by Tony Lewis
“No problem.”
Molar and its cut price clothing issues receded into the distance.
* * *
The hooded figure sipped from a cup of steaming hot tea, as once again the visions in the swirling liquids faded away. Pleasure was evident on the shrouded face, now that two fifths of the Cup had been found, and the completion of the quest was drawing ever nearer. At the start it seemed doubtful as to whether the five seekers could find their own backsides, let alone complete the tasks, but as time went on and their ability to accomplish the challenges became ever more apparent, a certain sense of optimism was now felt. Hopefully, it wouldn’t be long before they could be done away with, and the rewards of their hard work pilfered. There was no other trace of emotion felt as these thoughts became manifest. After all, you couldn’t make an omelette without bumping off a few undead idiots. Still, they would go to their respective makers satisfied in the knowledge that they had participated in something stupendous and world changing. Either that or they would be killed on the spot, leaving them as ignorant as they were now. Time and mood would tell. With tea finished, it was time for a lie down.
* * *
Jekyll sat in the café once again, nursing yet another cup of thick, black and highly caffeinated coffee. He was flicking through his note book and pondering the observations he had made over the last couple of days.
He had spent a lot of time following Vortex around, trying to catch the assistant curator getting up to something that he shouldn’t be getting up to. Anything that could give him away would do. Even a visit to Flange’s house would have been enough; it is well known criminal behaviour for an offender to revisit the scene of the crime (Actually, that is a complete load of old rubbish. No police force in the world had a Re-attendance Squad, a highly trained group of detectives who waited a couple of hours before springing into action and going back to where it had happened.
“Oh, there he is.”
“Damn, it’s the rozzers.”
“You’re nicked, son.”
“How did you know I’d be here?”
“Well, it’s well known criminal…”
“Oh, shut up and take me in.”
A copper could stand around all day in the aftermath of a crime, and all he would get is an aching back and kids asking ‘can I see your gun?’ If criminals did indeed visit the scene of the crime, then every crime in the world could be solved by watching Sky News, because they covered everything to death in glorious and monotonous high definition. Especially if it was a death).
He had written down Vortex’s activities but to be honest, they made for pretty average reading. Apart from going to work at the museum, he had given a talk at a local school (Jekyll had snuck in masquerading as a salesman, and had done so well that he had been asked to come back when the new budget was announced), gone to a restaurant for a midday meal, and then done some shopping, taking in a cake shop and a delicatessen.
After work he had met up with a couple of what Jekyll presumed were friends, and had gone to the local pub for a few hours. Hoping against hope that the two friends were co-conspirators, Jekyll had managed to get hold of Scorpio and persuaded her to join his covert operation to try and identify them, which she did. It didn’t take her long to recognise the nefarious duo. One of them was the Secretary of the Local Council, and the other was Cedric Pie, owner of the town patisserie aptly named Cedric’s Pies. Both of them were well known about the town and were respected pillars of the community.
Scorpio had said that she would have been gob-smacked if either of them had any involvement in any shady goings on, and even if they did, he would come up against the same stumbling block that he was having trying to prove that Vortex was involved in something dodgy. Without concrete proof, nobody would believe a word of it.
He had spent some time asking local residents about Vortex, but he hadn’t heard a bad word said against the man. The only negative thing that had been reported was that Vortex wasn’t running this year’s local half marathon for charity because he had a bad ankle. He was going to do a cake bake sale instead, with cakes that he was going to make himself. The man was spotless. It would be easier trying to find dirt on the Virgin Mary, and the more this went on, he reckoned it was going to be easier to unmask her as a master criminal then Vortex.
Fibula was fast becoming a waste of his time. Either Vortex was as angelic as everyone said, or he was the greatest con artist since Wendigo Scatterpants, Chief of The Lower Tribes of The Great Northern Steppe, convinced his armed forces (comprising of two elderly soldiers, a small hand held catapult and a horse older than the surrounding mountains), to invade the United States of America by promising them unbridled opportunity, wealth beyond measure and all the Indians they could eat. It went well until it got a bit drizzly on the morning of departure, so they stayed in bed.
As he finished his drink he decided to head back home. Maybe someone there might be able to shed some light on the assistant. At least if they did know Vortex, they wouldn’t be brainwashed like the residents of Fibula.
* * *
The hearse was parked in a lay-by at the side of the road. That being said, lay-by was probably too posh a word. It was a dent in a mud bank that passing horses seemed to use as a latrine, leading one to suspect that the mound wasn’t entirely made up of soft, moist earth. The flies buzzing in their thousands didn’t seem to think so, anyway.
Ollie had retrieved the next two pages, and they were currently trying to decipher the latest clue.
“Makes about as much sense as the last one,” said Stitches.
“We’ll get it eventually, something will click,” said Ollie. He read the verse out loud.
“In this place your foe does live
Your life is his to take or give
Use the steel and use it well
Or he will send you straight to hell
Use the words that you have gained
To protect yourself from being maimed
Be strong in body and in mind
Then leave this ghastly place behind.”
“Seems like things may be getting more serious,” said Ethan. “This is the first one that’s mentioned death.”
“True.” said Ronnie, “but to be fair the other ones have hinted at it, haven’t they, so it’s not like we don’t know that this whole business is entirely without risk.”
“Anybody recognise anything on the map yet?” asked Ollie. “Because I don’t.”
“Pass it here,” said Ethan, “let’s have a look.”
He stared at it for a while, then looked up and snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it. It’s a place called Glans. It’s about sixty miles away. The P in the middle there is a car park, and the stuff dotted around the outside is abandoned buildings. I think it used to be an industrial estate, but it’s just ruins now.”
“How on earth can you tell all that from looking at that map? It’s terrible, it doesn’t tell you anything,” said Stitches.
“I really don’t know, mate,” answered Ethan, shrugging his wide shoulders. “I stared at it and the name just popped into my head. I visited there once a few years ago, when I was travelling with a friend. It’s not even as if we did anything exciting there either. It was just a stopover.”
“Maybe,” Ollie mused, “whatever powers are at work here are actually helping us to get to the various locations. They’re not going to help us with the challenges of course, but it obviously benefits them to get us there.”
“Could be,” said Ronnie. “When I saw the first map it was like a little light bulb went on in my head, and all of a sudden without any effort, the memory was there.”
“Must have been a supernova that went off in Flug’s bonce to trigger a memory,” said Stitches. “You can’t even remember your own name most of the time, can you mate?”
“Umm.”
“Never mind.”
“Right, let’s get going,” said Ollie.
Ethan quickly stepped out of the car and c
harged the Bat Nav, letting it warm up for ten minutes before setting off.
The trip to Glans passed mostly without incident, taking in another liquid lunch break for Ollie, and a twenty minute stop for Flug to get over the worst bout of travel sickness the world has ever seen. When he got back into the car he looked ever so slightly greener than usual and about five pounds lighter, whereas the road surface looked a tad more colourful than usual, and appeared to have gained about five inches in height. Of course after such a violent projectile explosion, Flug decided that he was hungry, so they stopped at a roadside grease pit called The Devil’s Diner, whose neon lit sign bore the legend ‘Turn up, eat up, just leave before you throw up’. Nobody could decide whether this was a requirement or a challenge, but as they sat round the table staring at their plates of alleged food, it seemed to be the latter.
“I’ve never eaten anything like this before,” said Ronnie, pushing something grey and unidentifiable around his plate with his fork. “Stepped in it a few times, though.”
“It’s times like this that being dead is a real bonus,” said Stitches, sipping from a glass of water. “You should be alright though, Ethan.”
The lycan was staring at his own mysterious plate of brown lumpiness in wonderment.
“Why’s that?” he asked.
“Well if that isn’t dog food, I don’t know what is,” said the zombie.
The THWACK that came from Ethan’s hand connecting with the back of the zombie’s head was followed by a PLOP as Stitches’ right eye landed in his drink.
As he was fishing around for it, muttering certificate eighteen expletives under his breath, a musical trill came from Ollie’s pocket. It was accompanied by a disturbing vibration that tapped insistently against his thigh. It took him a couple of seconds to realise what it was, because it was such a rarity that the item in question did anything. The signal was so bad that if Marconi had turned up with his first primitive radio, his broadcast would have found an audience quicker.
Ollie retrieved his mobile phone from his pocket.
“Bloody hell,” said Stitches, “wonder when that was written. Looks like Starch wasn’t the only one trying to decipher ancient texts.”
Ollie unlocked the phone and hit the message button.
“It’s from Jekyll. He reckons that Vortex is involved in the theft somehow. He doesn’t explain too much, but that seems to be the main thrust of the message.”
“Wonder why he came to that conclusion?” said Ronnie. “I didn’t get the impression that he wasn’t to be trusted.”
“I sort of know what you mean,” added Ethan, “but there was something about him that was a bit strange. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but he did make me feel a little uneasy.”
Ollie began pressing keys so that he could reply to Jekyll.
“Well, there’s not a lot we can do about it, if he is,” he replied, making an electronic tune with his number pad. “All we can do is carry on doing our best to recover the remaining pieces. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter who’s embroiled in this. As long as we finish what we’ve started, everything should be okay.”
“If all goes well,” said Stitches.
“True. Right, if we’re all done, and judging by the amount of pushing around the plates that’s going on I’m assuming we are, we can get going.”
The only clear plate was Flug’s. He had ordered fish fingers, meaning Ronnie had spent ten minutes picking the breadcrumbs off. Calling them fish fingers was a bit of a leap of the imagination though, he had suspected on surveying the greying, rubbery substance. Likening the disgusting matter to anything fish-related was like saying Mrs. Ladle was a beautiful, erudite creature whose face could launch a thousand ships, when in fact she was as attractive as a storm front and could launch any sea going vessel simply by giving it a shove with her chin. Still, Flug had enjoyed them and wolfed the lot down. How long it would stay down was another matter entirely.
Stitches placed the appropriate amount of money onto the counter top. The waitress counted it and opened up the till.
“What, no tip?” she asked.
“Just one” replied the zombie as he made towards the door. “Try serving edible food, might liven things up a bit round here.”
* * *
Vortex rushed along the corridor to his office, constantly casting nervous glances over his shoulder to make sure that he wasn’t being observed. He had just come up from the store room where he had been sorting out some new exhibits that had recently arrived, and he didn’t want to get caught by Starch wanting to discuss them, which was what usually happened. Starch liked to have the final say on where things went and how they were arranged.
He finally got to his office unnoticed, quickly unlocked the door and slipped in. He went straight over to his desk, pulled out his chair and sat down. He quickly ran through the remaining arrangements in his mind, before picking up the phone and dialling a series of numbers that were written on a small piece of paper that he kept hidden in an inside pocket of his jacket. There were three rings before his call was answered.
“Hello,” said a voice that was just about discernible over the static hiss.
“It’s me,” said Vortex. “I was just checking in to see how the preparations are going.”
“It’s going very well. The last three are going to be more troublesome than the others, but I’m confident we’ll get the result that we want.”
“Are you sure?” asked Vortex.
“Everything will be ready at the appropriate time. Don’t worry, we’re right on schedule.”
“I hope so. I don’t want this to go wrong. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I don’t want it to go wrong when we’re this close.”
“It won’t,” the voice said reassuringly. “We’ve put a lot of effort into this and haven’t left anything to chance. Don’t’ worry.”
“Very well,” said Vortex. “Just remember on the day…hang on, someone’s coming. We’ll speak again.”
He hung up the phone and busied himself shuffling some papers, when there was a knock at the door.
“Come in.”
Starch strode into the office and stood opposite the still seated Vortex.
“Can I help you, Mr. Curator?”
“Oh, I was just wondering how the new exhibits are shaping up. They should make a nice addition to our History of Horror section.”
“They’re marvellous,” said Vortex. “We were especially lucky to get hold of Van Helsing’s crucifix. That should take pride of place.”
“Oh, most definitely. It was very kind of him to donate it, now that he’s retired. I’m not sure what to do with his toilet seat, though. Maybe it should go in the throne Room. Right, well, I’ll leave you to finish up whatever it is that you’re doing, and I’ll see you downstairs shortly.”
With that he left, leaving Vortex alone once again. He gave it a couple of minutes before opening the office door and checking that the hallway was clear. Seeing that it was, he returned to his desk and picked up the phone.
“Hello.”
“It’s me again,” said Vortex, “where were we?”
“Nowhere in particular. I think you were saying something about timing.”
“Oh yes. It’s vital that this comes together smoothly. We’ve got one shot to get it right and I don’t intend to miss it. How much longer do you need?”
There was a few seconds silence, punctuated by the crackle of interference.
“Judging by how things have gone so far, I’d say three days. That will guarantee that everything is set and in place. And, if I may be so bold, it’ll give me some time to get on without being interrupted every half an hour to be told how important this is. I am aware that you know, so there is no need to keep repeating yourself over and over.”
“Fair enough. My apologies. I think it’s just nerves. I won’t call you again. I shall wait to hear from you.”
“That would be better. Goodbye.”
The line went dead.
As he replaced the receiver, Vortex noticed that his hand was shaking, which was unexpected to say the least. He clenched his fingers into a fist and squeezed it tight. He looked around his office, a strange feeling of self-consciousness suddenly washing over him, which was ludicrous. It wasn’t as if he was planning the crime of the century, was it? Sure, he had to keep it a secret. If anyone found out what he was up to it would be a disaster, but that was no reason to feel so nervous. Everything was going to be fine. He gave himself five minutes to relax, and then went to join Starch.
* * *
The sign was bright red, garish and slightly rusty in places. It said simply ‘Welcome to Glans. Population fifteen thousand. Have an exciting time’.
“Do you suppose that sign gets bigger when things get really exciting round here?” asked Stitches.
The silence in the hearse indicated that none of the other four were going to dignify that last comment with an answer. Not that any of them were particularly keen to open their mouths at the moment. The after effects of their unscheduled stop at The Devil’s Diner cum Vomitaria had left them all feeling a tad green around the gills, and none too keen on seeing the putrid mess for a second time.
A short while later, a couple of high-pitched squeaks from the Bat Nav announced their arrival at their intended destination.
“God, I thought Molar was bleak,” said Ethan, bringing the hearse to a stop and applying the handbrake. “This place makes it look like a holiday resort.”
The area they were looking at did resemble the abandoned industrial site that Ethan had described. Deserted units were everywhere. Some had repaired cars; others had been coffin renovators (Yes, second hand coffins. Those things are expensive, you know) and even a warehouse that had stocked fancy dress costumes. Now they were just empty shells, home to rats, bats, insects galore and just about anything else that could creep, crawl or fly through the broken windows.
“I don’t remember that,” said Ethan, pointing to the very centre of the estate. “That used to be a car park for the workers. I know because we got told off for parking there.”