I could not help but wish I had acquired a Gatling for my collection, not that I could have carried it of course. Taking aim, I loosed off the first round, entirely missing, the nerves of this tense situation caused me to lose all train of rational thought and practice. Annoyed with myself for making such a beginner’s mistake in such a time of need, the lever clicked back and fore and I quickly took aim at the opponent I should have struck with my first shot. Squeezing the trigger, the round echoed around the field, striking the forehead of my target, blood spurting upwards, silhouetted against the lights still on in the house behind the now backlit mass.
The panic and stress of the situation got the better of me, as well as the lack of experience in facing such overwhelming numbers at close range. I began firing at a
rate of fire which compromised my accuracy, reminiscent of Holmes’ manner with firearms. With quick consecutive firing the third shot hit one in the chest, the fourth the shoulder. The fifth round hit the creature dead on the nose, destroying all that protruded from its face in a bloody mess, and yet, not stopping the assailant in its tracks. Cocking the rifle again, I took better aim, putting a round directing into the top of the skull, part of the scalp separating from the head and hanging brain matter visible,
he was done.
Taking aim with the seventh shot, I would not make the same mistake again, accurately aimed, I squeezed the trigger and a deafening sound rang out as the round ignited
in the breech as I momentarily blacked out. Just seconds later my vision began to return, I was lying on the deck of the basket, head resting against the sidewall. Looking
up I could just see through a blurred vision that Holmes was aiming his shotgun. A shot rang out, the flash being obvious, but I heard no sound, still deaf from the misfire. Holmes suddenly keeled forward as if being wrenched, the shotgun being pulled out of his hands, they were upon us, and we were still on the ground. Holmes threw back
his jacket and drew out the two Webley revolvers he was carrying, without time or thought to aim he opened up, firing repeatedly over the wall of the basket.
Arms reached over the basket towards Holmes, I could not see how much damage he was inflicting, but it was clearly not enough. His revolvers were out within seconds. A head of one of the creatures appeared over the rim of the basket, Holmes reversed the Webley Mk1 and mauled the foul thing continually until it sprawled over the edge, blood dripping into the basket. The ground below us felt light, we were beginning to lift.
“These things are keeping us down, we must get them off the basket!” Fogg yelled.
“Get down!” shouted Passepartout.
The immaculately kept blunderbuss was lifted above me facing the horde over the basket, the valet pulled the trigger and even with my still ringing ears I could hear the
thunder of it ring out. The whole basket was shrouded in powder smoke it had worked! The craft slowly took to the sky, but it was fast enough, a wondrous site that neither of us had ever experienced. We were free and clear for the first time all day.
My vision was clearing, but hearing still fuzzy. Holmes offered his hand to assist me to my feet, still shaky from the malfunction, we were now a hundred feet off the ground. I could feel my face burning where small shards of metal from the rifle had embedded in my cheek, an insignificant injury considering what we had survived. Turning to see the state of our friends, Fogg was grinning wildly at me, clearly quite pleased with himself.
As I looked at him, reaching out to shake his hand in gratitude, a hand from outside the basket reached from behind and grabbed at the gent and pulled him to the rim, trying to get better hold of him, its head drawing near, clearly we had an undesirable aboard. Before I coulddraw a handgun, Passepartout released the bayonet forwards on the fine blunderbuss and drove it forward into the eye socket of the beast. The triangular profiled and hollow ground long blade penetrated the eye socket and drove through the head and out the skull with no hesitation, soaring blood into the open air. The arms of the creature went limp and the body slumped, only being held to the basket by the bayonet through its brain. Passepartout stood looking at his victim for a moment, blood seeping over the barrel of the weapon which had driven all the way to the head. Admiring his handiwork, the sharp thinking valet took a pace forward for leverage and then drew the weapon back, the bayonet cleanly sliding back out from the eye socket. The beast slipped straight from the basket and dropped off to freefall back to the ground. Holmes patted the valet on the back, with almost no briefing he had risen to the task and saved all our lives. It was nice to know I had judged his character accurately, and equally comforting that I had loaded the weapon correctly, as it just saved all of our lives.
“We are heading for Switzerland, but our foe will suspect this as our mode of transport from the moment he sees it, being intelligent enough to know that coincidence is
worthy of investigation,” Holmes said to Fogg. Holmes’ plan was to put down in France and continue this adventure through more common modes of transport, as to not attract unnecessary attention. A balloon could and would easily be followed, and we must set down
eventually.
Mr. Fogg was busy shovelling further coal and getting the propeller going, putting us on course for the north of France. It would not be a quick journey, but at least a safe
and relaxed one, or as safe as dangling from the heavens could be This relative and short lived safety was of little comfort when we sat down to take stock of the weapons
and ammunition we had left. Holmes’ shotgun was gone, the Marlin was at least inoperable without major repair, if ever it could be saved, and the rounds for the pistols
were thin on the ground, they would likely not last another fight.
As we were whisked across the channel, Mr Fogg wanted all the facts, something that Holmes gladly gave up. The information we possessed was vital to the survival of our
great nation and perhaps the world, we needed reputable men to pass that information on. Finally having time to rest and consider the events of the day, we took stock of all information gathered and came to some potential theories.
What we knew so far was that Moriarty, upon fear of arrest and complete destruction of him and all his associates, had let loose an evil upon England. These creatures resembled humans in bodily shape, but moved in part like inebriated thugs and part like cattle. They felt no fear or morale and appeared to not notice pain or injury. At first it appeared that they could not be hurt in the same way a man could, and yet, their lack of emotion and fear of death only made it appear that they were more resilient to injury.
The real unanswered questions about these horrible foes, is what is their goal and purpose, what creates them and how, if any, are they controlled? Was this a virus which led to an uncontrolled wild animal, or were they being commanded by a greater force? The last question of which was a real concern, was that it appeared that all of these beasts used to be human. Therefore, could they infect others to make more like them?
Clearly there was plenty more to learn in this situation, hard questions which would inevitably provide even more difficult to accept answers. Holmes knew that whatever
Moriarty’s scheme was, a large part of it revolved around a location in Switzerland, and that the threat to that location was enough to provoke a war. We did not know the
location nor reason for the importance of Switzerland, but Holmes was adamant that continuing to travel towards the country would be enough a bluff to goad Moriarty in
to giving up more information than he realised. Having left instructions with the police earlier that day, we could only hope that the authorities would arrest Moriarty before he could board a vessel. Unfortunately, we would not know the result of this mission until we could reach land and a wire operator.
It only struck us as we were now in flight that in the rush to leave Mr. Fogg’s residence we had left my roll bag behind which contained our swords, a foolish mistake, but
a minor one in the
scheme of things. With any luck my good friend in Brussels was just the right man to replace them with weapons of at least equal quality. In fact, I would gladly replace my sword for something with a better cutting edge at a time like this. My sword had always been average at best for the tasks it was required, though it was
the issued pattern and therefore what I carried. It really saddened me to have lost such a sentimental item, though survival was far more important, and should we survive
this adventure, I knew well where to return to find it.
CHAPTER FOUR
Despite the drama and suspense of the day we had made our way over French soil. It was truly miraculous that we had escaped the war zone that was now England, and equally astonishing that after hundreds of years of peaceful land, war should be upon us without just cause or reason.
“Put us down at the first opportunity sir, we must make our way on land from this stage,” Holmes said.
Holmes knew that Moriarty would expect him to follow his foe to the ends of the earth in order to end his life of crime, hence the open war along the English coast, a mere precaution against Holmes crossing the Channel. Mr. Fogg got to work in lowering our altitude, we were safely over the Channel but with no means to communicate with England, or with any realistic chance of having any in the near future.
Over the last twenty minutes Holmes had contemplated how Moriarty had borne such a force down upon us in such a short space of time. He did not believe that it could have been hidden secretly away for this occasion, but more created in a time of need. The theory certainly seemed to fit the problem, and speaking purely as a doctor, this appeared to have spread like disease, and yet, that would not give our enemy any control over these beasts. If this was the case, then we now potentially faced a risk to humanity beyond any man had seen in our existence, for these beasts could truly lead to the destruction of the human race. I could only hope that the police and militias were quick in both understanding and controlling the situation.
The actions of this day would rather suggest that the foul beasts were attacking indiscriminately, which they likely were, but what of the previous night’s events. Those creatures knew who to attack and when, not alerting the authorities to any problemby the larger public disturbance that they now presented. The question remained, were those creatures the night before shepherded in our direction, or were they working from a kind of directive or control?
Clearly we needed a lot more information, but we had one strong element in our arsenal, we had Moriarty in the dark. For all his intelligence, he clearly was very concerned about what Holmes could either know or do. For all of Moriarty’s strengths, he was evidently worried enough to leave England in order to protect whatever assets he may have abroad, which were evidently vital to his operations.
I was glad Holmes had some skeleton idea of a plan, for the one thing that bounced around my brain was the sheer lack of firepower we now held. What occurred to me at this stage was my old friend in Brussels, he was an avid firearms collector and we would be passing within a short distance of his home on our route to Switzerland. Should we find him at home, he would provide a worthy ally.
We were descending at a slow but steady pace now, the open fields being a welcome sight after the horde infested streets and plains of the England we had left. A metal bracket next to me pinged as if under pressure, not a pleasant experience when we were dangling from the sky at heights which would inevitably lead to our deaths should we drop. We looked around for what had caused it, before we could speculate on the issue, a second sound rang out, something struck the frame of the basket and ricocheted across the interior around us. At this point we realised the harsh reality that our latest plight was not mechanical malfunction, but gunfire deliberately made against us.
Already on the way to the ground, we had no choice but to get to land and move on from there, as the dirigible could easily be pursued at the slow speeds it travelled. Every few seconds a bullet struck the basket, we all lay low on the floor, just hoping to remain uninjured. Nine shots had struck out, waiting upon the tenth and likely last, we all remained motionless. The shot rang out, it whistled and pierced the basket, striking the arm of Passepartout, who barely made a sound. I could see the rip of his jacket and blood just visible beneath the fabric. Moving over to the valet I checked his arm, the bullet had skimmed the flesh of his arm, causing nothing more than a painful flesh wound, a lucky turn.
We were just seconds now from impact to the ground, coming down slightly harder than would be ideal, bracing for the impact we took hold of the frame of the basket. We struck the farmland hard and one corner of the basket buckled, causing part of the frame to break, we were thrown about and tumbled eventually to a halt.
“Out!” shouted Holmes.
We were made, with little ammo and the further disadvantage of not knowing our location or terrain. The only conciliation in this regard was that the sparse population and open fields had shown us that the surrounding area was void of the hordes of beasts that had caused us so much trouble in England.
Stumbling out of the wreckage of what was an outstandingly created and treasured device of science; we knew that we had to cover distance quickly if we were to stay free and clear of whoever was now hunting us, likely Moriarty or a henchman of his. Leaving the Marlin behind as it was now useless, we began to move carrying nothing more than our handguns, as they were all we now had left besides the clothes on our backs.
“Mr Holmes,” Fogg spoke in a surprisingly relaxed tone.
“This villain has no quarrel with us, in fact, he owes me a sound apology. You continue with your task and leave this concern to me,” the eccentric Fogg explained.
Holmes quickly evaluated the situation, and understood. Fogg was no threat to Moriarty, and to spend any more time in his company would be a disservice to two men that had already done us a good turn. Fogg being the odd fellow he was may well talk his way out of Moriarty’s grasp, as no man could think he was guilty of anything but silliness.
“Good luck my fine man, stay out of England until you hear word it is safe, and find some better means of defence,” Holmes replied.
We had only just met, and yet a great friendship was already made, despite the weight we had placed upon their heads. Fogg was a sharp man and Passepartout an eminently capable fellow when push came to shove, we didn’t feel too distressed to be leaving them to talk their way out of a bind.
Our clothes were now grubby, covered in a mixture of coal dust, dirt, black powder residue and dried blood, not a pleasant sight at all, though it bothered me a lot more than it did Holmes, who never really fretted over grimy surroundings. We were fortunately lucky enough to remain unharmed, though exhaustion was taking its toll, the adrenaline rush of the recent drama and risk of death being the only thing keeping us active. We desperately needed rest. Fogg and his recently ruined flying machine would occupy Moriarty’s attentions for long enough, we needed to cover some ground quickly and find shelter. Getting moving we picked up the pace, though both knowing it could not be kept for long.
After just a few minutes at a jogging speed we came across signs for Rouen, this was a small stroke of luck in an otherwise day of pain and suffering. In Rouen we could blend in and rest without serious risk of discovery. We slowed to a walk, we had to keep moving but could not keep any serious progress for a moment longer. After an hour of walking we were staggering with all the drive and dedication to keep going, but with little strength left to do so, it was another hour of such a struggle until we reached Rouen.
It was a sad fact that we could not enter the first inn that we saw, as it would also be Moriarty’s first port of call to find us, a pity, as it looked to be a fine establishment.
“Our cunning foe will investigate the first three inns on this road and then travel to the other side of the town to investigate, and therefore, we will stay in the fourth on the road,” said Holmes.
This sort of talk sounded like an educated gamble, but we both
knew that no better option existed. We were now among a country with fewer friends and allies whilst being hunted like dogs. Despite this, knowing we could rest just one night was the most comforting thought either of us had known in years. All this time in the detective service had evidently given me an easy time of things, with war being a distant memory, but now it was hitting back harder than ever. The fact that we had few allies in the area was only made easier to accept when Holmes’ pointed out that Moriarty sat in the same boat.
Finally reaching the door of our intended inn, we stumbled through it, far from the fit and healthy men we used to be. Holmes was looking paler and more distraught than ever and seeing that I had not pursued the physical pursuits of my youth and military service, we were bedraggled to say the least. Entering the hall of the inn, Holmes asked for two rooms and the direction to the bar, not necessarily the best choice, but by far the most appealing one, our sanity was as important to our performance as our weapons were.
Being directed through to a small, low ceilinged room, with just a handful of tables, we slumped into the chairs surrounding a small candle lit table. There was no selection of drink in this place, we were simply seated and served what they had, red wine any civilised drink would be suitable at this stage.
A bottle of wine was placed between us, but the server did not offer a taste nor even pour the bottle, just handed us glasses. Filling both glasses near to the brim, Holmes slammed the bottle down on the table, took hold of his overly filled glass and held it up for a toast, neither of us knowing what to toast. We clashed glasses and drunk at the rate which would be better suited to ale.
What truly astonished me at this stage was that despite the horrors and physical pressures of the last forty eight hours, Holmes showed no reduction in resolve. We quickly topped off the bottle of red wine and gladly headed up to the less than luxurious accommodation, not that it really mattered. Within moments of me reaching my new home for the night I was out of consciousness and firmly into a dream world. The sleep was long but continually disrupted by images of what I had seen from the last two days, it took its toll and I awoke only half recovered from the day before.
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