Through Glass Darkly: Episode Two (4 page)

The doctor also alighted with the men from the search teams in order to try and help out at the hospital in the treatment of the priority cases.

Moments later and we were rising effortlessly back up into the heavens in order to head back to our temporary mooring in the park. Despite not having much experience at the helm, I couldn’t help but notice that the ship seemed to be far more responsive than it had been on our brief voyage down 7
th
Avenue, which I commented on to the Captain as we flew.

‘I think you’re right Ashton,’ he replied almost absently. ‘Though the credit must go to Mr Hughes here and his engineer Mr Bradbury, who seems to be working wonders. There was a time when I felt certain the Khan was dead in the water, but now, it really feels as though she’s regained her old spark of life.’

As we soared back up into the golden light that flooded the ship’s bridge with its warmth, it was difficult to imagine the Khan as anything other than a vibrant and living thing.

CHAPTER 21 – SUSPICIONS

Getting back to the park and our temporary berth was the closest thing we had to a home at the moment, and once the ship was properly secured I realised that for the first time in almost a week I’d be able to spend the night aboard, in my own cabin and my own bunk, which oddly I’d started to miss.

It was early evening by the time we got the ship secured with the engines off, by which time the light which had bathed the ship as we’d flown across the city had turned from golden to a deep orange. This made the park and surrounding buildings look even more beautiful than they had earlier on that morning when we’d left with the ill-fated search teams.

In other circumstances the warm and summery dusk would’ve been relaxing, but there was a part of me which suspected things were far from resolved, so relaxation was simply not an option.

Captain Platt had requested we all meet in the new command centre in the boat house next to the lake to fully debrief after the day’s activities, but he wanted a few minutes before-hand to check up on his injured men and no doubt to provide an initial update to his superiors. I suspected he’d also have a long evening of travelling around the city to visit the families of the dead men in order to inform them personally of the tragedy that had occurred. So while we waited I decided to have a walk around the small lake and enjoy the evening air.

Hughes ran into me just as I was about to set off and asked if he might join me, which I was happy to agree to.

We walked in silence for a moment or two, until as we passed one of the mooring hawsers from the ship, where he bent down to examine the end of it.

It was one of the hawsers that appeared to have been cut incredibly cleanly, which he showed to me before speaking.

‘Still a perfect mirror finish,’ he indicated, running his thumb over the unnaturally smooth cable end.

‘I had one of my men go and have a look at the buildings on 7th Avenue where your ship had originally appeared over the city, and where several of the cables had fused with the concrete of the buildings.’

‘And what did he find?’ I asked with genuine curiosity.

‘Well it was a difficult job to get to some of the anchor points,’ Hughes replied, as he straightened up and looked at me. ‘Three of the points were over fifty feet from the nearest ledge or balcony, so he had to arrange with the building supervisors for an inspection hoist to be set up, so he could be safely lowered down to examine them.

‘For every one of these hawsers that he found with that strange mirror surfaced end, he discovered the equivalent on the buildings. He also said the cables hadn’t just been cut through incredibly cleanly, they’d been cut perfectly flush with the concrete or brickwork of the buildings. The cuts were so close you could run your finger across the concrete and the point where the hawsers had been cut and you wouldn’t even feel the edge, the only difference you’d notice is that the end of the hawser was a lot smoother.

‘He was completely at a loss to explain how such a cut could’ve been made, because there was absolutely no sign of damage anywhere around the cut, and yet it was so close to the surrounding concrete or brick that a bit of damage would be inevitable no matter what type of saw or blow-torch was used.’

‘He had no explanation at all, for how it could’ve been done?’ I asked incredulously.

‘The only suggestion he could offer me,’ replied Hughes, doubtfully. ‘Is that the point at which the cable fused with the fabric of the building must’ve created a microscopic weakness in the metal, which may have caused the end of the cables to simply snap when they were put under enough pressure from the ship pulling on them.’

‘But surely as the hawsers are made up of hundreds of fine metal wires, that kind thing would’ve caused some of them to stretch more than others and the surface on the cable end would be much less even?’ I asked not particularly persuaded by the engineers theory.

‘A point which my engineer also made to me,’ replied Hughes. ‘But that is still the only possible explanation he can come up with at this time. I have asked him to take samples of the cable ends, with your Captain’s permission, to be sent for further analysis, but that’s likely to take several days at the very least.’

It was a mystery which I’d almost forgotten about until Hughes had mentioned it, but as we continued our walk around the lake it continued to niggle away at the back of my mind.

We walked for a little more, chatting amiably as we went before being called back to the boat-house for the briefing.

Platt started the meeting by relaying an update from the hospital on the injured men, all of whom thankfully looked as though they were going to pull through thanks to the timely intervention of Dr Zimmerman and the surgical teams at Belle Vue hospital.

We then moved on to the activities of the day, talking first about the creature that we’d captured at the abandoned boat yard, which had been transported to a separate hospital with the facilities to deal with prisoners who needed medical treatment. It was at this point that Platt had more information than we did.

Apparently the creature had already been X-rayed, and while the carapace shell that covered it seemed to diffuse some of the X-rays, it still worked well enough for the medical teams to be able to see that there was the majority of a human form fully contained within the thorax of the creature.

Furthermore, Platt explained the creature still appeared to be healing, which brought us to the first difficult point in the meeting.

‘I’ll be frank with you gentlemen,’ he continued. ‘I feel as though we’re out of our depth with the issues that this first creature has raised.

‘Firstly, we don’t know whether this creature is a friend or foe, if the mind of your fellow crewman somehow survives within that . . . shell, and whether she or it has in actuality been involved in any of the attacks taking place across the city.

‘Until we get some answers to these questions I feel we have no choice but to continue treating this creature as potentially hostile.

‘Secondly, the biology of the creature is still being tested, but the doctors on site have stressed they have absolutely no idea what they’re dealing with, including whether any of the sedatives of pain-killers they have at their disposal are likely to work in the way they do ordinarily.

‘Thirdly, and in many ways this is the most pressing of the three issues. We know now from the X-rays taken that there appears to be a human form somehow contained within the body of this creature.

This poses the obvious question of whether we should attempt to free this person from the shell of the creature while it is still healing, or should we wait.’

It was a stark set of choices which Jenkins, Fraser and Platt understandably looked to me and the Captain to decide upon.

‘Well from my perspective,’ began the Captain earnestly. ‘This is only a serious consideration if some semblance of Ariel’s mind remains within this creature, which there is no way of knowing for sure until it regains consciousness.

Having said that, if there is any chance that my crewman still exists within that shell, then I would prefer to do everything we can for her.

‘Consequently,’ the Captain continued. ‘The question we must try to answer is this. What would Ariel want us to do, if as we hope her mind and body survive within this creatures shell.’

‘That’s all well and good,’ interjected Jenkins. ‘But I hope you’ll understand that until we verify that Ms Shilling’s mind does exist within this creature, we will have to keep it securely restrained.’

‘Naturally.’ conceded the Captain without hesitation.

‘May I ask though,’ he continued. ‘Whether the doctors have any assessment of how difficult it will be to remove the shell of the creature that appears to surround the human body?’

‘They have examined the material,’ Platt replied, ‘And the only thing they can say at the moment is that while it is incredibly hard, they believe it could be removed using the tools they have, but they’re unable to estimate how long it would take or how painful it would be for the subject.’

‘And you’ve already said they don’t know whether their pain killers would work?’ I asked, beginning to be concerned about the direction the conversation has heading in.

‘That’s exactly right Mr Hall,’ replied Platt.

The room was silent for a moment, before the Captain finally spoke again.

‘Then as far as I can see, we’re left with only two options,’ the Captain began.

‘We can either try to remove as much of the creatures shell as possible before it regains consciousness, in the hope that if Ariel is in there, then her current unconscious state will in some way shield her from the worst of the pain. Or . . .

‘We leave the situation as it is for the moment, wait until she regains consciousness, and then try to remove the creatures carapace shell, hopefully after she’s helped us identify something that can be used as pain-killer.’

‘Is there a chance that some of the painkillers would still work?’ I asked, increasingly worried.

‘There is Mr Hall,’ Platt confirmed, compassionately. ‘But the biology of this creature is so alien, our medical advisors have also informed me that for all we know, a simple Asprin could work perfectly well or it could be the most effective nerve toxin we could hope to ever have to use against these creatures.’

‘There’s also the question of whether Ariel will be able to assist us when she regains consciousness,’ The Captain added. ‘We know from our own studies on these creatures that the interlocking and overlapping carapace shell is not only very tough in its own right, but the creatures can make themselves much stronger or more flexible, or just more impact resistant if they wish.

‘Now I don’t think Ariel would deliberately hinder the medical efforts to remove the creature’s shell, but if the procedure is painful, she may not be able to control her reactions.’

‘You seem to be leaning toward attempting to remove the shell before your crewman regains consciousness?’ commented Platt in anticipation of what the Captain was saying.

‘Yes,’ came the Captain’s stark reply. ‘And the procedure should start as soon as the medical team are ready to begin.’

‘I appreciate it’s a difficult decision Captain Hughes. Thank you for making it as straight-forward as possible.’ Platt responded. ‘The surgical team has been standing by to start work, I’ll ask for a message to be sent immediately informing them of our decision, and for what it’s worth Captain I think you’ve made the right decision.’

There was a part of me that was seriously troubled by the idea of performing such a significant and invasive surgery without Ariel’s consent, not to mention the possibility we hadn’t discussed that she might regain consciousness part way through the procedure, and what that might do to her probably already fragile psyche. I wasn’t quite at the stage of hoping that the Ariel I knew wasn’t inside this creature, and that instead it would just be another mindless Lamphrey, but I didn’t like what was going to happen one little bit.

While Platt was clearly wanting to move things on to the next section of the briefing, I had to interrupt.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, slightly hesitantly. ‘But I can’t help but imagine what it may have been like for Ariel being trapped inside this creatures body for the past several days, unable to see the world as we see it, unable to speak or communicate to other people, unable even to make herself recognised in order to ask for help, instead trapped inside the body of the enemy, before finally being attacked and shot several times, chased across the city, and then hunted down where she slept and gunned practically to death.

‘If that were me,’ I continued, painfully aware that as the other senior lensman aboard the ship it so could’ve been me the traitors chose. ‘And particularly if I then regained consciousness part way through a doubtless very painful surgery, might that not be one final trauma too far?’

‘What are you suggesting Mr Hall?’ Asked Platt reasonably.

‘Allow me to be present while the operation is being performed so that there’s at least a familiar face present if she should wake up. Also if you could find someone with some kind of psychiatric experience of helping people with anything even remotely similar.’

‘They’re good suggestions Mr Hall,’ replied Platt with sympathy. ‘I should’ve thought of them myself, and yes of course I will ask for both to be arranged. Though if you could stay for the rest of the briefing I’ll have a car standing by to transfer you to the facility on Staton Island the moment we’re finished.’

The rest of the briefing went much as it had done while we were still on the ship on the way back from the railyard, though Platt and Jenkins wanted to delve into my encounters with the two creatures in a bit more detail.

The problems that the search teams had encountered with the lensing scopes was something I felt it worth describing in more detail, as it was this to me that had been one of the principle causes of the teams being effectively trapped by the second creature later in the day. As such in addition to describing the difficulty which the men had had in using the scopes in close quarters I also explained how hard it had been for the men to track the fast moving creature, when it was moving around and behind things that were big enough for it to hide behind. And then how the men were having to do this while holding their scopes in their off hands and aiming a gun with their main hand.