The Tunnel at the End of the Light Read online

  Worms. He was seeing those damn worms that crawled into and out of the ether, careening, spilling into past and future, heedless of the nice, clean boundaries that normally stood between the two. In one direction, the past, the King worm rippled back down into the street, below, into the sewers where it had been born. But in the other direction, the future, it wrapped its way through London, leaving wreckage and corpses in its wake.

  Overcoming her fright, Emily scrambled around the debris and came up to Honoré, her eyes narrowing as she saw the open, blank expression on his face.

  ‘You’re seeing things, aren’t you?’ she asked. ‘Things about the King?’

  Lechasseur nodded once.

  Nearby, the front of a four-story building rattled as the King placed his hands on the roof, braced his considerable feet against the first floor, and pulled. The building came down, a raging torrent of bricks, rock and plaster that slammed into and rolled along the street. If anyone had been inside, they’d smartly fled at the first pounding.

  Rather than tear at the rest of the building, the King walked forward, into it, as if it shouldn’t be there and he could simply slip through it. When its undeniable physicality rebuffed him, he howled, then stepped automatically back into it, like a hundred foot tall wind-up toy whose spring driven motor kept dumbly slamming it into the same wall over and over again.

  It was an odd dance – funny, really, if not for the rubble that continued to fall.

  ‘He’s trying to get to something in that direction,’ Lechasseur said numbly. ‘He hasn’t figured out he can walk around it yet. He will in a minute, then he’ll take off down the street.’

  True to Lechasseur’s prediction, after the fourth or fifth attempt to walk through the building, the King stepped back. He raised his moon-sized eyes over the rooftops, flared his nostrils, then turned and started awkwardly moving his Brobdingnagian legs along the easier, trench-like spaces.

  His massive back was to Emily and Lechasseur. They, at least, were safe for the moment. Then Emily grabbed Lechasseur’s arm and pulled, not away, but toward the creature.

  Lechasseur yanked his hand back as if she were on fire. ‘Are you mad?’ he asked.

  ‘He’s looking for Crest, isn’t he? We’ll jump to Crest,’ she said, grabbing at his hand again. ‘Mestizer can do it, so can we!’

  ‘She’s had more practice,’ Lechasseur said, snapping his hand this way and that to avoid her touch.

  ‘Concentrate on what you’re seeing, we’ll both think of Crest! I’m sure it’ll work!’ Emily said.

  ‘Are you? Are you sure?’ Lechasseur objected.

  ‘Well, no, but it’s worth a try,’ she said. ‘It seemed to work before...’ She feinted left with her shoulder, then jutted to the right at a bare patch of air just as Lechasseur moved his hand there. She couldn’t tell whether he’d agreed, or she’d just managed to move a little faster than he, but in any event, their hands met, and neither let go as the veil of perception most people confused for the greater world, quickly twisted, shimmered and burst in a kaleidoscope of blue lightning.

  Then, almost as quickly as it happened, the chaos of overwhelming sensations sorted itself back into order. The hospital came into view. They felt their hands still locked tightly to one another.

  Orientating herself, Emily quickly realised where they were, but when was it?An endless crashing, like the rush of war, mixed with screams and a few sirens, turned them both away from the building, toward the street, where the great head of the King poked between the buildings. He was close and coming closer.

  ‘An hour?’ Lechasseur muttered. His head was spinning, and the feeling of disorientation he remembered from his last trip through space and time was back with a vengeance. ‘We couldn’t have jumped more than an hour. It was so fast.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. He’ll be here soon. We’ve got to move.’ Emily already had his hand in hers, so she simply tugged him along. He followed, sluggishly at first, but as his mind settled into place, his legs started pumping, and then they ran, together.

  ‘Crest it is,’ he said.

  They burst through the hospital doors and headed for the central desk. In the lobby, the lights flickered. The King had knocked out the main power lines, leaving the emergency generators to provide what they could. Other than the flashing lights, the interior of the hospital looked like a pocket of order amidst the chaos.

  A burly porter, temples greying, stepped into Lechasseur’s path, his hand held up.

  ‘We need to see Randolph Crest, immediately!’ Lechasseur commanded. His arrogant tone reminded Emily of something she’d nearly forgotten. Lechasseur was, despite his attempts at cultivating an English accent and an English air, an American from New Orleans. Unfortunately, the porter noted the fact as well.

  ‘Are you an immediate family member, sir?’ the porter asked.

  ‘No, but...’

  ‘Can I assume you are not a doctor?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s crucial...’ Lechasseur began.

  The porter nodded over his shoulder at a throng of doctors and nurses engaged in desperate life-saving efforts around a group of stretcher-borne patients. ‘As you can see, sir, there are many vital activities taking place at the moment. Immediate family and hospital staff only.’

  Lechasseur began to pace in frustration. Emily rolled her eyes.

  ‘I need to see him immediately!’

  ‘Might I suggest, sir, that you return home, shower and acquire some proper clothing. By the time you return, the situation may well be under control.’

  Unable to contain his frustration any longer, Lechasseur brought the conversation to an abrupt end by punching the porter in the mouth and sending him sprawling to the floor.

  A woman at the reception desk blanched as the tall, imposing Negro loomed over her. ‘Randolph Crest,’ said Lechasseur levelly. ‘Which room?’

  The receptionist nervously checked her ledger. ‘Ward 10, third floor,’ she stammered.

  Lechasseur tipped his hand at her. ‘Thank you.’

  The stairwell muffled the approach of the King a little, but as soon as they entered the hallway of the third floor the sounds of smashing masonry and screaming people struck them like a physical force coming through the open windows.

  Nurses and doctors hurried about, and Emily smiled and nodded to them as they passed. Lechasseur paid no attention. He rapidly scanned the doors leading off the hallway until he saw the one leading to Ward 10, then crashed through it into the room beyond.

  Crest didn’t notice them at first. He was sprawled on his back in the bed nearest the door, his swollen belly forming a large mound under the white sheets, an intravenous line leading from a needle taped to the oily skin of his hand to a glass bottle of some sort of medicine. His head was turned toward the window, giving him a perfect view of the carnage outside.

  Lechasseur and Emily took a second to look outside as well. The King was approaching fast.

  ‘End of the light! End of the light!’ Crest cried in his high-pitched voice, now more frantic than it had ever been.

  Instantly, Lechasseur’s thoughts were tugged by the same strong longing that had struck the first time he’d seen Crest. Much as he hated time travel, there was something in this man’s, this creature’s, life that his instincts were begging to see.

  ‘Let’s get this over with,’ Lechasseur said. He grabbed Emily’s hand and they stepped forward together.

  A combined shriek from Crest and the creature outside made them pause. With a surprising burst of energy, Crest rolled out of the bed away from them, briefly revealing a dark, hairy back, the same colour as those of the Subterraneans. The drip pulled from his hand and he scooted away. Cornered between the window and the bed, he faced the two friends, his eyes rolling wildly. His body no longer fully his own, he was fighting to stay in control of himself.

 
Emily took half a step forward. ‘We know you’re one of them,’ she said. ‘That’s why you’re connected to the hive Mind. That’s what made you think they were after you!’

  ‘It’s more than that! They were after me! And now it is!!’ Crest yelled.

  Seeing no exit, he began to panic. His hands shook, his legs wobbled and ripples ran through his loose flesh. ‘The light is ending!’ he said again. ‘I should have guessed you would be the ones to bring it to me!’

  Lechasseur and Emily both took a step towards him. He cowered and covered his face. Outside, the King did the same.

  ‘You don’t understand!’ Crest whined, pleading like a lost child. ‘I wouldn’t stay with them anymore! I couldn’t stay with them anymore! They don’t speak! They don’t think! They don’t feel!’

  Imagining a space between them that might somehow lead to freedom, he lurched forward, eyes wild and reeling, pain mutating into anger, adrenaline pumping through his veins. Through the window behind him, they could see the King repeat the action, careening into the side of a building, sending a torrent of rubble down to the street below.

  ‘Who controls whom?’ Emily said.

  ‘Does it matter?’ Lechasseur answered, pulling her forward another step.

  ‘I won’t!’ Crest howled. ‘And I don’t care if London and all the rest of your damned human cities are destroyed!’

  Lechasseur shrugged. ‘But we do,’ he said.

  With that, he closed the distance and grabbed Crest’s right arm.

  Lechasseur realised in a flash how right his instincts had been. Crest’s entire being was now rolling out before him. The spot on his hand that touched Emily’s was crackling with the vibrant feeling of electricity. Blue lightning flickered around them as the power grew.

  The world of things in which there could be objects that sat next to one another, collided into meaninglessness. The whirl that Lechasseur saw as he breached the known rules of existence, briefly revealed to him the smallest edges of the great single Event that truly comprised the totality of being. Then it all rushed backwards in a dreadful flood.

  Lechasseur already hated this part.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Rush of white light, rush of colour, then a tumble into shades of black. Lechasseur felt heat all around him, close – if possible, solid – air. He was dizzy, just like the first time he’d leapt through time and space, and he’d wound up somewhere in a field. This time, he knew what had happened, he’d been ready for it, he’d wanted it to happen. But as much as he told himself this, his senses remained doggedly confused. The image of the hospital room and the surreal destruction visible outside its window were still too fresh to relinquish for the sake of the muddy blackness that now greeted his eyes. It was as though he’d been caught half-awake and was now unable to decide which was real and which was dream.

  Emily’s harsh, insistent whisper helped.

  ‘Honoré? Honoré? Are you there?’

  Emily was apparently used to this sort of travel. How this could be, Lechasseur had no idea; the secrets were locked in her amnesia. But he could hear in her tone that she was worried, nevertheless. From the sound of her voice, she couldn’t be more than a few yards away, but he could see nothing in the darkness. Unless he really was dreaming. Then she might as well be on another planet.

  ‘Honoré?’ Her voice was louder, more concerned.

  ‘Here,’ he finally said, deciding she was real, or the next best thing.

  He heard her feet move along a hard, uneven surface. Then he felt her hand brush his chest and come to rest firmly on his shoulder.

  ‘Where are we?’ Lechasseur asked, lowering his voice to a whisper, lest something in the dark might hear.

  ‘Somewhere in Crest’s past,’ she answered, equally hushed. ‘Underground, I think.’

  ‘Crest is one of those things,’ Lechasseur said. ‘Should have guessed from the start. But he did look different. More... human, I guess.’

  ‘That’s because he’s spent a lifetime trying to fit in with us,’ Emily said, ‘and because he was never just one of them. Remember what Mestizer said about their King? What Crest himself said he was? A rare born, smarter than the others, born to lead, or at least to focus the hive Mind.’

  Lechasseur immediately understood. ‘He left them because he couldn’t stand it.’

  Emily said nothing, but Lechasseur somehow sensed her nodding in agreement.

  ‘So where is he?’ Lechasseur asked. He turned about, trying in vain to make out their surroundings. ‘Can’t imagine why someone would want to leave all this.’

  Sweat had accumulated on his upper lip and was running down towards his mouth. He spat it away by pressing some air between his pursed lips. At the end of his breath, a touch of coolness graced his mouth.

  ‘Feel that?’ he whispered, stepping toward the coolness. ‘A breeze.’

  He felt her press her face forward, although she kept her hand firmly on his shoulder.

  ‘It’s coming from here,’ she said.

  He groped forward, she beside him, still touching, as his fingers probed stone and dirt walls. His hand soon found the source of the breeze, hidden behind a large boulder wedged near the top of the space they were in. It was a narrow crevice, a space heading upwards. The rocks of which it was composed were anything but steady. Even the slight pressure from his hand sent pebbles and earth clattering down.

  ‘Move carefully,’ Lechasseur cautioned. ‘We don’t want to start a cave-in.’

  ‘Do you still have your torch?’ she asked, recalling the second one in his pocket.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Lechasseur said, mentally kicking himself that he hadn’t thought of this himself. He withdrew it and flipped the switch, starkly revealing the natural browns and greys of the space they were in.

  ‘Point it up there, please,’ Emily said.

  Lechasseur hesitated, then obeyed, angling the light toward the crevice, and beyond. For a second, despite the power from the new batteries, the light found nothing. Then, it fell on a patch of lighter rock, almost white and squared at the edges.

  ‘Concrete,’ Lechasseur said. ‘The bottom of a building foundation. Or a sewer, or the tube. The Subterraneans were trapped down here until that bomb blast last week, but Crest found a way out decades ago. This is what started it all. Maybe we do...’

  Before he could finish the sentence, Lechasseur felt his still-sore jaw snap sideways under terrific pressure from something fast, oily and hairy. The torch fell from his hand as his head slammed sideways into the wall, dislodging a few more stones.

  As Lechasseur tumbled, the Subterranean leapt atop him, snapping vile teeth toward his face. Lechasseur rolled sideways just in time to avoid losing his chin, his greater weight throwing the thing off balance. It toppled, righted itself, then bounced off a far wall and braced itself for a leap. With a dread chattering, the thing was on him again, tearing fingernails into his face, digging into his coat near his abdomen with prehensile feet.

  Lechasseur raised his hands and his legs, trying to fend off the brutal attack. Thinking his back a less vulnerable target, his panicked mind was trying to figure out how best to roll over when a dull THUD filled the air. No longer attacking, the creature slumped off him into the dark.

  ‘Honoré! Honoré! Say something!’ he heard Emily cry. ‘I just hit one of you on the head with a rock, and I’m not sure which! Honoré?’

  ‘Here,’ he moaned, then slowly started getting back to his feet. She helped him up as best she could on the jagged terrain. He could feel with his hands that there was some blood on his face, but none seemed to be flowing. Perhaps he’d got away with just scratches and bruises.

  ‘Just like Cionadh,’ he mused. ‘Do some things in time always repeat?’

  ‘I suppose,’ Emily said. ‘Like ritual.’

  The glowing torch had rolled downhill a b
it, so he scrambled after it, then shone the light on his wounded attacker. The dark, hairy chest moved steadily up and down, indicating it was still alive. A large bump rose on the left side of its skull where Emily had struck with the stone. As if it sensed the light, the creature tried to rise briefly. Lechasseur tensed. But then it lapsed into complete unconsciousness.

  ‘That’s a particularly ugly specimen,’ Lechasseur said, noting the oily flesh that hung so loosely on its frame. All at once, something in the creature’s face struck him as familiar. ‘Sweet heaven,’ he exclaimed. ‘This is Crest!’

  ‘This must be the moment in his life when he found the passage,’ Emily said. ‘This is the moment we were both being drawn to all along.’

  Lechasseur was about to agree, when a new sound made him whirl. A low, familiar scraping and shuffling made its way up from a lower darkness. Even in the few seconds that he stood listening, it grew slowly but unmistakably louder.

  ‘It’s the others!’ Emily said, whispering again. ‘They’re probably looking for him!’

  ‘I know how to fix this,’ Lechasseur said. He suspected Emily had guessed as well, but voiced it anyway. ‘If this passage weren’t here, Crest never would have left the underworld. All we have to do is seal it off.’

  He let the torch light glance once more on the creature’s unconscious form. Emily looked as well. Without the wrinkles and ripples that reflected the anxiety of conscious thought, for the first time the face seemed quite peaceful.

  ‘Seems a bit cruel to trap him here forever with those things,’ Emily said. ‘He is a poet.’

  Lechasseur turned back to the upward passage. ‘As cruel as letting him be killed by a so-called King in his hospital bed? To mention nothing of the tally of four sacrificial victims, and who knows how many others at the hands of the King?’

  Still, an undeniable twinge of regret accompanied his decision. Though he could think of no other parallels between them, Lechasseur knew that Crest was an outsider like himself. That alone made him feel for the creature’s plight. But what else could he do? Feel angry and guilty the way Emily did?