Necroscope: The Plague-Bearer (15 page)

And as for the time now…he glanced at the luminous dial of his watch: It was a minute or so prior to eleven-thirty p.m. He was back when he’d started out.

Night time—indeed the middle of the night, almost—and Kate was apparently safe, alive and well, and so far completely unthreatened. Harry was naturally glad for her sake…and yet in a way he was also disappointed. For it was beginning to look like his instincts—subverted and sidetracked by that phlegmy, sobbing voice on the telephone—had on this occasion led him astray.

But despite that the Necroscope felt flat and partly spent, with his previous sense of imminence and urgency fast dissipating, still he was determined to see it through: to follow the course he had set himself to its conclusion and see what would or probably would not now transpire.

For which reason he sought out a future-time door…

Just seven minutes away in time to come, and a little less than fifty yards from the ground floor entrance to Kate’s flat, Mike Milazzo made his way like an outsize garden snail up the canyon alley’s worn stone steps. Mike was aware that his trousers were damp at the waist and down the legs, where dribbles of the vile fluid that his body was leaking gathered or ran in slow streamlets; and he knew his shoes were full of the stuff, which squelched and brimmed over as he walked or hobbled, leaving a silver snail-trail that shone in the light of a gradually waxing moon.

Also, his gums had shrunk back, his teeth had loosened, and he constantly licked at the froth as it dried on his lips, spitting it out along with endless blobs of the thick yellow phlegm that flooded his mouth from some seemingly inexhaustible source. Worst of all, Mike could
smell
himself: the unmistakable stench of decay, of a body fast rotting alive!

And yet, even though almost all hope was gone and the true death loomed ever closer, still Mike’s stubbornly human streak—plus the enhanced physical powers of an undead vampire—sustained him. And even in the delirium of onrushing devolution he imagined himself buoyed up, almost weightless; and despite that he limped up the alley, still he felt that he flowed! And his hatred of the Francezcis, of The Chemist in his Bulgarian laboratory, and most recently of Angus McGowan: all of this pent-up loathing floated uppermost in what remained of his disintegrating mind.

Angus McGowan, yes, and his lying promises. Where was Angus now? Nowhere to be seen. And Mike’s awareness of the tiny vials in his pocket so keen and constant that it caused them to weigh like lead. Should he take them anyway? Take the contents of all three, regardless of the outcome? Was there still time? But how could
any
antidote possibly fight off the horror that had overcome him? And where was the one who was supposed to advise him?

“McGowan, you rotten little bastard!” Mike hissed the words out through a fresh burst of froth. “You said you’d be here…argh!
Argh!
…but where the fuck are you?”

That last was like an invocation.

A dark shadow seemed to grow out of the brick wall’s deeper shadows directly in front of Mike, bringing him to a staggering halt. It was Angus McGowan, his eyes ablaze in the night, feral in their reflection of a stray moonbeam’s faint yellow gleam.

For the merest moment startled, Mike just as quickly recovered. But this time his instincts, reflexes, and especially his loathing, would not be denied. He was no sooner confronted than he grabbed the lapels of McGowan’s long black coat and drew him close.

McGowan turned his face from Mike’s foul breath and gasped: “Mike, Ah heard what ye whispered—
and
what ye were thinkin’! But here Ah stand, even as Ah telt ye Ah would. So then, have Ah no kept mah word?”

“Too late! Too
late!”
Mike gurgled, tightening his grip for all that certain of his twig fingers felt they might break off. “Are you blind? Can’t you see I’m—
argh!
—finished?”

“Never, never!” The little man cried. “By tomorrow’s sunup, then ye’d be done for, aye. But tonight there’s still time!”

“Which vials do I drink from? And how, in what order?” Mike coughed the words out. “There are three different colours.”

“Aye, so Ah’m informed—red, black, and yellow. But Mike, what o’ the job? The job’s no done, man!”

“The job?” Mike brought up phlegm, spitting it aside before continuing. “The—ach,
argh!
—fucking job? I’m fucking
dying!
The true death, you little—
argh!
—little bastard!” He pressed McGowan to the wall, breathed into his face. And the little man saw his wet mouth gaping, saw the pus gathering in his eyes and read his mind. But:

“If ye do that—” he cried, “—what ye’re thinkin’, then it really is over!”

Mike nodded, closed his awful mouth, and said: “For both of us, Angus. It’ll be over for
both
of us. Because even if I knew how to use the antidote, there’s not enough of it for two, only for one. And however it went I wouldn’t be giving any to you!”

“But there’s still time for ye, Ah swear it! Only let me go and Ah’ll help ye. Ah’ll see ye through it!”

Now Mike saw that he had the upper hand—at least for the moment. And so: “Job or no job,” he choked and gurgled, “you’ll tell me what I want to know right now or I’ll bite your fucking face—
argh!
—and feed slop into the wounds. And just to make sure, I’ll cough up some of this shit into your mouth, too! And in another week or so, maybe ten days, when you’ve been through what I’ve been through—then you’ll follow me down into hell!”

But at that, amazingly, Mike sensed McGowan’s resolve stiffening; and in confirmation of this notion the other gasped: “Ah cannae believe ye’d do it, no while there’s a chance ye’ll come out o’ this alive!”

Mike nodded, smiling however monstrously. “Oh, really? You think I won’t do it? Then tell me, you little shit, what have I got to lose? Oh,
ha-ha-ha!”
He uttered a harsh, mad laugh, then quickly sobered and said: “Well, that’s it. You can kiss all of this goodbye, Angus.” With which he opened his mouth more yet.

And finally McGowan broke. “Verra well, Ah’ll tell ye!” he gasped, averting his face once again from Mike’s gaping, frothing jaws. “Show me the vials. Quick now; for the sooner ye take it, the sooner it’ll work on ye.”

“It?” Mike gurgled, continuing to press McGowan to the wall and holding on to him with one hand while groping in his inside pocket with the other. “Don’t you mean them?”

“It or them: what’s the difference?” McGowan snapped, wriggling in Mike’s grip. “Ah mean the antidote! Dinnae quibble the noo, Mike! Just show me they bleddy vials.”

Easing the container out of his pocket, Mike used his thumbnail to free the catch. The lid opened slowly on lightly sprung hinges, revealing the three vials. And:

“Aye,” said McGowan, peering at the tiny glass bottles and nodding his head eagerly now, “that’s it sure enough—the red, black, and yellow.”

“Again with the ‘it,’” said Mike. “What’s going on, Angus?”

Nodding again, and avoiding the froth that flew from Mike’s foaming, belching mouth, the other said: “Ah’ll tell ye in just a second. But first—maybe ye’ll tell me how ye intend tae do it.”

“Eh? How I’ll do what?”

“Why, how ye’ll get intae the wee girl’s place, o’ course!”

“The girl?” Mike’s mind was drifting.

“The job, man!” McGowan snapped. “The bleddy job! For if ye dinnae finish it, what use tae live with the Francezcis huntin’ ye down tae the ends o’ the earth? And by now Ah’m certain sure ye ken there’s more and worse ways tae suffer the true death.”

“The girl,” Mike mumbled again, trying to focus his mind.

And McGowan said, “Ye cannae just ring her bell or knock on her door. And it’s likely that B.J.’s bleddy white knight is up there the noo, baby-sittin’ the wee bitch and waitin’ on ye!”

In Mike’s mind the facts of what was happening drifted back into focus. He felt his hand trembling, and in fear of dropping the container snapped it shut single-handed and slipped it into a side pocket. Then, while again using his body and both hands, as before, to restrain McGowan—and for all that he longed to savage, crush, and kill him—still Mike was able to recognize the awful truth and logic of the little man’s warning about the nature of Francezci revenge…

For which reason he struggled with himself, was able to put aside his own vengeful urges and answer McGowan’s earlier question:

“I don’t—
arghhh!
—I don’t fucking
know
how I’ll get in! Maybe…maybe I can break in?”

McGowan wriggled again, tried to shake himself loose, shook his head instead and said: “What, in yere condition? Oh, there’s still a thing or two that ye
can
do, for sure; but break doon a sturdy door? No way, laddie! Yet even now Ah tell ye there
is
a way in! Only look up there, where mah gaze directs ye.”

And turning his head and feral yellow eyes as far as Mike’s grip would allow, the little man stared some fifty yards up the alley’s dark canyon throat, focussing on a feature in an otherwise blank brick wall no more than ten or eleven feet above the arched-over lower entrance to Kate’s flatlet.

Blinking a mucous film from his eyes, Mike followed McGowan’s gaze to a lone window with a railed balcony that was little more than a ledge. And despite the poisons, the lethal diseases that had ripened in him, still in command of a vampire’s night-vision the ex-Mob thug could see well enough—even as McGowan had seen—that on this balmy summer night young Kate had left her window standing ajar. A lace curtain stirred and fluttered, letting in a cool night breeze…where in all likelihood, and very soon, the same window would let in something far more substantial than a breeze, though by no means as natural and harmless…

Glancing at McGowan, Mike’s look framed a question to which he already knew the answer. And:

“Aye,” said the little man, nodding a confirmation. “Now ye see it: yere way in. And if B.J.’s English lover is in there…then the job’s as good as done. What d’ye say tae that?”

“I say—” Mike gurgled, “tell me about the antidote—and consider yourself lucky to go on living! Maybe then I’ll get to the job.”

“Oh, ye stubborn bastard!” McGowan moaned. “But verra well, have it yere own way. Ah’ll tell ye—for it’s a fact that yere time is runnin’ out. Are ye ready with the vials, then?”

And holding McGowan with one hand, Mike once again took out the small metal case and opened it.

The little man nodded and said, “Go on then: first take the yellow yin and drink it tae the dregs, every wee drop.”

Mike faltered, blinked, gurgled and finally said: “The yellow one? Are you sure? What, and no ‘wee tricks,’ Angus?”

“None whatsayever,” McGowan shook his head. “For if ye fail ye’ll no be alone in yere troubles; they Francezcis dinnae tend tae look too kindly on anyone who fails them, and that includes their agent and so-called Watcher, aye!”

The little man’s words with their ring of sincerity sparked a fresh burst of hope in Mike; whatever the outcome, he felt he couldn’t afford any further delay.

Using his bulk to keep McGowan pinned to the wall, and both hands to remove the yellow vial, then close the case and slip it back into his pocket, he unstoppered the tiny bottle and tilted its contents into his eager throat. Then, trembling and jerking to the shock of the liquid going down—which, while it lasted only a second, was not unlike the eye-watering sting of an ice-cold beer, or maybe the burn of a fiery liquor—Mike gulped at the night air, blinked…and staggered a very little.

But a little was all the opportunity that McGowan needed!

He slid sideways away from Mike, then continued to slide
up
the wall! And facing outwards, flat against the wall—with the palms of his hands, his narrow shoulders, back and buttocks appearing to act like a gecko’s adhesive pads—McGowan slithered or climbed until he was well beyond Mike’s reach; where finally he paused to look down at him and grin.

Mike snarled, raising his hands as if to snatch at McGowan; but laughing softly and light as a feather the other climbed to an even higher elevation, from where he called down:

“Now think, Mike, think! Auld Angus isnae the one ye should be chasin’ after! And look here now: am Ah no showin’ ye one o’ they things Ah said ye could do? And so ye can, because ye’re a vampire no less than mahsel’—just a wee bit less experienced, that’s a’. But still Ah’m sure that if ye’ll only gi’ it a try, then ye’ll see just how right Ah am. Only don’t go wastin’ yere time thinkin’ tae chase after me. The wall ye
should
be climbin’ is a wee bit further up the alley.”

“But the antidote!” Mike choked, coughed, spat on the stone steps. What’s the—
arghhh!
—point without the antidote, you cheating little bastard!?”

“Oh, that,” said McGowan, with a careless shrug. “The antidote, is it? The red and the black, d’ye mean? Well, what are ye waitin’ for? Go on then: take ’em. Drain ’em tae the dregs!”

“What?” Mike gasped, afraid and bewildered. “Take
them?
But which one do I leave out? Which one will kill me?”

Again McGowan’s callous shrug and his look of total indifference. “Take
both
o’ them,” he said, “whichever way ye fancy!”

Mike had meanwhile taken out the case again. Opening it, he stared at the remaining vials as if hypnotized. And: “Take both of them.” He repeated the little man’s incomprehensible instructions. And again: “Both of them? But—”

“There’s no ‘but’ ye great fool!” McGowan cut him off. “The Chemist only telt ye what he was told tae tell ye! Aye, and mahsel’ likewise. Three colours for three sicknesses, and each one an antidote in its own right! But dinnae think tae ask me which is which for Ah dinnae ken! And anyway what odds? Just take ’em however ye like, and have done wi’ it.”

“Jesus
Christ
!” Mike spat the words out, along with a great blob of phlegm. “Why you cheating, black-hearted—ach!
Argh
!—little
bastard
!”

But then, since there was nothing else for it—and because he was almost past caring—he drained the tiny bottles “to the dregs,” first the red and then the black…

The liquids stung going down, at which he believed he could actually feel them working!

“O’ course ye can!” said McGowan, reading his mind. “Ye’ll feel light in both yere head and yere limbs; light as a bubble, as if ye were floatin’! That’s how it is for each and every one o’ us—o’ our kind, Ah mean—but more especially in times o’ danger, such as this. The closer tae death, the more the vampire in us fights back.”

That last would seem to be true enough, for as before Mike fancied himself buoyed up. He felt weightless yet potent—in a state of transition, of metamorphosis—enabled and capable, even of aerial flight! But:

“Ah no, not just yet!” said McGowan, chuckling. “Ye’ll no fly, Mike, but ye’ll
climb
like a wee spider, that’s for sure! So on ye go. Ye know…what…ye…have…tae…do.”

The little man’s voice slowly faded away in Mike’s ears; or perhaps in his mind? But he was no longer sure of anything! And suddenly dizzy, he started up the alley: at first loping, leaning into it, and then leaping, bounding,
almost
flying!