The Monster Within (20 page)

‘Hmm…what?' Jack said.

‘Take a look.'

Jack and Scarlet leant in, looking for elevator ropes and machinery. Instead, they
saw complete blackness.

‘What is it?' Jack asked.

‘I can tell you what it's not,' Mr Doyle said. ‘It's
not
an elevator. It's as phony
as everything else.' He examined the other elevator shaft. ‘This one's the same.'

He led them over to the Occupants Directory. ‘Three of these companies—Rydor Cement,
Jaguar Cogs and Eclipse Printing—went out of business decades ago. A building in
this part of central London should be fully tenanted. Or at least show some signs
of life.'

‘Are you saying those businesses are frauds?' Scarlet asked.

‘I'm saying this
building
is a fraud.'

Mr Doyle led them up the fire stairs to a cast iron door with a complicated locking
mechanism. Producing his lock pick, he went to work on it.

‘This is quite complex, but with a little luck…' A click came from the mechanism.
‘We're in.'

Pushing the door open, they came into a dark room. Mr Doyle's hand raked the wall
for a switch and a row of gas lamps sprang to life.

‘My goodness,' Scarlet cried.

It was a laboratory. Benches covered in Petri dishes and racks of test tubes lined
the walls. The place smelt of disinfectant.

‘What is this?' Jack asked.

‘A research facility belonging to the Darwinist League, I imagine,' Mr Doyle said.
‘Most of the building is probably like—'

He stopped as a rumble came from below.

‘Is that another explosion?' Scarlet asked.

‘It sounds like it,' Mr Doyle replied.

They made their way back down the stairs. Just as they reached ground level, two
police officers appeared.

‘What are you doing here?' the first asked. His name badge read
Constable Hope
. ‘This
building's off limits.'

‘We're checking on some experiments we've been running,' Mr Doyle said, heading towards
the basement. ‘Shouldn't be too long.'

‘You can't go down there,' said the second officer, a man named Jefferson. ‘There
are gas leaks in the area.'

‘Then there'll be a disaster if we don't turn off our equipment.'

The policemen glanced at each other, undecided. Giving them a cheery smile, Mr Doyle
marched past. Jack shot Scarlet a panicked look.
Where are we going?
But he said
nothing as the police followed them.

‘You can only stay a minute,' Constable Hope said. ‘The whole area's being evacuated.'

‘I thought I heard another explosion,' Mr Doyle said.

‘Not at all,' Jefferson said. ‘It was just the building settling.'

Downstairs, they headed down a long corridor. Jack's heart was dancing a tango.
What
will the police do if they discover Mr Doyle doesn't work here?
Would they be arrested
again?

‘You officers must be excited about the policeman's ball,' Mr Doyle said. ‘It's next
month, isn't it?'

‘It is,' Jefferson confirmed. ‘Always a good party.'

‘Fancy dress again?'

‘Absolutely. Everyone likes getting dressed up.'

Mr Doyle stopped in front of a door, reached into his pocket and started searching
for a key. ‘Oh dear,' he said. ‘I've really got to do something about this coat.'
He dragged out an alarm clock, a box of mints, a book about butterflies, a ruler,
a skating shoe, a human brain made of rubber, two eggs, a pack of cards and a miniature
chess set. ‘Do you mind?' he asked, handing them out to everyone. ‘I'm sure they're
here somewhere.'

By now, everyone's hands were full. Reaching deep
into one pocket, Mr Doyle produced
a bronze statue of the Eiffel Tower and a pair of handcuffs. The bronze statue he
handed to Constable Hope, slipping one of the cuffs over his wrist. The other cuff
he secured over Jefferson's wrist, linking the men together.

Hope reached for his gun, but Mr Doyle landed two rapid punches to his jaw, then
Jefferson's, and both men fell senseless to the floor.

‘Mr Doyle!' Jack cried. ‘What are you doing? They're the police!'

‘If they're the police,' Mr Doyle said, ‘then I'm the man in the moon.'

He took out his lock pick, quickly opened the nearest door and turned on the gaslights.
Dragging the two unconscious men into the room, he pointed to their shoes.

‘Notice anything unusual?' he asked Jack and Scarlet.

They peered down. The men were wearing boots that were
very
scuffed.

‘Police officers never wear boots,' Scarlet said. ‘And certainly not in that condition.'

‘And the policeman's ball?' Jack said.

‘Six months ago,' Mr Doyle said. ‘And it's never fancy dress.'

They left the men handcuffed and locked the door behind them. At the end of the corridor
was another set of stairs. Construction sounds came from below.

‘What's going on here?' Jack whispered.

‘A robbery,' Mr Doyle said, ‘but of what, I'm not sure.'

Downstairs, another corridor lay ahead, but this time there were half-a-dozen people
in lab coats sprawled motionless on the floor.

‘Dead,' Mr Doyle pronounced as he hurried over. ‘All shot.'

Scarlet pointed at another bloody figure down the corridor. ‘He's still alive,' she
said. ‘Quickly!'

It was an elderly man with blood flowing from his stomach. Mr Doyle staunched the
wound. ‘Can you tell us who you are?' he asked.

‘Clayton,' he groaned. ‘John Clayton.'

‘What's happening here?'

‘They're after…X-29.'

Jack shot Scarlet a look.
X-29
. That was what John Fleming had been asking them about.

‘We'll get help,' Scarlet said.

‘No time,' Clayton said. ‘You must stop them… there is only one vial of potion…and
it must not fall….'

His eyes froze and he fell still. ‘We need to proceed with extreme caution,' Mr Doyle
said. ‘I don't know what X-29 is, but these men will kill for it.'

Just as he spoke, a police officer rounded the corner. Spotting them, he went for
his weapon, but Mr Doyle already had Clarabelle in his hand.

A bullet whizzed over their heads. When Mr Doyle fired back, the officer turned and
fled.

‘Quickly!' Mr Doyle said. ‘And keep your heads down!'

They raced to the corner. More men were at the far
end. A huge metal door, like a
safe, was open: papers and laboratory equipment had been scattered about the floor.
A ladder led to a manhole in the roof. Two men were climbing it, while a third, at
the bottom, turned and fired.

Mr Doyle fired back, wounding the gunman in the leg. But somehow he managed to drag
himself up the ladder.

Jack, Scarlet and Mr Doyle found themselves at the bottom of the massive hole in
Pudding Lane. Another ladder took them up to the street, where they glimpsed the
imposters disappearing around the side of a building. One turned and fired.

Jack and the others gave chase. As they started across the road, Mr Doyle grabbed
Jack and Scarlet and pushed them behind a steamcar.

‘Dynamite!' he yelled, pointing at a smoking stick in the middle of the road.

Ka-boom!

The blast sent brick, glass and mortar in all directions. Jack's ears pulsed. In
an instant, the busy London street had been transformed into a war zone. People,
moaning and weeping, lay all over the footpath. A cart was on fire. Two steamcars
vented steam.

‘Look!' Scarlet said, pointing to the sky.

An airship took off from the building, then swung around and out of sight.

‘They've escaped,' Mr Doyle said. ‘And they've taken X-29 with them.'

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

‘Ignatius Doyle! You are the last person I expected to see.'

But Jack and Scarlet were equally surprised to see Thomas Griffin. After ambulances
had taken the wounded to hospital, they'd traipsed back to Pudding Lane to find the
MI5 agent on the street with a group of other men. Jack and Scarlet had met Griffin
during their first adventure with Mr Doyle. He had helped them track down an organisation
known as the Phoenix Society, and saved London from certain doom.

‘It's a small world,' Mr Doyle said. ‘But not that small.'

‘So it's no coincidence you're here?'

‘Nor you, I imagine.'

‘Then you may have some information for us.'

‘Information is a two-way street.'

Griffin gave them the address of a nearby pub and said he would join them once he
had organised his people at the blast site. Mr Doyle took a seat and ordered tea.
It wasn't long before Griffin appeared.

‘It's been a while,' he said, shaking Mr Doyle's hand warmly.

‘You remember Jack and Scarlet?' Mr Doyle said.

‘Of course.'

Mr Doyle formed a steeple with his hands. ‘You would have received notification from
me regarding John Fleming,' he said.

‘Yes,' Mr Griffin said. ‘Thanks for that. It came as quite a shock to us that Fleming
had defected to SCAR.'

‘SCAR?'

‘Secret Commercial Armament Resources—SCAR—is a mercenary organisation that auctions
new technology to the highest bidder,' he explained. Turning to Jack and Scarlet,
he said, ‘SCAR and Domina are rival organisations that deal in stolen weaponry.'

‘So what exactly is being auctioned?' Mr Doyle asked.

Griffin hesitated. ‘What I'm about to tell you is top secret,' he said. ‘It's information
known to only a small number of people. At the conclusion of the war, the Ministry
realised that things could have gone quite differently for England. Certainly, with
the help of the Americans, we were able to defeat Germany and restore
peace to Europe.'
He paused. ‘But the Ministry wanted an edge. Something that would put us ahead of
the game.'

‘War isn't a game,' Mr Doyle said.

‘I know your feelings, Ignatius,' Griffin said. ‘But sometimes it's them or us, and
I'd prefer us any time.'

‘So what sort of weapon did the government want?' Jack asked.

‘The Department of Defence wanted to develop a weapon that would be the ultimate
fighting tool. Over the years, they have created new and devastating ways of killing.
Better guns. Better artillery. Better bombs. But the one thing that has always remained
the same is the soldier. In two thousand years of warfare, the individual at the
heart of a war has remained unchanged.'

‘But how can you improve the soldier?' Scarlet asked. ‘A person is only a person.'

‘Unless they are turned into something more. And that's what X-29 was all about:
a potion that would turn a man into the ultimate warrior. Of course, the Department
of Defence gave that task to—'

‘—the Darwinist League,' Mr Doyle finished.

‘Indeed. A special section was set up. Its mission was to develop a potion that would
increase human strength, speed, senses and endurance.'

‘And was it successful?'

‘Not entirely,' Griffin said, frowning. ‘The early experiments, conducted on laboratory
animals, produced positive results. When it was tested on a human, unfortunately,
the results were less successful.'

‘Who was the guinea pig?' Scarlet asked. ‘Whoever would volunteer for such a dangerous
test?'

‘What they required was someone who would not be noticed if the experiment was a
failure.'

‘You mean,' Mr Doyle said, ‘if they died.'

The MI5 agent nodded. ‘They intended to use a convict destined to die on the gallows,'
he said. ‘But the scientist in charge of the project would not agree to using a person
in such a way.'

‘So what happened?'

‘The scientist took the potion himself.'

‘And?'

‘The potion worked: he grew larger, stronger and faster. His hearing, sight and other
senses increased tenfold.'

‘So X-29 was a success.'

Griffin pursed his lips. ‘No, it was not,' he said. ‘The man was better in every
way, but he was also terribly deformed by the mixture. Realising what he had become,
he went berserk, tearing the laboratory to pieces. Eventually, he disappeared. We
tried to track him down, but how do you catch someone who has become superhuman?'

‘My goodness,' Mr Doyle said, angrily. ‘The games our government plays make me sick
sometimes.'

Mr Griffin ignored him. ‘The Darwinist League continued working on the potion,' he
said. ‘We recently received notification that it had been perfected. It was ready
for human trials, but now it has been stolen.'

‘How did SCAR and Domina find out about it?' Mr Doyle asked.

‘How do these people find out anything? There was a leak.'

‘Can we see the lab?' Mr Doyle asked.

Griffin led them to the underground safe where the robbery had occurred. Files and
cases were upturned. There was broken glass everywhere. The thieves had turned the
place upside down searching for the potion.

‘So how is the Valkyrie Circle involved?' Jack asked. ‘How do they fit into all this?'

‘That's a very good question, my boy,' Mr Doyle said. ‘And I believe the answer is
very simple: they're not.'

‘What?' Scarlet said.

‘It's too much of a coincidence that the bombing should occur here,' he continued.
‘You may recall the Valkyrie Circle sent threatening letters for years without actually
causing any violence. Then there was a lapse when they made no contact at all.'

‘It looked like they'd disbanded,' Jack said.

‘Which they probably did,' Mr Doyle said. ‘SCAR or Domina probably found out about
the Valkyrie Circle and realised they could use them as a cover.'