Tales From Beyond Tomorrow: Volume One

by Catton John Paul

  Frankie stared at the medical orderly, confused. What time was it? How long had he been standing here?

  He looked up at the sky.

  The bombers were flying overhead in a solid, geometric formation pattern. Hundreds of them. Some planes were close enough their insignia could be seen by the brilliant light of the flares, some were tiny specks high in the clouds, caught in the cross beams of the searchlights. The air shook with the crump of ack-ack fire, the ringing bells of fire engines, and the rolling detonations of the bombs.

  What the hell had he been doing, just standing here in a trance?

  He hurried down the stairs, following the orderly. "All the patients have camped down for the night," the man was saying. "I've brewed up some tea and Matron's trying to organize a sing-song. Not that they…"

  Frankie stopped.

  Something had pierced his mind – that's the only way he could describe it. A sudden, shocking image filled his vision, like a barrier falling across his path, or a blood vessel erupting in his brain. Instead of the stairs and the landing below he saw the street outside, explosions and flames, the burnt-out shell of a double-decker bus blocking the road.

  And he saw Liz.

  Liz, in the middle of the flames, clutching her useless bike, coughing from the smoke swirling around her.

  Then, as suddenly as it came, the vision had gone, and Frankie stared at the scared, unshaven face of the medical orderly.

  "I'm going outside," said Frankie.

  "Like hell you are," said the other man.

  Within five minutes, he was out on Giltspur Street.

  Silver gleams descended from the sky all over the city – landmines on parachutes, dropping along with the bombs. The pavement shook from a gigantic blast behind St. Bart's that left his ears ringing. He realized that each new avalanche of incendiaries and explosives was coming down at intervals of about thirty seconds, and he began to time his runs for cover, ducking into office doorways and behind pillars as he headed for Newgate Street.

  Sheltering in the porch of the Holy Sepulchre church, he looked across to the Central Criminal Court. A fire engine tore past, its bell ringing like a mad thing. Another wave of mines came down like ghostly tears, and an explosion over by the Old Bailey sent wood and metal cartwheeling into the sky.

  The whole of the City, from Aldersgate to Cannon Street, from Cheapside to Moorgate, was in flames. A fire engine stopped outside the Court building, and the crew began to unfold the hose. As soon as it touched the pavement, burning embers and ash fell upon the rubber, and firemen frantically beat them off with their jackets.

  It's all over, he thought, the tears rising in his eyes. It's all dying.

  It was too hot to pass down the Holborn Viaduct. He leaned back against the pillars, wondering which way to run, the smoke catching at his throat and floating sparks falling on his shoulders, then he heard the wail of tormented metal from further down Newgate Street. A double-decker bus had been blown up and onto its side, crashing to the pavement in a blackened wreck.

  Then he saw her.

  She was running down the middle of the street, in her uniform, wheeling her bicycle along with her. He knew at once that if she had tried to ride it, she would have been knocked over by the shock waves of heat blasted out by the falling bombs.

  He ran up to her and grabbed her shoulders. Her eyes were wide with fear and she gripped his arms, returning his strength. "What do you think you're doing?" Frankie shouted.

  "How did you know I was here?" she shouted back.

  He shook his head. "Come with me," he said.

  He took the bicycle and pulled it over to the side of the street. Liz said something but her words were lost in another explosion. He shrugged and pointed back to St. Bart's. He pulled her back in that direction but she struggled and said something like, "My patient's gone."

  Kelly. She shouted the name of Kelly. Then she pointed towards the church on the corner of Newgate and King Edward Street – Christ Church Greyfriars.

  What was he to do? He couldn't knock her out and drag her back to St. Bart's by force. If she was intent on going somewhere, he had to go with her.

  And they'd both be killed.

  "He said he had to get to the church," Liz yelled.

  "What for?" Frankie shouted back.

  "I don't know! But he kept saying it, over and over. We tried to keep him in the shelter, but he pushed us out of the way and ran out."

  Together they moved into the inferno of Newgate Street, with the firestorm spreading as fast as a man could walk. The heat of the flames sucked cool air into the road, sending sheets of newspaper, sparks and burning rags flying through the air around them. The very air itself was singed; it felt like breathing ashes. They passed a fire engine that had fallen into a bomb crater, with the crew standing around it shouting at each other. They ran to the south porch of Christ Church Greyfriars and hurried inside.

  The nave was empty, except for the flames climbing the walls and joining in the middle, like theater curtains closing on some grotesque drama. Climbing the steps of the tower would be suicide, so Frankie pointed towards the open door leading to the crypt. He took off his jacket and threw it over Liz to keep the burning cinders from falling on her, and led her down the steps to the crypt.

  As they came out into the low stone chamber, Frankie saw something that stopped him in his tracks. He'd seen many things in the months of war, but this…

  Five human figures clothed in white smocks lay on the bare stone floor of the crypt. Three women, two men. Their bodies were arranged in the shape of a five-pointed star – their heads together, almost touching, and their feet pointing outward to the walls. As Frankie got to the bottom of the stone steps, Liz behind him, he saw a circle drawn in chalk around the space where they lay, enclosing it.

  Liz pointed at the older of the two men. "That's him! That's Mr. Kelly!"

  As they entered the crypt, Frankie saw that candles and incense – still burning – had been placed inside the circle and around the bodies, along with tiny dishes of water and what looked like salt.

  But there…there, striking Frankie like a hammer blow, were the images scrawled in chalk around the edge of the circles. Stars and moons and suns, words in a language that he couldn't read, the unmistakable figure of an Ankh, and images that he recognized from his books as an Eye of Horus, an Amulet of Isis, a Djet Pillar…

  The recurring images from his dreams.

  "Don't go into the circle," Frankie said, holding up his arm to block Liz from getting past him.

  "What do you mean? They might be hurt!"

  "I've got a bad feeling about all this. Just…don't go near them. Not yet."

  Frankie looked cautiously around the crypt. The candles flickered and guttered in the drafts of hot air coming from above, but the flames from the bombings had not penetrated yet. The drone of the bombers, the roar and howl of explosions, the crackle of fire, and the distant shouts of men came from far away as if from another world. Towards the center of the crypt, a small shower of stone and plaster suddenly dropped from the ceiling, and Frankie peered up into the dark to assess the damage.

  Oh, bloody hell…

  "Liz," he said hoarsely, "you know that fire crew and ambulance in the street outside?"

  "Yes?"

  "They've got to have some stretchers with them. Run back and tell them there are five people down here who need help."

  "But we can't leave them!"

  "We can't carry five people ourselves, can we? You tell the firemen we need stretchers and I'll make sure the flames don't spread down here."

  "Don't be daft, I can't leave you either!"

  "Liz, just go! It'll only take a few minutes!"

  He looked at her face – the fear and concern mixed with indecision in her eyes – and realized he was desperately, painfully in love with her. He stared, willing her to turn around and leave. She nodded, gave him a last searching look, and ran back up the steps.

  Frankie walked
into the coldly echoing crypt, and looked up into the shadows where the fall of plaster and stones had come from.

  "Looks like it's just you and me, then," he whispered.

  SIX

  He walked gingerly around the chalk circle and the five prone bodies toward a stone pillar on the left, near the back wall. He looked upward. A section of the ceiling had broken away, revealing the wooden flooring of the nave above. The source of the damage was still there. In the dim light from the candles beneath and the flames from the church interior, he saw a dull metal bulk with stubby fins filling the hole, settling deeper into the mass of shattered wood.

  It was an unexploded incendiary bomb that had broken through the roof and struck the floor without detonating. Frankie heard of such a thing happening almost every day. He had even seen them while cycling to work, behind roped-off cordons with sappers working on them amidst the ruins.

  And now…

  He ran back to the staircase and grabbed the stepladder he'd seen on his way in. He pulled it over to the center of the crypt, opened it, jammed the back legs against the pillar, and began to climb up.

  He tried not to think about what he was doing. Liz, the church, the five people, the chalk circle, the bomb – it made sense but at the same time, it didn't. He was in control of his actions, willing his arms and legs to move – but at the same time, he felt that he'd surrendered control of his body to someone else.

  He got to the top of the ladder and looked at the dull metal casing of the bomb, the scuffmarks and scratches along its side. If he stood on the top rung of the stepladder to his full height, his head would poke through the hole in the floor above, but the bomb was in the way. He slowly straightened his back, gripped one of the broken timbers above for support, and put his right shoulder and the side of his face against the bomb.

  As he got into position the charred timbers groaned and cracked, and the bomb shifted, and he was now carrying some of its weight. If the hole got bigger, the bomb would fall to the stone tiles below, but Frankie was blocking it. He stood like Atlas, his legs trembling, his fingers gripping splintered wood, his arms keeping the round metal casing steady.

  Despite the fire and smoke above, the metal casing was still cold against the skin of his face. Myriads of thoughts blew through his mind like ashes on the wind. He wondered what the inside of the bomb looked like. Wires, switches, fuses and charges, surrounding the dark, central core of the main explosive?

  Or maybe just a burning speck of Hell, carried from the Fatherland and dropped into London?

  The church walls rocked with another detonation from nearby and the timbers cracked, sending a shower of sparks, stone dust and plaster onto Frankie's damp shirt and stained trousers. He looked back and downwards, to see if the five people had recovered consciousness.

  He stared in disbelief.

  Each of the figures glowed with a light source that came not from the candles or anywhere else, but – inside. Inside their bodies.

  Another section of wood snapped away and the bomb sank further into his grip. Frankie looked up and grunted as he took the extra load, his arms and legs tensing to stay on the ladder. The bomb must have weighed about four hundred pounds. If he fell now, they would fall together, down onto a hard stone floor.

  He blinked the sweat out of his eyes, and looked back at the chalk circle and the people lying within it. All of them were glowing now. Ghostly, gleaming silhouettes in human shape, with the barest shadows for eyes and mouth.

  Silently, the glowing figures rose into the air, leaving their flesh and blood shells beneath them. A column of light cut through the smoky air of the crypt like the switching on of a search-lamp. They floated up toward the light, but the five physical bodies remained on the floor, unmoving. The illuminated phantoms ascended to the ceiling and passed through it, the column of light fading behind them, until there were only the five bodies remaining among the scrawled chalk symbols lit by the candle glow.

  Frankie's breath came in rapid, sobbing gulps, his chest pumping up and down. Tears poured down his face and glittered on the metal casing of the bomb against his cheek. His arms and legs burnt with cramp and his spine felt like it had turned to iron.

  At first, he thought the shouts were part of the chaos raging inside his mind, but then he heard footsteps on the stairs, and the shouts grew nearer, and he was aware of booted figures in helmets rushing into the crypt.

  Below, a fireman's tin helmet came into his limited line of vision, and wide eyes in a soot-stained face.

  "Oh, my God!" he cried.

  "If I drop this thing, it'll make an awful bang," Frankie said, his voice hoarse with smoke.

  There was noise and motion both above him, and below. Strong hands took hold of the upper side of the bomb, in the nave, passing ropes and short wooden planks under and around it. Two men climbed the stepladder, level with Frankie, lifting their arms to take the burden away from him.

  As the other firemen helped him down the ladder his arms and legs trembled violently. His fingers and wrists were cramped and cold, and he felt like an old arthritic man as he stood upon the tiled floor, taking shuffling steps towards the way out, guided by the burly fireman. Before him, the rescue crew gingerly lifted the five people onto stretchers, and they still didn't wake from their sleep or coma or trance or whatever it was. Wellington boots scuffed and smudged the chalk symbols as they went about their work.

  When the firemen carried him up into the street, he looked up and saw – what could he call them?

  Thousands of diaphanous figures of light in human shape, gliding through the smoke and the searchlight beams and the ack-ack fire, tracking the bombers and matching their speed. Perhaps, Frankie thought with piercing clarity, because I saw those things in the crypt, now I can see them everywhere.

  But there were so many. There were thousands of them. Thousands of them.

  "Oi!" An ARP warden tugged urgently at his arm. "Don't stand there gawpin' like an idiot! Your lady friend's waiting back there at the ambulance."

  Frankie pointed upward. "But can't you–"

  The building opposite exploded from a direct hit, and the blast hurled them both down the street, in a tornado of brick, wood, noise and fire.

  No more shall we be swept away by the Tempest,

  but we shall hold the bridles

  of the Winged Steeds of Dawn…

  And we shall direct the course of the Evening Breeze

  to fly before thee.

  It was the first time in weeks that the all clear sounded before the dawn.

  The drone of the bombers' engines faded away and did not return. Rescue workers with aching limbs and blackened faces looked up at the turbulent sky, wondering at the ghostly flickers of light beyond the clouds that continued for several hours.

  On Ludgate Hill at dawn, the smoke cleared and a figure took shape – the pale dome of St. Paul's Cathedral. Its massive, serene proportions grew clearer and clearer as the sun ascended; blackened with soot, but intact.

  Frankie opened his eyes.

  He was filled with a sense of wonder; wonder at why he was lying down, at what he was looking at. Someone bent over him – a woman's face and body. Liz.

  Frankie tried to move, and realized he was lying in bed, and he recognized the room; one of the wards at St. Bart's. He lifted his head. Her hands tried to ease him back, but he had to see, had to see where he was. His nose was stuffed up and the only thing in his ears was a high-pitched ringing sound. The final explosion that knocked me out, he realized, outside the church – it made me deaf.

  But gradually, sound returned, mixed in with ringing like the tolling of a vast bell, he made out the crackle of flames outside and the sweeping chime of broken glass, and a voice. Liz's voice.

  Above him, Liz looked distraught as she tried to talk to him. He stared at her mouth in fascination, the red lips opening and closing. One word; she was saying one word, over and over again.

  He sat up and felt her arms around him as she gripp
ed him tight. He stared out of the window beside the bed, at the rubble and the columns of rising smoke, and the lines of stretchers holding the wounded and the dead, at the soot-stained wardens and firemen and nurses standing dazed in the ruins of their city. He remembered the things he'd seen in the darkness, flying into the sky on wings of light.

  This wasn't death, he realized. This wasn't death. This was life. Life eternal. Life lived to the full.

  "Jimmy kicked the Vespa into high gear as purple-blue energy beams crackled around him…"

  ONE

  Jimmy Diamond leaped onto his Vespa GX2000 scooter, kicked the antigrav engine into life, and rose into the skies above Hammersmith. He straightened his skinny tie, wiped the last remnants of egg and bacon from his chin, and pushed in the punch-card that gave him access to the DAIR (Driver and Aid Information and Routing) master computer. A light flashed above the slot, and the Vespa ascended, easing into the traffic of the main airlane.

  He picked up speed and turned onto the Central airline that took him cruising over the Bayswater Road. Soon, through the clear morning air, he saw the aerocabs and buses zipping about high above the rooftops, around the Churchill Monument, the Monico Tower with its rooftop crane that reminded everyone of a huge propeller, and the municipal airship moored to the Post Office Tower. Jimmy's parka fluttered in the breeze, and the muted sun glimmered though his Wayfarer sunglasses.

  It was a great day to be a Mod.

  He'd bought the Vespa earlier that year, and it was his most prized possession. Italian-made, a light but sturdy frame of pressed steel painted in red and white, the front shield curving up to the headlamp and handlebars. It could drive conventionally on the ground with the two wheels and newly purchased Dunlop tires at a top speed of 45mph, but airborne it could fly at 75 mph – the speed limit decided not by wind resistance, but the DAIR regulations hardwired into every metropolitan vehicle. The anti-grav generator was directly underneath the leather seat, and controlled by the tiny dashboard just under the handlebars. Jimmy's pride and joy, customized by the dozen or so mirrors fastened to the handlebars and the Union Jack he hung from the back aerial when he flew down to Brighton on weekends.