Kristin Read online

  He lunged at her, grabbed her head and forced his thumbs into her eye sockets, pushing the peculiar organs in hard, flattening them to bursting point. ‘Damn your lies ... she’s alive! If she’d left this world I would have known. Just as I knew when my father’s, my brother’s lives ended. Just as I know Kristin is alive. Tell me my mother is alive, tell me Kristin is alive ... tell me, tell me!’ He began to strangle her. ‘Tell me, or I’ll break your neck!’

  ‘ ... No ... thou wilt break ... hers!’

  Her neck shrank to the thickness of string. ‘Choking ... bitch is ... choking!’

  ‘Tell me!”

  ‘Whore cannot ... breath!’

  ‘Tell me, you bastard!’

  ‘ ... THOM ... !’

  He let her go, sweat streaming down his haggard face. ‘ ... Kristin?’

  The possessor could no longer deny the possessed. ‘For a moment. For a very brief moment,’ she answered.

  His head sank impossibly deep into her chest, entered her body, and he saw a heart that beated still.

  ‘Why have you let me live, Thom? Can’t you see this is torture?’ she whispered, running her fingers through his hair. ‘I can recall every bloody murder, every debasement, every wrong I have committed. The agony of each person. I can’t exist like this, not for one more day. Please, Thom, help me to die. Take my life before it claims millions more, before it crushes humanity.’

  ‘Whilst you can still talk to me, when I know you’re still there?’

  She kissed his forehead and twitched as the Beast snuffed out the lives of proud mothers, seeded the unsullied souls of their newborn babies with its malignance. Motherless issue, it muttered, deep inside her mind. Mine now. ‘Use your heart, Thom, look at me and tell me what you see?’

  The threat in her eyes, the entity’s portals onto earthly life, had been temporarily abrogated by human emotion.

  ‘A good person whose soul has been invaded, obliterated by a terrible force she can no longer control.’

  ‘Yes, I’m nothing more than the badness now, Thom, it’s consumed me. I’m its tool. You must end my life. As soon as I’m dead, the badness will die, and the world will be free of it. One small sacrifice, Thom.’

  ‘But it has no weakness.’

  ‘I can’t help you, its achilles heel is the last thing it would ever reveal to me, words it would never allow me to utter. But I can feel its fear of you, it’s palpable, absolute. It can’t bear to be anywhere near you, and yet it’s drawn to you like a moth to a flame. Its abhorrence of you is greater than anyone, anything else on this Earth. I’ve done my best to shield you from it but I’m so tired. It means to do you harm, Thom, it wants to kill you. It must kill you.’

  She flinched as it continued to preach, indoctrinate and kill. ‘Take it before it takes you. You’re a good man, Thom, a righteous man, with untold powers. You must find a way of ... no more words, bitch!’ it spat, jerking her head back like a puppet. ‘Don’t worry, Thom, you’ll find a way.

  My life here will end and one day you’ll join me — tomorrow, the next day, or in many years time, it doesn’t matter when, you know we’ll be together again, you know we could never be parted forever.’

  Twenty-one

  An olive-skinned man stubbed out his cigarette against a red brick wall and stepped out of the shadows. He glided silently across the road, entered the building and propped himself against the bar, ignoring their gaze.

  ‘A new whoreson in my presence,’ the raw voice scratched, acerbically.

  ‘Any service in here?’ the man barked.

  Thom nodded at the opened bottle and the man stood, sidled arrogantly behind the bar, dispensed a long drink and sat on a bar stool facing them. He was tall. His dark brown hair was slicked back, his cobalt blue eyes were cold and dead. He tipped his head, emptied the glass, and smiled insincerely. ‘Quiet in here?’ He took an extra glass from the shelf and filled all three. ‘Some weird shit goin’ down. Whad’ya think, huh? Think it’s the end of the world, huh? Think we’re all gonna die? Shit, I wouldn’t fuckin’ mind man, all my family’s dead or crazy. Think it’s the apocalypse?’

  ‘Believe it,’ the voice brayed.

  Thom downed the alcohol and stared hard at him, his brow creasing as the latino-american drawl left the man’s lips.

  ‘Not drinking, huh?’ the man asked the chilling, black-eyed woman.

  ‘Keep thy vile, burning fluid,’ she hissed.

  ‘I’m from Detroit. Shit’s happenin’ there too man ... fathers killing sons ... friends kickin’ each other to death ... churches burnin’ ... man! Hey, I know you!’

  ‘Thou knowest me? Brash fucker! Not even my father recognizes me.’

  ‘Yeah, sure, you’re that fuckin’ girl, right? On TV? Is it true what they’re sayin’ ‘bout you? Man ... you’re one crazy bitch!’ He reached slowly inside his jacket and laid his hand on something smooth and cold. His long fingers wrapped around it, grasping it lightly. He tensed his biceps, feint perspiration forming on his brow.

  Her jet eyes lost their reflectance. Suddenly, they seemed vast, hollow spaces empty of all matter, and he could feel a presence stripping him bare as it entered his mind, read his intentions. He shuddered, fear was a new experience for him.

  Beneath the jacket he loosened his hold, involuntarily rotated the smooth grip. The opposite end, the razor-sharp tip, pierced the sheer fabric of his white, cotton shirt, drawing a small drop of blood from his abdomen.

  ‘Bitch!’ he spat.

  ‘Thou wert slow, far too slow, and I will do anything to protect her.’

  ‘You are up against the best now, motherfucker.’

  ‘A killer never hesitates … he kills.’

  ‘Y’know, you’re right, and it’s kind of a pity.’ He spun the hunting knife and slashed her throat once ... twice ... then drove it in and left it there.

  The assassin stepped backwards, and the shower of her blood covered his smiling face, which transformed into a featureless wall of skin.

  Thom caught him with a blow to the cheek, another to the ear, but the man was bigger, stronger, and he brought a bottle down upon Thom’s head, pitching him into darkness.

  She seized the knife with both hands and withdrew it, slamming it down on the bar. The echo sounded like cannon fire. The spray from her neck slowed to a trickle and stopped. ‘Didst thou believe I would just let thee kill her?’ it gargled defiantly, as the last drops ran from her lips.

  The knife evolved into a sword. She thrust it through the white material of his shirt into his hard stomach and sliced upwards to the sternum with enough force to gut a shark, spilling his internal organs. The partially digested, bloody effluence of his final meal splattered onto the virgin carpeting. His throttled screams, begging for a mercifully quick death, fell upon deaf ears as she elevated his dripping, shelled carcass above her head, watching with relish as he wriggled on the long blade, his eyes bulging with blood and shock.

  When he was still she tipped the blade. His corpse slipped from it, crumpled to the floor and vanished. She lifted the sword to her mouth and ran her tongue along its razor-sharp edge, severing the tip: The taste of the lifeblood still tasted bitter to her, unpalatable. How could this species exist with such a foul substance circulating within their bodies? Soon only hatred would pump through their veins. It would be the only lifeblood they would need.

  Twenty-two

  ‘Prime Minister?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Our attempt to terminate the enigma has failed, or so we must assume.’

  ‘ ... What attempt?’

  ‘Our man should have contacted us on a secure line by six this morning. He hasn’t done so and as he’s always punctual it can only mean one thing, that he’s dead.’

  ‘I see,’ said the new Premier, Andrew Devlin. You should have told us your plans. Christ. We’ll send our best men in.’ He put down the red phone, his hotline to the corridors of power across the Atlantic, and stared at the black one: Now he woul
d organize his own solution.

  Devlin had been at the funeral of a close friend in the Solomon Islands when the siren sounded. The disturbing, disruptive tone had been weak there, as it had in many oceanic regions, its effect minimal. But he’d watched the television broadcast three days later expecting his doubts over the girl’s apparently terrible powers to be substantiated. Instead he’d witnessed the transformation of Greta Johansson from beautiful young television presenter into bloated old hag — a grotesque, smoking carcass.

  He withdrew a document from a desk drawer, faxed to Downing Street by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, William Spence, and read once more of the grim death of Professor Hassin Baabda at Scotland Yard. The vastly experienced police psychiatrist had spent less then thirty minutes alone with Kristin and was subsequently discovered with half of his skull missing, his brain extirpated. The security camera recording of the examination had shown Baabda reeling as a series of unseen blows punched cavernous holes in his head, whilst his subject rocked, crazed, but safely restrained in a steel chair inside a room she’d somehow sealed against outside interference. Logic dictated that it was impossible for anybody to commit such acts. But the world was no longer governed by logic.

  Pacing the room, he turned to the left and saw his reflection in the large, gilt-framed wall mirror. The insanity had killed his predecessor, the man who’d led his country so ably, with such distinction, for three years. But he would not buckle under the colossal weight placed so suddenly upon his inexperienced shoulders. He would not succumb. He’d fight the psychosis and demand that the surviving members of his cabinet do the same. He would not allow the nation to degrade any further. If this was a battle that could be won then his country would lead the way, he’d make sure of that. If the assassination of the female anomaly might help the cause, if only superficially, then so be it. He returned to his desk, picked up the black phone, and ordered the killing. There would be no mistake this time.

  Twenty-three

  The monster inside the human being felt her shiver as she huddled against a wall, defenceless against the relentless barrage of hailstones that battered her sallow face, making her howl with discomfort. It was a new type of pain — not as bad as a bullet in the back, but unpleasant all the same. It imagined the hard, frozen droplets of water had been sent by its father as further punishment for transgressing his foremost law once again.

  It made her open the coat, hoping that the repulsive edict burnt into her flesh had vanished, or would prove to be a mental aberration on her part, but it was still there and unlike the traumatic gunshot wound, it showed no sign of healing.

  It had been close to the Christ, very close, after it fled Koreans and returned to the streets it knew so well. But then the female had heard footsteps behind her, moving with stealth. She’d whirled around to find nobody there. There had been a deafening sound, a contained explosion, and she’d been blown forwards, landing face down on the frozen ground. She didn’t know anything was wrong, couldn’t feel any pain at first. Her back felt wet but she was unaware that half of it was missing. Then searing, mortal pain had assailed her and she’d screamed out, rolling one way then the other, unable to breathe, terrified that everything was about to end.

  A tall, olive-skinned man had stood over her, grinning, and she’d heard another explosion, felt more, terrible pain between her limbs of mobility as her organs of repro-duction were blasted away. It was a callous, savage attack, and she made the assassin pay.

  There was little left of him, more bullet hole than flesh after she’d repaired fully, snatched the powerful weapon from his shaking digits and emptied the remaining chambers into his head, saving one for his organs of reproduction.

  The assassin had surely been dispatched by those in power, in a calculated, but foolish bid to destroy the body of the female. Exacting immediate revenge for their murderous inclinations it turned its attention, quite randomly, to the continental island it recognized as Australia, and infected a group of individuals inhabiting a northern peninsular of the land mass with a mutated strain of the disease, influenza. The virus was highly contagious and particularly aggressive. It would spread like the dreaded fires of the bush, and kill hundreds of thousands at the very least.

  It decided things would be this way from this moment on. Any attack against its earthly body would be avenged swiftly, on a scale exceeding the limits of human comprehension. It would kill them, and make them kill. It would force them to do despicable things to one another. It would make them suffer until they begged for compassion it would never show them.

  It would make them serve.

  Twenty-four

  When Thom woke it was morning. His body had seized. Painfully, he straightened his limbs, back and neck. His phone had slipped from his pocket during the night and lay on the hard, cold ground, its screen cracked. There had been hardly any charge left in the cell when he’d last checked — enough to take one call ... from his mother ... or Kristin, and he’d turned it off to conserve what little remained.

  He picked the phone up and wiped the grime from the display. There was one message from a withheld number awaiting him. He opened the SMS, read it and swallowed. Then he dragged himself up, glanced once more at the message and stumbled across the deserted street.

  Three cars were parked on the other side. Thom chose a battered, blue Range Rover, smashed the driver’s side glass and got in. He hot-wired the ignition and moved off, erratically, towards the city. But within minutes he fell asleep and the vehicle caught a wall with a glancing blow that whipped his head forwards, tearing his slackened neck muscles and cracking a vertebra.

  Steam billowed from beneath the crumpled bonnet, the wind carrying it onto the windscreen in a mist, but the engine continued to run. He reversed the car and carried on; the sinister rumble from the leaden sky would keep him awake thereafter.

  Bracing his neck against the pain he reached forward and switched the radio on. White noise. He tried again, kept tuning, but the airwaves were dead and the vacant hiss quickly made him feel isolated. He switched off.

  The first of the army units appeared as he neared the northern end of Vauxhall Bridge Road and by the time he’d reached Grosvenor Place one such outfit had formed a roadblock.

  He brought the car to a standstill and an austere, red-faced, senior ranking officer strode forward and lowered his head, his breath steaming the glass. The soldier wagged a finger in a downward motion and produced a small photograph from his fatigues. He examined it closely, scrutinizing Thom, his face twitching nervously, eyes flitting back and forth. Then, without uttering a word, he straightened and waved him through.

  Thom eased down the accelerator and rolled forwards, checking the rear-view mirror. The officer was shouting madly at his men. Seconds later he pulled out a pistol, shot four of them dead, screamed maniacally and fired the next bullet into his mouth. Thom floored the pedal. There were no more checkpoints, no more soldiers.

  The car had picked up a double puncture and could carry him no further. He pulled over and continued by foot, his neck pulsating with pain. Sleet began to fall, settling on him, soaking his clothes, reddening and numbing his hands.

  He passed through the Queen Elizabeth Gate into Hyde Park and turned left into Rotten Row: The city’s finest open space had been disfigured beyond all recognition, its ancient trees burned black, as they’d been in his nightmares.

  Alongside the Serpentine Lake he stopped dead: hundreds of bloated cadavers drifted in the freezing water amidst mounds of litter. He waded in a few feet and rolled one of them over. Glazed, lifeless eyes, those of a teenage boy, gazed senselessly at him. He plunged the youngster’s head below the waterline, again ... and again, until his crazed expression sank below the loose surface ice, and then hauled himself out.

  Further on, he saw that an enormous pit had been gouged from the dead grass by some type of colossal digger, above which a cloud of flies swarmed frenziedly.

  He approached the hole and looked in. I
t was nearly full, full of death, the sort of death he’d only seen on newsreels from the end of the Second World War when the allies liberated Dachau and Belsen. The army must have dug the ditch, filled it with dead from the park and beyond and not covered it over.

  Thom turned away from the ditch, masking his face. The terrain was familiar, he was nearing the memorial. Ahead, he noticed a naked figure on the ground and he rushed forward. It was a man, a dead man, pegged out on the grass. Between his splayed legs a horde of ravenous maggots feasted upon the bloody stump that had been his genitals. More ate away at the remains of his eyes, crawled from his nostrils. Thom retched.

  Soon, he reached the circle of commemorative, granite stones, where the covering trees afforded some shelter from the icy cascade and waited, as he’d been told to.

  From some thick bushes to his right a cold forged, steel shaft slid silently forwards and a single shot cracked the damp air. The cartridge tore a hole in his thigh and he writhed in the dirt. Then through the mind-numbing pain he saw the ground beyond the clearing rupture and she rose up from beneath the sodden earth, worms and roots entangled in her black hair: He couldn’t, he wouldn’t, let her die this way. So violently. So coldly, when her love for him had drawn her to his side. He would do what she’d asked, but not like this. Not here. Not now.

  ‘IT’S A TRAP, KRISTIN!’ he cried. ‘GET DOWN, IT’S A TRAP!’ But the warning came too late. The hail of amm-unition blasted her backwards twelve feet and she thudded bloodily against the cold granite slabs.

  The barrage of bullets continued unabated. They punctured her arms, exploded into her skull, decimating her brain. They shattered her ribs, ruptured her heart, tore her lungs and liver to shreds. It went on, and on, and on. Then the guns fell silent.

  He crawled to her side: There had been a limit to the degree of punishment her body could withstand. It had been met, exceeded. Her ordeal on Earth was at an end, but she didn’t seem at peace. He held her slender wrist. There was no pulse, and already she grew cold, her flesh greying, her hands frozen in tight claws of defiance and anger. Thom closed the lids to her midnight eyes, kissed each tenderly and lay his head in the blood-drenched lap of her broken body.