by Will Hill
Slightly fewer than three hundred escaped patients effectively turned by Dracula himself, he thought, a chill running up his spine. Thousands more around the world. So much worse than any of us thought.
He sat forward and pressed a series of keys on his desktop terminal. The wall screen opposite lit up, displaying the Blacklight network. Holmwood opened the secure video messaging program and scrolled through his contacts list.
Matt’s word is good enough for me. But the others are going to need proof.
He highlighted Aleksandr Ovechkin’s name and clicked CALL. A few seconds later a young SPC operator appeared on the screen, wearing an expression of surprise.
“Director Holmwood,” said the man. “I am Yevgeny Alimov, Colonel Ovechkin’s assistant. I’m very sorry, I do not have your call on my schedule.”
“Don’t worry, Operator Alimov,” said Holmwood. “This isn’t a scheduled call. I need to speak to the director.”
Alimov looked relieved. “Yes, sir,” he said. “I will see if he is available. Excuse me.”
The young man got up from his chair and disappeared from the frame. Holmwood waited as patiently as he was able. He was on the verge of shouting in frustration at the screen when the large gray-clad figure of Aleksandr Ovechkin settled into the empty chair and smiled at him.
“Cal,” he said. “This is an unexpected pleasure. How are you?”
“I’m well, Aleksandr,” he replied. “Yourself?”
“I cannot complain. Each night we destroy vampires, each night more are turned. Such things do not change.”
“How are you doing with the Black Dolphin break?”
Ovechkin shrugged. “Half have been destroyed, although every single one of them has fought hard. We have surveillance on half of the remainder. The rest are gone. You?”
“Similar,” said Holmwood. “The breakouts are why I’m calling you, Aleksandr. I’ve come into some information. It’s only a theory at the moment, but I can prove it with your help.”
“Where did it come from?” asked Ovechkin.
“From one of my lieutenants. He works in the Lazarus Project, alongside the girl you sent us.”
“Natalia Lenski,” said Ovechkin. “Is she doing well? It was hard to part with her.”
“Extremely well, according to Professor Karlsson. She was involved in an incident two days ago that caused her some minor injuries, but nothing for you to worry about.”
“That is good. So what is the information?”
Cal took a deep breath and began to explain Matt Browning’s theory to the SPC director. It took him several minutes; the concepts were neither as easy nor as familiar to him as they were to Matt, so he forced himself to go slowly, to paint as clear and convincing a picture as possible for his Russian counterpart. When he was finished, Ovechkin fell silent for a long moment.
“You trust this boy?” he asked, eventually. “You think he is correct?”
Holmwood nodded. “I do. I’m going to order my Science Division to fully investigate his theory, but I need something from you first.”
“Tell me and it is done.”
Holmwood took a deep breath. “I need you to send me the DNA profile you extracted from Dracula’s ashes. Matt thinks there should be a sufficient match with the DNA of our captive escapees to be sure.”
Ovechkin stared at him. The Russian colonel’s face was monolithic, and not prone to displaying emotion; Holmwood was therefore surprised and relieved when a smile curled onto the SPC director’s face.
“You know, Cal,” said Ovechkin. “If you had asked me that three months ago, I would have denied that we had ever been able to extract a profile from the ashes.”
“And now?” asked Holmwood.
“I will have my geneticists send it over to you,” said Ovechkin, the smile still wide on his face, “providing that you share your results with us as soon as you have them?”
“Of course,” said Holmwood. “Thank you, Aleksandr.”
“It is not a problem. We are all on the same side now, are we not?”
I hope so, thought Holmwood.
“We are,” he said. “I’ll send you the results as soon as we have them.”
“All right. Do svidaniya, Cal.”
“Goodbye, Aleksandr.”
Holmwood reached out, cut the connection, and released a long sigh of relief. A new spirit of cooperation had settled over the supernatural Departments of the world in the wake of the furious, damning speech he had made after Admiral Henry Seward was taken by Valeri Rusmanov. It had been a painful process, as historical rivalries and decades-old layers of mistrust were put aside in the service of a common goal, and Holmwood was far from naive enough to believe that no secrets remained among them, but it was a vast improvement on the situation that had been the status quo.
He got up and walked across to his small kitchen. He pulled a bottle of water out of the fridge, carried it back to his desk, and scrolled up through his contacts. When he reached Bob Allen’s name, he highlighted it and hovered his finger over the button.
She’s going to hate you for doing this to her, he thought.
Holmwood hesitated, giving himself a moment to think through his decision. Matt said that having Larissa home would help, and he had no reason to doubt the young lieutenant. But there was more to it than that: The darkness was gathering around his Department, and Cal had a sudden desire to close ranks, to bring his people home.
She’ll understand. It was never meant to be a vacation.
Then guilt flooded through him as he remembered the man who was locked in the cell beneath Dreamland, the man he realized he had not thought about in a very long time. He had set Julian Carpenter aside, as there were far more important things happening; now, perhaps, it was time to deal with the man he had once called his friend.
Holmwood clicked CALL and waited for the connection to be established.
Two birds with one stone, he thought. I hope they can both forgive me.
* * *
Kate put her phone back in her pocket and shut her eyes for a long moment.
She was trying to think clearly, trying to sort out what she needed to be aware of and prepare for, but she could not stop picturing her father, her poor, dear father who had never hurt a fly, in the clutches of Albert Harker. How the vampire had found him, or Matt’s dad, didn’t matter now. All that mattered was destroying him and making sure her father was safe. Explanations, recriminations: They could wait.
She grabbed her console from her belt and tapped rapidly on its screen. The message was short; it ordered the on-duty pilot to meet her in the hangar in five minutes, on Zero Hour authorization. The high level of classification would ensure their departure was not challenged.
And to be honest, thought Kate, as she stowed her console and ran for the hangar, I’m not even lying. This is the definition of Zero Hour business.
She bolted through the open-plan desks of the Intelligence Division, oblivious to the curious looks she attracted from the staff. Kate pushed through the main door without slowing, cut right, and accelerated toward the double doors that opened onto the Blacklight hangar; they slammed open with a loud thud. She ran across the hangar, her boots cracking on the tarmac floor, and hauled open the door to the armory. There was no time to go down to her quarters and retrieve her own gear, so the guns and equipment on the stainless-steel racks would have to do.
Thankfully, there was a locker at the end of the room that contained a number of spare uniforms. She stripped off her clothes, not caring in the slightest whether anyone was watching through the plastic window behind her, and pulled on the familiar black bodysuit. She zipped it up, and was attaching weapons and kit to her belt when Matt burst into the room, his face pale, his breathing hard and shallow.
“Get dressed,” she said, barely looking around at him. “Uniforms there.”
Matt nodded, squeezed past her, and pulled down a uniform in his size. He held it in his hands for a long moment, then began to undress.
Oh Christ, she thought. He’s never worn this stuff outside of the Playground. I shouldn’t be taking him. It isn’t fair.
“Matt—” she began, but he cut her off.
“Save it,” he said. “I know what you’re thinking. I’m coming.”
She nodded and returned her attention to the task at hand. When her equipment was in place, she helped Matt attach his: Glock 17, Heckler & Koch MP5, T-Bone, ultraviolet grenades, ultraviolet beam gun, flashlight, radio, console.
“You know what you’re doing, right?” she asked. “You can use all this stuff?”
“Don’t worry about me, Kate,” he replied.
She was suddenly full of fierce, fiery love for her friend. He was scared, it was clear in the pallid color of his face, the wideness of his eyes, but he was here. And he was refusing to let her go alone.
“Okay,” said Matt, standing up and patting himself down. “I think I’m good.”
“Grab one of those,” said Kate, pointing at a row of gleaming black-and-purple helmets. “Pass me one, too.”
Matt nodded, then did as he was told. Kate took a helmet from him and slipped it over her head. She opened a panel on its underside, pulling out the black cable concealed behind it. It went into a port in her uniform, at the back of her neck. This connected up her uniform’s control system, meaning she was able to change the visual and aural modes of her helmet using the buttons and pad on the side of her belt.
Matt watched carefully, then copied her. The two young operators looked at each other for a brief moment, their visors raised, and Kate fought back the absurd urge to give her friend a hug. It was not the time for such things; they had a job to do.
“Let’s go,” said Matt, firmly. “I’m ready.”
“One last thing,” said Kate. “We have to go to the Ops Room. Just for a minute.”
Matt frowned. “Why?”
“I promised Paul I would.”
“Kate, there isn’t time,” said Matt. “We need to go.”
“I promised,” she said. “Wait here if you want. But I have to go.”
Matt stared for a moment. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s make it quick.”
“Agreed,” said Kate.
She pushed open the armory door and ran back across the hangar, Matt close behind her. They burst through the double doors, sprinted down the corridor, and stopped outside the door to the Ops Room, the oval space that was the tactical and strategic heart of the Department. Kate pulled it open; they stepped inside, then stopped dead in their tracks.
She had not wasted a moment wondering why Paul Turner had made her promise to go to the Ops Room before she left; there was too much else to think about. But even if she had, she doubted she would ever have guessed the truth.
In the middle of the wide room, leaning on one of the tables, was Colonel Victor Frankenstein.
The huge, misshapen man was wearing an operator’s uniform and casually holding the biggest shotgun Kate had ever seen; it dwarfed the T-Bone that hung from his belt. As they skidded to a halt, their eyes widening, Frankenstein regarded them with a narrow smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
“Paul told me what’s happening,” he said, his voice like rolling thunder. “I’d like to help. If you’ll let me.”
Kate glanced over at Matt. Her friend was still staring at the monster, his eyes wide with surprise. She looked back at Frankenstein, her heart filling with desperate gratitude.
“I thought you only protected Jamie’s family?” she said, smiling around the lump that had risen in her throat.
“Isn’t that what you are?” replied Frankenstein.
52
HEADLONG
Soho, London
The black van screeched to a halt outside the warehouse where Alastair Dempsey had been located.
Rain was pouring from the skies above London, bouncing up from the empty pavements and causing the gutters to run like rapids. The deluge had forced the majority of the pedestrians off the streets, sending them running for refuge in bars and restaurants, or in the tube stations that would take them home.
Jamie Carpenter sat in the back of the van, watching the feeds from the external cameras. He stared at the crisp HD images, waiting for the right moment for them to make their move.
He and Ellison had said little to one another on their flight from the Loop. As soon as they were in the air, Jamie had requested permission to make an emergency landing in central London, on the grounds that an operator’s life might depend on it. The communications operator on the other end of the line had sounded incredulous and had instantly refused the request, ordering them instead to London City Airport; it was the closest location where they could set down the helicopter without attracting unnecessary attention. Jamie held his tongue, resisting the urge to tell the communications operator exactly what he thought of him, and cut the connection as the dark vehicle thundered through the sky toward the capital. As they touched down in a secluded section of the airport, he asked their driver how long it would take to get into Soho.
“Thirty minutes,” he replied. “Maybe thirty-five, allowing for traffic.”
“Do it in fifteen,” said Jamie.
The driver attacked his task with admirable commitment, sending the vehicle hurtling into central London, weaving between the black cabs and crowds of tourists, the deafening siren and blinding blue light screaming on the van’s roof.
They covered the distance from the Loop to Soho in less than half the time it had taken Morton, but it had not been fast enough. Jamie had called up the location of their squad mate’s chip on the flat screen as they roared along the Embankment, and he and Ellison had watched it with a sense of utter helplessness, hoping for a miracle. It had been close, closer than Jamie had dared to hope, but in the end, it had been futile. Fifteen minutes before they had arrived on this dirty London backstreet, Morton’s chip had stopped moving.
It doesn’t mean anything, Jamie told himself, staring at the screen. There’s been no sign of Dempsey either. Surely he would have run.
Ellison stared at him with professional calm on her face. The woman who had come to find him in the dining hall, who had appeared on the verge of tears, was gone, replaced by the operator that Jamie had told his friends about. She was waiting for him to tell her what to do.
As Jamie watched, a man who had been vomiting enthusiastically into the gutter behind the van staggered away into the night, and suddenly the screen was clear in both directions.
“Go,” he said, throwing open the rear doors of the van. “Ready One as soon as we’re inside.”
Ellison nodded, and leaped out of the vehicle. Jamie followed, the rain and steam rising from the pavement instantly clouding his visor. He wiped it with the back of his gloved hand, slammed the van doors shut, and turned to face the warehouse.
The building loomed over them like some squat, hulking animal. It was made of the same pale stone as the rest of the old buildings in Soho, but had been stained dark gray by years of hard work and neglect. Its lower walls were plastered with posters for gigs, art installations, political rallies, and pop-up shops, pasted over and over each other until they were as thick as subway tiles in places. The entrance was set back from the street, up two wide stone steps, and covered with a steel security gate, the kind that is installed in the hope of keeping squatters at bay.
The gate and the door beyond it were standing open.
“Take point,” said Jamie. “Carefully.”
Ellison nodded, then ran up the steps and disappeared into the building. Jamie cast a final glance up and down the rain-sodden street, then followed her.
He pushed the door shut behind him and surveyed the area inside. A wall stood befor
e them, covered in drawing pins and scraps of paper. It ran away to their left and disappeared in the darkness.
“Flashlights,” said Jamie. “Thermo on your helmet, regular view on mine. Silent comms. If Alastair Dempsey is still here, he doesn’t get out. I don’t care if we have to blow this building to rubble with him inside it.”
“What about Morton?” asked Ellison.
Jamie didn’t respond. He pulled his flashlight from his belt and shone it along the wall; it ran for perhaps thirty feet before ending in a dark corner.
“This way,” he said, drawing his T-Bone and holding his light against its barrel. “Follow me.”
He walked silently down the dark corridor with Ellison close behind him. As they approached the corner, he spoke into his helmet’s microphone. “Give me a thermal of whatever’s on the other side of this wall.”
“Yes, sir,” replied Ellison. She stepped silently past him and slowly leaned out beyond the end of the wall. “Nothing,” she said. “Nothing warm, nothing moving.”
“Understood,” said Jamie, and stepped around the corner.
What had once been the main warehouse space was now a vast stone box. His flashlight picked out grooves in the floor that had presumably once held the foundations of shelving, and a pair of metal shutter doors at the far end. The floor in front of them was marked with a series of yellow lines.
“Loading bay,” said Ellison, then flicked her light to illuminate a door on the right-hand wall. “Stairs.”
“Okay,” said Jamie. “Stay on point.”
Ellison nodded and headed across the empty space, her boots thudding softly on the concrete floor. Jamie followed, his flashlight scanning the ground and the bare, peeling walls as she reached the door and pushed it silently open. His squad mate crouched down and peered through, her T-Bone raised.
“Clear,” she said.
Jamie stepped through the door. His flashlight revealed a metal staircase that doubled back on itself, with a landing halfway up. He climbed it slowly, his T-Bone pointed steadily upward. When he reached the landing, he trained his weapon on the open door that stood at the top of the stairs and motioned for Ellison to overlap him. As she climbed the stairs toward him, something floated momentarily into his nostrils: a bitter, oily smell that he could taste at the back of his throat. It was gone as quickly as it had arrived, and he refocused his attention as Ellison arrived at the door. She darted her head through it, then spoke into his ear.