That was Suzie’s cue and she took it.
“You might not be far wrong in that assessment. And I can’t tell you, yet, how to kill it. But I can tell you where it came from. You made it... or rather, the MOD did.”
The Minister went white.
“That’s the kind of statement that brings down governments,” he said softly. “I do hope you have evidence.”
Noble listened as she laid it all out for him—the story of wartime experiments gone wrong, conjecture about a breakage somewhere in a shipwreck and their trials and tribulations on the research vessel and Weymouth. The Minister took it all in—a man well used to absorbing information like a sponge.
“The stupid bastard built it to be intelligent?” he whispered.
Suzie nodded.
“But I think the intelligence was there from the start, in the source material from the Pabodie Expedition. The Inquisition thought so too.”
She shuffled her papers, then started reading. Noble realised it was some of the Spanish journal, a part he hadn’t yet read.
From the journal of Juan Santoro, Captain of the Santa Angelo, 14th August 1535
We will make port on the morrow. It matters little, for the dream is with us now in every waking hour and no distance from the beast will make any difference. It has passed on to us so completely that we will never be free from it. Nor would we wish anything other. Indeed, I am not the only one who has found himself standing over the lead casket just to be closer to the blessed, drifting peace it offers.
There is no pain in the dream, no fear, no hunger, just the sweet forever of the dead god beneath.
I have talked to the crew. We will do our duty and take our captive to the castle. But we will no longer work for the church after this task is done. I intend to set sail again as soon as night falls. There is a spot in the South Seas where a dead god lies dreaming.
We will find him and join him there.
From the journal of Father Fernando, 25th August 1535
I wish now that I had read Santoro’s journal a mere hour sooner, for then I might have been able to prevent the Santa Angelo slipping out of port under cover of night and I might have been able to question the crew as to the nature of the malady that so sore afflicted them.
For I too have been dreaming.
But it is of no matter. The beast is now in my thrall and its secrets shall be mine before the day is out. They will have to be, for I fear I have been lax in my inquisitions. Even as I have been burning my will into the beast’s flesh, so it has been leaving its mark on me. This morning, at my ablutions, I discovered a fleck of blackness betwixt thumb and finger that no amount of scraping will shift. It has now covered most of my left hand, forcing me to wear a glove lest, it is discovered. For if the Inquisitor General were to find out I am tainted, my questioning would be brought to an abrupt end and that, I cannot allow.
The beast will reveal its secrets.
I will begin again as soon as the irons are hot.
By order of the Inquisitor General, 28th August 1535
It is our command that on this day of our Lord, the twenty and eighth of August, that such parts of Father Juan Fernando that can be safely transported ,shall be taken to the place of the auto-de-fe and burned at the stake alongside the blasphemy which has afflicted him with its heresy.
It is further commanded that if the Santa Angelo is found in Spanish waters, it should be set aflame and sunk with all hands and that no man is to touch any part of it under pain of himself being subjected to ordeal by fire.
Any persons found spreading the sedition of the dreaming god shall be subjected to the full force of the Inquisition.
Let this be the end of the matter.
The Lord wills it.
The Minister had looked increasingly confused during Suzie’s reading.
“Is this some kind of joke? If it is, it is in very poor taste.”
“No joke,” Suzie said. “I double checked. The journal is authentic and exists in the Vatican’s library. I believe what we’re dealing with is some kind of intelligent protoplasm, one with a rudimentary degree of telepathy. And it may be contagious.”
The Minister sat back and ran his hands through his hair. He stared into the distance for so long that Noble thought there was to be no reply to Suzie’s readings. When an answer did come, it was a political rather than a practical one.
“Contagious, mind-reading slime? That’ll go down well with the PM,” the Minister said, and Noble saw a look in his eyes he recognised.
We’ve blown it.
Suzie hadn’t seen it and kept trying to press her case.
“If I can get back to my lab and just study it further, I may be able to come up with a preventative measure...”
The Minister stood and put out a hand for Suzie to shake.
“That sounds like a good course of action,” he said, but his eyes betrayed him.
He just wants rid of us as fast as possible.
He had one parting shot for them.
“I don’t believe you should tell anyone else your theory of MOD collusion in this thing’s creation,” he said, and suddenly Noble saw the shark behind the smile. “Official Secrets and all that, you know? We wouldn’t like to have to lock you up.”
His eyes said differently. Noble half-dragged Suzie away before the man changed his mind. They were escorted out of the building by the armed troops again and left in a cool, early morning in an empty Horse Guard Parade. There was no sign of any chopper.
“We need to get back to the lab,” Suzie said. “We need to give them something to work with.”
Noble took her hand.
“They’re not looking to us for help. We blew it Suzie. We just got the brush off.”
She shook her head.
“No. He said...”
“He’s a politician, Suzie. Lying is second nature to him. He just wanted rid of us. Look around. Do you see a chopper waiting to rush us back?”
He saw the anger rise up inside her and had to hold her back as she turned away towards the office buildings.
“The stupid bastard. Sticking your head in the sand is only going to get you your arse bitten.”
“I know,” Noble said. “But you have to admit that theory you started to push is pretty far out there.”
She laughed bitterly.
“Killer seaweed is choking the English Channel. I think we’ve already entered the Twilight Zone.”
She looked around again.
“So how are we expected to get back?”
“I doubt anyone cares. It’ll have to be the train, I think.”
“But that’ll take hours... hours we don’t have.”
“Then we’d best get moving.”
Still hand in hand, he walked her out towards Trafalgar Square.
July 23rd - Tower Bridge
* * *
John Spalding pulled his cab over at the South Side of the bridge and let the three Japanese out. He left the meter running. There was already nearly two hundred pounds clocked up there and he expected at least two hundred more before this jaunt was over. He sat and made plans for the evening—his wife deserved a night out. A few beers, a nice Italian meal, and maybe he’d even get lucky later. All thanks to the Japanese tourists’ unquenchable thirst for pictures of London landmarks.
They were at it again, taking turns posing with the bridge in the background and grinning from ear to ear. John tuned them out and turned on the radio. He’d kept it off during the trip so far—tourists, especially big spending ones, didn’t need scaring off by reports of death and destruction.
Things hadn’t gotten any better since the earlier reports. They were now calling it a “National Emergency” but if it was truly national, there was no sign of it having any effect here in the capital city. The bridge was as busy with traffic as ever and tourists from many countries were out in force. Just from where John sat he could see three coaches waiting for their loads to take pictures and a small fleet of taxi c
abs continued to dart to and fro across the famous bridge, depositing more camera-laden groups along the footpaths on either side.
He’d missed a bit on the radio and turned it up to hear properly.
“As yet, unconfirmed reports are coming in of sporadic attacks in the Medway towns and along the North Kent coast. A child has gone missing in Ramsgate and a family reported seeing a seething mass just offshore in Greenwich. If these reports are indeed true, it is feared that London itself may be next. Troops are being called in and...”
He’d heard enough. He leaned out of the window and shouted.
“Time to go,” he called out. His fare paid no attention and kept snapping pictures. He leaned on his horn until they got the message. They got into the back, glaring at him all the way. He’d probably lost all chance of a tip, but the news report had him spooked and all he wanted to do now was get away from the river.
Maybe they’d like to see Regent’s Park Zoo?
That was his last coherent thought, for just as he put the cab in gear to pull away, he felt the wheels lurch beneath him. He pushed hard on the accelerator, but the wheels just spun uselessly underneath.
“What the fu...”
He opened the cab door and slammed it shut straight away. The road below the cab had become a seething mass of green and brown fronds. The tourists had already turned in their seats and were excitedly photographing the phenomenon, but John’s attention was taken by the view to the front. A line of tourists had been making their way towards a coach. They were never going to make it. The creeping kelp poured over the passenger rails like water and seethed among ankles and heels. At first, the tourists seemed to think it was something put on for their benefit; part of the tour. They giggled nervously, danced gingerly among the weed and started to take pictures. It was only when first one, then two more, found that they were unable to walk due to the kelp taking hold of them, that panic started to spread. By then, it was too late.
John watched, open mouthed, as the kelp smothered the screaming, writhing bodies. It was only when the mass of weed rose and started to advance down the bridge that he thought to try to escape.
He hit the accelerator, but the wheels just squealed and spun. Reverse was no better, bringing only a sudden lurch and a stop that threw his passengers around in the back.
I’ve definitely blown that tip.
The tourists started shouting at him, but even if he could have understood a word of it, there was nothing he could do. The cab was stuck firm and there was no way he was opening the door to have a look, not after seeing what had happened –was still happening—outside. The kelp was spreading all across the bridge and crawling, with increasing speed, up the twin towers that defined the landmark.
John turned and spoke softly, hoping to calm his passengers. He had no idea whether they understood him, but just the act of it was something familiar, something to hold on to while things went to shit and worse outside.
“We’re okay in here,” he said. “This cab is built to handle anything. Good British engineering, none of that Japanese rubb...” He stopped short as the kelp crept over the bonnet. The passengers started to scream—John felt like joining them as the windshield view filled with green fronds. The kelp looked moist, slightly oily. It slapped wetly against the glass. When a slit appeared and a white eye looked in on them, John’s screams joined those of the tourists.
He was only vaguely aware that the cab seemed to be floating among the kelp, carried in a flow that was taking vehicles up and over the guard way to the river below. The last thing he saw as they tumbled over the edge was a mass of kelp that spread across the whole of the river Thames and was even now spreading westwards towards the city centre.
July 23rd - The Thames
* * *
There was no warning. A wave of green vegetation flowed up river with the tide and engulfed everything in its path. Several curious people stood on London Bridge looking down at the river. Tendrils whipped and lashed and the people were taken, only a faint scream from far below to tell they had even been there.
All along the lower lying streets on either side of the river the kelp flowed and fed. People tried to flee, piling up into panicked groups at dead ends and getting trapped by cars in rapidly forming jams. All this achieved was to give the kelp a purpose-built feeding ground, one it fell on in a frenzy of fronds and stingers.
Some people, thinking themselves safe once they had ran a good distance away from the river, turned to watch the carnage. But the kelp wasn’t about to let a potential meal go to waste. Dark buds formed all along the surface of the carpet of vegetation and with an audible, almost explosive pop, were fired in small parabolic arcs to land on the roads, bounce, and roll like soft, almost squidgy, cannonballs. Whenever they rolled up against something, be it lamppost, vehicle, or leg, they opened out, bat-wings clinging like a limpet and small tendrils lashing like whips.
Even above the sound of screaming and wailing, the predominant noise was cracking and ripping as everything made of plastic, Perspex or rubber was torn away and transported—first to the river, then, like a rock-star crowd surfing, away across the top of the fronds to be carried out towards the open sea.
July 23rd - Vauxhall Bridge Road.
* * *
Noble and Suzie walked briskly in thin drizzle.
“When is the train?” Suzie asked.
“An hour and a bit. We should make it okay.”
They’d have been in plenty of time if they hadn’t been kicked off the Tube train at Victoria Station when the whole network shut down due to “a major incident in the London Bridge area.”
Noble was starting to fear that he knew the nature of the incident.
But he couldn’t spare the time to worry. His main concern now was to get Suzie back to Weymouth as quickly as possible, before her obvious frustration boiled over into incoherent rage. He didn’t want to be in the firing line if that happened. It was lucky that he knew his way around London, for their quest for a taxi-cab was doomed to failure as several thousand people left Victoria Station at the same time and with the same purpose in mind.
“Let’s head down Vauxhall Bridge Road,” he said. “Maybe we’ll have more luck there.”
Twenty minutes later he was starting to regret that decision. His leg ached and complained bitterly at this new indignity forced on his recent wounds and there wasn’t a single cab to be had. In fact, traffic seemed remarkably light for a weekday morning in Central London.
He had just started to wonder why, when the first shout of alarm rose ahead of them, from Vauxhall Bridge itself. As he approached the area, he saw that the whole eastern edge of the bridge was crammed with people looking up the river. Something had their attention and from the look on their faces, it wasn’t good.
He saw for himself seconds later. Suzie’s grip on his hand tightened as they pushed through for a view from the front. His suspicion was correct—the kelp had arrived in the capital.
Not just arrived. It’s taking over.
Downstream from the bridge, the Thames was nothing but a mass of thrashing fronds. Above the waterline it had spread far and wide beyond the confines of the river; going as far as completely engulfing some buildings that were at least five stories high. The air was full of cracks and rips, as plastic and Perspex was torn away from the facades.
Suzie tugged at his arm.
“Time to go,” she said softly. “It’s coming fast.”
He saw that she was right. Even now, the kelp was less than a hundred yards from the bridge.
“Time to go, people,” he shouted, but the crowd ignored him—there was a spectacle in front of them and no visible signs of immediate danger. Noble was pushed aside, back towards the road.
“If you don’t want to watch, make room for some as does,” a Londoner said.
Noble shrugged and let Suzie drag him away. They reached the kerb just as a throbbing sound started to rise from the West.
Choppers. A lot of choppers.
>
They came overhead in a seemingly endless fleet, the roaring almost deafening and the downdraft threatening to knock Noble off his feet. Suzie kept dragging him away, but even she stopped to watch as the choppers reached the area above the kelp and began their bombardment.
Napalm washed across the full width of the river and the crowd on the bridge had to stand back as a wave of heat blew over them. A pall of black smoke started to rise high in the air and a wall of flame blazed for nearly a mile down the river.
Yet still, the kelp thrashed and continued to try to feed.
More napalm flowed. The kelp crisped and blackened, sending burning particles of charred weed into the air. Some of it fell on the front row of the crowd on the bridge. They tried to brush it off, leaving black smudges on their skin.
Suzie went pale.
“It really is time to go.”
She pulled Noble away as more ash started to fall around them. They started walking, then running, across the bridge, the ash beginning to drop like snowflakes.
“We must get inside,” Suzie shouted. “Right now.”
He didn’t wait to be told twice. He threw open the door of the nearest car and they both got in. Suzie was rolling up the windows before Noble even got the driver’s side door shut.
“What’s the rush?” he said.
“ A fleck of blackness betwixt thumb and finger that no amount of scraping will shift,” she said softly.
Noble remembered her words to the Minister.
It might be contagious.
Outside, more and more of the crowd could be seen unsuccessfully trying to brush black marks from their skin. The screaming started almost straight away.
“Can we get out of here?” Suzie said, a hitch in her voice, and tears not far off.
Noble checked the steering column. The keys were in the ignition. He looked over at Suzie.
“We can leave a note at the station if it’s theft you’re worried about,” she said. “But we need to go. Right now.”
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