He couldn’t afford to turn back, he could hear heavy footfalls behind him, so he pressed on and committed himself to his direction, knowing that when he broke back onto a corridor he could make his way to the other fire escape and down, if his body would allow him to maintain his pace and his lead.
His feet punched the stairs away one after the other like pistons pumping him further and further away from the carnage of his ruined life. Tears streamed down his face and he howled apologies to his Deirdra as he ran, his voice growing to a crescendo as his speed increased.
He passed landings, determined he would turn into a corridor at the next one, but each time he would let it go. Panting, his heart a jack-hammer at his ribs, his feet numb, his legs burning with the fire of his exertion, he arrived at the final landing and to his horror he didn’t even break pace and pressed on. He accepted that in his weakened state there was only a slim chance of escape, but he didn’t want to give up and be caught, which is why his choice of heading to the roof where there was no escape whatsoever terrified him.
Harry burst through the fire exit door and onto the roof, and was instantly dazzled by the brilliant sun low in the sky ahead of him. The tarmac roof was soft underfoot from the suns heat and the different terrain broke his pace, seeming to reflect the doughy feeling he now realised in his trembling leg muscles. The breeze was wild around him, pulling him in different directions, while the panorama of Camden spread out around him far below and dizzied him further. The blood raced tangibly around his body from the shock of running up seven floors and his exhaustion caused flickers of light to play in his eyes. Except the light was green and he had seen that before. It was the illusive ‘thing’ at his back. The sense of Deirdra being with him was even stronger, and although she didn’t say anything, her presence increased his awareness of the knife in his hand.
The two police officers piled through the fire exit and stopped. The man looked angry while the woman looked scared. Harry thought it strange that she didn’t appear scared of him, but scared for him. Despite the courage of their arrival on the roof they were both cautious in their approach, holding out placating hands. Speaking quietly and calmly, although the male officer called him names, called him names that were true. Harry must be sick. Harry was a psycho. The woman told the man to shut up. Harry remembered her; Kelly had been kind to him many times, cautioned him when his sense hadn’t kept up with his actions and taken him home when he had been lost. She spoke to him softly, pleading with him to give up, to put the knife down. He was startled to find he was holding the carving knife before him, stabbing it threateningly in the policeman’s direction and then in hers.
Images cascaded into his mind, mental pictures of him flashing his knife at the two officers, not just to get back to the door, but to wound them so much they wouldn’t be able to follow. To wound them so much they wouldn’t survive.
Pain. White-hot pain cleared the images from his mind. He pulled the tip of the knife from his palm and watched the blood run from the wound. The images were gone. Deirdra’s voice was gone. The puppeteer was still at the back of his mind. It had driven him up here. It didn’t want Harry to escape, he had been found out by the police, he was no use to the thing at his back. It didn’t want him to talk. It didn’t want him anymore.
He would do part of what he knew it wanted, not to please the thing, but to be with Deirdra. The real Deirdra. He ran his legs that were crooked with exhaustion. Ploughed them back into work. Racing forwards, the knife held forth. The air rushed around Harry as his legs still pumped away uselessly with no ground to pedal like he had seen an outsmarted Wil E. Coyote do so many times. The feeling of someone watching over him was gone. The thing had left him. He had been released.
“DEIRDRA, I’M COMING! PLEASE FORGIVE ME!” His tears were like ice on his face, sobered and chilled by the updraft of air that whipped at his skin and ripped at his clothes. Wild panic gripped him and shook him into madness as he saw the landscape of buildings rush into a blur about him. The communal green below widened rapidly to catch him. The path grew from obscurity into gritty concrete detail. “I LOVE YOU DEIRD – .” Harry’s head split open like a melon. He lay there for a few moments, wondering if he could move anything, he was sure his fingers were flexing. He thought it funny that he couldn’t feel any pain. Then he stopped thinking.
Alec Jacobs trudged across the basement and fumbled with a cluster of keys and unlocked a metal cabinet. He squinted in the half-light that the few remaining flickering strip lights offered and found the tube of filler and clattered the door shut and locked it. He flicked the lights off and felt his way back towards the lifts, he fingered the lift call button and waited in the dark, only it wasn’t as dark as it should have been.
There was a dull green glow to the darkness that lingered between two lockers that blocked access to the basements of the abandoned shops. The lift doors opened and the stark light of its interior was enough to cancel out the weak green light. It was his eyes fooling him; some residue of light on his cornea, possibly imagination, but uncertainty fluttered in the back of his mind. He let the lift doors slide shut and again the darkness rushed in on him and claimed the room except for the green ghost light.Alec moved hesitantly to the gap in the lockers. He unlocked one of them and pulled a torch out then stepped through the opening. The darkness had the musty sour smell of damp, dust and expired meat. He snapped the torch on and waved the shaft of light around the room beyond, thick shadows danced around the beam of light like black amorphous moths as it travelled the walls and debris, until the coronet of light vanished. Panic took hold of Alec with the thought of his torch failing him in a part of the building he had never thought to venture, but he felt instant relief as he jerked the torch and the spotlight returned to the wall. With his senses settled he realised that he hadn’t lost sight of the dust motes lit up by the torches shaft of light, but had only lost the spot of light at the end of the beam. He passed the torch back across the same part of wall and once again the circle of light vanished.
Alec stepped slowly forward across broken masonry towards the black hole that absorbed the spotlight from his weak torch. He flicked the light from side to side, and lit up the jagged teeth of the large gaping hole. He approached the maw and fingered the chalky dusty teeth of the broken concrete wall. It swallowed him as he stepped within.
For a brief second his eyes offered no respite from the darkness. Then he saw it, a faint glowing shape barely distinguished from the dark, Alec marvelled at how he had seen this weak light from the main part of the basement: a ghostly green shape among the black ocean that he now swam in. There was an uncomfortable softness under foot, a thick cloying surface that pulled on his shoes as he took his steps. He didn’t want to think about what was underfoot, all his attention was drawn to the shape, he levelled the shaft of his light and the green ghost was given form.
A green misshapen clumsy obelisk stood before him, an opaque fleshy membrane of translucent veins and capillaries stretched over a skeletal structure of thick crude bone which reached up from the floor to the ceiling like gnarled branches. The shock of the alien sight struck him as if it was a physical blow, Alec dropped his torch; the detail that it patted to the ground as if it had landed in something soft and thick was lost to him. The nightmare in his vision overpowered his other senses.
The obelisk seemed to keep some memory of the light his torch had cast upon it, as if it was somehow absorbed within. Something moved in that glow; great cramped limbs, human-like, but too many of them to belong to just one single person. The limbs twitched and slid slowly, one over the other, surrounded by a thick viscous fluid. Suspended in the gelatinous slime were shapes he couldn’t recognise, and shapes that were clearly vital organs that were no longer internal to anyone. Suddenly in a moment of sickening clarity of vision some of the shapes had faces; one by one they appeared like stars in the night sky. Some were clear while others appeared half-dissolved, either by shadow or eaten away by something else, maki
ng them ragged and hideous to look upon, or soft and borderless as the flesh became one with the liquid within the obelisk. Then there were the faces he recognised. Their eyes, or empty sockets, were upon him.
The ghostly light at the heart of the shape intensified then dulled, and suddenly an arc of green light flashed through the air and deposited itself into the darkness between him and his exit. Alec heard the buzz of flies disturbed by the strange lightning, and they pelted his clothes and face in their erratic flight. A man stepped into the half-light from Alec’s floored torch. A man dressed as Albert Taylor the undertaker used to dress, except his face was not Albert’s, it was dead and rotten and the green light throbbed within it’s skull, bleeding out through its eyes, mouth and nose. It spoke with Alec’s mother’s voice, except she had emigrated to Canada eight years ago to marry, and neither she or Alec could afford to visit the other. Despite the monster he knew was before him and the living obelisk he knew was behind him, he didn’t feel fear, he only had the emptiness he experienced whenever he needed his mother and the longing it created. He could see only his mother, and Alec didn’t run.
Chapter Twenty Nine
Craig stared up at the tower block through the windscreen of Kelly’s small car as she pulled the vehicle into its space in the car park. The fact that the building was home had always softened his perception of the place, but now that it felt far from homely all he could see was its grey, stark ugliness. What was he doing here? Separated from his family, living in a grotty building, struggling to make ends meet. Lonely.
He was distracted from his despair by the sharp creak of the handbrake as Kelly finished parking and rattled the key out of the ignition. He took his seat belt off but didn’t make any effort to leave the car. He didn’t feel any urge to go inside and Kelly seemed to share his lack of motivation as she joined him in listening to the tick of the engine cooling down. He glanced over at her and she looked at him, he broke eye contact and she did the same. He looked in her direction out of the corner of his eye and found she was doing the same and was attempting to stifle a grin. Ever since they had left A&E he had caught sight of that little smile of hers. Despite his unhappiness he found his own cheeks aching with a broad grin too. “Go on then. Say it.”
“You are going to have to stop picking on doors.”
“Aha! I have been waiting for this. In my defence…”
“Oh this should be good.” Kelly cut in.
“When you me and Balin lined up to kick Harry’s door in I thought you said to Balin that we would all kick the door on a count of three.”
“I meant after three.”
“I realise that now.”
Kelly bit her lip and nodded. Still smirking.
“Strained tendon! I never realised how fragile I was.” Craig shook his head. “Thanks for taking me. If it wasn’t for you being with me in A&E I would have been waiting hours.”
“At least with me at your side my being in the service gets you seen quicker.”
“I can’t believe I got seen by the same nurse who strapped up my dislocated shoulder. That was embarrassing. You know her don’t you? Chloe wasn’t it?”
“Zoe. At weekends we get called to A&E quite often, you get to know some of the nurses and porters a bit.”
“Yeah.” He cut in. “She seem different to you though?”
“Colder? Distrusting?”
So Kelly had noticed it too. “It’s because of all the stuff that’s happened here isn’t it?”
“She has seen us involved with it twice now.”
“I have seen it in the faces of other residents in the building. Weeks ago, my neighbour Vi wanted me to pop in for a cuppa from time to time, but I saw her in the lobby when we brought Cat back from hospital and she had that same look in her eyes. I doubt I would be so welcome now.”
Kelly leaned forward in her seat, folded her arms on the steering wheel and rested her chin on them and joined Craig in staring up at the tower. “I guess it’s hard for people to trust anyone with all that is happening on their doorsteps. It can’t just be us that are experiencing the suspicious looks – or the strange experiences. I know we seem to be experiencing a lot of bad things, but it’s not like we are looking very hard to find them.” Kelly slumped back in her seat, shrugged and gestured in the air with open hands. “We are just trying to understand what’s happening. To figure out how to stop it. We aren’t causing any of it.”
When he considered how his nightmares seemed to predict each terrible happening at the building her defence sounded hollow. He had got past his fear that his dreams were repressed memories of things he had actually done or intentions he didn’t want to admit to, those explanations didn’t make any sense, but his dreams somehow did connect him to what was happening. With every nightmare he had someone would suffer a horrific fate. He couldn’t help but feel responsible for whatever might happen when he slept.
Kelly let out a deep sigh. “I guess we have to go in.”
Craig leaned against the cool glass of the passenger window as he contemplated returning. “I’m glad you invited me over tonight. Forensics will be all over Harry’s place next door.” Kelly turned sharply to her side window, hiding her face from him. They had shared their disbelief at what had happened, but they hadn’t spoken about the events on the roof. Craig wanted to sweep his arm around her and pull her close and tell her it was okay and that it wasn’t her fault. In the confines of Kelly’s little car the gesture could easily be blundered. She might think it was a cheap pass.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go to your parents?” Whatever trouble the mention of Harry had caused her it was gone from her face, yet he doubted it had left her mind. “I don’t mind driving you.”
“No.” Craig realised his knee-jerk reaction to her offer and softened his voice. “No, it feels like running away.”
“I don’t think anyone would blame you.”
“I know, but this place was my home and I don’t want to be driven out of it by whatever is going on. Besides taking me to Bath would involve a four-hour round trip for you and that’s not fair.”
“I was thinking. Let’s see what tomorrow’s like but I imagine the forensic boys will be in Harry’s flat for days, so you could always stay over at mine until things have blown over. You can come and go as you please, just use the place as a base so you don’t have to get confronted with whatever they will be doing on your doorstep.”
“Yeah? Okay yeah.” She was clear that this was one friend doing another friend a favour but he was still surprised, this was not the woman who had treated his offer of a coffee as an indecent proposal a few days ago. Things had changed since then. They had been through so much together in such a short period of time and it connected them so much more than the coffee on the canal could have done. “We will see how it goes then, and yeah that would be really great, thanks.” Craig suspected that she wasn’t just being kind, but wanted some company herself with everything that was happening, he didn’t care though because she wanted him and that felt good.
After collecting some things from his flat he had walked up with Kelly to her place, practicing his strides with the crutch he had been given at the hospital so he could get around without hobbling. Craig had accepted Kelly’s offer of a shower, he towelled down, thought against aftershave but decided to spray enough deodorant to give him an attractive scent instead. He didn’t want to scare Kelly by making too much effort. In the bathroom he changed into fresh clothes, dark blue Ben Sherman denims that hugged his rear and his front nicely, and a pale blue fashion tee-shirt that was intentionally faded and distressed on the shoulders.
Kelly showered straight after him and she emerged from the steamy bathroom while he was sorting through his bag in the hall, she gave him a sheepish smile and held her towel tight around her, clearly regretting not changing into her clothes in the bathroom as he had. Craig had spared her a lingering look but he had caught sight of her fantastic slender legs, his glance had only been brief but in
his mind the journey his eyes had taken along the contours of her smooth glistening legs, to the hem of that towel at mini-skirt length, had been leisurely.
He had made himself comfortable tucked into one corner of the larger sofa with his legs crossed beneath him, drinking the white wine Kelly had opened for them while he waited for her company. Some time later Kelly had gotten herself ready and joined him, he had been mistaken in thinking that the highlight of the night had been glimpsing her bare legs because they looked just as shapely in the snug dark denims she wore. He was glad she hadn’t worn a dress because the memory of her bare legs was a tease in itself.
She wore a brown tee-shirt, the bottom-half detailed in amber bronze and gold beads and stitched through with some kind of elastic that pulled the material close to her abdomen, it drew attention to her slim figure and the plain-half of the top clung to the fullness of her breasts. Her hair had volume from being blow dried and hung in kinked plump swathes against her chest and shoulders. She wasn’t wearing make-up, he was glad because that would have meant she was trying to look attractive for him and his nerves at being around a woman he didn’t know that well would have gotten to him. Besides she didn’t need make-up.
They had laughed their way through a couple of episodes of The Simpsons and Friends that they had stumbled across on TV while they devoured a tube of Pringles together. Part way through the evening the wine had mingled with his painkillers to create a warm numbness through his whole body. They had rung a few local Chinese restaurants before they had found one willing to brave their building and its new-found notoriety and they had tipped the edgy looking delivery boy a fiver for his trouble. It was in this moment Craig had realised that they could have opened the guy to real risk and five pounds didn’t cover that. It had been the first point of the evening Craig had thought about the dangers beyond the front door, and despite his enjoyment of chilling out with Kelly he hadn’t been able to shake the thought of it from his mind.
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