“It’s beautiful,” Ollie whispered.
“You get used to it,” said Cobia. He had appeared behind them, and only his head had so far emerged from his gloopy coating. “Dissolve.”
Dan blinked. “Huh?” he said, but then all became clear when the transparent slime that currently clung to them all became water and fell away. It seeped into the floor immediately, and Dan noticed his clothes – what little was left of them – were bone dry.
“Impressive,” he said, fixing Cobia with a glare. “But spring something like that on us again and it won’t just be your nose I break.”
“You are prisoners. Suspected war criminals,” Cobia reminded him. “I can do whatever I wish.”
“I’d like to see ye try,” Artur warned, but Cobia ignored him.
“Were it up to me, you’d still be rotting in your cells. I do not approve of this… meeting,” he said, spitting the last word out like someone had slipped poison in between the letters.
“Meeting? Who are we meeting?” Dan asked.
“That would be me, Mr Deadman.”
Dan and the others turned to see a red-skinned man descending some ornate gold steps that led down from a doorway in one of the dome walls. He had a pointed abomination of a beard curving out from the bottom of his chin, and was flanked on both sides by a squadron of six heavy-set Deeper Downians, all carrying long-handled tridents. His expensively tailored suit seemed out of place among their armor and weapons. His grin, even more so.
The guards stopped at the foot of the stairs and fanned out, forming a solid wall of muscle and metal. The man in the suit kept walking until he was just three good lunges and a headbutt beyond Dan’s reach.
There was more movement from the top of the stairs. Six children shuffled out through the doorway and stopped at the top of the steps. From the other side of the door, Dan heard the soft lilt of music.
“Krato,” Dan growled. His brow furrowed as his mind set to work trying to figure out what the arms dealer’s presence here meant. His mind, however, came up blank. “What are you doing here?”
“Same as you. I’m here on business.” He gestured around them. “And, you know, to admire the view. Spectacular, isn’t it?”
He inhaled deeply, as if he could somehow smell the ocean on the other side of the dome. “Spectacular,” he said again, and there was a note of sadness in it this time. “It upsets me that we would threaten such a place.”
“Threaten? Who’s threatening?”
“Why, we are. Up There. Or Down Here, depending on where you’re from,” Krato said. “An attack is imminent. We’re going to obliterate this whole place.”
Ollie looked from Krato to Dan and back again. “We are? That’s horrible.”
“I know. Utterly beyond contempt.”
“First I’ve heard about any of it,” Artur said. “Deadman?”
Dan shook his head. “Far as I knew, this place didn’t even exist. Never met anyone who believed otherwise.”
“And he’s met some real crazy bastards,” Artur said. “Trust me.”
Krato raised a black-nailed finger and tick-tocked it admonishingly. “Now, now, you two. Let’s not tell fibs. The good people of Deeper Down deserve better than that.”
Since returning to life, Dan’s sense of smell had deteriorated. This was probably just as well, given the stench he gave off. There were two things his nose could still be relied on to detect, though – bullshizz and trouble. Whatever was going on here carried the distinct whiff of both.
It was all connected. It had to be. Krato. The sewer monsters. The mall. Hell, even the music playing behind the kids. It was the same lullaby-like tune that had been playing back at Krato’s office.
It was all linked, Dan just couldn’t yet see how. He decided to take a stab at it and hope for the best.
“You’re selling them weapons. This place, I mean. You’re selling them weapons to fight a war that isn’t coming.”
“Oh, it’s coming, Mr Deadman,” said Krato, and the way his eyes blazed told Dan the guy believed what he was saying. “It’s coming. And soon. That’s why we’re striking first.”
“Wait, what?”
Krato looked past Dan to Cobia. “Bring him in, would you?”
Cobia bristled. “You have no authority over me.”
“Well, technically I do,” Krato said. “Your boss’s boss’s boss – you know, the Prime Minister? - has given me authority to manage the war effort. Or did you miss the announcement? Since you’re here assisting with these prisoners of war – emphasis on ‘war’ – then that gives me complete authority over you.”
His smile, which had been steadily growing, suddenly fell. “Now go over to that door, open it, and go fetch him.”
For a moment, it looked as if Cobia might resist, but then he gave a single curt nod of his head and about-turned. Dan watched each resentful footstep until he reached a squat stone building a little larger than a garden shed. The door swung inward at his approach and they heard his footsteps scuffing down a set of steps on the other side.
“He’s gone,” said Dan, turning to Krato. He glanced over at the row of guards before lowering his voice. “So how about you tell us what this is really all about? You’re giving them guns and sending them to invade the surface? That’s insane.”
Krato snorted. “Guns? No. Guns are so old-fashioned. All that pew-pew, chow-chow. It’s… and speaking as someone who made a lot of money from them… it’s all a little embarrassing, you know?”
He smoothed his beard with both hands, sharpening the point. “War has evolved, Mr Deadman. And the weapons we use to wage it must therefore evolve also.”
“What’s he on about?” asked Artur.
“The usual monologuing bullshizz,” said Dan. “Like they all do.”
“Ha! Yes, maybe, but indulge me,” Krato said. “You see, war has always provided society with the opportunity to develop and grow. To overcome challenges it might never have otherwise anticipated. It allows us to push the boundaries, and – without blowing my own trumpet – I’ve pushed them further than anyone has ever pushed them before.”
He held a hand out and it took Dan a moment to realize he was gesturing past them. “You know our guest, I believe?”
Everyone turned to the squat stone building. Cobia had emerged, leading a small rat-faced figure with him. “Wait a minute,” said Dan, recognition dawning.
“Bonbo?” said Finn. His face lit up. “Bonbo, brah! Oh, man, I heard you were dead!”
“He was dead,” Dan said.
“He doesn’t look dead,” said Ollie.
“She’s got ye there, Deadman,” Artur agreed.
“He died in that bathroom stall,” Dan insisted. “I saw a fonking tentacle rip right through him.”
“Did you?” Krato asked, his face a mockery of concern. “Did you really?”
He raised both eyebrows and a finger, as if an idea had suddenly occurred to him. “Or did you see a tentacle rip right out of him?” He stroked his beard and nodded sagely. “Because that would explain a lot.”
“Ye’re fecking right it would,” Artur agreed. Then: “In what way?”
Something dark and sinister slithered deep down in Dan’s guts as everything – or lots of it, anyway – slotted into place. His thought process went something along the lines of:
But that would mean…
Of course.
But then…
Oh, fonk.
“It was the stress, you see?” said Krato. “That fight or flight instinct when you had him cornered in that stall. No way out. Nowhere to run. That’s what triggered it.”
Bonbo wasn’t meeting Dan’s eye. He wasn’t meeting anyone’s eye, in fact. Instead, he was just staring at the floor directly ahead of him, hands clutched in front of him, fingers twisting together. He had literally been an empty skin sack last time Dan had seen him, and Dan wasn’t sure how much of him had come back.
Bonbo’s scrawny arms were bare from below the el
bow. The scars of old scratches stood out as red lines against his skin.
“It was you. The mall. It was you,” Dan said, turning to Krato.
Krato bit his lip to stop himself grinning, but couldn’t contain himself. “Ack! OK, you got me. Yes, it was me. It was a test. A proof of concept, if you will.”
That slithering thing in Dan’s gut coiled tight as his fears were confirmed.
“Ollie,” he said. “Step away from Finn.”
Ollie blinked. “What? Why?”
“Just do it. Trust me.”
Ollie looked at Finn, who shrugged.
“What’s going on, brah?”
“I’m sorry, kid. I really am,” Dan told him. “But if you care about her – and I think you do – then step away. Now.”
“You’re scaring me,” said Ollie. “What’s wrong?”
“Kid, I mean it,” Dan said, ignoring her and focusing on Finn. “Step back. Step away. I’m asking you nicely.”
“Deadman? Ye’ve lost me here. What’s the problem.”
Krato cackled. “The problem is he’s figured it out. I knew you’d get there eventually.”
“Two of them. At the mall, there were two of them,” Dan said. He nodded in Bonbo’s direction. “He was one of them.”
“He don’t look like one of them,” Artur pointed out.
“It’s temporary, somehow. He changed back,” Dan said. He ran his dry tongue across his chapped lips, then nodded at Finn. “He was the other one.”
“What?!” Ollie cried. “No! That’s not… I don’t… He’s not… Are you?”
Finn shook his head. “Huh? No! I don’t know what he’s talking about. I don’t know what you’re talking about, brah.”
“I know you don’t, kid,” said Dan. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”
Finn laughed. It was a worried, fearful chuckle that bore no relation to his current amusement levels. “Sorry for what? I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“The drug test,” Dan said. “That’s what he was testing. He injected you with something that turned you into one of those things.”
Krato tutted. “‘Injected’? Oh, please. It was substantially more complicated than that.”
“That’s how the thing found us out on the ocean. That’s why it looked different. It wasn’t the one we saw in the sewers. It was him.”
“What was me? I still don’t follow, brah,” Finn insisted.
“It’s good you don’t remember,” Dan told him. “This is going to be hard enough on you.”
He turned to Krato, his face darkening. Dan had lost count of the number of times he’d been tied up or shackled over the years, but never had he wanted his hands free more.
“You’re a monster,” he said.
“No, I make monsters, Mr Deadman,” Krato corrected. “Although… maybe you’re right. Maybe I am. But all’s fair in love and war.”
He looked taken aback by the phrase, like he hadn’t been expecting it, and gave a little satisfied nod. “I like that. I may use it again.”
“Why are you doing this?” Dan demanded. “What’s in it for you?”
Krato looked offended. “Why, the knowledge that I’ve helped one of Parloo’s greatest civilizations protect itself from an act of aggression!” he said. “And money, of course. A lot of money.”
“What are ye going to buy with it? Fish?” Artur asked. “As far I know, there’s not really an exchange rate between Down Here and… well, down here. Good luck spending it.”
“Not their money,” Krato said. “See, the beauty of these bio-weapons is they’ll kill indiscriminately but leave most of the property intact. You see, in return for helping them protect their city…”
“They’re letting you keep whatever’s left of ours,” Dan finished.
“Got it!” said Krato, winking. “Good job.”
“I hate to break it to you, shizznod, but two of those things aren’t going to take out the whole place. The Tribunal will stop them.”
Krato’s eyes gleamed. “Who said I only have two?”
Dan remembered Krato’s office.
He remembered the children, all lined up and anxious-looking. He looked at them now, their eyes glassy and emotionless, like they weren’t fully here in the room.
Treatment, that’s what he’d said. They were there for their treatment.
“I’m going to kill you,” Dan told him. “I want you to know that.”
“What are you going to do? Dangle me from the roof again? I don’t think so, Mr Deadman. I don’t think you’re going to do anything.”
Krato waved to his guard. “Return them to their cells. Keep the blond one. We need him.”
Ollie, who had been struggling to keep up with everything that was going on, became suddenly animated. “What? No! What are you doing?” she demanded.
She raised her hands as Finn was yanked away by one of the guards, but a downpour of transparent gloop plastered them to her sides again.
“No!” she shrieked. “No, don—”
Wherever the sentence ended up, no one heard. As the cocoon closed around her, Ollie sank through the floor and out of sight.
Dan kept his gaze fixed on Krato as the sludge hardened around him. Krato smiled and waved his fingers, then Dan felt the bottom fall out of the world, and plunged downward into the dark.
TWENTY
“HRMF FCKN MM!”
Dan flicked his eyes open and, for the second time that day, found himself locked in a cell all alone.
“Fckn ft eeit!”
OK, maybe not alone. He rolled over a little and heard Artur gasp with relief.
“Finally! I thought ye were never going to fecking move!” he wheezed. “I thought me final resting place was going to be stuck between the floor and yer armpit, and that would’ve been a very disappointing way to go.”
“Where’s Ollie? What happened?” Dan asked.
“Again, I was trapped under yer armpit,” Artur said. “My grasp of the current situation has been kind of hindered by total darkness and yer overpowering body odor.”
Dan sat up. This proved tricky, partly because of the slime that still coated him, but mostly because his hands were still shackled behind him.
“Take care of these, will you?” he said, angling himself in Artur’s direction.
“A ‘please’ wouldn’t go amiss,” said Artur, but he shoved an arm into the locking mechanism, bit his tongue as he searched for the release mechanism, then gave a sharp yank. The cuffs sprang off and clattered onto the floor.
“Don’t mention it,” he said.
“I was going to say thanks.”
“Me arse ye were.”
They both got up, their feet slipping and sliding in the transparent sludge.
“Dissolve,” Dan said. The sludge continued being sludgy. “Fonk it,” Dan muttered.
He carefully picked his way over to the door, his arms held at his side to steady himself.
“Careful now,” said Artur, then his feet shot in opposite directions and he yelped as he did the splits. “Ooh, me lads,” he groaned. “Me precious lads.”
With some wobbling, a few sharp intakes of breath, and at least one, “Fonk,” Dan finally reached the door. He hammered a clenched fist against it, spattering the copper colored metal with flecks of slime.
“Hey! Open up!” he demanded.
He continued to demand variations on the same theme for several minutes, before accepting that nobody was coming to let them out.
“Damn it!” he grunted. He turned his back on the door, forgot about the slime situation, and had to grab the wall for support while his legs kicked frantically as his feet tried to find purchase on the floor.
“Dissolve!” he said, more forcefully this time.
Still nothing.
“So, what now?” Artur asked, once Dan had successfully found his footing. “Have ye a plan all worked out?”
“Not yet,” Dan admitted.
“What, nothing at all
?”
“I’ve got ‘Escape,’ but it’s a pretty broad heading and I haven’t worked out the details,” Dan said, mostly through gritted teeth.
He thumped the door behind him a few times, but got the expected ‘nothing whatsoever’ in response.
Artur, who had fallen over three times before deciding he was better off just staying seated, scooped some gunk from his beard and scratched his chin through it. “Explain something to me,” he said.
“Explain what?”
“Just, ye know, all of it. The whole thing with the monsters and what have ye. I mean, I think I’ve got a fair grasp of it, it’s just certain bits that I’m… Actually, no. I don’t have a clue about any of it. What’s going on?”
And so, Dan explained, as best he could, based on what he’d figured out. Krato had devised a way of turning people into living weapons, and had used it on Bonbo and – Dan was almost certain - Finn. The attack on the mall was a test, or maybe a demonstration. Either way, it had been done for the purpose of convincing the government of Deeper Down to go along with Krato’s scheme.
“He convinced them they were going to be attacked, then sold them the weapons to defend themselves with,” Dan concluded. “Only what they think is a defensive action will be the opening salvo in a damn war.”
“Bollocks. That’s not good,” said Artur. “How’s that plan coming along?”
“Get out of here, get Ollie, get up to the surface,” Dan said, listing the points on his fingers.
“Now ye’re talking!”
“As for how we actually achieve any of them? I’m open to suggestions.”
Artur gave this some thought.
“Someone’s bound to come eventually, right? If ye keep making a racket, I mean. They can’t just leave us in here forever.”
“We hope.”
Artur shook his head. “Nah, they wouldn’t. They’re a pretty fair lot. Quite nice, really.”
“Still can’t believe you’re married to one.”
“Technically, I’m married to two,” said Artur. “Possibly three. It’s complicated. The point is, they’re not going to leave us in here to rot. Someone is going to come.”
“And then what?” Dan asked.
Dead in the Water_A Space Team Universe Novel Page 21