REVELATION: Book One of THE RECARN CHRONICLES (18 page)

Meanwhile Ray had lost conscious as the oxygen in his
incubator had been replaced with a vacuum. His skin had started to
swell and turn blue as he began to suffocate from within. His
natural instinct had been to take large gulps of air but there was
none, and so his lungs had burst. If he had been conscious he would
have felt his blood starting to boil.

The technician looked at the small video monitors in front of
him.

“Professor, I’m picking up activity in the alma region of the
brain. It looks like the adult’s soul will be leaving the body
imminently.”

The professor had separated the new-born baby’s umbilical cord
from its mother but had made no attempt to clean the infant. He had
clamped the cord, but only at the end where it was attached to the
baby. It was important that the baby should not die yet. He was
completely unconcerned with the health of the mother. In fact, once
the baby had been removed from her belly he used his scalpel to cut
her throat. He couldn’t abide the awful sobbing noise she was
making.

The baby was placed into the smaller incubator and the lid
closed. Ray Greenway was almost dead and the signals from his soul
were becoming stronger. As he breathed his last, an airlock door
was opened providing a small additional chamber for the soul to
enter.

“Professor, the soul appears to have left the
body.”

The soul had indeed left the dead body of Ray Greenway, having
forced its way through the pores of his blue-tinted skin, and was
looking for a new host. Sensors in the incubator showed that it was
moving around the transparent coffin although nobody could see it.
The scientists were only aware of its presence due to the unusual
electrical activity that was being detected at various points in
the incubator.

“Professor, it’s in the airlock.”

The technician pressed another button and the airlock door
quickly closed behind it, as air was pumped into the small tube
that linked the two incubators.

Over by the autopsy table, two men in red overalls dragged the
girl off the table and tossed her lifeless body into a plastic
lined trolley before wheeling her out of the room. Her soul had
left her body and was now free, seeking a suitable new host. When
it couldn’t find one in the laboratory it would disappear into the
atmosphere to widen its search.

A few seconds later, Ray Greenway’s soul was free from its
transparent prison. It had been released from the airlock into the
small incubator where it found a new host waiting patiently for its
new consciousness to arrive. The soul passed through the baby’s
pores with ease and settled inside the recently discovered alma
region of the brain of its new body.

Professor Ivanov looked anxiously at the technician

“Well?”

.“We’ve done it sir. We’ve done it. The baby has a soul. We
just transferred a soul into a new body of our
choosing.”

The professor should have been elated. He should have been
cheering or doing a jig or something. He had done something no
human had ever done before him; he had taken a dead man’s soul and
placed it into another body – a body that he had chosen. Instead,
he remained remarkably calm. He turned to two lab
orderlies.

“You, Jones, dispose of whatever his name was.”

Jones identified the body.

“Greenway, sir.”

“Yes, Greenway. You, Wolzenik or whatever your name is, you
can dispose of the baby. I have to go and report to the
Pindar.”

Whilst the professor headed towards Thomas McCall’s office,
Jones pushed the trolley containing its macabre cargo down the
corridor to the incinerator room. He opened the doors of the
incinerator room and gave the trolley a shove, letting it freewheel
inside, where it rolled to a halt next to the body of the young
girl.

The doors flew open and Wolzenik hurried in. Jones nodded at
the trolley and then looked at Wolzenik.

“I hope you put the baby out of its misery
properly.”

“Course I did. I grew up on a farm.”

Maurice was feeling quite settled now. He’d been with the
resistance for about eight months and he felt safe. He was working,
doing something that he was good at – accounting – and he was
actually feeling fitter thanks to the compulsory physical training
he undertook four days a week. It was a new experience for him,
he’d never been one for working out, and if he’d had a choice he’d
still have found an excuse to avoid it. In the beginning muscles
ached that he didn’t even know he had, but now he had become
accustomed to the regime and was actually feeling the benefit. He
would certainly never be a contender for Mr. Universe, but he felt
healthier than he had for a long time.

There was a knock on the door of his room.

“Maurice?”

“Just a minute, Tony.”

Maurice stopped preening himself in the full length mirror
that was attached to the inside of the wardrobe door.

“Hurry up, Maurice. The boss wants to see us –
now!”

Maurice wondered why the boss wanted to see him. He put on a
pair of jeans, a T-shirt celebrating the nearly completed Crazy
Horse Memorial in North Dakota, USA, and a pair of trainers, before
trotting downstairs to the study where he found Roberto logging
onto the computer. He waited a couple of seconds and then took a
seat as the silhouetted figure of the Businessman came to life on
the screen. The silhouette spoke, the transmission protected by the
same signal camouflage technology that Maurice had had installed at
his own house. For a moment his mind had started to drift off
towards his wife and children but the voice of the Businessman
wrenched him back to reality.

“Roberto, Antonio, Miguel, Maurice… good morning. I hope you
are all well.”

The four responded in a disorderly fashion that they
were.

“Gentlemen, let’s get right to the point. I have been reliably
informed by two trustworthy SIMPs that The Order has succeeded in
transplanting a soul from a dead human into a live baby. I know
that it’s hard to believe but my sources are extremely reliable.
The bad news is that one of these sources is believed to have been
compromised – you don’t need to know the details, just take my word
for it. I need you to go to a small town, New Milton, just outside
Bournemouth. I want you to meet one the SIMPs, a man called
Wolzenik. He’ll have with him a new-born baby. I want you to
extract the pair of them and take them to Bournemouth Airport where
a plane with full medical facilities will collect them and take
them to a safe hospital. Be aware that the baby is premature, but
Wolzenik is taking all measures possible to keep the baby alive and
comfortable.”

Tony cut in,

“Are we expecting any resistance?”

“Hopefully not but, although Wolzenik has been keeping as low
a profile as possible, we believe that he may be being watched.
Maurice, I want you to go along as well.”

“Me? But I’m just an accountant.”

“Yes Maurice, you’re an accountant. But I want an extra pair
of eyes on this one. Don’t worry, I’m not going to send you in to
take part in the actual extraction. We all know what happened last
time you got involved in something other than number-crunching.
You’d probably shoot the baby or something. All you have to do is
to look out for the boys and warn them if anyone unexpected arrives
on the scene.”

Maurice breathed an audible sigh of relief, although he was a
little hurt by the inference that he would mess things up again.
The Businessman continued.

“OK. We’ll do it after dark. I’ll contact Wolzenik and tell
him to expect you around 8pm.”

The image disappeared and the three brothers all looked at
Maurice. Roberto was the first to speak.

“Well, Maurie boy… looks like you’re going to see some
action.”

“The Businessman said I was just there to watch.”

“Well, technically, yes. But if you need to get involved…
well… you might have to get a bit physical. Still, now you know why
we’ve been making you work out so much.”

Maurice hoped that he would be able to get through the night
without getting too involved. He certainly didn’t want a repetition
of the cock-up at the footballer’s house. If they gave him a
pulse-gun tonight he’d make damned sure it was set to stun. He’d
already killed one more human than he had ever wanted to
kill.

Whilst the rest of the group spent the rest of their day
prepping themselves for that night’s mission, Maurice decided to
occupy his time with some light reading. He had several e-books on
his tablet and wished he could download some more. However, Miguel
had removed the components that allowed internet and Wi-Fi access
to all but essential services. Maurice complained but all Miguel
did was shrug his shoulders and give a wry smile. Maurice
understood why his brothers had given him the nickname ‘Silent
Bob’. No matter how much Maurice tried to get an answer from him
all he ever received was the shrug of the shoulders and the grin;
it was left to Tony to put Maurice out of his misery.

“Security.”

“Thank you Tony. Why couldn’t he tell me that
himself?”

“Probably didn’t want to…”

Maurice read for a couple of hours, and after lunch took a nap
for another couple of hours. He wanted to be fresh and alert for
his lookout duties later on. A loud knocking on his door woke him
up.

“Come on sleepyhead. Departure in sixty.”

“Sixty?”

“Sixty minutes. One hour. Three thousand six hundred seconds.
You’ve got one hour to get ready.”

Maurice took a shower to wake himself up properly. He left the
shower cubicle, wrapped a towel around his waist and trotted back
to his bedroom where he found a black jumpsuit and what looked like
a chainmail ski-mask, laying on his bed.

“What’s this?” he called out.

“It’s your kit for tonight.”

“This ski-mask looks a bit heavy!”

“Pick it up…”

Maurice picked up the mask and was astonished how deceptively
light it was. Its weight hardly registered as he draped it over his
hand. Roberto laughed.

“New issue. Very flexible, very light. Try it on…”

Maurice held the mask in both hands and pulled it over his
head. It was really very comfortable. Roberto, Tony and Miguel came
into the room. They didn’t want to miss this. Suddenly Maurice
yelped and the three brothers collapsed into a giggling heap. The
mask had developed a life of its own and was gripping Maurice’s
face. It felt like it was trying to suck his face off. Tony managed
to stop laughing.

“Don’t worry Maurice. It’s supposed to do that. It means it’s
almost impossible for someone to rip your mask off and leave you
open to identification.”

“It’s bloody uncomfortable. I feel like I’m suffocating. Plus
I must look like I’m wearing a gimp suit. ”

“Yep. You do.”

“It’s really uncomfortable.”

“Everybody feels like that at first. You’ll soon get used to
it.”

“How do I get it off?”

“Easy. Just pinch the material at the back of your head
between your finger and thumb, and the mask releases its grip.
Anyone trying to take your mask off won’t normally be so gentle.
It’s a bit like a stinging nettle. Except it’s the opposite really.
So it isn’t. If you grasp a nettle tightly it won’t sting you but
if you’re gentle with it, it will sting. You do the opposite with
this; grasp it tightly it’ll intensify its grip on you. Be gentle –
finger and thumb at the right place – and it comes off real
easy.”

Maurice followed the instructions that Tony had given him. The
mask did indeed just slide off his head back into his
hand.

At 7pm the garage door opened and the SUV with its cargo of
resistance members pulled out into the road. As the garage door
closed, Tony put more weight onto the accelerator pedal and the car
powered off into the distance. The journey didn’t take long – not
with Tony at the wheel – and just before 8pm the vehicle pulled
into the driveway of a rather unremarkable semi-detached house. The
three brothers got out of the car and rang the doorbell. Unlike the
rescue at the Self Termination Centre this mission would be better
served by using discretion and not drawing attention to themselves.
The front door opened and the brothers went inside the house.
Maurice wondered why they weren’t wearing masks.

Maurice felt uncomfortable. He was alone in the back seat of
the car and didn’t know what was going on in the house. What if
they needed him? Should he go and knock on the door? Why had they
not put their masks on, but insisted that he should put his on? He
decided that he should probably do as he was ordered; he should
stay in the car and keep a look out. A knock on the car window
startled him.

“’Ere mate, what are you up to? You’re not from around
‘ere.”

Maurice tried to shush him away, much as one might try to
shush away an over attentive stray dog.