Knees Up Mother Earth (38 page)

Professor Slocombe issued, panting, into the car park.

“Now?” the chauffeur enquired.

“Give him just a moment. His cohorts will join him.”

A moment passed.

John and Jim did issuings.

“Now,” said William and the limousine slid away.

“Go back,” the professor told Pooley and Omally. “I can deal with this.”

“I don’t believe that you have a car,” said John. “Do you number levitation and swift flight amongst your remarkable achievements?”

“I’ll hail a cab.”

“Not necessary,” said John, spying Norman’s van. “We’ll take this one.”

“Second level secured,” called Sponge Boy. “Let’s take the third.”

Up the stairs they went. And down the stairs came Hellish things to greet them. Hellish dark things, darker than dark, of a blackness that had no specific name: the dark and scaly minions of the dread Lord Cthulhu. Sponge Boy and Terrence blazed away, and bullets blessed by the professor and coated with Old Pete’s sacred herbs issued from their weapons at six thousand rounds per minute. Dark things melted into light and were gone.

“Get a move on, John,” shouted Jim. “He’s gone. We’ve lost him.” John, Jim and the professor were squeezed into the front seat of Norman’s van. John was frantically attempting to hot-wire this van.

“It won’t start,” cried John. “I don’t know what’s wrong with it.
Bloody van
!”

Norman’s van burst into life and did its
brrrm, brrrm, bmmming
.

Unnoticed by John, Jim or the professor, a mysterious figure with a large carrier bag scuttled across the car park, opened a rear door of Norman’s van and slipped inside, closing the door soundlessly behind him.

John Omally put his foot down. “Go on, you beauty,” he cried.

The engine of Norman’s van spluttered and died.

“
Bastard
!” cried Omally.

Norman’s van burst into action once again.

“I recall Norman telling me about this,” said Jim. “You have to shout at the van. It works on road rage, or something.”

“Move on, you *****,” and John Omally’s language took a turn for the deepest blue.

And Norman’s van got a hurry up and hurtled in hot pursuit of William Starling’s limousine.

William Starling was on his mobile phone. “Building compromised?” he was saying. “Intruders now on level ten? Speak up, damn you. I can’t hear your voice above the alarms.”

Alarm bells were ringing in the Brentford Nick. Lights were flashing also upon a sort of hi-tech emergency board that had been installed there by a sort of hi-tech emergency technician who worked for the Consortium.

“Turn that damn thing off,” Constable Meek told Constable Mild. “I’m trying to watch the FA Cup Final here.”

“I’m trying to watch it, too,” replied Constable Mild. “You go and turn it off.”

Chief Inspectre Sherringford Hovis looked up from his viewing of the match. “Which lights are flashing?” he asked.

Constable Mild said, “Emergency ones – it’s the Consortium building in Chiswick High Road. There’s a pink light flashing, too. It has the words ‘TERRORIST ATTACK’ printed beneath it.”

Inspectre Hovis yawned. “Tricky,” said he.

“So what should we do, sir?” asked Constable Mild. “Press the panic button? Alert the lads from Scotland Yard?”

“Well …” Inspectre Hovis suddenly leapt from his seat. “Goal!” he cried.

Jim Pooley fiddled with Norman’s car radio. “Did you hear the word ‘goal’?” he asked. Static fizzings dissolved into the voice of Mr Merkin, live on Five Live.

“Four-three,” he bawled. “Incredible.”

“Four-three to who?” Jim asked. The radio fizzed into static once again.

“Bloody useless radio!” swore Jim.

Norman’s van leapt forward with renewed vigour.

There was a great deal of vigorous gunwork going on at the Consortium building. Black and ugly shapes bulged from black marble walls, minigun barrels rotated and spat bullets by the bucketload. The Campbell hacked down incoming darksters, the going was hideous and fire was beginning to take hold of the building.

Inspectre Hovis took hold of the telephone receiver. “Scotland Yard?” he said. “Sherringford Hovis, Brentford Constabulary, here. We have a Code One at the Consortium building in Chiswick High Road.”

“A code ten?” said the telephonist at Scotland Yard. “That would be a price request, would it?”
[52]

“Terrorist attack!” bawled Hovis. “Cross it to Lane, don’t hog the ball.”

“What?” asked the receptionist.

“Don’t let him do that. Foul, referee. That was a foul. What is the matter with you?” said Inspectre Hovis.

“I’m going to put the receiver down now,” said the telephonist.

“No,” said Hovis, “terrorist attack, Consortium building, Chiswick High Road. Send everything you have. Send ZZ9.
My God, ref, are you blind
?”

“Who is this, again?” asked the receptionist.

“Where is he?” asked the professor.

“Up ahead,” replied John. “I can see him heading on the road to Brentford.”

Now,
The Road to Brentford
, Bob and Bing never made that one. Which is a shame, because—

“Catch up and run him off the road,” said the professor.

“Professor,” said John, “this is a weedy A40 van. They have a limousine. It’s probably bulletproof.”

Jim Pooley tinkered further with the radio, then took to thumping it. “Stupid piece of rubbish!” he shouted.

Norman’s van accelerated.

“Oh and this is fast!” Mr Merkin was out of his seat once more and straining his voice into the mask-mic. “Landru to Lane and back to Landru again. Intercepted by Ricardo, no, it’s Rivaleno. Oh no, it was Ricardo. But to no good.

“Landru back to Lane. And Lane is on course, but no, Lane is down, brought down by Beckham. The crowd are on their feet. The ref is showing Beckham the yellow card. It’s a free kick for Brentford just outside Manchester’s penalty area.”

“Nice area,” observed Jim. “Is this Penge again?”

“It’s Southall,” said John, “but there are many similarities. Hold on tight, everyone. And get a move on, you useless piece of ****!”

The A40 van drew level with the limo. On the wrong side of the road, though, to the great consternation of oncoming traffic. Cars swerved and mounted the pavements, ploughing into kerbside displays of exotic fruit and electrical goods and saris and socks and Blu-Tack.

John slammed the van into the side of the limo.

A blackly tinted window swished down. The chauffeur’s hand appeared and offered John a finger gesture that in America is known as “flipping the bird”.

“
Bastard
!” shouted John.

Norman’s van gained speed.

“Have at you!” roared John, swerving in front of the limo and applying the brakes. The rear of the van struck home, upending its mysterious hidden occupant. Headlights shattered on the limo, but it accelerated, thrusting Norman’s van forward at alarming speed.

Ahead were red lights. Van and limo rushed through them. Vehicles with the right of way swerved and applied their brakes and mashed into one another.

“Exciting this, isn’t it?” said Professor Slocombe.

Jim Pooley cowered and ducked his head, still twiddling the radio’s dials as he did so.

John clung on to the steering wheel. “He’s going to have us off the road.”

They were approaching a junction, one of those T-junctions where you can turn either left or right, but there is nowhere to go straight ahead. Except directly into a building. A Gas Showroom, upon this occasion.

One of
those
junctions.

“Turn left here, I think,” said the professor.

“I can’t,” shouted Omally. “We’re going too fast. We’re going to crash.”

Behind them and grinding into the van’s rear bumper, the limo pressed onward, gathering speed. The driver’s eyes shone that blackest of blacks. His teeth ground together, teeth that were blacker than the blackest of blacks. His foot (in a green driving shoe, because he had verrucae) pressed further down upon the accelerator pedal.

“Left, please,” said the professor. “Left, please –
now
, I think.”

Omally, both feet on the brake and telling Norman’s van what a lovely van it was, heaved the steering wheel portside.

The van hit the junction, swerved and then rolled.

The limo rushed on towards the Gas Showroom building before it.

“Ooooo!” went John and Jim and the professor and the mysterious stowaway in the back as Norman’s van rolled over and over, scattering pedestrians and cyclists and oncoming cars and cats and dogs and a casual observer.

The limousine struck the Gas Showroom building before it.

A mighty explosion occurred.

Jim Pooley raised his head from a tangle of twisted limbs and body parts that were not his own.

“Am I dead?” Jim asked.

“Not dead,” came the voice of Omally. “Get your damned foot off my head.”

“Professor?”

“Fine, Jim – somewhat battered, but fine. The van seems to have landed the right way up, which is a blessing.”

“Untangle me,” said Jim. “There’s a hand in my trouser parts that is not my own.”

The Gordian knot that was John, Jim and the professor was finally cut with the aid of oncoming onlookers, or good Samaritans as they are sometimes called.

“Now, in my opinion,” began a casual observer. But he said no more, for Pooley swung open the passenger-side door and knocked him from his feet.

“Has anyone been listening to the match?” Jim asked the onlookers. “Anybody know what the score is?”

Professor Slocombe crawled from the van. “Your assistance would be appreciated,” he told Jim.

Jim Pooley hastened to oblige the scholar.

“The limousine,” said the professor. “Starling. Is he dead?”

Jim viewed the devastation fifty yards behind them. “Are you okay, John?” he asked.

Omally heaved himself from the van. “Battered but all in one piece.”

“We have to see if Starling survived,” said Jim.

“I’ll finish him off if he has.”

As the onlookers onlooked and the casual observer observed small stars and sailing ships and sausages and sprouts, the three front-seat survivors made their way towards the now open-fronted building from which projected the rear of the limousine. Smoke was rising freely and flames crackled around and about the wrecked automobile.

“Careful,” said the professor. “If he is alive, he won’t be pleased to see us.”

Jim Pooley took hold of a rear doorhandle. “It’s hot,” he said, blowing on to his fingers.

“Open it, Jim, but be careful.”

Pooley dragged open the door and peered into the rear compartment. It was very much of a mess, thoroughly mangled, and shards of twisted metal had ripped through the seats. But of William Starling there was nothing to be seen.

“He’s not in here,” said Jim. “He’s gone.”

A sudden cry of pain was to be heard.

The three men turned. Along the road, beside Norman’s somewhat dented van, they saw Starling. His clothes were torn, but
he
was still in one piece. The cry of pain had come from a motorcyclist whom Starling had unseated. As the three men looked on, William Starling climbed astride the motorcycle and swerved away at speed.

“Back to the van,” the professor cried. “And after him.”

“It’s all go nowadays, isn’t it?” said Omally.

“Maybe the crash will have got the radio working again,” said Jim.

Sponge Boy, Terrence and the Campbell were working their way steadily up the many floors of the Consortium building. Flames now roared beneath them in the stairwell.

The Campbell had a sweat on, but his claymore arm was still more than sound. He hacked away with a vim and vigour, cleaving darksters before him.

In his claymore-free hand, the Campbell carried a tartan holdall. Within this holdall lurked many pounds of Semtex.

“The crash and the explosion should have killed him,” said Jim, as John swore at Norman’s van and Norman’s van set off once more at speed.

“We are dealing with no ordinary man,” said Professor Slocombe.

“Who – or what – is he?” Jim asked.

“A man from another time,” said Professor Slocombe. “Another period of time – the late-Victorian age. He sold himself to the Dark Side, if I might put it so, and he should have died when the clock struck twelve midnight on the thirty-first day of December in the year eighteen ninety-nine.”

“Time travel,” said Jim. “Is that what all this has been about? Norman there bringing Brentford’s nineteen twenty-eight team to Wembley with the help of Mr H.G. Wells? This really is beyond belief.”

“I think I’m probably able to believe absolutely anything at all now,” said Omally, “no matter how absurd it may appear. And thus I think I’ll give up being a Catholic and become a Wiccan instead. Get on, you worthless ****.”

Norman’s van got on at the hurry-up.

“Another world existed in Victorian times,” Professor Slocombe continued, “a world of supertechnology, but it vanished from the pages of history. It was erased at the stroke of midnight, with the coming of the twentieth century.”

“This supertechnology,” said Jim, “is this the stuff that you mentioned to us? The stuff you said Starling needed to free the serpent from beneath Griffin Park?”

“The very same, Jim. William Starling should have died when the holocaust occurred at the turn of the twentieth century and all the supertechnology was destroyed. I do not know all of the details. It all has to do with alternative histories and alternative futures. Such things cause the mind to spin. Somehow some remnants of the super-technology survived, and Norman acquired them.”

“His patents?” said Jim.

“They were not
his
. Starling had accumulated his wealth because for a period he had been able to travel freely from his present into our present. Consequently he knew what to invest in, and he knew what would happen before it did so. But then, I am not without knowledge and I was able to predict what would occur – including the arrival of my old friend Mr H.G. Wells, with whom I have had the pleasure of spending many delightful chess-playing evenings over the last few months whilst Norman worked on repairing his Time Machine. The one in the back of the van here. I hope it didn’t take too much of a knock in the crash.”

Jim shook his head, but it didn’t help to ease his confusion. “Are we nearly there yet?” he asked.

“Nearly,” said John.

“Can’t you catch up with Starling?”

“He’s riding a Harley Davidson,” said John. “And I do not know swearwords of sufficient obscenity to make this knackered old van keep up with a Harley.”

“I do,” said Professor Slocombe. “Press on.”

And Professor Slocombe spoke Babylonian cusswords.

And Norman’s van went even faster.

And William Starling’s purloined Harley soared into the car park of the Consortium building. Smoke issued freely from the shattered windows on many levels Starling stepped from the motorcycle and gazed up at the conflagration. And words issued from his mouth. Words of no language spoken by man. Words of the language of the Great Old Ones.

The language of the Lord Cthulhu.

Starling reached into an inner pocket of his ruined jacket, drew out a pistol, tore the jacket from his shoulders and flung it aside. And then he stalked across the car park and entered the unholy building.

“Unholy bastards.” Terrence blasted away at darksters that rose up before him. And then gun barrels continued to spin, but nothing issued from them. “Sponge Boy,” shouted Terrence, “I’m out of ammunition.”

They were on the topmost floor, advancing along the black marble corridor that led to the terrible room.

“Hate to be the bringer of bad tidings,” said Sponge Boy, dropping his own mighty weapon to the floor, “but I’m also out.”

“Never fear.” The Campbell hewed and slashed, and dark shapes shredded before him. “We have reached our objective. I will set the charges.”

“Then do it speedily,” said Terrence, “and we might get back in time to see the end of the match.”

“You’re videoing it,” said Sponge Boy.

“Yeah, but it’s not the same as seeing it live.”

Something alive that wasn’t alive, that lived, yet did not live, stirred behind doors that were adorned with scenes of abominable horror. Great eyes rolled evilly, batlike wings rustled, tentacles curled and twisted. A fearsome inhuman intelligence sensed danger. Tentacles rolled, forced open the doors and spread hideously about the Eye of Utu, between the cabinets of fossils, towards the outer doors.

The Campbell unzipped his tartan holdall and took from it explosives. Affixed these to the doors. Did primings and pressing of buttons. Little red liquid-display figures began their countings down.

“How fast can you laddies run?” asked the Campbell.

“Quite fast,” said Terrence.

“Well, you have three minutes to flee from the building.”

“
Very
fast,” said Sponge Boy. “Let’s do it.”

“Do it,” said the Campbell. “Do it now.”

“Come on, then,” said Terrence.

The Campbell shook his head. “Not I,” said he. “I tire. I am done with being a man. It never suited me well.”

“Come on,” said Terrence. “Don’t mess about now. Come with us.”

“Two minutes and forty seconds,” said the Campbell. “Run fast, wee laddies, run fast.”

Terrence looked at Sponge Boy.

Sponge Boy looked at Terrence.

And then they both turned tail and ran.

Very fast.

Mahatma Campbell raised his claymore and faced the doors behind which lurked the horror.

“Come at me, if you will,” cried he. “I am ready for thee.”

“Come on,” said the professor.

“We’re there,” said John, swinging into the car park. “And there’s the motorcycle.”

“There is little time left, John. What must be done must be done, and Starling must not stop it.”

John and Jim aided the ancient scholar through the shattered rear exit door, along a corridor and into the ruined foyer. Smoke swirled. The lads fanned at their faces.

“This place really has gone downhill since the last time we were here,” said Jim.

“Needs a bit of a face-lift,” said John. “They should call in that Robert Llewellyn Jones.”

“Isn’t he the bloke out of
Red Dwarf
?” asked Jim.

“No, that’s Craig David.”

“Charles,” said Jim.

“Charles Atlas?” said John. “I thought he was a body-builder.”

“No, that’s—”

“Stop,” said Professor Slocombe. “This is neither the time nor the place.”

“Sorry,” said Jim. “Just trying to keep our spirits up, what with impending death seeming so high upon the agenda at present.”

“I understand that.” Professor Slocombe peered into the swirling smoke. “Light,” he commanded.

The swirling smoke parted.

“Impressive, that,” said John.

The swirling smoke parted to reveal …

Mr William Starling.

“Take not another step,” said he.

Professor Slocombe took another step.

“No,” said Starling and he raised his pistol.

“Put that aside,” said the professor. “Face me as a magician, one magician to another.”

“I think not, Professor. You cannot be trusted. You have wrought great harm upon my premises. Hardly playing by the rules, was it?”

“That you would relinquish your financial hold on the football ground if the team that won the Cup. I feel, Starling, that you might have reneged upon that particular deal.”

“Which is why you waited until this hour to attack my master. Cunning, Professor. Very cunning.”

“The game is up for you, Starling. You have lost. Even now, above—”

“Your Scottish creature seeks to wreak destruction. He will be gone in but a moment. But you first.”

William Starling cocked his pistol.

Behind him, coming down the stairs, were Terrence Jehovah Smithers and the Second Sponge Boy. They put fingers to their lips and did furtive creepings.

“Gentlemen,” called Starling without turning his head, “please don’t even think about trying to take me from behind. Walk slowly around, please, or I will shoot the professor in the face.”

Terrence and Sponge Boy slowly walked around. “Sorry, Professor,” said Terrence.

“Starling,” said Professor Slocombe, “there are only moments remaining. Deliver yourself now, willingly, into my hands and I will deliver you from the evil that lurks within you.”

William Starling laughed. “Oh no,” said he. “I have plans, great plans. All this world will be mine. I have been into the future, seen it for myself. And I will go there again. All is preordained – that you should be here, at this time, that you should deliver Mr Wells’ Time Machine to me. It is in the van in the car park, is it not? You cannot kill my master. That which does not live cannot die. Your time has been wasted. You have come here only to die, that I should be rid of further annoyance from you.”

From above there came a mighty rumble. But it was not that of an explosion, rather of a titanic force that splintered walls and tore doors from their hinges. The Campbell fell back as tentacles engulfed him. He fought with ferocity.

With the ferocity of a Skye terrier.

The floor of the foyer shivered.

“My master stirs from his dreamings,” crowed Starling, “and now all of you will die.”

Tentacles whirled and whipped, penetrated walls, swept down staircases and lift shafts, curled through offices, down and down and down.

“But you die
now
.” Starling aimed his pistol at Professor Slocombe’s head and pulled the trigger.

“No!” John Omally leapt in front of the professor.

A single shot rang out and John Omally fell to the shaking floor of the foyer.

John Vincent Omally.

Entrepreneur and Ladies’ Man of the Borough of Brentford.

Was dead.