“I think you will find that they do,” he said. “Shall you make the phone call or shall I? I’m sure our respective governments would love to hear from you.”
The small man reddened and looked flustered. He seemed to be about to argue then looked in Banks’ eyes and quickly away.
“Very well then, but you will not be armed and you will have a watching brief only. I have been told that the study of this find is my responsibility and my responsibility only.”
“And again, I remind you that your ‘find’ is a British officer. Any harm comes to him and your responsibility will be to answer to me. Best you take it seriously.”
The obvious leader of the armed men on the quay came over to defuse the situation and looked Banks in the eye.
“Captain Banks?” he said in a clipped precise English. “Captain Olsen. He’s right about the weaponry — I can’t sanction you running around with assault rifles in the city. You and your men may, however, keep your handguns as long as they are holstered.”
Banks nodded; he hadn’t expected to be allowed the rifles anyway.
“Where are we headed?” he said, addressing the captain rather than the other man.
“The university. We have a trailer ready for you and your men and passes will be provided for the laboratory areas. I assure you all due care will be taken with your man.”
Banks saw a different message in the small doctor’s eyes but now wasn’t the time to push it any further.
The squad fetched their kit, and Banks thanked the skipper for all his help — and his vodka. As soon as the beast was loaded onto the flatbed — once again covered in tarpaulin to hide it from prying eyes — they piled into a succession of SUVs and followed it in a winding trail through the city.
- 15 -
“So what’s with the wee crabbit guy?” Wiggins asked. Banks was in the back of the first of three SUVs with Wiggins alongside him and Captain Olsen and his driver up front. Hynd and Davies were in the vehicle just behind them.
“What is crabbit?” Olsen asked. “That is not a word I have come across before.”
“It’s Scottish,” Wiggins said, “and it means many things in different circumstances but it looks like all of them fit yon doctor.”
Banks laughed and addressed Olsen.
“How about dour, unsmiling, bad-tempered, an itchy pole up his arse… any of them ring a bell?”
Olsen laughed.
“All of them and all when applied to our doctor. I am afraid he is not a very good advertisement for our city but he is regarded as the expert in this particular field, having studied under Professor Jensen in his youth.”
“Jensen from the original experiment?”
“Yes, the very same. He lived here in the city and died an old man sometime in the 1980s.”
“I thought no one got out of the base alive,” Banks said.
“I do not know the story,” Olsen replied.
But Larsen might, Banks thought. There were holes in the story as told in the journal he’d read. Perhaps Larsen would be able to fill in the blanks.
The first sight of the university surprised him, for after seeing the city center on the way through, he’d been expecting an imposing old World European-style edifice. Instead, they drove around the outside of a tall, modern structure. Yes, there was plenty of polished wood in evidence in its construction, but the main thing on show was a high, wide, and handsome expanse of glass frontage, glowing red in the very last of the sun. They followed the flatbed down into a cavernous underground garage and while the bed of the truck was being unhitched from the front cab, Olsen showed them to a long, plush trailer.
“Are we going camping?” Wiggins said.
“This will be your home for the duration,” Olsen replied. “It is fully stocked, has hot water and power, no TV reception down here I’m afraid, but there is a DVD player and some movies. There is beer and vodka in the fridge and frozen pizza for the microwave.”
“Everything a growing lad needs,” Wiggins replied, looking ‘round. “Could do with a better view though. And maybe some dancing girls.”
The squad got their kit stowed inside the trailer; Banks had just enough time to note that it was far more luxurious than they would have been able to offer in Lossiemouth had roles been reversed.
“Wiggo, you and the sarge get settled in. Davies and I will go with the big hard man to make sure he’s looked after. Just don’t snaffle all the booze and pizza before we get back.”
With Davies at his side, they followed Olsen back out into the main garage then walked behind the flatbed as it was towed away by two forklift trucks.
The convoy of forklifts, flatbed, and men walked the length of the garage to the far-east end, into a descending tunnel that was obviously of older vintage. Olsen saw Banks looking around.
“This was a nuclear bunker in the bad old days,” he said. “Professor Jensen saw a use for it while the new university was going up and was instrumental in it being reconfigured and incorporated into the building works.”
They passed through a thick, circular iron vault door that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a bullion depository.
“What do you keep down here that needs so much security?” Davies asked but didn’t get an answer, although they didn’t have to wait too long to find out. The slope evened out as they entered a wide, circular underground chamber almost a hundred yards in diameter. The central area consisted of a wide circle of computer servers, gas chromatograms, and numerous long tables festooned with laboratory equipment. The forklift trucks unhooked the flatbed directly in the center of the facility. All around the outside walls were more of the large steel doors like the one they’d entered through.
“What do you keep down here?” Davies asked again. Captain Olsen waved a hand towards one of the doors.
“Have a look.”
Banks and Davies both walked over and peered through an eye-level window. The glass was almost opaque due to its thickness and at first, they thought there was nothing inside but an empty cell with roughhewn walls. Then Banks’ perspective shifted and he saw what he thought might be the outline of a moss-covered arm. Once he’d seen that, the rest clicked into place like one of those fancy holographic images you had to stare at the right way to see. It helped that he’d seen the same thing before, in the high cave above the fjord; one of the rock-encrusted figures was bound — perhaps asleep — embedded in the stony walls inside.
He turned away and counted the doorways — there were twenty-four of them equally spaced around the central area.
“Jensen’s experiment wasn’t confined to the base in the fjord, was it?” Banks asked and Olsen smiled grimly.
“Not after you Brits decided to give up on it. The professor was not ready to quit. He brought his samples here and, with the aid of volunteers from the local prison population, he continued his work. What we have here is the result. But they have all been asleep and immovable for more than fifty years now.”
Larsen, the doctor, arrived as Olsen was speaking.
“And as the heir to the great professor’s legacy, I am, of course, very excited to get to work on discovering why this new specimen is up and moving about.”
Banks decided not to mention the fact that they’d dropped a cave on the ‘specimen’… he didn’t want to give Larsen any daft ideas.
Davies went over to the flatbed to check on the prone figure still lying there in chains.
“He’s out for the count, Cap,” the private said on his return. “None the worse for the trip but he’ll be out for a good few hours now that he’s out of the sun.”