total failure of my plans. It is as well that I am a good and patient man and not prone to bitterness — somebody with a greater propensity toward self-pity than I might justifiably consider themselves a second Job.
I hurried the Chairman along the tunnel, back toward the sphere. He was degenerating fast, half his face gone, his body oozing and excreting spurts of that terrible green liquid. I tried to keep clear of the stuff but inevitably a little of it reached my skin, fizzing and sizzling like acid. Where it touched me, my body smelt like burning sausages.
We reached Love at last and I tried to get the old man inside. Behind us, I could hear someone running in our direction. Then a faint cry: “Tan!” It was Moon, of course, looking for revenge or some such. I bundled the Chairman through the green door and into the main hall.
What happened then was confused and difficult to follow. Even today I have great difficulty arranging events in their correct order.
The Chairman recognized the great hall as soon as he saw it, and I must say that his reaction was not one of grateful homecoming. Presumably he associated it with his long incarceration, with the tank and the amniotic fluid. In consequence, he became suddenly frantic to leave and return to the surface.
He roared something which I imagine was intended to be “No,” but, so thoroughly had his innards been eaten away by that viscous green slime which still oozed from his every pore, the words that emerged from his ravaged throat sounded more like animal roars than human speech.
Heroically, I tried to reason with him. “Mr. Chairman, please. I can repair you. Believe, me, it’s for the best.”
“Sur-face,” he growled, more coherent now. “SURFACE.”
“Stay. I beg of you.”
He seemed to calm down a little at this and I stepped closer, hoping to lead him by the hand and return him to the tank. Very probably, it was the worst move I could have made. With one swipe of what was left of his right hand (technically now more of a stump) he hit me hard across the face and sent me sprawling to the ground. I still carry the legacy of that blow today — a purple mark on my left cheek, around the size and shape of an apple, often mistaken for a birthmark.
I lay there, unable and unwilling to move, as the Chairman, dripping with poisonous green fluid, turned back toward the door and the outside world. How much indiscriminate havoc would he wreak before he was stopped? Given that his slightest touch was potentially lethal, I fancied the cost would be high indeed.
What I hadn’t bargained on, however, was another man, just as deadly as he.
Later, I reasoned that I must have reached the main hall just as the Somnambulist had removed the final sword from his belly. As I was thrown to the floor, he stood up, dusted himself down and looked over toward us.
The Chairman gaped at the Somnambulist. He pointed and screamed something which sounded at the time like
Spewing green acid, the Chairman staggered forward and flung himself at the giant. The Somnambulist, weakened by his ordeal, was taken aback at first, but soon fought back, and furiously.
There was a crash and a stumble behind me. Edward Moon appeared by my side, intending no doubt to challenge me to a duel or bring me to justice. Mercifully, we were both distracted by a far more terrible sight.
Surprisingly, the green fluid seemed to affect the Somnambulist just as badly as it had me, and his face contorted in pain. Moon and I could do nothing but watch. It was like seeing two lions fight for dominance of the pack — no, more than that, grander — like two ancient reptiles, megalosaurs clashing on some primeval killing ground, twin gods, colossi grappling of the fate of worlds.
Another sight distracted us even from this awful vision, at first nothing more than a wispiness, then a faint disturbance in the air, then a swirling, shimmering rush of color. A foot or so from where the conjuror and I stood transfixed, the Prefects flickered into existence. In their hands they carried four absurd sticks of dynamite — the kind you see in newspaper cartoons, great red sticks of the stuff, their enormous fuses spitting sparks.
Oh, you’ll say they couldn’t possibly work. Explosives don’t actually look like
Of course you’re entitled to your opinion, but I was there and I can assure you of their efficacy. Hawker or Boon (one of them — I get confused) flung the dynamite into the center of the great hall.
Leaving the red sticks spitting on the floor, the Prefects fled from the hall, peals of cackling laughter in their wake.
Moon stumbled forward, hoping, I imagine, to help his friend, but it was already too late. The first piece of dynamite exploded in the far corner of the room, bring half the roof down with an ear-splitting roar. I could hear the whole of the building’s structure creak and groan in protest and begin to fall in upon itself. Thick clouds of dust all but obscured or vision, but from what I was able to make out the giant and the dreamer ignored it all and fought on.
I have no shame in admitting that I picked myself up and ran, back through the tunnels and out into the street. I have many faults, but at least I know when to cut my losses.
The last thing I saw as I glanced back was the Chairman and the Somnambulist — monsters locked in conflict, an emerald miasma hanging about them, whilst Moon, not knowing what to do, gazed helplessly on.
He ran away in the end, just like me, though he stayed, I believe, to see the second explosion. He was later to claim that, before the great hall fell utterly in upon itself, the Chairman’s acid had begun to eat its way through the rock itself and that the adversaries had begun to sink into the earth, swallowed up as if by quicksand. He called out for the Somnambulist but the giant fought wordlessly on, and Moon had no choice but to flee. I wonder sometimes what he might have shouted before everything fell down, what final words he might have had, and I wonder, too, if the Somnambulist called back, if — at long last — he spoke.
All I know is that Moon escaped just before the last explosion. Behind him I saw the headquarters of Love, all that I had worked for, buried forever by rubble. I was glad not to be there to see that.
For the second time that day I emerged panting back onto the street. The fighting was over; police, medics and other professional busybodies were arguing over what to do with all the mess and corpses. Even the press had started to sniff about.
On seeing all of this commotion, I felt a sudden surge of hope. I thought I might still escape and slip away in the midst of the confusion. No such luck. I felt a revolver pressed hard against the back of my head.
“The Somnambulist is dead.”
“Edward?” I asked feebly.
He spun me around, placed the gun at my forehead. “The Somnambulist is dead,” he repeated in a flat, toneless voice.
I wondered how I could possibly apologize without sounding insincere. “Sorry,” I said eventually, and shrugged. “Thought he was indestructible.”
I doubt you’d have done any better under the circumstances.
Moon placed the gun harder against my head and seemed on the cusp of pulling the trigger when he was interrupted by a familiar voice.
“You must be Edward Moon.”
“What do you want?” Moon hissed.
“My name is Thomas Cribb.” I realized that the ugly man was standing behind me, facing the detective. “I would offer to shake hands but I can see you’re a little tied up.”
“What?”
“You’re about to make a considerable mistake.”
“I thought you’d joined Love.”
“Me? Well, I suppose I may do. But that will happen tomorrow.”
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t shoot him.”
“Only this.” Cribb smiled. “You don’t. I’ve seen the future and the Reverend Doctor here is languishing in a prison cell.”
