Should Have Killed The Kid (28 page)

'Can–'

'No, I'm not going to fucking show you. Believe me, you're probably better off not fucking knowing. I imagine you saw Monty on his way out? Yeah, that's the way a lot of us go. Burning through our own fucking juices. I mean, look at me. I'm only twenty-four!' Marge guffawed laugher for far too long at the poor joke but at least some warmth leeched back into her voice.

Sally seemed to respond to it a little as well, her own voice didn't exactly warm but at least it dropped back from sounding like she was on the verge of attacking the old lady.

'Why does it...' the soldier stumbled, swallowed and tried again. 'Why does it need to be the... you know...'

'The kid? Well I suppose it doesn't have to be really. Anyone's blood can be used. Even animals if fucking necessary...'

What?
Dave's ears perked up at that and he felt his heart start to thud in his chest.
Did she just say...

'... Probably the only thing that'll work though. Human blood is more powerful. Young blood most of all. Young blood has not been thinned by life. It still runs thick with magic.'

Should have fucking known better, couldn't be that lucky,
Dave thought sarcastically, though disappointment did settle heavily on his chest.

'But everything's fucked. Out there, it's all fucked. What the fuck is the point? Seriously.'

Sums it up nicely,
Dave thought.

'Yep, that it is,' the old lady agreed, 'and don't go getting your hopes up or anything. I mean even if this works, it's only going to be the first step on a long, hard road.'

Worst pep talk ever,
Dave thought.

'All we're going to do is seal the fucking breech back up. It's not going to fix a single thing but at least it'll give us some breathing space. Give us a fucking gasp of a chance. Still, got to do something about all the fuckers out there. But, with the fucking gigantic dimensional rent still up and running, there's not much chance of that. Not with the constant reinforcements. We're pretty sure that we can destroy them. But there's no point making our move with them pouring out of there so quickly. At the moment, anything would make exactly fuck all difference.'

'Hang on. You
think
you can destroy them?'

'Well, missy, it's not like this has ever happened before. Most of the spells we have are pretty much theoretical. Though I think it worked pretty fucking well out there on the highway, wouldn't you say? I remember it saving your fucking arse.'

'But there are other portals.'

'Yep, they're holding strong but that won't last much longer. Lack of fuel if you haven't noticed.'

'So then...'

'What'd I fucking tell you about getting your hopes up? Things are worse here but the fuckers have made it across the ocean too.'

Dave felt a last little hope that he wasn't even aware had been inside him burst and die.

So there's no rescue from across the sea...
Dave wasn't sure he could feel any worse.

The old lady seemed to feel the need to twist the knife though.

'Don't get the wrong fucking impression here. This is genocide on a global scale.

Dave winced.
Weighed against that was it really so bad? What Monty wanted me to do? Was it that horrible..?

... Should have fucking killed the kid.

'There's only a few pockets left out there at the moment and from what I understood before the fuckers crashed the web, large scale governments have pretty much been fucked right up the arse.'

'Why are they doing this?' Sally didn't sound like she actually wanted an answer but Marge was all too ready to provide one.

'Fucked if I know. I repeat, since some of us don't appear to be listening. It's not like I fucking understand them. It has been millennia since there was contact and even then the things weren't like these creatures. Fuck, if you can see the pattern of what they are doing then you are a step ahead of us. It seems completely random. Leaving pockets of people alive. The way they're cutting through things. Some stuff completely demolished, other stuff barely touched. Look at Melbourne. It's in bad shape but they've levelled Sydney. As in gone, completely erased from the map. If any of it makes sense then feel free to explain it to me. The only thing I can think is that they're are resculpting the planet. I hate to head on back to the fucking tenant and landlord metaphor, but to me anyway, it looks like they are redecorating their apartment. Rearranging things for new tenants. Makes me think along the lines of forceful eviction. Sort of makes you wonder what we'd be making way for, doesn't it?'

Silence greeted the conclusion of Marge's speech. It drew on and on as they all pondered her words. To Dave it felt as though there was a concept at play that he wasn't quite grasping. He could feel it there tickling away but it was like his brain wasn't interested in fully understanding what was happening around him.

Maybe it's a survival thing,
he thought. It was easy enough for him to picture his head exploding as full comprehension dawned. The way Marge had described it just seemed so... offhand.

'But that's getting distracted from the task at hand. Also, it's really only fucking conjecture on my behalf... We need to be focused on what we know. And what do we know? Hmmm? We know what we need to do. We need to get that kid to the portal in Hent and get it sealed and then we can worry about all the rest later. What do you think?'

The silence that followed made the previous one seem positively brief.

Dave couldn't seem to stop swallowing as he nervously waited for the soldier to explode with self-righteous rage.

In his head he pictured her leaping at the old lady and destroying their last hope at fixing things with a headlock that snapped Marge's brittle neck.

'Have a drink, it'll help,' Marge added and the sound of rapid gulps filled the air followed by a gasp.

'Okay...' After another pause that seemed interminable, the soldier finally spoke up. A quiet voice that still managed to convey a healthy dose of self loathing. 'What else are we going to do? It's absurd but there's... nothing else we can do. Nothing, nothing, nothing...' The soldier repeated it softly as though repetition would somehow make the whole thing more palatable.

Dave found her words almost hypnotic and found himself mouthing along with them, the inevitableness and finality of them held comfort for him. Almost as though the decision was being removed from his hands. He felt a little of the tension that had built in his stomach start to leech away.

Naomi's voice took it as a perfect opportunity to make a reappearance.

So, just because you're forced to help kill a poor defenceless child, it makes it alright, does it?

Dave quickly rushed to quash it.

'So you understand then?' Marge's voice slipped up another notch of warmth and friendliness. Perversely the new tone had the complete opposite effect that it should have. It set Dave completely on edge and it took him a moment to realise why.

But when he did, his brief relief vanished in a heart thudding moment.

'So you understand what needs to be done?'

Her voice is too friendly...

'And you want to help?'

She's taking the piss.

'Excellent!' Marge's voice abruptly flipped back to the ice cold tone and Dave felt his stomach lurch.

No no no no no.

'Cause I was just going to get to that.'

No no no no no,
Dave tried to flip but his aching body hampered him. His muscles screamed and locked in place while he tried to yell a warning but only succeeded in unleashing a croak as he flopped around like a fish out of water.

'Cause I really need your help.'

'WHAT THE...' Sally shrieked, a shriek that died off into a scuffle and then a gurgling hiss that made Dave want to blubber.

'NO!' He finally found his voice moments before his flails spilled him onto the wooden floor and his protest cut off as the impact knocked the air from his lungs.

No!
His brain made up for the lack of vocalisation as he locked onto the image in front of him.

Sally's legs beat a frantic tattoo on the floorboards while she flopped about in the arm chair. Her eyes wide as her head whipped from side to side in skittish uneven motions. A strange combination of emotion flitted by in her eyes: confusion, anger, fear. All of them forcing the lids wide, showing more and more of the whites until Dave thought they might burst from their sockets. Her lips moved silently beneath, mouthing gibberish. And even further down...

The pulsing fountain of blood jetted through the fingers she held futilely clamped over the huge tear in her throat. It soaked down her front, sprayed across the floor, fell all around Dave in hot and coppery rain while Marge stood nearby watching, a glittering and blood-soaked blade held casually down by her side.

'WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?' Dave roared as he finally managed to suck in a breath.

Marge turned and wiped at her brow, smearing a streak of red directly across it.

'What?' she asked while behind her, Sally convulsed, pulsing out the last of her life blood.

* * *

The grin still creased Dean and George's face as George briefly scribbled on a bit of paper then slid it across to John. He read it over and cocked an eyebrow. 'Seems a very reasonable price,' John murmured and Jess felt excitement build that at last the interminable interview might be nearing an end. 'But I think I'm going to have to pass.' Jess's hope deflated.

'I'm sorry?' Much as they'd arrived, the smiles fled both men's faces in unison.

Jess himself stifled a sigh.

'I mean if there is some issue with the...' George started but trailed off.

'It is only a starting point,' Dean took up the thread. 'And whilst there are several mitigating issues that preclude too steep a discount, there is some room for leeway.

'No,' John said again and his grin briefly spread even wider across his face. Something about the way it stretched just a little bit further than it should have didn't sit right with Jess. His felt his heart beat a little faster as his uncle parroted John.

'No?'

'No.'

'No!'

All three of them got in on the act and then abruptly lapsed into silence.

'Can I ask wh–' George started after a long few seconds of sidelong glances. His words cut off into a yelp though. Jess didn't blame him. He, himself actually screamed as John abruptly burst into action.

The chair went flying again, only this time it didn't merely clatter to the floor. Instead it rocketed across the room and exploded into slivers on impact with the door. John's transformation took place in the split second Jess's eyes traced the chair's trajectory. It was so abrupt that it seemed like the man teleported into position by the table, his body bristling with spikes once more as he leant across the wood making a strange hissing noise.

It all happened so quickly that it took Jess a few seconds to realise the reason for the sudden movement but when he did, his previous scream turned into another. And then another. And another.

The end of John's wrists had exploded out into blossoms of meat and gristle in a spray of blood that had misted the papers on top of the desk and painted the far wall red. From the mess that had previously been his hands, long, twisted spikes of bone cork screwed forward. One had been for his uncle, Dean. One had been for George. They were now embedded into the wall behind the desk, the length that had passed through the two slumlords' heads coated in a thick syrup of blood and brain matter.

Both wore nearly identical open-mouthed expressions as they feebly kicked a few times. Their hands scrabbled at the arm rests of their chairs before finally giving in to the mammoth trauma and stilling.

Jess squeezed his eyes shut but when he opened them again, the horrific scene still appeared and he screamed again. Something he regretted as John's face seemed to pivot around one eighty, the bones of the man's neck grinding until his beaming visage greeted Jess. Still, he couldn't stop as he saw the way John's flesh undulated. Saw what looked like hundreds of worms wriggling beneath the skin.

'Please be quiet.' The request seemed so out of place juxtaposed with the carnage behind John. Jess couldn't have obeyed even if he'd wanted to. Particularly as more spikes ripped through John's skin and raced across to pierce the two dead men, pinning their corpses to their respective chairs.

He screamed even longer and louder until his voice blew out and even then he kept croaking and wheezing. In a blur of movement, John retracted the spikes and his uncle and George transformed into a whirlwind of flesh and blood that splattered across the dingy office, spackling every surface in a meaty layer of render.

'Come now, there's no need for all this racket.' John's body pivoted to face the same direction as his head and Jess felt his bladder let go. The hot liquid spread across his groin and down his pant leg as, behind John, the lumpy remains of George and his uncle started to lift from their brief resting place. The organic cloud swirling behind the advancing John like a storm gathering strength. 'There's nothing to be concerned about,' John said as the flesh and blood started to flow into his own body. 'Now that I've finally located such a remote spot I didn't want anyone being able to track me there. Sort of defeat the purpose, now, wouldn't it? And sadly, as good as these guys are, they do still insist on some paperwork and I can't be leaving any evidence behind now, can I?'

Jess bowels quickly followed his bladder as the last of the fleshy storm was absorbed into John's body and he took another step forward, spikes emerging and receding back into his flesh.

'But you don't have to worry.' John grinned and Jess felt a faint stirring of hope build. That he'd be spared. That he wouldn't suffer the fate of his uncle and his uncle's partner. He was already promising himself that he'd return to his mother a changed man; that the acting up was a thing of the past. That from now on he'd be the pinnacle of good behaviour.

Then the little fragile bubble of hope burst.

'... This won't hurt that much.' John smiled wider and tears tracked down Jess's cheeks as he saw the needle points the man's teeth had transformed into.

* * *