Erik’s other problem was that he couldn’t always be bothered to find properly willing subjects. So he used stray animals and homeless people, along with drugs and machines and techniques he was forced to create in his own very private laboratories because they didn’t exist anywhere else. He had his successes and his failures, but he wasn’t nearly as efficient as he should have been in disposing of the remains. Erik was on the run, hunted across Europe by a dozen different organisations, when the Crowley Project found him and lured him to its cold bosom with the offer of well-stocked laboratories, cutting-edge technology, and more untraceable animal and human test subjects than he could shake a scalpel at. In return, of course, for his exclusive services.
Erik wasn’t cruel, as such—unlike Natasha. He didn’t care enough about his subjects to feel anything for them. They were only raw materials. For him, the end was everything.
He wasn’t much to look at. Medium height, a bit podgy, with flat blond hair and pale blue eyes. People found his presence disturbing because on some level they could sense they meant nothing to him. There was less human feeling in Erik than in many of the ghosts he pursued. He tended to slide and shuffle along, head down, as though always half-expecting to be shouted at, or struck. But when his eyes came up, they were always fierce and angry, a man rehearsing his revenges against an indifferent and ungrateful world. He did have feelings. But typically, he only wanted the things and people he couldn’t have, to justify his doing terrible things to those who denied him what he wanted. This was obvious to many people, but no-one had ever been foolish enough to tell him. It wouldn’t have been safe.
Erik wore a good suit, badly. Grace and elegance were not in him, only a brute, stubborn persistence. There was always a general air of untidiness and grime about him, and nearly always a few spots of blood down his shirt front. In the field, he carried the bare minimum of useful technology, in a pack on his back.
Erik didn’t give much of a damn about ghosts or hauntings. But helping investigate them was part of the price he paid for the Crowley Project’s indulgence and protection. They only called on him when they absolutely had to, not least because most other agents wouldn’t work with him, no matter what they were promised or threatened with. Natasha Chang was the first field agent they’d found who’d put up with him, because she found tormenting him amusing. Erik put up with Natasha for his own, very private reasons.
Natasha strode around the Oxford Circus entrance lobby like the Queen on a state visit, giving every impression that she was slumming just by being there. She took a keen interest in everything but didn’t touch anything; that would have been beneath her. She studied the ticket machines and the closed ticket barriers closely, frowning a bit. Erik leaned back against the closed and locked iron gates and smiled smugly.
“Would I be right in assuming that you have never travelled on the Tube, Natasha dear?”
“Of course not,” snapped Natasha, looking at everything except him. “I don’t do anything the common herd does.”
“Heh-heh,” said Erik, in his low, breathy voice. He pushed himself away from the gates and shuffled around the lobby, his eyes darting back and forth, taking in everything. Including Natasha. She caught him eyeing her covertly, spun round, and surged towards him like an attack dog let off the leash. She grabbed his crumpled shirt front with both hands and slammed him back against the nearest wall. She supported his weight easily, his feet kicking helplessly a good distance above the floor. His arms hung down at his sides; he knew better than to try to grab her wrists. She thrust her face right into his.
“Don’t look at me like that, Erik. Never look at me like that, or I’ll rip your eyes out and make you eat them. We are partners in the field, nothing more. You are less to me than the filth beneath my feet, and if you even dare to dream about me, I’ll give you nightmares you’ll never forget.”
“I love it when you talk dirty,” said Erik. And his tongue shot out to lick the tip of her nose.
Natasha dropped him onto his feet and backed quickly away, rubbing hard at her nose with the back of her hand. Erik readjusted his shirt and sniggered loudly.
“You’re big and strong and scary, and I love you for it, Natasha dear, but always remember . . . I’m as dangerous as you are.”
“You think you can threaten me, you little worm?” said Natasha, glaring at him from a safe distance.
“Heh-heh,” said Eric. “Save the sweet talk for another time. We have work to do here, remember?”
Natasha gave him her best dismissive sniff, and he ignored it with magnificent disdain. He eased over to the closed ticket barriers, produced a length of wire from somewhere about his person, and stuck it into the gate mechanism. He jiggled the wire for a moment, and the barriers sprang smartly open. Erik made his piece of wire disappear with a somewhat overdone conjurer’s gesture, then stood back and indicated for Natasha to go through ahead of him. On anyone else it would have been a charming gesture, but on Erik it looked sleazy and opportunistic. Natasha stuck her aristocratic nose in the air and stalked right past him. Erik considered goosing her as she passed but decided that on the whole he rather preferred having his testicles where they were. He glided through the barriers after her, and they both stopped at the top of the frozen escalator, looking down the motionless steps. Erik moved in close beside Natasha, and she made a point of moving away. The light was very bright, the silence very deep, and down below, nothing moved at all.
“JC, Melody, and Happy are down there,” Natasha announced coolly. “I can feel them. Already hard at work, the industrious little souls. I do hope they turn up something interesting. If only so we can have the fun of taking it away from them.”
“We’re not only here for the haunting,” Erik reminded her diffidently. “We’re here for them. Oh, I have been looking forward to this. They think they’re so smart, so good . . . I’ll show them what smart really is. Can I kill the girl? I’d really like to kill the girl. I have a brand-new really unpleasant technique I’ve been dying to try out on someone.”
“JC is our main target,” said Natasha. “He goes first. He’s the dangerous one. Ever since he took charge of this team, they’ve enjoyed success after success. And we can’t have that, can we? Their progress threatens the Project’s intentions. So JC has to die. Once he’s been taken care of, we can amuse ourselves with the junkie telepath and the girl geek.”
“Vivienne MacAbre seemed very impressed with the whole team,” ventured Erik. “Don’t think I’ve ever seen her so . . . vehement before.”
“I felt the threats and menaces were quite unnecessary,” Natasha said primly. “I am an experienced field agent. I mean, Come back with their heads or don’t bother coming back? When have we ever needed threats to motivate us? When have we ever failed the Project?”
“Vivienne scares me,” said Erik. “I like that in a woman.”
Natasha gave him her best withering glance, but he didn’t care. He was already thinking about things she didn’t like to think about.