Necessary Evil (Milkweed Triptych)

by Ian Tregillis

  The commander’s eyes widened in surprise. He felt it, too. “No! Blood—”

  He pulled the trigger at the same instant the Eidolons sheared the here-and-now from Marsh’s body. He was a hole in space, an impossible bifurcation slithering through the mortar of the universe. He tried to brace himself, but he was—

  *

  Will sprinted along the Mall, away from the Citadel and toward the strongpoint erected in Admiralty Arch. Trafalgar Square, just a few seconds beyond the arch for a man running full tilt, was his best bet of finding a taxi.

  He wouldn’t let Marsh down. He couldn’t fail Liv—she’d called him her champion. After everything they’d been through, together and separately, fates intertwined through the bonds of braided fate and historical paradox … Just one more time, thought Will, let me be her champion again.

  Rain puddles splashed his trousers. Every stride squelched water from the sodden leather of his shoes. He hadn’t run since university; the stitch in his side felt like a nail in his kidney. Or was that his appendix?

  He couldn’t bear the thought of harm befalling Olivia. Just once, he wanted her to look on him not with bemusement and sisterly affection, but something else.

  Will drew odd glances from the bored Home Guard volunteers manning the strongpoint’s machine gun. The Führer had indefinitely postponed preparations for Sea Lion last autumn, but most of London’s invasion preparations remained in place. So the HG men had nothing better to do than to lounge on the sandbag revetments and watch the gangly fellow in the mud-splashed bespoke suit.

  One called, “Where’s the fire, guv?”

  The last rays of sunset illuminated Nelson’s Column. Will panted up to the first taxi he saw, opened the suicide door, collapsed into the rear seat. He had to catch his breath before he could recite Liv’s address for the driver. His throat felt like sandpaper. “I’ll pay double if you get me there in ten.”

  “You’re on.” The driver wheeled his taxi around the Trafalgar, boomeranging back toward the river.

  Will sank back, closed his eyes. He felt for his billfold. But, of course, his pockets were empty. They’d been empty since the night Hargreaves had caught him out.

  “Ah,” said Will. “Ha. Oh, my. Hi, hi, driver. This is embarrassing. I’m afraid I’ve misplaced my billfold.”

  The car skidded to a crooked halt on the pavement just short of Waterloo. The screech of tires drew an angry glance from a bobby standing on Victoria Embankment.

  “Sorry,” said the driver. He killed the engine. “Can’t help you.”

  “I assure you I’m good for it.”

  “Not right now you isn’t.”

  “This is a matter of life and death, man!”

  “That’s life in wartime, mate.”

  “Look, I’ll give you my name and my address—”

  “Oh, I know your type. Too rich to pay for a taxi ride. The war makes a good excuse for shorting the help, don’t it? I’m surprised you’re in the city at all. Probably got a nice funk hole out in the country.”

  Will said, “Sir, I understand your frustration. I promise you that my brother—”

  “Out,” said the driver. “Out now, or I call that copper over here.”

  “Did I say double? Triple! Please.”

  The driver rolled down his window. He waved at the bobby. “Oy! Over here.”

  Will sighed. Not only was he without his billfold, he didn’t have his Identity Card on him, either. He’d never get to Liv’s house in time if the police questioned him.

  “Very well, very well. I’m off. See? I’m stepping out now.”

  The taxi pulled away, probably to return to the taxi stand at Trafalgar. Will approached the iron girders of the temporary replacement for the demolished Waterloo Bridge. “Temporary” being a relative term; the original Waterloo had been closed for years before Will entered university.

  He’d find another taxi. He hated to do it, but he’d have to wait to discover his billfold missing until after he’d already arrived at Liv’s.

  Somebody tapped him on the shoulder. Will turned.

  The bobby said, “Sir. A moment, please.”

  *

  —too late, I was real again.

  That made the fourth time I’d been disassembled and then reassembled by the Eidolons, but the first time it had happened by accident. The journey from ’63 still topped the list in terms of residual misery, but accidental teleportation came damn close.

  I stumbled. The ground crunched underfoot. The soft grass of St. James’ Park had become a precarious scree of sandy gravel mixed with large jagged stones. I scraped my hand open when I reached out to catch myself. My tumble kicked up plumes of dust that coated my eyeballs with grit. I exhaled the last traces of humid, verdant parkland, and inhaled the smell of dry desolation. The air was cool, but the stony earth reradiated the day’s surplus of sunlight.

  The Eidolons had deposited us into the talus at the base of a towering escarpment. Dim starlight and the setting half moon showed the craggy cliffs to be riddled with narrow ravines. The mouth of Halfaya Pass leered at us like a gap-toothed hag. The escarpment formed a natural border, and barrier, between the Egyptian coastal lowlands—where the roads were—and the Libyan plateau, which stood hundreds of feet higher. Halfaya was the only means near the coast of driving heavy armor from Egypt to Libya. Other routes meant long diversions to the south.

  The Mediterranean Sea was several miles behind us, too far to hear or smell it in this arid expanse. The sandy lowlands on the north end of Halfaya, where we now stood, offered little in the way of cover. Similarly the rocky highlands atop the pass. But the pass itself was a labyrinth easily defended against intruders.

  Looking like the trunk of a felled tree, the barrel of an antiaircraft gun loomed at us from the mouth of the widest ravine. It resided in a trench deep enough to hide everything but the barrel and breech, which stuck out just a couple of feet above the ground. Up close, it wasn’t hard to see how these things could shoot through a Matilda.

  The pain in my knee was gone. The lingering ache I’d had for as long as I could remember, the arthritic twinges that had plagued me since my youth, had disappeared. Not receded, but disappeared. As though they had never existed.

  I glanced at my younger counterpart. He had hunkered down among the talus, taking stock. He wasn’t bleeding, he wasn’t screaming in pain, so I knew at once my shot had missed. The Eidolons had yanked us away in the instant while the bullet was in transit. He massaged his knee. Yes, he felt the change, too.

  Then he noticed me. He whispered, “What on God’s earth are you doing here?” He glanced at my hands, to see if I wore a sticking plaster like all the other participants. I didn’t, of course.

  “Bloody great oversight,” I admitted.

  I’d never intended to come along. But I’d been so focused on tampering with the blood samples—the Twins’, the warlocks’, my younger counterpart’s—that I’d overlooked the simple fact he and I shared the same blood. To the Eidolons, we were two aspects of the same person. And thus, where he went, I went. First, I overlooked Gretel’s capacity for treachery, then this … Twice over, I was a fool.

  Could have been even worse. At least the Eidolons’ special interest in us, our blood map of circles and broken spirals, managed to keep our bodies distinct.

  He unslung his Enfield, worked the bolt. The sound ricocheted through the windswept ravines that confronted us. “I can’t let you interfere.”

  I rasped, quietly as I could, “I’m on your side, you damn fool.”

  “Moment ago you didn’t want us here,” he said.

  “I didn’t want you here. I want the mission to succeed.” As if I needed a reminder why people call me stubborn. Here we were, deposited by demons into the outskirts of a secret Reichsbehörde camp in the middle of Egypt, and he wanted to have a bun fight. “But there’s bugger all I can do about it now.”

  My counterpart dashed across the scree, squeezed around the trench hol
ding the eighty-eight, and disappeared into the deeper shadows. I followed, bitterly aware that I had no spare cartridges for my revolver. The shingle made for unsteady footing and a racket that funneled straight down the twisting ravine.

  We hadn’t been far from the Nissen when I’d accosted him in St. James’, and that distance held here in Halfaya. We joined the commotion surrounding my counterpart’s team just inside the first bend of the ravine. I tripped over a man curled into the fetal position, who rocked in the sand while crying and sucking his thumb. Not everybody weathered the transit with sanity intact.

  I could make out the Dingo, loaded with one of the pixies. The moonlight barely penetrated to the depths of our canyon, so I couldn’t make out more detail than that. But one thing I noticed immediately: the team was too big, and it was too loud. Somebody, a whole group of somebodies, was having a very urgent conversation.

  I knew the first part of my plan had worked.

  A forced whisper in Lorimer’s voice: “Everybody shut your sodding holes right fucking now.” He’d been a sergeant in the Great War. Decorated.

  That quieted most of the discussion. But somewhere in a dark canyon spur to my left, somebody mumbled to himself, “I can’t exist. I can’t exist. I can’t exist.” Ritter. He’d had the same reaction on the original raid.

  Lorimer directed the surviving commandos into three groups. Four men stayed to guard the warlocks, two scouted a retreat path toward the Egyptian side of the pass where my counterpart and I had landed, and two scouted the path forward through the ravine. It led to the camp, if the recon could be believed. My counterpart pushed through the commotion to confer with Lorimer. That left four extra men—five, counting myself—who weren’t meant to be here.

  Gravel pattered down the sheer sandstone cliffs. I looked up and caught a brief glimpse of a dark figure eclipsing the moon. The high, fingerlike tables made excellent positions for the snipers, as well as their spotters, who carried Sten submachine guns. Milkweed had positioned them well.

  The warlocks huddled behind the Dingo. Keeping to the deepest shadows, I sidled closer. They were arguing. Two or three of the bastards wanted to make the return trip immediately. It was too dangerous for them here. Four old men in the middle of a battle with superhuman monsters? They were vulnerable as newborn kittens. Which is why I’d gone to such pains to get them here.

  But if the warlocks sent themselves home …

  Lorimer scuttled over from his conference with my counterpart. He didn’t see me. “Oy! You lot! I hear one more word about leaving and I’ll cut your tongues out. Nobody’s going home until this is finished.”

  … they’d drag everybody else back to England, too.

  My oversight in getting pulled along meant I had no way to join Will in protecting Liv, but it meant I could take a more direct hand in the warlocks’ demise. Once the shooting started, any second now, the fog of combat would make it impossible to discern an unfortunate ricochet from a deliberate execution.

  I focused on the task before me. I tried to put thoughts of Liv aside, and inched closer to the old men.

  And tripped over something elastic. Another clatter accompanied my sprawl on the talus. This time I landed in something wet. The mélange of vomit and offal assaulted my nose. I hastened to my feet. And found myself standing over the ruptured body of a young woman.

  Rather, two young women. One head gazed at me through lifeless eyes, one pale and the other dark in the moonlight. The suggestion of a second head protruded from the crook between neck and shoulder; it, too, had mismatched eyes, but the mirror reverse of the first.

  The Eidolons had done as they were bid. They read the blood map that described this person’s life, and sent the person described by that blood to this spot. Except, in this case, that blood was shared by two separate bodies. The Eidolons brought both women to the identical location. But that was too much person for one body to contain. I counted three and a half arms. One leg forked into two shins below the knee. The instantaneous spike in pressure had found release in the soft tissues by forcing out the viscera.

  I coughed. Struggled to fight down the gorge.

  That explained the vomit. Somebody had tripped over her and had the same reaction.

  My God. This was my doing. It was exactly what I’d planned. Never thought it would be this messy. I closed her eyes, all four of them, and wondered if they’d ever had names. I hoped it was quick and painless. Quick, probably, but not painless.

  I’d met them. They weren’t bad girls. But they were the product of a technology that couldn’t be allowed to exist. This had to be done. I ripped out the wires and rummaged through flesh and muscle and spurs of bone for the dead Twins’ batteries.

  “You sick … You planned this.” My counterpart had found us, me and my victims. His lip curled in disgust at the squelching sounds my hand made. “You knew their blood was…” He trailed off again. “Identical.”

  The tone in his voice made me uncomfortable. His eyes narrowed, as they sometimes did when I was deep in thought. Any moment now he’d crack his knuckles.

  And in fact his hand was moving in that direction when a scrape, a shout, and a clatter echoed through the defile. A man tumbled into our staging ground from above. His head clanged against the Dingo, hard enough to knock him backwards for a heavy thud on the gravel. He came to rest with his head flopped over his shoulder. Broken neck.

  One of the snipers had slipped from his perch. Loudly.

  His Enfield landed amidst the warlocks. Didn’t go off and kill any of them, though, damn the luck. I leapt on it, then looted the spare magazines from his corpse.

  The short, sharp chatter of a machine pistol ricocheted through the canyon. Echoes made it impossible to know the source. The glow of a klieg light panned across our ravine, killing my night vision and evoking shouts in both German and English.

  I fired twice into what remained of the Twins’ heads, smashed the batteries to flinders, and ran to join the fray.

  *

  The bobby pointed at the taxi. “What was that about?”

  “That? Nothing.” Will tried to laugh. “Bit of a disagreement over the fare, I’m afraid. Silly thing.” Then he realized he’d been given a blessing in disguise. “Actually, officer, I’m glad to have found you—”

  “You asked him to drop you on Waterloo?”

  “Ah. No. Not exactly. We had a difference of opinion regarding the matter of my destination. But that’s water under the bridge now, isn’t it, ha ha. But as I was—”

  “Difference of opinion?”

  Will sighed. “Look, officer. I’ve left my billfold behind. I haven’t a penny on me. And I’m desperate to reach a friend in Walworth. She’s in terrible danger.”

  The bobby’s demeanor changed. “What sort of danger?”

  “I believe somebody is on the way to her house this very moment, intent on doing her harm.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “For heaven’s sake, man! I’ll give you my entire life history. But won’t you please send somebody around?” Will recited Liv’s address. “It’s life and death!”

  “I’ll call it in. Follow me.”

  The bobby headed for a police box up the street.

  “Thank you,” said Will. And then he sprinted across the replacement bridge, footsteps slapping heavily against the girders. The bobby’s whistle was shrill against the gurgling of the Thames.

  *

  Marsh kept low, hugging the contours of the ravine on his way toward the camp. Another burst of gunfire raked the striated cliffs behind him. Flakes of hot stone pelted him like a rain of fléchettes. He hit the sand.

  They couldn’t afford to get pinned in the ravines. They had to push forward, gain ground toward the camp, so the Dingos could come forward and deploy the pixies.

  And they were already down several men because of the detail guarding the unexpected party of warlocks. No mystery how that had happened. Liddell-Stewart’s handiwork again. But why?

/>   Marsh pressed himself behind a rib of sandstone. More gunfire swept the ravine. He popped off a covering shot with his revolver, then dashed a few yards to a wider spot behind a boulder. Heavy footfalls crunched through the ravine. He glanced over his shoulder. The commander had taken position behind him.

  Lieutenant-Commander. We even share the same rank.

  The boulder gave him decent cover and a view of the south end of the ravine. It opened on a relatively flat clearing that housed a dozen tents or more. The clearing was a natural break in Halfaya Pass, surrounded by escarpments and knife-narrow ravines. The pass continued beyond the clearing, for miles and miles.

  One of the forward scouts lay on the ground amidst a scarlet puddle. His partner was pinned behind a narrow lip of granite. He had no room to draw his weapon without getting plugged, much less run for more suitable cover. Marsh lobbed a Mills bomb toward the pair of Afrika Korps gunners trying to flush him out. Neither wore a battery.

  The blast scattered the Jerries and took down a tent. It gained the scout precious seconds to dash across the ravine and take position behind a waist-high shelf of stone. The canyon amplified the noise and stretched it out, turning a single blast into a long, continuous thunder. Marsh’s ears rang.

  He popped up, sighted on another Afrika Korps uniform, pulled the trigger, dropped into cover again. Still no sign of a harness. Where were they? They could play pheasant hunt with Rommel’s men all night long, but it wouldn’t do a damn bit of good if they didn’t get Klaus and Reinhardt.

  The commander—that name would have to do, for now—motioned at him. It was easy to divine his intent, because Marsh was having the same thought. He nodded. Then he held his hand where the commander could see it. Counted backwards on his fingers: three, two, one. And charged forward under the commander’s covering fire.

  Marsh joined the scout. “We have to hold this spot until they get the Dingo up,” he said. Somewhere nearby, an engine roared to life.

  “I know!” said the scout. He looked to be in his early twenties. Blood trickled from gashes on his temple, probably from shards of stone. “What the hell are they waiting for?”