Wiggins grinned.
“Just leave the whip and thumbscrews with me, Cap,” he said. “There won’t be any trouble.”
Banks deliberately hadn’t said what might happen if they weren’t lucky. He didn’t have to—everybody understood the situation.
If there’s a large patch of open ground in our path, or if it rains again, all bets are off.
- 12 -
Donnie saw to the professor, getting the older man fully clothed into the sleeping bag from Private Davies’ kit; Gillings was too tired to put up any complaint and using the private’s rucksack as a pillow, was asleep almost immediately.
“Is he going to be okay?” Donnie asked Davies. The private checked the professor’s pulse and looked grim.
“He’s still thready, jittering badly. He’s lucky the shock didn’t kill him outright. Normally, I’d suggest zapping him in a controlled environment to get him back to a steady rhythm. Failing that, he should take complete rest to give his system time to get back on an even keel—the heart can regulate itself in this kind of case, given time.”
“And if he’s not given time?”
Davies’ look was all the reply Donnie needed. Much depended on Banks and Hynd, who had just put on their rucksacks and were preparing to leave.
“Don’t forget us,” Donnie said as the two men headed for the door.
“I couldn’t if I tried,” Banks replied. “Wiggo here would never let us hear the end of it.”
And with that the two men left, heading into the night.
*
Wilkins had another coffee brewing. Donnie took two mugs when offered and went over to join Wiggins at the doorway where the corporal stood guard. Donnie passed over another of his cheroots and they both lit up. Wiggins screwed up his face.
“I don’t ken what’s worse—Wilko’s coffee or your fags.”
“Tell you what, get me home in one piece and I’ll stand for a Starbucks and a packet of Marlboro.”
“That, plus a pie and a pint and you’re on,” Wiggins said with a grin.
They looked out into the night. The view from the doorway was south, back across the plain they’d covered earlier. The captain and sergeant had already made their way off the outcrop and there was only shifting darkness to be seen under a glistening carpet of stars.
“There’s none of that blue static,” Donnie said.
“Too dry now—the wee fuckers will be burrowed deeper, where it’s still damp.”
“That’s good news for your captain and sergeant anyway.”
Wiggins nodded.
“Aye. Just about the first thing that’s gone right on this fucked-up mission.”
“How did you get into this game anyway?” Donnie asked. “If you don’t mind me asking?”
“There’s not much to tell. It was either the army or a spell in Borstal as a juvenile delinquent. I was running with a bad lot, I didnae ken any better and was just a stupid wee boy. Then the smack killed two of the lads I’d went to school with, I took a long hard look at myself, and went and signed up.”
“You took to the discipline okay?”
“Not at first. The sarge will tell you I was a loud wee tosser who gave him no end of aggravation—but it was him that sorted me out. He saved my life—well, stopped me from throwing mine away anyway, and it was him that got me my chance to get into this squad once I proved to him I could knuckle down and take orders. He’s like a big brother to me.”
“So what’s with all the jokes about his wife?”
Wiggins went quiet and Donnie thought he wasn’t going to get an answer then was surprised to see tears in the corporal’s eyes when he finally spoke.
“She died. The cancer got her a few years back. It nearly ended the Sarge but I stood up with him at the funeral, I helped put her in the ground, and I got pished with him that night.”
“So, the jokes are…?”
“How he copes. How we cope, lad,” Wiggins said. “How anybody copes.”
*
They stood in the doorway, swapping smokes and chatting about Glasgow, about home, which seemed a long way away. An hour after the captain and sergeant left, it started to drizzle. Donnie looked out the doorway and saw that the sky had gone dark, the stars now obscured by thickening cloud.
“Bugger,” Wiggins said.
“They’ll be a good way there by now,” Donnie said. “And maybe this is just a local shower.”
“Aye, well if it’s local, we’ll all probably get it. Still, they ken what they’re doing and worrying never gets us anywhere. All we can do is wait and see. The cap and sarge are giving your man there a chance to get some sleep, so that’s good news for him anyway. Still, I could really be doing with some of that whisky the camel had away with.”
The rain got heavier. Soon they heard it patter on the steps outside the door and saw dampness glisten dimly on the stones. Out in the desert, a wash of blue ran like sheet lightning across the plain.
“Looks like the wee fuckers are at it again,” Wiggins said.
“We’re safe up here though?” Donnie said.
“You saw what happened back at yon service station. If it gets wet enough, these fuckers like to travel.” Wiggins clapped Donnie on the shoulder. “Dinna worry, lad. We’ve got the firepower to keep them at bay if they get this far. You’re not ready to be worm food for a few years yet.”
*
Over the course of the next hour, the rain got steadily heavier until it ran in small streams off the roofs and a curtain of water obscured their view out the door. They saw enough to know that blue washes of electrical activity covered most of the visible plain to the south.
“Can I start worrying about your captain and sergeant yet?” Donnie asked.
“The cap and sarge have seen just about everything there is to be seen and come home safe every time,” Wiggins replied. “They’ll be fine.”
The corporal’s eyes told a different story but Donnie didn’t push it, for he saw that both Privates Davies and Wilkins were listening in and their worry was showing clearly in their eyes. Wiggins saw it too and spoke up.
“Remember being caught outside up on yon glacier in Norway with the troll after us in the storm, lads? That was a far tighter spot than this. At least here we’re warm and dry. Always remember, it could be worse.”
Davies grinned.
“That’s your pep talk is it, Corp?”
“The only one I’ve got,” Wiggins replied. “And if you don’t like it, you can fuck off.”
He’s done the trick though. Donnie saw from the smiles of the younger men that their mood had been lifted.
I wish mine was.
He left the doorway to check on the professor. The older man still slept and he looked less pale in the face than previously, with some color showing high at his cheeks, although his eyes resembled a panda, almost circular black shadows around fluttering eyelids. His breathing seemed to stutter ever few minutes but not enough to wake him. Donnie left him sleeping and went over to the fire to sit beside Davies and Wilkins.
“So, I got your corporal’s story,” he said as Wilkins passed him another coffee. “How about you two? How did you come to join up for this lark?”
Davies went first.
“Do you have any idea what it’s like growing up black in Easterhouse?” he said. “My old mum always told me not to take any abuse and to stand up for myself but when there’s only you against the pack, you have to do something or you’re going to get battered senseless every time. With me, it was martial arts—at first, because I wanted to kick some wee tosser’s arse, later for the discipline not to. I always gravitated towards structure and one day I saw a recruitment poster at college during a job fair—that was not long after my mum died. I needed something, I needed steady money, and I needed out of Easterhouse. So here I am.”
“And the medical stuff?”
“Mum’s fault. She was ill for years with just me to look out for her. I found I liked looking out for people. Th
is job lets me do it either as a medic or a fighter—I get the best of both worlds,” he said, laughing.
“And how about you, Wilkins?” Donnie asked.
“It’s in the family,” the young private said. “From way back as far as Waterloo so I’ve been told. We’re all Scottish, all soldiers. Great Granddad was in the Black Watch and died in Normandy; Granddad was in Aden; Dad served in Belfast. I never thought about doing anything else, even now with this buggered leg. Signed up as soon as I could after school. When the chance came to get onto the squad, I jumped at it. The cap and sarge are kind of legends to the younger lads.”
“How is that leg, by the way?” Donnie said.
“Better for the rest,” was Wilkins’ reply, although the private’s face was almost as pale as that of the professor earlier.
Further conversation was cut short when Wiggins shouted from the doorway.
“Davies, get your arse over here and bring your rifle. We’ve got problems.”
- 13 -
The first hour of Banks’ and Hynd’s run had gone well. They made good time under a clear starry sky, running on rocky terrain that wasn’t too hard or too soft. They’d been trained for times like this, maintaining an even loping pace that ate up the miles. Neither had spoken, saving their breath to keep them moving forward. They only stopped when Banks noticed the sky was darker ahead, clouds moving in from the north. He tasted moisture in the air as he slowed to a halt.
“Take five, Sarge,” he said. “We’re on hard ground here. Let’s see what’s coming our way.”
Hynd took the chance for a smoke but Banks’ concentration was on the still darkening horizon and the increasing hint of dampness at his cheeks.
“More fucking rain on the way. That’s all we need.”
“Do we head back, try to stay ahead of it?” Hynd asked.
“No way. We’re too far in. I’d rather get caught trying to make headway than have something snapping at my arse as I run away.”
“You’ll get no disagreement from me on that score.”
Banks tried to gauge the ground ahead of them but the cloud was already sweeping overhead, bringing deeper gloom without even the benefit of starlight. Raindrops pattered, already wetting the rock.
“I’m ready to push on if you are, Cap,” Hynd said, flicking the butt of his smoke away where its red glow was quickly extinguished as the rain spattered heavier. As of yet, there was no sign of any blue flashes.
“Let’s do it then, but we stick to the rocky ground—first sign of it getting soft underfoot we backtrack to firmer stuff.”
“Lights?”
“Let’s keep them off as long as we’re able. We don’t ken what triggers the beasties into action, so best not to give them any excuses.”
They set off running again.
*
The first swathe of blue flashes appeared twenty yards off to their left minutes later.
“Cap?” Hynd said.
“I see it. We’re fine as long as they’re over there and we’re over here,” Banks said and upped his pace, concentrating on trying to stay on solid ground, peering to identify the darker patches that indicated better footing. Rain dripped down the back of his neck and his rucksack had begun to chafe at the shoulders again. He knew from experience that the first hour of running was always deceptively easy and that aches, pains, and discomfort were all ahead in his immediate future. He was also aware they still had a couple of hours running ahead of them and without the GPS or stars to guide them, they were running blind, trusting to gut instinct and lines of sight in increasing gloom.
But what choice do we have?
The quicker pace couldn’t be sustained as the rain got heavier and the rock turned slippery underfoot. The swathes of blue increased in number and density and soon the two men were forced to a halt, standing on a slab of rock raised only a foot above the main surface of the plain, surrounded by dancing, crackling blue flashes.
He moved so that he and Hynd were standing back to back, weapons raised. There was an area of sand only half a dozen steps to his left, seething and roiling as the worms coiled just under the surface, the sand itself lit by a blue crackling haze that ran across its surface sending loose grains swirling. The rain was heavy now, pattering hard on the top of Banks’ head and running down his brow to drip steadily from his nose. His suit protected him from the worst of it but he was going to be damp through and through before too many more minutes passed. The only thing in their favor was that it wasn’t cold so the possibility of hypothermia wasn’t a problem.
Besides, we’ve got other things to worry about.
A worm’s head rose up from the sandy area to Banks’ left, a foot-wide cavernous mouth open, tasting the air and the rain. Blue static ran around the white, stick-like fangs. Banks switched on his rifle light and washed a beam across the area, hoping that the beast was a subterranean thing that would react adversely to the sudden brightness.
No such luck.
The worm took no notice of the light and pushed itself farther out of the sand so that three feet of it was raised upright like a tree trunk—a red, glistening tree. It was soon joined by others, a whole forest of a score or more, all pushing straight up as if to suck down the rain deep into their bodies. They varied from eight inches in diameter to one monster farther out in the sand right at the edge of their visibility that looked to have a gape nearly two feet wide with a glistening red torso of the same width below it. When that one rose up out of the sand, its mouth was more than eight feet high as it sucked at the rain.
“Steady, Sarge,” Banks said, little more than a whisper as he felt Hynd tense. At that, the nearest four of the beasts swung their heads—they had no faces as such—to point their wide-open, fang-filled mouths directly at where Hynd and Banks stood.
They heard me. They’re keying in to sound.
All four of the nearby worms, the biggest being the first one they’d seen with the foot-wide gape, dropped flat to the sand then came forward, straight at them.
*
Without speaking, Banks put a finger to his lips and took six quick steps north out of their path. Hynd followed without a word as the worms came on, not deviating from their course, crossing the rock where the men had been standing and coming to a halt with their heads raised, tasting…listening.
Banks held his breath, expecting an attack…but none came. Ten seconds later, the worms slithered back off the rock into the sand and raised their bodies upright again, joining the others in tasting the rain. It was coming down in curtains of water now, small streams forming at the soldier’s feet as puddles merged and water tried to find low ground. The blue flashing became a hanging, swirling aurora above the uplifted mouths of the worms and the red bodies swayed, all in time, as if dancing to some unheard rhythm.
Banks retreated six more steps north with Hynd at his side. The worms paid no heed and stayed where they were, swaying in the rain. With their mouths raised and the red glistening torsos moving slowly from side to side in unison, they looked like a field of exotic plants.
Banks watched them for thirty seconds more to ensure an attack wasn’t imminent, then led Hynd out again, finding a patch of rocky ground and heading north in silence into the rain.
- 14 -
“What is it? What do you see?” Donnie Reid said as Davies went to join Wiggins at the hut doorway.
“More of that blue flashing crap,” Wiggins said. “And it’s getting closer, coming up the rock towards us.”
“The worms?”
“I’d guess so. Stay back by the fire with the professor. Wilko, you stay there and watch our backs. Davies, you’re with me. We saw these wee buggers off easily enough earlier. Let’s hope they didn’t go just to fetch their big brothers.”
The professor was still asleep, not disturbed when Davies stood to move away to the doorway. Donnie saw that Wiggins stood in the open space, his feet in a growing puddle of water coming in from out in the dark. The light from the fire meant that t
he wall of water and darkness at the door looked like a sheet of gray metal but after a few seconds, he started to see blue flashes show through from the other side.
“None of these fuckers get in here,” Wiggins said. “Is that clear?”
“Yes, Corp,” both Davies and Wilkins replied in unison. Wilkins hadn’t moved from his place beside the fire but he’d turned face on to the doorway and had his weapon raised in readiness. Remembering the cacophony in the service station when the firing started, Donnie clapped his hands over his ears.
The first worm arrived in the doorway seconds later.
*
The head came through the wall of water, and Wiggins and Davies took two steps back as a six-inch wide mouth opened, as if tasting the air inside the hut. Wiggins put two shots down its throat, blowing it away before Donnie had time to get a good look at it
The shots brought Gillings awake with a startled yell and as if in response, two more of the worms came through the sheet of falling water in the doorway. These were larger, each nearly a foot thick, each with mouths flared open like a flower looking for the sun, white fangs glistening in reflected firelight. Blue static sparked at the interface where their bodies met the sheet of rainwater and once again Donnie smelled ozone and felt his body hair crawl and rise up.
The two men at the door each took a worm and two shots from each of them sent the worms to the floor, little more now than piles of red and pink protoplasm, white teeth scattered like dropped needles at the soldiers’ feet. Professor Gillings was still only half awake and swearing loudly.
Operation Mongolia (S-Squad Book 8) Page 7