by WR Armstrong
Marcos Powell fancied the little dark haired nurse. She had a pretty face and cute figure. She was definitely his type. And she was a good laugh as well, always in a cheerful mood, even cracking the odd joke. Her name was Melanie Peters—Nurse Peters to the patients, but she had said he could call her Melanie as long as no one overheard. Everything happens for a reason, Marcos thought as he lay in bed, feeling like a complete waste of space. Maybe it was true after all. If he hadn’t taken the fall in the underground he wouldn’t have been admitted to hospital, and he never would have met Melanie.
It was nearing lights out time. Melanie had just entered the ward and was making her way along the tiled floor pushing a trolley containing medication. The old guy next to Marcos had an eye for the ladies and was watching her closely. He had a bad habit of making rude remarks about the nurses. Last night he’d been particularly rude about Melanie. If he said one more thing out of place the young scaffolder was apt to spring out of bed and throttle the lecherous old bastard, pelvic injury or not.
Melanie was approaching their area now. As she tended to nearby patients, checking temperatures, administering medication, making sure they were comfortable, Marcos watched her as keenly as the old codger in the next bed. She had an easy going personality and a great bedside manner, Marcos thought with a faint smile, and what’s more she appeared to be smitten by him. Not that it was all that surprising, for he had always been popular with the girls.
Melanie stopped to chat to another male patient; a bit of a charmer this one, with dyed black hair and a mischievous twinkle in his eye. As she turned to go he patted her backside, a gesture that got him severely reprimanded. That was another thing Marcos liked about Melanie, she had spirit, refusing to take any crap and wasn’t afraid to call a spade a spade. He could quite easily imagine taking her down his local to meet his mates, into the lion’s den, so to speak, and be certain she would hold her own. As soon as he got the opportunity he was going to ask her out on a date.
She was tending to the old guy now, who seemed utterly mesmerised by her charms, but she paid him scant intention. Instead she gazed directly across the bed at Marcos. And then she winked her eye provocatively. Marcos reciprocated, feeling suddenly warm and fuzzy and very much wanted. His dick was also feeling wanted, twitching steadily to life, threatening to become a mini tent pole beneath the covers. Maybe this was love, he thought as Melanie leaned forward to straighten the old guy’s bedding. He glimpsed her cleavage and felt the first real signs of a full erection. Knowing she wore little beneath the white starched nurse’s tunic made his imagination run riot.
She finished with the old boy and skirted the bed to attend to Marcos. They passed the time of day as she routinely straightened bedclothes. Then Melanie began to tuck him in, but not before she slid a hand deftly beneath the sheets and did something that made him grin with suppressed delight.
“Keep it warm for me lover boy,” she teased, straightening up and sauntering away. Marcos observed her cross the ward delirious with happiness whilst experiencing the biggest hard on of his entire life. He imagined her lying naked across his bed, and grinned a little. He checked out his fellow in patients, the old timer, the charmer, and a teenager who’d crashed his motorcycle, and sensed he wasn’t the only one fantasising about the young nurse. Allowing his head to fall back against the pillow, Marcos made himself a promise. Just as soon as he was back on his feet he was going to bed Nurse Melanie Peters, and she was going to love him for doing it. He smiled to himself, a happy man, and when the lights went out a few minutes later, he drifted off to sleep, anticipating pleasant dreams.
Instead he suffered terrible nightmares. When the horror of those nightmares shocked him awake in the middle of the night the voices that had plagued him since the accident screeched wildly inside his head. They were overwhelming, manipulative, and they were ordering him to kill. Until now he’d managed to shut his mind to their twisted ideas through sheer strength of will, but they were persistent and put over a good argument, and much though Marcos hated to admit it, their demands were starting to make a strange kind of sense.
By the time morning came and the first rays of late September sunlight filtered gently through the hospital blinds he accepted what had to be done. It made perfect sense. He couldn’t understand why he had put up such a fight. The voices were right. Killing was a means to a perfect end. He was being offered the chance of eternal life. All he had to do was follow the voices lead. It was that simple. And the best thing about it was, Melanie could be a part of it. There was a way they could be together forever. She would do unto him that which he would first do unto her. That was all it would take. The two of them need never suffer illness, need never grow old and lose their health. Melanie would retain her beauty and her vibrancy and he would never lose his strength or his masculinity. What a wonderful life they would share together, and it would be a life that would never end.
Immortality was his for the taking. All he had to do was have faith in what the voices said and it would be done. Marcos grinned broadly in the darkness. Melanie: his partner for all eternity.
The phantom voices continued to work on him, reshaping his thoughts, slowly driving him insane with their incessant ranting.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Kate reached the corner of Fryer’s embankment at 6am. It was a cold damp morning. Here to jog, she was dressed appropriately in a thermal T-shirt and fleece-lined tracksuit. Nike running shoes completed the outfit. She looked unrecognisable from the Kate Marshall her work colleagues knew. As she warmed up she recalled her conversation with McGrath the previous evening in which she routinely updated him on the archaeological team’s progress in the underground. They had also talked on a more personal level. It quickly became apparent they had much in common. When McGrath mentioned that he liked to run Kate took the opportunity to invite him to join her that morning. She only hoped he would recognise her in her present get up.
She completed a series of light stretching movements, exercising the neck muscles before working her way down to the arms, hips and then the legs, at the same time savouring the solitude this secluded stretch of embankment offered. The place was always deserted this time of the morning. Today, except for a man out walking his dog and a couple of fellow joggers, she was alone.
When McGrath failed to show by six fifteen she set off determined not to let the disappointment spoil her early morning exercise regime. It was what got her going, what fired her up for the day ahead. If she missed a day she always felt off kilter. It was as much psychological as physical, she supposed, but exercise did make a big difference to how she felt about herself.
She jogged at a leisurely pace before gradually building up speed. In the trees flanking the path birds chirped, creating a dawn chorus. A fellow jogger passed by, heading in the opposite direction. She quickened the pace trying to rid herself of the disappointment at being stood up.
Soon her heart rate was up and her leg muscles contracted and expanded nicely. The cold air was like fire in her lungs. Her chest heaved with exertion, her cheeks burned. She loved running, always had and guessed she always would. It helped her to think.
She turned a corner, running like the wind, pounding the cobblestones of the canal bank like a pro, passing beneath a low arched bridge where her footsteps echoed like muffled gunshots. She re-emerged from the bridge and pushed on hard up a slight incline. She was lost in her own world when suddenly a man appeared at her shoulder, having stolen up from behind to keep pace with her effortlessly. She looked and saw it was McGrath.
“You’re late,” she complained.
McGrath sidestepped a puddle. “Couldn’t be helped I’m afraid. I got called into work in the early hours.”
“How come..?”
“For some unknown reason absenteeism is dogging the reconstruction team all of a sudden, so it’s a case of all hands on deck.”
Kate frowned.
“Something on your mind...”
“That’s how the
problems started with the French burial pit. Workers suddenly went missing with no explanation.”
“Coincidence,” McGrath suggested. “It has to be.”
He quickened the pace. Kate struggled to keep up. She gritted her teeth and pushed on, her breath vaporous in the chill air. Perspiration stung her eyes. Her chest grew tight with exertion. She developed the stitch. It was soon evident that McGrath’s fitness level was far above hers but she nevertheless gamely battled on.
They reached the next bridge. McGrath re-emerged first, slowing to allow her to catch up. They covered the distance to the next canal-bridge in virtual silence. They rounded another corner narrowly avoiding a teenager riding a bike, before reaching another incline that took them back onto the path running adjacent Fryer Road. Here they rested on a seat overlooking the canal.
McGrath stretched out, planting his arms along the back of the bench whilst gazing across the canal and the wasteland beyond, home to a derelict block of flats. Early morning mist hung in the air holding back the sunlight.
“I adore mornings like this,” Kate said wistfully, her mood mellowing.
The mist reminded McGrath of his SAS training up on the Brecon Beacons. It brought back memories of intense cold, aching limbs and a Bergen filled with survival equipment that always included a ton of Mars bars, which any self respecting SAS officer swore blind meant the difference between life and death.
“There have been developments concerning the excavation,” Kate said following a lengthy pause, “that I neglected to mention on the phone last night.” She hesitated. “I’m not sure whether I should be telling you this Paul, so promise me you won’t go blabbing to the Press?”
McGrath assured her he wouldn’t.
“As a result of what has been found in the tunnel roof,” Kate said, “the heads of the archaeological team have discounted the idea that the mass grave is an old plague pit. Rather, they suspect some kind of pagan grave has been uncovered. Artefacts including pottery and weaponry with Celtic influence are in abundance, although the grave itself doesn’t date back that far.” She looked uneasy as she added, “The unearthed dagger like crucifixes, whose purpose incidentally was never established by the French archaeologists, are thought to be impaling devices, quite possibly used for the purpose of torture.”
McGrath was intrigued. “What evidence do you have to support such a theory?”
“The remains of a hand have been discovered in the grave,” she explained, “impaled to a piece of wood by one of them.” She paused before adding, “Pagan crosses have also been found.”
“I thought the cross was a Christian symbol,” McGrath queried.
“It is a popular misconception,” Kate said. “The sign of the cross was around long before Christ appeared on the scene. There is one disturbing factor about the burial pit. Every skull so far unearthed, of which there are quite a number, has been damaged in a way suggesting death resulted from head injury.”
“What possible reason could there be for that?”
Kate admitted she and her colleagues were at a loss to know, although Chrichton, she said, was hopeful that one of his contacts had in their possession a manuscript, which may hold some answers. McGrath could quite understand the archaeologists not wanting any of the information getting into the hands of the Press. Already the Media was trying to imply that the burial pit, due to the accidents that had occurred in the underground and the murder of the tube driver, might herald a real life “Quatermass and the Pit” situation. Kate wasn’t the only one having to deal with pressure from the Press. McGrath had also been plagued by phone calls from reporters. He could well do without the intrusion into his private life.
Following a short silence Kate said thoughtfully, “It appears that for some unknown reason a whole community was singled out and ritualistically massacred, and then buried in one huge grave. Perhaps the manuscript I mentioned may shed some light on the affair.” She smiled, and jumped to her feet, her mood altogether brighter. “Any way,” she said, “I think that’s quite enough macabre talk for the moment. How’s about I race you to the end of the path. The loser buys lunch!”
With that she started running. McGrath observed her briefly before following, a faint smile forming on his own lips.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Elsa Bailey stood in the parish church praising the Lord as she did every Sunday morning. She sang enthusiastically and prayed deeply. At confessional the day before she was admonished of her sins, which allowed her to partake of the Eucharist with a clear conscience at the rails of the sanctuary. The Catholic convert gazed adoringly at the eagle lectern placed in the nave on one side of the chancel opposite the pulpit, at the twelve consecration crosses adorning the interior walls, peculiar to English ritual, the mullioned windows and stepped buttresses, thinking how wonderful God’s House was.
Clutching her rosary beads with grateful hands, she watched the choristers in the choir stalls sing passionately, triumphantly. Thankful was she also that the Lord Jesus and his host of angels had seen fit to speak into her mind, offering her words of wisdom that renewed her faith in God and in humanity. Her heart swelled with love for the Almighty, for Elsa was sure He had not forsaken her after all, that He would show her the way. The heavenly voices had come to her in the tube crash, whispering reassurances, making promises that uplifted her flagging spirit to new levels.
The hymn over, she and the rest of the congregation retook their seats and listened in respectful silence to Father Patrick Donnelly offer up his sermon, the theme of which was the abuse of trust, which condemned to Hell those guilty of such an act. In the eyes of his congregation the Father’s commitment to the Church, together with his sincerity was unquestionable. Elsa, like so many others, wished she shared his inner strength, could live by the same high moral code as he, but knew she was weak, pitiful, and barely able to look herself in the eye for she had failed everyone she had ever known. Her mother, who died when she was a child, her elder brother, who had been killed by drugs before she was old enough to fully understand, and now her husband, Winston, who had succumbed to cancer last year and had only months to live. Surely, she could have done more to help them? The problem was, she had not tried hard enough to find answers.
The service over Elsa thanked Father Donnelly for helping restore her faith in God. On the church steps she kissed his down turned hand as a mark of respect, confiding in him her belief that she would have died of despair had she not discovered the Catholic faith, and more particularly, such a marvellous minister as himself.
“If only there were more like you in the world, Father,” she whispered reverently, ignoring those who bustled past, having emerged from the church to shiver in the bitter autumnal wind.
The priest smiled, clutching her cold trembling hands in his. “I do what I can, my child,” he returned.
Elsa smiled back, mesmerised by his holy countenance. A small child wondered by, slightly ahead of its mother. Elsa watched the priest lift the toddler into his arms, fussing it as if it were his own. And so good with young children, she observed. She thanked him once more for such a marvellous service but he appeared not to hear; his attention focused on the precious young thing in his embrace. She wandered off down the leafy path towards home filled with hope, for the voice of Jesus spoke inside her head, supported by a multitude of heaven’s angels.
She arrived home to a cold house and a terminally ill husband. She offered up a prayer, hoping that the voice of Jesus was right and Winston’s health might be restored. She stared through the kitchen window, feeling safe inside the house. She ventured out rarely nowadays, usually just to shop, visit church to take confessional, or Holy Communion, or to attend Evensong. Inside her home she was protected from the undesirables that stalked the outside world. Undesirables like the youths that had picked on her on the tube train. How she hated their kind with their misguided beliefs and their bigoted philosophy. She had always believed that forgiveness should hold sway when others committed wrong
ful acts. It was however, easier said than done when you were personally victimised.
Retiring to the bedroom she’d shared with her husband until his illness had made him feverish and incontinent, she sat on the edge of the bed studying his gaunt face, once so handsome, so sexy, trying to imagine him well again. He’d been ill for such a long time it was almost impossible to do. Often she had to resort to photographs in order to recall how he’d looked as a healthy man. An involuntary movement of his right leg caused his foot to slip from the mattress, the limb coming to hang limply in mid-air. He coughed, his ailing body hitching as if subjected to a minor electric shock.
Elsa raised the foot gently back onto the mattress, covering it dutifully with the blankets. Bending, heavy breasts swaying from the motion, she kissed him lightly on the forehead. Poor Winston, she thought. Why, he was barely out of his fifties yet stricken by terrible disease. It was such a shame, such a terrible waste. Elsa thought he looked so peaceful lying there with his eyes shut: his breathing shallow yet regular. The crucifix around his neck caught her eye, winking magically at her in the morning light. She stared transfixed, for the sign of the cross held new meaning for her since the accident when the voices of God’s own congregation invaded her mind, led by sweet Jesus. She had to admit to having doubted their authenticity initially, for their rhetoric contradicted the writings in the Scriptures, going against everything Christian religion taught, for they professed crucifixion was the way to eternal life. Elsa’s conscience argued that Christ had died on the cross in order to save humanity rather than Himself. His was a selfless act. The voices therefore were self-serving: the thinking behind their words flawed, essentially wrong. Yet, their twisted logic held a persuasive quality, for they offered hope and hope sprung eternal. They offered her the opportunity to help one of those she had so far failed. With that in mind it was easy for her to convince herself the voices belonged to Jesus, and the angels of the Lord.