by Andy Remic
Donna kissed him again, getting flour on his suit jacket. ‘No, sweetie. No problem at all.’
Callaghan halted the BMW on a squeak of breaks in a side–street near the Wharf, and kicked the cumbersome bike onto its stand. Pain and exhaustion crackled through him like crystals in his blood and his eyelids felt heavy, like tomb slabs. Cold had taken possession of his limbs. He could not remember being so downright chilled to the core in his entirety as a human being.
Surely, it must kill me, he thought. Hypothermia? It must be in my blood. Waiting to kick in, like a bad line of coke. He laughed manically. Jesus, but it’s been a long day. A long life!
He walked stiffly towards the Marriott and his apartment, shivering and wearing a fresh fall of snow like iced dandruff. Reaching the escalator which ran down to Canary Wharf tube station, he leant against a rail and watched a few lonely people hurrying backwards and forwards through the fall. His eyes tracked, looking for police, searching for gangsters. Was it a foolish thing to do, going back to his apartment? Oh yes. But there was stuff he needed: passport, money, credit cards. And then... then he could disappear off the grid for a while – if he chose. And he did choose... To hell with his damn apartment – it had become a death trap, a snare, a light–bulb in the dark for all the wildlife lowlife. Too many people knew exactly where to find Mr Callaghan, and, reasonably, Cal no longer enjoyed this feeling of notorious stardom.
He moved to the foyer which sat like quiet velvet. He slunk in, hit the lifts, jacked up to his floor. He stared at the dents in the metal wall – which had, just a few hours earlier, saved his life from flesh–raping steel. This image of fractured metal sent a volley of spiders crawling down his spine, poured hot engine oil into a Sahara mouth. Shit. That could have been me, he thought.
The lift chimed.
Cal stepped out warily, eyes sweeping the corridor.
The bodies had gone.
For a moment, a fleeting instant, Callaghan blinked and thought he’d finally gone certifiably insane; imagined the whole damned episode! – including Volos and the murders. But then he clocked a few patches of blood camouflaged against lush carpet, and a bullet embedded in plaster where McGuinness had sat. The wall had been fastidiously cleaned... but in a kind of hurried way. As one would expect, when removing the body of a policeman.
Cal gave a narrow smile and moved to his apartment; the door was a mess of chewed wood and tentatively he pushed through the spastic portal into an environment which, once, had been his comfortable nest; a place of coke and whisky and fun hot wild sex. Now it felt cold and alien. Strange. Disjointed. Unreal. Diseased. Hurriedly, Cal moved to his hidden safe, spun the dial and stuffed his pockets full of money. From the bedroom he grabbed a pack and filled it with more money, his passport, a small bag of Charlie and two bottles of single malt Laphroaig.
He grabbed his phone, keeping a nervous eye on the door with its open bullet wounds, and frosted fingers tried Mia’s number. No answer. Shit. Damn. Come on! Where was the woman? He tried Jimmy’s number again, expecting the answer machine. It rang three times – and was picked up.
‘Jimmy!’ cried Cal, mouth forming an eager pucker. ‘Jimmy, it’s me, Callaghan.’
‘Yes, I thought I recognised your voice.’
Cal went cold. Colder. Ice–flow cruised his bloodstream. His pulse died. He licked badly chapped lips, rubbed his face, then said, slowly, a man exploring language, ‘Volos, what are you doing at Jimmy’s?’
‘Callaghan.’ A big sigh. Like he was talking to a naughty child. ‘What did I say to you? I feel like I keep making idle threats – threats that, foolishly, nobody believes.’
‘Don’t listen to him!’ screamed Jimmy from somewhere in the background. There came a crackle, then a thump.
‘Jimmy? Jimmy!’
‘Yes, it was Jimmy. Even now, he is lying prostrate on his bed. He is bleeding from a quite severe head wound. And, unfortunately, he is soaked in petrol.’
‘What?’
‘As I said earlier, Mr Callaghan. I make threats. You ignore me. It is time you learned how important you are to my game plan; get over here, get over here fast. And you may save your friend’s life – despite the fact that he betrayed you a thousand times.’
There came a whump as of an exploding fireball... and the line went dead.
Cal stared frantically at the phone.
‘No!’ he screamed. ‘You bastard, you bastard!’
Grabbing his pack, he sprinted from the room and down the corridor. The lift descent took an ice–age; crossing the foyer, a millennium; reaching his bike, eternity. And all the while his mind and brain and thoughts were a raging, raging charging torrent – what he would do when he got to Jimmy’s modest terraced house, what he would do to Volos if Volos really had set Jimmy on fire –
Oh, you son–of–a–bitch, he cursed.
Followed be denial. No. It couldn’t happen. Wouldn’t happen. It was another empty threat in order to get Callaghan to play ball; to be a good little doggy and jump through required hoops.
Cal slammed the BMW across the snow–filled streets of London, tyres sliding but Callaghan – for once – was oblivious to this slick icy threat. Time no longer had meaning. He blinked, and it passed – a blur of neon, snow, empty streets, cold wind.
He stopped, parked the bike, and looked up.
An orange glow flickered in the front bedroom window of Jimmy’s house.
Jimmy watched the Zippo with calm eyes. Petrol stung his skin, prickled his nostrils, made him shiver with an anticipation not just of fear, but true, raw terror, a primal terror he had never thought possible in his existence. It was a dream, this raw liquid fear. Volos, standing there, glaring down with dark insect eyes, Zippo burning with a strong yellow flame. It cannot happen, Jimmy told himself. No human would do that to another human being. Nobody would do it to me! After all, I’m not a bad man... am I? I don’t deserve to go like this...
Volos let the Zippo fall, and took several long strides back, wrapping his leather coat around him. Jimmy fixed on the lighter – eyes tracking it, a slow firefly glow turning over and over and over on its journey to the petrol soaked bed...
There came a whump.
Fire roared.
Engulfed him.
Jimmy opened his mouth to scream in shock in disbelief but no sound came out and fire rolled over him and he felt it scorching him tearing him like teeth burning liquid molten rock. Pain slammed him like a wall. It was everywhere, engulfing him and disjointedly he watched himself struggling, struggling with his bonds and thrashing on the bed bouncing on the bed trying to escape that which was inescapable. The fire: his lover. His injection. His bloodstream. Flames kissed him intimate. Raped him. Fucked him bad. And took him to another realm of pain – one which Jimmy had not believed possible. And then – then the pain went and was gone. Jimmy felt his eyebrows and hair burn into nothing. He felt his lips and skin melt over his jaw. He thrashed, weaker and weaker, thick smoke filling the room and stinging his eyes and, strangely, he could smell himself cooking, could smell the aroma of his own charred flesh and blistering skin and softening, ripening muscle falling from bone like well-braised pork. He could not cry, for the fire would not let him. All thoughts of hatred and revenge and bitterness fled him and only a coolness remained, a strange and intrinsic cool which flowed over his eyes and into his flesh which no longer burned, no longer scorched, no longer seared and blackness enveloped him and in harmony, in peace, in a total integration of all life’s final moments the serenity of approaching death soothed the raging inferno of his mind – and Jimmy floated away to a safe place; a place where the pain died and nobody could hurt him again.
Callaghan kicked down the door, sprinted wildly up the narrow steep stairs, one hand on the smooth polished banister, boots thumping, sweat in his eyes, panic in his breast. Volos stood on the landing, coat wrapped around him, head down. Cal burst past him into the bedroom where Jimmy writhed weakly. The flames had died down now, soot charring th
e wallpaper, smoke hanging thick and black near the ceiling. ‘No!’ screamed Callaghan, racing forward but heat forced him back. He took off his jacket, threw it over the blackened charred stick–man that was Jimmy but it was too late and Cal was there, his jacket melting to the corpse and tears stung his eyes and a snarl took his head in brutal jaws and rammed him against the wall. Cal looked down into Jimmy’s eyes. They rolled back into a blackened charred skull. Cal slid from the bed, sat on the floor where the carpet still smoked, burning in patches. His eyes streamed. He looked down at his hands. Part of Jimmy’s scorched flesh had come away, and stuck to his own burnt skin. Callaghan lowered his head and cried for an eternity.
A cough brought him out of his reverie. Cal looked up, around, to where Volos stood, dark eyes glittering. With a vicious snarl Cal lurched up, lunged wildly at the figure. Volos picked Cal up and threw him easily across the room, where he smashed into a wardrobe and hit the ground, winded. He rolled to his feet, looking wildly about but there was no weapon, and he advanced with murder on his face, death in his eyes. He attacked again, fast and manic, fists a blur. Volos stepped back, swayed, again picked Cal bodily up and threw him across the room; Cal hammered into the wardrobe door, smashing the mirror with a song of chiming shards. He blinked, coughed, looked down at his cut hands. Mirror pieces tinkled as he shifted his weight. Cal picked up a long jagged shard. It sliced his palm. He stared at his disjointed reflection. Cooked flesh cloyed his nostrils. He stood, blood dripping on the zig–zag platter of broken mirror. He moved towards Volos with it raised as a knife.
‘Stop, Callaghan.’
‘You burned him, you motherfucker! Now you die.’
‘And if I die, they all die.’
‘Fuck you! Then they all fucking die! I’m going to cut out your fucking liver.’
‘You wish Mia dead, then?’
Cal faltered, stumbling to a halt. ‘Mia?’
‘If you kill me, she dies.’
‘Bull... shit.’
‘Answer her phone, did she? When you called?’
‘You’re lying.’
‘A big gamble, Cal, for one who has been led like a goat on a string from the start. Think, Callaghan. Use your brain not your emotions. Think.’
Callaghan screamed then, a low, ululating sound of agony which tore through him. He flung the mirror shard at Volos and dropped to his knees, face in his hands, blood streaking his cheeks like tear smears. He cried, rocking, frustration a fist in his heart. Hatred bubbled through him like poison. Despair tickled distant corners of his brain and threatened to engulf him.
‘Be strong.’ Volos placed a hand on Callaghan’s shoulder. ‘And you may live through this.’
‘Fuck life. Fuck you!’
‘You should pull yourself together.’ Volos stared off, through the smoke, through the window. Snow was thick in the air; tumbling romantically to the ground. ‘In every war there are sacrifices, Callaghan. Jimmy – well, he was your sacrifice – one which, you will come to understand, was deserving. And... to show you: this is no game, no joke. This is a hard and nasty reality; life and death, Callaghan, life and death.’
He moved back to the door. Glanced over his shoulder. ‘Maybe Morana was wrong.’
Callaghan looked up through blood tears. ‘Morana?’
‘You have seen her. In your dreams.’
‘More bullshit!’
‘A young girl. With a sword.’
Callaghan froze. How could Volos know that? How could he possibly know what had featured in Callaghan’s dreamscape and nightmares for the past year, now? Growing, expanding, becoming more and more frequent, more and more threatening? How could he know? He couldn’t know!
Callaghan climbed to his feet. Glanced back at Jimmy’s charred remains.
‘Follow me,’ said Volos. ‘Mia’s life depends on your actions. On your choices. You need to think clear, Callaghan; your paths, your destiny, you hold them now like a newborn, squawking in your arms. But you must make the right decisions.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘I told you before. We must seek out one of The Killers.’
‘And do what?’
‘Make him clean again. Send him back to the Second Level.’
Callaghan followed Volos down the stairs, out into the snow. The world was pure and white and cold. Callaghan shivered as a biting wind wrapped around him and snuggled in close.
‘This Killer? Is he dangerous?’
Volos glanced at Cal. ‘One of the worst,’ he said.
They moved in silence.
Volos strode to Cal’s bike, lifted it easily from the stand and climbed on. He motioned to Cal, who trudged, beaten, through the thick fall and climbed up behind.
Volos fired the engine, and they moved away into heavy white.
Cal was numb.
Not from cold, but with despair.
Volos was large and real and evil in front of him, and Cal held on to the rear grab–handle of the BMW, trying like hell not to touch the big murdering freak; that slick leather coat, that evil deadly flesh. Cal felt nausea swamp him. Vomit rimed his mouth.
Volos rode fast, and a fatigued Cal had to hang on tightly and work hard not to be thrown free. Tyres squealed and slid in snow–mush. And – Cal blinked, for Volos rode without lights. Trying to kill us? Cal smiled grimly. He cared little for life now... his world had become a madness... it was only the talk of Mia which had helped him cling to this dream, this world, this reality. After all... where would it all end? Where could it end?
They left London central under cover of darkness, and Volos sped many roads Callaghan had never explored leaving him confused and disorientated. Down tree–lined streets they swept, through mazes of terraced houses, down broad avenues lined with large mansions, along anodyne dual–carriageways until Cal felt himself nodding into an uneasy and very dangerous sleep... lethargy crept up on him, drained him of his last will to go on, and placing his face against Volos’s broad, damp back he was gone and falling –
For an instant.
The bike stopped, juddered; the engine burbled and died. Cal climbed free and stood, hands by his sides, useless in the snow. Volos swung free, and looked up and down the street. Snow still fell. The world was deserted. An empty, hollow shell.
‘What now?’
‘Follow me.’
‘I haven’t brought my cameras. To take pictures. That’s what you said, right? To be your... biographer?’ He gave a weak laugh. Spat in the snow. Stared at the congealed blood on his ribbon–flesh hands.
‘Observe.’
Volos moved to a set of heavy iron gates and paused, peering through to a distant, detached property. Cal moved up behind him, wishing like hell he had a gun and could put a bullet in the back of this bastard’s skull. Volos reached out, and something went click. The gate swung inwards a little and Volos slipped through, closely followed by Callaghan. They moved right, into a dense copse of conifers where the snow had settled, making the whole world eerily silent. Still. Nothing moved. A blanket covered the world. Volos dropped to one knee, and stayed there for quite some time observing the house.
Cal looked on ahead. A long gravel drive swept up to the broad–fronted property; the front façade was red brick, windows lit with a comforting, yellow warmth. There were two cars parked on the gravel drive, but Cal couldn’t make out any more than vague shapes.
Snow swirled, filling the scene with a hazy glow.
Behind Volos now, Cal dropped to one knee also. He glanced down and fingers curled around a heavy branch. It was thick, and it was solid in his cold, mirror–sliced fist. Back of the head, thought Cal savagely. One swift strike. It'll break the fucker’s skull clean in two. He lifted the branch with an infinity of care, first to elbow height – then shoulder. Still, Volos was immobile, long black leather coat slick with snowmelt and Cal felt a surge of adrenalin because he could end this thing, kill it, kill Volos right now and walk away a free man...
Volos’s head swivelled. Dark ey
es met Callaghan’s. Cal instantly dropped the branch.
‘Good boy,’ said Volos.
‘Fuck you,’ said Callaghan.
‘Follow me. And don’t make a sound.’
Volos moved fast along the edges of the evergreen shroud, along by the side of the house to a row of unlit rooms. He eased across the gravel drive which crunched, half–muffled by snow, under his boots. Cal followed closely thinking dark, bloody, violent thoughts of death and destruction. All he needed was something sharp. A decent club. And he’d make this motherfucker pay for killing Jim.
Volos reached a dark window. He slid a long talon under the edge of the peeling wood, and there came an easy crack of tensioned, breaking timber. The window slid up. ‘You first.’
‘Me?’
Volos glared, and Callaghan climbed through the maw and fell with a dull thump on the carpet within. Volos eased his bulk through the portal and they stood, in the darkness, listening. Volos moved to a nearby doorway and opened it a crack. Dimmed light cut a V across the floor. Voices could be heard, mumbled, subdued. Callaghan glanced left, at polished oak furniture, and right towards –
Shit, he thought. A gun. It was stocky and black, a heavy, police–issue Browning. Callaghan knew nothing about guns, but this looked real and nasty and heavy and deadly. He edged towards the high dresser. Then, he focused on Volos – who in turn was focused on something beyond the door. Callaghan’s nose twitched. He could smell hot wax from burning candles. He frowned, reached out, eased the gun from its position, and hid it behind his back.
Volos glanced at him. ‘When it starts, observe,’ he hissed. ‘And do not get in my way.’
Callaghan gave a short nod, and Volos moved quickly from the darkened sitting room into a wide hall, which led in turn to –
A kitchen, lit by the surreal and beautiful glow of many candles.
‘… be ready, my love,’ Cal heard a female voice say. His hand, with the raised gun, faltered at Volos’s back. It was one thing to kill this bastard, but in front of a woman? An innocent housewife? How could he do it? Do that? He couldn’t do it! What sane human could?