“Elliott . . . ,” Will said, edging closer to her. “We’ve got —”
“Jiggs . . . is that Jiggs?” Elliott demanded, squinting down the tunnel. Although there had been the odd mention of him, nobody had actually laid eyes on him yet, although they assumed they would before long.
Elliott shook her head slowly.
“No,” she said.
She shot a glance at Drake.
“No! Not him!”
Will saw the way she’d set her jaw, and the look of deadly intent in her eyes.
“Elliott, give me the rifle,” Drake asked, trying to seize hold of her, but she was too fast.
She ran toward the figure.
Toward her father.
VANE PUSHED HERSELF off the Colonist she’d just impregnated. With slow, reptilian precision, she extended her leg to the floor beside the bed, where she planted a foot. The tube-like ovipositor was retracting into her mouth as she slid her other leg across the limp body, then stood up.
The Colonist on the bed was a middle-aged woman who had only recently been brought up from the subterranean city. She’d been one of the unlucky inhabitants of the shantytown in the North Cavern, taken from there at gunpoint by the Limiters, and Darklit until nothing remained of the conscious centers of her mind.
And although effectively brain-dead, the Colonist’s chest now began to heave and she coughed soundlessly as the egg sac induced involuntary spasms in her air tract. In a few cases, the troublesome human host would actually bring up the egg sac, and that meant starting the process all over again. Vane watched the woman until she was satisfied that the implantation had been successful, then looked from one end of the warehouse to the other. The Styx women had been systematically working their way through the humans, and maybe as many as a hundred had already been impregnated.
Vane’s insect limbs twitched, then came together above her head. They oscillated against each other, faster and faster, until they were producing an unbroken sound similar to that of a cricket. Vane silenced the limbs, angling her head as she listened out. Barely a second later, a hollow rattle drifted back from somewhere else on the floor as Alex replied in kind.
Vane and Alex continued to communicate, homing in on each other as they headed toward the beds at the entrance to the warehouse.
Through the steam and subdued lighting, they spotted each other. They met around the bed of a young man, the very first human to be impregnated.
Although both Vane and Alex had been feeding on the raw meat and drinking regularly from the vats of viscid sugar solution provided for them at various points across the warehouse floor, the Phase had drastically changed their appearance. The relentless production of egg sacs had sent their metabolic rates soaring through the roof, so much so that nearly every ounce of their body fat had been burned off.
They barely resembled the strikingly beautiful women they’d been before the Phase began. Under their torn and bloodstained clothes, their physiques had been pared down to not much more than muscle and bone. Their faces were unnaturally angular, as if an artist had attempted to recreate them by using an assortment of hard planes.
“Time to check on our young,” Alex announced in the rasping Styx language. If Will and Chester had been there to see her appearance as she spoke, it would have explained why the Styx’s tongue had always sounded so inhuman to them. It was inhuman, and they were inhuman.
“Yes, it will be time,” Vane replied, eagerly rubbing her bony hands together. As she did so, the musculature and ligaments in her arms slid against each other under her taut skin like a mechanical model.
Alex moved closer to the young man and leaned over him. She paused to wipe her chin. The glands in her throat hadn’t yet stopped producing the lubricative fluids required for the multiple impregnations, and these were now overflowing from her mouth and dangling from her cracked lips in sticky necklaces.
Undoing the top button of the man’s shirt, she slid her hand inside it.
“Yes,” she sighed.
She gently took out a pulsing, ivory-colored larva some five inches long. It was similar in appearance to a giant maggot, although far stubbier. Holding the Styx Warrior larva in both hands, she lifted it up to her face to examine one end. “Who’s such a pretty little thing? Who’s just perfect?” she cooed.
The eyes hadn’t yet developed, but a small mouth opened and closed. As it did so, something caught in the illumination from one of the nearby overhead lights. The Warrior larva’s fangs shone with a pearly whiteness, like a baby’s milk teeth. They were snapping together as she held the grub against her chest, looking down at it lovingly.
Vane had also reached under the man’s shirt and into his pleural cavity, which had been exposed as the grubs burst from his body. She took out not one but two larvae, cradling them in her arms as they wriggled against her like lively puppies.
“Yes, they are perfect,” Vane said, her eyes flooding with tears of happiness and fulfillment. One of her larvae began to make a high keening sound. Almost immediately the other larva in her arms and Alex’s also joined in.
The man’s body on the bed started to move as though he’d miraculously been brought back to life. But he was well and truly dead. The movement was the other larvae as they tried to gnaw their way through his jeans and worm out from his shirtsleeves.
“The little ones are ravenous,” Alex said. “They’re our firstborn. They’re special. I think we should spoil them.”
Vane nodded in agreement. “They deserve a special treat.” She placed her larvae back on the bed and strode across to the very corner of the warehouse. There she peered into the shadows at the group of Colonists and New Germanians. Most of them were simply stretched out on the floor, but a few were sitting up. And although they’d had their minds wiped by Dark Lights, the Limiters had taken the precaution of erecting a pen around them in case any of them still had the ability to wander off, like bewildered cattle.
Vane opened the gate to the pen and heaved a thickset man to his feet. “Let’s be having you,” she said.
It was the Third Officer, still in his police uniform. “Good. Nice bit of flesh on you,” Vane said, yanking him toward her. He could barely walk, his feet landing on their sides or clumsily knocking against each other. But Vane half dragged, half carried him until she was back at the bed. Alex had ripped open the clothes on the corpse so that the other larvae — as many as thirty of them — no longer had to fight their way out.
Vane pushed the Third Officer down onto the mattress. The larvae’s teeth clicked like many pairs of castanets as they wriggled toward his living tissues. The two Styx women looked on, their hearts bursting with pride as their babies began to gorge themselves.
Eddie and Sweeney had both come to a standstill in the long entrance passageway, but Elliott was very much on the move. She was striding toward her father, and closing in fast.
Everyone in the dimly lit Hub had their eyes on her — Parry, Danforth, and, even though they’d just had their emotional reunion, Chester and his parents.
Will couldn’t see Elliott’s expression, but from the way she’d talked about Eddie in the past, he thought the odds were stacked against this being a happy reconciliation between father and daughter. Quite the opposite, in fact — Elliott had taken the side of her Colonist mother and had even killed Limiters down in the Deeps. Will really didn’t want to think about how she was going to react now she was finally coming face-to-face with her father again.
“She’s armed,” Will pointed out to Drake with some urgency.
Chester had quickly made his way over, and Will gave him a glance to see if he was similarly troubled. “You know, she might use that rifle on him,” Will said to him. But his friend didn’t answer — he seemed to be completely preoccupied with Elliott’s progress along the passageway.
“Well, isn’t any
one going to do anything?” Will demanded frantically, directing the question at Drake. “Just in case?”
“Stand down,” Drake whispered. “Let her keep the rifle.”
As Will saw the big man next to Eddie turn slightly, he realized Drake was speaking to him. Although Sweeney was some forty feet away, he had heard the directive with his incredibly acute hearing. Will watched as Sweeney gave the tiniest shrug.
“I say again — stand down,” Drake whispered. “But step in if you see a blade.”
Will thought Sweeney gave a wink in response, but he couldn’t be sure. In any case, he was too intent on Elliott — if there was going to be an incident, it was going to be now.
Some ten feet away from her father, Elliott shouldered her rifle, aiming it squarely at him.
Eddie stood his ground, not shifting an inch.
“Drake . . . ,” Will said, panic creeping into his voice.
Maybe Elliott was expecting Sweeney to intervene with his lightning-fast reactions, because she seemed to falter slightly in her step as she stole a quick glance at him. However, Sweeney showed no signs of doing anything.
As she came closer still to Eddie, she lowered the rifle from her shoulder but made as if she was going to lash out at him with the stock. Ultimately she didn’t, lobbing the weapon at Sweeney, who caught it with ease in his enormous hands.
Instead she stopped before Eddie. She shook her head, then slapped him across the cheek with such force that the sound carried all the way back to the Hub.
“Ooh, bet that stung!” Chester said, cringing slightly.
Elliott struck her father again, slapping his other cheek with equal vehemence.
“Eddie’s been getting a lot of that lately,” Will said. This elicited a sidelong glance from Drake, before he whispered another directive to Sweeney.
“I think we’re out of the woods,” he said. “You can give them some space now.”
Sweeney started down the passageway toward the Hub. Much to Will’s amazement, Elliott and her father had begun to talk, albeit Elliott was shouting.
As Will considered what had just taken place, he was puzzled. “How could you be sure she wasn’t going to shoot him?” he asked Drake.
Mrs. Burrows opened her hand, revealing the contents to her son. “That would be difficult . . . without these.”
“Bullets?” Will said, then realized why his mother had them. He glanced at the long-barreled weapon Sweeney was holding as he ambled into the Hub. “So Elliott’s rifle wasn’t even loaded?”
Drake nodded. “Eddie’s vital to us right now — I couldn’t afford to let anything happen to him. So I rang ahead and asked your mum to make safe the rifle. She’s just about the only person I know with the ability to sneak in and do it without waking Elliott up.” Drake looked directly at Will. “You don’t think I’d leave something like that to chance, do you?”
“Thanks for telling me,” Will grumbled, annoyed that he’d been left in the dark. “And you’d better make sure they’re back in her rifle before she finds out. Otherwise she’ll never trust you again.”
Parry had come over. “So we’re allowing the enemy onto the base now,” he said disapprovingly to his son. “Are you handing out tickets? It’s getting like bloody Piccadilly Circus down here.”
“Eddie’s not our enemy, and what Will and I learned from him this morning explains exactly what the Styx are up to,” Drake said firmly. “And it’s worse than any of us could ever have imagined.” He produced the Book of Proliferation from an inner pocket and passed it to Will. “I want you to gather everyone together in one of the briefing rooms and bring them up to speed. And that includes Old Wilkie and his granddaughter, the Colonel and Sergeant Finch — they all need to hear, too.”
“Me? You want me to do it?” Will said, aghast. He wasn’t sure yet if he himself was wholly convinced by what Eddie had told them, and he also felt that he lacked Drake’s authority to deliver such an earth-shattering revelation.
Drake nodded.
“So I tell them everything?” Will asked.
“Everything,” Drake confirmed.
Will couldn’t have felt more uncomfortable with Drake’s answer, because in telling everyone about the Phase, he’d also implicate Elliott. The fact that the Phase could change her into something alien and hostile hadn’t been out of his thoughts since Eddie had revealed it in the Humvee that morning. She was Will’s friend, and he’d been doing his best not to view her any differently. And if Will was the one who broke the news about Elliott to everyone, it would make him feel very disloyal toward her.
“You really mean everything?” Will asked again.
“Yes, chapter and verse,” Drake answered a little tetchily.
“Why are you lumping this on the lad? What’s so important that you and this Eddie fellow can’t give us the sitrep yourselves?” Parry demanded of his son.
“Because I have something I need to see to right now,” Drake said, inclining his head toward the entrance tunnel where Elliott and Eddie were deep in conversation. Elliott’s voice was no longer raised, and from the way it was going between her and her father, it certainly appeared as though there wouldn’t be any trouble between them. Nevertheless, Drake was far from relaxed. This was made even more evident when he drew his Beretta from its holster and made sure it was loaded before replacing it.
Parry seemed to realize that his son had other priorities and didn’t push the point. Drake took a step toward the entrance tunnel, but then stopped and swung around to his father. “Tell me — does the medical bay in this place have an X-ray machine?” he asked.
“Check with Finch, but I’m pretty sure it does. The bay was fully reequipped in the seventies,” Parry replied. “Even if the machine needs some coaxing to get it working, Danforth’s your man. He’ll be able to do it.”
Parry stayed behind to summon Stephanie and the others from their rooms, using the intercom, while Will and Chester began to walk toward one of the briefing rooms just off the Hub. Will was carrying the Book of Proliferation rather gingerly in his hand — he didn’t much relish the thought of touching the human skin of the cover.
“So what’s this about, Will?” Chester asked, leaning his head conspiratorially toward his friend. “And what’s with Drake and the pistol? Doesn’t he trust Eddie?”
“The gun isn’t for Eddie. It’s for Elliott,” Will replied.
Chester stopped dead in his tracks as Will continued toward the briefing room.
The dim half-light of the room seemed highly appropriate as Will recounted what Eddie had told him and Drake. When he’d finished, Will glanced at the somber faces around the table. Nobody spoke — there was only the sound of the steady rush of air coming in through the vents.
Parry was the only one not looking at him. With a small flashlight, he was examining the Book of Proliferation, squinting at the pages through his reading glasses. Then he raised his head to Will. “I don’t know this Eddie chap from Adam, but if this is just some tall tale, it’s a mighty elaborate one. And it does explain why the Styx have become so active; they didn’t have any choice in the matter.”
One of Sergeant Finch’s many cats leaped up onto the table. Its tail switched from side to side as it strolled regally toward the old man in his mobility scooter. The sight of the animal reminded Will that he had something else to add. “I don’t know how I forgot,” he said sadly, “but there’s one more thing I need to tell you. Bartleby’s dead.”
Coming on top of the revelations about the Phase, there was no immediate reaction from anyone in the room, until Mrs. Burrows spoke. “Bartleby would never have deserted Colly, not voluntarily,” she said.
“Eddie told us it was all an accident,” Will said. “Bart surprised one of his Limiters, who reacted on instinct. The man’s been punished.”
Hunching f
orward, Chester thumped his elbows on the table. “I hope he bloody well has,” he said angrily.
Will nodded. “Actually, the Limiter killed himself. Right in front of us, he blew himself apart with one of Sweeney’s grenades.”
“It was just awful,” Mrs. Rawls whispered.
Stephanie made an Erm noise, and raised her hand as if she was in a classroom. Old Wilkie was about to tell her to be quiet when Parry intervened. “Let the girl talk if she wants,” he said. “We’re all in this together.”
Stephanie took a breath. “Will, what you’ve told us sounds sort of like something from a horror movie. I totally accept the Styx are real enough and everything, specially as you brought one home with you. But this stuff about eggs and reproduction and these monsters wiping out human beings . . . how do you know it’s true? It seems so — like — out there,” she said, raising her hands and wiggling her fingers in mock terror. “Other than what Eddie Styx has told you, and this Monster Booky-wook of Monsters he’s got” — she gestured in Parry’s direction — “you don’t know for certain it’s true. You don’t have any other proof, do you?”
Will was about to say something, then closed his mouth.
“So?” Stephanie pushed him.
Will knew then that he couldn’t avoid opening up about Elliott. While he’d been briefing them all, he’d tried to make as little eye contact with Chester as he could, hoping that his friend wouldn’t work out the implications for her until Will had spoken to him in private.
Will swallowed. “Elliott,” he said quietly. “Elliott could be the proof.”
Chester murmured something, but Stephanie was quick to follow up. “Why Elliott?” she demanded.
“She’s half Styx, isn’t she? And she might be old enough for the Phase to alter her.” Will made himself look at Chester. His friend’s face fell as he realized the significance that Elliott’s mixed parentage could have for her.
Stephanie had put her hand up again. “But she looks normal — she can have babies like . . . like normal people, can’t she?”
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