by Martin Dukes
“I assure you I am not. We could plant a tracing device on you,” said Armand patiently. “You would only need to stay long enough for us to identify the source of the signal. The likelihood is that the sanctum itself would be empty by now. I imagine the Brothers were thrown into confusion by your disappearance. They are powerful individuals, archangels – far more powerful than us. They will be looking for you in Elysium. They may even have the resources to track you down here. It is impossible to be sure, but I’m afraid you mustn’t feel that you’ve reached a place of safety here. On the other hand, they won’t be expecting you to go back there.”
“I need to help my friends,” said Alex, his mouth set in a stubborn line. “In Zanzibar.”
“You need to help yourself first,” said Malcolm. “Like Armand says, they may be coming after you again. Anyway, who’s to say you can phase your way back to Zanzibar. It may only work in Elysium.”
“Well, I’ll just have to give it a try,” said Alex, leaning back and folding his arms. He felt a curious sensation of power. “I’m fed up of being yanked about by people – you included. I didn’t ask for all this.”
The three angels exchanged wary glances.
“Okay,” said Armand cautiously. “What do you want, exactly?”
Alex explained about the madness of the Sultan, the eclipse and the coming of the worm storm.
“I want all of us out of there,” he said. “Me, Kelly, Henry, Will and Tanya – you need to get us home. And there’re some other local guys you need to get to a place of safety, too.”
“The last request you make would be straightforward enough to accomplish,” said Armand stroking his chin. “But it could be hard to place you and your friends back where you came from. You’ve been out of your reality a long time.”
“Things have moved on,” said Malcolm regretfully. “I mean, several months have gone by in your biological time, haven’t they?”
“Time’s relative, isn’t it?” said Alex belligerently. “I’m sure you can fix it if you want to. Anyway, you got me into this, so it’s down to you to get it sorted.”
“That’s going to take some pretty high-level intervention,” said Dave.
“Exactly,” said Armand. “And in order to get their attention we need something to show them. They’re watching but we need evidence. Do we understand each other, Alex? We need to locate that temple and then we can make a move.”
Alex bit his lip and glanced around him at the expectant angel faces. “Okay,” he sighed resignedly. “I’ll go back.”
But first there were preparations to be made. Alex made it quite clear that he wasn’t going anywhere dressed as he presently was, so Malcolm provided him with jeans and a T-shirt that seemed likely to fit him more or less correctly. The T-shirt was a black one with a winged skull on the front.
“If you think I’m wearing that…” said Alex irritably, turning to Malcolm with eyebrow raised.
“Oops! What am I thinking of?!” said Malcolm apologetically, going off to find another, this time one embellished with a picture of a winged wellington boot.
“You are joking,” said Alex regarding it bleakly, and then, “alright, it’ll do, I guess,” when Malcolm’s face showed clear signs of impatience.
Armand disappeared to alert a number of angels whose cooperation was thought necessary if the Brothers were to be brought to justice. Dave also vanished and came back a short time later with an armful of the grey devices that Alex was used to thinking of as angel tech. The largest of those, an object about the size of a computer keyboard, was set up on Malcolm’s kitchen table. Various others, shaped in smooth curves like a collection of curious stones found on a beach, were placed around the kitchen.
“Sensor terminals,” said Dave when Alex picked one up. “This is the, uh, master console,” he said, indicating the large flat stone. “I guess that’s what you’d call it.”
“You’re going to need to carry a wire,” said Malcolm with a grin. “So we can keep an eye on what’s going on.” He held up a tiny grey object, no larger than a grain of rice.
“What are you going to do with that?” asked Alex as Malcolm approached him.
“I’m just going to pop it behind your ear,” said Malcolm. “Don’t worry, you won’t feel a thing.
Feeling somewhat anxious, Alex turned his head. There was the light pressure of Malcolm’s fingers and then a sensation akin to a pinprick soon replaced by a dull ache that gradually disappeared.
“Where is it?” asked Alex groping behind his ear. “I can’t feel anything.”
“It’s under your skin,” said Malcolm, stepping back and regarding him with satisfaction. “Completely invisible.”
Alex felt somewhat uneasy about this, but Malcolm and Dave set about various tests whilst he sat on Malcolm’s sofa in the next room and considered what was being asked of him. The thought of re-materialising in the midst of the Brothers was one that appalled him. When he had first T-phased he had done so by visualising the person he wished to go to. The last thing he wanted to do was to be reunited with Ezekiel. He supposed that he would have to visualise the sanctum and its odious circle of skulls instead. He stared glumly at Malcolm’s bookshelf and fireplace, wishing fervently that his life had been simple, uncomplicated and dull. A sensation of home-sickness came over him, a sensation so strong he buried his face in his hands, screwed up his eyes and fought to hold back the tears. He thought of his friends. What would Kelly be doing now? He pictured her sitting in the corner of the warehouse room, pale face tilted up, winding a strand of hair glumly around her finger. He thought of Henry, surreptitiously inspecting his wound and saying nothing even though the pain of it was lancing through his side. He thought of Will, idly kicking at the base of the wall, of Tanya nestling into Kelly’s side. They were all there because of him, he conceded morosely. It was his fault. And it was Ezekiel’s fault that Malcolm had felt obliged to snatch them out of reality and dump them in Zanzibar. Alex clenched his fists into tight balls as a cold thrill of resentment washed over him. What right had Ezekiel and his friends to chase him down because of their stupid skull collection? It was all wrong. It was, and Alex was going to do something about it. So he concluded, running both hands pensively down his face.
He stood up and crossed to where an untidy arrangement of sports equipment was leaning against the bookcase. He drew out a seven iron and a putter from a bag of golf clubs, regarding them thoughtfully.
“Which one is stronger?” he called over his shoulder.
“Oh, that one definitely,” said Malcolm, coming into the room and indicating the putter. “I’ve been doing a lot of work on my short game.”
“That’s not quite what I meant,” said Alex, turning to him with an expression of steely determination on his face. He noticed a baseball bat in the corner, tucked behind the golf clubs.
“This will do nicely,” he said, hefting it meaningfully in his hand.
“Ha!” said Malcolm wagging a finger. “You wouldn’t be thinking of attacking an archangel with a baseball bat, would you by any chance? Because that would be crazy, wouldn’t it?”
“I don’t care,” said Alex firmly. “If I’m going, it’s going with me.”
Malcolm shrugged. “Okay. Your funeral, although you want to focus on getting in there and keeping a low profile until we get a trace. There isn’t any weapon we can give you that’d be the least bit of good against an archangel. Get right in there. Find a broom cupboard or something and hide in it. Stay out trouble until we get a fix on you; that’s my advice.”
“And how am I supposed to know when you’ve got a trace?” asked Alex twirling the bat.
“You’ll know,” said Dave’s voice, in his head.
“That little jigger we popped in you takes care of two-way comms,” he continued. “I’ll be able to hear you and you’ll be able to hear me. It can’t read thoughts, though, so you’ll have to speak out loud.”
“Okay, cool,” said Alex with a nod.
&
nbsp; He practised phasing some more, teleporting himself from room to room in Malcolm’s house and then out into the garden. It became easier, the mental pathways more routine. After half an hour or so, he could do it almost without thinking. He simply visualised his destination, closed his eyes and configured his thought patterns in what he now knew to be the correct manner. After a while he found that he could do it even without closing his eyes, without any of the muscular tension that had at first been necessary.
“Sweet,” said Dave. “How do you even do that?”
“I don’t know,” said Alex simply. “I just can.”
“It looks effortless,” said Malcolm.
“It’s not,” said Alex, sitting down heavily on Malcolm’s rather lumpy sofa. “I think I’ve done enough for now. I’m going to need a bit of a rest.”
It was true. There was no physical fatigue associated with the process of phasing, but he felt increasingly drained mentally, a curious sensation of being stretched, as though his spirit, his life force was being somehow depleted. There was numbness in the back of his brain, and the dark space where what he had begun to think of as the portal lay became increasingly hard to reach.
Alex slumped on Malcolm’s sofa and looked at nothing in particular whilst his mental resources gradually replenished themselves. Malcolm, whose culinary resources were stretched thin by the necessity of entertaining guests, set about preparing baked beans on toast.
“He’s a purist,” said Dave. “Has to do everything the traditional way. Me, well, there’s no point in being an angel if you can’t do this.”
A box of pizza appeared on the table next to him.
“See what I mean?” he declared as he opened the lid and looked inside. “Damn, I ordered pepperoni,” he said.
“You’re crazy,” said Malcolm, putting a Pyrex bowl of beans into his microwave. “You’ll get fed up with all that eventually.”
“Ah, but will I now?” said Dave staring at the pizza. He blinked his eyes. “Ah, pepperoni! There you go! You want a bit, Alex?”
Alex shook his head. Armand reappeared, once more with a little gust of lavender. He frowned.
“There, I’ve done what I can. At least they’re looking. Now we need to show them something.” He looked at Alex. “Are you ready?”
“After lunch’ll do,” said Malcolm pressing the button. “Give the lad a chance to recover. He’s been zapping himself around all over the place.”
It was an hour later, according to Malcolm’s kitchen clock, that Alex professed himself ready to go. First he helped Malcolm wash up. Oddly, the experience of drying the dishes, the soft clink of cutlery and the warm tea towel between his fingers, was an agreeably soothing one. On a superficial level he felt perfectly calm now, but on a deeper level a strange anger burned within him, and shot through the hot darkness of this was a sinuous vein of fear.
“How are we going to do this?” asked Dave as the last of the pots was put away.
“I’ll just stand here,” said Alex, moving across the narrow hall and into the lounge, looking out at the view that Malcolm had made for himself. He picked up the bat, slapped it into his palm and heard Armand’s voice raised in momentary protest behind him.
“I already told him that,” said Malcolm cutting him off.
“You got me?” asked Dave’s voice in Alex’s head.
“Loud and clear,” said Alex.
“Okay. Good to go.”
Alex relaxed, closed his eyes, even though he didn’t need to close them, and a vision of the Dodekakephalon swam before his mind’s eye, focusing gradually until it was perfectly clear. He reached for it.
Chapter Nineteen
“Which way’s west,” asked Will as they came hurrying out of the warehouse compound.
“This way,” said Henry, looking up and down a deserted street. “Uphill, away from the harbour. Have we got everybody?”
“Amjad and Jemail are just getting Zoroaster on the donkey,” said Kelly coming up at his side. Tanya was holding her hand, looking scared.
The sound of braying and swearing from inside the courtyard suggested that neither Zoroaster nor the beast were content with the situation. The donkey was the only occupant of a stable next to the warehouse. Zoroaster insisted he was quite alright to walk. The donkey insisted likewise. Several precious minutes were wasted before the donkey was saddled and Zoroaster mounted grumpily on top of it.
“You’ve got to,” Will had told him. “There’re miles and miles to go and there may be times when we have to run.”
“Pah! I’m at least as well equipped to run as you are,” said Zoroaster nastily.
A hot breeze stirred the tops of the trees that stood on either side of the road. The occasional shot could still be heard down by the harbour, and a column of smoke, lit intermittently by fire from below, drifted seaward.
“Let’s go, then,” said Henry as Zoroaster came swaying past on his donkey, still muttering darkly to himself.
The party had hardly swung out onto the road when there were shouts from some way behind and a group of men came running up.
“Halt or we shoot,” they heard. “Halt in the name of the Sultan!”
“Ignore them,” commanded Rakesh. “If we can just reach the edge of that wood we shall be clear.”
Kelly hardly dared look back as they hurried away, the edge of the wood looming distantly against the night sky.
“We’re never going to make it,” gasped Tanya at her side.
“We will,” said Kelly, reaching for her hand.
Two shots rang out. Rakesh turned briefly and indicated a low farm building – a barn – that came close to the edge of the road where it turned sharply to the right.
“Behind here,” he urged, beckoning frantically as the others darted past him into the cover of a farm track. “We’ll rush them as they come past,” he hissed, cocking his rifle. He signalled for Jemail, Henry and Amjad to join him at the front as he peered cautiously around the barn’s rough stone corner. “You two keep running,” he urged Will and Kelly. “Make lots of noise.”
Zoroaster, dismounting awkwardly, put an arm around Tanya’s shoulder and pulled her behind a broken farm cart. With a glance at each other Will and Kelly set off again, gasping, panting, calling ostentatiously to each other.
Seven men came pounding along the road, two out in front, the remaining five a little behind. Rakesh and Jemail waited until they had passed the corner, until they were at a range at which even a musket would be deadly. The rifles, held in a steady hand, were deadlier still. There were two loud reports, bright flashes and the acrid smell of gunpowder. The first two of their pursuers dropped to the ground, one to roll and lie motionless, the other to thrash, writhing with pain, his screams rending the night. One dropped a musket, the other a spear. Amjad snatched this up even as their comrades advanced, cautiously now, shouting to each other, shadowy figures twenty metres or so distant, a sword’s edge and a spear point glinting in the moonlight.
“That evens up the odds a little,” grunted Rakesh grimly.
“They don’t know how many there are of us,” said Jemail, struggling in the darkness to reload his rifle.
“Here,” said Henry, groping in the dust and passing up a dropped cartridge. His heart was pounding in his chest, the sword hilt sweaty in his palm.
“They’re sending someone back,” observed Amjad, hefting the spear in his palm.
“Indeed, so we must take them,” said Rakesh. “We have no choice. Come on!”
So saying, roaring like a lunatic, he charged out at their pursuers, followed after a moment’s stunned hesitation by Jemail, Amjad and Henry. They covered the ground within an instant. Or so it seemed. Henry’s perceptions were fragmentary, chaotic shards of terrified existence – pale moonlit faces, grunts, a scream, the thud of Rakesh’s rifle butt connecting with someone’s head, his own sword blade hacking aside a clumsy swipe and sinking into flesh. There was another brilliant flash, a sharp crack as a pistol was fired, bo
dies tumbling and a momentary respite. A single figure was running desperately back along the road towards the harbour. Amjad lurched forward, drew back his arm and hurled the spear. The quivering missile found its mark between the man’s shoulder blades. He staggered, took two steps and then toppled forward. Slumping face-down, he jerked spasmodically and then lay still.
“Good effort!” said Henry. “Top chucking!”
“I’m hit,” gasped Jemail at Henry’s side.
“He’s taken a pistol ball!” announced Rakesh anxiously.
It remained too dark to see clearly, and yet it was obvious from the dark blood stain spreading across Jemail’s thigh that he was seriously wounded. He was already down on one knee, and Rakesh helped him gently to lie flat on his back.
“Is he alright?” asked Henry intently.
“I don’t know, I don’t know,” said Rakesh, an edge of panic in his voice. “Damn that cloud.”
The cloud that had momentarily dimmed the terrible beauty of the eclipse edged aside. Rakesh’s hands glistened wetly with blood as he tore at the fabric of Jemail’s trousers.
“Do you think you can walk?” he asked.
“I’ll try,” said Jemail weakly.
“Let’s get him into that barn,” said Rakesh glancing about and wiping his hands on his tunic.
Supported on either side by Amjad and Rakesh, half carried, half dragged, Jemail was brought into the barn and propped in a corner amongst straw and a pile of empty baskets. Working by the shafts of moonlight that came slanting in through the slatted gable, Rakesh tore strips of fabric from his own clothes and fashioned a crude tourniquet. Will and Kelly came breathlessly through the low door, having retraced their steps once the sounds of fighting had ceased.
“What’s happening?” squeaked Will. “There’re bodies everywhere.”
“Jemail!” gasped Kelly, pushing forward past Amjad and Zoroaster. “Oh my god! What have they done to you?”
Rakesh made space for her and she knelt in the straw beside him, taking his hand in hers.
