The Stone Man - A Science Fiction Thriller (30 page)

Patrick’s arms were held stiffly his sides, his fists bunched up so hard that the veins stood out in his forearms, and the whites of his eyes were shot through with red as they bulged in their sockets. There was no blood—somehow—from the point where the Stone Man’s chest piece dug into his neck, and then suddenly it all seemed to stop apart from the deafening noise. The scene was frozen before us: Patrick’s neck and back impaled on the Stone Man’s chest, his body taught and screaming. The Stone Man standing still, impassive, unmoved. For a moment all movement ceased, except for the silently shouting mouths of various people inside the tent, with Straub’s superiors yelling right into her ear in a frenzied attempt to be heard, all of them noiseless under the audio barrage from outside. Numb with shock, I turned to see Paul pulling on his hair, screaming noiselessly at the plastic screen and hopping around helplessly on the spot. A thin plume of black smoke emerged from either side of the point where the Stone Man met Patrick’s neck, and then the chest piece began to withdraw. As it did, Patrick’s screams begin to choke off, and his eyelids fluttered spastically. They then closed, but he remained upright.

After a second or two, the chest piece pulled completely clear, and revealed a perfectly cauterised rectangular hole where the upper portion of Patrick’s spine used to be. The hole was charred, the solidified blood lining its walls burned black, but otherwise clean. The front surface of the Stone Man’s chest piece was still flat, the segment of Patrick presumably locked away within somehow. As it retracted, it split into two once more, and the roar that filled the air began to lessen until the chest piece was entirely within the Stone Man again. The surface of the Stone Man’s chest was then free of any sign that anything had ever come out of it.

The second the roar died, Straub’s voice could be heard, telling her units to stand by, stand by, but I wasn’t paying attention. The ringing that was now in my ears was deafening, but I wasn’t concerned about that in the least; I was watching Patrick, who still to my utter amazement stood upright, though his face was now slack and lifeless.

The Stone Man was immobile also, but the temperature was still close to freezing. If anything, it seemed to be getting worse, and even in all the chaos I could feel my fingertips starting to go numb. Somebody behind me shouted something about a rad spike, along with a number, and I noticed Paul crying beside me, shaking his head with his fists still tightened into his hair. For my part, I don’t remember thinking anything at that point. My brain had shut down. This was all too much, too much, and the fresh explosion of activity inside the tent now felt like needles in my back. Even so, I couldn’t take my eyes off that hole in Patrick’s body.

There was a very sharp, stinging sensation, like the flick of a wet towel but happening simultaneously all over my skin (I would later find out that it was due to a milliseconds-long temperature drop of another fifteen degrees) and then the Stone Man vanished before our eyes without a sound. People all around me immediately started shouting. I didn’t notice that it was no longer cold.

Patrick’s head flopped forwards onto his chest, still attached by the now-loose flesh of his neck, and then his body flopped onto the floor like a sack of meat. A medical team rushed to attend him, and I turned away and began to vomit helplessly.

*** 

Whilst all the resulting shouting and rushing chaos was going on, Paul and I had stood dumbly for ten minutes, not knowing what to do with ourselves, until we were suddenly and briskly escorted out of the tent and back inside the house. We sat like scolded children, stunned and trembling, until one of the soldiers’ walkies had buzzed and we’d then been led into the back of a waiting truck. Straub and her superiors had disappeared into the back of the tent almost immediately after Patrick’s death and the Stone Man’s subsequent vanishing, presumably to take charge of proceedings, and we hadn’t seen her give the order for us to be moved. We didn’t protest, regardless; I was still numb with shock, and Paul allowed himself to be marched along without a sound, eyes still red and head bowed low. He was almost unrecognisable.

We were driven for quite some time, maybe an hour, but we couldn’t tell where to as the back of the truck was covered with tarp. It was hot in there, even though the sky was now completely darkened over, and the heat combined with the presence of the two soldiers riding with us lent the whole experience an air of heavy oppression. Perhaps if I’d been more aware at the time, I’d have properly registered the expressions on the faces of the soldiers. These were battle-hardened men, trained men, but looking back I can see how they looked just as rattled as we did.

We arrived at our destination. It was a large, nondescript building, the outside lit by a single floodlight, with nothing visible in the darkened surroundings to suggest which part of the country we were in. We appeared to have pulled up at the back entrance. To this day, I don’t know where it was. I assume it was part of some military base, perhaps even a simple barracks. It certainly wasn’t a high tech MI5 affair, as you might expect; once inside, the place was functional and sparse, and looked like it had been built sometime in the sixties. The long, high-ceilinged hallway that we were led into was dark, apart from a few dim sources of light up ahead that streamed out of what looked like small office windows. Some people were clearly working late, as I could hear a printer or photocopier buzzing away in the distance.

We were led into a small room—not quite what you would call a cell, as it was more pleasantly furnished than that word would suggest—lined with faded carpet, and with walls covered in sky-blue paint. There were two cheap three-seater sofas facing each other, and Paul and I sat on one each without being instructed to do so. As the two soldiers filed out, Paul suddenly lifted his head.

“My wife,” he said, quietly, “she’ll wonder where I am. She’ll worry.”

The last soldier to leave hesitated in the doorway, and looked at Paul.

“Someone will be with you shortly,” the soldier said, and then left, closing the door behind him. Paul didn’t argue, and instead lay down on his back. I did the same on my settee. Despite the events of the last hour, we were both so damn
tired
. We were physically exhausted.

We lay there in silence for at least forty-five minutes, listening to occasional footsteps outside and distant mechanical noises, and after a while I thought that Paul had actually gone to sleep. I looked over; his eyes were in fact open. They looked haunted.

“You okay?” I asked, without thinking. I surprised myself. I was concerned. Paul let out a slow, steady stream of air from his nose in response, then he spoke.

“God knows,” he said, his voice cracked and dry. I wondered when he’d last had a drink of water, and then suddenly felt thirsty myself. I looked around. No sink. Paul fell silent again for a moment, and then looked at me.

“He didn’t have anything to do with any of this, Andy,” he said, his voice small and quiet. “He was just a normal guy. And they let it happen. They drugged him and led him out there like a sheep to be slaughtered. Sure, they didn’t
know
he would be, not for certain, they only
thought
he would be … but they would have done it regardless. It could have been you, or me. And I don’t think anyone’s going to get to know about it, either. They won’t tell anyone about this.”

I knew what he meant, but at the same time the thought came again:
What else could they have done? What other option was there?
I didn’t voice it though. I knew, despite his disgust, that Paul didn’t ultimately disagree. He just couldn’t get his head around it. Instead, as always, I turned to more practical matters.

“He was chosen, Paul. I don’t think it would have made any difference either way. I think it was pretty much inevitable. For some reason, it wanted his DNA or whatever … or a piece of someone with those genes.”

“So why not a finger? Or some hair? Or some fucking, some fucking
spit
or something?”

“I don’t know. Who knows what they want it for. I’m not sure we’ll ever get to know. It’s gone.”

I was wrong, as it turned out. We
would
get to know, and we would wish that we didn’t.

Paul suddenly stiffened, his face twisting for a moment, and then stared at me, hard.

“Did you see it? I mean, at the end. Did you see through its eyes when …” he gestured backwards with his head. I shook mine.

“No. I did just before, when it came up the street, but not at the very end, no.”

“What … what do you think that’s all about then?” Paul asked quietly, looking slightly scared. He’d transformed, at least temporarily, back into the child again, scared and confused. I didn’t think the usual, confident Paul was a front though; I thought he was simply both people, just as we all are never one person alone. Different sides of us, brought out by different situations, and we can never truly know who we will be from one day to the next. You can be one of them
more
than you are any of the others, and decide that is
you ...
but when you are caught unawares, the dice of your personality is rolled and the outcome is not given by any means.

“Well,” I said, feeling more tired than ever and shifting on the sofa. I felt strangely comfortable talking about these things now, a distance between myself and earlier events beginning to form in my head. Whether it was an effect of being elsewhere, or the pull finally stopping, or even shock, I was starting to feel numb to it. “It’s like I said earlier … and I think what we’ve just seen confirms it. Think about it. You build the Stone Man in such a way that you can see through its ‘eyes’. It’s unstoppable. So you set it off, and it has one purpose: to collect … you know … and bring it back. Okay? And if that’s what it’s designed for, then it makes even more sense to have a built-in remote camera, doesn’t it? As how else would you know when the job was done? How else would you know when to call it home?”

Paul nodded slowly, not taking his eyes from mine.

“And therefore you’d need to broadcast from the Stone Man to wherever you are,” I continued, “just as it would need to remotely detect Patrick. And just like you and I picked up on the latter, I think I could also pick up on the former.”

“Why not me as well, though?”

“Well, I had the signal clearer than you from the start. You could only pick up on me until we actually met, and touched. It’d make sense that I could pick up other things that you couldn’t.” Paul nodded again in response, and then lay back on his sofa.

“So …” he said, contemplating the ceiling, “the question is …”

“Who sent it?” I said, finishing the sentence for him. “I know. And based on everything we’ve seen, I reckon your idea probably isn’t too far off.” He looked at me again, intrigued.

“What, you think …” and just as he had done when sat in the pub, he pointed his finger upwards without a sound.

“I reckon so,” I said. “Let’s be honest, it’s certainly a lot more credible once you consider everything it’s done, all those things that are way beyond our understanding. Hell, throw teleportation into the mix and it’s suddenly pretty much the
only
option.” Paul was silent for a moment.

“Jeeeesus,” he finally said, quiet and awed, but in a way that suggested the other Paul was coming back, the usual Paul, perhaps returning because he was needed to get through the situation. I became numb, Paul became more alive; that was the difference between us. “What the hell do you do about that, eh?”

“Right now, I think they’re more worried about keeping it quiet,” I said, “and will probably worry about the rest later.”

“Which means we might be in trouble,” said Paul, arching an eyebrow. “Especially with you being press.”

“I don’t think so, for two reasons,” I said, propping myself up on one elbow. “One, this isn’t
The X Files
, and I don’t think any of those squaddies out there today were exactly black ops guys or the like. Look at Private Pike; I think they’re confident that standard military disclosure agreements will keep a lid on it, so I doubt we’re getting taken out the back or anything. But two, and this is the big safety net for us … they have no reason to believe that they’ve seen the last of the Stone Man.”

“You think it’ll come back?” asked Paul, bleaching slightly.

“I’ve no reason to believe it
won’t
. And someone had enough of a reason to send it in the first place; who says they only needed to do it once? These guys need us, Paul, as long as they think the Stone Man might come back. They’ll want to make sure we’re keeping quiet, sure, but they need us. We’re fine. Don’t worry.” I expected a response, but Paul didn’t speak for a while. Surprisingly, he started gently shaking his head.

“What?” I asked, slightly annoyed. He turned to me.

“They needed Patrick, too,” he said, quietly. “Look how he ended up.”

I didn’t have a response, but with perfect timing, the door opened and one of the two soldiers came back in.

“This way, please,” he said, pulling his rifle against his chest to open up the doorway for us to pass through. Paul and I exchanged a glance, and then did as we were told. We were led further down the previous hallway, passing the small, fogged-out windows on the way and hearing the sounds that for all the world could have been coming from any office in the country. We were taken through the double doors at the end of the corridor, which led us into a second, much shorter hallway with only three doors in it; two on either side, and a more grandiose-looking one in the centre, with an additional guard already stationed in front of it. It was fairly clear where we were headed.

After knocking, and hearing a muffled response from within, one of our guards opened the door and led us through. We were now in the more pleasant, but no less intimidating surroundings of what appeared to be an office. Adorning the walls were several maps, and although the flooring was more luxurious (sporting what looked like an almost-new, thick blue carpet) and the several pot plants had been dotted around the room in an attempt to give it a more homely feel, the walls were still covered in the same faded paint that we’d seen in the main corridor, and the strip lighting above cast a harsh glare onto everything. A very large oak desk sat in the centre of the floor, upon which we could see several framed certificates and a few field photos of Brigadier Straub. The latter was unsurprising, as Straub herself was seated behind the desk, waiting for us. She didn’t stand as we entered.

“Good evening, gentlemen, sorry for keeping you waiting,” she said, gesturing to the two empty seats that were already placed in front of her desk. She turned to our guards. “Wait outside, please. You’ll be called if necessary.” They saluted and left, passing another, previously unseen man who was coming the other way. This guy was perhaps only a year or two older than myself, and dressed in civilian clothing: shirt and tie, black trousers and shoes, and the now-familiar laminated ID on a lanyard around his neck. His hair was slicked back, and that, combined with his old-fashioned glasses, made him appear more senior than he really was. The bags under his eyes looked dark, and his face was slightly red. This was clearly a man who had not slept properly for several days, and his breathing was slightly laboured. In his hand was a tablet PC.

“Doctor, grab a chair from over there please and join us,” said Straub, picking up and glancing at a piece of paper in front of her before turning back to us. The man she’d addressed as Doctor dragged over a metal office chair and placed it next to us on our side of the desk, sitting down without looking at either Paul or myself.