Department 19: Battle Lines (67 page)

The impact was enormous. Cracks raced across his visor’s surface, disabling its thermographic view as Jamie was lifted off his feet and sent tumbling through the air, his eyes rolling, his head a ball of agony. He landed hard on the tarmac and slid along the alleyway on his back.

Never been hit like that,
he thought, as he tried to force his limbs into action.
So strong. So much power.

He reached up with a shaking hand and pushed his visor back. His ears were ringing, and his brain felt slow and stupid, like it was no longer working properly. He forced his eyes open, looked down the alleyway, and felt fear tighten round his heart.

The blackened figure of Alastair Dempsey was walking towards him, a smile on what was left of his face.

He shouldn’t even be able to stand. My God.

Jamie pushed himself backwards along the ground. His Glock had fallen from his hands as he was thrown into the air and he fumbled at his belt for something, anything he could use. He pulled the beam gun and saw glass fall from the end of the cylinder; he turned it round and stared numbly at the shattered remains of its bulb. His hand closed round the grip of his MP5, but even in his desperate state he could not bring himself to pull it free. Firing the submachine gun a stone’s throw away from a crowded Soho street was far too dangerous to consider, no matter what it might cost him. Then his fingers brushed the handle of his T-Bone; he yanked it out of its loop and brought it round before him.

Dempsey wasn’t hurrying. His expression was one of supreme enjoyment, the look of a predator as it approaches an injured animal. He walked steadily across the wet stone, his smoking, red-black arms hanging loosely at his sides. Jamie aimed the T-Bone and pulled the trigger. As the stake burst from the barrel, a single thought filled his mind.

This isn’t going to work.

The stake rocketed down the alleyway on a direct collision course with the centre of Dempsey’s chest, barely visible to Jamie’s eye. A fraction of a second before it crunched home, the vampire moved, sliding to his left as though it was the easiest thing in the world, and plucked the trailing wire out of the air. Jamie saw burnt skin peel away from his hand as he grabbed the hurtling metal cable, but Dempsey seemed not to even notice. He looked down at the wire for a moment, then jerked it up and back with a flick of his wrist.

Jamie didn’t even have time to think about releasing his grip on his T-Bone before he was wrenched up into the air again, his shoulders and forearms screaming in agony. He watched, almost incredulous, as the wet ground moved away from him, as his limp body seemed to float towards the waiting vampire, who reached up with what seemed almost like indifference and caught him by the throat.

His legs kicked and jerked, flailing away at nothing. He grabbed at Dempsey’s arm, tearing at the burnt skin, feeling it come loose in his hands like barbecued meat, but the grip remained utterly implacable. He could feel his throat being constricted and panic burst through him; there were grey spots appearing at the corners of his vision and he was suddenly tired, so very tired. His hands fell away from the vampire’s arm and dangled uselessly at his sides. As the darkness crowded in on him, as the last spots of light in the centre of his view of the world seemed about to turn black, Dempsey threw him against the alleyway wall, as casually as someone might throw a tennis ball.

The back of Jamie’s head smashed into the wall, his helmet the only thing that prevented his skull from cracking like an egg. The impact cleared his vision, bringing the world back into shocking focus. There was a loud crunch as he hit the wet bricks, before pain, stabbing and urgent, filled his torso and shortened his breath to ragged gasps.

Ribs
, he managed to think, as he slid helplessly to the ground.
Broken. Three or four of them. Maybe more.

Then a simpler, more primal thought filled his head as he saw Alastair Dempsey walk towards him.

I’m going to die.

The vampire strolled across the alleyway, reached down, and hauled him to his feet. Jamie tried to will his reeling, damaged body into action, to raise his arms and fight, but couldn’t do it; he had nothing left.

Dempsey peered at him, his burnt face even more awful close up; his eyelids were gone, as was most of his nose, and his lips were cracked and oozing in a dozen places. The skin itself was charred black, apart from in the places that it had peeled away, revealing mottled red beneath. The vampire smiled, his fangs emerging from behind his broken lips.

“You can’t be my friend,” he said, his voice a ragged growl. “I don’t play with men. But you’ll do for food.”

Jamie watched, his mind so overwhelmed by fear that he was incapable of even closing his eyes, of shutting out the terrible thing that was about to kill him. The fangs were vast and otherworldly; he waited for them to pierce his skin, wondering if it would hurt.

Crack.

Something hot and wet sprayed into Jamie’s face. Then the pressure holding him against the wall was gone, and he slid to the floor. He summoned some distant reserve of strength and wiped the liquid out of his eyes, in time to see Alastair Dempsey crumple on to the ground in front of him, a huge hole where one side of his head had been. Blood and brain gushed out, sliding across the wet ground, as the vampire’s eyes, their crimson fire extinguished, rolled back in his head.

He tried to take a deep breath, grimacing at the pain from his broken ribs, and slowly turned his head. Ellison was walking down the alleyway towards him, her Glock raised, smoke curling upwards from its barrel. She didn’t run, or lower her weapon; when she arrived in front of him and pushed her visor back, she kept the pistol trained on the motionless body of Alastair Dempsey.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “Are you hurt?”

Jamie grimaced, and forced out two words.

“Stake him.”

Ellison nodded. She drew the metal stake from her belt with her free hand, keeping her gun on the vampire, then darted forward and slammed it into his chest. The charred remains of Alastair Dempsey burst with a wet bang, splattering them both with blood. For a long second, Ellison kept her gun pointed at the gore-soaked patch of ground, then holstered her weapon and came towards Jamie, concern written across her face.

Jamie felt his broken ribs scream with pain as Ellison helped him to his feet; he clenched his teeth and tried not to let it show. He leant against the wall of the alleyway and took a low, shallow breath. The pain was bad, but he didn’t think the jagged end of one of his ribs had punctured a lung; he could breathe, just about.

Ellison took a half-step back, as he tried to force a smile on to his blood-smeared face. He felt no euphoria over the destruction of Dempsey. He just felt tired, and empty.

“Well done,” he said, the words little more than grunts. “Are you OK?”

Ellison shook her head. “No, sir,” she replied. “Not even close. Are you?”

“No,” he said. “I’m alive, though. Thanks to you.”

She managed a smile of her own, a fleeting expression that was quickly replaced by one of misery.

“Jesus, Jamie,” she said, her voice choked. “John… poor John. I just…”

He reached out, wincing at the pain, and took hold of her shoulder. “I know,” he said. “He was a good man and he deserved better. But we’re still here, Lizzy. And we have to keep going.”

“I keep thinking about it,” she said. “What he must have gone through… you know… before he—”

Jamie felt his heart break for her. “You always will,” he said. “You’re never going to forget him or what was done to him. So you have to
use
it. Use it to stop it happening to anyone else.”

She nodded. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry. I’ve seen awful things before, just nothing so…”

“I know,” he said, softly. “It’s OK.”

“We need to get you to the infirmary, sir,” she said.

Jamie nodded. He reached down and pressed a button on his belt, opening a line to the driver of their van. “Immediate extraction requested,” he said, grimacing with pain. “My location.” He twisted the dial and pressed the button again, re-establishing his connection to the Surveillance Division. “Clean-up required at previous location. Emergency services likely already in attendance. No supernatural exposure. Remains of Morton, John, NS304, 07-B require extraction and return to the Loop.” He twisted his comms system off and looked at Ellison. “Two minutes.”

Ellison nodded.

The two Operators stood in the darkness, their minds full of pain and loss, as the remains of Alastair Dempsey diffused into the rain and drifted towards the overflowing drains.

Pete Randall was standing beside the final conveyor belt, pretending to keep an eye on the men packing the newspapers and loading them on to the pallets, when he heard a deep growl emerge from Albert Harker’s throat. He looked up at the vampire and saw his eyes bloom their familiar glowing red, before he swooped down to the ground beside him.

“They’re here,” said Harker, a dreadful smile of anticipation on his face. “Three of them. They just arrived.”

“What are you going to do?” asked Pete.

“Why, kill them, of course,” replied Harker. “What did you expect?”

“You don’t care about any of this, do you?” said Pete, his voice trembling. “Everything Kevin told us, what you told us once we got to London. None of it was real, was it?”

Harker snarled, then lifted Pete off his feet with one slender hand, holding him in the air without any apparent effort.

“Don’t presume to tell me what I care about,” said the vampire, his eyes burning with red fire. “You could never understand what this means to me, how much I have suffered at the hands of the men we have set ourselves against. The difference between you and I is that I have the fortitude to do what needs to be done. I don’t snivel and whine at the first sign of adversity.”

“My daughter… died,” gasped Pete. “Is that… not… suffering enough?”

Harker laughed, a short sound that was little more than a grunt. “People die,” he said. “They die every day, when I was not even allowed that option. My life was stolen from me by the people who were supposed to care the most, men who I should have been able to trust unthinkingly. I would have traded death for the life I have lived, and traded it gladly.”

He released his grip on Pete, who crumpled to the floor, massaging his constricted throat. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Greg Browning watching the scene playing out in front of him. His new friend was as still as a statue, his eyes wide, but he said nothing.

“Keep loading the trailer,” shouted Harker. “I will be watching. If you stop, I will kill you. If you try to run, I will kill you.”

“We were never meant to survive this, were we?” said Pete. He was holding his injured neck, tears standing in the corners of his eyes. “Greg and me, and the rest of them. It doesn’t matter now, so just tell the truth, you bastard.”

Harker stared at him for a long moment, then raised a single finger to his lips. “Shhh,” he whispered, then flew straight up into the shadows at the roof of the building and disappeared.

Pete climbed slowly to his feet and faced the workers in the blue overalls. There was nothing he could say to them, nothing that could make what was happening any better. The five men held his gaze, expressions of awful resignation on their faces, then returned to their tasks. Pete watched them, impotent misery coursing through him, as Greg Browning walked slowly over and stood beside him. There was a long, uneasy silence, until eventually his new friend spoke, his voice barely a whisper.

“We’re going to die, aren’t we. All of us.”

“I don’t know,” said Pete. He was dimly aware that a role reversal had taken place, that Greg was now looking to him for answers. “Probably.”

“I don’t want to die,” said Greg, his voice choked with fear. “I know I said I didn’t care what happened to me, but I take that back. I don’t want to die.”

“Me neither,” said Pete. “Not like this. But if I have to, I want to take him with me. That’s all I can think of right now.”

“How?” asked Greg.

“Just be aware,” said Pete. “If a chance comes, it’ll probably be the only one we get. Be ready to take it.”

Kate led Matt and Frankenstein slowly between the towering aisles of machinery, the three Operators gripping their weapons tightly.

The noise was relentless; paper thundered through rollers and trimmers, as huge bars smoothed ink across it. The heat was overwhelming, and dust hung thickly in the air. Matt rested his finger nervously on the trigger guard of his T-Bone, glad his visor was hiding his face from his companions; he didn’t think he would be able to hide his fear without it.

Something moved, in the darkness near the roof.

Matt froze.

“What is it?” asked Kate.

“I don’t know,” he replied. “I thought I saw something. Up there.”

They waited, absolutely still, their T-Bones raised. Matt’s heart thumped in his chest, as he stared up at the distant ceiling.

“OK,” said Kate, eventually. “Let’s keep moving.”

They made their way slowly between the machines. Above their heads, a conveyor belt curved down and ran round a corner to their left. They followed it in single file, their weapons raised, and saw the huge room open up before them. The three Operators stopped, their uniforms disappearing into the shadows, and surveyed the scene.

Newspapers rolled endlessly down the conveyor belt, as men in blue overalls scurried to and fro, packing and bundling and loading them on to pallets. At the rear of the wide space, a row of rolling metal doors punctuated the wall; standing in front of one of them were two men in normal clothes. Their heads were inclined towards each other, as though they were deep in some vital conversation. Then one of the men looked up, and Matt heard Kate gasp.

“My God,” she said. “I didn’t really believe it.”

Pete Randall frowned, as though he had heard something, and whispered to the other man, who stood up straight. Matt felt the breath catch in his chest and stop.

His father was standing less than ten metres away.