The Reviver (44 page)

‘First contact. With a dead race.’

‘They went to extreme lengths to preserve their knowledge for others. This will change everything, if you could just—’

‘Are you done with me?’

Andreas visibly gave up. ‘Yes.’ He stood and held out his hand again. ‘No hard feelings, Jonah. Please.’

Jonah looked at the hand. He didn’t glance Barlow’s way, but he had an uncomfortable feeling that Barlow was enjoying this.

He reached out and took Andreas’s hand in his.

Darkness.

Smoke surrounded him.

The cities are burning,
a voice said.

He heard screams. The smoke began to clear.

The sight was shocking. He was in the open, a vast dark wilderness. Wind screeched around him. The sky was black. Far ahead, tall glass pillars, huge pillars that must surely be buildings but like none he’d ever seen, stood wreathed in flame.

He looked down. People running far below him. He couldn’t make out their faces, faces that didn’t make
sense
somehow.

A great hand reached out and down. The hand was a claw. Whatever it touched, smoke billowed from the contact. The people screamed.

Stretched out on the desolate ground before him was a vast shadow.

He wanted to turn his head and see what was casting it, but then he realized: the shadow was his own. The claw was his own. He opened his mouth and cried out, the roar of triumph enough to make the ground shake.

The shadow has come,
a voice said.

Jonah released Andreas’s hand. The vision had taken only an instant, he knew. It had been raw and real, and deep fear had come with it. For the voice had been Lyssa Underwood’s, and the shadow was the creature that had spoken through Alice Decker.

The final confirmation. Tess was wrong. He looked into Michael Andreas’s eyes and the creature was there.

Andreas stared at his own hand, clenching it until the knuckles whitened.

Jonah stepped back. He looked at Will Barlow now, who was awestruck, taking in the change that had come over Andreas.

‘Is it …
done
?’ Barlow asked.

Andreas brought his head up slowly and turned to Barlow. ‘I’m
weak,
’ he said, almost trying out the words. ‘He’s strong. He resists, even though he doesn’t know it. Patience. Tomorrow. Perhaps sooner. And then always.’

Jonah watched them, frozen, dimly aware that it was Andreas’s true self that was being referred to. Barlow knelt, took Andreas’s hand and kissed the back of it.

They both turned their eyes to Jonah, eyes filled with contempt and arrogance.

Andreas faltered, then stepped back to sit on the bed.

Jonah felt the door handle at his back. Instinct told him not to turn his back to them, but a deeper instinct was shouting at him to run. ‘Whatever you are,’ he said, ‘you’ll be stopped.’

Barlow laughed. ‘Really? By what? Tess and her friends? They forgot what they were. Lost and silent in the dark, the eons stripping them of identity. I want to see their faces when they remember.’ He stepped forward.

Jonah’s fear became terror, his legs threatening to fall from under him. He turned, grabbed the door handle and yanked it open, running out straight into Tess, her hand reaching up to the door.

‘Jonah?’ she said, startled. ‘I was coming back to…’ She trailed off, looking past him, her face creasing with worry. Jonah turned and saw Andreas slumped on the edge of the bed, half-supported by Will Barlow. Andreas’s eyes were open, confused, but the creature had gone from them. For now.

‘Help me,’ said Barlow to Tess, and she ran to Andreas’s aid.

‘What –’ she started, but Barlow shot a look at Jonah.

‘It was Miller. He was
ranting
at him, Tess.’

Tess looked at Jonah, disappointment verging on anger.

‘Tess,’ Jonah began, ‘I have to tell you what—’

‘Don’t even
start,
’ she said, walking through and closing the door in Jonah’s face, leaving him in the corridor with the guard.

Jonah went to open it again, but Barlow came out, shutting it fast behind him.

Barlow spoke to the guard at the door. ‘Take him back. Lock him up. They talk to nobody, not even you, understand?’ He turned to Jonah. ‘You should be ashamed, Miller.
Ashamed.
’

And knowing that the guard wasn’t looking at him, Will Barlow smiled his triumph at Jonah, and in his mind Jonah could hear again the victory roar of the creature on those blackened wastelands.

*   *   *

When Jonah returned, Annabel half-ran to the door to embrace him. He saw the relief in her eyes, and in Never’s. Relief that he had come back at all.

As he told them what had happened, their faces lost colour with every word.

‘Andreas – the
real
Andreas – is fighting it,’ he said. ‘The moment that fight is lost, I think we’re out of time. How’s your plan, Never?’

‘It’s all we
have,
is how it is. We wait until the building’s at its quietest, say three or four. Then we cross every finger. Jonah, what the fuck is Andreas? The vision you had – was that of what’s
going
to happen?’

Jonah thought of the huge glass pillars on fire, and of the faces below him that he couldn’t make sense of. ‘I think that happened a very long time ago, Never. The cataclysm Andreas spoke of. When their own world was destroyed.’

‘“Knowledge preserved”,’ Annabel said. ‘That was how Andreas put it. Warnings for those who would listen. Perhaps the warnings were about this creature.’

‘Well,’ said Never. ‘That’s a
brilliant
fucking warning.’

Jonah shook his head. ‘They were out there longer than we can imagine. Maybe they were a lighthouse, there to warn others off. But after long enough, after they forgot their own purpose…’

‘They became a beacon,’ said Annabel. ‘Drawing us in.’

*   *   *

They waited. All Jonah’s requests to speak to Tess were ignored.

They turned out their light and pretended to sleep, waiting in fear as midnight approached, the time Andreas would present himself to the Unity group.

‘If ever there was ominous timing,’ Never said as the hour came and went.

Jonah wondered if Andreas was still himself.
Tomorrow,
the creature had said.
Perhaps sooner. And then always.

They could hear the guard posted outside their locked door, laughing with other guards; cans of beer opening, relaxing as the end of their odd assignment drew to a close. Payday getting nearer.

At one in the morning, the guards discussed doing building rounds. Every hour on the half hour, they said, and sure enough at one-thirty the guard outside the door left, returning after fifteen minutes. The same thing happened an hour later.

When the guard left at three-thirty they made their move.

They quickly stuffed their sleeping bag decoys. With Never taking the lead, the up-and-over into the neighbouring office was fast and quiet, a feeling of edgy commitment in the air as they took their turns.

The plan was simple enough. They would make their way to a store room Never had noted while being led to the showers, and jury-rig a small fire in a trash can or other container to create as much smoke as they could manage.

They waited until they were certain there was nobody around before moving from the office.

Jonah took the door handle and was about to open it.

‘Wait,’ whispered Never. Jonah stayed still, listening. A moment later he heard it too. Footsteps. He did as he was told and waited. The office they stood in was dark, and his face was in shadow, but he had a good view of the corridor. A woman walked past, white-coated and purposeful.

‘Late worker?’ he said. There was something familiar about the woman but he couldn’t place her. Striking features. Almost beautiful, but her eyes too close together, her nose too long and thin. He shrugged off the feeling; shrugged off too the mild hint of thirst that followed it.

‘I’d assume anyone left in the building is either part of Unity or part of security,’ said Annabel.

Jonah waited, then grasped the handle again and opened the door.

It took another minute for Never to lead them to the storage room. ‘DANGER’, a sign on the door read. ‘Storage area. Authorized personnel only. Safety protocols must be observed.’ In smaller print below was an extensive list of safety directives and the words
Corrosive, Flammable.
‘Here we go,’ Never said, reaching for the handle.

Annabel shook her head. ‘Won’t it be locked?’

He turned the handle and opened the door a few inches, grinning. ‘I’ve worked in labs before,’ he said. ‘You only lock doors if stuff gets nicked.’ He pushed the door wide.

The store room had ten ranks of ceiling-high open shelving. Behind them, the door closed silently as they made their way along, passing a set of fire extinguishers. Boxes of protective clothing, lab wear and low-tech equipment gave way to electrical and electronic devices. What seemed to be a computer junkyard was along one shelf, and it drew Never’s attention for a moment. At the back of the room, one wall was taken up entirely with four huge metal cabinets, labelled with familiar warning symbols, and dozens of containers. In the corner was a small sink with a single faucet and a bottle of saline wash. Above the sink was a notice with instructions on dealing with chemical injuries. Knowing what he was after, Never opened door after door until he found it. Jonah and Annabel stood patiently.

‘Right,’ said Never, three large bottles at his feet. ‘Sorted. We need something to light it with. There may be flint gas lighters around; if not I can get any handy power socket to make all the sparks we need. You two hunt around. I’m going to get something nasty.’

Jonah squinted. ‘What do you mean?’

‘We want plenty of smoke, but if someone comes along to investigate, we want it acrid. Then maybe they’ll not come close enough to see it’s just a few bins on fire. Anything corrosive will do. The rest’s just detail. Chuck it on carpet, plenty of acrid smoke. Just don’t breathe it.’ He went to open the next cabinet and the door came off in his hand. He balanced it back in place. ‘Oops…’

Jonah shook his head. ‘Try not to destroy the place.’

‘Not my fault if their maintenance people are shit,’ Never said, bending down. He gave a little cheer and took a bottle out. ‘Formamide,’ it said. ‘Highly corrosive.’ The shelf above had smaller plastic bottles of methylated spirits. ‘And one for luck,’ he said, taking one of them, and as he did, he swore, pulling back. The bottle of meths fell from his hands, thudding to the ground. Annabel jumped.

‘Be careful!’ she said.

‘There’s, ah, something in there.’

Annabel and Jonah stared at him, then leaned down to see where he pointed. Tucked in behind the bottles was a small plastic box, wiring visible through the plastic.

Annabel stood. ‘Jesus … is that…?’

‘It’s a box with wires,’ said Jonah, his mind racing. ‘What do
you
think?’

‘Shit,’ said Annabel. ‘Hannerman must always have had someone on the inside, after all. And if they couldn’t stop Unity from going ahead…’

Jonah thought about Hannerman’s file – an obsessive nature, always having a backup plan. Now that Unity was complete, the only option left was to destroy them all.

‘We stick to the plan,’ said Never, staring at the device buried in all those bottles of flammable liquid. ‘We get the lighters we need, then we set off the fire alarms and make it convincing. They’ll evacuate but we’ll be well gone. Agreed?’

Jonah nodded, but he was torn. He knew that a big part of him wanted Andreas dead. That if he was honest, it might just have been Tess’s presence that was stopping him from torching the building himself. But there was something else. Those with Unity were perhaps the only ones who could ever know what Andreas really was, if only the memories would return to them. Perhaps they were the only ones who could stop him.

‘Agreed,’ said Annabel. She and Jonah walked to the end of the row of shelves.

Then they heard the storage room door click and squeak gently as it opened.

Annabel and Jonah were standing in plain sight of the door. Jonah raised his hand, palm towards Never. Stay back, the gesture said. Stay still.

The woman Jonah had seen in the corridor entered.
Shit,
he thought. The one that he’d thought looked familiar. The thirst he’d ignored had surely been a warning from Daniel, because he could see it now.
Striking features. Almost beautiful, but her eyes too close together, her nose too long and thin.
Long blonde hair in the picture he’d seen of her, standing beside her brother.

Yes, Hannerman did have someone on the inside, all this time,
he thought.
And God knows how she managed to do it.

The woman was Hannerman’s sister. Julia.

When Felix Hannerman had died he had taken himself out of the reach of revival, just as his colleagues had done. But it hadn’t been a last, pointless statement of defiance, Jonah realized. He had known he was badly injured, maybe close to death. He couldn’t risk being captured or revived. He had killed himself to protect their last hope. His sister. Waiting until all of Unity was in one place.

And just like Jonah and the others, she had waited until the building was at its quietest, its residents least alert. Until they were most vulnerable.

Julia Hannerman saw them. ‘Don’t move,’ she said, her voice timid and wavering.

‘Please, Julia. We can help you,’ said Jonah. ‘Lower the gun.’

34

‘Please. I know who you are, Julia. My name is Jonah Miller. They’ve been keeping us prisoner.’

Julia Hannerman took a step forward to allow the door to close behind her. ‘I know. I know everything that goes on here.’

‘This is Annabel Harker. You know what happened to her father.’

Julia Hannerman looked down momentarily.
Guilt?
Jonah wondered.

‘Please,’ Annabel said. ‘We just want to get away from here.’

Julia’s gun dipped down for a moment, but she raised it again, determination visible on her face. ‘This is the only way. They’re all here now, all sleeping five floors above. The fire system is disabled. External security overrides are inactive. All the fire exits have been sealed.’ With her free hand she reached into a pocket and produced a handful of empty tubes, which she threw at Annabel’s feet.