by kindels
"I'm fine, thank-you," I replied in response to their concerns. "I just felt dizzy for a few seconds. I'm okay now. This whole affair must be having a greater effect on me than I had previously imagined. I'm beginning to act like a neurotic, crazy old lady."
"Not at all, David," said Forbes. "We're all in much the same state. I admit I'm terrified, and I don't mind admitting it."
"He's right, David," said Kate. "Perhaps you should sit down for awhile, take the weight off your feet, and maybe try to sleep for an hour or so."
"I don't think that would be a particularly good idea, Kate, do you?" I said, looking at her in a way I don't done before.
Something was going on, something I didn't yet understand, but a sudden sense of something being not quite right had entered my head. Was it the result of the dizzy spell? Could I be imagining things, hallucinating perhaps? Kate and Forbes both looked somehow different to me. The same and, yet, not quite the same as they had a few seconds previously. Their features appeared slightly blurred and indistinct. I shook my head, trying to clear it, thinking that my eyes had been affected by the dizziness. It didn't work. They remained just out of focus. I couldn't say why, at the time, but I made the decision to say nothing to either of them, and kept silent as I sat and allowed myself a few moments' grace to try and recover my equilibrium.
"David, I said, are you alright?"
Kate's voice suddenly broke through into my head.
"Of course I am. Why, what's wrong?" I asked as I saw the worried look on her face.
"You've been sitting there, in a trance-like state, for the last ten minutes. Your eyes were open, but you just seemed to ignore William and me when you were spoken to."
"Yes, we were beginning to worry about you," Forbes added.
I couldn't understand it. As far as I was aware, I'd just sat down on the sofa to clear my head. It appeared, however, that I'd just lost ten minutes of my life, if the others could be believed. I decided to bluff my way through things, by not letting on that I was worried about these occurrences, though indeed I most certainly was.
"I'm fine, really," I said. "I must have been daydreaming or something. I'm so sorry if I appeared rude. I think recent events are catching up with me. I suddenly feel overwhelmingly tired."
"That's understandable," said Forbes. "I'd say we're all pretty much worn out, eh, Kate?"
"Definitely," Kate replied.
"You're sure you're okay, David?" Forbes asked again, and I nodded.
"Let's get back to trying to solve this mystery we've got ourselves caught up in, shall we? If we're in danger, we must find a way to fight it."
"Bravo, David. That's the spirit," said Forbes. "Listen, why can't we simply make a run for it? You know, grab your boat and leave the island, head for the mainland. If those things are here, trapped in the croft perhaps, they may not be able to follow us over water. What d'you think?"
I looked at Kate. She appeared to hesitate for a few seconds, and then replied to William's suggestion.
"It sounds like a remarkably simple way of doing things, but you may have a point, William. You would have to understand though, David, that if we abandon your home, and leave it to these entities, you could never return, for they would still be here, waiting to snare the unwary visitor, and the whole thing might begin all over again. You'd have to place your island completely off-limits to visitors."
"Yes, something like the government did when they infected Gruinard Island with Anthrax back in the nineteen forties," Forbes added.
"Er, that's all very well, but I don't have the power of the government to keep people away."
"No, David, but I'm sure we could think of some story that would satisfy people, and maybe even convince the authorities to place Skerries Rock out of bounds to visitors."
"But, Kate, this is my home. Everything I own is here. This island is my living dream, and now you want me to simply abandon it and run away."
"Yes, I do, before your living dream becomes your own personal living hell!"
I had to admit, she'd figured out a logically convincing point.
"What about we try and get away, but come back better armed with experts who can maybe help us eradicate these 'entities'?" I asked, eager to find a compromise solution.
"Look, I just want to get away, as fast and as far as possible," said Forbes, who now appeared totally absorbed by his own suggestion of a getaway from Skerries Rock. "Please, can't we at least try?"
Another ten minutes passed, as the three of us argued the point, until I agreed, at last, to attempt a return to the mainland later that afternoon.
The others agreed to leave the future of Skerries Rock in my hands, for the time being, after I agreed to consider their suggestion of a blanket ban on any and all visitors. I'd seen the sense of at least trying to prove to ourselves that we could, indeed, leave without carrying the entities with us. I'd asked Kate what we'd do if they did, however, manage to attach themselves to us or to the boat; but, she remained steadfastly in Forbes's corner, saying that we'd be no worse off than we now were, which I found a little odd, and more than a little suspicious. After all, hadn't we all previously agreed that we must not let these things, whatever they were, reach the mainland?
***
Ten minutes later, William Forbes and I made our way down to my boathouse, where we began fuelling up my boat. Forbes appeared relieved to be out of the house and in the open air, and I couldn't say that I blamed him. The problem, as far as I was concerned, was that something now seemed seriously wrong about the current situation. We were actively engaged in a plan that could well see the entity, or entities currently plaguing us, being unleashed on the unsuspecting population on the mainland. It appeared obvious to me that the unseen and evil, malevolent force had but one goal, and that goal remained, to inhabit the mind and body of a suitable host in order that it might continue its seemingly eternal killing crusade. The biggest mystery, in my mind, remained the fact that Kate's friend, Miles Prendergast, had asserted that Forbes was in no way related to the Cavendish family unless a tenuous link existed, extending, perhaps, from the family of the woman who'd given birth to the original Jack the Ripper, and whose name remained a mystery to us all. If Forbes was, as Kate suggested, a conduit or means for the entity to reach the outside world, why direct him to visit me on the pretext of helping him to solve the mystery of his dreams, and the apparent power contained within the page of The Ripper's journal? What the hell had I got to do with it all?
As the last of the required fuel dribbled into the boat's tank, a sudden wave of nausea swept over me. With the nausea, I experienced a light-headedness that made me begin to sway, and I must have appeared to Forbes much as a drunken man would.
"I say, are you okay, David?" he asked, as my legs almost gave way, and only a supreme effort on my behalf prevented me falling from the low boat dock into the cold, dark seawater.
As suddenly at it had appeared, the nausea and dizziness left me, and an odd sensation rippled through my entire body. In those few moments, a clarity of thought, that had little do with my own thought processes, gave me a sudden and crystal clear picture of everything that had taken place so far. An understanding that could only have come from another's mind, coursed through me as a sense of all-pervading danger and imminent disaster took hold of me.
I turned to Forbes, about to shout a warning, but it came too late. He'd jumped into the boat, doing his best to help and hurry things along by disconnecting the fuel line from the engine inlet. It was the final act of his life.
The blinding flash that erupted from the engine compartment of the boat engulfed Forbes in one single, horrifying sheet of flame. There was no explosion, just a sudden rush of sound followed by the glare of the flash, and the awful sound of Forbes's agony as the angry flames consumed him where he stood. I ran to the wall of the boathouse where a fire extinguisher stood in its cradle, ready for use. Although it only took a matter of seconds for me to return to the boat with the extinguisher,
the screams of the man in the boat seemed to go on forever and ever. Such was the searing heat, which emanated from the burning figure in front of me, that my eyes felt as though they, too, were on fire. His clothes were gone, quickly eaten away by the angry tongues of flame. Forbes twisted and flailed as his flesh literally began to melt before my eyes. My nostrils filled with the sickening stench of burning flesh. I gagged at the smell. The screaming stopped as his throat filled with the flames that now grew in intensity, his bones cracking and shattering as they were consumed by the awesome power of the conflagration. As the burning wreck, of what a few seconds before had been a living, breathing, human being, collapsed into nothing more than a pile of smoking ash on the deck of the boat. I suddenly realised that not a single scorch mark, not a piece of equipment on the boat itself, nor the deck where he'd stood, had been affected by the fire. The only thing that had burned, or had been affected in any way, was William Forbes.
I stood staring at the small pile of human ash that lay on the boat deck. Everything that Forbes had feared had come to pass, and in only a few, horrifying seconds. I felt a passing sense of guilt, though I now knew that there had been little I could have done to prevent the eventual demise of the man. He'd been exactly what Kate had said he was, a conduit, a vessel that had unwittingly allowed a fearful and terrible presence to enter the world once again. His job done, Forbes had been expendable. Why keep him alive, when he no longer filled any useful purpose, as far as the entity was concerned?
I said a silent prayer for the departed soul of William Forbes. At least he was now at peace. He could no longer be harmed by any being, human or otherwise. His suffering had ended in a few terrible, pain-wracked seconds. The boat remained in perfect working order, as the thing that had murdered Forbes intended. I now knew the truth, and it was time to put all my faith in the knowledge I'd gained. Within my heart, and deep inside my soul, the presence, that had entered my mind during the two dizzy spells I'd experienced, now filled me with hope. No longer an 'entity', as Kate might have called it, but a part of my inner core, I knew that together we had one more battle to fight. If we could win, the terror would be over. If not, there was little hope for the immortal soul of Kate Goddard, nor for mine!
Chapter Thirty
Requiem
Stunned by having witnessed the terrible and agonising death of William Forbes, though no longer surprised by what had taken place, I checked the boat, making sure it was secure, and then made my way back to the path, towards the croft. My jaw had set with a grim resolution to end the terror that had visited itself upon my home once and for all. In addition, I knew that it would be my task, and that of the 'being' that had become my inner self, to rid the world of a creature that had terrorised generations.
The sky shone a clear, light blue, in contrast to the deep blue-green of the ocean that met with it on the distant horizon. The day felt warmer, than many in quite some time, and the sunshine gave a false air of good cheer and bonhomie to the overall vista of Skerries Rock. There'd been nothing cheery, however, about the fate of poor Forbes.
Three-quarters of the way along the path, with the croft in clear view, I saw Kate, standing in the doorway, waving to me. I waved back. In a few seconds, I had covered most of the short distance between us, and Kate turned her back and walked ahead of me into the living room. I closed the door behind me as soon as I crossed the threshold. The atmosphere within the croft had, again, turned as cold as the grave. In the hearth, the log fire burned brightly, its warmth somehow dissipating into nothingness, obliterated by the all-pervading chill. Kate stood in front of the grandfather clock, showing no sign that she felt the cold, as I expected. I wasted no time on pleasantries. The time had arrived to end this, once and for all.
"Why did you kill poor Forbes, Kate?"
She looked surprised for a second, and then her face adopted a look of total composure as she replied.
"You know?"
"I know enough."
"But how?"
"The second entity, the one you've been running from, or at least the thing inside you has been running from."
A wave of anger, mixed with bewilderment, spread across her face.
"That thing was in Forbes. I was sure of it," she snarled.
"So, if you'd known it was in me, you'd have killed me?"
"Of course."
"Who are you, really? I know you're still you, Kate, but what or who is that thing that's taken control of you?"
"You can call it Jack the Ripper, if you like, David, but it's really been around so much longer, from way before the time of The Ripper. I tried to tell you earlier. It's an elemental being, a force we don't really understand. It's been here on Earth for centuries, trapped by the gravitational pull of our atmosphere. It would rather not be here, but it has no choice. It feeds on what we'd call negative emotions. The stronger the emotion, the longer it sustains itself. It's like a snake that can survive a whole year on one large meal; but, in this case, it inhabits a new host every now and again, and uses its human host to carry out a series of killings that enable it to feed off the fear, the terror, and, of course, the sport of the kill itself."
"That's bloody evil, through and through," I replied, though I already knew the truth of what she'd told me; the truth having been related to me by the second entity that had lodged its essence within my mind.
"Of course, you'd think that, which is why that puny thing within you is trying to destroy me, thinking that if I'm gone, the entity within me will die too. It won't work, David. I warn you. It's stronger than all of us and can't be destroyed by any force here on Earth."
"You seem to be forgetting, Kate, that the second entity is not of this world either."
"I forget nothing, David. The thing housed within your body is a so-called 'Guardian', an elemental charged with tracking down and liquidating beings that have transgressed the inter-dimensional plain, and passed into worlds they should never have inhabited. It can never be as powerful as the soul of The 'Ripper', who now resides within me. He is too strong, too clever, and will not allow himself to be destroyed."
So, everything the entity that had entered into my body during the first of my dizzy spells had implanted into my conscious mind, had proved to be true. I'd doubted it at first, but had slowly grown to trust what it told me. Its telepathic power enabled it to speak to me, without words, as thoughts implanted in my mind, so that it felt as if I was thinking its thoughts as it read mine. It provided me with a vision of the vast boundaries of space and time, a swirling mass of gaseous and half-real ephemera, where beings, devoid of corporal being, resided in the vastness that stretched to infinity, far beyond human understanding. Such is that vastness that it had taken those in charge of protecting lesser species, such as we here on Earth, over four hundred of our years to track the rogue being to Earth, yet even that was comparable to no more than a millisecond in their concept of time. At last, however, this guardian had found his quarry and had decided to use me, rather than Forbes, as the conduit for its destruction. Forbes's mind had been too weak to carry within it the awesome mental power of the guardian. In so doing, it proved to me that Jack Reid had been an innocent bystander, no longer in control of his own mind and body, and the same must apply to Mark Cavendish and, god forbid, to the original Jack the Ripper and those of his ancestors who'd also been chosen as hosts by this terrible being. I now knew that the thing within Forbes had been benevolent all along, though its various manifestations had scared the life out of us mere mortals as it struggled to gain release, into our world, in order to carry out its task. I still didn't know, however, why the evil force that now resided within the Kate-thing, had come to choose the Cavendish family as its perennial hosts in the first place. The evil elemental had, all along, been contained within the pages of the journal, its last refuge after the death of its Victorian host, and from there it had struck out at each of its new hosts over the last century. Even when the journal had been all but destroyed during Mark Cavendish's f
ateful trip to Poland, enough remained for the being to remain hidden within that last page. It explained the eerie warmth that people had felt when they'd handled the page. It was, as some had thought, very much alive.
"So, Jack the Ripper was as innocent as Jack Reid, and so many others. The thing you call an elemental controlled them all, and they had no way of stopping it?"
"Precisely. The first Cavendish to be controlled by the elemental was simply available at the time; and, after finding itself trapped on Earth, the being found it convenient to continue to use the future progeny of the family. They were easy to locate and control. They also possessed a certain gene structure that meant the being could inhabit their bodies, for a long period of time, without causing total mental and bodily breakdown of the host, as often happens when it comes into contact with humans."
" Jack the Ripper was different, wasn't he? He tried to resist."
"A brilliant and clever deduction, David. Yes, he did. He felt the presence of the being within him and tried, by using all he knew to fight against it. His Victorian mind saw it as 'The Voices'. He even turned to his pathetic natural father, Burton Cavendish, for help. All Cavendish did was provide drugs to dull the man's brain, and they made it easier, in reality, for the being to maintain its hold on the weak-minded fool. Far from being the monster that history has painted him as, he did all he could to resist the mind control of the elemental and, in fact, could almost be described as doing all he personally could to stop The Ripper murders by fighting to retain his own mind, unsuccessfully of course."
A series of images and thoughts suddenly lanced into my mind. The guardian, whoever or whatever it was, communicated with me again, and I saw the next avenue of the solution opening up before me. I knew I must be careful though. The thing within my friend Kate was undoubtedly clever, resourceful, and had lived far too long to be taken lightly.