Finally the stones were in place. She gave Woody a longing glance, wishing she could bring him along, but she sensed that McClane’s patience was wearing thin. She had to make an impression on him pretty quickly or she’d be going through alone.
The pigeon was still warm, the ravaged body limp and soft in her hands. One wing was missing, the shoulder destroyed by the bullet. She brought the body inside and tilted it, pointing the wound at the floor beside the nearest stone. Blood dribbled out, and she moved slowly along the floor, connecting two stones with a dark line.
McClane gave a snort of contempt in the background. She ignored him, dribbling a trail of blood to the next stone, going back to fill in a few gaps in the line. Soon she was squeezing the little body to get more blood, trying not to grimace. By the end she had to use the wound to brush blood directly onto the floor.
When the line of blood was an inch from the final stone she paused and looked up. There was open contempt on McClane’s face. Jameson was a dozen feet behind his partner, his face white, his hand clamped on the butt of his pistol. Colleen made sure she was outside of the circle, then pressed the pigeon’s body to the floor, making a bloody mark, completing the ring.
Air moved on her skin, and the hairs on her arms stood on end. She looked at the center of the ring. There was a faint hint of movement there, like the shimmering of heat waves on a hot summer day. It wasn’t heat, though. The carriage house was as chilly as an insulated icebox.
Jameson made a sound deep in his throat and whirled, running out of the building. McClane watched him go, then turned back and faced Colleen. He looked shaken, but the sneer was still in place on his lips. "I don’t see any gateway to another world," he said.
Colleen looked at the circle, waiting for something else to happen. "I don’t know how long it should take," she said.
"This is ridiculous." His voice didn’t match his words. He sounded frightened. "This is nonsense. I’ve wasted enough time." He spun and walked out of the building.
A big part of Colleen yearned to follow him. She stared into the middle of the ring, waiting for fog to form, waiting for a change. Then she walked carefully around the ring, studying the line of blood, checking that it was unbroken. Finally she took a deep breath and walked into the center of the ring.
Nothing happened. She walked right back out the other side, still in the carriage house.
The rumble of an engine told her that McClane had started his car. Tires crunched on gravel, and the engine receded in the distance. She stared at the ring, her fists clenched in frustration. Finally she grabbed a stone and dragged it out of the circle. The crawling sensation on her skin immediately vanished, the air lost its shimmer, and the heat of the day began to reassert itself. She plodded over to a chair and slumped down, defeated.
Chapter 11 - Lost Souls
Maggie lay slumped against the pillows, her face nearly as white as the hospital sheets beneath her. An intravenous bag hung beside her, connected to a needle in the back of her hand. Colleen sat and gazed at her, not wanting to disturb her rest, but after a few minutes Maggie's eyelids fluttered open.
For a moment the two women gazed at each other in silence. Then Colleen smiled and said, "Hi, Maggie."
"What's going on?" Maggie's voice was small and hoarse, and Colleen felt her stomach constrict.
"Everything's fine, Maggie. Don't worry about a thing."
Maggie's eyes sharpened. "Balderdash. Give it to me straight."
Colleen's eyes went to Maggie's right hand, which was bright red in color and swollen to twice its normal size. Maggie's forearm was swathed in bandages, but the swelling and discoloration extended up past her shoulder. She had an infection, something the doctors couldn't quite identify. Whatever it was, it was serious.
"Don't look at me like that," Maggie snapped, her voice irritable. "My arm may be hurt, but my brain is still working. Now knock off the mollycoddling and tell me what's going on."
Colleen nodded and gave in to a flood of relief. It felt unutterably good to defer to someone, to pass the burden of decision to someone higher up. She poured out the whole story, everything that had happened since Maggie was hurt.
When she finished, Maggie closed her eyes. Only a furrow between her brows told Colleen she was still conscious. A long minute dragged past, and then Maggie's eyes opened.
"You won't like to hear this," Maggie said. "I understand why you've done what you've done, but you need to smarten up."
Colleen blinked at her, surprised.
"You've been irresponsible," Maggie told her. "Carter is dead by now. You need to accept that. He's gone. You have to let go."
Colleen opened her mouth to protest, but Maggie silenced her with a sharp look. "He's gone, and the only thing you can accomplish by opening another gateway is to let in something dreadful." She gestured at her bandages. "Maybe something much, much worse than what came through last time."
"But what if-"
"But nothing!" Maggie's eyes flashed, and there was nothing of the invalid in her voice. "Carter knew the risks when he joined the battle, just like we all did. He put his life on the line to protect all of us from what's on the other side. If you open up that portal again, you'll make a mockery of his sacrifice. You need to go back to McDougall House and smash that portal stone. Grind it up into sand, and scatter the sand far and wide."
She glared until Colleen nodded. Then her voice softened. "I'm sorry, Colleen. It hurts to lose a team member. But don't use his death to make things worse. Some things are not meant to be messed with. You should go through some of the old film archives. There are things on those films that will make your skin crawl."
They chatted for a while longer. A doctor came in, popped a thermometer in Maggie's mouth, took her pulse, examined her fingers, and looked at the thermometer. "You're getting better," he said. "I don't know what this strange infection is, but you're fighting it off. Slowly, but I think you've turned the corner." His gaze fell on Colleen. "Your friend needs her rest," he said. "Mind you don't stay too long."
Colleen nodded. When the doctor left she made her goodbyes and headed back to the McDougall estate. Her emotions were in turmoil. On some level she knew Maggie was right, but the knowledge ate away at her. She had lost too many friends and colleagues. Carter felt like the last straw.
Back in her workshop she found Tom and Archie working away with an enthusiasm that she just couldn't dampen, no matter how vile her mood. "He can fight now," Tom said. "Can he ever! Jack Dempsey couldn't lay a glove on him now. He doesn't use his legs in combat yet, but you won't believe what we can make his arms do."
"And you can program him for more than a few seconds now," Archie interrupted. He tapped a shiny rectangular structure riveted to Woody's back. "There's slots for up to eight control strips, and they can be twice as long as before. I bet we could make him walk out the door, go all the way around the building, come back, and stop right here. Give us a few days and we can send him into town for soda!"
Their enthusiasm was infectious, and she allowed herself to be drawn in. "Show me," she said, and watched as they put Woody through his paces. She made a few suggestions, demanded that Tom put labels on the strips, and finally left them to their work. They were beaming with pride as she walked out of the carriage house.
The inside of McDougall House was shadowy and quiet. There was still unrepaired bullet damage, but for the most part the house was an oasis of serenity. Colleen, her feet dragging with exhaustion, plodded down a flight of stairs to the storage rooms in the basement. She found an elderly woman sitting at a desk, going through a stack of international newspapers and making clippings.
"Can I help you, dear? It's Miss Garman, isn't it?"
"Just Colleen, please," Colleen said. "I'm sorry, I know I've seen you around the place, but I don't know your name."
"Mary Parker," she said, smiling. "You can call me Mary. I'm in charge of the archives for the department."
"I'm looking for some films," Coll
een told her. "Maggie told me I should watch them." Something about the woman's kindly face made Colleen want to keep talking. "I don't know why I need to do it now, I'm kind of busy, but- I guess I'm not sure that any of the other things I want to do really matter. So I'm here, looking at films, so I don't have to think about..."
Mary reached out and squeezed her arm. "Believe it or not, I know what you mean," she said. "Who knows? Maybe this is exactly what you need. I know you Department Nine people get up to some pretty difficult things. Oh, they don't tell me the details, not old Mary Parker, but you piece things together when you get enough hints. Sometimes you need to get your mind off of some of the things you've seen. And sometimes you need a reminder that you're not the only one in the fight. Here, come with me."
Colleen followed her deeper into the basement storage rooms. Mary kept up a constant chatter as they walked.
"They keep the film in vaults. There's enough silver nitrate in those canisters to burn this place to the ground a dozen times over. Dreadful stuff, film. I can't believe they let movie theatres use it. You get a hot projector going, you're asking for a fire. Did you know silver nitrate will burn under water? God's truth."
She produced a ring of keys and unlocked a room the size of a small closet. "Here's the first set. The walls in here are fireproof. There are two more vaults, kept separate so the film can't all go up at once. The projector is in the corner here. They keep the screen in the next vault, but most people use the wall in the index room. Do you know how to use the projector?"
Colleen nodded. In truth she had never used a film projector in her life, but figuring out mechanical devices came to her as naturally as breathing. She thanked Mary and the old woman bustled out.
The index room was a long chamber, one wall lined with cabinets full of small drawers. The other walls were painted a flat white. Colleen dragged the projector in and set it up at one end of the room. She brought in half a dozen film reels and fed one into the projector. Then she turned the lights off and sat down to watch.
The only sound was the hum and flicker of the projector. Colleen was accustomed to an orchestra playing during a film, and she found the silence eerie. Equally eerie was the footage. Some kind of strange creature sat motionless in the corner of a dark cell. She could see tentacles and the hint of a malformed body. Occasionally a tentacle would twitch. Beyond that, nothing happened.
Her mind wandered as she watched the film. The projector itself was much more interesting than the film, and her fingers itched with the desire to take the machine apart and learn its secrets.
She idly pondered the creature projected on the wall. It reminded her of the thing that had injured Maggie, the creature she had thought was a wolf. It was monstrous, unnatural, and thoughts of werewolves flickered through her mind. Nothing about the creatures she'd seen was like any werewolf she'd ever heard of. This was a different kind of monster.
If she were to be attacked by a werewolf, she mused, she would be in a good position to defend herself. Werewolves didn't like silver. All this silver nitrate had to be anathema to them.
The reel ended and she put in another one. This time it was surveillance footage of a freighter bobbing at a wharf. Absolutely nothing was happening. The film had been shot at night, and she could barely make out the outline of the ship.
Her mind continued to wander. In the absence of werewolves the silver in the film stock wouldn't be much use. The nitrate, however, was another matter. It would burn fiercely. It would be a real threat to anything from this world or the other one.
She tried to squash the thought. Her mission was to destroy the portal stone and carry on with the war against the cult. The portal would never be reopened. She never needed to face those dread creatures again.
Something moved on the wall, and she sat up straighter. Two men, just dark forms in the foreground, squatting, watching the freighter. Then one man lit a match and Colleen sucked in her breath as she recognized their faces.
It was Carter and Smith, younger than she'd ever seen them. She watched as they shared a cigarette, first one face and then the other softly lit as they passed the smoke back and forth.
Both of them were gone. Neither could be saved. Of that she was almost certain.
Almost.
If either of them could speak to her, she was quite sure of what they would say. They would agree with Maggie. Re-opening the portal would be madness. The potential gain was insignificant, the life of a single man who was almost certainly dead. The danger was enormous. Who knew what would happen if Katharis was released into the world?
Her duty was clear. The portal stone had to be destroyed.
The Carter projected on the wall took a drag on the cigarette and his face was briefly lit. He looked handsome and dashing, his face slimmer than she remembered. She smiled as she realized why he looked so different. He had no mustache.
She imagined keeping this film reel, treasuring it because it was all she had left of him. The thought broke her heart. But it wasn't as if she had a choice to make, after all. She had tried to open the portal. She had failed. Even if she were mad enough to gamble the world in an attempt to save him, she couldn't do it. She didn't know how.
The shadowy Carter passed the cigarette to Smith. For a moment the glow lit Smith's features. The lines of stress and care were so much less on his young man's face, and Colleen smiled fondly. But her smile faded, pushed away by a rising fear. She realized that she had made a decision. Almost certainly the wrong decision, but it was nevertheless what she was going to do.
Carter was not the only friend lost with only a ghost of a chance at salvation. If the risk was unthinkable for one man, maybe it was marginally worthwhile for two.
Shaking her head at her own foolishness, Colleen stood and turned off the projector. She finished running the film through and put it into its canister. Then she took the whole stack in her arms and headed for the stairs.
Mary's eyebrows rose as Colleen went past, but all she said was, "See you later, dear." Colleen nodded and marched up the stairs, outside, and over to the carriage house.
Tom looked up from the copper strip he was labelling. "What's that? Film cans?"
She nodded.
"What are you going to do with them?"
"I'm going to destroy them," Colleen said, "and you're going to help."
His eyes widened. "Are you sure?"
She gave him a wicked grin. Her decision was made, for better or worse, and considering what was hanging in the balance, destroying property and breaking the law carried consequences that hardly mattered. "Afraid of destroying an irreplaceable film archive?" she asked. "You should see what we're going to do next."
He looked at her, concern plain on his face. The grin she gave him didn't seem to reassure him much. "Tell me, Tom, do you know how to drive?"
He nodded.
"Good. Here's what we're going to do..."
Chapter 12 - Desperate Measures
Smith was having a rough day. His unquiet mind offered up a hundred torments, and he paced back and forth in his little cell, trying to win back the focus he'd found during the interrogation. It was fading quickly.
As the day wore on and the residual remains of last night's pill faded away, he had increasing difficulty figuring out what was real. He had seen things no mind could endure, and his tortured psyche alternated between showing him horrific flashbacks to that night in Victoria, and cushioning him with scenes of his childhood in Calgary.
At times he was convinced he was in an aspen forest. Every detail was perfect, from the touch of the breeze on his cheek to the smell of leaves moldering underfoot. He saw a butterfly dancing just out of reach, walked toward it, and bumped into the wall of his cell.
The scrape of metal made him turn. The orderly was unlocking his room, and Smith smiled. He'd made a mistake, but now he could correct it. He would take his evening pill.
It was a different orderly from the morning, a big man with sloping shoulders and a s
lack face. He made a summoning gesture and muttered, "C'mon."
The orderly didn't take him to the night doctor's office, though. Smith tried to stop as they went past the familiar door, earning him an impatient tug on his arm. They went instead to the same room where he'd interrogated the boy. Colleen was waiting inside.
She thanked the orderly and stared at him pointedly until he took the hint and stepped outside. Then she closed the door and turned to face Smith. "There's a problem," she said.
"What is it?"
Her composure seemed to drop away from her as she poured out the story of the raid and the failed attempt to open the portal. "We set up the stones in a circle, we put blood on the floor just like the kid said. And it didn't work."
"Nothing happened?" Smith said, relief and disappointment battling within him.
"Not quite nothing. The air started to hum." She rubbed her arms as she remembered. "And I could feel – something. But there was no gateway, and Carter's still stuck."
She stared at him, her eyes intense, filled with some strong need, and he felt himself shrink in dismay. He wasn't up to this challenge. No way. A man could only do so much, and then it was time to pass the torch to someone more capable, less damaged.
Except that he had passed the torch to Carter. And there was clearly no one else.
"Do you know what I did wrong?" Colleen asked. "I have to try again. I just hope I don't need to go through alone. The Secret Service guys, either they don’t believe, or they can't handle the reality of it."
A voice spoke, a quiet, even voice that Smith was startled to recognize as his own. "I believe. And I can handle the reality of it. After all, I've seen worse."
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