Catacombs of Terror! (16 page)

“Clear,” said Kafka.

“Look,” said Stonehenge, “I'm not used to making everything up as I go along, but it seems that we have no choice. If we're to stop Them, we have to be very, very careful. We
have
to know what we're doing.”

Wow. This was Stonehenge the prof talking. I was almost impressed. It looked like he'd got over his fear, his concern, or whatever it was. I almost missed his unique line in taking twice as long as he needed to say anything at all.

“The main trouble is that we're about a mile north of the chloroethylene vats. Well, slightly to the northeast. Due south of here is the Circus, which is really where we need to be. That is the hub of the tunnel system. The thing is, I'm certain that the Circus cavern is extremely well guarded. Trying to get into it would be suicide. And a very unpleasant suicide. Here, look at the map.”

The map was bad news. To me it looked like a mess. An incomprehensible mess.

“Are you sure that's a map?”

“Of course it's a map! Look! Here's the Circus. Here's the three tunnels radiating out from it. The northern tunnel leads directly to where we are. To Charlcombe.”

Stonehenge was stabbing his finger on the piece of paper he was calling a map, but it took me a couple of minutes to see what he meant. It wasn't like any sort of map I'd ever seen. More like a diagram of somebody's memories. Even more like something you'd find scrawled on the floor in a building for people who might need upholstered walls. Whatever. But it made sense, after a while.

“I'm really fucking worried about the pigs,” said Kafka.

“I'm really fucking worried about the pigs, too,” I muttered, still staring at the map.

“Shoot the leading pig,” announced Stonehenge. “That should frighten the rest. I don't know how long for. I don't know if these pigs are tribal. If they have a hierarchy. But I imagine that they do. All the legends concerning the Fleet Pigs talk of a queen. If there is a queen, then it follows that there should be tribal leaders.”

“You imagine.
If
. Then it follows. You're very good, Stonehenge. I'm very, very glad that we've got you with us. Tell you what, when we get face to face with Queen Pig, you can do the diplomatic bit, okay?”

I ground my cigarette out with my shoe. Stonehenge hadn't made me any less worried about the pigs. I glanced at Kafka. He didn't look particularly uplifted either. But the top of the ladder was still here. The rungs got harder to see as they were swallowed by that yawning darkness.

“What's that smell?” asked Stonehenge. He swung his face around. But we knew where it came from. Even if we didn't know what it was.

“It's from the pit,” said Kafka simply. “It comes in waves. It can get pretty intense down at the bottom. And worse in the tunnels, because there's no way out.”

This was stupid. We were standing around doing nothing, scaring the crap out of ourselves. Pathetic. The other two carried on talking, but I didn't listen. I walked closer to the hole and stared down into it. It was like a well full of ink. Black ink, the darkest, most viscous, velvety ink I could have imagined. And as I stood there, a gasp of sulphur retched from its depths. The odour washed over me. I didn't care about that any more. I didn't really care about anything any more. I was ready to go down.

We worked out a route from the map. Committed it to memory. Or tried to. I went down first. Stonehenge next. Then Kafka. I could almost taste the darkness after only about five rungs. I had a sudden crisis of confidence. Luckily it was a very quick one. I didn't have time to stop climbing, or anything like that. Step after step. Once Stonehenge lowered himself into the hole, it got really dark. His bulk blocked out the blue light. I kept climbing down. Eyes open or shut, it made no difference. A wave of sulphur gusted gently over me. More than once. It was like the tunnels were—breathing, or something.

No one said anything the whole way down. It was a long trip. Took a long time. I thought about whistling, but I couldn't remember a tune. I got the same feeling as ever, of being alone in the universe. A lonely universe. An endless tube, spinning and spinning in the emptiness. It got so I couldn't tell if I was climbing up or down. I was just climbing. I thought about all this stuff for a while. Passed the time. After that I started counting rungs, but then I forgot whether I was counting with my left hand or my left foot. I tried to work that out, but I didn't get anywhere. Then I started wondering whether I was going down or up again. Okay. I don't want to bore you as much as I got bored. That would be horrible. Yeah, well.

It wasn't any more fun at the bottom, but I felt a shudder of gratitude at being able to stop climbing. I had been going downward after all. I stepped away from the ladder as Stonehenge and then Kafka reached the end of it. I waited for a while as we got our breath back. Then I reached inside my pocket for my flashlight.

Well, we were in a chamber. Okay. But it wasn't the same chamber that me and Kafka had found less than twenty-four hours ago. It was bigger. Much bigger. Thirty feet in diameter? Forty? I didn't care. It wasn't relevant. I heard Kafka gasp. Or maybe it was me. I swept the beam around the walls of the chamber. Still three tunnels. Still the weird bell-jar shape, like being in some kind of dome. Still mud walls. Still flagstones on the floor.

“What is this place?” breathed Stonehenge. He wasn't asking us. He was just wondering out loud to himself.

“Which tunnel was it?” asked Kafka.

I kept the beam moving because I couldn't think of anything to say. Then I thought of something.

“I don't know,” I muttered.

“Good job that I brought this then,” said Stonehenge, fumbling in his pockets. He pulled out a compass. “We need to go due south. Oh. Oh no.”

“What is it?” asked Kafka.

“Take a look at this,” Stonehenge grunted bitterly.

We crowded round. The little needle on the compass was spinning wildly, sporadically swinging one way then the next.

“It must be the iron content in the rock down here . . . .” Stonehenge was trying to rationalise something that was three dozen stops past Barking. Iron content? Oh, for sure. That'll be it. I guess the fact that the chamber had enlarged itself had one of those logical, scientific-type explanations, too.

“Put your goddamn toy away,” I said. “And tell me what you think will happen if we try firing a gun. Maybe the lead content in the rocks will fuck the bullets up. No, actually, don't bother trying to think of something. I couldn't bear it. Hey, Colin. Have you got any idea—any idea at all—which way we went last night?”

He trailed his eyes around the walls of the chamber. Shook his head.

“Wait a minute,” said Stonehenge. “Take a look at the bottom of the ladder. That's our reference point. I'm guessing, but I think we climbed down facing roughly south. So if we take that tunnel . . . there, it should be the right one.”

I shot him a grudgingly admiring glance.

“Okay. I'll go first, then you, Stonehenge, then Colin. A couple of things. No random flashlight use. No unnecessary talking. And if you need to fire a gun, make sure you know exactly what you're pointing at. What I'm saying is, make sure it's not me. Clear?”

They nodded.

“Okay. Colin, here's yours.” I handed him a gun.

“And Stonehenge? Here's yours. This is the safety. Keep it pressed down. Flick it up when you need to, if you need to. Keep your arm steady when you aim and if you fire. Make sure you've got a clear shot. Squeeze the trigger, don't pull it. Just remember: steady, steady, steady. Don't fucking panic. If your head's panicking, make sure your arm's cool. Right? Steady. Squeeze. And only—absolutely only—when you have to, when there's no other thing you can do. Okay?”

Stonehenge took the pistol. He looked at it a little apprehensively. That was okay. Apprehensively is the only way to look at gun, the way I figure it.

I took another look around the chamber. Water dripped constantly from above. It wasn't homely, but the tunnels, I knew, were worse. Much worse. It was cold. Three people against a global conspiracy. Flesh-eating pigs. Sacrifice. Yeah, well. I pointed my flashlight towards the tunnel that we had to assume was the right one. And I started walking towards it.

At the entrance to the tunnel I stopped. I turned around. Kafka and Stonehenge were whispering to each other.

“Come on then,” I said. They stopped conferring and followed me over. They didn't look too happy. I wasn't grinning myself.

“Ready?” They looked at each other, then at me. Kafka made a grunting affirmative sound. Stonehenge nodded slightly. “Okay. Let's go,” I said, with an authority I didn't feel. I snapped off the flash. We walked forward, into the darkness.

One thing hadn't changed since last night. Walking into the tunnel was like walking into fog. Thick, dense fog. I held my gun in one hand, and with the other trailed my fingers along the wet, slimy wall. I could hear Stonehenge and Kafka's footsteps behind me, but they were a little muffled. I couldn't hear anything else, apart from an intermittent dripping. There was nothing else. Yet.

The smell of sulphur was stronger than in the chamber, but I was expecting that. Stonehenge gagged a few times. But he'd be okay. He'd better be. I tried closing my eyes. No difference. Opened them. No difference. I wasn't about to try that too often, or else I wouldn't know whether they were open or shut. Even if I couldn't see anything, I wanted the option to be there. What was I looking for? Oh yeah. Vats of dry-cleaning fluid. Naturally. And pigs. Whatever. We had stuff to do. What was the order of importance? Destroy the vats. Get Barry out. Rescue the sacrificial victim. Right. A breeze. Piece of cake.

Then I heard something. Or I thought I heard something. Maybe it was Kafka. I stopped dead. I said, “Sshh.” Kafka and Stonehenge stopped, too.

“What did you say?” I whispered back to Kafka.

“Nothing. What did you say?” he whispered back.

“I didn't say anything either.”

We stood in silence for a long time. Or a short time. I couldn't tell. But I hadn't been wrong. There was a sound, and it wasn't our footsteps, and it wasn't dripping water. As far as I could tell it was a sort of thrumming, throbbing sound. Like something with a very deep voice muttering something unimaginably obscene, very slowly. Not quite regularly. Very, very distant. As if it was very loud, though. As if it was coming through layers of rock and clay, faintly echoing along the maze of tunnels. Through the catacombs. It wasn't a reassuring sound. I might have said something to that effect. I don't know.

I remember Kafka swearing softly, and a faint worried noise coming from Stonehenge. I took my hand from the wall and grabbed for one of my whiskey bottles. Then I put my gun in my pocket and unscrewed the bottle cap. I took a big swallow. I passed it back, and I heard Kafka, then Stonehenge taking similarly large gulps. The bottle came back. I had another swig, put the cap back on, and slid it back in my pocket. I took my gun out again. We walked on.

It wasn't much further on when the wall wasn't there under my fingertips. I halted. Kafka stumbled into my back, then I felt a lurch as Stonehenge bumped into him. We steadied ourselves.

“Okay,” I whispered, “I'm going to turn my flashlight on. Just me. The wall isn't there any more. I think it's where me and Colin found the first crossroads last night. But I'm going to check.” I flicked the switch. The light was gloomy and yellowish, not bright at all. But it was enough. We were in a cavern. It was enormous. Horribly enormous. Slowly I moved the beam of the flash around. The ground was level, paved with flagstones, but there was enough of it to—to, I don't know—have a football match? A military parade? For all the damned in hell to park their fucking cars? It was huge. Immense. My flashlight barely found the edges of it.

“This wasn't here last night, Stonehenge,” I whispered. “If we're in the same tunnel as last night. Big if. But we definitely went south last night. Because of where we got out. And we're pretty clear that we're going south now. Fact is, I've never seen this before. But then the chamber at the bottom of the hole wasn't there last night either, not like it is tonight. So, that leads me to a conclusion. I don't like it, but I don't like anything that's happened in the last couple of days. These tunnels change. They change shape.”

“We've got to be in another tunnel,” said Kafka. “They can't change shape. They just . . . they just
can't
!”

“They just can. They just do. And as long as we stay alive, we're going to have to deal with it. Okay. We're going to keep straight ahead. I'll keep the flashlight on.”

“Just a moment,” said Stonehenge insistently. “If you're right—and I'm assuming that you are—how do we know if we can get back? How do we know if we can get out?”

“Good question. I was wondering that myself. I didn't get as far as finding an answer. Sorry. But I don't think there is one. Any other questions? Not that I'll have any answers to them, either, but you might like to ask them anyway.”

There was silence.

“Okay. Straight on, I think.”

We trudged across the cavern floor. Flagstones stretched out in all directions. I couldn't tell how high the ceiling was, because the beam didn't reach that far. The space didn't feel huge. The cloying atmosphere saw to that. It looked immense, but it felt claustrophobic. After a long time we reached the wall at the opposite side.

As usual, it was clay, with rocks poking out all over the place, and wetness glistening everywhere. I couldn't figure out how it had been made. There was no sign of what had been used to hollow it out. Just little, soft-looking ridges. It was like the inside of a mouth. There was an opening in the wall, which went pretty much in the direction we'd been heading. It looked a little small. A little low. We'd have to stoop. Which meant that it would be hard to see straight ahead. It would be hard to see what was in front of us, especially if I turned my flashlight off. I briefly thought about the pigs. We'd have to kneel to get a clear shot. There was barely enough room for two of us to fire. If Stonehenge panicked and let fly, then me or Kafka would get a bullet in the back of the head. It looked too cosy. Too intimate. Too intimate for three frightened men with loaded guns.