Pandaemonium (40 page)

Sendak walks over and kicks him gently on the soles of his feet to get his attention.

‘Head up, son, you just saved all our asses.’

‘Then bollocksed up our chances of escape,’ Deso argues.

‘He giveth and He taketh away,’ says Rosemary, sitting down beside him and giving his hand a squeeze.

Just along the wall, Marianne is wincing, cradling her hands in her lap and looking very white.

‘Morphine’s wearing off,’ Mrs McKenzie says. ‘There’s no more. I gave the boy the lion’s share, but he’ll be feeling everything soon enough too. He’s still losing blood.’

‘How long for the paramedics?’ asks Heather. ‘You said two hours, that had to be at least an—’

Sendak looks reluctant to answer. Heather clocks this and cuts herself off.

‘Two hours was for the armed response. Paramedics were all at a crash, an hour south of Inverness. They ain’t comin’. Not in time, anyway.’

‘An armed response team will have medical supplies and transport, though,’ she suggests.

Sendak sighs grimly. ‘They ain’t comin’ either.’

‘But you said . . .’

‘I know what I said. That’s what they
told
me. I didn’t believe them but I had to talk like the glass was half full at that point. It’s no-bullshit time now, though, and the no-bullshit reality is that they don’t just send out an ARU on a member of the public’s say-so. At most they’ll send the local beat-cop from Tornabreich to check it out, and that ain’t happened either. Which means best-case scenario is Hamish Macbeth shows up soon and we evacuate five, maybe six people, while the rest wait who knows how long for back-up.’

‘And what’s worst-case?’ Blake asks.

‘PC Macbeth got here a little while back but encountered resistance.’

His tone is flat, indicating to Blake that he is strongly inclined to believe this the more likely. However, having just admitted he gave the glass-half-full treatment to Heather earlier, there has to be a reason he’s laying it all out so straight now.

‘Give it up, Sergeant,’ Blake says. ‘What aren’t you telling us?’

All eyes are on Sendak now; whether they be anguished, desperate or daring to hope.

‘There
is
somewhere we can find some meds,’ he reveals. ‘More wheels too, maybe.’

‘What’s the catch?’ asks Blake.

‘It’s also most likely where these freaks have come from.’

‘MoD - Keep Out,’ states Kirk.

Sendak nods: half confirmation, half confession.

‘Underneath Ben Trochart is a rabbit warren of tunnels and caverns. Used to be a secret nuclear command bunker. Post-Cold-War, it’s been turned into an R&D facility: ten times as secret.’

‘So how does an ex-US-serviceman know this about a top-secret MoD facility?’ Blake asks.

‘The MoD are only holding the note. They ain’t running the show.’

‘You were posted there,’ Blake deduces, trying - and failing - to keep a tone of accusation from his voice.

‘Yep,’ he confirms unapologetically. ‘Two years I was in that place. Saw some funky shit . . .’

He could go on, but who is that going to help, and besides, there ain’t the time.

‘I never saw any goddamn demons running loose, if that’s what you’re gonna ask. What matters is I know my way around - including a short cut to get in. That’s the good news. The bad is that we’re talking a mile and a half through the woods to get there -
before
you step into the heart of darkness. For that reason, I don’t expect to be inundated with volunteers . . .’

‘I’m in,’ Kirk interjects.

‘. . . which is why I’m just gonna tell you how it’s gonna be. You just told me you can’t drive, didn’t you?’

Kirk sighs.

‘That’s okay, because I want you minding the store until we get back. This fire should keep ’em away, and it’s gonna burn plenty yet, but anything comes calling . . .’

Kirk pats the chainsaw.

‘I’ll send them away with a flea in their ear,’ he says.

‘My man.’

Sendak then turns to Adnan.

‘How about you?’

‘Failed my test last month,’ he confesses. ‘But I
can
drive.’

Sendak checks the safety and tosses him the shotgun in a gentle arc. Adnan catches it one-handed.

‘Good enough. Four shots, four kills, way I heard it. That ratio puts you on this detail. I don’t need you to parallel park.’

‘Fair enough,’ Adnan agrees, already picturing the frag count on his HUD.

‘I’m in too,’ Blake declares. This prompts a look of grave concern from Heather, but they both know there’s no choice.

Sendak produces another set of keys from his pocket and strides towards the storeroom. Blake makes his way over to the pile of weapons recovered from Deso’s fiery rout. He crouches down alongside them and picks out a long-handled axe. When he stands upright again, he finds Heather beside him. She weaves the fingers of her right hand through those of his left and brings her face close to his: close enough, but not close enough.

‘Stay alive,’ is all she says. He’s sure she’s going to kiss him but she doesn’t. His heart is thumping. He’s disappointed, but also relieved. He’s not sure he could have left here if she had.

Sendak emerges from the storeroom with two bows, a long box full of arrows and a roll of tape.

‘Anybody knows how to use these things - and I mean really knows, not just which part you hold and which end you point - then be my guest.’

He then squats down next to the improvised flame-thrower and goes to work with the roll of tape. By the time he’s finished, it has Deso’s lighter strapped just beneath the nozzle at the end of the lance, the lighter itself rigged so that this little pilot light remains permanently burning.

Sendak stands up with the rig strapped to his back and gives a nod to Rocks and Radar, who are manning the barriers on the emergency doors. When he turns to make sure his detail are ready and assembled, he finds Rosemary standing in front of him with a bow in one hand, a knife in the waistband of her skirt and an improvised quiver round her shoulder, fashioned from a tennis racquet cover she found in the storeroom.

‘My family goes to Crieff Hydro twice a year. I’ve been doing archery there since I was nine. I’m in.’

‘That’s great,’ he says. ‘But I meant for here. When you see them coming, take out as many as you can, but make sure you get back inside and let these guys close the doors way before—’

‘I can drive,’ she says.

Sendak’s expression is equivocal. She can tell this didn’t quite sell it.

Rosemary fleetly draws an arrow from the bow and plugs George W Bush from close to twenty metres away at the other end of the hall.

‘You’re hired,’ he tells her.

Having added a driver, Sendak beckons Blake across. He addresses him quietly, glancing towards Heather as he speaks.

‘You know, you don’t have to do this, Father. I got what I need in terms of personnel, and I think that lady back there needs you more than either of you is entirely prepared to own up to.’

‘You could be right,’ Blake admits. ‘But the greater our numbers, the better everybody’s odds. Besides, there’s something
I
need too.’

‘What?’

Blake stares portentously at him.

‘Same as you. Answers.’

‘Yeah, but they ain’t gonna attack,’ Sendak asserts with calm conviction. ‘They’ve seen enough to understand what a shotgun and a flame-thrower can do. They just want to know what we’re up to with these things, and they’ll be content to see us take them away, because then they can get on with trying to break into the games hall and eat our friends.’

Vindicating Sendak’s judgement, their escort falls away, even before their route takes them out of the trees and on to open land. They pick up the pace now, their path clearer and more direct, though Sendak appears to be leading them towards a rock-face. When they make no diversion to skirt around it, Blake starts bracing himself for the prospect of a climb, though he doesn’t see how any of them are going to manage it while carrying their weapons.

‘Okay, everybody take a second, catch your breath,’ Sendak tells them.

Adnan checks the time on his mobile. It’s quarter past one. They’ve been travelling almost an hour. He wonders how long Cam’s got; how long any of them’s got. They found a blood-streaked police motorcycle at the edge of the road only a few minutes into their trek, confirming Sendak’s fears. The local bobby’s failure to report in may or may not trigger a reponse - who knows how much radio traffic is normal for round here in the middle of the night? - but at most it’s not going to be swift and it’s not going to make any difference. It’s all about the four of them now: no one else.

There is some thick vegetation growing along the foot of the rock-face, bushes and creepers climbing seven or eight feet in places. That will get them an easier start, but there’s at least twenty feet of bare rock to scale after that.

As the others wait in place on the coarse grass, their breath spiralling steam into the moonlight, Sendak strides on, heading straight for the wall. Blake watches keenly, assuming the military man is going to demonstrate some kind of climbing technique. Instead, Sendak takes a machete from his belt and begins hacking at the bushes in front of him. He tosses away a few branches and beckons the group forward.

‘Demon-hunters, party of three?’ he says, turning on a torch and directing it through the gap he has created, revealing the walls of a concealed crevice.

They venture in slowly behind Sendak, his torch now the only source of light in a very, very dark place, the passage before them disappearing into complete blackness. Adnan raises his shotgun, taking each step tentatively, while Rosemary notches an arrow against the bowstring and tugs it back.

The passage widens after a few yards, the torch playing back and forth steadily across the floor of what turns out to be a large cave. Sendak then draws the beam along one wall, looking for where it ends. The torch suddenly lights up a twisted and bloody face, its mouth open to scream. Adnan pulls his trigger in fright, finding it locked as he’s forgotten the safety. Rosemary, having no such obstacle, looses an arrow that goes through the mouth, pinning the head back against the rock. Sendak draws the torch down beneath the neck and picks out a military uniform.

‘Oh my God,’ Rosemary gasps. ‘It’s a soldier. I’ve killed him.’ Sendak brings the beam down just a little further, then cuts its path short when it briefly discovers the glistening viscera spilling out from the soldier’s abdomen.

‘No,’ Sendak assures her. ‘You’re a few hours late for that, but nice shot all the same.’

He resumes his scan of the walls and ground, then finds what he’s after. The beam focuses upon a metal panel lying on the floor of the cave, then he sweeps it a couple of feet to one side and picks out the hatch it was previously covering.

‘This is where they got out, I’m guessing.’

Adnan keeps his weapon trained on the hatch, remembering the safety this time, while Sendak crouches down and points the torch through it.

‘Let me check it out,’ he says, disentangling himself from the spraying apparatus. ‘Gimme the gun.’

Adnan hands over the weapon and guesses he’s not the only one to feel that bit more vulnerable as Sendak disappears out of sight, leaving them in almost total darkness.

There is almost total silence too, a long few seconds of listening to each other breathe, before soft sodium light erupts from the aperture. It is followed shortly by Sendak’s face.

‘Step into my office,’ he says.

They follow Sendak along a narrow, concrete-walled passage, which takes them to another, wider hatch and another ladder, this time plunging a long, long way down through an enclosed shaft.

‘We must be miles from where Kirk found that MoD sign,’ Blake says quietly as they descend. ‘How big is this place?’

‘Big,’ Sendak replies.

‘Bloody typical,’ Adnan mutters. ‘Why is it that when the military have to host something dangerous, they stash it in bloody Scotland?’ He puts on a fake upper-crust accent. ‘“What’s that? Polaris? Thames Estuary? No thank you.”’

‘Adnan?’ Sendak interrupts him.

‘What?’

He puts a finger to his lips.

Adnan cans it, and the ensuing silence is filled with a pulsing sound, low and powerful, which gets steadily louder the deeper they go.

At the foot of the shaft, they reach a sturdy metal door, which is visibly vibrating on its hinges with each throb.

‘Brace yourselves,’ Sendak says, and Blake thinks for a moment that he’s talking about how much louder the noise will get when the door opens. However, it’s not the sound that Sendak meant them to prepare for, but the sight.

They emerge into a wide corridor. The lighting is low: a few fluorescents are flickering, but most of them are completely smashed. What light there is illuminates a scene of true Stygia. There are body parts scattered across the floor: arms, legs, torsos, heads, a couple of slain demons, and blood everywhere. The walls are sprayed; the floor is awash with it.

Rosemary sucks in a loud gasp, feels her head swim.

‘Keep it together,’ Sendak tells them. ‘We’ve seen worse shit tonight, and we’ll see worse yet.’

Rosemary reaches out a steadying arm against a wall and closes her eyes. She puts herself back in that shed, with Deso. It’s just for a second, but it’s enough. When she opens them again, she’s ready to go on.

Sendak is standing amidst a pile of butchered flesh. Instead of mere disgust, it is consternation that is writ lividly upon his face.

‘What’s wrong?’ Blake asks, like there could possibly be anything
right
about this scene.

‘Where the hell were these guys’ weapons?’

‘They must have been taken by surprise,’ Adnan suggests.

‘Yeah, but . . .’ Sendak examines a single bullet hole in one wall, probing it with his finger. ‘Looks like all they were carrying were side arms. I don’t get it.’

‘Father,’ says Rosemary. ‘You need to see this.’

Blake turns to observe that she has progressed a few yards down the corridor and is standing over another mutilated body, lying halfway out of a doorway. As he approaches, he sees the dog collar, just like his own, around the corpse’s neck, but that’s not why she has alerted him. On the half-open door is a coat of arms: cross keys beneath a triple-crowned mitre.

‘This is a Vatican symbol,’ he announces, glancing from the insignia to the sign above the door frame stating: ‘Authorised Personnel Only’.

Blake nudges the door open further, but Sendak grabs his arm. Blake moves aside to let the Sarge go first, the spraying lance and its twinkling cigarette lighter preceding Sendak’s entry.

Blake is about to step over the body and venture through the doorway when his progress is halted a second time, this time by Adnan scuttling low to crouch over the dead cleric and wrest something from his hand.

‘What are you doing?’ Rosemary asks in disgust.

Adnan holds up a keycard, wiping blood from it on the thigh of his jeans.

‘Sharp thinking,’ Sendak approves.

‘I play a lot of
Doom
,’ Adnan explains. He opts not to add that he is actually playing it in his head right now, it being the only way he can get through this without turning into a gibbering jelly.

Sendak leads them along a narrow blank passageway with a sliding double door at the end, also marked with the Vatican symbol, this time above a bar of printed text. He nudges at the barrier and finds it locked.

‘Looks like the Church were running the show,’ he states with some disquiet. ‘How does that work? “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith”,’ he reads aloud. ‘Mean anything to you, Padre?’

‘That’s the Vatican arm in charge of investigating the supernatural, ’ Blake informs him.

‘Figures.’

‘Though it’s what it used to be called that’s most ominous.’

‘Do tell.’

‘The Holy Inquisition.’