“The clue is in the description,” said Happy.
“We’ve been planning this for a very long time,” said Patterson. “And we’re not about to let you butt in and screw it up now. The greatest minds of this generation have been considering a single fundamental question-What if Man was a mistake? What if we were supposed to be so much more, but we fell short of our true potential? We were never meant to be something as small and limited as Man! We were supposed to fly like angels! We were all supposed to be living gods and walk this world in majesty and glory! And it’s not too late. We can all blaze like suns. We can all shine like the stars!”
“Is this like the sixties?” said Happy. “When people thought that taking lots and lots of LSD would turn them into superheroes? The mind’s true liberation, through frequent frying of your neurons? Trust me-that really didn’t work out too well.”
“You think so small,” Patterson said coldly. “Little man. Touched with the gift to see the world clearly, and all you’ve ever done is complain about it. Wake up and smell the gravitas! We weren’t supposed to be like this! We weren’t supposed to suffer, to get ill, to get old and die! ReSet will set us free from all that. We will go on and live lifetimes and become what we were always supposed to be!”
JC considered him thoughtfully. “What if these New People you’ve brought about aren’t human? What if they don’t look like us, think like us, feel like us?”
Patterson smiled. “Would that really be such a bad thing? Would the complete replacement of Humanity be such a great loss?”
“Okay, someone’s taken the train to freaky town,” murmured Happy.
“Why are you here now?” said JC, moving up another step towards Patterson. “Why show yourself to us? You’ve been conspicuous by your absence, until now.”
“You were never really meant to get this far,” said Patterson. “I let you in because… we had to let somebody in. We needed someone to clear up the mess. All the unpleasant side effects to our glorious creation. But now it falls to me to stop you here. To stop you interfering with things you’re incapable of understanding or appreciating. My organisation has plans for the New People. And we can’t have you upsetting them with your unwanted presence.”
“Given everything we’ve overcome and dealt with to get this far,” said JC, “how do you plan to stop us?”
Patterson actually smirked, he was so pleased with himself. “You think you’re the only one to quietly remove useful and highly dangerous items from the Carnacki Institute Armoury? Look what I’ve got here…”
He extended one hand, so they could all see what was nestling on his palm. A small black box, gleaming and glistening, covered with rows of curling brass sigils. Everyone looked at the box, then looked at Patterson.
“I have to say,” said Melody, “I have eaten things that looked more interesting than that.”
“Hell,” said Happy. “I’ve crapped more interesting things than that.”
“Typical,” said Patterson. “I show you a wonder of the world, and all you can manage is vulgarity. This… is a Boojum. Because it makes things softly and silently vanish away. I say the Word, and whatever I point the box at… isn’t, any more. You’re all going to disappear, right here, and no-one will ever know what happened to you. You’ll be a small part of the great Chimera House Mystery-all the people who worked here, or walked in one night and were never seen again.”
“Cut the crap, Patterson,” said Melody. “I hate it when people give cute names to machines. Boojum, my arse. Lewis Carroll has a lot to answer for. That box is nothing more than a simple dimensional frequency adjustor. Took me a moment to recognise it, it’s so primitive. I built one of those when I was sixteen! Out of bits and pieces I ordered from the back pages of the Fortean Times!” She looked at JC and the others because they were all looking at her. “We all have our own basic frequencies, that tell us which dimension of reality we belong to. Or possibly vice versa. That box changes people’s frequencies, so that they drop out of this reality and into another one.”
“And you built one when you were sixteen?” said Happy.
“Well,” said Melody, “I didn’t say it actually worked… But the theory was sound.”
“So,” said JC, “that box is still basically a Boojum, for all practical intents and purposes, in that it can make us all disappear. Do you have any defence against it, Melody?”
“If I had my equipment with me…”
“I’m going to take that as a no,” said JC. “So hush now, children, while daddy negotiates.” He smiled engagingly at Patterson. “Let’s start with a basic Why? shall we…? Why did you, or your unseen lords and masters, set out to create the ReSet drug in the first place? Did you know it would create New People?”
“Let’s just say we had hopes,” said Patterson.
“But Gog and Magog, in their own Beastly way, were quite convinced the New People are going to destroy the world,” said JC. “Tear down human civilisation because they don’t need it. Remake the entire world, and perhaps even reality itself, in their not-at-all-human image. How will your organisation profit from that?”
“Oh, I don’t think things will get that far,” said Patterson. “There are checks and balances in place… things going on behind the scenes, behind the scenery of reality, to ensure nothing too bad happens. Pieces have been moved into place to take advantage of the situation. But I think I’ve said quite enough. You don’t need to know any more. It’s time for you to go.”
He held up the Boojum, and JC produced his Hand of Glory. The two men said their activating Words, pretty much in unison… And the small black box and the small withered paw both vanished, gone in a moment, blinking out of existence simultaneously as two great powers cancelled each other out. Both men looked at their empty hands, and it was all very still and very quiet in the stairwell.
JC launched himself up the intervening steps and threw himself at Patterson. They slammed together and wrestled fiercely in the confined space. Happy and Melody charged up the stairs, while Kim shouted fierce encouragement to JC. Patterson forced JC off him, with a great effort, and swung wildly at his attacker, who ducked aside at the last moment. Patterson’s strength and momentum carried him right past JC and over the stairwell’s railing, and out into the void. He grabbed the railing with a last desperate effort, and hung on to it with one hand, dangling over the long, long drop. He looked down, then up at JC. Happy and Melody crowded in on either side of JC, and the three of them looked at Patterson. Kim hovered above them all.
None of them moved to help Patterson. Great beads of sweat appeared on his dark face as he hung helplessly, unable to pull himself back up. He glared up at them but said nothing. He wouldn’t beg. JC regarded him dispassionately, and when he finally spoke, his voice was so cold it actually shocked the others.
“For all the people who died here, because of you. For all the lives you ruined, through the ReSet drug. For killing the policemen and the security men. For creating the New People and endangering the whole world… For being a traitor to the Carnacki Institute, and the whole of Humanity… It falls to me to pass judgement on you.”
“JC?” said Kim. “What are you doing, JC? You can’t just kill him. ..”
“Yes, I can,” said JC. “For all he’s done and all he’s made possible-yes, I can kill him.”
“Hold it, hold it, take it easy,” Happy said quickly. “JC, I can see where you’re going with this, but don’t. We can’t kill the man. He knows things, JC. We need to know who he’s working for, if there are other traitors inside the Institute, and everything these people are planning!”
“I’ll never tell,” said Patterson. He swung slowly from his single handhold, making no attempt to pull himself up. “I’d rather die than have them angry at me. There really are fates worth than death.”
“You aren’t actually going to kill him, are you, JC?” said Kim.
“For God’s sake, JC,” said Melody.
“‘Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord,’” said JC. “But he isn’t here right now, and I am.”
He slammed his fist down on Patterson’s hand. The dark fingers sprang open under the impact, and Patterson lost his grip. He fell like a stone, screaming all the way down. JC watched him fall and wouldn’t let himself look away until he lost sight of the man in the gloom of the stairwell. The scream cut off abruptly, and JC finally turned away.
“Damn, JC,” said Happy. “That was… hardcore. I’m not saying you were wrong, necessarily, but…”
“You killed him,” said Kim, looking at JC as though she’d never seen him before.
“It’s part of the job, sometimes,” said Melody. “We’re trained to kill the bad guys, if necessary. If there’s no other way.”
“Yeah,” said Happy. “But there’s a difference between taking out a threat in the heat of the moment and a cold-blooded execution. I mean, I never liked Patterson, but he was one of us. Still a part of the Carnacki Institute.”
“Yes,” said JC. “One of us. That’s why I did it.”
