Department 19: Zero Hour (26 page)

“What’s your point, Lieutenant?” asked Turner. His eyes were still narrowed. “Where are you going with this?”

“My point is that I think outrage is a reasonable response to what the public is only now just starting to find out,” said Kate. “But not for the reasons they think. As you said, it’s not going to be long until some vamp gives an interview or goes on TV and the public realise that they aren’t all monsters, not all sadists and murderers, that most of them are just normal people who live similar lives to them. And when they do, there’s going to be a wave of outrage that makes the people in the forest with their signs look like the mildest inconvenience.”

“Explain,” said Turner, although Kate could see from his expression that he already knew where she was headed.

“Members of this Department have destroyed thousands of vampires over the years, sir, probably tens of thousands. Men and women who were killed
just because they were vampires
, not because of anything they’d actually done, any crimes they’d actually committed. No charges, no trials, just a T-Bone stake through the heart and some carefully worded lies for their families. And we’re still doing it, sir, every night when the squads go out on Patrol Respond. It’s a necessary evil, and I have no doubt that we’ve saved at least as many lives as we’ve ended, but none of that is going to matter. This is what Larissa warned us about when she came back from NS9, sir. To the public, this is going to look like mass murder, pure and simple.”

Turner put the files he was holding back on to the desk. He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples and forehead with his fingers, then opened them and smiled gently at Kate.

“You agree with her, don’t you?” he said, his voice low. “You think Larissa’s right.”

“I don’t know,” said Kate. “I think there’s truth in what she says, but then I think about Alexandru and Valeri Rusmanov, and all the other monsters I’ve seen with my own eyes, and I don’t know. I don’t think destroy on sight is the right SOP, but I don’t have a better solution either. I think a vampire prison would be too difficult to hide, not to mention incredibly dangerous, and, until Lazarus finds a cure, I can’t think of any other alternatives. But it troubles me, if that’s what you’re asking. It does.”

Turner nodded.

“Don’t you ever have doubts, sir?” she asked.

“No,” said Turner, instantly. “I was ordered to do the things I’ve done for Blacklight and I never hesitated, never asked why. Maybe I should have, but I didn’t, and it’s too late for me to start now. I’ve waded through blood for this Department, Kate. I’ve seen things I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, and I’ve done things that will never truly leave me, not if I live for another century. So I have to believe they meant something. I have to believe I did them for good, no matter how hard they were.”

“What would you do?” asked Kate, her voice low. “If you couldn’t believe that any more?”

Turner looked at her, his face paler than ever, the translucent pallor of a ghost.

“I’d put my pistol in my mouth,” he said.

Kate frowned. “Don’t even joke about that.”

“I’m not.”

Silence settled uneasily on Kate’s office. She stared at the Security Officer, attempting to gauge whether he was serious, whether he meant what he said. She had never known him to lie, and she was trying her hardest not to let the awful image of him with a gun in his mouth take root in her mind.

“So what do we do?” she said, eventually, trying to keep her tone light. “Practically, I mean, about what’s going on out there. What’s the plan?”

Turner shrugged. “There isn’t much we can do,” he said. “The police are dealing with the incidents as they happen, and Surveillance is modelling new filters for Echelon to try and make sure we only send squads to genuine supernatural incidents. But there are going to be a lot of false and incomplete reports over the coming days, and we’re going to see a lot of time and energy wasted. We’ll continue to deal with it all as best we can, and cross our fingers.”

“And in the longer term?” asked Kate. “How long can we carry on without coming clean, without admitting who we are and what we do?”

“I don’t know,” said Turner. “Every journalist in the country is going to be digging now, so it’s going to get out eventually, maybe even quickly. Without official confirmation from the MOD, it will all be conjecture, no matter how convincing a case they manage to make, and we need to keep it that way, at least until Zero Hour. After that, maybe none of this will matter.”

“Maybe not,” said Kate. “I doubt it, though. This is pretty much the biggest story in history. I don’t think it’s going to just go away, no matter what Dracula does.”

“It will go away when people start dying,” said Turner, his grey eyes empty. “Especially in the numbers you read out yesterday. But let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

“Did you find him?” asked Julian Carpenter, as Cal Holmwood pushed open the door of his cell. “Did you find Adam?”

“Hello to you too, Julian,” said Cal. “NS9 are working on it. That’s all I can say.”

Julian nodded. “I told you everything I know, Cal. You believe me, don’t you?”

“I said I believed you,” said Cal. “I meant it.”

He watched carefully as his old friend nodded again. He had reinstated Julian’s privileges after he had finally, belatedly cooperated; as a result, his face was clean-shaven, and the photos of Marie and Jamie had been returned to pride of place on the small shelf above his bed. But there was something in Julian’s demeanour that made him uneasy; it was an eagerness that almost felt like desperation.

Cal had hated having to threaten him, in particular having to use the man’s family as the stick with which to beat him, even though he had never wavered in his conviction that it was the right thing to do. And part of him genuinely hoped, however naively, that his old friend might still manage to make a new life for himself, out there in the real world. But now, as he looked at Julian’s gaunt face and sunken, staring eyes, he was not so sure.

“I’m releasing you, Julian,” he said. “As I promised you I would, under the conditions I’ve explained previously. I need to know where you intend to go. We need to make amendments to it before you’re taken there, wherever it is.”

“Amendments?” asked Julian.

Holmwood sighed. “Don’t play innocent, Julian. Cameras, microphones, recorders, motion sensors. You have to disappear.”

“Don’t worry,” said Julian. “I’m good at that.”

Holmwood managed a half-smile. “So where to?”

“Do you remember my mother’s cottage, near Caister-on-Sea?” asked Julian. “You came for the weekend once, when Jamie was little. It had a red door and a walnut tree in the middle of the garden.”

“I remember. You and I went fishing off the sea wall.”

“That’s right,” said Julian. “When we got home, Marie had made lemon cake. It was my favourite and she’d made it as a surprise.”

“I said I remember,” said Cal, gently.

Julian nodded. “I’d like to go there,” he said. “To that cottage. I can’t go back to Brenchley. There are too many memories.”

“Fine,” said Cal. “I’ll make the arrangements. And for what it’s worth, Julian, I think it’s a good decision. I think a bit of peace and quiet might do you good. I’ll aim to have you moved—”

“Don’t do this,” said Julian, his eyes suddenly fixed on the Interim Director’s. “I did what you wanted, Cal. Please don’t do this to me.”

Cal felt pain stab at his heart. The look on his old friend’s face threatened to undo him; it was helplessness, awful and humiliating.

“I told you, Julian,” he said. “This is the only option.”

“I could still be useful, though,” said Julian, his voice a hoarse whisper. “I’m still me, Cal, still the man you knew. You could reinstate me and I could help. I could still do something …”

“No,” said Cal, as his friend’s words trailed off. “You can’t. I’m sorry.”

“This is it then?” asked Julian. His eyes were red-rimmed and full of tears. “This is how it ends for you and me?”

“It’s not the end of anything,” said Cal, trying to ignore the lump that had taken up residence in his throat. “It’s a new beginning for you, a new life. When this is over … I don’t know, maybe we can talk again. But for now, this is all I can do for you. I hope you can see that.”

Julian nodded, and dropped his eyes to his bed.

“There’s something you can do for me, though,” said Cal. “As one friend to another, completely off the record. A last favour, if you will.”

Julian looked up, resignation written all over his face. “What is it?”

Cal smiled. “The night you died,” he said. “You can tell me how the hell you did it. I’ve been trying to work it out for months.”

A smile rose on to Julian’s face; it was thin, but it was a smile nonetheless.

“Off the record?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Cal.

“You’d better sit down.”

He did as he was told, pulling the plastic chair over from beside the door and settling into it.

“Come closer,” said Julian.

Cal narrowed his eyes, but leant forward.

“Closer.”

His eyes narrowed even further, but he humoured his old friend.

“You will never, ever know,” whispered Julian, his smile widening into a grin that contained no humour whatsoever.

Cal sat bolt upright. “What?”

Julian shook his head. “You can stop me seeing my family. That’s fine. You can put me under house arrest, like some naughty kid. That’s fine too. But you can’t take everything from me, Cal. I won’t let you.”

“I was at your funeral,” said Cal, his face darkening with anger. “I saw the medical report on your body. Your
dead
body.”

“I know.”

“Tell me how you did it,” he said. “That’s an order.”

Julian shrugged. “I’m not an Operator any more. You’ve made that very clear. So you don’t get to give me orders.”

“Did Frankenstein help you? There’s no way you pulled it off on your own, and he was your closest friend. He was the only person who knew you had Jamie chipped when he was a baby. Did he help you do it, Julian? Tell me.”

“Why don’t you ask him?” said Julian.

“I will.”

“You should. Let me know what he says.”

Cal stared at his old friend for a long moment, then sighed. “This is petty, Julian.”

“I know.”

“Does it really give you that much satisfaction to know something I don’t?”

“Some,” said Julian. “It amuses me to think of you trying to work it out.”

Cal rolled his eyes, then got up and pushed the chair back across the cell with his foot. “For the record,” he said, “it’s not house arrest. It’s precautionary surveillance.”

“Semantics.”

“You’re still alive,” said Cal. “It could be a lot worse.”

“Right,” said Julian.

The Interim Director opened the cell door. “Someone will come and collect you tomorrow,” he said.

“I’ll be here,” said Julian. Then he looked up, worry ghosting across his face. “The mission you told me about, Cal. The one Jamie volunteered for. Is he going?”

“He’s going.”

“Will he be coming back?”

Cal looked at his old friend, saw the desperation in his eyes, and realised that, on this one subject, he couldn’t lie to him.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I hope so.”

Matt Browning’s first thought upon entering the
Mina II
was disappointment that it had no windows.

He had walked up the ramp and into the belly of the supersonic plane with butterflies swirling in his stomach. Part of it was the pressure he put on himself to do well at whatever was asked of him, a weight he had been carrying on his shoulders his whole life. This mission was no different, even though his role was only that of observer. Another part, far greater than his almost constant nervousness and need to please, was excitement. Matt had never been on a plane, nor left the country of his birth; family holidays in the Browning household had been week-long trips to Blackpool and Skegness. Now he was going all the way to
America
, and would be doing so in a plane that aviation enthusiasts would have gladly given one of their kidneys for the chance to look at, never mind fly in.

He had been accompanied into the
Mina II
’s hold by two members of the Science Division and a Security Operator. These men were the plane’s permanent crew, who oversaw her smooth running and protected her from prying eyes wherever she went in the world. As the pilot throttled up the huge engines, and the plane began to gather speed along the Loop’s long runway, Matt had gripped the arms of his seat and looked over at his travelling companions; veterans of supersonic travel, all three were already fast asleep.