Doctor How and the Deadly Anemones (10 page)

“Excellent,” said Steve. “Let’s roll cameras and get some VT. I’ll be back in a sec.” He climbed ten feet up an exit ladder next to a manhole, where he could hear the sounds of Brixton Market – the music and the haggling over prices – and wrapped an arm inside a rung. His mobile phone registered a signal, and he texted ‘Brixton. Found sewer monster! CU 1 hour’ to his wife before climbing back down.

Roddy had put away his SLR and taken out his video camera. He plugged a small stereo mic into the jack on the side. They’d learnt the hard way that flowing water masks sounds, making a mic essential if they wanted the viewer to hear anything but the white noise of the water. He handed the mic to Steve, threading the wire through his fingers carefully so that it didn’t dip into the filthy water. His companion pocketed his torch, turned his helmet light off again and took his position in shot in front of the rats. Roddy’s helmet light was now their only source, and it shone on Steve and the rats. “Take one,” said Roddy. “I’ll pull out from the rats, right?”

The camera bleeped as it started recording. He zoomed in on the rats, pulled out and up to include Steve and waved a finger to signal that his friend was in shot.

“Here in Brixton, the only monsters you’ll find in the sewers this weekend are the rats,” said Steve. “But they’re not as big and dangerous as the fat cats that stalk the Square Mile of the City to the north. This is Steve Cox reporting for Underground London.” He held his position for a couple of seconds. He heard the
bleep
as the camera stopped recording. “How was that?” he asked.

“Shouldn’t it be here
under
Brixton?”

“You’re such a pedant. And so am I. Let’s go again.”

Roddy set the shot up for another take. The camera gave a
bleep
. Roddy panned out then waved his finger to signal that Steve was in shot again.

“Here under Brixton –”

“Sorry. Could you maybe say ‘Beneath Brixton’? Nice alliteration.”

“Yeah, yeah. Ready, Roddy?” He could see his friend was looking at the camera’s LCD display.

“Damn it.”

“What?”

“The rats have gone.”

Steve looked down. “They’ve left their meat.”

“Must’ve had enough.” The camera bleeped as Roddy turned it off.

“I know how they feel. Let’s have a gander at that first take. I can always do something on just the doll.” They huddled together over the camera. “Turn your bleedin’ head light off, will you? I can’t see the screen.”

Roddy let out a sigh of irritation and turned off the light on his helmet. The three-inch LCD screen on the camera lit them up with a bluish glow, but beyond that the tunnel was pitch black.

Whilst Roddy fiddled with the menu, Steve reached around behind his friend and tapped him on the side of the shoulder.

Roddy jumped. “Oh, ha-bloody-ha,” he said. “If I drop this, you pay for it, pal.”

Roddy found the Play button and pressed it. The image zoomed out slowly from the rats to reveal Steve looking into the camera.

“Shush!” said Roddy. “I can’t hear the sound with you horsing around.”

“It’s not me,” said Steve.

Roddy felt a tap on his shoulder. “I told you to –” He looked at Steve. His friend was looking just behind him, his face frozen in horror. “What –”

Something wet slid into Roddy’s mouth. He tried to scream but his mouth was stuffed with something cold, foul-tasting and blubbery. He felt the stinging of needles on his tongue and down his throat. He couldn’t breathe, or even cough. His vomit reflex was triggered as the back of his throat was touched, but the blubbery thing blocked it. He grabbed at it with his left hand, but snatched it back as it was stung. He felt his stomach being ripped from the inside as he was whipped backwards into the stinking water. The camera struck the wall and fell, the LCD shining uselessly into the water.

“Roddy!” Steve stumbled backwards in the pitch dark and tripped on something. He fell to his knees and fumbled for his helmet light. There was nothing but the sound of the water. He got up on his shaking knees, leaning against the wall for support and turned the light on. He’d tripped on a blue-green cable. The same kind of slimy cable that had reached for Roddy. It twitched at the end. The other end belonged to something behind him but he didn’t have the courage to turn around and see what it was. He jumped up to the second rung on the ladder and began scrambling up, one hand reaching for his phone with the other. He jabbed at his wife’s number and it began to ring.

Something wet and rubbery whipped itself around his neck and stung him. He let out a strangled yell as his wife answered the phone and the grip around his throat tightened. He felt the numbing paralysis spread through his body and a curious sense of relief that the horror was over as he blacked out.

Trinity scuttled along the sewer, the scent of not one, but two of the polyps in her olfactory glands. It was something of a relief; she’d had a bad night of it. The bleach and other chemicals sent down the toilets had proven highly effective at destroying the scent of the polyps. She’d completely lost them at one stage and she’d wasted hours taking the wrong route and then back-tracking along the labyrinthine network. The lack of rats on the polyps’ path had been what had given them away.

She sensed that one of them was in a different behavioural state from the other, and rationalised that it was the one which was following the first one. She made a mental note that the subtle difference was a stress hormone in the animal.

The pipe came to an abrupt end in a pool. She knew from what Tim had told her that this was the sort of area where the first polyp was currently trapped. She stopped at the exit to the pool and focused all of her senses. There was nothing of interest in the immediate vicinity. She turned her mandibles up at the thought of the putrid water, turned herself upside down and clambered out and up the wall, then onto the ceiling. She stopped to observe for a few seconds, and could see that there was an outflow under the surface in one corner. On the side opposite from the inflows, there was a massive slab of iron several feet across, hinged so that it opened away from the pool. She knew what this was: if there was a storm surge, the force of the floodwater would force open the flap and empty the sewage straight into the Thames. She knew exactly where she was now.

She ran over the ceiling and down to the iron flap. There was no trace of polyp there, and she guessed that the salinity would have put them off. She concentrated for a moment, confirming her position with the Doctor via the biochip. This, then, was the limit for the polyps. The Doctor confirmed back to her that this was the pinch point for a hinterland of connected sewers covering a huge slice of South London. The good news was that it was limited to fifteen square miles. The bad news was that it was fifteen square miles on the surface, but hundreds of miles of sewer below ground.

She ran back up and over the ceiling to the other two pipes pouring their contents into the chamber. Both had traces of polyp on them. The stressed one had taken the route with the filthier water; the healthier one had had first choice and taken the one with fresh water. The choice was hers as to which to hunt. She would go after the stronger one first, telling herself the decision wasn’t based on the fresher water.

The polyp was feasting, tearing large chunks out of the inside of the humans and stuffing them into the mouth at the centre of its tentacles. The outer layers of the humans were very tough, and not something the polyp had encountered before – loose but waterproof and not easy to tear into.

The lower legs of the second human had slipped through the rungs of the ladder when it had died, so the body was now hanging upside down, with its head a few feet from the bottom of the sewer. Conveniently, its head was facing the polyp, so it could feed on the innards of both men simultaneously.

The polyp’s efficiency was the result of the extreme evolutionary pressures on its home planet. Being large and soft-tissued made it vulnerable. Its digestive system had adapted so that it could quickly squeeze the moisture out of its food and digest it quickly, thereby keeping the creature mobile. If it wanted, it could lose up to seventy-five percent of its mass of water quickly in order to go into hiding. It was precisely these abilities which had allowed its sibling to lay up undetected at the scene of the earlier killing.

There were hard objects around the bodies, covered in human smells but completely indigestible. One of them kept emitting flashes of light when the polyp moved its foot. Its light sensors weren’t up to much, so it wasn’t particularly bothered by this. Indeed, the flashes occurred when it had the most pressure on its foot, which was when it had a large chunk of human flesh on the end of a tentacle. If anything, it was receiving a positive reinforcement – learning to associate the flashes with a full mouth. Its nervous system wasn’t complex enough to feel happiness, but it felt a primitive level of something best described as satisfaction. It didn’t have conscious goals as an individual, but deep inside its body was preparing to take positive action. It could feel that the change would require energy, and was feeding itself according to that future need.

The twin rumblings of both the Victoria and Northern lines at Stockwell had infuriated Trinity because the randomness of the noise caused by poor engineering had made it difficult to filter out. She could smell the freshness of the polyp’s trail now and there was the smell of fresh and rancid meat in the water. There was a touch of spice, too – similar to that which she’d sensed on the human Kevin. Above was the rumble of traffic, and what she thought could be overland trains vibrating through the foundations of railway arches. This must be Brixton up ahead. She was getting hungry.

She’d never been to Brixton – a big black cat or an outsized spider would have stood out, even in such a cosmopolitan and unfazed population – but she’d seen images on the news. Now she saw them in her head and imagined where she was. She concentrated on the Doctor, who confirmed she was a hundred yards south of the police station. She hated this background noise, but knew she wouldn’t have to tolerate it much longer because she could sense she was moving in for the kill.

Then she smelled human blood in the water, and froze whilst she assessed the situation. The blood was fresh, and there was enough of it to infer substantial bleeding. A second later she realised that it was from more than one human because there were two blood types in it. As she accelerated upstream she updated the Doctor. This wasn’t the kind of news she wanted to give him, and felt she’d failed. But he needed to know – he always knew what to do. In her mind’s eye she could see him bashing his fist on the table in frustration but there was nothing either of them could do about it except get on with the job in hand.

As the sewer split in two there was no hesitation in choosing the new route: follow the stench of blood which now filled her senses. The sewer curved around, limiting her visibility to ten yards in front, but she ran on regardless, her feet silent on the brickwork above the water. She could hear a sucking, gurgling noise from up ahead. She’d heard sounds like it before and knew it wasn’t a good sign.

The tunnel straightened and she saw the gruesome scene just fifty feet ahead of her.

The humans wouldn’t like this at all; the Doctor even less – but for different reasons. She put aside her anger for being too late and focused on her prey. It was feasting off the innards of the two dead humans, and was oblivious to Trinity’s presence. Every time a tentacle delivered a dollop of food the mouth opened with a gurgling noise and then made a slurping noise as it closed. Excess air was expelled with a farting noise. She concentrated hard and sent a mental image of the carnage to the Doctor. Trinity knew he was a stickler for good manners, but knew that the creature’s inability to chew with its mouth closed would not be at the top of his concerns.

No trace of the polyp must be found by the humans.

That was the overriding order. In which case, she had a very large meal to consume. That suited her just fine.

She’d been going light on the camouflage to conserve energy. Now she turned it up to full effect, reducing her infra-red signature too, and crept to within twenty feet of the creature. She stopped and focused all of her senses on it. Within a few seconds she’d gained a comprehensive picture of its physiology. The thing was practically blind, but was sensitive to aerial vibrations and smells. Apart from its eight stinging tentacles with their lethal poison, and a gizzard that could crush glass, it was defenceless. It had grown accustomed to the vibrations from the Tube and overland trains, and the noise and smells drifting in from the manhole fifteen feet above would provide an extra masking layer for her attack. She would approach it from above, distract it, lasso those tentacles with web and then eat it alive from the foot up. Slowly. Her mandibles twitched in anticipation of the succulent flesh.

She climbed to the ceiling, ten feet above, and started crawling her way along. Her attention was fixed on the polyp, which continued to gorge itself on the corpses. It had now managed to rip the waterproof trousers off the body lying in the sewer and was tearing at the leg muscles with four of its tentacles. This was prime human muscle; a bloody treat.

There was a metal
clang
which was so close she could feel it through her feet because the ceiling was just five feet below street level. The polyp felt it too and stopped feeding. There was the sound of metal against metal as a tool locked into place.