Duplicity

Duplicity

By Ian Woodhead

Copyright Ian Woodhead, August 2012

Cover design by Dave Jeffery

Edited by Linda Ackerson

Electronic Edition License Notes

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Chapter One

The pretty little red-head was going through her tired speech, explaining to the group just how long the famous deep red stalactites had taken to form at the famous Cullbeck caves.

This would be the third time that Henry Collins had listened to this.

On the first occasion, he’d been stuck at the back of their group, bored out of his mind and alternating his thoughts between wondering if the tour guide was good in bed and just how delicious that first beer would taste once they got out of here.

The acoustic qualities of these caves, allowed the sound to travel for miles. Henry closed his eyes and pressed his back against the rough stone. He’d promised himself a few minutes ago that when he heard her voice, he wouldn’t scream out.

“I only want to go home.” He whispered, shivering.

The woman sounded as though she stood right in front of him. Henry guessed that he must be a mile below her now, hell she could be in the next cavern and he wouldn’t know.

Her voice faded, they were moving off, just one more famous sight to witness before she’d lead them out and into their over expensive tourist shop. He never found out what the other sight was; they didn’t make it that far.

Henry opened his eyes. He couldn’t believe it; he’d managed not to make a sound. When he and his wife had first heard that beautiful voice echoing through the tunnels yesterday, they’d both screamed themselves raw.

“Have I really been down here for two days?”

If Henry had known then what he later found out, he’d have stayed silent; maybe his wife would still be with him.

They had both moaned, watching in disbelief as five humanoid creatures detached themselves from the cavern wall. A luminescent green substance spotted their rough, sinewy bodies. They turned as one, their huge lantern orange eyes locked onto Henry. Bernadette’s moans turned to screams when the things jumped on the woman.

Her shrieking abruptly stopped when one of them grabbed her blonde curly hair and pushed her head into his slender grey chest, muffling the sound. Henry ran forward, growling, only to have the remaining creatures grab Henry. One placed his claw-like hands upon his shoulders; he felt just how cold the creature’s skin was through his dirty white shirt.

“Leave her alone!” Henry screamed.

“Leave her alone!” Repeated the creature, its voice perfectly imitating Henry’s voice. It then it kicked his feet out from under him.

The back of Henry’s head smashed into the cavern floor, he groaned and watched as the creatures dragged his screaming wife down one of the fissures beside him. Their sick green glow retreated, leaving blackness in its wake.

His eyes had closed. A combination of stress, fatigue and slight concussion knocked him cold for several hours.

Tears cleaned a narrow path down his cheeks when the vivid memory of those things stealing his wife returned. He crawled towards the fissure and howled when he saw that they’d plugged the hole with a large stone. Henry moved with growing desperation from one fissure to the next to discover they were all the same.

Henry opened his eyes and moved away from the wall, according to the dim readout from his phone, it had been five hours since he had left the fissures. Five hours of intense, searching and he had failed to find his darling wife or an exit.

“I’m so sorry, Bernadette. I should have listened to you.” He whispered.

He’d been so busy watching a tiny bat flying above him that he’d not noticed that the rest of the party had left them. By the time they turned back, the others were out of sight. Of course they was nothing to worry about, there was only one path, what could go wrong?

They reached an intersection a few metres further down the pathway. His wife had sworn that it shouldn’t even be there. Henry just knew that the others had gone down the left path, he could even hear the guide’s voice echoing down the cavern.

By the time he’d realised they had chosen the wrong path, they were both hopelessly lost.

Henry’s feet stopped by the edge, the ledge overlooked the precipice. He kicked a small pebble over the edge and unlike those fissures; the pebble took an age to hit the bottom.

How deep was it? A hundred feet or a mile, it didn’t really matter. The fall would do the job. Henry had never considered himself a brave man but he was a realist and knew a futile situation when he saw one.

Henry was going to die in these caves, just like Bernadette. If the hunger or thirst didn’t get him then those creatures certainly would. At least two of the things had been following him for the past hour, maybe longer. The occasional sound of a dislodged pebble scraping across the floor and a couple of flashes of green proved to Henry that he wasn’t wrong. Those evil bastards were following him like hyenas follow a wounded zebra. He didn’t know when they’d strike; perhaps they’d wait until he was delirious with thirst

Well, Henry wasn’t going to give them that opportunity; he would rather jump off here to deny them their meal. He shuffled his feet forward, until the edges of his shoes were over the edge.

“I know that you’re there!” he shouted. Henry started a little when his voice echoed through the rocks. He’d begun to cry again, he cursed his own cowardice. Henry had been so terrified that the creatures would rip him apart that he didn’t shout for help and yet here he was, ready to jump to his own death, and screaming at the bastards. Where was the logic in that?

A pair of long, grey arms peeled away from the rock near where he stood. The rest of the creature became visible. Henry must have walked right past it and not even noticed. There was movement all around him; the entire cavern appeared to be coming alive as seemingly hundreds of the things detached from the rock, like spiders clinging to walls.

The closest one took a pace towards him; it opened its long mouth and yawned. Henry cried out. A collective groan from the assembled creatures rippled out. It stretched out its arm. Henry gasped when he saw its fingernails were now painted in bright blue, the same colour as Bernadette’s fingernails.

Henry moaned and shook his head, he had no idea what was happening. He took a step forward, his feet lost purchase and he fell into the blackness.

His last sight was of his beautiful wife as he plummeted past her, she was clinging to the side of the wall.

Chapter Two

Six months later

Henry mumbled an apology and hurried away, eager to lose himself in the sea of shoppers on the busy high street. He knew he shouldn’t have said sorry. It wasn’t his bloody fault that the silly woman wasn’t looking where she was going, too busy yapping away on her mobile to pay attention to Henry.

Henry’s stress meter didn’t move up too far, it couldn’t. The damn thing was already at it’s highest level. After the traumatic event that he’d just endured, Henry was surprised that he wasn’t hiding under a table, shivering. He certainly couldn’t cope with another confrontation with another strong headed female.

He spotted a gap appear on the crowed pavement and stepped into it, he then stepped back into a shop’s alcove and sighed.

The woman had already gone, their near miss already forgotten. He wondered how many more innocent pedestrians she would mow down with that Sherman tank sized pram.

Oh, god, he needed a major shot of caffeine like a starving man craved food.

“But not pies.” He muttered.

No, not a pie, Henry shuddered. The incident on the bus earlier on suddenly ran through his mind. He forced in a lungful of cold air whilst distantly wondering if the big man upstairs enjoyed picking on him.

Henry couldn’t go into work in this state, he was a nervous wreck. He spun around at the sound of a bolt being slid back. Good lord, how convenient, Henry had taken shelter in the doorway of a café. Had the big man upstairs heard his plea?

A portly man in his early sixties, wearing a green and white striped apron opened the café door and twisted around the closed sign.

“Good morning, sir.” He said.

The man didn’t seem to notice how jittery Henry was.

“Well, I don’t usually have customers lining up outside my door. Not that I’m complaining, you understand. If you take a seat, sir; I’ll take your order in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.

Henry followed the old man into the dark shop and took a seat by the window.

“Is it coffee?”

Henry nodded.

“Not a problem, I’ll bring you one over. Oh, and don’t you fret over how dark it is in here. They’re on a timer, as soon as it gets to nine, my beautiful shop will be bathed in bright light.” He grinned at Henry.

His perfect grin remained Henry of a shark.

“It’s just like magic. Now you wait here.”

The man scurried off. Henry sighed, that fellow could talk for his county, he’d even put his wife, Bernadette, to shame. This shop wasn’t his usual haunt. He’d never been in this one before. If the bus was early, which wasn’t often, he would have gone to Starbucks directly across from the mill where he worked.

He gazed at the back room and wondered if he dared to sneak out of the shop while the man’s back was turned. All he wanted was a little anonymity, a little quiet and a big mug of coffee. Henry had visions of that bloke bringing him his drink and then sitting opposite him and telling Henry all his woes.

Hordes of early morning shoppers and workers streamed past the window. Each one wrapped up in their own little world. Henry doubted that any of them could be as stressed out as him.

The morning had started innocently, with no hints of his impeding calamity. Up at six, a cornflake breakfast, washed down with two cups of strong coffee. As per usual, Bernadette demanded a cup of tea before he left the house and as per usual, he complied. 

The bus he caught was on time for once and to break with routine, he decided to take a seat upstairs, that decision was when his day turned to shit. On most mornings, Henry enjoyed the journey into the town centre. The meandering route cut through the outlying villages broken up with large stretches of green. After Henry boarded, the bus didn’t usually make another stop until they reached the town centre.

He was on good nodding terms with most of the other passengers, hardly surprising, considering he’s been using the same route to work for the last eighteen years. Henry climbed the stairs to the top, secretly pleased to discover that he had the deck to himself. With a bit of luck, it would stay like that for the rest of the twenty-minute journey. The other regulars had all chosen their seats downstairs.

Henry needed a bit of solitude, some time to think. He was due to have his annual review this morning. He needed to compose himself, to get everything he was going to say, right in his head.

The departmental pay reviews were due next month and his rise hinged on him making a good impression, the meeting had been playing on his mind for the past week, he hated speaking in front of the management, come to think of it, he hated speaking in front of any crowd.

Henry gazed through the dirt-streaked glass, watching the landscape flow past. He was halfway through prioritising the decisions he’d taken that had increased his departmental efficiency when the bus lurched to a halt.

Henry’s heart sank when he watched a trio of teenage girls clamber on board the bus. That was just what he needed, Henry sighed. It was a guarantee that they’d all troop up here, claim the rear seats and pollute his silence with either a torrent of frivolous yapping or by playing horrible music on their mobile phones.

Well, as soon as they’d got themselves settled, Henry would go find a seat downstairs, sure the regulars would probable give him a couple of curious glances but it was better that allowing those girls to ruin his day.

He heard them laughing and giggling as they all climbed the stairs, it amazed him how anyone could have so much energy so early in the morning. Why did they have to be so bloody noisy? Henry was so glad that he and Bernadette had opted for the no-child option early on in their marriage.

Through the reflection, he saw the first girl reach the top of the stairs. She walked past Henry towards the back seats. Her other friends clambered to the top, laughing and giggling, Henry winced, they definitely had no concept of quiet. The middle one followed her friend to the back but the one at the rear stayed where she was. He watched the thickset girl, with wild strawberry blonde hair look directly at the back of his head, grinning.