by Brian Lumley
Messing with the Mechanisms
THE LAWYER WAS AS TALL, PALE, AND ALMOST as cadaverous as Ian Goodly. That was where any similarity ended. For while in the precog’s eyes there was this warmth belying his looks, in the lawyer’s eyes there was only a cold, malicious glint. And he, too, was angry.
Shown or rather ushered into the cell by two burly, white-clad interns who then left and locked the door behind them, he stamped his feet, brushed himself down, then whirled and hammered on the door, shouting: “Who the hell do you people think you are? D’you think you can get away with this? Do I look as if I’m suffering from some mutant bug, some new strain of…of this Asiatic plague? I had my bloody shots the same as anyone else! Maybe they’re what put me down! So do I have to sue the bloody National Health Service, too? God damn!”
His pinstripe was crumpled, tie askew, shirt collar flapping loose, and he hadn’t yet shaved. Three days’ stubble made his chin look blue against the pallid parchment of his hollow cheeks. Now he whirled again, this time to face the youth who sat there looking at him. “And who are you?” he snapped.
“Don’t you go takin’ an attitude with me, mate!” said that one. “It looks like we’re in the same boat. They said as how I might ’ave contacted some-bleedin’-thing. Meself, I dunno what they’re on about.”
“That’s ‘contracted,’” said the lawyer, as he flung himself into the empty chair. “And what they’re on about—what they’re up to—is holding us in isolation against our will. Certainly against mine! Here,” (he dug in an inside jacket pocket to produce a card and passed it across the table) “If you’re in need of representation once we’re out of this place, contact me. By God, but these bastards are going to make me rich!”
“Well, I could certainly use some o’ that,” said the other, pocketing the card and reaching for a third skewer.
Then the lawyer patted his side pockets, shook his head in disgust, and pointed to the cigarettes. “Yours?”
“Naw,” said the youth. “’Elp yerself.”
The lawyer lit up, then reached over and drew the ashtray to his side of the table. His contact with the silver was only momentary, because it didn’t require to be any longer, but his expression never wavered. He showed no sign of pain or revulsion whatsoever, except at being detained in this place. And:
“So much for that theory, too!” said Doctor Burton [Page no. 168]01, the other side of the screen.
“Well?” Trask looked at Millie, and beyond her at the precog where he stood, then turned and looked at Chung. “Is there anything? Do we have anything at all?”
They said nothing, looked undecided, which he took to be a negative. But then Millie said, “And how about you? You’re the one who can usually tell the difference between true or false. So are they on the up-and-up, or what?”
Trask shook his head and frowned worriedly. “I’m stymied,” he said. “Maybe it’s because I’m looking too hard. Or it could be that I’m relieved it isn’t obvious. But in any case this is getting us nowhere and we’ve other things to do. So that’s it, we’re finished here.”
“Do you people always talk to each other in code?” Doctor Burton inquired, as he showed them out into the corridor where their driver was waiting.
“Er, we’ve worked together for many years,” Trask told him. “I’m sorry if we appeared to be rude.”
Not so much as rude but weird as hell! thought Burton, who had seen some weird ones in his time. But then Millie turned to him with a curious expression on her face and said:
“And we’re also sorry if we seemed weird. People are always accusing us of that!”
The two doctors accompanied them to the exercise yard, and as the team was getting into the back of the van Goodly paused, turned to Burton and said, “Please remember what you have been told. This visit hasn’t proved anything, that’s true—but it hasn’t disproved anything, either. You should watch all of those sleepers very closely. And the longer you detain them, the more closely you should watch them. If things are to develop at all, it may take some time.”
“Can you say how long it will be?” said the other. “I mean, before we can clear them? This facility has its priorities, you understand. We do have other work to do.”
And the Minister Responsible replied, “Of course we understand, but especially in a place like this you must understand that public safety and the government’s priorities come first. I’ll let you know as soon as I’m able. Until then, nothing has changed.”
“As you will,” said Burton, a little sourly…
On the way back to the chopper, Trask turned to the precog and asked, “Were you having second thoughts back there?”
“I was having thoughts, certainly,” said Goodly.
“Which is more than I can say for myself,” said Millie.
“And I got a kind of—I don’t know—mental fuzziness?” said Chung. “But nothing specific. Nothing I could put a finger on.”
“But it didn’t feel right, right?” said Trask.
All three of them could only shrug and look blank, and the Minister Responsible said, “I do hope I haven’t made a terrible mistake…or rather, I do!”
And Trask said, “But best to err on the side of prudence.”
And still unwilling to let it go, he went on: “Well, it didn’t feel right to me. Not at all!” And turning again to Ian Goodly, “What do you mean, you were having thoughts?”
“I mean I was wondering about something,” said the precog. “We know what effect the vampire’s bite has, also what happens to a victim who is totally drained of his blood, and even what occurs with the introduction of a leech into the human system. All such things are well documented. But where spores are concerned…we know so very little.”
“Go on,” said Trask.
“When I was a boy,” Goodly went on, “my uncle had a farm in Yorkshire. In the woods nearby was a large pond where the lower branches of the trees trailed in the water. I remember watching moorhen chicks hatching out in their nest. The first thing they do, these little fellows, after they’ve broken free of the eggshells—”
“—They jump in the water and swim,” said Trask. “I think I know what you’re getting at.”
“So do I,” said Millie. “The devious nature of the vampire. Is it inherited? Is it instinctive in them from the very beginning? Do they ‘know’ to protect themselves without knowing why? And is that what happens to these sleepers while they’re unconscious? Do they become aware, if only partly?”
“But that lad ate garlic!” said the Minister.
“Maybe the changeover isn’t complete as yet,” said Trask.
“And the lawyer touched silver.”
“But briefly,” said Trask. Then, sighing, he sat back. “The simple fact is,” he said, “that we don’t know. But one thing is for sure: we do know we can’t take any chances. Just as soon as you get the opportunity, I think you should call Burton and his colleague and make your point a lot more strongly. For example, I didn’t like the way those two interns just thrust that lawyer chap into the observation room. That was contact…and it was very close contact. I certainly hope the boffins at Porton Down are being a bit more careful.”
“So do I,” the Minister nodded.
And the precog said, “One other thing. I’m simply hazarding a guess, of course, but that sensation of pain that I was feeling…”
“What about it?” said Trask.
“Well,” said the other, “considering the sort of place that Bleakstone is, and also the volatile nature of its more regular inmates, if anything ever did break loose in there—”
“—The result would be a whole world of pain for someone,” said Trask, very quietly. “Yes, I see what you mean…”
In the observation cell in Bleakstone, the lawyer was quieter now. He stood up, took three paces to the large picture on the wall, pressed hard with his fingertips against the glass that covered it, and said, “Hmm, bulletproof! And it’s not simply a picture. It’s
very odd, but do you know I sensed them there watching us? They seem to have gone now.”
“I know,” said the pimply youth. “I knew they were there, too, but I don’t know how I knew.”
“Something is telling me we should watch ourselves,” said the lawyer, returning to his chair. “We must watch what we do and say, or we could find ourselves in big trouble.”
“But if we play it cool,” said the other, “sooner or later they’ll ’ave to let us out.”
The lawyer nodded, then cocked his head on one side in an attitude of listening, and said, “Ah! Those doctors are coming back. So let’s be patient until we find out what’s happened to us and what’s going on here…until we know why those others were…what, frightened of us?”
“Suits me,” said the youth. And, as the lawyer reached for the hors d’oeuvres, “Don’t! They’re not…not right for us.”
“Really?” said the lawyer, as he paused and picked up the cigarettes instead. This time he left the ashtray alone. There was a burning in his thumb and forefinger, and there was something about the ashtray that he didn’t like. But now they must stop talking, for the doctors were back in the room beyond the pastoral picture.
Then, when the youth stood up, the lawyer asked him, “Just where do you think you’re going?”
“That’s between me and Ma Nature,” said the youth, closing the toilet door behind him.
And all unseen, as quietly as possible while shuddering in every fiber, he emptied his seething, burning stomach into the toilet bowl…
Back at E-Branch HQ in the afternoon, Trask called Liz Merrick into his office and told her to close the door and sit down.
And without pause: “How are you getting on with Jake?” he asked her.
“As well as can be expected,” she answered, just a little stiffly. “And he hasn’t been looking at all sleepy, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“No,” said Trask, “and neither has Millie, thank God!”
“But if you’re worried about them,” Liz said, pointedly, “then surely you should be even more worried about me. I was with Vavara and her women for quite a while, and for part of that time I was unconscious.”
“Yes, and I’ve been with you most of the time since then,” said Trask, “and I do trust my own five senses—not to mention my sixth. You’re okay, Liz, I’m sure of that. But surely you must understand my concerns about Jake? And I’m not just talking about Szwart’s vampire spores.”
“But we’ve been over this before,” said Liz, “and Jake’s ready to take whatever tests you’ve set up for him. He’s more than ready—he’s eager!”
“That’s not the whole thing,” said Trask. “Look, I don’t want to get personal, but…I mean, I don’t quite know how to put this.”
“You don’t have to put it,” she answered. “You’ve already put it. You’ve been trying not to, but you’ve been thinking it ever since I walked in here. No, we haven’t slept together…not yet. But don’t think I don’t want to!”
Trask relaxed a little, and said, “Liz, I’m sorry. But you know we’re into this too deep now to let personal feelings get in the way. It’s just too important. And believe me, there are no words to express how relieved I am that you’ve had the good sense to—”
“—Good sense nothing!” she said, hotly. “I want him more than I ever wanted anything.” And now she was flushed and there was the silvery gleam of tears in her eyes. “Jake’s the one who is holding back. He is the one who’s got all the ‘common sense,’ the guts, fortitude, and bloody pride! Oh, Jake wants me—and goodness knows he could have me—but not while Korath’s there. Not while that damned, godawful, leering vampire Thing is there sharing his mind with him. That, in the main, is what’s holding him back: the fact that he won’t share me! And it’s why we have to see that he gets rid of it.”
“But only one of the reasons,” said Trask.
“For me, right now, it’s the only reason I need,” said Liz. “Yes, I love him dearly. And just as you love Millie—just as you have Millie—so I want Jake.”
And suddenly Trask felt guilty. Here he was warning Liz off Jake, but he’d spent last night with Millie. And Liz was right: the danger was the same on both sides.
Standing up, he moved round his desk, took her in his arms, and as she sobbed a little said, “It’s all a matter of priorities, isn’t it, sweetheart? Maybe my priorities have been wrong and I’ve put my head before my heart, but I thought my reasons were good ones.”
“Oh, they were, they were!” she said into his shoulder.
“And maybe I’ve been selfish, too,” Trask went on, gruffly. “I just didn’t want to admit—not even to myself—that Millie might be…that she could be in trouble, too.”
Liz drew away to arm’s length, and said, “What’s next, Ben? I don’t want to search your mind for it. I’m frightened what I might find in there. So just tell me: what are we going to do?”
“To hell with the tests!” he told her then. “They can wait. I don’t think they would prove anything anyway. I saw that this morning. So this time let’s get the priorities right. We have a job to do, and I need my agents on it in full force, which includes Millie and Jake. But an idea has been growing in me. It’s a kind of…a kind of prayer I’ve been saying to myself, over and over again, ever since those damned Things came through the Gate from Starside: if only Harry Keogh were here. Oh God, how I wish the original, the real Harry were here!”
“But he isn’t,” said Liz.
“No, but he could be,” said Trask. “Something of him could be, through Jake Cutter.”
Liz’s jaw fell open a little. “Jake’s been in contact with him once or twice, but—”
“—But he couldn’t handle him,” said Trask, “didn’t understand him, let him go.”
And now her eyes opened wide. “You think we can somehow get Harry back, enlist his aid?”
“We can try,” said Trask, excited now. “Indeed, we have to try. And you know, Liz, we’ve done some very marvellous things, here in E-Branch.”
He released her, pushed her towards the door. “Now get out there and whistle me up some agents. Chung, Goodly, and Millie. And Jake, of course. See to it they’re all together in the same place—” he glanced at his watch, “—in fifteen minutes’ time.”
“In the same place?” she repeated him. “But where?”
“In Harry’s Room,” Trask told her. “Where else…?”
“We’re only missing Zek,” Trask said, when the specified agents had convened in Harry’s Room. Those few words—in addition to the location, which in E-Branch was the holy of holies—served immediately to quell any speculation among those gathered there. Except for Jake Cutter, everyone present now knew more or less why he or she—why they as a group—were here.
“We’re missing Zek and Nathan,” Ian Goodly corrected Trask. “They were powers, those two, and especially without Nathan our task will be that much harder. But we can make up for them—in numbers, at least—with Liz and Millie. So whatever it is you have in mind, Ben, and since this time we’re not attempting to move a world, it strikes me we have a good team.”
Jake Cutter was mystified. “Er, don’t I fit into this somewhere?” he said. “I mean, what’s going on?”
“Jake, there are some things we need to know,” Trask told him, “questions we have to ask. But the real expert—the only one who might be able to answer our questions with any kind of genuine authority—is no longer available, no longer with us. We do know, though, that Harry Keogh was irresistibly drawn to you, that he found an affinity with you and your mind. We know that for sure, because of what you’ve experienced, what you’ve become.”
“A Necroscope?” said Jake, with precisely the kind of naïvety that conjured pictures of the young Harry Keogh himself.
“The Necroscope,” Trask answered him. “The only Necroscope, on this planet, anyway. So, you want to know where you fit into this? You’re the focus, the magnet, and this ro
om is the genius loci. Or maybe you’re that, too. I don’t know.”
Uncertainly, Jake glanced from face to face, finally found Liz’s and paused there. She nodded eagerly and said, “It could clear a lot of cloudy water, Jake, and tell us a lot of things we badly need to know. That is, if we can help you to find the original Necroscope, or him to find you…”
And now he got it. “So this is—what? Some kind of experiment—part of those tests we talked about?”
“In a way,” said Trask. “I suppose you could say that, yes. But that’s not all it is. We want to know about vampire spores—without finding out the hard way! Since Harry was converted by spores, who better to ask? We’d like to know what’s happening in Sunside/Starside, where Nathan and other friends of ours are fighting the selfsame battle against vampires. Also, we’re interested in Harry himself: where is his principal focus now; and if you’re his legacy to us, does he intend to carry on his work through you, and how? And last but not least, we’d really like to ask his advice about your unwanted tenant. For you see, Jake, we believe that Harry was once in the same fix—that he was possessed by the spirit of Faethor Ferenczy—and so might be able to suggest a way to get rid of this Korath creature.”
(At which a night-dark something immediately surfaced from the depths of Jake’s mind and gurglingly enquired, Oh, really? Does this fool really think so? Hah!) But Jake was accustomed to it; he ignored it, nodded his partial understanding of what Trask had told him, and asked, “So how will we go about it? Do you intend to play gadgets and ghosts again, where Harry’s the ghost and I’m the gadget?”
“There is no other way,” Trask answered. “You’re our only connection with Harry—you and this room, which was once his. Can you smell the musty air in this room, Jake? Harry breathed it. So if there was ever a place where his essence lingers on, this is it. When he first discovered you he brought you here—not once but twice. It’s like a nexus, binding whatever’s left of him to our world. Genius loci, like I said.”
“His spirit of place,” said Jake.