‘You’re crystal creatures?’ I said.
‘That surprises you? You have gone native, haven’t you? The local barbarians carried away what they thought was an object of power; a magical jewel. I think they liked the way lights moved within it. It ended up in the hands of Queen Cleopatra. An appalling creature. I liked her immediately. I thought we could be useful to each other, so I made contact with her. She wasn’t surprised; her kind talked with gods every day. The idea was that I would teach her people the wonders of science, and then she would have them build me a new ship.
‘But instead she just used me to make herself strong, dominate her people and suck the life out of her enemies … Just because she could. And she kept on doing it until she’d drained the machine’s energies! I was so weakened by the crash I couldn’t stop her. I couldn’t even recharge the machine in that primitive environment. I was forced to shut it down, go dormant, just to protect myself. I wish I could have seen the look on Cleopatra’s face when all her power disappeared in a moment. Her own people dragged her down and took the machine away from her. They executed her while they were sure they could, and then hid the machine inside her mummified body. With a special lock on the sarcophagus lid, just in case.
‘The machine took centuries to recharge itself. Until finally I was able to reach out and influence the minds closest to me. The tomb was found and opened, the mummy brought out into the world again. And I arranged for it to be brought to this country.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I sensed that one of your ships had crashed here not long ago. Do try to keep up!’
‘Were you looking for me?’ I said. ‘Did you want my help to get you off-planet?’
Chloe looked at me as though I was mad or simple. ‘No! I just wanted to kill one of you again!’
‘But why here? Why Cardavan House?’
Chloe smiled smugly. She was having a good time, forcing me to ask question after question and then teasing me with the smallest possible pieces of information.
‘I have always been well served by the weaknesses of others. I needed someone who would guard and protect me. And who better than some poor fool who thought I belonged to him?’
‘So,’ I said, ‘basically you’re an alien AI of sorts, a crystal intelligence in a piece of alien tech. Moving from one human hiding place to another, so you can kill undetected.’
‘That is such limited human thinking,’ said Chloe. ‘How have you fallen so far? How do you stand it?’
‘Why did you start killing people here?’ I said doggedly. ‘Why reveal yourself?’
‘Because of you, of course! The moment you arrived, old enemy, it set off all kinds of alarms in my head … But I couldn’t find you, you’d disguised yourself so well. Still, I knew if I just kept feeding I’d eventually get to you.’
‘But when you tried to take my life energies, you couldn’t,’ I said. ‘What happened? Performance anxiety?’
Chloe scowled at me. ‘You’ve done something to yourself. You’re not what I expected. But it doesn’t matter. I’ll just eat up everyone else here until I’m strong enough to batter my way through these new defences of yours. Another victory in the war that never ends! Another chance for my kind to revenge themselves on yours.’
‘I don’t remember you,’ I said. ‘There’s no quarrel between us. We don’t have to be enemies.’
‘Of course we do!’ said Chloe. ‘Your very existence offends me. The war will never end until every one of your kind has been wiped from the universe.’
‘And then?’ I said.
‘What?’
‘What will you do then? When all of my kind are gone?’
Chloe shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Find someone else to hate, I suppose.’
‘There has to be something better you could be doing with your lives.’
‘There is nothing better!’ And then Chloe stopped, looking slyly at the open doorway. ‘She’s almost here. Your little favourite. I know I’ve only just eaten, but there’s always room for dessert.’
‘Don’t come in, Penny!’ I said loudly. ‘It’s in here! It’ll kill you!’
But the footsteps out in the corridor didn’t even slow. Penny appeared in the doorway, her breathing back under control again, ready for anything. And then she saw Susan lying dead on the floor, with Chloe standing over her, smiling her cold inhuman smile.
‘Oh, shit!’ said Penny.
‘Yes!’ I said. ‘Get out of here, Penny, please. Let me handle this.’
‘We’re partners,’ said Penny. ‘We work best together. You need me to keep you human.’
‘That isn’t going to help this time,’ I said. ‘Go, Penny!’
‘Too late!’ Chloe said happily.
She threw herself at Penny, her clawed hands reaching out eagerly. I threw myself between them and grabbed hold of Chloe’s wrists, just as I had with Professor Rose. Chloe fought me with the same inhuman strength and we staggered back and forth across the room, knocking over furniture and smashing delicate irreplaceable ornaments. The thing inside her laughed happily. Fighting not just to hurt me, but to get past me to get to Penny. Burning up Chloe’s life energies to do it, because it didn’t care what it did to its host.
I tried to restrain Chloe without hurting her, but the alien within her made that impossible. And in the end Chloe jerked her wrists out of my hands, because the only way I could have held on to her would have been to break them. I held my ground, standing between her and Penny. Chloe lashed out with her small bony fists, hitting me again and again. All I could do was keep my arms up and endure the punishment. I didn’t cry out. I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. And then Chloe stopped fighting, and smiled at something behind me.
‘Well! Look who’s here!’
I felt my blood run cold as I heard Stuart’s voice.
‘Ishmael! What are you doing!’
Chloe grinned at me triumphantly. I grabbed hold of her while she was distracted, spun her round and held her tightly from behind, pinning her arms to her side. She fought me savagely, but her new unnatural strength was no use against the leverage I had.
‘Let her go!’ said Stuart. He stood in the doorway beside Penny, glaring at me. ‘Stop that! You’re hurting her!’
‘Help me, Stuart!’ said Chloe. She sounded perfectly normal, and the face she showed Stuart looked just like his wife’s. ‘Ishmael’s gone mad! He’s the killer! Kill him, before he kills me!’
Stuart produced a gun from inside his jacket. The gun he swore he hadn’t brought with him. I should have known: a soldier never goes unarmed. He aimed his gun at me, and Chloe stopped struggling to give him a clearer shot at me. Penny grabbed Stuart’s arm and tried to wrestle the gun away from him. He threw her to one side with casual strength, not taking his eyes off me for a moment. Penny hit the floor hard and didn’t move. Stuart aimed the gun at my face. His hand was very steady.
‘Kill him, Stuart!’ said Chloe.
She sounded less like the real thing now, but I wasn’t sure Stuart had noticed. I stood very still.
‘Look at her,’ I said, keeping my voice calm and reasonable. ‘Listen to her. This isn’t your Chloe. She’s been possessed by an alien intelligence. That’s what’s been happening here. Look what she did to Susan.’
Stuart looked at the body on the floor, and a slow uncertainty appeared in his face. He had heard of such things. He looked carefully at Chloe, and didn’t like something he saw in her face. He didn’t lower his gun, but for the first time he didn’t seem so sure about what he should do. Chloe screamed and swore at him, pleading and insulting, trying everything to get him to shoot me. But the louder she screamed, the less she sounded like Chloe. And then, quite suddenly, she stopped trying. She stood very still and laughed at Stuart. A nasty, mocking sound. He flinched at the sound of it. The gun moved to target Chloe, and she laughed even harder.
‘You don’t have to shoot her!’ I said quickly. ‘Just help me subdue her, until we can figure out some
way to get the alien out of her.’
‘I’ll never let that happen!’ Chloe said viciously.
Stuart looked at Susan, unmoving on the floor.
‘Yes!’ said Chloe. ‘I killed her! I killed all of them! And I’ll keep doing it till every single one of you is dead!’
Stuart looked at her steadily, his gun aimed at her face. ‘I don’t know if you can hear me in there, Chloe, but I can’t let that happen. I have to stop this, now. I’m so sorry …’
His finger tightened on the trigger. I didn’t know what to do: killing Chloe might kill the alien or just release it. But then Stuart’s hand trembled and he lowered the gun until it was pointing at the floor. And while I was watching what Stuart was doing, Chloe back-elbowed me in the ribs, knocking the breath out of me. I couldn’t hold on to her any more. She broke away from me, and ran straight past Stuart and out of the room. He didn’t even try to stop her. I could hear her laughing happily as she ran down the corridor. Penny rose painfully slowly to her feet, to stand beside Stuart. He looked at her and then at me. His face was full of misery.
‘I couldn’t do it,’ he said.
‘Of course you couldn’t,’ I said.
NINE
The Jewel in the Mummy
Stuart pulled his military dignity around him like the uniform he used to wear. And just like that, he was himself again. His back straightened, his mouth firmed, and his usual calm authority settled back in place. He nodded to me, and I nodded back.
And then I looked at the gun he was holding.
‘You said you hadn’t brought a weapon?’
He looked at the gun with a ‘This old thing?’ expression and put it away inside his jacket. Which had to have been expertly and expensively tailored to hide a bulge like that. He smiled briefly.
‘I didn’t want the family to worry,’ he said. ‘It wouldn’t have fitted the image they had of me as just a civil servant.’ He looked at the open doorway. ‘Chloe’s still out there. We have to go after her.’
He was saying all the right things, everything he thought he was supposed to say, but he couldn’t put any emotion into it. He knew his duty, knew what he had to do. He just didn’t know how to do it.
‘There’s no hurry,’ I said. ‘After all, where can she go? The house is still locked up. She can’t leave until Security get here, and they’ll probably have to break in. How long before that happens?’
‘God knows!’ said Stuart. ‘They should have been here by now.’
‘We’ll find her,’ I said.
‘Can I just point out that we don’t know who locked the doors?’ said Penny.
‘Of course you can,’ I said. ‘And I will point out in return that it doesn’t really matter. The alien doesn’t want to leave. It doesn’t want us to leave. It wants all of us dead, so there’s no one left to raise the alarm and warn the world.’
‘Tell me about this alien,’ said Stuart. ‘I want to know everything. Right now. And I don’t give a damn how complicated it is.’
‘Understandable,’ I said. ‘But first, where’s Bernard?’
Penny made a startled noise and glared at Stuart. ‘I only just realized he isn’t here! Tell me you didn’t leave him down there on his own!’
Stuart cleared his throat, but didn’t look guilty. The Colonel didn’t really do guilty. ‘I found it necessary to leave the drawing room for a while. Bernard had fallen asleep in his chair and was snoring. Quite remarkably loudly. So I went out into the corridor for a little peace and quiet. And then … I thought I heard Chloe calling out to me from upstairs. As though she was in danger. I knew I shouldn’t leave Bernard unguarded, but it sounded like Chloe needed me more. So I made sure the drawing room door was properly closed and headed for the stairs.’
He sounded perfectly calm and reasonable. As though he’d only done what could be expected under the circumstances. But he was having a hard time meeting my eyes. He’d left a tired out old man he was supposed to be protecting all on his own, in a house like a war zone. But then I’d always known that in any situation the Colonel would protect his wife first.
After all, protecting Chloe was why he’d asked me to come to Cardavan House.
‘I heard sounds of fighting and followed them here,’ said Stuart. He looked steadily at Penny. ‘I shouldn’t have hit you. I’m sorry.’
‘That’s all right,’ said Penny. ‘You were under a lot of stress. But if you ever try that again I will knee you in the balls so hard they’ll go back up the way they came down and you’ll never see them again.’
I nodded solemnly. ‘She would, too.’
‘I believe you,’ said Stuart.
‘All right,’ said Penny. ‘Let’s get back downstairs. Bernard’s not safe while Chloe’s still running around loose.’
I thought I saw Stuart wince, just for a moment, though whether in respect to Bernard’s situation or Chloe’s I wasn’t sure.
‘Do we tell Bernard what’s happened to Chloe?’ I said. ‘And that Susan is dead?’
‘No,’ said Stuart. ‘He wouldn’t understand about Chloe, and I don’t know how he’d cope with Susan’s death. He might launch into one of his rages and attack us, and we might have to hurt him in order to subdue him. And anyway … he’d probably just forget and have to be told again and again. Why be cruel? We’ll just tell him Susan is still up here, looking for his cigar case.’
He stopped and looked at Susan lying dead on the floor. She seemed such a small thing, in death. But then that’s true of most of us.
‘Bernard is better off not knowing,’ said Stuart. ‘Once Security get here, a doctor can give the old man something to keep him calm and we’ll get him out of here. It’s a shame, but without Susan to look after him I don’t see Bernard ever coming back. Even though he and Chloe are all that’s left of the Cardavans. And Chloe is …’
He couldn’t bring himself to finish the thought. Military discipline could only carry him so far.
‘We’ll find some way to save Chloe from what’s inside her,’ I said.
He looked at me. ‘Do you have any idea how?’
‘Not at the moment,’ I said. ‘But I’m working on it.’
I led the way down the landing, towards the stairs. Taking my time, so I could bring Stuart up to date on what had been happening. Fortunately, years of weird missions had taught me how to be succinct. Penny chimed in now and again, to make sure I didn’t miss out on the human angle. She saw that as part of her job, in our partnership. I never told her I sometimes deliberately left things out so she’d feel she was needed. It’s all part of being in a relationship. And part of being human, as I understand it. I told Stuart everything he needed to know about the alien, except for the bits that touched on me. Though I still wasn’t sure how much of that I believed. The alien hadn’t struck me as being a particularly trustworthy narrator.
I kept a careful lookout as we walked, but there wasn’t any sight or a sound of Chloe anywhere. Presumably she’d gone back down into the house, to feed on the only other potential victim left. I didn’t mention it out loud, but it had occurred to me that it might be a good idea to leave Bernard on his own as bait in a trap. We could hide and watch, and when Chloe came for Bernard we could all jump her from ambush. I was almost positive we could stop Chloe before Bernard came to any harm. But it still sounded like a plan that needed a lot more thought before it could be presented to Penny and Stuart. So I didn’t say anything.
And then I stopped suddenly, as I heard footsteps coming up the stairs. Stuart and Penny stopped with me. I gestured for them to listen, and first Stuart and then Penny nodded quickly, to show they heard the footsteps too. We stood listening as the footsteps drew steadily closer.
‘That can’t be Chloe,’ murmured Penny.
‘Doesn’t sound like her,’ I said.
‘And anyway, why would she want to come back?’ said Penny. ‘She knows she can’t take us while we’re together.’
‘Unless she’s killed Bernard for more s
trength,’ said Stuart. ‘And we’re the only ones left …’
He drew his gun and covered the end of the corridor. We stood close together, watching the top of the stairs. Waiting … And then Bernard came stomping up into view, red-faced and puffing from the exertion of his climb. Stuart quickly made his gun disappear. Bernard saw us waiting, waved cheerfully, and ambled down the corridor to join us. I did wonder for a moment whether the alien might have transferred itself into Bernard to catch us by surprise. But it seemed unlikely. Why swap a perfectly sound young body for an older and damaged one, just for a moment’s advantage? Bernard finally came to a halt before us, and looked reproachfully at Stuart.
‘I woke up on my own! You’d all gone off and left me … Took me a while to remember where everyone was, until I searched for my cigar case and found I didn’t have it. The old memory isn’t what it was … It felt a bit spooky down there on my own, so I thought I’d come up and help Susan look.’
‘She’s still in your room,’ I said. ‘She hasn’t found it yet.’
‘She’ll never find it without me,’ said Bernard. ‘Even I don’t remember where I leave things half the time!’
He seemed remarkably calm and composed after his little rest. Back in control of himself, with no memory at all of his earlier rage.
‘Susan said she was going to get changed,’ said Penny. ‘I don’t think she wants to be interrupted. Come back downstairs with us. She’ll join us later.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Bernard.
He extended a gentlemanly arm to Penny. She smiled and slipped her arm through his, and the two of them strolled back to the stairs, chatting companionably together. Once again, a female voice was doing wonders to keep Bernard calm and focused. Stuart and I followed at a distance so we could talk.
‘Until we have some idea how to get the alien out of Chloe safely,’ said Stuart, ‘you are not to do anything that might hurt her.’