Doctor How and the Deadly Anemones

by Mark Speed

  “On whose side?” asked Bunce.

  “His own damned side, apparently. He biffs the anemone, scoops it up and then biffs a couple of our guys who get in his way. Except he’s pretty gentle on our guys by comparison. Our guys only got winded. Here, take a look at this. This is the best of the footage from the helmet cameras.” Schlutz clicked a control button and a fifty-inch TV screen blinked into life on the wall showing the desktop of Colonel Schlutz’s computer.

  Doctor Peterson now had her back to Sir Adrian, and was facing the back of Commander Bunce’s head. She felt a puff of breath from Sir Adrian. She saw a slight movement of Commander Bunce’s hair, who was sitting in front of her, and slightly to the right. She liked Sir Adrian, but was a little disconcerted about how indiscreet the head of MI6 could be. He didn’t seem to care about stating his lack of confidence in Thickett in public, and nor did he care about letting his breath out in boredom – even if he did so silently.

  Schlutz clicked through some folders to some MP4 files, then doubled clicked on one. A chaotic light and black image appeared. In the distance along a tunnel were two men bearing carbines with flashlights on them. The sound was confusing – splashes of water, shouting, all echoing in the confined space.

  The men jumped about as something dropped into view, splashed into the water and assaulted them. Schlutz slowed it down and in a few frames the silhouettes of two or three tentacles could be seen. “Tentacles. Definitely tentacles.” He let it go back to normal speed for a couple of seconds and then slowed it down again. “Okay, here’s our Predator guy. See that? You can just make out the outline of a shadow because the helmet cam is at a different angle to the flashlight. We analysed the terminal velocity and we figure he just free-falls at least twenty feet and makes a perfect landing on a slippery surface. I tell ya, I know some of the best special ops guys in the world and not one of them could do that. This guy’s superhuman. Okay, so now you can just see our rearmost man uses this chance to break off combat and regain the initiative. He said the anemone made a grab for the Predator guy but couldn’t hold on, then there – see that? He just biffs him with something – the guys say it looked like a nightstick. And there he goes. He picks up the anemone and he’s outta there, sprinting right at the guy filming this on his helmet cam. And then watch this.” Schlutz slowed the film down again.

  Peterson felt another puff of air. She couldn’t help but agree with Sir Adrian that Schlutz was dragging this out.

  “You can see our man with the helmet cam gets a bead on him because he’s much easier to see now that he’s carrying this dead jellyfish. But just as our man’s about to shoot he’s up-ended by something grabbing his ankle.” Schlutz closed the file and then double-clicked on another in the same folder. He toggled through to a specific point in the movie clip.

  “Okay, this one is from the second team we inserted in Vauxhall. You can see two of the boys each throw a stun grenade up towards the oncoming threat.” There was a high-contrast image of two special ops soldiers either side of the pipe leading to the embassy throwing something up the pipe and then slamming their backs to the wall, carbines at the ready. The soundtrack was as confused as before – the sound of water and shouted commands.

  There was a blast of steam, the soundtrack thundered, the camera shook and a couple of bright flashes caused the camera to blank with white noise for a couple of seconds. The picture resolved again to show the aftermath of the steam blast and the two stun grenades. It was obvious that the man from whose helmet cam the footage had been taken was slumped with his back to the wall. The movie was silent – the microphone having been destroyed by the blast.

  “There!” said Schlutz. “The invisible goddamned man. See that splashing moving across the water? It’s actually in the water. And you can see he goes down that pipe. He knew exactly where he was going. Goes to the outflow into the Thames. The rest you know – some indication of recent activity there, but no real clues so far. That Predator guy is the damnedest thing I ever saw in three decades in the services. One of the guys said it was muttering in English about the casualties. He described the guy’s accent as that of a local male.”

  “I’m surprised his eardrums hadn’t been pierced,” said Sir Adrian. “Are you sure he was hearing correctly? Concussion does some odd things.”

  “He was the only one whose hearing survived. Happened to have his mouth open. Of course, we’ve had to have the poor guy’s stomach pumped – he caught a mouthful of you-know-what when the grenades went off. The only thing we have to go on is the stuff in the jar. The guy who was grabbed by it grabbed it right back. Seems the gas killed it pretty quickly.” Schlutz swung around in his chair to face the others and jabbed his finger in the direction of the jar.

  The jar was gone.

  “Hey! What the –”

  His three British colleagues looked at Colonel Schlutz, then at the space formerly occupied by the jar.

  “Is this more of the British sense of humour thing? Because if it is, it ain’t damned funny.”

  “Search me,” said Sir Adrian.

  “Believe me,” growled Colonel Schlutz. “I fully intend to.” He pressed a button on his desk. “Seal my office. Send in a couple of field agents.”

  “Joe, this is ridiculous,” said Sir Adrian. “Are you sure you didn’t put it in your drawer?”

  “My drawer is locked.” Schlutz’s face shifted again. “Say,” he said. “That Predator guy was speaking in English with a London accent.”

  “Now look here, Joe. If you’re implying –”

  “I ain’t implying anything Sir Adrian. I’m just stating the facts as we know them, and I gotta say something stinks in this sewer business.”

  Peterson couldn’t help smiling inwardly. She realised what was odd about that second puff. She’d felt it not on the back of her head, but on her face. Sir Adrian would have had to have taken a very deep breath indeed to have created that effect from behind. She did some mental calculations and concluded that about eighty cubic feet of air rushing in to fill a hole might just about have done it. She smiled to herself again as the arguments began about who last saw the jar, and what could possibly have happened to it in the space of a minute in an office with a single door, which had remained closed.

  There was a polite but firm knock. Two burly men in dark suits with bulges under the left armpit entered.

  “Close the door behind you. I want you to turn this place upside down,” said Schlutz. “Search everyone, myself included. No one leaves until we find that damned jar.”

  “False imprisonment is an offence in this country,” said Commander Bunce, getting to her feet.

  “Lady, you are on US sovereign territory,” growled Schlutz. “And there ain’t no diplomatic niceties when we’re in a state of war.”

  “Good lad,” said the Doctor, taking the jar from Kevin and holding it up to the light.

  “I was more nervous of doing that than I was dealing with the special ops guys. That was like burgling someone’s house.” Kevin took off his goggles and balaclava. “Though I never had equipment like this. Would have made it a piece of cake.”

  “I can’t say I’ve had the pleasure of that particular experience myself,” said the Doctor with a hard stare.

  “Uh… Yeah, but you’ve done covert ops, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, but always on the right side of the law.”

  “You’re only on the right side of the law because you are the law.”

  “This is war and I’m trusted by all to make a moral judgement.”

  “Whatever. We can agree that it’s a hell of a buzz stealing that from under their noses, right?”

  “I think we can agree that it wasn’t theft. These remains belong to Tim. They will be very, very grateful. I took the liberty of ordering some of your Jamaican patties for you whilst you were out there.”

  “Cheers, Doc. I’m Hank Marvin.”

  “It’s been one heck of a Monday so far. And we’ve still not got to the bott
om of these blasted flowers.”

  A house-bot arrived carrying a polished metal dome from under which Kevin took a piping-hot Jamaican chicken patty. “Like, the flowers seem to be mostly harmless.”

  “Think so?” asked the Doctor. “Nothing that distorts time is harmless. Don’t forget that these seem to be capable of excluding my Spectrel from accessing specific areas. Get enough of them together, spread them around the country and I’m limited to travelling at night.”

  “I think it’s a bit of a joke.”

  “A joke?”

  “Sure. If they really have this technology then why not turn it on all the time?”

  “Preposterous. They just haven’t perfected the design yet.”

  Kevin looked at his watch. “Well, by my reckoning it’s gone six in the real world now. And you’re right: it’s been a very long day. Apparently Tuesdays are always good days – you know, Monday’s over.”

  “Brilliant pop psychology. If you got that from your mother’s therapist friend then you can forget me ever having those talking therapy sessions with her.”

  “Oh, so you’d seriously consider them would you? I can –”

  “I was being facetious. If I ever –”

  A light on the console flashed.

  “Oh, for photon’s sake, what fresh hell is this?” asked the Doctor. “Oh, no. No, no, no. No!” He banged both of his fists on the console in despair. “Can’t I ever get a moment’s rest?”

  “However bad it is,” said Kevin, popping the last of the patty in his mouth, “it’ll look better tomorrow. That’s what my mum says. And especially since tomorrow’s a Tuesday. Now, if you can get to noon on Wednesday, then the week’s halfway through and –”

  “Do you know what, Kevin? I’m going to reframe this as good news.”

  “That’s a very positive attitude, Doc. That’s a winner’s attitude.”

  “Oh, I’m so glad to hear it from someone with such a history of extraordinary success in such a wide range of human endeavour.”

  “So, go on. Tell me this bad news as a good news story. It’ll be good therapy for you.”

  “We know pretty much the exact location of that other polyp.” The Doctor danced around with mock glee.

  “That’s brilliant! I assume Tim are on their way, yeah?”

  “Oh, Tim are on their way alright. Full steam ahead for Tim – or what’s left of them. They might be there by nine o’clock. Nine o’clock on which day, I’m not quite sure. But I’m going to make sure our little crack unit – our little dream team as you call us – is there to seal off the area and make sure that pesky little critter doesn’t escape again.”

  “Great. Your obvious sarcasm aside, this is a really positive plan, Doc. So, how do you know exactly where this polyp is then?”

  “I know exactly where it is,” yelled the Doctor with more than a touch of maniacal hysteria in his voice, “because it has just eaten the new Rindan consul and her husband!”

  “Oh.”

  “Oh. ‘Oh’ indeed, Kevin.”

  “So, uh. This complicates things a bit, doesn’t it?”

  “Do you know what?” said the Doctor. “I guess it does complicate things just a tad. Good job you didn’t have a chance to take off your combat gear.”

  “You mean –”

  “You’re going in again. Except this time there won’t be any Navy SEALs.”

  “Promise?”

  “I can’t make promises. You know that. We’d better get there.”

  Trinity scuttled silently into the control room in her spider form.

  “Bad news travels fast. But what’s bad news for some is good news for others,” said the Doctor. “Trini can’t wait to get back into it. But – both of you – I want this one alive.”

  Trinity hissed her disapproval.

  “Like, why?”

  “I have my reasons. Now, we’re going to drop Trini off first. She should be able to deal with this one herself.”

  “What about me?”

  “You’ll stick with me for now.”

  The Doctor concentrated on his controls for a few moments. “Okay, off you go, darling,” he said to Trinity, who shot out of the Spectrel.

  “I don’t see how she’s not going to kill it, Doc.”

  “She can paralyse it, or truss it up in a web. That’s up to her. Thankfully, she’s eaten today.” He fiddled with the controls. “And this is us. Of all places, the Rindans decided the new consul would live in Catford.”

  “Catford? So much for intelligent alien life. They certainly ain’t.”

  “The Circarians have bought the odd cheap property and refurbished it for rental. Not a game they should be in, frankly. As this sorry episode demonstrates. Come on.”

  “Don’t we have to… you know?”

  “Get naked? No, consul Pinca and her husband are quite dead. They must have had all of twenty-four hours in their new home. I think that’s probably a universal record for the shortest diplomatic mission not terminated by an act of war. Put your goggles and your mask in your pockets, and keep your Con-Bat in your holster.”

  Kevin gave him a puzzled look.

  “I don’t want you looking like we’re there to mete out summary justice. You’re there in case the polyp is still around.”

  “It’s gonna be long gone.”

  The Doctor gave him a forced grin. “Since you’re the pop psychology expert, you ought to know that looking like you mean business is a big part of getting the job done.” He took out his Tsk Army Ultraknife and stepped out of the Spectrel. Kevin followed.

  They stepped out into a living room of around the same size they’d seen in Du Cane Court. A quick glance told Kevin that it was above the height of the orange sodium vapour lamps in the street outside, which were just coming on with the approaching dusk. The furniture was more modern than the Plenscas’ residence in Balham, though it looked a little cheaper and less tasteful than the Doctor’s choice.

  “Ikea,” sniffed the Doctor. “The glue’s still fresh. I can smell it.”

  The Doctor caught Kevin looking up at the ceiling, which was slightly higher, with cornicing between the ceiling and walls. On one side it had been repaired badly with a modern facsimile which didn’t quite match.

  “Late Victorian,” said the Doctor. “Large house converted into flats. I do so hate that. It never quite works because they weren’t designed for it.” A floorboard creaked under his foot as he walked towards the door to the hall.

  “Who that there?” shouted an Eastern European voice. There were loud footsteps and Grk appeared in the doorway. “Doctor! Thank God you is here. Come quick.”

  “Quick? A bit late for quick,” said the Doctor, and followed Grk through to the bathroom. Kevin tagged along behind, glancing in the other rooms, looking for any possible threats.

  The scene was much the same as the one in Balham had been. Both Rindans were half-eaten. One was on the floor by the toilet, and the other lay on its back next to the bath-shower unit.

  “Oh, my,” said the Doctor. “I see the polyp had so much time that it was able to take the choicest cuts before moving on.”

  “What is choicest cuts?” asked Grk.

  “The best bits of meat,” said Kevin, looking at Grk dead in the eyes.

  “When did this happen?” asked the Doctor. He was squatting down, scanning the remains with his Ultraknife.

  “I not sure, maybe was happen this morning?”

  “Well, when did you find out?”

  “Just before I make call with you.”

  “Hmm. It looks like it happened an hour ago at the most. She would have come back from the office a bit early, still space-lagged. She’d have taken the traditional Rindan evening rain ritual in the shower, along with him. She goes to relieve herself, is grabbed by the polyp. He tries to get it off, but he’s stung badly. The polyp’s in a feeding frenzy, and this is its favourite meal. Probably hasn’t eaten in a while, and maybe not since splitting up with its other half. He co
llapses unconscious and the polyp is able to take its time. And you can see here,” the Doctor pointed to some puddles of water on the linoleum floor, “That it actually came out. Watch.” He turned off the bathroom light and touched the surface of the Ultraknife. The water glowed slightly.

  “It’s like a CSI for aliens,” said Kevin.

  “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Forensics,” said Kevin. “Very impressive.”

  The Doctor turned to Grk. “So have you told the Rindan consulate yet?”

  “No. I hope Doctor How will do this for me.”

  The Doctor chuckled. “Not my problem, sunshine.”

  “What you mean? Of course this your problem. You responsible for make safeguard all out-of-town peoples when here.”

  “Uh-uh,” said the Doctor, rising to his feet. “This was all done under an exclusion clause. They thought they’d be safer with you – at least that’s what they said publicly. Dolt even agreed it with them. Nope, this is your problem, chum. You were supposed to guarantee their safety.”

  “Okay, okay,” said Grk. “So maybe I make call with Rindan consulate tell them bad news. I call me mate and we make job of cleaning up now. Give remains back to Rindans, assuring that proper death rituals carried out.”

  “Excellent,” said the Doctor. He motioned for Kevin to leave the bathroom. “I’ll get out of your way and let you get on with the clean-up. Come on, Kevin. Nothing for us here. Let’s see if Trini’s got that polyp yet.”

  “Wait!” said Grk.

  The Doctor stopped at the living room door. “What is it?”

  “Is two thousand for clean-up with receipt, sixteen hundred without. VAT, yes? Must have cash without receipt.”

  The Doctor chuckled, then it turned into a full laugh. He slapped Grk on the shoulder, and Grk caught the laugh too. Kevin looked at them both and began laughing. He didn’t know what it was about, but it was just what he needed to relieve the stress. He laughed until tears started rolling down his cheeks.

  “Grk,” said the Doctor between breaths. “You are absolutely joking.”