‘Stuff me,’ said John Omally, which was quite unbecoming of a Pope. ‘Would you look at that holy show?’
‘Unholy show, John. That is disgusting.’
‘Yes, though, isn’t it? And that.’ Jim followed Omally’s pointing finger. ‘You’d need to be double-jointed.’
‘There’s something inscribed there, John. You know the Latin, what does it say?’
Omally leant forward and perused the inscription, ‘Oh,’ said he at length, his voice having all the fun of herpes about it, ‘that is what it says.’
‘Exit does it say?’
Omally turned towards the grinning idiot. ‘Give me that hip-flask, you are a fool.’
‘And you a Pope. Drink your own.’
‘Give me that flask.’
‘Well, only a small sip, don’t want your judgement becoming impaired.’ Pooley began to hiccup.
Omally guzzled more than his fair share. ‘It’s in there,’ he said, wiping his chin and returning the flask to Pooley.
‘What is?’ Jim shook the flask against his ear and gave the self-made Pope a disparaging look.
‘The big It, you damned fool.’
‘Then next right turn and on your bike. We don’t want to do anything silly now, do we?’
Omally nodded gloomily. ‘We must; stick your tattooed mitt up against it.’
‘I can think of a million reasons why not.’
‘And me. For the Professor, eh Jim?’
‘For the Professor, then.’ Jim pressed his hand to the door and it moved away before his touch.
Omally took up his bike, and the two men stepped cautiously through the opening.
‘Oh, ruddy hell,’ whispered Jim.
‘Yes, all of that.’
They stood now in the vestibule of what was surely a great cathedral. But its size was not tailored to the needs of man. It was the hall of giants. The two stared about them in an attempt to take it in. It was simply too large. The scale of its construction sent the mind reeling. The temperature had dropped another five degrees at least, yet the smell was ripe as a rotten corpse.
‘The belly of the beast,’ gasped Pooley. ‘Let’s go back. The utter cold, the feeling, the stench, I can’t stand it.’
‘No, Jim, look, there it is.’
Ahead, across an endless expanse of shining black marble floor, spread the congregation, row upon regimental row. Countless figures crouched before as many flickering terminal screens, paying obeisance to their dark master. For there, towering towards eternity, rising acre upon vertical acre, spreading away in every direction, was the mainframe of the great computer. Billions of housed microcircuits, jet-black boxes stacked one upon another in a jagged endless wall. Upon giddy stairways and catwalks, minuscule figures moved upon its face, attending to its needs. Feeding it, pampering it with knowledge, gorging its insatiable appetite.
I AM LATEINOS, I AM ROMIITH.
The Latin, the formula, words reduced to their base components, stripped of their flesh, reduced to the charred black dust of their skeletons; to the equations which were the music of the spheres, the grand high opera of all existence. Omally slumped forward on to his knees. ‘I see it,’ he whispered hoarsely, his eyes starting from his head. ‘Now I understand.’
‘Then bully for you, John. Come on let’s get out, someone will see us.’ Pooley fanned at his nose and rubbed at his shirt-sleeves.
‘No, no. Don’t you understand what it’s doing? Why it’s here?’
‘No. Nor why I should be.’
‘It is what the Professor told us.’ Omally struck his fist to his temple. ‘Numerology; the power lies in the numbers themselves. Can’t you see it? This whole madhouse is the product of mathematics. Mankind did not invent mathematics nor discover it. No the science of mathematics was given to him that he might misuse it to his ruin. That he might eventually create all this.’ Omally spread out his arms to encompass the world they now inhabited. ‘Don’t you understand?’
Jim shook his head. ‘Drunk as a lord,’ said he. ‘And this time as Pope.’
Omally continued, his voice rising in pitch as the revelation struck "him like a thunderbolt. ‘The machine has now perfected the art. It has mastered the science, it can break anything down to its mathematical equivalent. Once it has the formula it can then rebuild, recreate everything. An entire brand new world built from the ashes of the old, encompassing everything.’
‘But all it does is churn out the same old stuff over and over again.’
Omally clambered to his feet and turned upon him. ‘Yes, you damn fool, because there is one number it can never find. It found the number of a man, but there is one more number, one more equation which never can be found.’
‘Go on then, have your spasm.’
‘The soul. That’s what the old man was trying to tell us. Don’t you see it, Jim?’
‘I see that,’ said Pooley, pointing away over John’s shoulder. ‘But I don’t believe it.’
Omally turned to catch sight of a gaunt angular figure clad in the shredded remnants of a tweed suit, who was stealing purposefully towards them.
‘The Saints be praised.’
‘Holmes,’ gasped Pooley. ‘But how . . . ? It cannot be.’
‘You can’t keep a good man down.’
Sherlock Holmes gestured towards them. ‘Come,’ he mouthed.
Jim put his hand to Omally’s arm. ‘What if he starts clearing his throat?’
Omally shrugged helplessly. ‘Come on, Jim,’ he said, trundling Marchant towards the skulking detective.
Holmes drew them into the shadows. There in the half-light his face seemed drawn and haggard, although a fierce vitality shone in his eyes. ‘Then only we three remain.’ It was a statement rather than a question. Omally nodded slowly. ‘And do you know what must be done?’
‘We do not.’
‘Then I shall tell you, but quickly, for we have little or no time. We are going to poison it,’ said Sherlock Holmes. ‘We are going to feed it with death.’ The cold determination of his words and the authority with which he spoke to them seemed absolute.
‘Poison it?’ said Jim. ‘But how?’
Holmes drew out a sheaf of papers from his pocket, even in the semi-darkness the Professor’s distinctive Gothic penmanship was instantly recognizable. ‘Feed it with death. The Professor formulated the final equation. He knew that he might not survive so he entrusted a copy to me. What he began so must we finish.’
‘I’ll drink to that.’
‘Computers will react only to precise stimuli. Feed them gibberish and you will not confuse them. But feed them with correctly-coded instructions and they will react and function accordingly, in their own unholy madness. Professor Slocombe formulated the final programme. It will direct the machine to reverse its functions, leading ultimately to its own destruction. This programme will override any failsafe mechanism the machine has. I must, however, gain access to one of the terminals.’
‘And how do you propose to do that?’ Jim enquired as he slyly drained the last drop from his hipflask. ‘They all seem a little busy at present.’
Sherlock Holmes drew out his gun. ‘This is a Forty-four Magnum, biggest. . .’
‘Yes, we are well aware of that. It might, however, attract a little too much attention.’
‘My own thoughts entirely. I was wondering, therefore, if you two gentlemen might be prevailed upon to create some kind of diversion.’
‘Oh yes?’ said Pope John. ‘What, such as drawing the demonic horde down about our ears whilst you punch figures into a computer terminal?’
Holmes nodded grimly. ‘Something like that. I will require at least six clear minutes. I know I am asking a lot.’
‘You are asking everything.’
Holmes had no answer to make.
John stared hard into the face of Jim Pooley.
The other shrugged. ‘What the heck?’ said he.
‘What indeed?’ Omally climbed on to his bike. ‘Room for one
more up front.’
Jim smiled broadly and tore off his metallic balaclava. ‘Then we won’t be needing these any more.’
‘No,’ said John, removing his own. ‘I think not.’ Raising his hand in a farewell salute he applied his foot to the pedal. ‘Up the Rebels.’
‘God for Harry,’ chorused Pooley, as the two launched forward across the floor, bound for destiny upon the worn wheels of Marchant the Wonder Bike.
A strange vibration swept up the mainframe of the great computer. The figures moving upon its face stiffened, frozen solid. Diamond-tipped lights began to flicker and flash, forming into sequences, columns, and star-shapes, and pyramids, veering and changing, pulsing faster and faster. A low purr of ominous humming rose in pitch, growing to a siren-screaming crescendo, as the machine’s defence system suddenly registered the double image coursing across the floor of its very sanctum sanctorum. A ripple of startled movement spread out from the base, as the terminal operators took in the horror. Their heads rose to face the mainframe, their mouths opened, and the curiously mechanical coughing sounds issued forth, swelling to an atavistic howl.
‘Do you think they’ve tumbled us, John?’ Pooley clapped his hands across his ears and Omally sank his head between his shoulders as the two zig-zagged on between the sea of terminals and their shrieking, howling operators. The robots were rising to their feet, stretching out their arms towards their master, their heads thrown back, their mouths opening and closing. They stormed from their seats to pursue the intruders.
At the back of the hall a stealthy figure in shredded tweed slipped into a vacant chair and flexed his long slim fingers.
‘Get away there!’ Pooley levelled his travelling hobnail towards a shrieking figure looming before them. He caught it a mighty blow to the chest and toppled it down across the face of a terminal, tearing it from its mounts amidst a tangle of sparking wires and scrambled mechanisms.
‘Nice one, Jim.’
‘Hard to port, John.’
Omally spun a hasty, wheel-screeching left turn, dodging a cluster of straining hands which clawed towards them. They dived off down another line of abandoned terminals, the robots now scrambling over them, faces contorted in hatred, anxious to be done with the last of their sworn enemy. Small black boxes were being drawn into the light, emitting sinister crackles of blue fire. The chase was on in earnest. And there were an awful lot of the blighters, with just two men to the bike.
The figures on the high gantries now ran to and fro in a fever of manic industry. They worked with inhuman energy, tending and caring to their dark master. The lights about them streamed up the dead black face, throbbing in ‘V formations, travelling down again to burst into pentacles and cuneiforms. They became a triple-six logo a hundred feet high which reformed into the head of a horned goat, the eyes ringed in blood-red laser fire. Blackpool illuminations it was not.
Holmes laboured away at his terminal, but here and there his trembling fingers faltered and he punched in an incorrect digit. Cursing bitterly, he was forced to erase an entire line and begin again.
‘You rotter.’ A clawed hand tore off Pooley’s right shirt-sleeve. ‘I’m down to the arm. Let’s get out of here, John!’
‘Strike that man.’ As a foaming psychotic rose up before them, Pooley levelled another flailing boot. The floor was now a hell-house of confusion. The robots were fighting with one another, each desperate to wring the life from Pooley and Omally. The cycling duo thundered on. Omally wore the orange jersey. The tour de Brentford was very much on the go.
‘Get a move on, your Popeship, they’re closing for the kill.’
John swung away once more, but the road-blocks were up. He skidded about, nearly losing Pooley, who uttered many words of justifiable profanity, and made hurried tracks towards the door.
The robots encircled them, black boxes spurting fire. The circle was closing fast and every avenue of escape was blocked as soon as it was entered. Omally drew Marchant to a shivering halt, depositing Pooley on the deck. ‘If you know how to fly,’ he told his bike, ‘now would be the time to impress me.’ Sadly, the old battered sit-up-and-beg showed no inclination whatsoever towards sudden levitation. ‘Well,’ said John, ‘one must never ask too much of a bike.’
Pooley rose shakily to his feet. To every side loomed a sea of snarling faces, surrounding them in an unbreakable circle. It was many many faces deep, and none looked amenable to a bloodless surrender.
‘Goodbye, John,’ said Jim, ‘I never knew a better friend.’
‘Goodbye, Jim.’ Omally pressed his hand into that of his lifelong companion, a tear rose in a clear blue eye. ‘We’ll go down fighting at least.’
‘At the very least.’ Pooley raised his fists. ‘Beware,’ he cried, ‘this man knows Dimac, the deadliest martial art known to . . . well, to the two of us any way.’
The crowd rose up as if drawing its collective sulphurous breath, and fell upon them; cruel hands snatched down, anxious to destroy, to draw out the life. Omally struck where he could but the blows rained down upon him, driving him to his knees. Pooley could manage but one last, two-fingered expression of defiance before he was dashed to the deck. The writhing mob poured forward, thrashing and screaming, and it seemed that nothing less than a very timely miracle could save the dynamic duo now.
A great tremor rushed across the floor of the unholy cathedral. The lynch mob drew back in sudden horror, the black marble surface upon which they stood was being jarred as if by some mighty force battering up at it. Pooley and Omally cowered as the floor moved beneath them. A great crack tore open, tumbling robots to either side of it. Shards of sparkling marble shot up like some black volcanic eruption. An enormous fist thrust up from the depths. Another followed and, as the crowd backed into a growing circle, crying and pointing, a head and shoulders emerged from the destruction, rising noble and titanic amongst the debris.
‘Fe . . . Fi . . . Fo . . . Fum.’ As a great section of flooring smashed aside, Neville scrambled up through the opening. He was bloody and scarred, with great wounds upon his arms and legs, but his face bore an old nobility. He was indeed a Titan, a god of olden Earth. Yes, there were giants in the Earth in those days, and also after that. Neville stood, a Hercules in soiled Y-fronts. ‘All right,’ he cried. ‘Who wants a fight then?’
‘Not us,’ cried Jim Pooley.
‘Hello, lads,’ said the bulging barman, sighting the cringing twosome, and flexing a selection of chest muscles. ‘You appear to be somewhat unfairly outnumbered.’
‘A bit of assistance would not go amiss.’
Neville flexed shoulders which had previously only been flexed by the Incredible Hulk, and even then to a minor degree.
‘The rest has done him good,’ said John. ‘He looks well on it.’
Amidst a roar of green flame, Cerberus, the hound of hell, sprang up from the netherworld beneath to confront the barman. Its three heads, one now shredded and dangling, worked and snapped, saliva drooled from fanged jaws, and the stench of brimstone filled the already overloaded air. The scorpion tail flicked and dived. ‘Come on, doggy,’ called the barman. ‘Time for a trip down to the vet’s!’ The creature launched itself towards him, passing over two terrified human professional cowerers. Neville caught it by a throat and the two crashed back into the crowd.
‘On your toes, Jim,’ called Omally. ‘I see a small ray of light.’ Shrinking and flinching, he and Jim edged away.
Neville swung the beast about, bringing down a score of robots. Others snatched at him but he swept them aside. Above, the mainframe pulsed and flashed, the moving lights forming obscene images. Pooley and Omally backed towards it, the exit was thoroughly blocked and the only way seemed like up.
Neville drove his fist through a plasticized face, sending up a cascade of synthetic blood. The hound of hell fell upon him once more but he tore down a lower jaw with a rending of bone and gristle. He was quite coming into his own.
Pooley and Omally gained a first staircase. ‘Not
more stairs,’ gasped Jim.
‘Pull the plugs out,’ screamed Omally. ‘Pull it to pieces. Follow me.’ He thundered up the steps on to the first gantry. A vista of housed microcircuits met his gaze. Omally thrust forth his hand and tore out a drawered section, punching the things free. Pooley followed suit. Faces turned from the melee below, a group of androids detached themselves from the throng. Pooley ran along, drawing out random circuit patterns. Omally followed on, punching them from their housings. They gained the second level. Ahead stood a robot barring their way. ‘You duck, I’ll hit it.’ Omally pressed Jim forward. The robot swung its hand at him but Jim ducked out of reach, grabbing at the knees. Omally drove a fist over his diving back, and the thing lurched off the gantry to fall into the chaos which now reigned below.
Neville stood defiant, taking on all comers. Cerberus with but one head left snarling, snapped at his ankles. A ring of shattered pseudo-corpses surrounded the combatants. John and Jim gained the third level. They were making something of an art out of dispatching the face-workers.
‘Pull it to pieces, Jimmy boy.’
‘I’m pulling, I’m pulling.’ Jim ran forward, dragging out segments, Omally came behind, kicking and punching. Micro-circuits fell like evil snow upon the ferocious crowd welling beneath. Up another stairway and beyond.
Below them the lights exhibited a jumbled confusion. Great battle waged upon the floor. Neville stood head and shoulders, and a good deal more, above the great ring of his attackers. Blue fire sparkled as they strove to apply their killing weapons to his naked flesh, but Neville snatched out the arms from their silicone sockets and flung them high over his head. Cerberus had barked his last, but from the great chasm yawning in the marble floor other horrors spilled, spinning and thrashing, whirling out of the pit. Barbs and spines, close balls of fur, animals and swollen insects with the heads of infants. A darkness was filling the air, as if it were a palpable thing, felt as much as seen. A fog of hard night.
‘Bandits at six o’clock,’ shouted Pooley. ‘Get a move on, John.’