before I realised.

  I deliberately turned my back on the creature, and walk calmly back to the men who needed my help, removing the empty bullets from my gun and refilling it as I went.

  ‘Sergeant,’ I called as I walked back to them. ‘We need to set up a perimeter of men with lensing scopes. Use everyman who has one to keep an eye out over a narrow angle of view, while we assess the state of the injured and get them ready to move.’

  He did it without question, and within half an hour he came back to me with an update.

  ‘We have eight dead so far sir,’ he said quietly. ‘Five patrolmen and three railroad staff, there are another four who won’t last much longer if they don’t get medical attention, another three that can walk and might be able to fire, leaving three of my men out of the original search teams still fit and able. On top of that there’s the eight men that came with us.

  ‘All the men here are low on ammunition, we’re scavenging bullets and guns from the fallen and sharing out the ammunition from those incapable of firing, but we’ll still only have a dozen rounds per man.’

  The numbers simply didn’t stack up. There were too many dead or fallen to carry out of the rail yard, and I wouldn’t consider leaving anyone behind, not even the dead knowing what this thing would do to them. But if we stayed the creature would just bide it’s time, get us to use up our ammunition and then pick us off.

  It was an impossible situation. We couldn’t leave and nobody could come to our rescue without becoming a target themselves. Even if we did get lucky or somehow manage to find a way to overpower this creature, there was nothing to stop it from just retreating until another opportunity presented itself before striking at us again.

  CHAPTER 19 – FEAR ITSELF

  I should’ve been afraid, but something inside me had changed or was changing.

  I felt something smouldering with an angry heat within me where my fear should’ve been. Even though I now walked through the railyard alone with the creature that had killed so many people still crawling around somewhere.

  I could’ve just stayed where I was once I’d found the radio, hoping the creature wouldn’t find me, or even have walked out to where the police radio cars were waiting a couple of miles away. A single figure almost as invisible as the creature itself amongst all the carriages and equipment of the yard.

  It was that wonderful time between late afternoon and early evening. The sunlight becoming a deep golden colour as the evening approached but still bright from the day, casting long lazy shadows across the railyard as I walked calmly back to where the search teams waited.

  When I arrived back at the area of open ground where I’d left the men, I saw they’d rebuilt the defensive barricade around themselves with some more oil barrels, crates and pallets that had been littering the place. I stopped for a moment between two of the railway carriages on the edge of the clearing to look around and see if the creature had returned. It wasn’t hard to spot, back on the carriage rooftops, staring fixedly at the circle of people in the centre, apparently unaware of my presence or even that I’d left the group.

  The thought struck me in that moment about how unfair this situation was to these people. Not only the men sitting inside their circular barricade, peering out through those altogether inadequate lensing scopes which I’d made for them, but also the wider population of the city that had taken us in and tended to our wounded. They simply weren’t prepared for what was happening to them, they hadn’t had the years of war against these creatures to make them ready, to acclimatise them to their new reality and gradually turn them from being ordinary people into soldiers.

  But this was the situation they were in now, and adapt I was sure they would.

  While I was lost in my own thoughts, the creature seemed to have changed it’s posture slightly. It was subtle, but it instantly made me think it must be up to something so I flipped my magnifying lenses down again to study it in more detail.

  How it could appear so similar to Ariel when it was still, but be so obviously inhuman when it moved repelled and fascinated me in equal measure. It had started to creep forward toward the front of the carriage roof it sat upon, clearly stalking the people in the centre of the clearing. The thought rekindled my rage, sending flames licking upward from the previously smouldering coals.

  Even as I watched it inched further and further forward, a little bit to one side, then the other over the roof of the carriage, testing the watchers who stood guard with their scopes before advancing again toward the opening it thought it had seen.

  I moved away from the carriages I’d been stood between, flipping the magnifying lenses back up as I did so, making no attempt to hide my approach, walking straight toward where the creature lurked on its rooftop rather than back to the defensive circle of men.

  It only took a moment for it to spot me, but it was a moment in which it knew I had seen it first, and that I was the hunter again and it was my prey.

  I could see it was disconcerted at my presence, at my not acting in the same way as the group it watched, at my ability to see it. As I drew closer it backed away to the far side of the carriage roof allowing only its eyes and the top of its head to be visible so it could watch me.

  I continued approaching until I was standing half way between it and the group of police and railyard workers that had been besieged by it, perhaps twenty meters from each.

  After watching it for another few seconds I turned my back on it again and walked slowly back to the barricade that the men had built, all of whom were looking much relieved to see me again. The creature could easily have closed the distance to me in the time it took me to walk over to the group, but to do so would expose it to the counter attack of the men behind the barricade. I knew this would cause it to hesitate until it had lost its opportunity.

  But I needed to keep the creature distracted, so I kept my back turned to it while I spoke to the gathered circle of men in front of me, not moving past their barricade and into the comparative safety of the circle, still a few yards away from the barricades, alone and seemingly vulnerable should it attack.

  ‘Mr Hall, I think you should come back inside our circle of spotters,’ one of the sergeants was telling me. ‘The creature is still out there somewhere.’

  I ignored him and stayed where I was.

  ‘Something is about to happen,’ I informed them simply. ‘And it is very important that you don’t react when it does. You’ll hear something and you’ll see something, but you have to remain looking at me. In fact better yet, you need to start making a noise, clapping, shouting, banging anything you can find so the creature doesn’t hear what’s coming, but save your ammunition.’

  I held up my hand to stop them before they started to ask what was going on.

  ‘If you want this
thing dead, don’t ask any questions, just do as I say.’

  Still looking uncertain they reluctantly did as I asked, shouting and banging the barrels that made up their barricade, as I turned back to face the creature.

  You had to pity the thing in a way. Just an hour or two ago it must’ve been sure of victory, could almost taste the blood of the helpless creatures it was slowly picking off, and now, not only had its plans been thwarted, it had also been hurt and chased and hunted in return, and on top of all that its prey was now making so much noise it could barely think.

  I saw the shadow first. Racing across the distant horizon toward us, and then the steady drone of those wonderful, powerful engines. It took all my self-restraint not to look up, but I allowed myself the narrowest of smiles at the idea of what was about to happen.

  Arc weapons it has to be conceded are some of the least accurate, but more dangerous weapons carried aboard the Kubla Khan. To the casual observer, or even to their target the discharge takes the form of a bolt of forked lightening, but unlike the lightening created in a thunder-storm which releases its electrical energy with a crack or bang, the discharge of Arc weapons seems to scream like some kind of malevolent eagle.

  Too late the creature understood what was happening, and looked skywards at the great bronze craft that was dropping out of the heavens like a stone toward us.

  That it recognised its own destruction was heading straight toward it was probably no great surprise, nor was its panicked attempt to get away.

  But even as it turned to flee the heavens screamed their vengeance down upon the solitary fleeing form, super-heating and super-energising everything in the path of the lightening. As soon as I heard the distinctive discharge I dived away from the creature at the same time shouting to the men to get down behind their barriers.

  While not accurate, the impact of any form of Arc discharge is distinctive. Semi-conductive materials like metals that are struck by the forks of Arc energy are simply heated to a couple of thousand degrees within the space of a second, while less conductive materials like, brick, wood, glass and if we were lucky the flesh of the creature, would be energised and heated to the point where some of the material would simply explode into its constituent atoms, propelling small fragments of almost equally hot, flaming or molten material away from the point of impact at high velocity.

  I don’t know who was firing the gun, but they weren’t happy with just one shot, firing time and again over a period of perhaps thirty seconds, doubtless chasing the creature as it tried to flee, before they finally let go of the trigger.

  I’d been aboard the ship many times when these weapons were unleashed, but I’d never been so close to the target when it was hit before, and after experiencing it I was quite thankful that I hadn’t.

  Dusting myself off after the firing stopped, I turned to check on the men and find out if anyone had been hit by the flying shrapnel from the impacts. But fortunately what few pieces of shrapnel had come our way had safely impacted on their barricade, starting a few small fires here and there but hurting nobody further.

  They’d been through an enormous amount during the course of the day, but I felt for them now as I saw the dumbfounded shock written all over their faces at what had just happened, and this from just one battery of guns aboard the ship, what would they have thought if they’d seen all twenty batteries open fire at once, and the damage that the assortment of different weapon types could inflict.

  From the numerous shots that the gunner had taken I was far from certain the creature was actually dead, but if it had survived it would surely have been caught countless times by the flying shrapnel and other super-heated material, so would at the very least be severely wounded, with its fear of people well and truly re-affirmed.

  In the meantime, as the cradles descended from the ship to take the dead, wounded and able-bodied aboard, I thought briefly about heading over to see if I could find the creatures remains, until a waft of intense heat on the breeze reminded me that it would take several hours if not days for the fires to go out and the super-heated pools of glass and metalwork to cool down to the point where it would be safe for anyone to walk amongst the wreckage that now filled this part of the railyard.

  CHAPTER 20 – POST MORTEM

  It was the work of minutes to get aboard the Khan using the cradles, which I was pleased to see all seemed to be working perfectly again, though as they were being operated for the most part by Bradbury and his men who’d only been using them for a few days now while doing their repair work, there was some uncertainty about how many people they could safely carry until I explained that each cradle was designed to carry things far heavier than people.

  As soon as the injured were safely installed in one of the medical bays, and under the care of Dr Zimmerman, who appeared to be aboard again, and the rest of the men had been made comfortable in one of the nearby crew lounges I reported to the bridge, where I expected to find the Captain would need some help in flying the ship.

  When I got there though, I was pleased to see he’d once again recruited Jenkins and Hughes as his bridge staff. The Captain was at the helm, while Jenkins had now taken over at the engines and Hughes at the power distribution station.

  ‘Welcome aboard again Mr Hall, and well met,’ called the Captain as soon as I entered the bridge. ‘If you wouldn’t mind taking the helm while I check on the rest of the ship, it would be much appreciated.’

  ‘Of course Captain,’ I responded taking the helm from him. ‘Our heading?’

  ‘West North West for the moment Mr Hall,’ he replied simply, with a genuine smile on his face. ‘We’re heading back to our dockyard in the park.’

  ‘This is Fraser to the bridge,’ came a familiar voice over the intercom, ‘Do you need me to stay out here Captain Hughes, or would you like me to return to the bridge?’

  ‘If you wouldn’t mind staying where you are for the moment Agent Fraser, just in case we need your assistance again?’ asked the Captain cordially. ‘Mr Hall has arrived to assist us on the bridge.’

  ‘Mind sir! I think I’ve got one of the best views across the city imaginable from here,’ came Fraser’s equally cordial reply. ‘Oh and Ashton, good idea!’

  This raised a smile from the Captain and a bit of chuckle from both Jenkins and Hughes.

  At this the Captain gave the order that sent us back up into the bluebird skies where I began the manoeuvre to turn the ship around and head back to the park. As I did this he absently started to check on the various engineering consoles around the bridge to confirm the good operation of the ship, hesitating momentarily as the deep golden sunlight spilled in through the windows to bathe the often austere glass and polished metalwork of the bridge in its gentle warmth.

  After enjoying the sight of the city below in the warm afternoon light, he slowly turned back to the ships instruments, occasionally issuing instructions to Jenkins, Hughes and myself about our course, speed or elevation, before eventually settling back into the Captain’s chair.

  Sailing through the afternoon sunlight reminded me of the shakedown cruise we’d completed over Portugal sailing up the Tagus River that divided the old city of Lisbon, before heading northwards to the Pyrenees for our high altitude tests.

  We’d seen many beautiful sights as we’d traversed America and the Atlantic, but the trip up the river still stood out in my memory. The azure sky framing the pale buildings of the historic city, while the sunlight flickered and danced on the waters of the wide river below. The buildings were unmistakeably taller in Manhattan, but the combination of sky, sun and sea was equally lovely.

  I was lost in the moment, when Jenkins unexpectedly asked the Captain if it would be alright to ask me a few questions about my rather busy day now that we were underway.

  ‘I have no objection at all Mr Jenkins,’ replied the Captain. ‘In fact I’d quite like to hear some of the details was well. If Mr Hall has no objection?’

  ‘None at all Captain,’ I was happy
to reply.

  Over the next ten minutes or so, as we sailed back to Central Park, Agent Jenkins asked first about what had happened with the first creature, and in particular to explain the rumour he’d heard that once we’d brought it down, it had appeared to be part human.

  I answered his questions, firstly explaining how Riley had been injured when the creature tried to get away, but how Shelby has saved the day by planting a couple of shots squarely into its back, knocking it over and in the process impaling it on a long shard of toughened glass. I then explained how as a consequence of Shelby’s work I had enough time to join him in putting several more shots into the creature as it got back up, which resulted in the thing first crashing through an interior window before falling to the warehouse floor two stories below.

  I had to confess my own confusion and uncertainty at discovering what appeared to be Ariel’s face hidden beneath the creatures carapace armour.

  ‘Surely you don’t think this monstrous thing could actually contain some trace of your former crewman?’ Jenkins asked almost incredulous.

  ‘I honestly don’t know,’ I had to concede. ‘But there are some things about its behaviour that have been odd from the start. It always seems to prefer to run rather than attack. Even when I was defencelessly hanging from the warehouse roof, it didn’t attack, it just stood and observed, which I’ve never seen one of these creatures do before.

  ‘Compare the oddly peaceful behaviour of that gruesome looking creature with the violent and aggressive behaviour of the second creature, which looks exactly like one of our crewmen . . . and suddenly anything seems possible.’