Tales of Crow- The Complete series Box Set

by Chris Ward

  The car park was a wreck. Nothing remained of Laurette except a few shredded pieces of his fallen cloak. Two DCA cars had overturned, their windows shattered. Bodies of those DCA agents nearest to Laurette lay on the ground, unmoving. A couple of other men were screaming, while the rest had taken up defensive positions away from the cars: in the doorways of neighbouring buildings, in alleyways, behind overgrown flowerbeds and rock features.

  ‘Let the dance begin,’ Kurou said. ‘Attack, my dear friends. Attack with all your might.’

  A series of howls filled the air. The DCA agents looked around them, faces filled with horror. Kurou, staring into the screen, began to laugh as his Huntsmen emerged from their hiding places and began their attack.

  Kurou changed the view to one showing the list of his Huntsmen. Eleven of the twelve were now in the process of engaging. A twelfth, however, had gone offline. Kurou frowned. He loaded up the data, his eyebrows rising with surprise as the renegade Huntsman’s name came up.

  Divan.

  39

  Patrick

  He heard the battle long before he saw the muzzle flashes lighting up the night sky. He pulled the moped to a stop as he reached the edge of the industrial estate, then dragged it off the road, concealing it in an old shed behind a line of bushes. On foot, he approached the battle, peering around corners, checking the coast was clear, then running forward.

  Every molecule in his body told him he should run from this place, but both remaining threads of his world ended here. Race was here, and so was the money he needed to pay for Suzanne and Kelly to escape. He had screwed it up for everyone; now he had to make it right.

  He peered around the last corner and found himself facing a scene of carnage. Howling, snapping Huntsmen battled against DCA agents armed with guns. A couple had barricaded themselves into cars. As one Huntsman tried to break its way in, a gun barrel appeared and shot it through the mouth. The Huntsman fell back, spraying blood. The door opened and the man emerged ready to finish it, only for another Huntsman to appear from nowhere, leap onto his back and rip out his throat with a single swipe of its claws.

  Patrick, heart thundering, ducked out of sight.

  He waited a few seconds, willing his feet to move, then backtracked, giving the battle a wide berth and making his way around to the factory’s rear. From an embankment overlooking the industrial estate, he tried to figure out if Kurou was inside.

  From his vantage point, he could see into the upper floor windows. The lower windows were all dark, but as he squinted, he spotted a flicker from inside.

  Someone was in there.

  The battle had moved around to the front. Patrick looked around him for something he could use as a weapon, finding only a lump of granite which might once have been part of an ornamental flowerbed. He hefted it in his hand, then slid down through the grass of the embankment and ran up to the factory’s wall.

  A service door with a rusted handle broke open easily, the clang of his thumping blows with the rock masked by the rattling gunfire. Patrick, breathing hard, slipped inside and closed the door.

  He was in an empty storeroom. He opened a door and found himself in a corridor. From through a doorway farther down came a man’s cries.

  Patrick adjusted his grip on the rock and crept closer. A cry came again and Patrick stopped in his tracks.

  Tommy.

  Blood was bad between them, but his uncle had money. He was a civil lawyer, and that was just the surface. He could surely pay all of them to safety.

  A cry came again, this time leaving no doubt as to the pain being inflicted. Patrick’s fingers clenched around the rock.

  Just inside the door stood a tall figure. What if it was Race? Patrick closed his eyes, wishing he could be sure.

  Then the creature shifted slightly, revealing the corner of its snout.

  Black and white.

  Race’s had been brown.

  Patrick threw himself forward, the rock arcing through the air as he slammed it with all his might into the side of the Huntsman’s head.

  The creature crumpled, first to its knees, then falling straight forward onto its face. Patrick barreled past it, finding Kurou leaning over a metal stretcher on which Tommy Crown was strapped.

  The rock struck Kurou square in the face before the scientist could even look up. He crashed to the ground, rolling on to his front, hands over his head, howling in pain.

  Patrick wanted to finish him off, but the Huntsman was already stirring, groaning as it came back to its senses. The straps holding his uncle were fitted with clasps, so Patrick unfastened them and pulled his uncle up. Kurou had attached a series of electrical pulse pads to Tommy’s skin, so Patrick ripped them free.

  ‘Patrick?’ Tommy muttered, shaking his head. ‘What happened?’

  ‘We have to go. Come on.’

  He helped his uncle off the stretcher and together they staggered to the door.

  ‘He brought me in the back,’ Tommy said, voice still slurring. ‘I was in one of the cars. This bomb went off. It was Carmichael-Jones, one of the DCA men said. Suzanne’s dad. That crazy bastard blew him up.’

  ‘They caught you?’

  ‘One of them came through the roof of the car, ripped it clean off. Goddamn, what kind of sorcery is all this?’

  A rear fire exit door was swinging open. Patrick helped Tommy towards it. ‘They’re in Porlock on the coast,’ Patrick said. ‘A boat leaves Friday. I need money, Tommy.’

  ‘Christ, if that’s all you need, consider it done. Think there’s room on that thing for me?’

  Patrick couldn’t help but smile. ‘It’s only Ireland. If not, we’ll take turns swimming.’

  Tommy patted him on the back. ‘Damn you, boy, you’ve got some surprises, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Have I impressed you—’

  Patrick’s legs went numb. In an instant, his feeling was gone and he crashed to the ground. He lifted his arms, trying to sit up. As he did so, he caught a glimpse of the room down the corridor where he had found Tommy. The Huntsman stood there, watching him, blood streaming down one side of his face.

  ‘Boy, what’s going on?’

  ‘Something … I don’t know … I can’t move….’

  Tommy tried to pull him up, but Patrick’s legs were immobile.

  ‘Get up, damn you.’

  ‘I can’t! I’ve got no feeling in my legs. It’s like—it’s like they’ve switched off.’

  And then he remembered the time he had spent in Kurou’s care. His legs felt they had turned off with the flick of a switch.

  A little insurance policy.

  He grabbed Tommy’s hand. ‘Go,’ he said. ‘Get the fuck out of here and don’t look back. Suzanne is in Porlock. Get her and her sister Kelly on that boat. Promise me, Uncle Tommy. If I can make it, I will, but don’t wait. Please. Please!’

  Tommy stared at Patrick a moment, then nodded. ‘I’ll do what I can,’ he said. Then, glancing up once at the Huntsman advancing down the corridor, he turned and staggered away, pushing through the doors and out into the car park.

  Patrick watched the Huntsman approach. It didn’t even look at him as it walked past, instead going to the door and closing it, as though frustrated Tommy had let a draft come in.

  With the Huntsman guarding the door, Patrick tried to climb to his feet. His legs still didn’t work, but his arms felt fine. He pulled himself to the wall and pushed up into a sitting position, wishing he had kept the rock.

  A figure stepped out into the corridor. One hand reached up, adjusting a top hat. As emergency lighting caught Kurou’s face, Patrick saw the blood streaming from a cut below Kurou’s eye, staining his satin shirt.

  ‘Well, we meet again,’ Kurou said. ‘Dear Patrick, you certainly have a way with introductions.’ One hand flicked blood off his cheek. ‘I underestimated you. I didn’t think for a minute you were brave enough to come inside, but I do love bravery in a person. It’s quite the compelling attribute, is it not?’

&n
bsp; ‘Fuck yourself with a ten-foot stick,’ Patrick said.

  ‘Oh, what ungratefulness,’ Kurou said, theatrically rolling his one seeing eye. ‘After I saved you as well. And many could say I saved your brother, too.’

  ‘You turned him into a monster.’

  Kurou shook his head. ‘Oh no, I made him something far better than he was before. Humanity is such a pathetic race, don’t you think? Just look at the grace of a hawk, the agility of a cat, the tracking skills of a dog … we have none of it. We build our machines to compensate. How silly we are.’

  ‘You’re human too, you prick.’

  Kurou sighed. ‘Regrettably so.’ He lifted a finger. ‘Wait. Do you hear that?’

  Patrick listened. ‘What?’

  ‘Silence. It appears the battle is over. Now, would you like tea?’

  40

  Urla

  She hardly dared to pick up the phone. When she did, Justin’s voice on the other end trembled as he spoke.

  ‘The battle’s over,’ he said. ‘And I believe we won.’

  ‘What the fuck does that mean?’

  ‘Our units returned early this morning. We suffered heavy losses, but—’

  ‘How heavy?’

  ‘Six of sixty men—’

  ‘Dead?’

  A deep breath. ‘Returned.’

  ‘Jesus.’

  ‘Doctor Crow had a hostage, Stanley Carmichael-Jones.’

  ‘So he didn’t leave the country after all?’

  ‘It seems not. However, Doctor Crow had wired him up with some kind of bomb. The initial blast killed a dozen men, and then those creatures attacked.’

  Urla tried to think of something to say, but nothing meaningful would come. She stared at the wall until Justin spoke again.

  ‘Should we cancel the parade?’

  Urla closed her eyes. Maxim Cale would likely be waking up right now; perhaps his aides were preparing him for the official breakfast she had organised. He was due to leave for it within the next five minutes. If she cancelled the parade … she could kiss goodbye to any promotion. She would rot away here in this nothing town.

  ‘We can pull security from the regular police and the local military base,’ she said. ‘It’ll be better than nothing.’

  Justin was quiet a long time. Urla sensed something important he wanted to say, but she was afraid to ask. In the end, he solved the problem for her.

  ‘Doctor Crow got away,’ he said.

  Urla felt her knees go weak. ‘Tell me that’s not true.’

  ‘We found no trace of him.’

  ‘And those things?’

  ‘Tommy Crown said there were fourteen. Our men neutralised twelve.’

  ‘Well, that’s something. The other two?’

  ‘One was seen fleeing. Of the other we saw no sign. It’s possible Tommy Crown miscounted.’

  ‘Bring him here. I need to talk to him again.’

  Another pause. Urla knew the answer before Justin spoke.

  ‘He escaped. One of the creatures broke him out. It is believed he fled with Doctor Crow.’

  Urla slammed the phone down on the tabletop. When she lifted it again, she was surprised to find it still worked.

  ‘This is a fucking mess. Get everyone we have searching for Doctor Crow, Tommy Crown and that last … thing. We need them captured before the start of the parade.’

  ‘I’m afraid we don’t have many men left. I’ve already put in requests with the neighbouring departments for a loan of men.’

  ‘You did what?’

  ‘I reached out to the neighbouring DCA units to inform them that we were in need of cover.’

  Urla wished she could reach down the phone line and strangle him. He must have known how such an act would humiliate her.

  ‘That’s an executive order. You do not have the authority to do that.’

  ‘In an emergency, I felt it necessary to use my initiative.’

  Urla could feel Justin smiling. ‘I could have you arrested.’

  ‘By who?’

  Urla slammed down the phone, and this time the casing broke off, and the connection went dead.

  41

  Kurou

  Flawed.

  So many things he needed to tweak to make his Huntsmen into perfect killing machines.

  Checking their visual files, he had noticed a common trait among those he had created from captured members of the DCA.

  Hesitation.

  Despite how he had altered them, when faced with their former comrades, they had shown a reluctance to complete their duty, and against desperate men seeing only the monsters they had become, that had proven a fatal flaw. Five to one they had slaughtered their attackers, but Kurou had dreams that twenty, fifty to one be achievable.

  They needed to be faster, stronger, more agile, and they needed better weapons. Their claws and teeth weren’t enough. They needed stronger armour, better tissue regeneration speeds, more high-tech analytical procedures to ensure they knew when a battle could be won.

  A work in progress, nothing more.

  His fingers tapped away on the tablet screen, a blur as he wrote his notes.

  Flawed, they might be, but he was a scientist, and a scientist’s work was forever trial and error. He had tried, and he had failed, but he was still alive, and there would be further successes to be found.

  Patrick lay on the floor of the old pinball hall, unconscious, his limbs secured to the ground with packaging tape. Among the wreckage of the place, Kurou had happened upon an old music player Race must have dropped on their first meeting, and now the sounds of Plastic Black Butterfly, a band Kurou had encountered what felt like a million years ago, rattled out of a small speaker. As he worked on Patrick, he listened to an old acquaintance, Ken Okomoto, shredding through riff after riff, and he felt like he finally understood how someone could feel about mastering the guitar. It wasn’t so different to how he performed his experiments: you were forever searching for an ultimate fluidity, a poetic grace.

  He wondered, absently, if Ken Okomoto were still alive, and if so, what he was doing now. If he still lived, he would be an old man, perhaps sitting in a rocking chair, remembering the days he spent in the company of a man named Crow.

  It was a hits album. As the songs came and went, Kurou heard the voices of first the original singer, O-Remo Takahashi, a man long dead, and then Jun Matsumoto, who had taken over vocals following Takahashi’s death. Kurou’s mood darkened with each song featuring Jun, and he scratched at the socket of the eye Jun had taken from him, itched the scar tissue Jun, in his sacrifice, had caused. So many years ago, yet Jun had left a lasting mark, and in many ways was still with Kurou, a shadow at his shoulder.

  In the end, Kurou couldn’t take any more. He threw both the speakers and the music player out through the open door.

  No matter.

  He was about finished anyway.

  In the doorway, he found the Huntsman he had left on guard slumped on its knees, head bowed. He nudged it with his foot, and it fell sideways into the grass, its eyes glassy and dead.

  He had sensed the creature had been injured during the battle. When he examined its chest he found three bullet wounds. Its tissue had begun to regenerate, but one bullet had nearly severed an artificial nerve column he had inserted. Having used the creature to carry Patrick here, it seemed he had worn the Huntsman out.

  He frowned. No matter. Just another example of his need to progress.

  The time was coming to move on.

  There was just one last job to be done.

  Still frowning, he dragged the creature’s corpse back into the abandoned pinball hall and hid it out of view. Perhaps one day he would come back to reclaim the technology he was leaving behind, or perhaps it would just rot away, out of sight, out of mind.

  A poor but convenient end.

  As the three of them fled, he had seen the surviving DCA hauling the dead Huntsmen into a pile and setting fire to it.

  It warmed his heart a li
ttle that the idiots were depriving themselves of his complicated technology.

  As he headed back to Patrick, he caught a brief glimpse of himself in a tarnished surface. Once, he had lived a life away from any reflections, the very sight of his own face the greatest enemy of all. In the decades since, he had grown less vain, more resigned, almost comfortable with the monstrosity staring back at him.

  Once, he had simply been hideous. He had been hideous yet valued, his knowledge and skills sought after by governments and rich men the world over. Now, he was hideous, scarred, old, and forgotten.

  Karma, perhaps? Or the sign of a world moving on, turning to face new monstrosities such as Maxim Cale?

  ‘Dear friend,’ Kurou said as he stared at himself, unsure whether he were speaking to his own reflection or the distant specter of Maxim Cale, ‘I would very much like to see you eye to eye one last time. A penny for your thoughts? A crow’s eye for a hawk’s eye, sire?’

  Behind him, Patrick groaned. The boy was waking up.

  With the Huntsman dead, it would be a long walk to the town. But, Kurou reflected, it would be something of a victory march.

  And for that he should feel happy.

  42

  Maxim Cale

  His senses—in particular the one that mattered—had dulled over the years, softened by easy living and repetition, his budding political career taking him far from the years of need and longing, into a world of boredom, endless conversations, and polite comfort. After years of slowly moving up the ranks like an icebreaker cutting through an Arctic ice sheet, he was now in position to finally break free and take total control.

  Britain, the hard work of its isolation already done by a succession of paranoid leaders coupled with the fear of an ongoing war in Europe he had in many ways been responsible for, was now a blandly safe place, malleable like putty, ready to be moulded to meet his demands.