The Stone Man - A Science Fiction Thriller (53 page)

“There,” he said to the soldier to his right, and gestured on the floor with his foot. As the soldier stepped forward and thrust a small metal stick into the ground, Paul couldn’t help but think how the man that had just taken instructions from him could just as easily have been instructed by someone else to put a bullet into his brain. He pushed the thought away and began to walk in a straight line, away from the stick in the opposite direction to the way he’d come. His thinking was, if the barrier area was really small, he might push farther if he had to, but would he need to? The walk from where they’d set off—next to the parked chopper’s landing gear—had been roughly forty feet. The choppers had landed as close to where he’d been standing as they could, and at the time he’d moved about ten feet away from the stile that he’d been sitting on. Paul did the rough maths as he walked:

So the helicopters were what, ten feet from me? And I’d been sitting on that stile for hours, and the barrier had probably gone up during that time … so that would make the stile and fence the line through the middle, as that’s where I was when it went up. So me about ten feet from the fence, and the choppers ten feet from me, and the barrier edge forty feet further out than that … that’s sixty feet.
Roughly.

Paul reached the fence again, relaxed on this side of it, and climbed over the stile, tensing as he did so. If the barrier was a circle, or even a square, he had roughly another sixty feet to travel to the opposite edge, but he was taking no chances. His hands went out, and he began his shuffling, nervous walk again, but with slightly less fear this time, knowing (to an extent, he couldn’t be certain) that he would have enough warning, that he should sense the edge of it before hitting it.

Eventually, the tingle came into his fingers and mind, and he breathed a sigh of relief and pointed at the ground with his foot once more. As the soldiers ran a rope between the two metal sticks, crossing the fence to do so, Paul looked at the distance he’d covered. He thought to himself that the sticks were placed at about an equal distance apart on either side of the fence. He realised dimly that the fence would, of course, have to be bulldozed away.

A short time later, after Paul had outlined the perimeter completely, the measurement came back: 133.6 feet on all sides. The perimeter was a square, after all.

They’ll play it safe,
thought Paul,
and that’s fine by me. They’ll operate on far less than that, allow for error. Operate within a hundred feet, something like that? Is that enough? That’s a big area, isn’t it? One hundred feet?

As he stood in the field, breathing hard with his heart feeling like it was beating in his throat, he watched the eight soldiers work (with the remaining two doing watching of their own, their eyes on him). The others were beginning to lay down markers, carrying out the extremely preliminary stages of what would become a mammoth operation to prepare the area in time. Already, the air was starting to fill again with distant noises—blades in the air and engines on the roads—and, far off, lights were again appearing in the sky, but many more than before. Unknown to Paul, the Prime Minister had thrown his weight behind the plan; the government response would show this, and it was already beginning. Paul tried to slow his breathing in order to calm himself, as he realised that he wouldn’t be doing anything now for many hours. How long did it take the Stone Man to walk to Sheffield last time? And how long had it already been walking? He didn’t know, but he was pretty certain that he had a long time to wait, and for most of that he would have to be out of the way; they would need to not only clear the
barrier
area of any obstacles, but secure the
surrounding
area. He wondered what they’d tell the media, and realised that they’d probably have to put some kind of cover over it as well, to guarantee blockage of any views from above. With Patrick, he guessed there hadn’t really been time for anyone to secure satellite footage, but this … barring any surprises (
you don’t know what it’s got up its sleeve, Paul
) could go on for years, and that would mean interest.

He started to take slow, deep breaths, and after a few minutes, if only for a moment, some of the old Paul—a stranger in his new life—came back, and he chuckled gently as he thought about the amount of work involved; all just to enable what was effectively an idiotically simple plan. The preparation of the area, land rights, media suppression, food and water supply chains, man hours, power, surveillance, security, funding … an immense amount of management, preparation and paperwork all to carry out a fundamentally basic, idiotically simple task.

The old Paul shook his head, and even though afterwards he went away and didn’t ever really come back again, he continued to chuckle quietly in the dark, a condemned man laughing at the absurd.

***

Chapter Nine: Execution

*** 

Paul looked at his watch for the third time that minute, and then went back to staring towards the large opening in the metal wall over one hundred feet away. Inside the hall—a construction that would be best described as hangar were it not for the absence of aircraft—it was relatively silent; none of the personnel were talking, of course, and the main sound was the hum of the industrial space heaters and various computer stations that lined the walls. The jeep’s engine was also ticking over—had been since he’d been put inside it—but it was a finely tuned machine, and so the noise from it was minimal. There was the odd burst of radio crackle now and then, with updates that had been coming more and more frequently since the last hour had begun, but Paul was sure that if he were closer to the command tent in the far corner—the only separate structure within the hall itself—he’d be able to hear plenty. From outside, Paul could hear the increasing and dropping whirr of distant helicopter blades as several of them exchanged positions far overhead, and the odd shout as various members of personnel called to one another, hurrying and bossing. Regardless, the lack of interior sound, combined with the horrendous anticipation, was maddening. No one had spoken to him directly for the last two hours, ever since he’d been put into place, and he hadn’t seen Straub again since she’d arrived. Even then it had been at a distance, and Paul was certain she’d deliberately avoided his gaze. His only usefulness was as bait now, after all.

Make the most of it,
the voice in his head said, cynically.
You don'’ know what that sodding thing's gonna do once this all starts.
The voice had a point, Paul had to admit. There were absolutely no certainties as far as the Stone Men were concerned, even with all the research and analysis that had been going on around the world for the last year. They were operating on the basis of mere assumptions, assumptions based only on what they’d seen so far and the small number of notable energy readings they’d managed to obtain. Those assumptions were now the thin, brittle surface that Paul’s life rested upon. Little comfort indeed, and even if all the prior theories were correct, they were no guarantee that his plan might yield any results.

As if it were the last thing he’d ever see (
probably is
, the voice added), Paul took in his surroundings again, trying this time to see the finer details, the intricacies of the clumps of dirt in the floor, the beauty of the mist haze surrounding the electric lights in the ceiling, the imperfections of the thin metallic walls. He failed. It still looked like a big metal barn.

The floor had been landscaped, at least as much as possible in the time available. The total, flattened area, levelled off to create as even a surface as they could, was a square of at least three hundred feet in diameter. Paul guessed they wanted room to manoeuvre should the need present itself. The corrugated ceiling was very high—for reasons Paul couldn’t guess at—standing at least one hundred feet. Though the winter sun was fully up outside, and Paul could see the grey, cloudy sky through the hastily-erected hall’s opening, the light inside was far brighter and warmer. A few jeeps were parked along the western wall, and at the end of the row—presumably in case an opportunity should present itself, despite being useless in the past—stood a tank. There were even two cameras, manned by a three-man crew, stationed at opposite corners. These weren’t courtesy of the media, Paul assumed; these were for the purposes of posterity and research. Being as cut off from the world as he was (
cut off again,
the voice said), he had no idea what the actual media knew of this, whether they were too busy covering the seven directions that the Stone Men had taken or whether they’d gotten wind of the operation occurring across two fields in Sheffield. He thought the latter was likely. The Stone Man coming for him would be close by now, he thought, and even if the media were just following its path they would have come across military interference and tried to find out why. Plus, securing the field would have taken some kind of interaction with the land owner—even if just to tell him that his field had been commandeered—and at the very least people living nearby would have noticed several army convoys, parades of earth-moving vehicles, and several helicopters hovering above.

Had there been a local evacuation? Paul had no idea. He’d been given a sedative and put under guard whilst they’d worked tirelessly through the night and into the next day (he’d been so tired by then that, despite all the adrenaline, his body was ready for it) so he hadn’t seen the actual process, but he’d heard the back end of it as he’d woken up. He hadn’t been allowed out of the tent that he’d been placed in for several hours after, but once he’d been led out for briefing and preparation he’d seen the small village of tents and plastic outhouses that had sprung up magically overnight. One or two members of personnel, even soldiers, had caught his eye for a moment and looked hurriedly away. Being bait might be contagious, after all.

The sight of the hall itself as they’d approached had been impressive indeed; not necessarily for its size, but for that fact that this huge, grey, thin-walled fortress (if that wasn’t a contradiction in terms) had sprung up overnight, squatting in the middle of the landscape like an ugly metal wart.

As he passed through its giant sliding doors (opened by manpower rather than machinery) and into the small command tent that stood inside, he’d felt a moment of claustrophobic panic and his breath had locked up in his chest. It felt like being dragged underground.

He’d sat patiently, and listened as his own plan was relayed back to him by men he didn’t recognise—even David wasn’t there, perhaps busy cleaning up other elements of the current Stone Man situation—and nodded at the appropriate moments. When asked if he had any questions, he had only two:

“What’s been arranged for when I need to sleep?”

“No solid plans for that part yet, as all resources have been directed towards preparing and securing the area prior to Caementum’s arrival. This will be addressed shortly.”

“How long, based on any info that you have, do you expect this operation to continue?”

Glances were exchanged.

“Currently?
Indefinitely.”

He’d been led out to the waiting Jeep, which then drove to the far end of the hall and turned to face the entrance. That had been two hours ago, and he’d been left pretty much alone since, apart from his silent driver and the two armed guards accompanying them. During this time, seen at a distance, Straub had made her arrival in the hall, flanked by her own small entourage. Paul liked to think that her lack of communication had been due to being too busy, but he didn’t really believe it.

Paul thought that the restraints weren’t necessary—his ankles were bound to the seat—but he could understand why. They didn’t know if he was going to panic, even if this was all his idea. Now they were committed to it, they needed him under control.

And now, with the time ticking away, he realised that his shirt was sticking to his back. He’d lost several of his layers before this all started—the inside of the hall was warm enough—but he was still sweating fast.

This will work. This will work. Those things don’t care about time. They expect all their prey to run straight into the web. Why else would they build the buggers so big? They’re designed to intimidate. Faceless. Unstoppable. Big.

More time passed, and the distant radio chatter changed from intermittent bursts to a constant stream.

Soon.
Oh Jesus, it’s almost here.

A squad of armed soldiers jogged into the hall in formation, and lined up along opposite walls, facing inwards. Through the entrance, Paul could see more and more people scurrying back and forth, final preparations beginning. After all, if the plan worked, they would have more time than ever to study the Stone Man.

I don’t want it to be the original. It will be worse if it’s the original. I’ve seen what it does.

A shout went up from outside, and almost at the same time the helicopter noise from above increased dramatically and stayed there, the choppers moving closer and assuming position. That was when Paul thought he felt the first heavy thud pass through the floor.

Wait, it’s here? It’s already that close? Oh fuck. Oh fuck.

Suddenly, the radio chatter stopped almost altogether, and the only time it was heard was when short bursts of unintelligible info came through in regular but spaced-out intervals. Paul thought it sounded like some sort of distance countdown. During this time, the thuds continued, gentle and barely felt at first, then growing (to Paul’s ears) into a solid, ground shaking series of dull booms.

This went on for what seemed to Paul like half an hour, but was in actual fact only six minutes. At the end of that time—and for the first time—Paul saw one of the soldiers inside the hall pick up his radio and send a message of his own. He was standing, Paul saw, nearest to the entrance and at the end of the line of men flanking the eastern wall. Paul heard his response, even at a distance, undistorted by radio noise.

“
Visual confirmed
.”

Paul stared frantically out through the open double doors, squinting to see any movement. All the running back and forth outside had now stopped, and were it not for the helicopter noise, Paul could almost believe that there was no one there. In his sight line to the outside world, there were no temporary structures, as obviously they’d calculated the Stone Man’s approach and wanted it clear. Now there was just the field beyond, seeming to stretch away for as far as he could see.

And then (at first, he thought he was mistaken, the faint suggestion of movement on the horizon seeming like a trick of the light, something incorrectly seen through a heat haze, a trick that then became more and more solid and proved to be something else) far off, a slowly rising dome came into view, small at this range but unmistakable. It continued to do so as it came up over the crest of the slope, becoming a head. Then a pair of shoulders, a barrel chest, a waist. The surface of its body was a greyish brown.

It’s the original.

It continued to rise into sight as it came, emerging slowly, its incredible size having impact even at this distance, something huge brought up from below like the remains of a sunken ocean liner. Now Paul could see its legs, see the feet come down in perfect rhythmic sync with the vibrations in the floor. It was the Stone Man, and it was there for him.

Reflexively, despite everything, Paul jolted from his seat, all thought gone from his mind but the unstoppable urge to run. Before the awestruck soldier next to him could move, he was up and his hands were on the edge of the jeep’s door. In a millisecond he would be swinging his legs up and over and then he would—

Clank.

The forgotten handcuffs on his ankles reached the full length of their extension, and jarred his legs back as he made to leap from the vehicle. His hands slipped on the jeep edge, previously supporting his entire bodyweight, and his suddenly unsupported chest went crashing down onto the metal. The pain was intense and immediate, and all of his air shot out of him, causing the world to go temporarily grey as his guard hauled him back inside the jeep. The guard’s radio was blaring, but Paul couldn’t make out the words as he tried to get air back into his lungs, eyes goggling and breastbone screaming. Two sets of hands gripped his shoulders now, but Paul barely felt them as he gasped and wheezed, staring out through the windscreen at the giant figure as it approached.

Whoever had calculated its trajectory had done their homework correctly. The oncoming Stone Man was almost perfectly framed by the huge doorway, a grim picture before Paul’s eyes that contained an image of relentless pursuit. The vibrations through the floor began to feel like distant war drums, and as Paul began to take on sweet, blessed air once more, he tried to dig deep and steel himself for the intense test of nerve that was about to begin.

You aren’t being fed to it,
the voice said.
You’re not like Patrick. They’re not just going to hand you over, and they aren’t going to double-cross you. They wouldn’t have bothered building all this shit for starters, especially when all they had to do was pull a trigger and end the problem. They’re committed to this. Their main concern is keeping you alive, that’s the whole point of this. You don’t know what it’s going to do once the plan is in motion, but you have some more time, at least. You have to relax. It WANTS you to be scared. Don’t let it win. Don’t let it win.