In The Blood (Book 4): The Blood Bath Read online

  Then, in an instant, the adrenaline fled. The blood cold, and practically still in his veins. It hadn't been leading him to Steve. He could feel that now, the tingle was different, not dousing for infected blood, but for familial blood. What was left of it, at least.

  His father's body lay on the floor facing the ground. Still, frail, and so thin compared to how he once was.

  The blood blades around his hands shifted, liquefying and receding back into his body as Ben kneeled down and touched his patriarch's shoulder with fingers that trembled, He turned the old man, and heard a crack. The body was so rigid, so fragile after having all his fluids and marrow drained, that his shoulder had snapped from even the slightest movement.

  Ben fell back over himself as the cadaver clattered against the polished concrete floor. The clothes hanging from his father's body were torn to shreds, large teeth marks across his gut. Ben didn't need to count them. He knew there would be sixteen, knew this was Steve's doing. He had found the old man, tortured him whilst his ramshackle troops and the Tacks ripped each other apart. But his father would never give up whatever knowledge he had, and rather than take him prisoner, waste time and resources on enhanced interrogation, he sought to send Ben a message.

  The message was received loud and clear, but Ben wasn't going to take it in the way it was intended. He searched the blood and couldn't find a trace of Steve anywhere in the vicinity. His former mentor, the killer of his father and friends had fled. He was smart, knew that he was no match for Ben, not any more. He would return to Thames House for sanctuary, surrounded by reinforcements, declare the destruction of the compound, the massacre of the guerilla forces as a success, even with the heavy casualties on their side. Ailes would congratulate him, albeit with reticence, and they would continue their trail of murder, butchering the infected wherever they might be.

  Ben knew what needed to be done, and closed his eyes, sinking into his thoughts, to the blood's thoughts, and asked it for one last favour.

  The blood did not hesitate to respond. He would have his vengeance. It would have its vengeance. No longer would it stand by and be slaughtered. They would take the fight to them as Ben had planned to do with his army. Together, they would insure that once and for all they and any other infected would be allowed to live in peace without the threat of capture, recruitment or death at the hands of the Squad. Ben may not have had his army any longer, and he would mourn their deaths in good time, but now he had something more powerful. The blood itself as an ally.

  14

  “You're insane!” Kat shouted, as soon as Ben had shared the plan with her, Luke and the scant few survivors.

  “This is what it wants,” he said, indicating to the free blood. Hundreds of them had come over the bank of the river and were a thick mass of gelatinous maroon that undulated over the corpses left out on the battlefield of the cobbled square. “This is its plan, and it's a hell of a lot better than mine.”

  “Your plan got over forty people killed, what makes you think their plan is any better?”

  “Because it's their plan. There's no human element to it, no ego, it's a unanimous decision the blood has come to. It knows the threat the Squad poses, and it's weighed the odds out.”

  “But you're still going...”

  “I have to be there... I have to end this... make sure Steve doesn't escape again.”

  “They can do that - -”

  “- - The blood wants me there, as its avatar. It can make decisions as a collective, as a hive mind, but it doesn't have the... tactical mind of a human.”

  “It came up with a plan, that shows some level of tactical thought.”

  “There's no point arguing,” Ben said, tersely. “I'm going. You and Luke and the rest are going to take the boat out on to the river, a couple of free blood will stay with you to keep you safe.”

  “You think this old rust-bucket is going to survive on the Thames? It's barely surviving as it is, moored here.”

  “The blood has reinforced the hull, scabbed up, it's going to be fine.”

  “Fine.” she huffed. “What happens if you don't make it? Then what? We just wait and wait and don't hear a damn word?”

  “The blood will let you know,” he said. “It will let Luke know. It has a contingency, and... a plan for the future, when this is all done.”

  “Which is?”

  “The contingency... is bloody. The future, it's peaceful. Serenely peaceful.” He looked away, tried to hide his rheumy eyes from her. There was a large part of the plan he had not and would not tell her. The contingency was not only bloody, but would be their last ditch effort to take the Squad down, and it would almost definitely lead to his death. She wouldn't allow that, and he knew it, as did the blood, and so they conspired to keep that information from her.

  Kat ran out of objections, ran out of energy, and leaned against the railings, sighing as she looked up at the blue skies. There was movement across the square, an ebb and flow up and down the undulating mass of bloody jello. A bump started to rise, turning into a small hill of viscous red that continued to grow taller and taller as something under the syrupy plasma rose. The peak burst, washing over the shoulders of the figure, returning to the mass. Kat stared wide eyed at the man, a Tack in full uniform, as he strode across the pulsating assemblage of blood.

  He came to a stop in front of the two of them, a vacant look in his eye. Ben eyed him up and down. On close inspection, the uniform had been sewn back together by threads of dark brown scabrous thread, but he didn't imagine anyone would look that closely. The arms however, were more of an issue. He looked over the Tack's shoulder to the blood.

  “Guys,” he said. “I know you can't exactly see, but pay a little more attention, they're going to notice things like this...”

  He spun the Tack around and grabbed his hands showing them to the blood that was working hard at putting the bodies back together. “As dumb as it is, race is kinda a big thing for people,” he said, indicating to the colour difference between the Tack's left hand, which was a tanned white, and the right hand, which was a dark brown. Neither of them matched the pale white skin of the head, which had the brightest of natural blonde eyebrows. “I know you're doing your best, but we've got to get this right...”

  The Tack officer nodded and walked back into the deep pool of blood. Plasma poured out of his nose and mouth, rejoining the rest of the fluids, and his body fell back under the surface, lifeless once again.

  “They'll get it right soon enough.” Ben said, glancing back to Kat. “If anything, when this is all done, blood can be a poster child for some kind of anti-racist campaign...” He smiled.

  Kat did not smile back. “This isn't a joke,” she spat. “You're doing this for all the wrong reasons... for revenge... that hasn't got you anywhere good, has it?”

  He thought for a moment. She was right. He had lost his childhood, his adolescence, his twenties and the best part of his thirties to the pursuit of vengeance. But this wasn't vengeance, not any more. That was finally clear to him.“This isn't about my father's death,” he said. “I didn't love my father, I didn't even know him. He was absent my whole damn life, so him being dead doesn't make a damn bit of difference emotionally. Him being back, that wasn't a glimmer of hope, it's been too damn long, we were never going to hang out and be friends. Finding him was nothing but a means to an end, a selfish endeavour, based on the slim chance that he'd be able to help us, tell us what the hell we were infected with and cure us... and we got the damn cure, so he fulfilled his purpose. His arc is over, done and dusted. This is about more that me, about more than him or us. Ever since I was a kid I've been on this single-minded quest, so obsessed with my own Goddamn issues and BS that I don't think I've done a single altruistic thing in my life. Joining the Squad was a means to an end, gaining the trust of you and your friends was a means to a damn end, going to Hamburg and Brighton and building this damn army was a means to a Goddamn end. It's about time I did something that wasn't selfish, that wasn't
all about me. Every action and decision I've made has resulted in pain and suffering. I've blamed that on others, on the blood, on the Squad, but that's just excuse after excuse. I'm to blame. And it's about time I did something for the greater good. That's why I have to do this, to end this, because I can't bare to see anybody else die for my mistakes, not any more.”

  Kat stared at him. She didn't agree, but knew his mind was made up, and he wouldn't take any objections or disagreements. She looked out over the river and tried to find the whispers in the blood. Look after him, she thought.

  We will, the blood replied, in a hushed voice like the sigh of a gentle breeze. We will look after all of you. Always.

  15

  As the blood began spitting out Tacks it had been stitching back together, refilling with itself and possessing, Ben inspected them one by one. They still weren't overly good at discerning skin tones, but with some guidance they were doing better. Fourteen Tacks and counting. Some of their limbs were beyond repair, and surviving pieces of his recruits were substituted. It hurt Ben to be using them as replacement parts, but they had signed up for this war, and even though they would not get to make the final battle, at least they would be there in body, if not in spirit.

  An unruly tide started picking up on the surface of the blood, it shifted angrily, and spat out a body that rolled across the uneven cobbles.

  The body gasped, coughing blood out of its throat. It was one of the recruits, alive, repaired and rejuvenated by the blood. Ben ran over to him, helped him sit up and get the rest of the fluids out of his lungs.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  The man continued to cough, the blood hanging out of his nose, still filling his mouth. There was something about this man that put Ben on edge. Short and stocky, shaven head, he had been one of the last recruits to arrive, and as with most of his army, Ben couldn't recall the guy's name. A ripple of electricity sparked through his veins as the man continued to cough and dry wretch.

  “How did you survive?” Ben asked.

  He caught the man's eye and felt his story transmitted through the blood. He hadn't survived, not truly. The blood had reanimated him to deliver a message, a confession, the last thoughts his brain processed before he died. He was a mole, working for the Squad all along.

  Ben absorbed the memories the blood gave him from the man, how he had been recruited but refused to kill, so they held him back as an asset, for situations such as this. As soon as the message went out through the blood, taking him over, he bided his time for a moment to make contact with the Squad, alert them of their position. That was why the army was massacred, not from anything Ben had thought or accidentally transmitted.

  Relief washed over him, the guilt of all those lives lost still lingering, but so much less now that he knew it was not all his fault.

  He watched as the blood evacuated the body of the man who betrayed them, spurting out through his mouth and nose with haste, as if the sanguine fluids were disgusted by being in the bastard. It lingered on his skin, and Ben watched with a unnerving calm as the blood began to tear the body apart, chewing through the clothes and flesh, the muscle and tissue, the bones and organs, until nothing was left. The traitor did not deserve to live on as a part of the reanimated army, to stand alongside the blood, free or otherwise. Ben agreed with their decision in silence, withdrawing, watching more Tacks being reborn out of the viscous fluids. Soon, it would be time to strike. One final fight, a last stand, to end this war once and for all.

  16

  As night drew forth, the mass of blood had done its job; twenty three Tacks put back together and possessed by the 'goblins. They had learned to walk, and then to run. Ben taught them how to fire their weapons, and even attempted to teach them how to speak. The latter was the least successful of his endeavours. Speech, it seemed, was beyond the ability of the blood residing in the reanimated bodies. They were used to communication without words, and the idea of them learning English, let alone being able to speak it out loud, was a tall order for such a truncated timeline.

  The rest of the free blood hopped over and under and through the railings back into the river, swimming along with the current. Ben asked the Tacks to head to the vans waiting outside the gates. Three of the Squad's vehicles were still sitting there, abandoned since the massacre, and they would provide the perfect cover to infiltrate Thames House.

  He took one last look at Container City, at the stray body parts of his men and women. He would make certain their deaths were not wasted, and turned on his heel, walking towards the gates. He had resolved that he would leave without saying goodbye to Kat or Luke. If all went according to plan, they would wake the next morning and find themselves finally free from the Squad. That wasn't the only reason he did not tell them of his departure. A part of his was certain that Kat would want to come too, but deep down he didn't believe he could trust her in the field. People are fallible, weak, blood was not. Blood wouldn't hesitate to kill an aggressor, blood wouldn't choose self-preservation over the greater good. He had watched so much free blood dispersed, destroyed, and that didn't shake its will to complete the task at hand. It was naturally utilitarian, and for this incursion to be successful, the needs of the many had to come before the needs of the few.

  He got into the driver's seat of the van at the front and turned the key in the ignition. The Tacks driving the other two vans followed his motions as he transmitted them through whispers in the back of his mind. In return, they sent him emotionless serenity. That was their natural state, a state that filled him with mindlessness, a blissful void where thoughts and fears should be. A state he had only briefly touched upon in his former life, in the pub, with the white noise of a myriad people talking, moments before his life took the fork in the road that led him here. He drove on, embracing the emptiness of his mind, and readied himself for the wanton death and destruction that he would bring down once they got to their destination.

  17

  The vans split up as they came close to Millbank. One of them went into the parking structure under the building. The second to the main entrance and came to a halt outside. The third, with Ben behind the wheel, pulled up to the entrance he had first walked through. It didn't seem so grand now, the concrete architecture was not magnificent with its carvings and art deco brickwork. He saw it in a different light, monotopian in its shades of grey, old and neglected. The carvings of nautical imagery no longer made him wonder if it were illustrating either transport or colonisation, he knew now that it was indicative of what lay inside, the selfishness of man, the desire to expand – in Steve's case, literally – the endless search for power. But those people, who lived and worked deep in the bowels of the building, they were grasping so desperately for that power, for control, and yet it was always out of reach. Ben, however, had that power. But now, he knew full well that he could not let his control over the blood go to his head. Hubris had destroyed him and his plans over and over again. The only way he could be victorious was to embrace the unimaginable power that flowed through his veins, but not allow it to consume him.

  In the parking structure, eight tacks got out of the van and approached the elevator. The one in the lead reached for his ID card and swiped it against the panel on the door, awaiting the arrival of the elevator as Ben had instructed.

  At the main entrance, eight tacks came out of the van and walked towards the large wooden doors. Their weapons were hanging from straps slung over their shoulders, fingers resting on the triggers.

  A silent count went out over the blood as Ben came out of the driver's side of his van. Seven Tacks filed out of the back and grabbed hold of him out of eyeshot of the cameras. They dragged him across the road towards the entrance. The count continued as the Tacks grabbed Ben's head and pointed his face at the cameras over the entrance, letting the facial recognition system get a nice long look at him. It would take a few seconds for it to register, maybe close to thirty seconds for the message to get through to Ailes. Another thirty to sixt
y for someone to do something about his capture.

  The count continued as the Tacks walked into the main entrance. Seven of them swiped through the security gates, whilst the one at the lead walked over to the security station to interact with the guards.

  “Anything I can help you with?” asked a security guard.

  The elevator arrived in the basement, and the eight Tacks entered, pressing the buttons as they had been instructed to get them to the operations level. The doors glided shut with a silken sigh, sealing them in and whisking them deep underground.

  It was only Ben who was using numbers for the count. The blood knew what he wanted to happen for every digit that ran through his thoughts. The Tacks let go of his head and Ben looked dead ahead at the doors to the Squad's entrance. The mirrored glass shot his expression back to him. It was emotionless, refracting the heavy, dark bags under his eyes, the whites shot red. There was so much blood, and it was all ready to burst forth, just waiting for the final signal.

  The seven Tacks that had swiped through the main entrance separated as they went up through the floors, moving out across the halls of MI5. At the security desk, the guard was joined by a colleague.

  “What's up, mate? Got a problem?”

  The blood-controlled Tack cocked his head, looking at them both with eyes it was unfamiliar with operating. This Tack needed contacts that had become dislodged at some point during his death and reanimation, and everything it saw was a thick blur of barely unidentifiable shapes.

  Deep underground in the Squad's headquarters, all the taps in all the toilets turned, water flowing out of them, filling up the sinks.

  The door at the Squad entrance clicked to signal it had been unlocked. Ben stared at the exhausted reflection of himself. And began to count out loud as the Tack next to him grabbed hold of the door.