But the Doctor had always done right by us, till then-good pay, and the best of everything. That all changed… He changed, after he acquired that bloody Door.'
'The Apocalypse Door,' I said.
'Yeah. He brought it back from Los Angeles, and within a few hours he was a different man. He abandoned his old base in the rain forest without warning, and suddenly our base was the new centre of operations. And don't ask me where we were; I haven't a clue. We were brought in on planes with no windows, and put up in underground barracks. Could have been anywhere; we were never allowed outside. Most of us were glad when the Doctor arrived; extra security meant something to do, at last. But right from the beginning, it felt wrong… The Doctor locked himself away in his private office, and wouldn't talk to anyone. Just sat there, with the Apocalypse Door, talking to it, and listening to what he thought it said to him.'
I looked at the Armourer. 'Could the Doctor really be talking to it?'
'We don't know enough about the Door,' said the Armourer, frowning. 'Given what's supposed to be on the other side of it… Who knows?'
'William was supposed to be digging up some more information on the Door,' I said.
'Haven't heard anything from him… Arthur! Front and centre!'
A long gangling type in a messy lab coat nowhere near big enough for him lurched forward out of the crowd, and swayed to a halt in front of the Armourer. He had a broad open face, wide owlish eyes, and a general air of bruised innocence that had no place in the Armoury.
'What have I done now?' he said, in a tone of voice that suggested he'd said that many times before.
'For once, nothing obvious. Arthur, contact the Librarian, in the Old Library, and ask him what he's turned up about the Apocalypse Door.'
'I already tried, sir, just before the incursion. There was no reply. But that's not unusual, for the Librarian. Do you want me to try again?'
'Rafe's probably convinced William to take some rest at last,' I said. 'I'll pop down and have a word with him later.'
The Armourer dismissed Arthur, and we turned back to Dom Langford. He started talking immediately, as though he needed to talk to someone.
'I saw the Apocalypse Door, once. I'd been sent to the Doctor's private office, with an urgent message. He wasn't answering his phones again. When I got to the office the door was open, but he wasn't there. I thought I'd better wait. They wanted an answer to the message. So I went in, and waited. The Apocalypse Door was there, standing upright on its own, right next to the desk. I walked around it; it looked like just an ordinary, everyday wooden door. But… the office was hot. Unbearably, unnaturally hot. I could hardly breathe. And it felt like the Door knew I was there. That it was looking at me, watching me with bad intent. I didn't want to look at it, but I didn't dare turn my back on it. I started shaking. I was in a cold sweat all over, despite the heat. I edged closer to the Door, and listened. Put my ear right next to the wood. I couldn't hear anything, but suddenly I was terrified. There was something there in the office with me, some huge awful presence…
'I panicked. Turned and ran out of the office, dropping the message on the floor. I'd never panicked on a battlefield, never turned and run in any firefight; but I ran then. I never went back. No one ever said anything. But the Doctor was in there with that Door all the time! No wonder he changed. Being around that Door would change anyone.'
'What about the rogue Drood, Tiger Tim?' I said. 'Did you ever see him with the Door?'
'Tiger Tim gave everyone their orders, on the Doctor's behalf,' said Dom. 'Because the Doctor couldn't be bothered with everyday matters anymore. Tiger Tim more or less took over operations, and we all went along, because he seemed to know what he was doing.'
'And he put together the army that attacked us today?' said the Armourer.
'Took every man the Doctor had, and more,' said Dom. 'Word had got out on the circuit, in all the recruiting markets: good pay, and I mean really good pay, and a chance to try out a new drug that would make you superhuman. New men kept turning up all the time. And a lot of them didn't answer to Doctor Delirium or Tiger Tim. They represented someone else. Someone with really big pockets, to foot the bill for so many mercenaries.
'They didn't tell us we'd be attacking Drood Hall until the very last moment. And by then we'd taken the Drug, and we didn't care anymore. We'd fight anyone, kill anyone, do anything…
'The things I did, the things we all did… That wasn't us! We were soldiers, professionals, not butchers! Not monsters… The Drug turned us into monsters. I don't remember most of what I did; just enough to make me glad I can't remember the rest. I'm not like that. I'm not. They poisoned our souls…'
His head slammed back against the chair suddenly, and his whole body convulsed, straining against the straps. The display screens were going wild. Dom Langford aged horribly, years gone by in seconds, collapsing in on himself before our eyes, looking desperately at us all the time for help we couldn't give. The last of his strength had run out. The Armourer rushed back and forth, injecting drugs into the tubes, working the controls of the diagnostic chair, doing everything he could think of to try and save the man who'd been his enemy only minutes before. But there was nothing he could do. Dom Langford died with the face of a man hundreds of years old, his body little more than a hollow shell. He looked at me pleadingly, right up to the moment when the light went out of his eyes. He thought I could save him, because I was a Drood, and Droods can do anything.
I held his hand, at the end, but I don't know if he could feel it. 'We should have taken him to the hospital wards,' the Armourer said finally. 'He might have lasted longer there…'
'They didn't have the room, and we didn't have the time,' I said. 'We needed his information. And we didn't kill him; they did, when they introduced him to the Acceleration Drug. So, are you going to make a scarecrow out of him, like the others?'
'Of course,' said the Armourer. 'Waste not, want not.'
But I could tell his heart wasn't in it. The Armourer gestured for some of his people to take away the chair, with the withered body hanging loosely in the straps.
'I need to ask you something,' I said. 'How did the Accelerated Men get their hands on strange matter guns? You told me you only ever made the one, for Uncle James, and you had that destroyed.'
'There was only ever one,' insisted the Armourer. 'And I gave it to one of my lab assistants to destroy. Very capable young man. Raphael. Went on to be Librarian, you know. Before William came back, and took over.'
I had a sudden terrible suspicion.
I called up the Merlin Glass, made it form a doorway into the Old Library, and hurled myself through it. I looked around, and there was Rafe, packing ancient and important-looking books into a travelling bag. As though he was preparing to leave, in a hurry. He froze where he was when I appeared through the Glass, and his eyes shot to one side. I followed his gaze, and there was William, ly ing unconscious on the floor in a pool of his own blood. Someone had cracked his head open, from behind. I looked back at Rafe. He hadn't moved. He watched me silently as I went over to kneel beside William. The old man was still breathing, though his pulse was faint and thready. I straightened up and looked at Rafe, who flinched back despite himself.
'What have you done, Rafe?' I said.
He didn't move a muscle, studying me carefully. 'He shouldn't have tried to stop me leaving.'
'He was your colleague. He was your friend. He trusted you!'
'He trusted Rafe. And I'm not Rafe. He never mattered to me. He's not one of us.'
'One of you,' I said, sick to my stomach. 'An Immortal.'
'Exactly. If you're wise, you won't try to stop me leaving. My work here is done.'
'Over my dead body; traitor.'
'My plan exactly,' said Rafe.
There was a gun in his hand. A large bulky pistol of a kind that sent a chill through me.
'Yes,' said Rafe. 'The gun that fires strange matter bullets. This is the actual original, that the Armourer made for the Grey Fox. The one he trusted me to destroy. Of course, I couldn't do that. Far too useful. And I have a sentimental attachment, to anything that can kill Droods. I got this to my people, and they used it as a template, to make more. Though it took our scientists years to work out its secrets. The Armourer does good work. He really does have a first-class mind, for someone who isn't an Immortal. Step aside, Eddie. You don't have to die here. Just disappear back through your useful little toy, and you can come back again for poor William when I'm gone. And you'll never see me again.'
