Chapter 18 - Inferno
“So,” Jamieson says, raising his voice to make himself heard over the noise of the rushing water, “you got a lotta boys here, Sculptor.”
Angelos ignores him. His robes are soaked in the underground stream; he presses on, nonetheless.
“I told you, Sculptor,” Jamieson shouts after him, “Camarilla ain’t gonna find us down here. No need to rush.”
“It is not the Camarilla which concerns me,” Angelos mutters, not quite beneath his breath, “not so much as the…”
He pauses.
“You know...Donnie..." he says, "you have a knack for getting people to talk. It's the Malkavian in you, I suppose. How's your arm?"
Jamieson glances down at the twisted stump jutting out from his sleeve.
“I’ll be honest,” he says. “I kinda liked my old one.”
“Once we have captured the Caecilian,” Angelos tells him, “I will craft you something suitable. For now, however, you must forgive me for showing caution. You have…ah, already proven yourself capable of assassination. Giving you a natural weapon to carry on your wrist now would be imprudent, I feel."
The Sabbat slip on, through the darkness of the tunnels.
*
In a stairwell to the north of the river, Eames' enforcers check their weaponry.
"Sun goes up, sun goes down," one of them whispers to himself, nervous. "Sun goes up, sun goes down."
*
Angelos stoops, running his hand across the Ogham runes.
"Kinda wish we had stuff like that back home," Jamieson says from behind him. "I mean, sure, there's the native crap, Lupine drawings, out in the hills, but..."
"Their history is yours," Angelos murmurs. "You should embrace it, Donnie. Every war that is fought is fought for territory, and for thousands of years, Kindred and Kine and creatures beyond our reckoning have chosen - for whatever reason - to scrap over this little patch of grey on the map. As I move through the strata below the living city, I feel the anger of the Northern brutes as they sailed upriver to burn and rape. I undergo the torments of the barons of Normandy as they ruled a country which spoke only in another man's tongue. I hear the footfalls of the black-eyed alchemists of Rome and the sniggers of the foul House of Windsor and the heated cries of the East... the true home of all who arose from the Dark Father. We are only elements, of past and present and future, and we may tear these shards apart and mould them together once again as we please until we find perfection. So embrace your...native crap, Donnie. "
He taps his long nail gently against the rock.
"This was a place of power once," he continues, as if to himself, "as it is today. The city remembers. The Lhiannan dwelt here once...and yet even these daubings are not so very old, a few millenia at most. What lay beneath the earth where they laid their foundations?"
He rises, slowly.
"Beastie's that way," Jamieson says, pointing with a polite little cough.
Angelos gazes out into the gloom.
"Yes," he replies. "I can hear it."
*
"You hear that?" Oscar says.
The bug is beginning to pick up faint voices; barely audible beneath the cackling static and the wails of the Caecilian.
"They're coming," Eames replies.
You gently turn the mobile about between your fingers.
The voices grow louder. An obvious American drawl.
"...are you gonna do with this thing?"
And a deeper voice replies. You can't make out what's being said.
"Jamieson?" says Fellowes. He gives you a look. "Dammit, shouldn't he be staying well clear?"
"He's keeping Angelos talking," you tell him. "He wants us to know for certain when the bastard's above the explosives."
"Closer now," Oscar hisses.
You begin to dial.
*
Jamieson stops walking. Behind him, Wallace jabs the barrel of his shotgun into his back.
"Keep moving," he growls.
Jamieson gives him a look.
"Oh, no-no-no-no," he says. "I ain't getting close to that pit edge. If your boss there should happen to decide he'd like to see just how that thing feeds, I'd very much like it to be one of you fuckers, instead of me."
Wallace leans forward, meeting the American's gaze.
He snarls,
"Maybe I'll toss you down there myself, Yankee freak."
Jamieson shrugs, as if the whole thing's of very little concern to him, and takes another few steps forward. He glances back, taking note of the broad-shouldered vampire who's taken up position at the cave entrance.
Ahead, Angelos steps up to the very edge of the pit. Two pack members accompany him on either side.
The Caecilian is seething. The worms shift and gibber, snapping up at the empty air.
A slow, gentle smile spreads across Angelos' tattered face. He watches it for a moment, apparently enchanted.
"Oh," he whispers. "Oh, you are beautiful. You are art indeed. The work of the Black Hand, if I'm not mistaken. Valsharos? Yes, Valsharos. Not a classic example of his craftsmanship, perhaps, a little more baroque, a little more influenced by Unta's ideas...but that's to be expected. But you're distressed, my baby, you're crying out..."
He waves a hand. The Caecilian stills. Slowly, as if puppeteered from above, the worms turn their ruined heads up towards him, and fall silent. The great flesh-mass pulsates more slowly, as if calming.
"Tell me," Angelos says. "Tell me what's wrong, little one."
He listens, head slightly cocked, to the hissings of the Caecilian.
Jamieson shifts his feet, and takes a step backwards.
Wallace calls, anxiously, hefting his shotgun,
"Almost dawn, Sculptor."
Angelos' expression alters, very slowly, as if coming to some great realisation.
He says, calmly and without rancour, pushing himself upwards as if to rise,
"Betrayal. Foolish of me, reall-"
*
The explosion bursts upwards, flowering out; and before it, all-consuming comes the blinding white smoke.
The ashes of Sculptor Angelos, the Caecilian and the two Sabbat members blow upwards, and out, mingling with tumbling shards of London rock.
Far above, on the tarmac outside Battersea Power Station, one pack member turns to another and says,
"Did you hear something?"
From somewhere out in the darkness, a voice cries,
"Camarilla! Camarilla!"
A strangled scream, to the west. And the shout is taken up, on all sides.
"Camarilla's coming! Camarilla's coming!"
Car headlights are bursting up out of the grey night.
The pack member blanches.
"Oh," he says. "Oh, shit."
His partner glances at him in silence, and then turns, and dives through the doorway into the station.
"Yeah," the pack member says, to nobody in particular. "Yeah, right. Run."
He sprints out, east, ducking under the broken wire fence, yelling as he goes,
"Scram! Camarilla! Camarilla! Time to go!"
He almost makes it to the river.
*
The smoke is everywhere. Grappling at the solid rock of the cave floor, eyes tightly shut against the burning dust, Wallace screams. Something hard is sticking into his shoulder. Precious vitae is oozing from somewhere, coating his fingers.
"Anyone there?" he yells, fumbling outwards, trying to find his shotgun. His voice comes out muffled, numbed by the constant ringing sound in his ears. "Butcher? Caern? Caern, where the fuck are you?"
Silence; then the rattle of machine-gun fire, from above. Then a couple of low, thudding booms.
"Bastards must've got into the tunnels," he mutters. "We'll show 'em. Sculptor, you all right? Sculptor?"
And from somewhere to the right, a voice cries out, weakly,
"I'm here, old bean. Pip pip and cock-a-diddle....heheh...cock-a-diddle-doo. Nah, I'm just messing with you. He's toast. Fuck...fuck me, I think there's a rock in my chest. Is there a rock in my chest? I'm...currently having trouble seeing."
Wallace grits his teeth and begins to drag himself forward across the floor.
"I'll kill you, you American fuck!" he howls. "You're dead!"
"Probably," Jamieson replies, from somewhere in the smoke. "Like I said, there's a rock in my chest. You found that shotgun of yours yet?"
Wallace's fingers close on something hard. He smiles to himself, relieved, and yells,
"Looks like I just did, motherf-"
A cold metal circle presses, very gently, against his forehead.
"Doubt it," Jamieson says. He pulls the trigger, and fires twice.
After a moment, keeping his eyes firmly closed against the muggy smoke, he lets the shotgun slip out of his grip. His severed stump, pressing against the butt, is aching horribly.
Wincing, vitae gushing from his chest, he crawls forward a couple of inches across the rock, and feels his hand around the object clutched in Wallace's hand, trying to discover its shape.
"Well, I'll be damned," he says, at last. "A foot."
*
"Oh, she's a grand old rag, she's a high-flying rag...and...forever in peace may she wave..."
Jamieson stumbles up out of the cave entrance. His free hand clutches at the severed scalp of Wallace, stray, greying skin hanging from the rotten hair. He shakes at his head, trying to dislodge the ringing sound filling his ears.
"...emblem of..." he mutters, distractedly, "the land I love.."
He takes a step downwards, and almost loses his balance in the fast-flowing water.
"Oops," he giggles, and looks up.
The tunnel ahead is filled with Sabbat. Some of them injured, clutching at fresh wounds. Others are holding knives, long blades, and guns. All of them are gazing down at him at stunned surprise.
Jamieson raises his severed stump.
"I'm unarmed," he says.
One of the pack members, his face torn and coated in white dust and phosphorus burns, raises a quivering finger.
"That's him!" he snarls. "That's the fucking traitor!"
"Donnie Jamieson," Jamieson replies, calmly. "Like the whiskey, only spelt different."
He shifts, trying to find his footing in the stream, and lets Wallace's hairy patch of flesh tumble down out of his grasp. His fist coils.
The Sabbat charge, the water splashing up all about them as they cascade down the sloping tunnel.
"Ah, well," Jamieson mutters. "What the fuck, then. Oh, she's a grand old rag-"
He twists, and swings, catching the first of the Sabbat in the face with his stump of an arm, only tumbling back as three pistol shots drill into his chest-
"-a high-flying rag-"
He snatches hold of a head with his free hand and rams it against the wall of the tunnel.
"-emblem of-"
A snarling shape hurls itself at him, tossing him back and down, into the rushing water. His spine cracks against the tunnel floor. The flowing stream froths up around his face.
Gazing benignly at the hate-filled face in front of him, he brings his fist up and strikes at the vampire's face, digging in his nails, tearing at his assailant's skin. The Cainite shrieks, but other hands are snatchig at him, rough boots kicking downwards, fists pummelling.
A long blade swings downwards, tearing through the air, making for his throat.
"-land I love-"
To the very end, Donald Jamieson keeps smiling.
*
The little room is silent. On Oscar's cameras, a couple of Eames' agents can be faintly seen, carrying Sabbat remains in bin-bags to one of their vans.
The static crackles.
"Tinker here," a voice says, uncertainly. "You there, Regentia?"
"I'm listening, Tinker, dear," Eames replies. "Report, please."
"Resistance was relatively scant at the entrance," the voice says, "as you'll have seen. The majority of the Sabbat was gathered in the station itself - mainly in the tunnels below. It was strange, Regentia - as if they expected the attack to come from below."
"I asked for a report," says Eames, leaning forward, "not your speculation. The outcome, please, Tinker."
"Fighting was fierce in the tunnels," Tinker continues. "Your Nos cleared the way with a couple of grenades, which helped a lot. Still...three of ours went to their Final Deaths before the Sabbat retreated. Some of them might've made for the Thames, but I don't think we'll have time to pursue them tonight."
"That's fine," Eames says. "And the cave?"
"Remains of four Kindred...and something larger, all burnt up. Three of the Sabbat must've been taken out by the explosion. The fourth was missing his head. Shotgun blast. Saiga-12, I think."
"Any sign of our operative down there?" you ask.
A moment of silence.
"Answer the man," Eames snaps.
"Possible remains of operative found in the tunnels. Surrounded by Sabbat bodies. If it was your man...well, he'd have been one tough son of a bitch. With permission, Regentia, we'll finish up here and then head back to the vans. Not long till dawn."
Eames meets your gaze.
"All right," she says. "Thank you, Tinker. Over and out."
She turns, and touches your arm.
"It's probably best it turned out this way," she tells you, gently. "The man was a genuine liability."
*
Dawn is coming. You can feel the weariness creeping over you like the malevolent rays of Old Father Sun himself.
You lie back across your cot and wait for torpor to engulf you entirely.
A strange, rhythmic humming sound; you turn, without thinking, and lift your mobile off the table.
A 0151 number. A Liverpool number.
You gaze at it for a moment, and then accept the call, raising the phone to your ear.
A shrill, monotonous voice whispers from within,
"Sommers."
You remain silent.
"Sommers," Bishop Dubrik says, "if I may give you some free advice...try to be a little harder to reach. When one is connected, one can be got to. My name is Dubrik. I thought we should talk."
Pushing yourself up off the cot, you lick your lips, but don't answer him.
"Oh, for goodness' sake," snaps Dubrik. "I know you're alive, Sommers. I knew that for certain as soon as I heard that Angelos had been killed. If one does not see a Cainite's Final Death, one assumes that he is alive - no matter what the evidence that he is not. You pulled off quite a trick."
"Not without cost," you reply.
"You sacrificed a knight," he says, "and you felled a king. I daresay the Sabbat in London will take some time to recover."
You fall back against the cot. Your eyes can barely remain open.
"You're tired," Dubrik says. "Yes, I'm tired too. The sun rises, and all of our scheming and plotting ceases to matter for another twelve hours or so. Angelos' scheming, however...well, that's turned to dust."
"You suspected I was alive," you murmur. You're too weary to make it sound like a question.
"Suspected," he replies, "but not certain. I simply passed the information on to Angelos as I'd heard it. His lack of caution was his own undoing. I will not hold myself to blame for that."
You tell him, closing your eyes,
"The Sabbat will be driven from London. You sent Angelos to his death and you betrayed your on brethren."
"Unlikely," says Dubrik. "Someone will rise to take Angelos' place. And even if we were driven out...well, we'd return, some day, even if it's marching at Caine's side at Gehenna's light. You'll learn to be philosophical about all of this, Sommers, if you live to be a little older."
He lets out a little cough that could be a laugh.
"It occurs to me," he says, "that one of my people is now in your hands. Amanda Wilkinson. You knew that she was working for me, and you used her to spring your trap. I want her returned to me, unharmed. I have a bounty on your head; it will be removed. I cannot, however, speak for others in the Sabbat who will - understandably - desire to retaliate. Moreover, Angelos attempted to negotiate with me before his death with information concerning recent goings-on in London and further north. This information is yours, if you so desire."
Your fingers are beginning to feel numb.
"What do you want Wilkinson for?" you mumble. "She wasn't much of a spy."
"Perhaps she can learn from this experience and become a far better one," Dubrik replies. "At any rate, that is not your concern. If you comply with my request, you will put Wilkinson on a train headed northwards in the next week. Remember how simple it was for me to get in contact with you, Sommers. You're meddling in the affairs of Cainites far older and far more vindictive than you could ever hope to be. Don't make the mistake of-"
You hang up, lolling your arm dozily out across the cot. The phone bounces across the saferoom floor.
And you fall into torpor.
How will you respond to Dubrik's request?
A) Accept.
B) Refuse.
