Blood Water (11 page)

'We'll carry him to my car,' Waites said, getting to his
feet. 'Come on. You guys grab an arm each. I'll take
his legs.'

Sean and James took hold of the man's arms gingerly,
watching his mouth in case the creature decided to
make another break for freedom. They turned him over
and lifted him, surprised by how heavy he was. Sean
watched him carefully as they carried him towards the
steps: his head was lolling to one side, his mouth open.
Was that a gasp? There were also red, bleeding sores
on the back of Titus's neck. Sean wondered what the
creature was planning to do at that moment. Would
it stay inside the headmaster until it saw a chance
to escape, or was it intending to wait until it had
one of them alone before emerging and attacking?
Either way, Sean didn't want to be alone with it. As
they negotiated the steps, he nearly lost hold of Titus's
arm, and glanced at Waites. However, all the teacher's
attention was focused on Titus's mouth.

'Right, guys, careful now. I'll try and open the door.
Turn him round . . . God, I can hardly see through this
thing. Hang on, put him down a second. I've got a
better idea.'

He took off the face guard and put it on Titus,
securing it as tightly as he could. Sean and James
removed their face guards too.

'Right, that should stop it from getting out. We'll tie
him up properly at the centre. Come on.'

They picked up the body again and slowly turned
so that Waites could shoulder the door open. As they
passed through, the doors banged twice against the headmaster's
body. They carried him through the hallway
and out into the car park. The rain seemed to have eased
slightly, but the path was covered in water, and when
James accidentally stepped onto the grass, it was like
stepping into a bog.

'My car's on the far side,' Waites said.

'That figures,' James said, already showing signs of
tiring.

They splashed across the car park until Waites told
them to stop.

'Right, just put him down gently while I get the car
open,' he said.

They laid him down in the water; his face was paler
now, almost luminous in the dark, but with more sores
visible on his forehead and cheeks. Waites took out
his car keys and unlocked his old Vauxhall Corsa,
opening a back door so that they could manhandle the
headmaster inside.

'One of you will have to sit back here with him,'
Waites said.

Sean and James both stared at him, horrified, neither
one willing to volunteer.

'Come on, we don't have time—'

'All right,' James said. 'I will.'

'No, I will,' Sean countered.

'I'll do it,' James insisted firmly.

'No!' Sean was adamant now, his fear gone, his desire
to protect his brother stronger.

'James,' Waites said, handing over the car keys, 'you
drive. I'll sit in the back with our friend here.'

The brothers didn't argue. They lifted, pulled and
shoved the headmaster into the vehicle, trying to
manoeuvre him into something resembling a sitting
position, then got in themselves; Waites was as close
to his door and as far from the unconscious man as
possible. He knew that thing was still alive and kicking
inside the man's body, and he was already panicking at
the idea of what would happen if it managed to 'jump
ship' again.

James started the engine, flicking the front and rear
windscreen wipers on. Sean buckled up his seat belt
and looked in the rear-view mirror. He could only see
Waites's profile, but it was enough to tell that he was
very anxious and uncomfortable. Titus's head was lolling
back on the seat, his mouth wide open behind the mesh
of the face guard. Sean imagined the black slug shooting
out and oozing through the mesh, shredding itself then
somehow miraculously re-forming and darting towards
the back of his head. How much contact with the
thing did you need before it killed you? he wondered.
Did you merely have to touch it, or did it have to be
inside you? And how long before it was able to regain
control of the headmaster's body? If it did so while
they were in the car it could be disastrous. As James
reversed the car out of its space, Sean tried not to dwell
on such things.

The car sent wave after wave of water across the car
park as they moved towards the road. Unsurprisingly
there were no other vehicles: everyone was either at
home or waiting out the weather somewhere or helping
others get out of harm's way. This time James took the
back road to the study centre, hoping that the water
wouldn't be too high.

'So what do you know of this Sally?' Waites asked,
trying to take his mind off his fellow passenger. 'What
did you say she did at the centre?'

'Well, I'm not really sure,' James said, peering ahead
into the rain and darkness. 'I know she helped Dr
Morrow quite a bit so she must be into marine life, but
she kept snakes and things too. Perhaps we'll find out
when we get there.'

'Well, whatever it was they were doing, Morrow used
his last few moments on this earth to point us to it.
Hopefully we can rid ourselves of this . . . thing before
it does any more damage. Jesus . . . how the hell are we
going to explain the mess at the school?'

Neither James nor Sean could think of a reply.

'I don't know,' Sean said after a while. 'But they'll
realize it was an infection of some kind. I mean, it
doesn't exactly look like murder.'

'No.' Waites looked out of the window, wishing it
was light again, but knowing there were many hours of
darkness still to come.

'God, it feels like this is the end, you know?
Everything's happening at once,' James said as he slowed
down for a bend in the road. It was unlikely there would
be other traffic around, but he wasn't taking any chances.
The rain blocked out any other sound, and as the car
made its way along the waterlogged country lanes,
the occupants could almost imagine they were alone in
the world.

'Nearly there now,' James said, turning to Sean after
what felt like an eternity.

Sean was peering out at the road ahead too – what
he could see of it at least. He hadn't looked behind for
a couple of minutes now, but when he happened to
glance in the mirror again, what he saw made him
cry out.

The headmaster's body was still sitting slumped, his
head lolling backwards and moving slowly from side to
side, but his eyes were now open.

Sean's cry caused James to lose concentration for a
second, the car swerving across the road. 'What is it?'
he asked, still straining to see the road ahead.

'He's awake!' Sean said, eyes glued to the mirror as
Titus slowly lifted his head.

'Oh, shit,' Waites said. 'Move it, James!'

'We're nearly there, just round—'

But it was too late. With an unearthly groan, Titus
raised his hands towards Waites's neck. The teacher was
surprised by the headmaster's unnatural strength. The
man was panting in his face now, and Waites expected
to see something wriggle from his mouth and try to
fight its way through the face guard.

'Here it is,' James shouted desperately. He swerved
off the main road a little faster than he should have
and started down the winding drive towards the lake
and the study centre. The car rose and dipped over the
bumps and potholes, throwing the occupants around.

'Oh God,' Sean heard Waites mutter behind him. 'I
can see it.'

Waites started screaming and struggling with Titus,
desperately trying to keep their mouths apart to stop the
creature from switching host. James was also panicking,
glancing in the mirror, then looking over his shoulder.
It was Sean who noticed first that the car was moving
dangerously close to the edge of the road, which was
raised above the fields on either side. Sean cried out as
James turned the wheel hard to the right, but it was
too late.

The vehicle left the road, veered onto its side, the
wheels churning the mud and sending it flying up
behind them, then flipped over, rolling twice before
settling back on its wheels with a loud, metallic moan.

Sean's head was pounding. He'd half expected to pass
out – that was what people did when they were in a
car accident, but apart from being thrown about and
bruising his shoulder, he was fine. But his head was
pounding from the whiplash. It was like he'd been
standing next to a loudspeaker on maximum volume
for an hour. He felt like crying, the pain was so bad.
He turned to his brother, who was just sitting there,
his hands back on the wheel, staring through the
windscreen in shock.

'Are you OK?' he asked.

'Yeah, I think so. Must have hit my head on something
though. I feel all right . . . Jesus, this car must
have been made before airbags were invented. We were
lucky.'

A back door opened and Sean heard Waites
scrambling out. He and James got out too and the
three of them congregated behind the vehicle. The car
was a wreck. Three windows had shattered, one rear
wheel had been crushed by the weight of the chassis, a
headlight was missing, parts of the frame had buckled
and there was a large dent in the roof. The one functioning
headlight illuminated the area around them, though
the interior of the vehicle was still in darkness. Sean
thought he could see Titus, sitting bolt upright again,
facing straight ahead. He looked at Waites.

'Did it . . . ?'

'What? Get me? No, of course not.' Waites wiped
water from his face and spat, not taking his eyes off
the car.

James glanced at him uncertainly.

'What? I'm telling you, it didn't get me. Look, the
face guard is still on, you can see.'

'So what do we do now?' James asked, still testing his
limbs to see if anything had been injured.

'We need to get him into the centre. How far
is it?'

'It's just down there,' James said, pointing along the
road.

'OK then. I'll have to knock him out. We'll drag
him . . . Once we get him inside—'

He was interrupted by the sound of a car door
opening. Sean wasn't sure how much of the water in his
eyes was rain and how much was tears from the pain, but
through it all he could just make out the door swinging
lazily open; first one foot emerged, then the other, very
gingerly. It reminded him of his grandfather – though
this man was barely fifty years old. Titus reached behind
his head and deftly undid the straps of the face guard
before anyone could stop him. He threw the mask down
and smiled. His eyes were the worst thing of all. They
were wide and staring.

'Well, well. What a fix we've got ourselves in.'

'Shit . . .' Waites murmured.

'What now?' James whispered, though his words
were lost in the rain.

'Why don't we go into the centre?' Titus said; he
looked like a zombie. 'We're all terribly wet. Wouldn't
want to catch something. Hmm?'

Sean and James exchanged incredulous glances. This
was already a situation none of them knew how to
handle, but now Titus, or rather the thing inside him,
was talking quite normally. They didn't take their eyes
off the man as he looked around.

'This is familiar,' he said, taking a step forward. The
others all took a step back. Noticing this, the headmaster
chuckled. 'Oh come on, there's no need to fear
me. We can all be friends. Besides, there's three of
you and only one of me. I'm not stupid enough to try
anything.'

'You'd better not,' Waites said, reminding himself
that he was talking to the creature, not the headmaster.
'If we have to kill Titus to get to you, we will.'

'Kill Titus?' The creature smiled again and mulled
things over. 'You're really prepared to kill this innocent
man? How cold. Although, to be honest, he is already
dead: destroying his body will make little difference
to him now. As for killing me, well . . . I'm only trying
to survive. Isn't that what we're all doing?'

'We don't normally murder innocent people to do
it.'

'Survival doesn't discriminate. You do what you have
to do. I can't help it, it's something I have no control
over. I don't deliberately kill. I have no wish to harm
anybody.'

'I don't believe you,' Waites said.

'Me neither,' Sean said. 'What do you want?'

'What do I want?' Titus repeated, as though
genuinely considering the question. 'What do I
want . . . ?' He was staring at the ground now, but after
a few seconds he looked back up at them, smiled, then
roared and charged at them, his hands outstretched,
grasping for them, murder once more in his eyes.

This time Waites was ready for him. At the last
moment he stepped to one side and put out his right
foot. The headmaster had no time to avoid it; he
flew forward into the mud. Waites rushed across, turned
him over and punched him hard in the face. The headmaster
was out cold again. Waites undid and pulled
off his tie.

'What are you doing?' Sean asked.

'Might be a bit more effective than that face guard.'
The teacher wound the tie round the headmaster's
mouth twice, securing it behind his head in a double
knot. 'There, that should keep the little bastard in there.
Come on, guys, help me get him up.'

They lifted the headmaster, this time with Waites
taking one arm, both brothers the other, and dragged
him along, his feet making two troughs in the
mud. They struggled up the hill and onto the pitted
road, where they stopped briefly to catch their
breath. James looked back at the car: he hadn't
locked it, but no one was going to be able to drive
it away.

Sean glanced at the tie covering the headmaster's
mouth and wondered if it was strong enough to prevent
the parasite escaping. They dragged their captive
towards the study centre, its lights just visible through
the darkness. Sean kept looking at the gag – it seemed
to bulge outwards every now and then, but perhaps it
was just his imagination.

At the car park they stopped for another breather.
Although there were three of them, the headmaster
was a large man, and his clothes were heavy with water
and mud. When they'd got their breath back, they
picked him up again, dragging him into the reception,
where a film of water covered the linoleum floor.
They dumped Titus on one of the benches, closed
the front door and stood there, panting.

'OK,' Waites said. 'Let's go to Sally's office, James,
and try not to drop him . . . We don't want him
waking up.'