by Andy Remic
‘He dead?’
‘No. His pulse is erratic. Pass me my pack.’
Carter gave the unconscious man several injections, antibiotics, a K7 stimulant, vitamin enhancers and morphine in two-milligram stages. When Justus awoke, Carter wanted to kill his pain, not push the man back into unconsciousness. Morphine had a terrible habit of rendering its subjects cheerfully immobile.
Suddenly, Justus’s dark eyes fluttered open. He stared up in confusion and his mouth opened in a silent scream. His body jerked, tensed, spasmed, and Carter swayed back as a fist the size of a shovel whirred past his face. He placed his hand against Justus’s lacerated chest. ‘Shhh, Justus mate, it’s me—Carter. I’ve come to get you out. Rescue you. Take you out of this shite-hole.’
‘Carter?’ He felt the big black guy relax under his hands, body trembling with pain and fatigue. Justus levered himself up onto his elbows, glancing around the cell before fixing his gaze on Carter and Mongrel. He shuddered.
‘You OK?’ rumbled Mongrel.
Justus nodded, then patted Carter on the shoulder. ‘Papa Carter, you old dog.’ He coughed, a heavy cough filled with phlegm. Then he smiled, showing several broken teeth. ‘Am I fucking glad to see you.’ He got to his knees, then stood, taking several deep breaths and swaying dangerously. He looked down at himself, his battered body covered in his own vomit, urine and blood. He rolled his neck gently, and pulled a dislocated finger back into line with a disquieting crunch.
‘Keep still. I’ll give you another two mgs.’ The needle slid back into Justus’s vein, and as Carter pulled away the black man began to cough savagely again.
‘Can you walk?’
‘From this place, Carter? I can fucking sprint.’ Justus sighed then, closing his eyes as he swayed again and nearly fell. ‘I am a long way from home, Papa. I am a long way from my beloved Kenya.’
‘Come on. We need to move.’
Justus’s face hardened. ‘Have you got a weapon for me?’ Mongrel handed him a Beretta 92 and a fist full of magazines. Justus weighed them thoughtfully, then gave a pain-filled grin. He exhaled softly. ‘I have a few scores to settle with those bastard Nex—that for sure. Not for all the gold in Africa would I let this humiliation fade away ...’
Carter moved to the doorway.
‘Did you tell them anything?’ asked Mongrel.
‘Mongrel, you dick!’
‘It’s okay, Papa Carter,’ said Justus placidly. Then he fixed Mongrel with a dark unreadable stare. ‘No, I did not tell the Nex anything. Because, my friend, the Nex did not ask me any questions. They did this purely for sport. For entertainment.’
‘Now I see why you sore.’
‘Sore, my friend? I would bathe the world in blood. I would snap every Nex pencil neck with my own bare hands.’
‘Let’s move,’ snapped Carter, and with a gun in each hand he led the way. Mongrel took Justus’s arm across his own huge shoulders and supported the big black man as he hobbled on naked feet down the cold metal walkway. It took both Carter and Mongrel to get Justus’s huge bulk up the ladder, and they stood panting for a few moments before setting off once more towards the umbilical tunnel and the distant Sub-Core beyond.
And then the bullets came. They ripped along the tunnel, and Carter and Mongrel retreated, returning three-round bursts. They squatted behind a steel bulkhead and Mongrel flipped free his ECube. He cursed.
Carter fired a few more shots. Return fire followed, ricocheting dangerously around the three men.
‘What is it?’
‘You not like answer to question. There are Nex. Lots of them.’
‘How many?’ snapped Carter.
‘Thirty—no, forty. They tracked us after the detonations! They blocking tunnel, Carter. And that our escape route. What the fuck we going to do, lad?’
Carter pulled shut the heavy portal door to cut off the tunnel as more ricochets made him duck and flinch. He sat back on his haunches. ‘Shit.’ His face creased into a sour frown.
‘We need a plan, Carter.’
‘You think the engines on this old sub work?’
‘No, it nuke-powered. Long ago decommissioned with core removed. That not an option.’
‘Right, then.’
Carter placed his weapon on the ground and pulled free a blue-wrapped pack of HighJ. He primed the detonator as Mongrel looked on in horror, mouth agape, the half-conscious Justus lolling against him. ‘What you doing, Carter?’
‘Watch.’
‘No no no. You tell Uncle Mongrel first—that look suspiciously like bomb you got in sweaty paws there. That dangerous, that is. What you planning in mad bad head?’
Carter grabbed his H&K. He took a deep breath. ‘Be ready.’
‘For what?’ screeched Mongrel.
Carter opened the heavy steel portal, then sprinted forward into the plastic umbilical with his H&K blasting, bullets slamming down the translucent tunnel and making the slowly advancing Nex pause briefly before returning fire. With bullets zipping around him, Carter hurled the package of HighJ at the Nex, turned and sprinted for the cover of thick portal steel.
The HighJ package exploded with a fury of purple and green fire, annihilating the Nex and destroying the plastic umbilical which connected the ancient submarine to the Sub-Core.
Carter leapt through the submarine portal and slammed shut the heavy door behind him. He spun the wheel and threw the heavy rusted bolts with shaking hands as behind him a wall of fire slammed against the heavy steel door.
‘What have you done?’ whispered Mongrel, horrified.
The fire washed over the hull of the submarine, and the pressure waves of the explosion sent the vessel spinning slowly, yanking against its thick, rusted tethering chain—which groaned like a huge animal in pain and parted easily with a crumbling of corroded links.
The plastic tunnel was gone—melted, vaporised—and with no restraint to hold the defunct war machine in place it whirled for a moment on the energies and wild eddies of the explosion. Then it bucked violently and its nose slowly dipped towards the far-distant ocean floor. The dead submarine began a long, slow, spiralling descent into blackness ...
CHAPTER 13
K-LABS
Jam watched with slitted copper eyes as The Priest’s Comanche leapt into the air and slewed sideways through the falling snow. He breathed slowly, feeling the power in his huge armoured chest, and he flexed his talons and lifted his face to the spinning flakes. Jam liked the cold. All Nex liked the cold; it sharpened and speeded up their reactions. The heat slowed them down, made them lethargic, made them easy targets.
But I am not Nex, Jam thought. Not in my mind; only in my body. But what about your soul? whispered a voice in his mind. They have eaten your soul. When you die, there will be no Heaven for you; no human Heaven, nor Nex Heaven ... not even Hell awaits you. You are an abomination; you are mongrel-breed; you are an in-between, a deviation deformo that should never have existed...
Earlier, Mongrel had mentioned Nicky’s name. Before, when Jam had been wholly human, Nicky had been his lover, his partner, and his friend; his future wife-to-be. But, as Jam’s mission in Slovenia went horribly wrong, and he had endured torture inflicted by Mace—Durell’s finest Nex surgeon—so every footstep had taken him further and further away from his life, from his woman; from his love.
Jam had fought a war inside himself. And had won. His humanity had been stronger than the Nex side that had been blended with it. And yet he still carried the Nex stain in his blood. He appeared as an armoured monstrosity, a huge and powerful cross-blend of human and genetically spiralled insect. Things could never be the same for him again ...
Jam stared into the falling snow. The Priest, he thought. A good man; the best of men. Sometimes, though, he was too fanatical in the Spiral cause. With The Priest there were no greys, no in-between shades. Only black and white. And if you crossed to the wrong side ... well, then you were dead.
Their first meeting, after Jam had gradually worked hi
s way through the REB ranks, building their strength, gaining Spiral trust with every Nex killing, gaining respect with every rescue of innocent men, women and children, had been a tense and fraught affair. And it had taken much to persuade The Priest that Jam was his own true Spiral self-his old Spiral self... But the earlier divisions between the two factions no longer mattered. Both Spiral and the REBS, despite their historical differences, had been forced to join ranks against the might of Durell in these last few days of conflict. It was to be a fight to the death.
Jam turned as his squad emerged into the snow, and he saw the glint of fear in their eyes. Not at the mission to come—but at the entity they had to risk their lives alongside ... No matter how often he proved himself in battle, Jam was a twisted and deformed horror—to them—and would always provoke an immediate reaction of fear, mistrust, loathing. They were not only scared of his power, his insect blood. They were faced with their own mortality. They were horrified that, one day, if things went brutally sour, then they might end up like Jam. Sadness flooded through him.
A great sadness that could never die.
‘Follow me.’ Jam’s voice was deep, rumbling, powerful. His team consisted of Spiral personnel and REBS; their mission was to locate the K-Labs rumoured to be buried under an old nuclear power station, infiltrate, hack the computer systems, discover what they could—and then blow Durell’s stash of poison to Kingdom Come.
Jam analysed his team in his mind as he led them to the Chinook’s K5 transport helicopter. Sonia J was the first to follow him. She was an expert on HIVE Media computer systems; having been integral to the growth of Durell’s media company in London and New York, she carried with her top-level access codes and the ability to worm her way into many of the medial giant’s digital cells.
Next came Baze, huge and bear-like, with hands like shovels. Oz, tall and gangly, a chain-smoker with shaved head and battered, pock-marked features, and Rekalavich, the tough old Russian with bitter memories and a nasty grudge against the Nex. These were what Jam termed his Heavy Squad, able to bring massive amounts of firepower into play when so required.
Baze carried the MG. Oz, who doubled as a sniper, carried his trusted Swiss SSG550 rifle strapped tightly across his back; this weapon was his love, and he had been known to break people’s cheekbones for leaving so much as a thumbprint on the polished stock.
Haggis, or Whisky Haggis as he was sometimes known, was the explosives expert on this mission. Finally, their pilot was Fenny, still sporting long curling locks, still wearing a cheeky—if weary—grin and still harbouring a love of pouring beer into the laps of his friends: a pastime that had earned him many a well-deserved punch on the nose.
Fenny had the Chinook CH-58’s rotors turning slowly, warming the engines, and he waved as Jam led the ragtag band towards the chopper. A freezing wind howled down from the Scottish mountains and the group lowered their heads, throwing packs through the open cargo doors and climbing onto the low corrugated alloy platform. Rekalavich moved instantly to the mounted MG, checked the ammunition belts, wiped the snow-melt from the gun’s barrel, and lit Bogatiri papirosi cigarette. Haggis started to complain about the smell of the smoke and Sonia moved across the massive deck—stacked with several crates bearing stencilled Arabic letters—and poked her head through to the cockpit.
‘Where are we going?’ she asked, her face drawn and weary. She felt completely out of place with this group. A motley crew of soldiers, killers, and one genetically modified Spiral Nex. How crazy can life get? she thought, her mind in a whirl.
‘You have to ask the boss,’ chuckled Fenny. ‘I don’t even know myself—yet.’
Jam leapt aboard the Chinook, and the suspension lurched under his weight. The group’s members exchanged glances as Jam moved forward and Sonia J sidestepped to give him room. Jam smiled down at her—a disconcerting predatory look on a misshapen armoured face which was wide, flat and almost triangular. Sonia J forced a smile in return, then moved to a corner of the Chinook’s cargo bay where benches lined the riveted and badly painted wall. Canvass harnesses were attached to the frame and Sonia strapped herself in tightly.
‘Where we going, Big Guy?’ Fenny tilted his head, staring up into Jam’s copper eyes with a smile.
You are one of the few, thought Jam, sighing deeply. One of the few who still treat me the same; one of the few who remember me from before—before the torture at the hands of Mace. Before the transformation into ScorpNex. One of the few who still look at me without the veil of prejudice.
‘Norway,’ said Jam. ‘And I thought I told you to get those fucking curls shaved.’
‘I’ll do a deal, JamNex. You shave my curls, I’ll wax your insect armour. How does that sound? Does it tickle you in the right place, my old and chitinous friend?’
‘You make me feel wanted again,’ rumbled Jam with an alien smile.
The weather over the sea as the Chinook crossed the Prime Meridian consisted of freezing ice rain which had lasted without respite for the previous 500 kilometres. Winds howled and buffeted the transport aircraft as Fenny fought the storm with a grim, weary look on his normally pampered face. Bags marred the usually smooth skin around his eyes, ruining the effects of his Oil of Olay, and he continually cursed his lack of sleep. On board, every member of the group felt sick due to the incessant pounding of the storm and the constant pitching and yawing of the Chinook. They all had the feeling that at any moment they would be plucked from the raging heavens and tossed screaming into the sea.
Sonia had her knees up under her chin and her arms wrapped around her legs. For a while she had listened to the banter of the soldiers, but soon it grew wearisome—there are only so many jokes about ‘fannies’ and ‘sheep VD’ that a girl can listen to—and she closed her eyes, trying to link the rhythm of her body to the undulating pendulum swings of the helicopter. I am a fish out of water, she thought. A simple TV presenter who’s out of her fucking depth.
Jam settled himself next to her, and even with her eyes closed Sonia could feel his presence. The oiled smell of his ScorpNex chitin. The way the alloy bench groaned under his weight. Sonia smiled then, and opened her eyes. ‘How are you?’ Jam asked her.
Sonia shivered. ‘Well, cold. A bit at sea. I’m not a soldier Jam—I never was.’
‘But you are vital to the success of this mission. You know the HIVE systems better than anybody here. And we are desperately short of programmers. They are the first people the Nex exterminated; they remember too clearly how Spiral relies on its technology.’
‘But what happens if my codes don’t gain us access? What if I can’t find out what we need to know?’
‘I will help you,’ said Jam softly. ‘Together, we will infiltrate their systems. Trust me—I have every faith in our combined abilities. Remember when you joined the REBS? You were sick of the killings? Sick of Nex rule? You wanted to make a difference? Well now you can. In a small way. Maybe even in a huge way. Who knows what secret talents you hold? We all have our part to play, Sonia, we all have our roles in life—and they change. They are not always clear—even when sunlight is shining through the crystal ball.’
Jam seemed to sleep then, his copper eyes closing, and Sonia’s mind drifted back; to her TV productions, to thoughts of her colleagues, to the farce of the trial and her certainty that she would die under the hail of bullets fired by the execution squad.
The Chinook hammered across the Norwegian Sea and flew parallel with the coast, which was shrouded in heavy mist, for many kilometres. When it reached the edge of the Arctic Circle it banked steeply, thundering inland. The weather had cleared somewhat as they pounded low over the coastal waterways with sheer hills rearing up from the sea to either side. These waterways led inland, past Angersnes, Fagervika and Bardal, and Fenny shaved their speed as they approached the disused nuclear power plant at Hemnesberget. Here, he banked once more, heading south to touch down a couple of kilometres from their intended target.
‘Any signs of electronic sc
anning?’ asked Jam, as the Chinook’s howling engines powered down, whining slowly to a stop.
‘No. Nothing. But that doesn’t mean we weren’t picked up by advanced scanners. To tell the truth, Jam, this crate is a bag of shit, and I’d rather fly an old B52. With no wings.’
‘You did well, Fenny, getting us this far.’
The group jumped free into the LZ, a small clearing surrounded by towering Norwegian spruce which offered excellent cover and camouflage for the Chinook. The stretch of forest would also provide cover from the air on much of the short journey to the Hemnesberget Power Plant. The soldiers, alert now that they were on the ground and, indeed, in enemy territory, checked weapons and set up a defensive perimeter of sub-machine guns.
Fenny would stay with the aircraft, to carry out checks and to be available to pull the group out if the mission suddenly went pear-shaped. For Sonia, especially, this was a more than sobering thought.
Once ready, the group moved away from the clearing, over a forest floor strewn with patches of frozen snow. Under the rich-scented boughs they trudged, Jam and Oz in the lead, followed by Sonia and then the rest of the group. It offended her pride that they wanted her at the centre—as if she needed protection. But Sonia had to concede that she definitely was not a battle-hardened veteran. And so she kept her mouth shut and her eyes on the horizon. The soldiers were only doing their jobs.
They moved forward for a kilometre in silence. Then Jam and Oz slowed their speed as they approached a ridge which fell away down a concave slope that looked like a giant scoop, more sparsely scattered with vegetation and showing several huge drifts of snow which had gathered in hollows.
The group paused for a while, strung out under the cover of trees, gazing down at the power plant near the coast. It was a huge, staggered building—a main concrete block four storeys high, the walls covered with galvanised panels and painted dark green. The view was dominated by the huge white cooling dome of the reactor.