Eleanor

by RA Williams

  Buster helped him to his feet before ejecting an empty cartridge from his rifle.

  ‘How many can there be?’ Gaele asked, exhausted from the endless skirmishing.

  ‘Two missing expeditions. The inhabitants of the station,’ said Buster, slamming the rifle bolt home and injecting a fresh .303 round into the chamber, before dropping another wraith with a head shot. ‘A Crimen hive can be more than a hundred.’

  ‘We cannot fight them all off,’ Gaele replied. Tearing his pistol from its holster, he pumped four rounds into a pair of immolated beasts staggering from within the annexe. ‘No matter how many we dispatch, Sergeant Major Clarke will have lost all of the West Kent Regiment to attrition.’

  ‘We have the Mohawk.’

  Grasping a pair of burning fiends, Balthasar crashed their heads together repeatedly until they were an indistinguishable mess. He killed with an elegance that even a professional hunter such as Gaele admired.

  ‘It’s an even fight.’

  ‘Even?’ the Mohawk replied, striking with his hatchet, disembowelling a beast with barbarism bordering on obscene. A stew of intestines coiled out at his feet as he kicked the beast aside. ‘I’ll kill all of them.’

  Balthasar nodded, his normally expressionless eyes piercing and alive. In that moment, Gaele could find little difference between the two men. Climbing over the veranda rail, Balthasar leaped to the parade ground, purposefully exposing himself.

  ‘Kill anything you see, Mssr Gaele.’

  ‘Where are you going, Buster?’

  ‘To have a look in there,’ he said, pointing out a customs shed on the edge of the parade ground. Moving away from the light of the burning annexe, he called back, ‘If you can survive the night, you’ve a chance.’

  ‘Best of luck,’ the Mohawk said, creeping off in the opposite direction. ‘There’s plenty of mutilation for us all.’

  Gaele felt exposed and alone. If only he could find his sons; with their long spears, they could easily fend off the marauding wraiths. He decided his odds would be considerably improved within the Lewis gun position. Taking half a dozen long strides through the ceaseless deluge, while avoiding a tangle of carcasses, he mounted the steps to the villa, hands pulling him under the eaves. Eleven grenadiers fired continuously at the frenzied beasts, while Corporal Lathbury poured fire from the Lewis into the darkening sky.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Sergeant Major Clarke shouted, helping Gaele upright. ‘Where in hell has Major Hadley gone?’

  ‘To the customs shed.’

  ‘The customs shed?’ Clarke dropped a beast with two rounds to its head. ‘It’s full of them devils.’

  Inserting a stripper clip of .303 into the chamber of his Enfield, he turned to the men who remained, now not much more than a platoon.

  ‘Aim for the head. Anything less is a waste of ammunition.’

  The grenadiers unleashed a hail of rifle fire. All around, Crimen fell to their marksmanship.

  ‘I’m starting to believe we just might make it through the night,’ Clarke told the Belgian before the Lewis fell silent, ammunition drum spent. ‘Reload,’ Clarke ordered.

  With shaking hands, the loader attempted to replace the ammunition drum as quickly as he could. A beast landed in their midst, pounding wings knocking the loader, splintering the railing. Tumbling from the veranda, the loader was set upon by the frenzied hive and quickly devoured.

  ‘Give us another drum, for fuck’s sake,’ Lathbury stormed.

  A grenadier lifted a loose drum amid the spent cartridges. Snatching it from his hands, the gunner slammed it into the receiver. As he chambered the first round, yet another Crimen pushed its way under the eave. Before anyone could get a shot off, it dashed Lathbury’s head against the wall of the villa, cracking it open like an egg, and sucked out the fluffy brain matter bubbling from inside. Using his Enfield as a cudgel, Clarke crashed the butt against the back of its head. It turned, an inhuman rattle bellowing from its flesh-clogged mouth. Jabbing with the rifle butt, Clarke struck its mandibles, shattering them. The creature wrenched the Enfield from Clarke’s hands, and then set upon him.

  Gaele fired, the Winchester barrel mere inches away from the fiend’s head, blowing most of the top of the beast’s head off and killing it. With a nod of thanks, the sergeant major took up the Lewis gun, bringing it to bear on the attacking horde illuminated by the flames of the burning annexe.

  ‘Christ,’ he shouted, knocking down the wraiths with controlled bursts. ‘There’s no end to them.’

  Moving from the cover of the veranda now, Clarke positioned himself on the steps leading to the parade ground. From this exposed position, he widened his field of fire, sowing the hordes of beasts. Brum-brum-brum. Brum-brum. Knocked from their perch among the trees, three fiends tumbled through the branches, landing on the ground. A volley of grouped .303 rounds from the rifles of the grenadiers finished them off. Brum-brum-brum. Brum-brum. Another one knocked from the night sky. Brum-brum-brum. Brum-brum. Yet another dropped as it attempted to climb into the veranda. A grenadier sighted in his Enfield, taking off the top of the beast’s head.

  Gaele watched Clarke fend off the marauding wraiths, expending the ammunition drum in five-round bursts. The station compound suddenly brightened as the customs shed went up in flames, revealing scores of wounded Crimen clawing their way over increasing piles of carcasses. Brum-brum-brum. Brum-brum. They were finished off.

  A banshee howl pierced the night, and a wraith emerged from the torched shed, unlike anything Gaele had yet seen. A flash of lightning illuminated the beautiful beast before peals of thunder drowned out its shrieks. It was swathed in a full-length native kitenge, lush black hair surrounding a captivating face. A woman. Burning Crimen escaped from the shed behind it, wings alight.

  ‘God’s teeth,’ said Clarke, checking his fire.

  Gaele lowered his rifle, mesmerised. By the light of the burning shed, the woman appeared so pale as to be luminescent, and utterly flawless. She was different to the others, gliding as if on glass, escaping the flames calmly, the pelting rain bouncing away from her as the other beasts encircled her. The Belgian raised his rifle to put the fiend down. As he sighted in the beast through the cordon of immolated Crimen surrounding her, their eyes met. Something inexplicable happened. He felt a jolt within, so captivating that it took away his breath and he could not fire upon her.

  ‘Clear them wretched ghouls away,’ Clarke ordered.

  A volley of Enfield fire grounded the burning fiends moving around her.

  Clarke’s shouted orders brought Gaele back to the reality of the situation they were in. Realising what he gazed upon, he shouted, ‘Shoot her. Kill her!’ But his voice was lost in the deafening gunfire.

  An enormous beast appeared out of the burning shed, its humanoid body well-muscled and branded with exotic tattoos. Its elongated lower jaw and protruding mandibles were more goliath beetle than human. A thundering screech echoed across the station from its jaws, immense wings unfolding from its back, propelling it into the air as it darted towards the banshee. Buster emerged from the customs shed close behind the giant, his drill jacket smouldering. Leaping on it, the two of them tumbled into the morass of mud and carcasses.

  The sergeant major continued laying fire upon the beasts. With each wraith taken down, the grenadiers put a .303 round into their heads. Brum-brum-brum. Brum-click.

  The Lewis gun fell silent.

  ‘Come on, you bastard,’ Clarke shouted, madly working its action, attempting to clear the jam. A clutch of Crimen fell upon him, goring him before Gaele could bring his rifle to bear.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Clarke cried out before he was pulled apart, the beasts feeding on him, their malnourished bodies bubbling then instantly growing robust. His corpse drained of nourishment, they cast the sergeant major aside, turning on the horrified grenadiers.

  The Belgian brought Henry to the fight, blowing one of the beasts off the veranda before another’s pulsating wings knocked him over
a pile of broken wicker chairs. His luck seemed to have run out on him.

  Brum-brum-brum. Brum-brum. The Lewis fired again. Expended brass casings showered down upon Gaele, Crimen cut down like harvest wheat.

  Much to his surprise, his son Barasa stood above him, laying a curtain of fire down on the beasts, while his other son, Adongo, ran through another with his spear.

  ‘Adongo – sa tête. Le coup de hache, le coup de hache,’ yelled Gaele, telling his eldest son to cut off the beast’s head.

  ‘Ja, bwana Mkuba,’ Adongo replied. Unsheathing his dagger, he lopped off the beast’s head with a single pass.

  Taking the Lewis off Barasa, Gaele shoved it into the hands of a grenadier. ‘Keep up the fire.’

  Scooping up the unused ammunition drums, he pushed them into the hands of yet another soldier.

  ‘If the Lewis gun falls silent, all of us are dead. You understand, ja?’ The wide-eyed soldiers nodded. Looking to the ten remaining grenadiers, he said, ‘I’ll go with my sons.’

  ‘Where are you going, sir?’

  ‘My boys and I will lure the beasts away from the swarm. Singling them out, we will exterminate them one at a time.’

  ‘Out there? It’s pure terror,’ said another grenadier, directing his rifle across the killing field clogged with carcasses.

  The Belgian was not frightened. Not with his sons in the fight.

  ‘What are our orders?’ the grenadier asked, catching his wind during a lull in the attack. Gaele realised that with his warrior sons fighting alongside him, he could be the hunter at last, and not the hunted.

  ‘Keep those winged devils off this veranda,’ he said. ‘Conserve your ammunition. Short bursts.’

  A wounded wraith lay at the bottom of the steps, wings broken, chest peppered with bullets. It hissed menacingly. Removing his pistol, Gaele blew its brains out. ‘And make very certain they are dead. Bonne chance.’

  Descending the steps, Gaele and his sons moved cautiously past heaped Crimen bodies towards the cover of the jungle fringe, the canopy above alive with movement. Between the crashes of thunder, he heard the terrible howls of the wraiths. Silently, he made his way to the customs shed with his sons.

  Crouching behind a felled ulumbu tree, Gaele drew his sons’ attention to the shed, now fully engulfed in flames. Using hand gestures, he indicated they should flank it and meet around the front. The three of them together were too tasty a target, but individually they could slip one by one through the cordon protecting the banshee.

  He watched as his sons silently crept away, waiting until they were out of sight before slipping out from under the canopy. He hadn’t gone four paces before he felt the air above in flux, and sudden weight on his shoulders.

  Twisting, he parried with his Winchester, fending off a little imp. It tumbled into a pile of discarded pirogues. As it regained its feet, Gaele realised the imp was once a small boy, a pair of oversized shorts still clinging to its moulting frame. No more than twelve years of age, the imp retained more human features than the others. Even with a mouth of razor-like cuspids, its face remained childlike. Hissing, it beat its runty wings, charging at Gaele with incredible agility. He managed to fend it off with his rifle stock. In the light of the burning shed, he watched the boy’s face transform into a ghoulish mask, carnassials snapping at him, hands clawing maddeningly at his drill jacket.

  Then he understood; the small prig was after the fresh blood pounding through his heart. Wings thrashing, the little beggar screeched with rage. Suddenly, it was pulled away, hurled into the flames of the customs shed.

  ‘Cheeky little nipper,’ said the Mohawk as he appeared from the darkness, saturated in gore from the slaughter, eyes like a rabid hyena.

  The imp re-emerged from the annexe, smouldering. It darted towards the Mohawk, sinking its teeth into his shoulder.

  ‘Be off, brat.’

  Gripping the hatchet from his belt, he buried it in the little fiend’s head. It wobbled, before collapsing in a pile.

  The customs shed exploded, fire burning hot through the zinc roof.

  ‘Have you seen her?’

  Gaele nodded.

  ‘Come then. Let us run her to ground and cut her up proper.’

  ‘Your mind is ravaged, Captain Taggart.’

  The Mohawk drew close, taking hold of the Belgian’s arm tightly. ‘Eaten away, Monsieur,’ he said, eyes wild with mania. ‘I know how to treat them. Bastards, the lot. Only question is, do you?’

  Gaele slipped his grip. ‘Is there not slaughter enough here to feed your urges?’

  ‘I’m where I belong,’ replied the Mohawk. ‘Sod off and let me have my fun.’

  A burnt Crimen crashed down between the two of them, its thrashing wings sending Gaele through the air. He landed hard, Henry slipping from his grip. The Mohawk went berserk, flaying the beast wide open from neck to groin.

  Gaele raised the Winchester to his eye. It wasn’t the beast he aimed for – if he squeezed the trigger, he would end the Mohawk. But the night was not yet over. He fired. A .44 rimfire crashed into the burnt Crimen’s head, showering the Mohawk in brain matter.

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ he yelled back gleefully.

  Toggling the repeater’s lever action, Gaele’s attention was drawn to the brum-brum-brum of the Lewis gun again, knocking down the waves of swarming beasts. Balthasar continued skirmishing with the mighty wraith, anticipating each strike before the beast could make any counterstrike. With a rake of his hand, he tore away the beast’s mandibles, exposing a waxy fascia underneath. It shrieked, bucking as it tried to break Balthasar’s grip.

  Sapphire flames erupted into bright orange as the customs shed burned hot, turning the night into day. Gaele watched a ghostly figure moving effortlessly within the hive.

  The banshee was as exquisite as a Duchesse de Brabant tea rose rising from Congo’s red earth. Gaele reloaded, his reaction visceral. Though beautiful, she had a blackness in her eyes more horrific than all the atrocities soaking Congo’s earth with blood. Hunting predators was Gaele’s profession, and experience taught him to maintain eye contact at all times. But La Reine Blanche was a predator like none other. To make eye contact with her was to look too long into the midday African sun.

  ‘Buster!’ he shouted in warning over the peals of thunder. ‘Balthasar!’

  The banshee stopped, flawless face still as the rain slackened. From her delicate mouth, she hissed, ‘Balthasar Toule.’

  At once, the earth went still, the hive docile.

  Balthasar’s ferociousness receded too. Frozen to the spot, he released the beast he was fighting off. ‘Siobhan.’

  ‘Thy flesh,’ said the banshee, her enchanting voice hushing the Crimen susurrus. ‘I remember your taste.’

  Brushing aside her guardians, she lingered mere feet from him.

  ‘Your flesh is frail,’ she said.

  The Belgian recognised fear in Balthasar’s face. But rather than cower, he slowly brandished a spike from the hip pocket of his khaki drill jacket.

  ‘Jungfräu,’ she spat, her voice a glottal snarl as her beauty shed, head elongating, eyes sinking into their pallid sockets as her nose-leaf burst, exposing knotted inner cartilage. Fuscous eruptions wept on her spiny back as membranous wings forced their way out from within. Where words of velvet had sprouted, now mandibles snapped a banshee’s howl. ‘Your filth shall not touch me.’

  Balthasar hesitated, clearly entranced and yet terrified by her presence. Drawing back a clawed talon, the banshee smacked him across the face. Sent flying, he crashed through the side of the fully engulfed customs shed.

  ‘Oi, luv.’ Sinewy legs pivoted, talons digging into the mud as she turned. The Mohawk scooped up Buster’s spike. ‘Fancy a go, you ugly witch?’

  Crimen quickly surrounded the Mohawk. Siobhan hissed unintelligible lexemes at them. They stayed back. Seeing the spike in the Mohawk’s hand, she howled menacingly.

  ‘That’s right, darling,’ he said, moving closer to her. �
�My boss can’t peg you, but there’s nothing stopping me.’

  Siobhan slithered back.

  ‘You got no idea the spite I must get out of my head.’ Raising the spike, he advanced.

  Before he could reach the banshee, her horrific form sloughed. Clumped hair grew thick and luxuriant again, the ghastly wings protruding from her back curling up. Reabsorbed. Siobhan’s exquisite kitenge fell to her feet. She stood disrobed, her flesh pale without imperfection once more. Sensual. Hips narrow and wanting, her shoulders lean and delicate, breasts firm and desirable. Siobhan was cunning. Even the Mohawk was seduced. Hands dropping to his side, the spike fell into the muddy earth. ‘Jungfräu is useless upon me.’

  She laughed, but too soon. Her chest exploded in a spray of spoiled cruor as a hot rimfire round tore through her.

  ‘No!’ cried out the Mohawk, turning to Gaele as he lowered the trigger guard, ejecting the empty cartridge he had just fired into Siobhan. The wounded wraith Balthasar had released roared in anger, throwing itself before the banshee to shield her. Sighting his repeater, the Belgian had to decide between the beast and Siobhan. He fired, the energy from the bullet blowing further apart the already wounded Crimen’s chest, black batter coursing from within.

  Balthasar emerged from the shed’s inferno. Tearing off his immolated khaki drill jacket, he ignored his grievously charred body, scooping up the spike from the mud and leaping on the fiend. It flapped its wings madly, spiralling into the night sky. Balthasar, clinging to the fiend, buried the spike into it with such savagery his forearm vanished into its chest cavity. Releasing a primal knell, the beast tumbled to the earth, Buster holding true as it thrashed madly in the mud. With a trembling hand, it reached for Siobhan. Showing no interest in its misery, the banshee retreated towards the jungle fringe.

  Before Gaele could put a bullet into her head, he felt sudden pain in his side. Looking down, he saw blood spouting from a gash in his khaki drill jacket.

  ‘I’ll have you playing Victoria and fucking Albert,’ snarled the Mohawk. ‘You will not have her.’

  He bashed Gaele across the face and sent him tumbling into the mud. As the Mohawk reared back to strike him with his hatchet, the weapon was knocked out of his hand. He turned as a hurtling fist crashed into his face, sending him reeling away. The Mohawk drew a pistol from the holster on his belt, but before he could fire, his arm was wrenched back with a loud snap. He stumbled back, screaming, right arm dangling grotesquely. Adongo grasped him by his throat, hurling him aside as he came to his father’s aid.