‘Tell me, Carter - your needs would seem unbalanced.’
‘My woman, Natasha, is dying. Jam can help her. Is he here? Or is he dead?’
‘Ahh, the sweet Natasha. I remember her well. She had a hand in the fall of Spiral_mobile ... well, Carter, my oldest and bravest adversary—’ Durell seemed to smile. Releasing his grip on Mila’s chin he turned and moved, making crackling sounds, to stand in front of Carter where he lowered his head until his broad twisted face was only a few inches from Carter’s own. ‘It would seem that you are in my control once more. So, unfortunately, things will not be going to plan for you and your little band. Yes, in answer to your first question, Jam is here. And no, he is far, far from dead ...’
Durell backed away.
Carter could smell the strange Nex stink that had haunted his darkest nightmares. He shuddered. Blood rolled down his wrists as the wire continued to cut into his flesh.
Something moved in the doorway, and a massive shape filled the frame, stooping to enter. It unfurled, its triangular head coming up with tiny copper eyes fixed directly on—
Carter.
It moved forward, its heavy armoured feet booming on the wooden floor, and halted, swaying a little, its eyes blinking in the bright light.
‘It is too warm here,’ said Jam.
‘I agree,’ replied Durell softly. He glanced at Carter. ‘Welcome our new ScorpNex. It has taken a long time to achieve such a fine specimen, but shall we say that this time we had a rewarding subject on which to build; from which to
blend.’
Carter frowned.
He stared at the huge ScorpNex in front of him - and then the lines of the deformed face clicked into place. Carter blinked, and felt his knees go weak. He staggered against the two Nex who held him tightly and shook his head wildly in disbelief...
‘It... it can’t be ...’
Jam, the ScorpNex, smiled. Drool pooled from his twisted jaws, stretching to the floor in viscous strands.
‘No, it fucking
cannot be!’
‘Hello, Carter,’ said Jam, his voice soft and deformed -but still recognisable. Just.
Carter found tears on his cheeks.
‘Jam! What have they fucking done to you ...’
‘Carter -’ the ScorpNex spread its arms wide, making tiny crackling sounds as its chitinous armour shifted ‘— this is good, this is progress, this is
evolution.’
‘Jam?’
Jam’s head moved, dipped, turned to stare at Mongrel who had crawled to his knees in the corner, blood coating his face, eyes wide in horror.
‘Welcome to my home, Mongrel,’ Jam growled softly.
Durell chuckled. ‘Such a beautiful moment. Oh, my heart bleeds ... but now, now to business. Jam?’ Jam turned his gaze on Durell.
‘Yes?’
Already the Nex were backing away, dragging Mila towards the door. The two Nex holding Carter suddenly dropped his arms and stepped away, leaving Carter and Jam in the centre of the room and Mongrel on his knees in the corner.
They left the building with Gol. Durell remained ... watching from the doorway. ‘They wanted you, Jam. Now they’ve found you. Kill them both.’
Jam’s huge head wavered, shifted, and his stare fixed on Carter who stood, head down, eyes dark and brooding, his hands bound behind his back.
Jam seemed to grin, light reflecting from the tips of his long twisted teeth.
And in a blur of movement, he attacked ...
T
he Priest’s eyes narrowed.
Something clicked against the hard floor.
Then there was a long, low and terrible hiss ...
He whirled in the gloom that was speckled with light from far above, as a huge bulk rushed towards him. He reached for his Glock but too late - he was thrown across the chamber, grunting with pain, hammering into the wall and crumpling into a heap. Wheezing, The Priest struggled to his feet and peered through the darkness, his sandals scrabbling against the loose sand scattered over the fused glass floor of Spiral_Q.
It moved slowly towards him.
The Priest’s eyes went wide.
‘What in God’s name are you?’
It moved on all fours, like a huge cat; its head was triangular, armoured and tufted with thick strands of fur, and its eyes were a deep and iridescent copper.
Its head dropped low, almost touching the ground, eyes looking up at The Priest with a kind of primal curiosity. Then its lips curled back to reveal long fangs and it snarled and claws clacked against the floor and thick heavy corded muscles bunched—
‘I know you,’ said The Priest, placing his hand against the Bible within his robes. ‘You are a Sleeper and I remember you.’ He smiled gently, nodding, his face lit with a serene light as he was listening to some distant voice.
The creature snarled and The Priest saw it ready for the kill: each fraction of a second filled with a rippling of muscle, a vibration of sinews, a focus of intent...
He sighed, hand moving from his Bible, brushing past his wooden beads as his sandals fought for purchase on the uneven sandy floor and dipping beneath his robes to reveal—
A big, broad-bladed, serrated knife.
‘You are an abomination under God’s Law,’ he said, his voice now strong, booming almost, and eyes glittering in the gloom. ‘And as such you must - die ...’
The Sleeper attacked, bounding across the chamber towards The Priest who leapt forward to meet it, his huge frame silhouetted against the gloom as they smashed together. The huge jagged knife slashed up, and then out, slicing fur and bone and sending a dark spray of blood up over The Priest’s face, splashing against the wall and floor.
He gasped in shock at the icy coldness of the blood as the Sleeper hissed in pain, rolling to one side. It skidded across the ground and The Priest ducked, whirling in a circle. Then it uncurled and stared first at the deep bubbling wound in its armoured flank, then back at the Priest.
He smiled, arms spreading wide, blood dripping from the tip of the glinting blade.
‘Come, my friend. God has a very important lesson that he would wish me to teach you.’
The Sleeper rolled to its feet and edged forward, with infinitely more care this time, clawed pads clattering against the ground in a slow, hypnotic rhythm. The Priest moved away from the wall, face settling into a calm mask of understanding. The knife weaved in front of him, the steel blade his only defence ...
The Sleeper charged.
The Priest rolled with awesome speed as a claw flashed past his face and the bulk of the creature smashed against him. The knife struck out, but the creature had spun to one side and whirled, huge heavy head swinging from side to side like a pendulum, to return and glare at The Priest - who ran at it, sandals flapping against the sandy glass floor as the Sleeper leapt again at the huge man. There came a sudden flurry of blows, and The Priest’s powerful arms encircled the blood-dripping Sleeper. The large-bladed knife clattered across the floor and they hit the ground hard, rolling to a halt against the wall in a tangle of violence—
The Sleeper snarled.
The Priest head-butted its lower jaws, three, four, five times—
The Sleeper suddenly scrabbled against the huge man like a cat trapped in a cage, claws shredding his robes and the flesh beneath in a spraying shower of crimson. The Priest’s face compressed in a titanic strain of effort, going through shades of red and purple as muscles writhed like eels along his arms and chest and his eyes searched desperately for the fallen blade—
A claw shot up, slicing through the already tattered grey robes. The Priest felt a warm sluicing of blood as the claw continued, and there came the wooden clatter of rosary beads against the glass floor.
The Priest’s eyes went wide.
‘My beads!’ he hissed.
He slammed his right fist into the Sleeper’s triangular head again and again and then kicked himself backwards, scooping up the blade and leaping at the stunned creature. The knife slashed down five times, and blood splashed across the floor and over his grey robes in pumping arcs. The Sleeper seemed to deflate and lay still, wheezing in the throes of death. Its huge head turned and the copper eyes bored into the blood-soaked Priest, hands slippery with gore and beard spattered with tiny pieces of armoured shell, which had been pulverised by the pounding blows of the broad serrated blade.
The Priest was panting, his eyes wild.
Staring down, he said in a deep and solemn voice,
‘My brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against the darkness of the world!’
He took a menacing step forward.
The Sleeper snarled, its blood forming huge pools on the ground. It struggled to rise, claws raking the glass, but sank back again as The Priest stooped towards it. Their stares became locked, joined to one another by dark threads of understanding ...
‘...
Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God that ye may be able to withstand the evil day ...
’ The blade rose high above The Sleeper’s head, and the beast’s copper eyes lifted to follow the eerie glint of steel.
‘And having done all, to Stand!’
The blade plunged down, striking just above one eye.
There came a heavy crunch.
And the Sleeper died.
Panting, The Priest backed away and looked around the chamber, searching for more enemies. He then got down slowly onto his knees to retrieve his rosary beads.
He returned swiftly to his task. He cut through the alloy panel and reached inside, hand curling around a sheaf of metal documents. He stowed them beneath his robes, found his Glock, and with sandals leaving bloody imprints in puddles of death he moved to his Skimmer so that he could ascend from this pit.
Heneghan stared down from behind the facial shield of HIDSS as The Priest toiled across the sand. As he climbed into the Comanche’s cockpit she half-turned, glancing at his shredded and bloodstained robes; the dark splatters on his hands and face; the look of thunder in his features.
‘You been fighting again, holy man?’
‘The bugger tore my beads!’
‘I can see how that would be your greatest worry during a bout of violent combat,’ the pilot said softly, eyeing the vicious serrated blade, which dripped blood onto the floor of the Comanche’s cockpit.
The Priest’s gaze met Heneghan’s.
He was serious. Deadly serious.
‘It was an act of blasphemy!’ he growled.
‘Was it?’
‘The beads were my mum’s! Now - take me to Greece.’
Jam’s claw lashed out towards Carter’s face and the Spiral agent rolled swiftly to one side, rising smoothing to his feet and launching himself into the air. Both his boots connected with Jam’s triangular head, knocking the ScorpNex back a step. He gave a grunt and a deep hiss of surprise—
Carter landed and sprinted, arms still wired behind his body. Mongrel had produced a hidden knife from his boot and cut his own bonds ... now he cut Carter’s as Jam charged.
‘Don’t do this, Jam!’
Claws lashed out and Carter ducked, landing a savage right hook on Jam’s armoured head. He punched again and again, then dodged a blow by the ScorpNex and skipped to the left, boot lashing out in a powerful sidekick to connect with Jam’s chest. Jam caught Carter’s leg and tried to force him down but Carter flipped himself into a roll, boot hammering twice against Jam’s face as he kicked himself away and rolled fluidly back upright, despite his previous injuries ...
‘Jam, stop!’ he bellowed.
Jam halted, his copper eyes staring at Carter. Mongrel, who was watching almost paralysed, started to sidle towards Carter’s Browning and the sub-machine gun on the side benches—
‘You the enemy now.’
‘We were friends!’ snarled Carter. ‘Don’t fucking do this! I can help you.’
‘How?’
‘I don’t know ... but I don’t want to fight you, I don’t want to—’
‘Kill me?’ Jam chuckled with genuine humour. ‘Show me Carter, show me how you will kill me ...’
Jam leapt and Carter dodged again. Jam came down and spun in a blur, arm lashing out to smash Carter from his feet. Carter hit the ground hard, rolling to a stop and grunting, coughing and holding his chest where pain hammered through him with an intensity he had rarely felt before.
Carter rolled again and Jam’s armoured feet landed where his head had been, cracking the thick wooden floorboards which splintered and spat shards of wood into the air.
Carter got to his feet and attacked - launching himself at Jam who plucked him from the air and threw him across the room. He landed heavily, crashing into one of the bunk beds and sending it tipping over - and with sudden panic Carter realised that he was tangled in its strewn wooden slats—
Mongrel grabbed the sub-machine gun.
Growling, Jam charged as Mongrel opened fire. Bullets spat across the Op HQ as Jam swerved to one side, the fusillade tracking him—
And then the whole world seemed to shake with the boom of a devastating explosion. Shrapnel scythed the building and the ground shuddered. Mongrel ceased firing, smoke curling from the gun’s barrel—