The siren was still screaming. I leaned across the desk.
“Sukie?” I said.
She looked lost in sleep, but managed a very slight nod.
“Nnn . . . be OK . . .” Her hand twitched the typed card toward me. “Take this. . . .”
I certainly hoped she’d be OK. The priority now, though, was the records office. The hostilities wouldn’t begin to die down until I’d been there.
As I took the card from Sukie’s hand, the telegraph stopped and settled, the new list protruding from its front. I couldn’t leave the list out in the open. Others might come to steal it. It wouldn’t be good to pocket it, either, in case anything happened to me.
I took it and hid it between two thick volumes on the shelf above the desk.
“Sukie,” I said. “If you can hear me, the new list is between volumes one and two of the Apocalypti Phrase Book, Unexpurgated Edition, OK?”
“Nnn.”
She nodded. She was coming around, but I couldn’t stay. The fighting was still going on in the hallway and the Shifters seemed to have the upper hand. Two of them were arguing over a Vigilant’s corpse as they both tried to extract its soul at once. Another guard was taking a beating from a creature that looked half man, half octopus. All eight of its hands were at his neck, and it threw him back so forcefully that his body left an imprint on the wall.
The records office was in turmoil too. The enemy had found a way in. Demons in shadow form soared about the airy white space, attacking drones on their rolling ladders, breaking open filing cabinets with pincer-shaped hands.
I saw a worker up in the heights seized and thrown aside like a rag doll before plunging fifteen floors, about two hundred feet, hitting the marble floor not far from me with a bang and a spray of red. Another was dead before he hit the ground, torn apart in midair by the intruders. His body came down in three separate pieces.
Meanwhile, the guardians of the records, the bats from the rafters, were defending their space. They dive-bombed the demons in packs of twenty or more, snapping and lashing with silver-needle teeth and claws. In every quarter of the vast room, airborne fights to the death were in full swing.
One misplaced name, one theft, had caused all this. I’d never be able to look anyone here in the eye again. And after what I’d done — I supposed everyone knew by now — the last person I needed to see was Miss Webster.
But that’s who I was running to. Her little booth seemed impossibly distant, nothing but a soft smudge on the horizon. Crossing the floor toward it, I caught sight of a many-armed shape rushing down at me. The bats were on it in a split second, a small army of them tearing it to shreds. The shadow petered out like a snuffled flame and frittered away like dust.
“I hope you’re very pleased with yourself,” Miss Webster said sourly. There was so much spider activity about her head, her perm seemed to be moving by itself. “But there’s nothing I can do, thanks to you. Can’t you see all our staff are occupied? Your card will have to wait.”
“It can’t,” I said. “The numbers — the numbers are out of alignment.”
“Of course they are. I’m not a fool. And whose fault is that anyway?” She scowled across the room as another employee fell many floors screaming. Then she turned the scowl on me. “We can’t process anything with all this disruption.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t think —”
“That’s correct, you didn’t think. You’d better give me the card anyway. I’ll hold on to it until someone is free.”
“No,” I said bluntly.
“What did you say? Give it here,” Miss Webster said, brushing a cobweb from the tip of her nose.
“I’ll file it myself. That’s what I’ll do.”
“Don’t be an imbecile. Look around you. This is unprecedented, unheard of. You’re not even qualified.”
But it was the only way. Balance the books and contain the incursion. I started from the booth, turning to ask one last question.
“Miss Webster, where are the Hs? This has to be filed under Harvester.”
She clucked her tongue and sighed dramatically. “If you had any sense, which you clearly haven’t, you’d do well to wait. But if you must —” She broke off to check her ledger. “You’ll find them on levels 53 and 54.”
I hurried to the steps that spiraled up to level 1, daunted but knowing I had no other option. As I started up the staircase, a formation of bats clouded around me, circling my shoulders and head. At close range, their beady eyes and pink-fanged mouths were worrying, and at first I thought they’d come to attack — that they’d mistaken me for an intruder, or maybe they were demons in disguise.
But they had other ideas. They hovered there, waiting for my next move. They knew what I was carrying and what it meant. They’d come to escort me all the way.
As I climbed from level to level, the majority of the guardians stayed with me while one flew just ahead like a scout and another watched the rear. At each turn of the stairs, enemy agents swooped into range, looking for a way through, but the guardians were multiplying, sending wave after wave of reinforcements down on the shadow creatures, ripping and tearing the darkness apart.
The climb seemed to go on and on, but finally I dragged myself up the last few steps and stood on the platform below the first cabinets marked HA and looked out across the ever-growing space with the clouds just above me. I heard an explosion deep in the building — the beginning of the end, I hoped.
Then I rolled the stepladder into place, started up, and pulled out the fifth cabinet drawer from the top. There were more Harvesters here than I’d expected, each with its own folder and reference number. I found Dad’s tucked away near the back.
As I opened the file, a second, more distant explosion rang out. Inside the folder was Dad’s entire history, indexed and sorted all the way up to the fatal crash.
I couldn’t read it now. I wouldn’t be able to bear it. Someday, perhaps, I’d try. There was only one thing to do now, and my escort seemed to know. They parted and drifted away as I kissed Dad’s card and slipped it inside a slot at the back of the folder, then closed the folder and filed it away.
The siren stopped immediately. The last intruders faded from view, their dark shapes shrinking into corners and melting away. The winged guardians swept up through the clouds toward the rafters miles above.
It must be over, I thought. The books were balanced, the numbers aligned. Shattered and close to tears — but I wouldn’t cry yet, not yet — I began the long climb back down.
The waiting room was the first place I checked after the records office. Ancientspeak music wafted across the white-walled space, a weird kind of bossa nova with soft-spoken lyrics that made no sense to me.
Becky and Mum were together on a white two-seater sofa, watched over by a pair of armed, grim-faced Vigilants. Mum looked broken as she leaned against Becky, who was stroking her hair and whispering, “There, there.”
“It’s ending,” I said.
Mum didn’t hear me, but Becky looked up. “There’s still some activity in the conference room. Lu just got called away.”
“I’d better go.”
“Don’t,” she said quickly. “It’s under control. You did what you had to do.”
“I’ll be fine,” I said. “I won’t be long.”
“Please, Ben . . . don’t.”
I couldn’t begin to tell her what I’d seen in the last few minutes. Whatever she was worried about in the conference room couldn’t be any worse than that.
“I’m responsible for all this,” I said. “I mean all of it. I need to make amends if I still can.”
Mum peered up at me then, just before I left the room. She didn’t seem the least bit aware of her surroundings. Her eyes were glazed and far away.
“It’s OK,” I told her anyway. “Like Dad said, it’s going to be fine.”
Then I turned away, heading out along the hallway.
The fighting had stopped, but the aftermath was awful to se
e. Bodies littered the floor, Shifters and Vigilants alike. The walls were cracked and marked bloodily in several places. A scattering of gray-black ashes marked the spot where the Deathhead had fallen. A 11215 if ever I’d seen one.
The conference room was hazy with smoke. It rose from the floor, from burned-out defenders and demons. As I moved inside, it was hard to see much of anything at all. The few figures still standing were like ghosts in the fog. The place had been ripped apart, chairs scattered, the great long table split into two. It looked like the end, but now I heard movement in the smoke — a roar and a muffled scream, the sound of a Mawbreed ingesting a man’s soul with one greedy gulp.
It wasn’t over. The enemy were defeated, but they didn’t know when to stop. I moved deeper into the smoke, half expecting them to lunge at me left and right. The first clear sight I had of anything was a Vigilant cowering on the floor, gazing up in terror at the Mawbreed looming over him.
I couldn’t make it stop. I tried to picture something to save him, but it wouldn’t come in time. The Mawbreed was fast, faster than a thing that size ought to be, and its drooling mouth covered the guard before I could blink.
Back along the hallway, the telegraph woke again with a sound like a backfiring car. Here came another list of names to add to the last, but there wouldn’t be any record of the souls these demons were stealing.
How many? I wondered. How many more?
The smoke cleared just a little, forming a canopy under the ceiling, and I noticed another figure stretched out on the floor in front of me, dressed all in white, battered and burned. My heart slumped as I moved nearer and saw Lu kneeling over him. She was weeping and clutching his hand. She looked up as my shadow fell over him, then she looked back at Mr. October.
A fireball, or something like one, had torn straight through him. There were dark scattershot marks around his midriff and chest and a great deal of blood. For a minute — it could’ve been longer — my mind shut down. I couldn’t think. Couldn’t feel a thing. I prayed for a dark hole to open up so I could roll inside it and vanish.
“He’s breathing,” Lu said.
“No!” I knelt down, facing her. “Is he really?”
“I’m sure of it.”
I let it sink in for a moment. Some relief. Still hope.
“What happened?” I asked.
She shook her head, uncertain. “He was like this when I got here. He rang, but too late.”
Somewhere in the thick of the smoke, a Mawbreed growled. Another, finishing its meal, belched loudly.
“Too slow,” Mr. October murmured. At the sound of his voice, Lu and I looked at each other, drawing the same short breath.
“You’re alive,” I said.
He tried to nod, but ended the movement wincing.
“Too slow,” he repeated. “This body wasn’t meant for combat. It hit me before I had time to change. There’s a lesson in there somewhere, Ben. Never bring your mourning attire to a war zone.”
His gray eyes held mine. His face muscles ticked as if he was trying to take on another appearance but hadn’t the strength.
“Sometimes it’s all too much,” he said. It was the first thing I’d ever heard him say, a lifetime ago at Highgate Cemetery. Feeling through his pockets, I found a handkerchief and dabbed it around his damp face.
“You know what to do to finish this,” Mr. October said. “And you know how. It’s your time now, young man.”
I knew very well what he meant. I had to visualize what I wanted so clearly that I could have sketched it.
His eyes fluttered shut. Perhaps he’d only blacked out. He still might survive. So I wouldn’t mourn yet. I’d only feel what I needed to feel. All I needed now, as I got up to my feet and the seven remaining Mawbreed came into view, all I really needed was rage.
They dragged their great bulk toward us, leaving silvery snail trails across the stone floor. Seven red mouths gaped open, scenting us on the air. I took a step forward, bunching my fist around the handkerchief as the picture came fully together in my head.
It wasn’t pretty, but it had to be done. It wasn’t something I’d ever boast about, but I wanted it now more than anything.
“For my dad,” I said, “and for Mr. October. For everything you’ve done here tonight. For everything you are.”
Lu let out a gasp behind me as a tremor rolled through the room. Everything seemed to flicker and turn black for a second. It’s your time now, Mr. October had said, and I wondered if I found the phrase book in my pocket and opened it the words might finally hold steady and be still.
It wasn’t easy to watch when the Mawbreed began to eat one another. But I’d made this happen and I had to see it through.
It began when two of them ambushed another, turning on it from both sides, their ravenous mouths clamping down on it and devouring it in three, four swallows. At the same time, the other four went into a kind of standoff, facing one another for several moments before all flying in at once, chomping blindly, smothering one another with their suckered hands. Suddenly the whole nest of them were pulled into the same fight for survival. I’d imagined all this, I’d dreamt it up, but a part of me wished I hadn’t.
Mawbreed fed upon Mawbreed until only one was left standing, and that one was so morbidly bloated that it couldn’t move. It lumbered to and fro like a drunk, letting out a belch that would’ve drowned out the siren if it hadn’t already been switched off. The creature gave me one last lingering look — if it could see anything at all, and I wasn’t sure that it could — and opened its yawning, dribbling mouth as far as it could go.
Then it proceeded to eat itself.
I watched until there was nothing left to see. Wherever it went after that long last swallow, I’ll never know. I felt drained as I came slowly back to myself and looked down on Mr. October.
“Will he make it?” I said to Lu. “Will he heal?”
She looked at me, stunned by what she’d just witnessed. It took her some time to find the words.
“What you just did . . . I never saw anything like it.” Then she nodded, remembering the question. “There’s a chance. His pulse is strong.”
She glanced past me and across the room, eyes widening. I followed her look and saw what she saw: the last surviving enemy in the room.
Its shadow nimbled down the wall — the spider shape whose web had sucked out the light. When it reached the floor, resting in the shade below the windows, I almost lost sight of it. Then it spun itself a new form, a nearly but not quite human form with two arms and two legs that hovered above the ground in front of the stained-glass windows.
Its face wasn’t clear to see, but I knew the general shape of it well enough, and I recognized the grating voice when it spoke.
“Next time,” said Nathan Synsiter, the scarecrow, second in command to Randall Cadaverus. “Next time, Ben Harvester. We told you what would come upon you if you took sides in this struggle. Don’t think it’s over between us. Whatever else you do, don’t fool yourself about that. We’ll be back for full payment, with interest.”
I was still trying to decide what to do with him — flip him inside out or make him explode — when he hurled himself at the glass, dissolving for an instant, then becoming just another frozen figure in an ancient battlefield scene.
This battle was over; the eternal war would go on. I’d taken only a small part, yet seen enough for a lifetime. As I turned from the windows, a medical team ran inside the room, followed by a crew of battered and bruised Vigilants. The medics ran to Mr. October while, behind them, Becky looked in from the door. My mother was with her. She looked OK, but I’d seen her look much, much better.
Becky slowly took in the scene, the carnage, the injuries to Mr. October, with mortified eyes.
“Oh my God, Ben, is he . . . ?”
“Not yet,” I said. They were stretchering him away when I noticed Mr. October’s fingers wiggle at his side. The movement reminded me of the first sweet apple he’d pulled from the air for m
e, and I thought, You know, he may look fragile, but he’s very resilient. Where there’s life, there’s hope.
Lu scrambled to her feet and dusted herself off, then took my arm as we walked from the room.
“I’ll take you home now,” she said. “You did good, very good. But that’s enough for one night.”
“And what a night,” Becky said. “What a Halloween.”
We went out, leaving the empty conference room behind — empty except for the Overseers frowning down from their portraits at the carnage.
Well, that’s what happened. It’s everything I know, up to and including Halloween night at HQ.
So this is my dispatch from Pandemonium House, hidden away in a place no one will ever find it unless they know how to look. And you do have to look in just the right way, otherwise the walls on Camden Passage stay sealed and the alley beyond it stays hidden. It’s a secret.
I’m recording this for myself, to try to make sense of it all. I’m typing it at the desk on the old Olivetti Lettera 22. Built in 1958, pistachio colored, it could’ve been anywhere in its life before it came here. It could’ve belonged to a famous author or to a war correspondent who carried it around the globe, or it could’ve been here all the time. Perhaps it’s never left this place, and it’s only ever been used to record the names of the soon-departed.
That’s the part of the job I’m starting to like least. After what very nearly happened to Mum — and I still swear it was her name I saw that night, not Dad’s — it hurts to type the cards. Whenever the telegraph spits out a new name, I know someone else somewhere else is hurting too, or soon will be.
You can’t take these things for granted. You have to concentrate. I’ve learned my lesson and I know not to mistype the cards, not to misfile them, and never, ever to unbalance the books.
Two hours after we left the conference room, word reached us that Mr. October’s condition had worsened. Ministry medics were holding a vigil while Sukie, who quickly recovered and returned to duty, kept a close eye on the telegraph, hoping and praying his number wouldn’t come up.
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