It is close to midnight and they are out in the English countryside, not far from the North Sea coast.
“Shh!” responds Barry.
“I was just saying ...”
“Quiet!” hisses Barry. “They keep late hours out here in the sticks. There might be a guard or something.”
“Bollocks!” replies Kevin. But he says nothing else for a few moments.
“This is it,” says Barry.
“How can you tell?”
There is a brief wash of pale blue light.
“Got the map on my phone, haven't I?”
Kevin puts down his heavy bag with a loud clank. He stretches and looks around at the all-embracing gloom.
“Well, I reckon we're wrong! There's nothing around here at all.”
He gestures impatiently at the blackness around them. In the distance, they can just make out the lights of traffic on a distant highway. Here and there, the light of a farmhouse shows in the night. Above them, low clouds obscure the stars and a patch of gray reveals where the overcast covers the moon.
“That's the whole point, ain't it? Sure, we're in the middle of nowhere now, in 2016, Kev. But hundreds of years ago, it used to be somewhere. An important place; the sort of place where you'd find buried treasure. In your Uncle Jack's old book, there were trees marked, but the farmers must have cut them down years ago.”
“I know, I know,” says Kevin, trying to remember the details of the plan. He struggles a bit with details; they tend to become a bit blurred around the edges and then disappear.
We're going into a field to dig something up.
He is clear about that bit. The rest is a little hazy.
“Look,” says Barry, in his special consoling voice, “all we're going to do is have a look around. If we find something, fine; if not, we go home. How's that, mate?”
“All right,” says Kevin.
“Right,” says Barry, “so help me get this gate open.”
As they struggle with the gate, Kevin can't help noticing what little light he can see is starting to fade away. It seems that a mist is rising, obscuring the glimmers of distant vehicles and farms. With the mist comes a slight chill, as of a cold breath on the back of his neck.
***
It is Barry's idea, of course. He is the brains of the outfit, or so he tells himself, and anyone else who'll listen. Kevin is a nice enough young man, but not what you'd call bright. Not much get-up-and-go, either, as Barry puts it. Kevin sort of nods, smiles and just goes along with his oldest friend who also happens to be his only friend. It is easier that way.
The truth is that they are a couple of misfits, currently with just one part-time job between them – Kevin's, in a second-hand record shop – and a lot of unrealistic dreams. This is where the treasure hunt comes in.
Kevin's uncle died and left him a few old books, a bit of cash, and a metal detector. It is a big, clunky old thing, not like one of the newer models – or so says Barry. But, as he points out, it is better than nothing, and could be, as he puts it, 'a ticket out of this dump'.
The dump in question happens to be their home, a former fishing village called Brigstock on the east coast of England. It is picturesque enough if you like that sort of thing, of course. It is just a bit depressing to live in a place that only comes alive in the summer tourist months.
“You can't build a future on three months' paid work a year!” Barry says, and he is right.
But how can a couple of guys with no money move to London? Even the cheapest place to live there costs a fortune.
“Problem is,” as Barry often explains to Kevin, “you need money to make money in this life.”
And so Barry has hatched various money-making schemes; some strictly legit and some a bit sketchy with regard to rules and regulations. Their plan for a Miss Brigstock beauty contest failed because of Barry's former girlfriend Kimberley, who inexplicably became an active feminist during the course of their relationship. She organized a demonstration that attracted just the kind of publicity Barry was not hoping for.
Donkey rides on the beach had seemed less problematic, but unfortunately, the second-hand donkey they acquired had a terrible work ethic and a tendency to bite small children. Kimberley had organized another demonstration, this one in the name of animal welfare.
Then there was the plan to offer guided tours of the village, which sank as well, due to the fact that there was very little of it to tour. After you pointed out the old lighthouse, the war memorial, and the beach – which, while very nice, people can really see for themselves – there is precious little of interest left.
An offshoot of that scheme was the Ghost Walk, because as Barry explained, ‘you didn't need any real facts to make that sort of thing interesting.’ So they gave it a try, with Barry giving a speech about various supposed village spooks, in return for a very modest fee, while Kevin’s job was to add an authentic touch of the Gothic.
The plan was for Kevin to leap out at the customers in the graveyard after Barry finished his account of the tragic suicide of Deirdre Barlow, a woman wronged by a heartless lover. It wasn't entirely Kevin's fault that the white sheet he wrapped himself in caught on a stone angel and left him standing, all too obviously alive, in front of half a dozen bemused Japanese tourists.
“Boo!” he said, feebly.
“This is not a young lady,” one of the customers quite reasonably observed, amidst the flash of camera phones.
“No, and it is not a ghost!” said another, trying hard not to laugh.
As well as getting some excellent photos for the press, at least one of the tourists had the presence of mind to film the whole thing. Needless to say, it was a big hit on the internet, and yet not a single penny had been made by Barry or Kevin. Such is the fundamental injustice of life; they managed to get their fifteen seconds of online fame and yet totally failed to translate it into cash.
And so it went on, every winter with fantasies of sudden wealth, and every summer filled with efforts to devise another money-making scheme. The unexpected inheritance of the metal detector was a bit of a godsend, in this respect.
“This is brilliant!” said Barry. “Like money for old rope.”
It was, he explained to Kevin, so much easier to just walk up and down the beach finding lost coins, even the odd bit of jewelry, maybe. But the trouble was that other people in Brigstock had much the same idea and got there first. You had to get up very early in the morning, every day, to find anything worthwhile. And some of the other detectorists were a bit territorial, to say the least. While Barry was clever and quick talking and Kevin was big and solid, they didn't want to fight for a patch of beach every single day.
It was then that Barry had his brilliant idea. It happened on a wet day in November when they were, as usual, short of cash and inspiration. They were sitting in Kevin's room over the family chip shop and the internet was down again. Barry was so bored he was reduced to reading. Leafing through the books that Uncle Jack had left, he suddenly sat up straight and started scrutinizing the brown, dog-eared pages very closely.
“Well, I'll be!” his eyes widened with surprise.
“What is it?” asked Kevin.
“Your uncle – was he, like, educated and that?” asked Barry.
“I dunno,” replied Kevin. “He did talk a bit posh, I suppose, but I only ever saw him at Christmas. Why?”
Barry held out the book.
“Well, if this means what I think it means, your Uncle Jack was onto something big in the way of ...” He struggled with the word for a moment, “Archaeology!”
“What, like in Tomb Raider?”
“Yeah! Only this is for real, see? Seems like old Jack was looking for buried treasure, and he's marked some of the likely places in this old book of his.”
Kevin took the book from Barry and thumbed through the handwritten pages. He noticed that his late uncle's writing began neatly enough, with lots of legible stuff at the beginning about things Kevin couldn't understan
d. There were headings that did make sense, though. FOLKLORE/LEGEND, THE SACRED CROWN, and DUNCASTER!!!
“An actual crown!” said Barry. “Worn hundreds of years ago by some old king! Imagine what we'd get for that. Why, we could melt it down, or sell it to some posh collector in London, or New York, or maybe China!”
As he flicked on through the old journal, Kevin tried to imagine going to China with a crown, couldn't, shrugged off the idea.
Barry does the thinking, he thought.
“So we're okay to go and dig it up, where it says on the map, there?” asked Barry.
“Yeah, sure,” replied, Kevin. He flicked forward, past more drawings and notes, and reached the end of his uncle's journal. It was a bit weird. For the last few pages, the formerly neat writing became messy and much harder to read. What was legible made little sense.
SENTINELS. The word appeared again and again, at first as a header over notes, then on its own, underlined and finally incised deep into the paper as if Uncle Jack had been trying to tear the book apart with his pen.
“What's up, Kev?” asked Barry.
“It's all this stuff he wrote at the end,” explained Kevin. He handed the book back to his friend. “It's a bit weird, isn't it?”
Barry glanced at the pages, flipped back a little, and chuckled.
“He's written something about 'Killer Smog' and what looks 'BBC mascara',” he said. “Did he go a bit funny before he died, then?”
“Dunno,” replied Kevin. “But it's weird, right?”
“These educated people are all weird, Kev!” said Barry. “That's what gives us an edge. We're practical men. We get the job done. He snuffed it before he could dig the thing up and enjoy the proceeds, poor sod!”
And so the great adventure began.
***
“Come on, Kev, get a move on!” Barry is already in the field and heading God-knows-where.
Kevin heaves the shovel and the metal detector over the gate and then follows them. He always has to carry the heavy stuff. Barry says this is because he – Barry – has asthma and can't be expected to do any physical labor. Besides, somebody needs to scout ahead, and get 'the lay of the land.' But Kevin knows that, when they get to the location, assuming they find it, Barry will be able to lift the detector to do all the fun stuff.
Kevin struggles to get the equipment slung over his shoulder again, picks up the shovel, and then realizes that he's lost sight of his friend.
“Hang on a sec, mate!”
No reply. No idea which way to go.
“Barry!” he hisses. He wants to shout but knows that will earn him a harsh reprimand. At the same time, he knows that nobody more than ten feet away could hear him. His brain seizes up and he gives a moan of frustration.
Then he hears something. Or rather, he feels it. A sudden impact close by, carried through the dirt to his feet. It's like a massive footstep getting closer, the thudding sound of its steps growing louder, more insistent.
“Barry,” he whimpers.
Scenes from a hundred horror movies play simultaneously in his mind. A thousand simulated deaths flicker across the wide-screen of his imagination. There's evisceration, decapitation, ripping limb-from-limb, and of course there's always room for some good old-fashioned stabbing, bludgeoning, and strangling.
Oh god don't let it be a gigantic, hideously-deformed mutant with a meat-hook for a hand!
The footsteps stop, and after a moment of ominous silence, he feels hot breath on the back of his neck. There is a new noise, too, a gust of moist air expelled from vast, inhuman lungs.
Kevin is terrified. He tries to call out to Barry, but all that comes out is a puny squeak.
Then something touches him. It is a strong, muscular touch that feels nothing like a hand. It feels wet and boneless, but beefy like a tentacle. The Thing works its way around his left ear, then ventures across the back of his neck leaving a cold trail of what feels like slime. There is another muffled sound, like a grunt of cruel laughter, and again he feels the hot breath of the Thing on his clammy, goose-pimpled flesh.
“Kev! What are you playing at?” Barry flicks on a flashlight and directs it at his friend's face. Kevin is too petrified to speak.
“Well, I hope you'll both be very happy together. You and Daisy, here,” says Barry, nodding at something behind Kevin. He shines the flashlight over his friend's shoulder.
Turning, Kevin finds himself staring into the big, soulful eyes of a brown and white cow. The inquisitive beast gradually retreats from the bright light, making very normal cow-noises that are suddenly not terrifying at all. Beyond it, Kevin can make out some pale, rectangular shapes – evidently the rest of the herd.
“I thought it was a monster,” explains Kevin, hearing himself and realizing he sounds like a complete fool.
“You great daft idiot,” says Barry. “I should have brought Kimberley.”
“Thought that was her for a second,” replies Kevin.
They stare at each other for a moment, then burst out laughing.
“Come on,” says Barry, when they've recovered, “it's not far. I'll keep the flashlight on, but pointed down.”
“All right.”
And this time, they set off together.
A few minutes later, Kevin realizes that Barry was right – it really wasn’t that far. The ground begins to rise slightly, then the slope becomes serious and he finds himself starting to slip. He can see the dancing pool of light from Barry's flashlight moving up the slope, and hisses after his friend.
“I can't carry the bloody thing up there!”
The light stops, flicks around and then settles on him. After a moment, the light starts dancing about on the grass again as Barry comes down the hill.
“All right, pal, we can carry it together. Gimme the box thingy, you carry the pole.”
Dividing the burden between them makes it a bit easier, and after some more slipping and swearing they reach the upper surface of the mound.
“Right, let's get this started,” says Barry.
Sure enough, he starts to sling the detector gear over his shoulder.
“Can't I do the detecting, Barry?” whines Kevin.
“I've explained this before,” hisses Barry. “I've got the more sensitive hearing. I can tell the difference between a buried treasure and an old gas cooker. You, on the other hand, have the stocky frame and well-developed muscles of the artisan, and get to do the digging.”
That's typical of Barry, thinks Kevin, throwing in unfamiliar words like 'artisan' to confuse me. He stands leaning on the handle of the shovel while Barry starts walking slowly back and forth, following what he calls ‘a search pattern,’ though to Kevin it looks like a very optimistic person trying to find a contact lens.
***
A mile or so away, an elderly couple are having a disturbed night. The man lies under the candlewick bedspread, wakeful and annoyed, while his wife of fifty years stands by the window.
“Come back to bed, woman! Your side's getting cold.”
The woman gives no sign of having heard him, instead leaning forward to move the curtain aside. Grumbling, her husband heaves himself out of bed, finds his slippers, and shuffles across the tiny bedroom to join her.
“See?” says the woman.
He doesn't see anything, and says so.
“See? There are lights on the mound!”
Now, the man does see a brief flicker of bluish light that comes and goes erratically.
“Cheeky buggers!” he says. “Out this late, they'll be up to no good.”
“They might be trying to find it,” she says, insistently.
She sounds upset, and the old man puts a thin arm around her shoulders.
“Don't fret, girl. It's probably just some white trash from Ipswich going up there to score a bit of weed.”
She looks around sharply and says, “You should stop watching all them American programs!”
She turns back to gaze into the night.
“I hav
en't heard anyone talk about the Sentinels for a long while.”
The old man knows what she is imagining. They are both local people, and they've both heard the stories from their parents and others. There are places he would never go by night. The mound was somewhere he would never dare visit by day, even when he was young enough to climb it. Everyone knows of the three who dwell there, sleeping but all too easily woken.
“Look, love, chances are it's nothing to worry about. Just some daft young folk mucking about.”
She looks at him again, and in her worried eyes he sees the serious, lovely girl he married one spring in a world that had seemed so much simpler and quieter.
“What if it's not? What if they've got bad intentions?”
He looks out into the gloom, and gives the only answer he can.
“We can't help them now, my dear. Even if we tried, they wouldn't listen to us. We have to leave it to them whose job it is to sort these things out.”
After some more talk, they go back to bed, nestle gently in each other’s arms and fall into the dreamless sleep of the more-or-less innocent.
***
Treasure hunting seems to take forever. After ten minutes or so of shoveling, Kevin sits down, and then realizes the ground is not entirely dry. A cold dampness begins to spread over his rear area. He considers getting up, but doesn't.
After a few more minutes, things take a promising turn as Barry stops. He seems to be listening to something, and Kevin imagines the rising tone of a metal object sounding in the headphones.
Kevin clumsily gets to his feet, and grasps the shovel. Could it be show time? Barry takes the headphones off and slowly walks over to him.
“You know your Uncle Jack?” asks Barry in an odd, quiet voice.
“What about him?” says Kevin.
“What did he die of?” asks Barry.
Kevin racks his brains and then remembers.
“Mum said it was a heart attack. Why d'you wanna know?”
Barry is silent for a moment then asks, “Do you know where he died?”
Kevin is perplexed for a moment, then it dawns on him what his friend is implying.
The Smog (The Sentinels Series Book 3) Page 16