On his tray was a glass of murky drink. The inky posset. No one would spike him secretly anymore-the choice was his. The offer was there, the hope, though he was dreaming without the ink’s help. Billy was a hostage-prophet, augur-inmate. He was being played as a piece in a variant game of apocalypse.
You were supposed to run the numbers. Fortune-telling was quantum betting, a competitive scrying of variably likely outcomes. That variation, the disagreements, indispensable to the calculation. Triangulating possibilities. No one knew what to do now prognosticators all agreed. Billy gripped the frame of the bed. He stared at the ink-intoxicant.
There was a knock and Dane entered. He leaned against the wall. He wore a coat and carried a bag. For a long time, neither man spoke. They just looked at each other.
“I’m not your prophet, Dane,” Billy said. “Thanks for saving my life. I never said that yet. I’m sorry about that. But this is… You have to let me go.” Still sought, yes, but. “You can help me.”
Dane closed his eyes. “I was born in the church,” he said. “My mum and dad met through it. It was my granddad, my dad’s dad, who was the one really into it. It was him taught me. He used to do catechism with me. But I mean, that’s bollocks, ain’t it? It’s not about reciting like a parrot. It’s about understanding. He used to talk me through it.”
He opened his eyes and took equipment out of his bag, checked it, put it back. A spearhead emerged from the muzzle of what looked like a pistol. “Most of my friends… Well you know what it’s like with church and kids. They don’t stick with it, do they? Me, though… I had a calling. You know what the Teuthex said.” Dane examined his kit. “We can protect you. You’re being hunted by Goss and fucking Subby. Everyone wants what’s in your head, Billy. I know, I know, don’t tell me, there’s nothing in your head. Whatever.”
“What are you doing?” Billy said.
“My job. I done such things for the church. You can’t ask me all the things I done for the church, ’cause I won’t tell you. All the faiths got their…” There was a pause during which even the empty hallways seemed to wait.
“Crusaders,” Billy said.
Dane shrugged. “I was going to say oddjobsmen. Go-to guys.” The hashish-eaters; the Hospitallers; Francis X. Killy. Sanctioned wet-workers of the devout. “Everyone’s got apocalypse brigades, Billy, for when it all goes down. Waiting like kings under hills. They couldn’t exactly go undercover.” He laughed. “They couldn’t exactly get a job at the Darwin Centre.”
Dane lifted his shirt. His skin was studded with keloid marks. He pointed and one by one named them like little pets. “Clockworkers,” he said. “Saviour Sect. Mary Martyrs. This one…” A long and snaky path. “That’s not from a godfight, that one, just a straight-on face-off with a crook. He was stealing from us.”
Footsteps approached but passed on. Dane looked at the ceiling. “You know what the question is?” he said. “What is it you’re loyal to. God? The church? The pope? What if they don’t agree?” He kept his gaze up. “What you want and what I want ain’t the same thing. You want to be safe, and… not to be a prisoner. Which do you want more? Because it’s safer here. You want a bit of revenge, too? What I want’s my god. Maybe that’s in the same direction for a bit.
“If we do this, Billy, you and me, I got to know you’re not going to run. I ain’t threatening you-I’m telling you you’ll die if you try to deal with shit on your own. If we do this I’ll help you, but you have to help me. That means you got to trust me.
“It ain’t going to be safe even a tiny bit, understand? If we go. You got everyone after you.” He lifted the bag.
“You’ll be safer if you stay here. But they won’t let you go. They want to know what you see.” He tapped his head.
“Why are you doing this?” Billy’s heart was speeding again.
“Because it ain’t our place just to watch. There’s a god to save.”
“They think it’s the right thing,” Billy said. “I read about the movement without movement. Moore thinks he’s doing the holy thing, moving like a kraken on a board. By not moving.”
“Well ain’t it convenient that this interpretation lets him sit on his arse? They won’t let you go. I want your help, but I ain’t going to force you. Time ain’t with us. So?”
“I’m not what you think,” Billy said. “I’m not a saint, Dane, just because I cut up a squid.”
“Are you more worried about being a prisoner or a saint?” Dane said. “I ain’t asking you to be anything.”
“What are you going to do?”
“You fallen in the middle of a war. I’m not going to bullshit you, I’m not going to tell you you can get your revenge for your mate. You can’t take Goss and neither can I. That ain’t what I’m offering. We don’t know who has the kraken, but we know the Tattoo’s after it. If he gets hold of something like that…
“It’s him who got your friend killed. The best way to ruin his day’s to get the god back. Best I can do.”
Billy could stay among obsequious jailers. Offering him hallucinogen, taking devout and monkish notes on whatever drivel he subsequently raved.
“Will they come after you?” Billy said. “If you go rogue?”
What this renegacy would mean! Dane would be without the church that made him, an apostate hero taking faith into the heart of darkness, a paladin in hell. A lifetime of obedience, followed by what?
“Oh yeah,” Dane said.
Billy nodded. He pocketed the ink. He said, “Let’s go.”
THE TWO MEN ON DUTY AT THE GATE LOOKED SHOCKED AS DANE approached. They nodded. They piously averted their eyes from Billy. It made him want to pretend to speak in tongues.
“I’m out,” Dane said. “On a job.”
“Sure,” said the younger doorman. He transferred his shotgun from arm to arm. “Let us just…” He fumbled with the door. “Only,” he said, and pointed at Billy. “Teuthex said we need his permission…”
Dane rolled his eyes. “Don’t bugger me around,” he said. “I’m on a mission. And I need him for a moment to taste some stuff out. Need what’s in there.” Tapped Billy’s head. “You know who he is? What he knows? Don’t waste my time, I’m bringing him straight back.” The two men looked at each other. Dane said, in a low voice, “Do not waste my time.”
What, were they going to disobey Dane Parnell? They opened the gate.
“Don’t lock it,” Dane said. “He’ll be back in a second.” He led Billy up the stairs, Billy behind him risking a tiny backward glance. Dane pushed open the trapdoor and pulled him out past bulwarks of rubbish, into the rear room of the South London Church of Christ.
LIGHT BURST THROUGH WINDOWS. LONDON DUST SETTLED AROUND them. Billy blinked.
“Welcome to exile,” Dane said quietly, lowering the door. He was a traitor now, in his fidelity to his duty. “Come on.” They went past the kitchen, the toilet, the bric-a-brac. In the main room, chairs were circled. Billy and Dane came out into a meeting of mostly elderly women, who broke off chatting.
“Alright love?” one said, and another, “Is everything okay, sweetheart?” Dane ignored them.
“Do they…” Billy whispered. “Do they worship the, the kraken…?”
“No, they’re Baptists. Mutual protection. Any second the Teuthex’s going to find out we’re gone. So we’ve got to get far away, fast. Follow me close and do exactly what I say, when I say. You try to go off on your own, Billy, and you will be found and you will die. Neither of us wants that. You understand? Walk quickly but don’t run.
“Are you ready?”
Chapter Twenty-Two
THERE WAS NO PLEASURE, NO I-TOLD-YOU-SO AMONG THE hedge-seers who had for so long predicted that the end was on its way. Now that everyone who cared to think about it agreed with them-though they might abjure the insight-those who found themselves suddenly and unexpectedly the advance guard of mainstream opinion were at a bit of a loss. What was the point of dedicating your life to giving warnings if everyone who might have listened-because the majority were still unbothered and would possibly remain so till the sun went out-merely nodded and agreed?