Blood On Borrowed Wings: A Dark Fantasy Thriller

by Darren Stapleton

  Bronagh looked down as if searching the shallow contents of his oversized coffee mug for something dear and lost.

  ‘You’re probably risking her anyway.’

  ‘Maybe. Sometimes you don’t have a choice,’ Beaugent said.

  ‘There’s always a choice,’ said Bronagh. ‘Always.’

  Beaugent stood, dusted a few small crumbs of bread from his palms and went back to the galley’s viewing window. ‘Bronagh, get that harpoon realigned and Loopes, get a comprehensive provisions list drawn up ready for docking, I don’t want to hang around down there.’

  Bronagh emptied his mug, and took it with his plate to the washing-up crate. He placed it in gently, in the dirty water though it took him effort to do so, and then went down a deck to hammer out the visible kinks in the returned harpoon gun.

  ‘I think we should get five loaves this time,’ said Loopes to the two empty chairs, not really wanting to think about bread at all.

  But choosing to.

  Pity and respect can never co-exist.

  Disabilty Abled

  Dr. S. Pentz

  CHAPTER 19

  I held my ID card up to the viewing window in the door and waited. He was obviously taking his time to work out if the photo was genuine before allowing Pan and me entrance to his home. It was a small one storey place, tucked in amidst tall, gangly trees and surrounded by the anonymity of tilled, arable land on the Lowlands outskirts. I knew it well and it was the nearest, safest place I could think to go to. It was the only place. We had left the smell and dark draw of the Deadland Swamps behind us, but the stench of rotten eggs still lingered on our clothes and skin. We needed a drink, needed to clean up, regroup and hide and this was the place. Pan and I had not talked much as we picked our way East and that suited me fine.

  I waited for the password question, hoping I could answer it. Doc Carlow’s voice sounded deep and dulled through the heavy door but the question was audible enough.

  ‘Name our Sergeant in general training and tell me who bunked with me?’

  'Bleecker was our Sergeant and Keogh bunked with you. He hated sharing.’

  It went quiet then, as it always did, whilst he checked my answers against his extensive field diaries and notes. I often wondered what he would have used to encrypt entry if he had not been a doctor with such substantial diaries and records of our past, maybe logarithms or dates of medical or personal significance. I shuddered at the thought of having to try and memorise the date penicillin was discovered or when the first ‘Nubbing’ operation was performed. We had gone through his list of questions a couple of years ago and they were based entirely on his own typically illegible and doctoral scribble.

  It was as good a secret code as any.

  I was sure I would know the answers. Of course Doc had no recollection of that, or any other day after Bethscape, beyond what was written in his diary.

  ‘What is he doing?’ asked Pan.

  ‘Checking my photograph and answers. He remembers me from before his accident, he just doesn't know our current footing.’

  ‘You’d think he would know. I mean, I thought he was a doctor. Smart. Last time I checked they didn’t give out those jobs to dummies and fuckwits.’

  ‘He’s neither.’

  ‘Still…’

  Pan paused at the sound of a heavy wooden bolt being drawn back. There were the clicks of a couple of latches and a key rattling inside a mechanism, clicking tumblers, and eventually the door swung slowly back.

  Doc Carlow was small and moved with an efficiency and purpose that suited his size. His face was warm and had lines worn in at the corners from smiling. His clothes were rarely co-ordinated, though he was always clean and neat. His big brown, childlike eyes belied the sharp mind behind them.

  The door opened directly into his warmly lit sitting room that had a low ceiling and comfortable chairs. The place had a studious feel, abetted by a plethora of medical journals and studies bulging out of bookcases that filled every foot of wall space. There was evidence of friendship in Doc Carlow’s eyes, but there was no sign of our traumatic past. No memory of the trials and triumphs we had shared since Bethscape.

  No sorrow.

  There were his books and the chairs and a fake, plastered smile as a greeting.

  That was as good, or as bad, as it got.

  Then I saw the light of recollection come on.

  ‘Come in. How are you? My God, Drake, you look dreadful.’

  ‘Been better, Doc. I need your help.’

  ‘You mean “we”,’ he said.

  ‘I’m Pan,’ she said, feigning embarrassment at my lack of manners, as if she were at a cocktail party.

  ‘Pleased to meet you.’ He looked her slowly up and down and I was not sure if it was because of her grubby and stained evening dress or the form that was obviously simmering just beneath it.

  She offered a winning smile back, either pleased of the attention or well-practised at disguising that she wasn’t.

  ‘Are you aware of the contusion on your mandible?’ Doc asked Pan.

  ‘I put it there,’ I said.

  He looked at me. It was a look that said he did not agree with such practices and, password or not, that I was skating on very thin ice.

  ‘Ice,’ he said, ‘that should reduce the swelling and inflammation. Wait there please.’ He went into his kitchen and I could hear the grating noise of an infrequently used ice-cube tray being prized from the freezer. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

  ‘You sure you know him?’ Pan whispered.

  ‘For years,’ I whispered. We were like two children conspiratorially chatting behind the teacher's back.

  ‘He seems odd.’

  ‘He is.’

  ‘What’s wrong with him?’

  ‘Ask him yourself. He's the doctor.’

  We watched him come back into the room holding a triangular bandage, bulging with lumps of ice.

  ‘May I?’

  Pan backed away.

  ‘I’ll just put it down here and would advise you to apply it to your bruising.’ His voice was free of offence or disappointment.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Pan, still aware of her negative reaction.

  ‘No need,’ he dismissed.

  ‘It’s just…’

  ‘There’s no need to explain, Pan,’ he turned to me, ‘Have I met her before? Does she know about my, ah, condition?’

  ‘I haven’t told her a thing, Doc.’

  ‘Do I need to take a photograph? Will she be coming again?’

  ‘Why not take one just in case?’ I said, taking the opportunity to have some fun at Pan’s expense.

  Pan lowered the ice pack, ‘If you think you are taking a photo of me when I look like this…’

  ‘Nobody else will see it. It’s just for my reference. I’ll place it in today’s journal entry and a copy will be placed by the door alongside questions about today; that we can use as code.’

  Pan looked confused.

  ‘So you can get in to see me again if you need to,’ said Doc.

  ‘Can’t I just knock?’

  ‘It’s his memory Pan,’ I said, ‘It’s shot.’

  ‘Literally and metaphorically,’ Doc added.

  ‘I gathered,’ said Pan.

  ‘I can remember how to read and write, I can remember medical practices, even Latin names for diseases and disorders that would make your head swim. The things I learnt up until Bethscape Field are almost entirely intact, but my short term memory suffered, can be patchy and long term recall is totally unreliable.’

  ‘You were at Bethscape Field?’ she said.

  ‘Apparently,’ he gestured towards me with his thumb. ‘So our friend here tells me.’ He walked over to a small table by his kitchen door and picked up a little plant, in a red plant pot. ‘You see, I can tell you the Latin name for this plant, tell you that its flowers are blue and that they emerge in early May, but I cannot tell you if I have watered it this week.’ He stuck h
is finger into the soil and smiled when it came out moist.

  ‘He has some recollection of our early training and military times, but not much after, and what there is, is patchy at best and certainly not robust enough to rely on as a frame of reference for whom he lets in through the front door,’ I said.

  ‘Is that why you came up with this system?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Doc, who was enjoying being talked about, ‘that way it is always current. I’ll write a few notes on the back of your photograph that tell me who you are and how we left things, that way, the next time you announce who you are through my portal, I can catch up with my notes. I’ll make sure that we are indeed friends and that it is safe to let you in through the door.’

  ‘Isn’t it a little elaborate?’ asked Pan.

  ‘Maybe, but let me put it this way. You could possibly have made a death threat or have claimed you lent me some money on your last visit. I can corroborate or refute it with my notes and behave accordingly.’

  ‘Yeah, about those five thousand credits I loaned you,’ I said.

  Doc laughed. ‘Luckily my humour has been largely unaffected.’

  ‘Can I see your notes about Drake?’ asked Pan.

  ‘Sure. That will give me time to annotate today before it all starts to drift off into the fog.’ He walked across the room and picked up the card with the photograph of Drake and his journal.

  ‘Here. Knock yourself out, unless Drake wants to do that again for you.’ He threw me a critical glance as he passed the notes to Pan. ‘I assume you lost consciousness?’

  Pan nodded, ‘but you should have seen the other guy.’

  Doc tilted his head before shaking it then set about updating today’s notes.

  Pan turned over the last photograph Doc had taken of me. I looked tired on it. It was dated nearly a month ago, before I had taken the Angelbrawl job. A tiny pang of guilt rang out like a crystal bell at the back of my mind. I should come here more often. Not only did Doc remind me who I was and how lucky I was to be alive, he also had the amazing characteristic of living almost entirely in the present. Reminiscing was not an option in conversation, unless it was about ancient history, so we would talk about current issues and dilemmas in our lives or the world at large. I gave him a frame of reference for the passing of time and assistance if the untrustworthy outside world was involved in some way. I got something much more wonderful. The unconditional friendship of someone who not only could help me focus entirely on the present, but offer intelligent advice without the baggage of judgement or cynicism that experience can bring. He offered a virgin ear for any problem and a voice untarnished by motive or duty to respond with. It was refreshing. Like meeting a total stranger and finding you had the most important things in life in common with each other.

  I did not feel sorry for him, pity is a useless emotion.

  He was there at Bethscape Field, as was I.

  None of us escaped intact.

  On the back of my photograph, in looping scrawl it read;

  ‘Drake. Vanguard Slayer B.I.A. Talked about moving out of the city/ Nimbus/buying land nearby. Drinks tea. Hates coffee. Stayed an hour. Back next month. Maybe.’

  ‘What’s B.I.A?’ asked Pan.

  ‘Brother s In Arms,’ replied Doc without looking up from the writing. I had not registered her question. Instead I was staring at two words in the top right hand corner on the back of my photograph, two words that seemed to rest a cannonball in the cavity of my chest. In print, hardly legible, it said:

  Best Friend.

  ‘Now “the story so far” is out of the way, let me get you two a drink. Tea Drake, or something stronger?’

  ‘Tea’s fine,’ I said.

  ‘Pan?’

  ‘Something stronger,’ she replied.

  Doc left the room and the vague clinks and bangs of drink preparation drifted in from the kitchen.

  The back of Pan’s photographic paper was probably already bedecked with: red dress, bruised chin by Drake, physically attractive. He wondered what Doc would have written in the top right hand corner of her photograph, and then decided he did not want to know.

  Pan flopped into rather than onto a plush, bulky, well-worn armchair and then carried on pressing the ice pack to her jaw.

  I would have to pay her extra for this, for the time and thump on the chin if nothing else.

  I sat near the window and looked out at the swaying leaves of the thin trees; their silver undersides flashed to the wind occasionally revealing their brighter, hidden colour. Verdant green replaced with the silver hues of celadon and frosted emeralds tousled in the rising wind. Sometimes the harsher the weather, the more beautiful nature appeared.

  Like life, I thought, as I looked at Pan.

  Doc came in with a tray bearing a tumbler of rum, half filled with ice and a small jug of water.

  ‘Your tea will be ready shortly, Drake,’ he said, and then he almost poured rum onto the little plant, in the red plant pot by the kitchen door, before he corrected himself and grabbed the water jug.

  ‘Seems like we could all do with something stronger,’ Pan said. ‘Even May Blueflower over there.’

  Doc beamed.

  He liked her.

  Maybe I did too.

  Surprise is never someone else’s fault.

  The Art of Preparation

  J. Fumii

  CHAPTER 20

  ‘Black, no sugar.’

  A fat man ordered a coffee then started pointing at the pastries in the small chilled counter. Ristas was a small business, only offering the basic fare in Lowlands’ coffees and cakes, but it was always busy, and the queue that was slowly extending as the fat man pondered his choice of delectation, huffed and sighed in visible shows of impatience and irritation.

  ‘No, not that one, the bigger one. There.’

  ‘This?’

  ‘No, next to it.’

  The disinterested waitress pointed to another and raised her eyebrows questioningly.

  ‘That’s it,’ he paused, circling his finger over the glass leaving a sweaty smear as he did, ‘and that one with the cherries too. Please.’ He added the please as an afterthought and through a mouth already starting to fill with saliva. The waitress used serving tongues, dirtier than her hands, to pack the two pastries into a paper bag emblazoned with the caption ‘Insist on Ristas’.

  Two stocky men towards the back of the queue looked like they did not belong. One shifted nervously from foot to foot, twitching, like his shoes were ill fitting or full of hot coals, the other, beefier man stared straight ahead as if he were gazing through an invisible window to a mystical foreign land rather than at a very real, greasy, stained, stucco plastered wall of a drab, Lowlands coffee shop.

  ‘Coffee, black and no, to go,’ shouted the waitress to some hidden minion barista in the back room. She gestured for the fat man to make his way to the pay point so she could serve the next thirsty customer.

  Twitcher and Beefy blustered their way to the front of the queue.

  ‘Hey, excuse me?’ said an angry, middle-aged woman, already blushing pink and making herself difficult to shove aside. ‘Do you think I'm standing here for...’

  Beefy smashed her in the face with a slow, heavy fist.

  The air escaped her with a whoomph like a gas fire being lit, and she sat down on her bustled behind. Her glasses broke clean in the middle and one half fell to the floor. The other half stayed in place, hooked on her ear.

  ‘Anyone else?’ said Twitcher. His gaze darted around the shop. Customers were moving, scrambling away from him, leaving or trying to hide under tables.

  He stepped around the now seated woman and pulled a crossbow from beneath his coat, unfolded the armatures and dropped a bolt in place with a speed and proficiency that suggested he knew what he was doing.

  He levelled it at the waitress who had ducked behind the glass cabinet for protection. Twitcher levelled the bolt so it made a slight scratching sound as it raked across the curved glass, and
pointed it at the waitresses face.

  ‘This is a high tensile bow, it has enough poundage per square inch to cut straight through that glass and your stack of pastries, and then pin your head to that swing door behind you. Now stand up.’

  A heavyset third man removed himself from the queue. At first he looked like he was about to leave but instead he went to stand near the entrance and changed the open sign hanging on the door, to closed. He pulled the canvas blind down and popped the deadbolt on. He took a crossbow from his jacket, ratcheted the safety off and swept it demonstratively across the room. The people seated at the high counter in the window all ducked their heads in unison.

  It must have looked odd from outside.

  ‘I said, stand up!’ Twitcher shouted. As the waitress did, he grabbed her thin blouse by the collar and dragged her halfway over the counter. Her legs flailed. Cloth ripped.

  ‘Calm down,’ said Beefy. ‘No one has to get hurt, remember?’

  ‘You could have fooled me,’ uttered the woman, picking up the other half of her glasses.

  Twitcher ignored him and her and vaulted the counter to go into the back room. The shop fell silent. There was the sound of something like a pan being dropped, a couple of high pitched screams followed by a man and a woman clattering through the swing door before it had stopped moving. The woman ran straight into the counter and came to an abrupt stop. The man tripped on a bounce mat and hit his head on the counter’s back. It made a dull sickening thud and he half slid to the floor, coming to rest propped up, eyes closed, like he was straining to listen to the pastries inside the display case his head now rested against.

  The waitress screamed.

  Twitcher nodded at his accomplices then said, ‘Out there,’ to the standing barista.