The Relic Keeper (23 page)

“And now it’s the other way round,” Mathew noted.

“Yes, maybe it is. Perspectives change, but not human nature. Perhaps that is what your message to me is.”

“Are you religious then?”

“Not really. Why do you ask?”

“Well, the only people I’ve heard talk like that have been people like, well like Deon.”

“I have a set of beliefs and ideals, but I’m not really religious. Very few people today are,” Rei explained. “Deon and people like him are the exception. He had a rough childhood from the things he has said and I think he takes some comfort from his God, but he’s easily influenced. I really don’t understand all that business he was involved with before the massacre. But like many people today he has trouble reconciling what he believes in with the world around him. I think that leads him to be confused and keeps him away from other people. If he just lets go a little and, how did they phrase it in the twentieth century? ‘Lightened up.’ If he did that he’d better understand himself. He’s looking for answers to his life, but he’s waiting for some reason to his existence to leap in front of him and show him why he is here. He needs to look at himself more and find his own reason for being. Deon sees God in every burning bush, but he fails to notice the forest fire.”

They sat in silence for several more minutes. Not talking, just letting their thoughts meander through their minds in the warm late night. The moon cast some light, and in the distance was the red-orange glow of a city, quietly half-asleep. No owls, foxes or other nocturnal beasts made themselves known to the pair as they sat in an open field in the far side of the twenty first century.

“What will happen?” asked Mathew eventually.

Rei looked across and her pale gaze made Mathew feel less anxious before she even spoke.

“We’ll find your daughter, piece together what has happened to your family and then get you out of the country as we have arranged. You have to be prepared that she may not want to come. You have been gone a long time. You may be able to return to England one day, but we need to get you to a safe place first. Once we are out of England I can arrange transport to Japan. You should be there within two weeks.”

“What if something happens? What if Deon doesn’t join us.”

“Then we will make another plan. Whatever will happen will happen. But there is no reason that we should fail. Now, try and get some sleep.” Rei picked herself off the ground and started to walk away.

“By the way,” he called after her.

“Yes,” she said turning and smiling.

“What message do you have for me?”

“I don’t know, only you can answer that.” Then she added with a laugh: “Maybe my message to you is not to antagonise Philip too much before he kills you.”

Mathew lay back and fastened the sleeping bag around him. It was warm and comfortable, despite the thinness of the material. He had been through hell and was still alive, he told himself, and Rei was right, what could go wrong? Sleep made him think of death now, although it had never done so before he undertook the suspension. A series of possible outcomes to the events that they’d planned started to crawl through his mind as very gradually he let himself sink into a much-needed sleep. His c-pac beeped once to show that another update from the parent machine had been received. Mathew was already half asleep and didn’t acknowledge the note. Had he listened to it Mathew would have been puzzled that Deon was reporting an unexpected visitor.

“Hello Brother Deon,” said the familiar voice as the door opened.

Deon stood in the doorway, looking surprised at the guest who had arrived unannounced at his apartment. He stood aside to let the visitor into the room, all the time wondering how anyone knew where he was. He had been constantly busy since Mathew, Rei and Philip had left the night before. He’d watched them leave the block and checked the watcher to ensure that they exited the building without incident. It had been early enough in the evening for their departure to be uneventful, but this was a bad neighbourhood, and he liked to check, so he kept a vigil as they headed into the city. As he watched them walk on the screen that shimmered while it was projected into the air, he had speculated whether he was right not to go with them. While it was true that the four of them would attract more attention, and also that someone might recognise him, especially now that his face was being broadcast in relation to a crime he knew nothing of, he also knew that he understood the Roamers better than any of the others. They had customs and traditions that were unique and values that differed to the rest of society, that went back decades. He had a responsibility to Mathew, and he hoped that his mission would be guided to help him make the right decisions.

Deon had quickly started work on scheduling the next phase of the journey. He knew some people in the south still and spent a little time setting up a new identity for himself so that he could contact them without being noticed. He managed to find a series of boats headed across the channel, and narrowed down his search so that he had a choice of several commercial ferries or a couple of private vessels that were officially involved in moving personnel to and from the aquacultural fields off the south coast, but in actual fact dealt in transporting anything across the water – at the right price. The main items moved were small firearms and contraband alcohol, but it was not at all uncommon for people to wish to move in or out of the country undetected. For a fee they could keep any questions at bay, the only problems he could foresee were that either Mathew or himself would be recognised. But he doubted anyone would be keen to report Mathew, and who would they tell anyway. As for himself, he would just have to trust in the greater scheme of things and hope that few smugglers would be willing to contact the police. He arranged for a choice of crossing and left this open for a last minute change of plan should it be required.

As he worked on his arrangements Deon became increasingly focused on the ethervision screen that floated in front of him. In the far distance he could hear people outside arguing and shouting in apartments down the corridor. Fights and attacks were common here and he hardly ever noticed them anymore, not since James Peacock had hammered at his door as his life dripped away from him in the corridor. Today though, some of the voices from outside seemed nearer. It was almost as if they were in the room with him, and he looked up several times for the source of the sounds, and even checked to see if his c-pac was receiving incoming calls, but there was no one there.

“Deon,” called a voice. He looked around. It had definitely called him by name, but there was no physical entity to the voice. It came again, calling his name from the air.

“Who’s there?” he called back, alarmed. The room swam into a confusion of blurred colours and the voice and the screen remained his only point of attention as the fog around him began to form.

“Deon, you know who I am.” He stared at the ethervision screen, blank but for lists of sailing times. He was on a mission and was being addressed by name from nowhere. This could be the aid he had needed and waited so long for.

“Deon, you are tired. You are in trouble. You need to rest. You may rest forever if you want. You know how to rest, Deon. End your mortality. End your life here, Deon. End your critical life.”

“He’s fucking shit,” a second voice added. Deon looked around, but still saw no one, he just heard the words resounding in his ears. “Deon, he’s a cunt. He’s a cunting, cocksucking fucking piece of shit. Who cares about him? No one does, ’cos he needs to die. He’s a wanking, motherfucking arse. The scum that can do no good. Those other three are better off without this cunt. That’s why they left. If he was with them he’d fuck it up. He fucks everything up.”

“I don’t. Leave me alone,” he screamed.

“He thinks he can help, but he’s too shit to be of help. He’s not critical. He’s just a wanking cock, a cunt, fucker, lonely, useless cunt. CUNT!”

Deon screamed at the voice while the first one carried on talking directly to him, always suggesting that he could rest forever. He clamped his hands over his ears, then clenched them into fists, flailing blindly, but the voices remained loud and obtrusive, more so than ever before. He staggered about the room, his eyes shut and tears pouring from them, and then, suddenly, the voices stopped, and he was again sitting alone in front of the screen. He looked at his hands and saw the red imprints his nails had made on his palms. He looked at his hands for a long while. The marks were almost like stigmata on them. And now all was quiet. There was no sound at all either outside or in the room. He sat still for a long while. Although he had no sense of the passing of time he remained on the floor for nearly two hours while the fog slowly dispersed. Then he heard something outside. A rap at the door. Directly on the door, too, not using the intercom system, or contacting him first through the c-pac. Someone was actually knocking at the door, like people had done years ago to attract attention. Like James Peacock had done as he lay outside dying. The knocking remained persistent. He waited but it did not cease, and when he checked the watcher he could see a shadowed figure in a large coat and hat. He put a message onto the c-pac:

“I have a visitor. Someone has come to the apartment.” He opened the door and stood astonished before the person waiting for him on the other side.

“Hello Brother Deon,” said the familiar voice as the door opened.

Mathew awoke with a start as the noise of the bustling camp increased. Engines were revving and the travellers were cramming their lives into the fleet of trucks. Karl was shouting at the men to prepare their vehicles and the women and children were variously taking what they needed and throwing out what they didn’t.

“We’re leaving in 10,” said Karl to Mathew, ignoring Rei, who was already packed and prepared to leave.

“How far can we travel today?” Rei asked.

“About half of the way that yous want to go,” replied Karl. “We’re low on fuel and need some supplies, so we’ll stop in about 20 miles at a place I think that I can get some. Then we’ll make a camp at about sixteen hundred and drop yous off about ten the day after.” And with that he was gone to shout commands at the other men and organise the six large trucks into a convoy.

Mathew sat with Rei in the second vehicle; Philip was in the rear of the one behind it working on some notes. The almost familiar Berkshire countryside rolled past them as they made their slow way west along what Mathew supposed had once been the M4, although now it was a rough and uneven, albeit wide, road. Every now and then they passed abandoned trucks and cars along the side of the road. Some of them looked familiar to Mathew; many of them didn’t. The day was already warm and dry, which eased their route, but made the cab of the truck hot. Their driver was a man named Shane, who was both short and huge. His belly almost touched the truck’s steering mechanism and he sang, not quite to himself, as he drove, glancing up at his passengers as he came to the more bawdy parts of his song. He smiled often, and spoke little, and smelt of engine oil and grease.

“We’re stopping soon,” said Shane, although how he knew this Mathew and Rei couldn’t fathom, and with that he drove the truck to the left of the road and up a dirt track passed a small hand-painted sign that read, ‘Clifton Farm. Private. No unauthorised entry. Owner armed.’ Mathew looked at Rei, who smiled reassuringly back at him, disguising the fact that she was beginning to question this method of transport. Rei had a bad feeling about the farm but said nothing; she merely rested her hand on the handle of the small nail gun she still had concealed in the bag in her pocket.

Aaron ran a finger across the table in Deon’s room and looked disapprovingly at the clean line he left through the dust that dwelled there. “So this is your London hideaway, eh?”

“I’ve been using it since I left Unit. I’ve had a job in a hospital, helping people.”

“Yeah, I know. You’ve been quite hard to trace, although I suppose that was deliberate.”

“I’ve needed to keep to myself. I’ve been featured on a broadcast by the police. Me and Nasreen, they think we had something to do with what happened, and a bomb that went off. Thing is, both events nearly killed me, but they think I done them.”

“Yes, you’ve certainly been drawing attention to yourself – for someone who’s trying to keep their head out of site. But you weren’t involved in the bombing were you?”

“No, I never had nothing to do with none of it, you know. None of it. But I’ve been trying to work out what I have to do and I have gotten my new role. I have a job that needs to be done here now.”

“What job, Deon?” asked Aaron.

Deon remained cautious. There was no reason to refuse to divulge to his former colleague what he was doing, but he knew that the fewer people who were aware of Mathew and the plan to move him out of the country, the easier the situation remained.

“So what’s the job?” Aaron repeated, seemingly slightly irate at Deon’s taciturn behaviour.

“It’s nothing really important. I’m just helping one of the patients at the hospital.”

“The Walden Centre?”

Shit! How did Aaron know where he’d been working? But then there was no reason to hide things from him. “Yeah, I work there and I’m helping one of the patients that I’ve met. He had an accident and needs some help adjusting.” Which wasn’t exactly a lie, and as long as he could change the subject Aaron would have no reason to enquire further into the clinic. “How about you? Where have you been?”

“Well, Deon, I suppose I was fortunate not to be at Unit when the calamity struck, and since then I’ve been trying to work for Jesus and aid the truth. I have been in God’s service. There is much to be done, you know.” Deon nodded, yeah, there must be lots to be done.

“Of course, out of each situation, however bad, we can take something positive. I’m certain that we can rise like a phoenix, Deon.” Aaron looked up theatrically as if delivering a sermon. Deon wasn’t sure what a phoenix was, but he decided that this was not the time to ask. “The deaths in Unit have left us an open wound,” continued Aaron, “but also this has exposed our enemies.”

“What enemies? I don’t understand.”

“People like us, Deon, we have a job, a mission; more important than helping in hospitals or working with the poor. We are like an army. Remember how Caroline would say that we are the ground force, the troops of God, misunderstood, but ready to fight for our Saviour if we were called?” Deon listened intently, trying to concentrate on the words and not allow his mind to wonder. He felt his peripheral vision narrow and felt strangely that Aaron was the only thing he was truly aware of. He nodded regularly to show his interest, aware that the mist was rising. Aaron continued: “We need to take up arms against the people who perpetrated this attack on innocents. It is not that we take revenge, but that the evil people of the world should be eliminated to allow the good to rejoice in all that is pure and divine. I know that you’ve been tired and stressed, Deon. You’ve been waiting for a sign of what action you should take now. I expect you think that Mathew Lyal was that sign, don’t you?”

Deon was thrown. “I helped him. I felt I had to.” What did Aaron know about Mathew? Where was this all going?

“That’s right. You were drawn to Mathew Lyal because of his situation. But he is a conduit, Deon, a channel. God does not work through Mathew Lyal, he has used his unique qualities to attract you, and that has allowed us to find you and guide you to your real mission. Now because of Lyal there’s going to be a discussion on the ethics of cryopreservation. But Lyal himself, he’s not your real mission.”

Deon was confused. “He isn’t? What is my real mission?”

“Working with us, Deon, to re-establish the way to worship Jesus. This country is corrupt and overrun with false religions and idols, but if you come with us we can change that.” He took hold of Deon’s hand and tugged him lightly, stepping into the corridor and leading Deon away. “Come with us right now and we’ll help with the crusade for truth.” Why did that phrase sound so familiar, Deon thought. This was Aaron and he would need to accompany him, he obviously needed Deon’s help, and there was no reason not to go. But he had not finalised everything he was doing. Deon tried to think. What was it he had been doing? Something to do with Mathew, but his thoughts were confused and random. Whatever it was, it could be done later. He did what he always did when he was confused; he would leave a message for himself on his c-pac. As they waited outside the block where Deon had lived for the past few months he felt for the c-pac, and when Aaron was out of earshot trying to get a cab, he left a simple message for himself to retrieve later. “Aaron arrived, left with him. Still to finish job. Crusade for truth.” He wasn’t sure why he felt the need to do this in such a clandestine manner, or why he’d said the final sentence, but he felt that it needed to be done.

“Do you have everything you need Brother Deon?”

“Yes. Wait, I need something.” Deon rushed back to the apartment. He needed something, but what was it? He looked at the box of relics in the corner, the bottles on the shelf, the clothes heaped into a pile. He thought he saw the grey cat in the corner of the room, but he couldn’t be sure if it was there or not. Then the mist descended and swirled around him. It moved across his vision, leaving a single track free, down which Deon looked. And there, in his glory, the Archangel Michael came flying towards him on wings like glass. The angel alighted in front of him, and pointed to the hole in the wall. Deon grabbed the reliquary, and stuffed it into his backpack, then left not even bothering to shut the door. He wouldn't be returning. He went to look back at the angel, but a story of the perils of looking back stuck in his mind, and he ran to the street.

Seeing nothing of the mighty city that surrounded him he climbed onto the back seat of a three-wheeled cab and headed off with Aaron, all the time wondering who else was involved in this mission. He wondered if Michael had stayed to watch him leave.