The Delirium Brief

by Charles Stross

  I push back at the voices in my head and try to block out the hungry awareness and force myself up until I’m kneeling and braced against the floor on my palms. My head is spinning. I want to throw up.

  “Bob”—it’s Johnny, kneeling beside me—“it’s going to be all right.” His voice low-pitched but urgent. “Someone set the airport police on us but the skipper’s on it”—he means Captain Partridge—“telling ’em it’s an unscheduled exercise, crossed wires—standin’ off while they confirm, then we’re gonna get you out of here—”

  “Get me to. Nether Stowe House,” I grate, and Johnny and whoever else is there with him recoil from whatever they hear in my voice. Flying will be good: flying will get me up above and away from all the souls laid out so invitingly like a giant buffet in all directions.

  “What’s wrong with—” a hushed voice asks Johnny.

  “Not sure mate, but I think ’e’s leveled up from tactical to strategic and ’e needs ’is personal Auditor bad only she ain’t ’ere—”

  “But his eyes—”

  I concentrate on my deep breathing and the whole mindfulness shtick and on trying not to casually squeeze the contents of a taxiing aluminum tube of intercontinental goodness into my imaginary mouth—it’s a Boeing 777 or Airbus A330 and it’s nearly two miles away, a distantly rational part of me realizes—

  “Get me out of here,” I tell Johnny, working hard to make my voice as normal as possible, and then I push myself up and stand. Cubicle farm, office, a worried-looking warrant officer in airport firefighter drag (spoiled slightly by the MP5 with Basilisk sights he’s carrying); he takes a step back behind Johnny, but Johnny is made of stern stuff and stares me down calmly enough. Johnny’s mind … if I let my inner demon off the leash I think it might actually break a tooth on Johnny. “I’m not safe, and the SA wants me at, at Target One.”

  “Right.” Johnny’s eyes narrow. “’Scuse me for saying this, mate, but you’re in no condition to go anywhere right now.”

  “But she needs me—” Anxiety rises and surges over my defenses: I feel the pinprick popping of defensive wards deflagrating all around, unprotected minds wriggling like so many shell-shucked tasty oysters as their bodies fall, retching, to the ground for a hundred meters in all directions—

  “Don’t.” Johnny raises a warning hand as the soldier behind him keels over in a dead faint. “By right of oath I bind you”—verses in Old Enochian salted with English codewords roll out, and the thing in the back of my head listens incuriously—“Ruby. Seminole. Kriegspiel. Hatchet. Lock down and make safe—” In the background I hear a hollow bang, very different from an explosion, and the crunch and crackle of a vehicle impacting a building, its driver unconscious. The part of me that’s still me, still Bob, feels a stab of guilty remorse, but the part of me that’s the Eater of Souls doesn’t give a shit, being more irritated (if anything) by Johnny’s use of my oath’s override facility. “Abstain from feeding, feel no hunger”—the great hollow antipressure inside me recedes slightly—“be calm, all is in hand.”

  My eyes close. Johnny recites the override words again. “Bob. Can you hear me?”

  “Yeah.” I feel tired. Desperately tired. So tired I could sleep for a thousand years.

  “Bob, open yer eyes. Come on, wake up! We need you.”

  I open my eyes. On the floor behind him, a soldier lies as if asleep except for a trickle of blood running from his left nostril. “Oh shit, did I—”

  Johnny bends over him. “’E’s breathing but ’e’s out for the count.” He rolls the body over into the recovery position, then stands up. “Come on, we’ve got a chopper to catch.”

  “But I can’t—”

  All of a sudden Johnny McTavish is up close, right in my face, doing his best drill sergeant act, and as he used to be a sergeant in the French Foreign Legion it’s not exactly an act: “Howard you miserable worm, get your fucking shit together right now and move it! Because the next time I hear you say can’t I will take your can’t and shove it so far up your ass you can give yourself a tonsillectomy by biting. Is that understood? Do you fucking hear me?” With every fuck he shoves me so that I’m constantly off-balance and then he’s behind me and grabbing my shoulders and aiming me at the doorway. “We have a fucking helicopter to catch and if you want to see yer trouble and strife again you will quick march double time—”

  We’re going, my rational brain realizes. We’re going to Nether Stowe House. We’re really going. The paralysis and terror falls away behind me, replaced by uncertainty.

  I’m not sure what we’re going to find when we get there, but it can’t be anything good.

  * * *

  Mhari lies on the shelf in the walk-in wardrobe, counting the minutes. After rather too many of them pass for comfort, her phone vibrates again. It’s a message from Persephone: I’m trying to dislodge the fleas. Hold on.

  Dammit, what now? she asks herself, gritting her teeth. She waits a while longer, then she hears the muffled, vaguely familiar chimes of unsilenced phones receiving incoming messages in the living room. There are voices, low and hard to interpret—then the bedroom door opens abruptly. She cowers back inside the closet as the bedroom light comes on. “She’s still out,” says the older guard.

  “Look, we can go now,” the youngster says from outside the door, “can’t we?”

  “Huh. I suppose so. You got it too.”

  “’S’what I said.”

  “Well, then.” The guard pauses in the doorway for a few seconds, then switches out the light. “Nighty night, and may the Lord have mercy on your soul.”

  The door closes and Mhari relaxes infinitesimally. That was too close, she thinks shakily. For a while she’d considered jumping down and looking for somewhere more comfortable to hang out. But still she waits, and after another minute she hears footsteps, and then the beeping of the neutered burglar alarm followed by the rattle of the front door closing.

  “All clear,” Persephone calls quietly through the bedroom door.

  “Don’t turn the light”—Mhari jumps down—“on. Okay, you can do it now.” Persephone flicks the switch, and Mhari sees her expression: the older woman looks as if she’s swallowed a live mouse. “What is it?” She follows Persephone’s gaze, and turns to look at the bed. “Oh. Fuck.”

  The beeping from the suite’s burglar alarm stops as the alarm hits the point in its cycle where it would normally arm itself but, thanks to Persephone’s firmware crack, lapses into catatonia. “You can say that again,” Persephone says grimly.

  “What do we do now?”

  “We get the civilian out—” Persephone stops and takes a deep breath. “What a mess.” She takes another breath. “I think I saw her handbag on the living room table. Go see if she’s got a phone or any ID in it while I look for the keys to this crap.”

  Mhari does as she’s told without arguing because Persephone’s expression frightens her. Society ladies aren’t supposed to do homicidal rage in public. ’Seph is doing a good job of bottling it up, betraying it only through a certain tightness about the mouth and her unusually clipped diction, but Mhari can tell she’s boiling. Truth be told, Mhari’s pretty upset too. She’d read the report and knew what Schiller’s Church did in their compound in Colorado to runaway teens who wouldn’t be missed, but there’s a difference between reading the dry facts and interrupting a kidnapping in progress. There is indeed a handbag in the living room that hadn’t been there earlier: a Louis Vuitton, not counterfeit if Mhari is any judge, and the contents tell their own story. In addition to makeup and tissues there’s a purse containing the driving license and credit cards of an Angela McCarthy, MS. She also carries university ID and a couple of library cards in the same name—also condoms, lube, iPhone, and a slim business card wallet. The cards carry just her name, a Gmail address, and usernames on Tinder and Ashley Madison. So, a postgrad student who’s hard up for cash, moonlighting in an older profession. London is a horrifyingly expensive city to study in; most stud
ents need to work, and a surprising number of the prettier ones try sex work.

  Mhari takes the bag through into the bedroom. Persephone has found a bunch of keys in the drawer full of restraints, and as Mhari enters ’Seph manages to unlock the leg irons. Angela is still unconscious, her shallow breathy inhalations telling their own story. “We’ve got to get her out,” Mhari says. “Shall I call an ambulance?”

  Persephone pauses. “If we do that, we blow the mission. Traceless infiltration, remember? And the portal’s only good for two bodies.”

  “Can we get her up to the safe house in the lift or fire stairs, then? I think I can carry her—”

  “Under the eyes of whoever’s monitoring the cameras in the corridor? I don’t think so. Anyway, we don’t have a card key for the lift and taking the fire escape would be a really bad idea—too many right angles, and the hounds are out upstairs. The only way is the lift, and for that we’d need to get a card.” The collar padlock releases with a metallic click and Persephone gently pulls it away from Angela’s neck. “How do you feel about extemporizing?”

  “About—” Mhari looks at Persephone and sees the older woman watching her, poker-faced. “What. You’re thinking of extracting her through the portal and leaving one of us here? To do what?”

  “Schiller’s expecting to find a drugged-up helpless woman on his bed, waiting for him to apply the, the thing in the fridge, or something like it.” Persephone’s eyes are burning. “Those guards—we can grab the recording of them bringing her in, we captured them discussing leaving her, we’re miked up, there’s the thing in the fridge—we’ve got the evidence we came for. This is what we need to nail him, once we’ve cleaned house. Assuming he gets away from Nether Stowe of course.”

  “Right, but if he isn’t alone—”

  “I’ve got a booster to install for Gary’s optical bug, and some transmitters like the ones Cassie was passing around at last month’s party. We put in a call for the OCCULUS crew at Target One as soon as they’ve wrapped up there. They can get here before Schiller. So, there’ll be backup—” Persephone slows. “Shit.”

  “What?” Mhari raises an eyebrow at her expression of frustration. “Are you going to unlock that gag thing or am I?”

  “Oh, sorry.” Persephone goes back to testing padlock keys. “I wanted it to be me,” she explains. “I’ve got unfinished business with the preacher-man. But he’ll probably remember me from last time we met, and anyway, I’m not blonde.” She finds the right key and unlocks the bridle and bit. Angela’s breathing evens out, then speeds up slightly.

  Mhari clears her throat. “Am I not blonde?” she asks rhetorically.

  Persephone looks at her dubiously. “Yes, and you’re absolutely fabulous, sweetie, you’re exactly Schiller’s type, but you’re not trained for Field Ops, you’re a Human Resources manager—”

  Mhari hisses and extends her canines. “And you know what they say about HR, don’t you? Let me do it, ’Seph, you get her out of here and I’ll be your bait. If Schiller tries to fuck with me he’ll regret it, that I can promise you. We’ve still got twenty minutes to set it up—you can patch the OCCULUS team into my headset when they arrive and I’ll take it—”

  “Set what up?” croaks Angela. She clears her throat. “Who, who are you people? Ow. My head. Where—”

  Persephone nods at Mhari. “Let’s do it.” She turns her attention to the other woman. “Uh, Ms. McCarthy? I’m afraid you’ve been roofied and abducted. We’re from the Security Services and we’re here to arrest the bastard who did it.” She looks past Angela, who is making an uncoordinated effort to sit up, and shakes her head silently at Mhari, who is mouthing words at her vehemently: cardiac arrest. “Can you move? We need to get you out of here. Mhari, I’m going to update the SA on what we’re doing here. You should go and check the wardrobes in the other rooms, see if you can find something more suitable”—McGuigan’s little black dress is a far cry from Mhari’s webbing vest and combat pants—“otherwise he might suspect something. Angela, can you stand? I need you to stand up, if you can, so we can get out of here—”

  Mhari hurries next door to rifle Overholt’s wardrobe for a disguise. The clock is ticking, the game’s afoot, and she surprises herself at how hungry she is for Persephone’s improvised plan to succeed.

  ELEVEN

  NIGHT AND MAGIC

  “Don’t let go,” Mo tells Cassie; “whatever you do, don’t let go of my arm.”

  “ButBut—” Cassie is so tense she’s vibrating. All around the lounge angry and concerned voices are rising. Bodies sprawl and glasses roll and smash on the floor as hands slacken in release.

  “They can’t see us,” Mo tells her, although it’s a prayer as much as it’s an assertion of truth. “No, really. We need to go back up the stairs, Zero is on his way with the car, if anyone tries to stop us leaving Alex will cover—”

  The rising shrieks of damned souls resound from the open doors of the chapel. Mo tries to turn, but Cassie is rooted to the spot. “Come on.”

  “Feeders,” Cassie says in a dialect of Enochian that Mo can just about make out. Looking at the middle-aged movers and shakers as they struggle to extricate from beneath the insensate bodies of their host-ridden seducers, Mo sees immediately that she’s right: the abortive ritual has opened the way for an infestation. Heads turn, directing a luminous green gaze on their surroundings; hands rise before faces for the curious inspection of the newly incarnate.

  “Okay, we are leaving right now,” Mo says firmly. She grabs Cassie’s wrist with her free hand and turns, forcing her to move. “Quick march, work that catwalk, whatever gets you moving—” Something has clearly gone very wrong indeed with Schiller’s project. The tongue-eaten communicants have collapsed and Schiller’s ritual has been damaged. That invocation has in turn attracted an invasion of feeders, whose nibbling at the walls of the universe has been repaid with sudden success and a breakthrough to the rich buffet pickings in the lounge. “Come on!”

  Cassie breaks into a trot and nearly leaves Mo behind—her feet are sore from the unaccustomed strappy heels, while Cassie, as catering staff, gets to wear sensible shoes—but Mo leans on her and manages to keep up. With her free hand she taps her earpiece. “Zero, extraction now! Alex, front gate, cover us! Backup, I need backup—”

  Behind them the naked dead are rising, struggling to control their unaccustomed bipedal locomotion and to navigate their peers. The feeder-possessed are little better than zombies until they learn control, but once they’re fully integrated they can run—and their touch is lethal: the feeders can transfer by skin-to-skin contact. And Mo is coldly certain that her ability to go unnoticed only works on conscious, self-aware beings: the effect happens in the observer’s mind, not their eyes. As Cassie rushes towards the stairs Mo recalls the usher. “Stop,” she commands, holding the younger woman back. “There’ll be guards—”

  “FuckFuck.” Cassie stops dead and Mo barely manages to stop in time. “Can’t go there.”

  “There’s got to be a fire exit,” Mo tells herself. “Where … of course, it’ll be at the opposite end of the lounge. Past the toilets.” She glances round, taking stock.

  They’re in the wide corridor leading to the staircase, cloakroom, and the side passage to the chapel. The screams of despair and agony from the communion ceremony beyond the chapel door tell their own tale: the other parasites, the hosts of the Inner Temple—segmented worms, suckling off the rich gonadal blood supply as they control the minds of their mounts—writhe directionlessly, as if cut off from whatever ghastly fount of will directed them. “Where—”

  Cassie grips her arm. “The toilets are beyond the lounge, along another corridor.” She points back the way they’ve come, through the lounge and the orgiastic feasting feeders and the screaming, panicking guests. Cassie’s features sharpen as her glamour falls away; she’s gathering her mana, and Mo feels a spasm of relief at the quivering, barely restrained power she feels through the alfär’s wrist. “We
must choose: we can go through the feeders, or past the worms, but—”

  Mo instinctively raises her free hand to the glittering borrowed necklace she wears. “This ward’s good for about three minutes. Can you handle the feeders?”

  Cassie bares her teeth in an expression that is very unlike a smile. “Watch me.”

  “Good.” Mo’s necklace is one of Persephone’s specials; a tiny thread of pearls dangles from the central diadem, and she tugs it viciously until it comes free. She remembers something Bob once said, jokingly, as he lit off a Hand of Glory: Once you pull out the pin, Mr. Hand Grenade stops being your friend. “Let’s go,” she says as the concealed high-end ward lights off, making her teeth buzz with a taste of electricity and regrets.

  Cassie lets go of her wrist and doubles back towards the lounge. The wall sconces and spots have gone out, replaced by dim emergency lights, and the first couple of feeders are staggering towards the corridor, still getting used to controlling their fleshbodies. As Cassie approaches they look up, green-glowing eyes casting hollow shadows across their cheekbones: a B-list pop starlet and a posh boy in a half-unbuttoned dress shirt, bow tie dangling. There’s nothing human about their expressions, just a shared feral hunger. They lurch towards her, and Mo, still invisible, murmurs the macro to release one of the canned exorcisms stored in her bracelets. The pop starlet drops like a puppet with severed strings; the boy’s body collapses across her. Cassie glances round. “Waste not thy ammunition,” she says, in the horribly accented dialect of Old Enochian that is the alfär High Tongue.

  “But you”—Mo scans swiftly: they’re still in the corridor and Cassie is concealed from most of the lounge by one wall—“I’m warded, you’re not.”

  “Oh, but I am.” In the gloom, Cassie’s smile is terrifying. “My magi can feed my will from a distance, you know.”

  Mo bites her tongue. The alfär magi are castrated PHANGs, bound to service, and the power they can deploy or funnel to Cassie is fueled by blood and lives. “Damn.” She supposes she’s wasted an exorcism macro. But this is not the time for cost-value calculations; swallowing her gorge, Mo shelves the matter for later. “Let’s go,” she says tensely, “clock’s ticking.”