Pastworld (27 page)

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Chapter 56

Catchpole and Bible J finally pushed themselves out through the hoarding at Moorgate station. They had searched the remains of the Fantom’s lair. There was nothing but a chair in the middle of the ticket hall with ropes attached. There were the remains of some food stores and enough weapons and ammunition for a siege, but nothing else, not a living thing except some newly emboldened rats.

They had no direction to follow now and the crowds were dense. Even getting through them was likely to be difficult let alone catching sight of the Fantom. There was a moment of silence and anticipation. The crowd around them pointed and looked upwards, raised their hands, excited. High above them a tethered passenger airship was dropping thousands of leaflets that fluttered and swung around in the cold air. Catchpole picked one out of the air and read it aloud to Bible J.

M

A GRAND DEMOLITION!

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M

WELCOME TO THIS TENTH ANNIVERSARY PARTY IN CELEBRATION OF PASTWORLD. THE MOST SUCCESSFUL THEME PARK IN HISTORY. THE PLACE WHERE PEOPLE COME TO LIVE THE LIFE OF THE PAST, WITH ALL ITS CERTAINTIES, PLEASURES, AND DELIGHTS; BUT YOU DON’T NEED TO BE TOLD THAT, BECAUSE YOU ARE HERE ALREADY!

M

THE SPECTACULAR DESTRUCTION OF THIS, THE LAST OF THE 20TH-CENTURY BUILDINGS, TOWER 42, WILL SHORTLY TAKE PLACE. YOU ARE ADVISED TO STAY WELL BEHIND THE SAFETY BARRIERS. PLEASE ENJOY THE FIREWORKS AND THEN JOIN ME, ABEL BUCKLAND, FOUNDER AND CEO OF THE BUCKLAND CORPORATION, IN BIDDING FAREWELL TO THE LAST ARCHITECTURAL ANOMALY STILL STANDING IN PASTWORLD.

M

A
BEL
B
UCKLAND

M

Catchpole threw down the leaflet. ‘Tower 42. The Fantom was there just recently. He was caught by our security cameras. That will be the place.’

They moved off through the crowd towards Tower 42. Danger signs were everywhere, but luckily the bobbies on the perimeter were all distracted, looking up at the two passenger airships in the sky and the still scattering leaflets.

Catchpole and Bible J squeezed in through the fence and the hoarding and on across the wasteland into the stairwell of the building.

Catchpole led the way up the first staircase using the beam from the borrowed police lamp. They continued to climb floor after floor until eventually they found themselves in a long corridor full of debris, abandoned tools and carefully placed explosive charges. Catchpole kicked aside the mech rat that scuttled over and it hit the wall. ‘If you’re monitoring any of this, then that’s for you, Hudson, old friend,’ he said.

Outside, on the temporary platform, Abel Buckland stood enjoying the muted sounds of the crowd rising up from the city far below them. Using his hand-held device, Buckland set off the first rocket of his great firework display. It shot upwards and exploded high in the air in a great white burst of light. The light revealed the Fantom who stood fully masked, his cape billowing in the wind.

It was then that Eve stepped forward. She walked almost to the very edge of the building and held her black-sleeved arms out wide from her body. ‘No, Eve,’ Lucius called out, fearing that she was about to leap or fall from the building.

‘Eve,’ said the Fantom, and he let go of Lucius carelessly and in a rush so that Lucius lost his footing and slipped down on to the uneven surface of the roof itself. He huddled there, holding tight to a twisted steel beam.

‘Dad,’ Caleb called out in fear.

‘I’m all right, ’ Lucius called back. ‘Hold on and don’t move. I’ll save you.’

‘Rather save yourself,’ said the Fantom and aimed a cruel kick at Lucius. His boot flicked across the top of Lucius’s head, narrowly missing him.

Caleb shouted from his frozen position. ‘Leave my father alone or I will use this.’ He waved the long-barrelled gun uncertainly in the Fantom’s direction.

The Fantom laughed. ‘Sadly the recoil will send you straight down to the ground, my poor little brother, so go ahead and fire.’

The Fantom reached over and held on to Eve. He lowered her arms carefully, slowly, tenderly, so that finally they stood close together, on the very edge of the building, like lovers in an embrace, high on the very edge of the world.

Buckland called out excitedly, ‘The charges have been set, and in a short time, after the sirens, the building will simply be no more.’ He switched something on the device. More fireworks, bright rockets and fountains of colour lit the sky.

Buckland raised his device and signalled with three quick flashes of white light across the gap towards the smaller of the airships. The ship moved out from its position and slowly approached the building.

Lucius Brown crawled gingerly back from the edge, keeping low to the platform on his knees, his elbows tucked in and his head down.

Catchpole and Bible J stepped out on to the roof. Catchpole shouldered his rifle, and aimed it in the direction of the Fantom and Eve. Bible J called out, ‘Eve,’ and she turned her head a little and smiled across at him.

‘Let her go,’ said Bible J.

The Fantom swung round and saw a man with a rifle and another boy with a gun, a rough-haired boy with a familiar face. ‘Of course, the black book, the Bible – the boy is called Bible something,’ said the Fantom.

‘Let her go, come to me, Eve. I . . .’ said Bible J.

‘Eve is mine,’ said the Fantom, ‘made for me. You have no understanding of this creature. She and I are linked for ever, linked in love and death in a way impossible for you to understand.’ He turned Eve so that she faced Bible J back across the jagged roof braces.

‘This young man has called for you to go to him. Perhaps you should show him who you love. She has been made, programmed especially to respond to me. She can never resist me no matter what happens.’

Then Eve took the Fantom’s hands and placed them around her own throat. She tilted her head back with her eyes closed in an image of surrender, of submission. Eve and the Fantom teetered together on tiptoe on the brink. The Fantom, inscrutable behind his mask, and Eve seemingly the swooning, willing victim.

Lucius Brown, unnoticed, had crawled over to Caleb, who still stood on the girder. Lucius stood and helped his son down on to the more solid roof platform. Caleb hugged his father fiercely.

Sgt Catchpole picked his way across the roof and stopped some feet short of Abel Buckland. He spoke. ‘I now know the truth about this whole sorry mess, Mr Buckland. I have read Inspector Lestrade’s files and personal notes and I know about the Prometheus project.’

‘I do not have to answer you, Sergeant Catchpole. You are an employee of the Corporation. I order you to arrest these youths, who are threatening my life and the lives of my characters.’

‘Do they really have lives?’ Catchpole said.

The small airship had reached the edge of the building. Inspector Prinsep’s pale face loomed out of the cabin port. He raised the vessel up so that the gondola door was easily accessible, directly above the roof platform.

‘We are leaving,’ said Buckland. ‘You must arrest Lucius Brown and his son for their own safety. Take them somewhere secure. The other youth is a known criminal, a felon, and may be shot at will. I should hurry if I were you. This building will not be here for much longer.’

‘Caleb,’ Catchpole shouted, ‘take your father now and get off this roof. Go now, straight down and don’t stop. Save yourselves at least.’

‘So,’ said the Fantom, ‘you will run away, Father, and leave us. Well, you may run, but you cannot hide for ever from me. I will find you.’

‘They’ll be under tons and tons of modern rubble if they don’t get out before this place goes down,’ Buckland shouted.

Sgt Catchpole fired his rifle once so that the bullet struck Buckland’s hand and his remote control device shattered. Fragments of it sprayed out into the darkness beyond the roof. Blood streamed from Buckland’s hand and he fell on to his knees moaning.

‘You will regret that,’ said the Fantom calmly.

‘It was inauthentic,’ said Catchpole. ‘It didn’t belong in here at all.’

‘I will cut you and then take out your heart while you are still alive.’

Catchpole swung the rifle across to point at the Fantom.

‘You won’t risk a shot – surely not with the lovely Eve so close to me.’ The Fantom pulled her closer still.

‘Go, Caleb, and go now,’ said Bible J.

Caleb took his father’s hand and pulled him towards the narrow staircase to begin their descent. Lucius called out, ‘All my fault, all my fault, the ghost in the machine.’

The cabin door stood open on the hovering airship. Inspector Prinsep stood in the doorway. ‘This way, sir,’ he said.

Buckland crawled his way across the roof, whimpering and holding his damaged hand in pain, and Inspector Prinsep managed to pull him into the cabin.

Buckland, out of breath, called back to the Fantom, ‘Come with us now, and bring your Eve with you. This thing holds four very comfortably.’

Caleb took a last look back at Eve. She was outlined in a sudden green burst of light from an exploding firework. Her bright eyes were fixed on Bible J.
Eve is his girl
, Caleb thought.
I must let him save her
. He gave a little wave at Eve as if he were leaving her standing at a bus stop, not teetering on the edge of life itself, six hundred feet in the air.

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Chapter 57

Bible J kept his pistol trained on the Fantom. It glinted in the reflected light of the continuing fireworks.

He took a step forward and the Fantom took one step closer to the edge, pulling Eve with him one step closer to the abyss.

The Fantom gestured out across the city rooftops. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘look at the marvels of Pastworld.’

The gun trembled in Bible J’s hand. The Fantom hummed a tune to himself, under his breath.

‘Have you ever jumped from this high, ever fallen free?’

‘No,’ Bible J said through clenched teeth. He was furious, powerless, armed but with no chance of taking a clear shot.

‘I have many times. Why just the other day I jumped from this building. You should try it. It’s quite a feeling.’

‘No, thank you.’

‘Put it this way. It’s either jump now or stay and be swooped up by my ragged men. Come on now, lad,’ he said. ‘Join us.’

There were repeated shots from the stairwell.

‘Here come my reinforcements,’ the Fantom said grinning.

‘All of your ragged men were slaughtered tonight,’ Catchpole called out, ‘every last one of them. Lestrade’s work.’

For a split second the Fantom hesitated in his reaction. He looked down at the city far below them, and tightened his grip on Eve.

A brighter white light flared up for an instant, and there was a roar from all the Gawkers milling about below.

Buckland called out from the airship, ‘That was a warning signal. There will be a siren or two and then the building will be blown. Come inside, Adam, and bring Eve with you.’

The Fantom moved to step up into the gondola of the airship, but at that moment Bible J jumped forward and held on to him with one hand as tightly as he could, bunching the windblown flapping cape around the Fantom’s waist.

‘Let her go,’ Bible J screamed. ‘I love her.’

The Fantom turned, one arm still firmly wrapped around Eve. He raised his free arm. An ivory-handled razor flicked open and the blade caught the light. The razor flew downwards towards Eve’s exposed throat just as Bible J thrust his own head in the way.

‘Adam,’ Buckland shouted from the airship. ‘Now. Quickly.’

Bible J fell down on to the roof. He slipped forward, blood pumping from his neck. The Fantom raised both his arms. He still held the razor. It was high in the air, and it dripped an arc of blood. Eve stared up at the Fantom as if she were magnetically attached to him. She was aware Bible J had fallen injured, possibly dead, beside her. It was then that something was released in Eve, and the spell was broken. She screamed fiercely in the Fantom’s face. She resisted him. She broke free and crouched down next to Bible J, cradling his bloodied head. With the sudden chance of a clear shot at the Fantom, Catchpole fired his rifle several times.

Inspector Prinsep threw a stun grenade from the airship. A muffled explosion shocked the air around them. Catchpole was knocked off his feet. The crowd below roared.

The Fantom, with almost calm deliberation, just stepped off the edge of the building out into the open air. He made no attempt to climb into the open door of the airship gondola, which in any case had been pushed clear of the building by the shock wave from the grenade.

He went into free fall.

Buckland screamed out something which was lost to the wind as his creation fell. The swirling air rushed past the Fantom, and his black cloak billowed out behind him. The Fantom pulled at something, a little hooked handle on a lanyard across his chest. He was jerked upright as his bright scarlet parachute rippled and blossomed above him in the surrounding grey air. He slowed in midair. He became, for a moment, a puppet dangling on a string. He drifted towards the crowds and the cobbles with a strange slowness, floating towards the Gawkers and the wet roadway below. Inspector Lestrade watched the red blossom as it fell and signalled to his army of cadets to move in.

Amid the noise of the cheering crowd came the rattle of cab wheels, and a black closed cab driven by the last of the ragged men swept through the crush. The harsh scrape and rattle of iron rims rang unnoticed against the cobbled road. The warning siren sounded again. From somewhere close, echoing from the high hard walls, came the sound of police whistles. Then another siren sounded, and was answered by another. The Fantom ran forward across the wet cobbles, a ragged sleeve reached down from the closed hansom cab and pulled him up, and then the cab careened off down an incline and away from the crowd and into the fog with a great panel of scarlet fabric trapped and flapping behind it.