“Let us very definitely not go there,” I said quickly. “The recording sounds fine to me. Everyone? Right; do your thing, Blue. Catch us a siren.”
Of course, then he had to make a whole big thing out of finding just the right spot along the bank of the loch. He walked us up and down through the mud and spiky grass, his face set in a rigid mask of concentration, which he had to spoil by occasionally glancing at us to see how we were taking it. He finally settled on one particular spot that looked exactly the same as all the others and gestured grandly with his left hand. A glowing golden pool some six feet in diameter appeared before him, flat and featureless, not so much covering the ground as replacing it. The pool was a gateway to everywhere else, to all the dimensions that ever were or may be, and was painful to look at directly for more than a moment.
Blue’s time with the elves had clearly helped him; I could remember when he needed to spill his own blood in sacrifice to summon the golden pool to him. And the pool looked a lot bigger than I remembered. A hole punched right through the walls of reality by sheer willpower. Only the Blue Fairy was skilled enough and crazy enough to call it up, just so he could go fishing in it . . .
He worked his rod and reel expertly, and hook and line disappeared into the golden pool without in any way disturbing the glowing surface. Blue stood quietly, apparently calm and relaxed, and we all stood and watched him. There’s always something fascinating about watching someone do the one thing they’re really good at. The sound of the line whining off the spinning reel was almost hypnotic as the line dove down and down into depths we really had no business fooling with. But that’s an elf for you. And then the line snapped taut, jerking this way and that across the glowing pool, and the Blue Fairy’s breath hissed between his clenched teeth as he worked the reel, putting a steady pressure on the line. Slowly, steadily, he began to haul his catch in.
I realised I was holding my breath. Blue didn’t always get what he was after the first time, and he had been known to haul some really nasty things up out of the depths. The line remained taut, rising very slowly, the reel clicking quietly. Whatever Blue had hooked, it didn’t seem to be fighting him.
I glanced quickly around. We were all standing far too close to the pool, and none of us had taken any precautions. I had my torc to protect me, but God alone knew what the others were relying on to save them from the siren’s call. I started to say something, and then the golden pool exploded as the siren burst through into our reality.
It rose up and up, towering over us, too big to be contained by the pool through which it had found a foothold into our reality. It was huge and glorious, completely unearthly, unfolding and uncoiling in every direction at once. It was vast and wonderful, too beautiful to be born, dark yellow flesh with rainbows exploding inside it. It sang, and I was lost. A glorious, wonderful, unbearable sound. I fell to my knees before it, and so did we all. Who knows what songs the sirens sang? Who knows what songs were sung for noble Odysseus? We knew, and I will hear that song in my nightmares forever.
Because I was nothing in the face of that song. Nothing that mattered.
The siren called, and we all shuffled forward on our knees, gazing adoringly up at the living fountain of flesh towering over us. Even the Blue Fairy had dropped his rod and reel, caught up in a song that went for the soul. I could barely see my surroundings, feel the tough grass scuffing beneath my knees. The siren wanted us, and not for anything good. Death would be the kindest thing that would happen to us, once the siren had clasped us to its unforgiving bosom. I knew that, and I didn’t care. I wanted to worship it forever, worship it with my body until I died of it.
Except . . . there was another voice in my head and in my heart, another face before my eyes. My Molly, my sweet Molly Metcalf, who had put her mark upon me long ago. As soon as I thought of her, I could feel the torc blazing coldly around my neck, trying to alert me to the threat . . . and those two things together gave me all the strength I needed to stop moving forward. I slowly turned my head to one side, looking away from the terrible, wonderful thing before me. It was all I’d ever wanted, right there waiting for me, and I fought it with every ounce of strength and will I had. I turned my head away, my whole body twitching and trembling with the effort, and saw another face, looking at me.
The Blue Fairy had stopped moving too and had turned his face away from the siren. Perhaps because of his nature, perhaps because he also wore the golden torc, perhaps because he was half-elf. Or maybe he was just stubborn, like me.
We looked at each other, and I slowly turned my gaze to the rod and reel lying abandoned before the Blue Fairy. He looked at it too, and with the last of his strength, he grabbed the reel and threw it into the golden pool, hook and line and all.
The line snapped taut again, dragging at the siren’s fleshy orchid head, distracting its attention. I forced myself up onto my feet, turned my back on the siren, and lurched over to the communications centre. I had to record the siren’s call before it was sucked back down again. I subvocalised my activating Words, and my armour flowed over me in an instant, sealing me in and protecting me from the world. The golden strange matter encased me from head to toe, and just like that the siren’s song was nothing more than noise. I hit the record button and turned quickly to see what was happening.
The siren was no longer held to this world, but it didn’t want to go. It had been defied, and it was angry. It had found an endless feeding ground, and it would not be denied. It towered high above us, flaring and pulsating; and even through the protecting filters of my golden mask, this extreme and awful creature was still the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. The Blue Fairy was on his feet but halfway transfixed again, and the others were very close to the siren now. So that left just me. Because that’s a Drood’s job: to be the last man standing, and stand between humanity and all the threats from outside.
I walked right up to the siren and hit its glistening side as hard as I could with a spiked armoured hand. My fist slammed right through the pulsing, sliding substance, and my armoured arm sank deep into the shifting body, right up to my shoulder. The siren screamed, a terrible agonised sound that blew away all its song’s effects in a moment. The others scrambled back away from the pool, away from what they’d been worshipping just a moment before. I jerked my arm out and drew back a fist to strike again. The siren plunged into the glowing golden pool, sounding for the dimensional depths where it belonged. Where prey knew its place.
I armoured down, the golden strange matter retreating into my torc. I wasn’t ready for the others to see me in my armour just yet. They’d look at me differently. I stood by the side of the loch, savouring the quiet. With the siren gone, I couldn’t for the life of me remember what had been so entrancing about its song, and that was probably for the best. The others were back on their feet, their eyes still a little lost and dimmed, but they were recovering fast. They were professionals, after all.
Katt glared at the Blue Fairy. “The next time you have a brilliant idea, feel free to keep it to yourself!”
“We have a recording of the call,” said Blue, giving her back glare for glare. “Or at least, as much of it as the console could handle.” He looked over the equipment, muttering to himself. “We’re missing most of the higher and lower frequencies, which is probably just as well, but what we have should do the job. More than enough to bring Nessie at the gallop, if only to see who’s calling. Honey, I’m patching the recording through to you now. Are you getting it?”
“Got it. There’s just under a minute of the call recorded, so I’ll put it out as a repeating loop. Yeah, that should do it.”
“A thought,” Peter said suddenly. “If what we’re broadcasting is a mating call . . . won’t everything in the loch with working glands come running? We could end up with every living thing in the loch trying to hump the submersible.”
“Thank you for that mental image,” said Katt. “Which I just know will haunt my nights for years to come.”
&n
bsp; “I’ll put the call through some filters,” said Honey, “so only really large organisms should be affected.”
I leaned in close so I could see her face on the tiny screen. “Are you sure you can drive that thing?”
“Of course,” said Honey. “I’m CIA. I can drive anything.”
“Want to bet she crashes the gears on her first try?” Peter murmured to Walker.
“I heard that!” said Honey. “Okay . . . Going down, people. See you in a while.”
We all looked around just in time to see air bubbles frothing all around the yellow submersible as it drifted away from the bank, and then it sank slowly and with great dignity beneath the dark waters of Loch Ness. It was soon gone, not even a yellow glimmer in the water, with only the slowly widening ripples on the surface to mark its passing.
We all crowded around the communications console, watching the data coming in and listening intently as Honey kept up a running commentary on her dive. Walker and I studied the data streams carefully, but there was no sign of anything out of the ordinary. Everything in the submersible seemed to be functioning as required. Honey sent it nosing carefully through the night-dark waters, broadcasting its looped siren call, watching and waiting.
Time passed, and after the first half dozen false alarms, we all started to relax a bit. Two hours passed, then three. If anything, it got colder. A heavy wind blew the length of the loch, driving its chill through our clothes and into our bones. We all ended up huddling together like sheep, to share our warmth. The sky was completely overcast now, the light fading, and it occurred to me we’d better scare up something while there was still enough light to photograph by.
The submersible prowled up and down all twenty-four miles of the loch, and most of what lived in the waters gave it a wide berth. The submersible’s powerful lights hardly penetrated the underwater gloom at all, and while the sonar picked up shape after intriguing shape, Honey had to be almost on top of the object before she could identify it. So far, the most promising near misses had involved several hopefully shaped sunken tree trunks, half a dozen shoals of fish, and a couple of quite surprisingly large eels. And that . . . was it. Honey grew increasingly short and bad-tempered in response to our well-meaning suggestions, and she ploughed more and more desperately up and down the loch. I think the overcrowded confines of the submersible’s cabin were getting to her. Her sonar did pick up a great many large cave mouths sunk deep into the sides of the underwater banks, some of which led on into whole cave systems farther in than the sonar could follow.
“There could be miles and miles of caverns down there,” said the Blue Fairy. “Maybe even rising above sea level, with breathable air. Maybe that’s where the creature lives when it’s not in the loch itself. Maybe it only comes out to feed, or breed, and that’s why it’s so rarely seen . . .”
“The words straws and clutching at spring to mind,” said Katt. “Can’t we call this a day and go find a nice hotel somewhere? The monster will still be here tomorrow, if it’s here at all. I hate this place! Beastly cold and . . . grim! I’ve shivered so much I must have lost ten pounds through sheer exhaustion. Mind you, on me it looks good.”
“Heads up! I’ve got something!” Honey’s voice crashed out of the console viewscreen, jolting those of us who were understandably half-asleep on our feet.
“Oh, joy,” said Katt. “Another suggestively shaped tree trunk? A stray duck with delusions of grandeur, perhaps?”
“I have a new contact on the sonar,” said Honey. “It’s big, it’s moving, and it’s heading right for me. Still too far off for the headlights to reach it, but . . . It’s big. I mean seriously big. The computer estimates . . . four hundred feet long, from end to end. Estimated weight . . . No, wait a minute, that can’t be right . . .”
Walker and I pressed our shoulders together as we leaned in over the data streams crossing the console screens. Whatever was heading for Honey and her little yellow submersible, the computer was estimating its weight as eighty-seven tons. No. Not possible; not in any living organism I understood.
“How close is it?” said Peter.
“It just changed direction,” said Honey, her voice calm and professional. “It was coming at me head-on, but now . . . it seems to be circling the submersible, keeping its distance. Damn, these speed estimates can’t be right either. Nothing that big and that heavy could move so fast in these waters . . .”
“Nothing we know,” said Walker. He was frowning. “I think it’s time for you to head for the surface, Honey. Let it follow the mating call—”
“Too late!” Honey’s voice rose despite herself. “It’s here! Right here! It’s huge! It shot straight past the front window; I had it square in my headlights for a moment!”
“What is it?” said the Blue Fairy. “What does it look like?”
“Ugly bastard,” said Honey. She sounded shaken, but her voice was under control again. “It’s gone back to circling the submersible. Moving more slowly now. I think it’s curious. Oh! I just got a look at the face through the window. It came right up and looked at me. It’s . . . horrible. It’s a monster. Not Nessie. Not Nessie at all. All right, that’s it. I’m heading for the surface. I’m not staying down here with that . . . thing one moment longer.”
“Slowly,” I said. “Slowly and steadily and very carefully. Don’t do anything that might upset or panic the beast.”
“Or frighten it off,” Peter said quickly. “I can’t film the thing till you get it up here on the surface.”
“Teach your grandmother to suck dick,” said Honey. “Now shut up and stop distracting me. I know what I’m doing. Damn, that thing is big! It dwarfs the submersible.”
“Does your craft have any defence systems?” said Walker. “Guns, force shields, that kind of thing?”
“Not even a loudspeaker for me to shout harsh language through,” said Honey. “Apparently this happy little yellow toy was never meant for anything but short-range reconnaissance. Which is not what I asked for . . . I shall have some very harsh words with certain people once I get back to Langley. I’m still rising, very slowly. I’m not far from you. I should end up surfacing within a few yards . . . The beast is following . . . and sticking pretty close. Just the wash of its passage is enough to rock me from side to side.”
“Can you identify it yet?” said Katt. “I can’t make head nor tail of what your sensors are sending us. Is it a dinosaur, do you think? A brontosaurus or a plesiosaurus—something like that?”
“Beats the hell out of me,” said Honey. “Big and ugly: that’s all I can tell you. Just the glimpses I’ve seen in the headlights were enough to make my skin crawl. Whatever this is, it doesn’t belong in our world anymore.”
“Get to the surface,” I said. “We can’t do anything to help you while you’re still down there.”
“I know that,” said Honey. “Still rising. Still heading in your direction. Should be with you soon.”
I looked out over the loch, searching the dark waters with my eyes, but I couldn’t make out a damned thing. The overcast sky had turned the loch’s waters dark as night. The surface was disturbed by the gusting wind, but that was all.
“Shit! Shit!”
Honey’s voice sounded more angry than alarmed. I looked quickly back at the console. On the screen, her dark face looked shaken but determined.
“What is it, Honey?” said Walker, his voice steady and reassuring.
“My engines have shut down.” Honey’s voice was reasonably calm, but her distraction showed in the way her hands flew across the controls, hammering at the keyboard with unnecessary force, to no response. “Engines are off-line; sensors have shut down. It’s all I can do to keep this link open . . . Shit. There went life support. Not good, people. I’m dead in the water, power levels dropping, and . . . I’m sinking again.”
“Is the mating call still going out?” said the Blue Fairy.
“No. At least the hull is still secure . . . Oh!”
We all
heard the heavy muffled thud as something hit the submersible from outside, shaking Honey violently back and forth in her chair. Only the restraining straps held her in place. Something hit the submersible again even harder. All kinds of alarms and flashing lights filled the cramped cabin. Honey was thrown back and forth in her chair like a rag doll.
“Hull . . . is still intact!” she managed finally. “But I don’t know how many more knocks this stupid piece of shit can take. It wasn’t designed for this . . . Oh, hell.”
“Now what?” said Peter.
“The mating call’s still going out! It shouldn’t be, but it is.”
“Shut it off!” I said. “Maybe then the monster will lose interest and go away.”
“I can’t!” Honey’s voice was rising sharply now. “I’m shut out of the computers. There’s no way this is coincidence. Someone sabotaged my submersible.”
We all looked at each other, and I knew we were all trying to remember which of us might have had enough time alone with the communications console to rewrite the submersible’s programming. Could have been any one of us. We were all, after all, professionals.
“The air’s stopped circulating,” said Honey. “And the lights are going out.”
Something hit the submersible again, driving it sideways. The alarms in the cabin sounded shrill and raucous now.
“You’re almost here, Honey,” said Walker. “Only a few hundred yards. Can’t you coax a little more out of your engines? Any last emergency power reserves . . . ?”
“Hull breach!” said Honey. “I’ve got water coming in . . . Half the electricals I’ve got left are shorting out . . . I’m sinking, people. There’s no way I can reach you. Oh, God . . . It’s getting cold in here. Cold. And dark. I never wanted to go out like this . . .”
The Spy Who Haunted Me sh-3 Page 14