Julien pressed on, deliberately ignoring my question. “There are wards for unicorns who need reshoeing with pure silver hooves, and for werewolves with the mange. I understand Leo Morn’s a martyr to it, in the winter months. For vampires who’ve made themselves ill by drinking the wrong blood group: Rhesus intolerant. And, of course, a ward to treat all the rare and nasty diseases that will keep turning up in the Nightside through Timeslips: from the Past and any number of unfortunate futures. You really don’t want to know about the Plague Ward, John.”
He carried on, talking with increasing enthusiasm, extolling the many virtues of the Hospice, genuinely proud of all the incredible services its staff could provide. Often only because of his vigorous fund-raising though, of course, he never mentioned that bit. He talked at length of the giant spiders who lived in the basement, spinning bandages, and the ghouls who were bused in every day to eat the medical waste, and the occasional body too toxic to dispose of in a normal manner. Or too tough to burn. A ghoul’s digestion can handle anything, up to and including nuclear waste. Though you really don’t want to be around them when they fart.
And, sometimes, ghouls would be called in to deal with certain bodies that were too dangerous to be buried. Any villain who ever said I’ll be back! as he went to his death at the hands of a triumphant hero . . . never met a Nightside ghoul. But I couldn’t help noticing that Julien was saying most of this to cover up the fact that he didn’t want to talk about Ward 12A. I mused on this while noticing that all of the porters, including those pushing patients around in wheel-chairs, were actually very familiar-looking cat-faced robots. I pointed this out to Julien as a matter of urgency, but he just nodded easily.
“I know,” he said. “The Authorities bought them at auction, from one of the vaults discovered after the Collector’s death. We donated them to the Hospice. Mark always did have a fondness for this particular kind of automaton, brought back from some future iteration of China, I believe. You don’t have to worry, John; they’ve all been very thoroughly reprogrammed to serve and protect the patients.”
I decided I was still going to keep a very careful eye on them. These robots, or some very like them, had tried very hard to kill Suzie and me when they worked for the Collector. In fact, I was almost sure some of them were keeping a careful eye on me. I caught a number of cat-featured heads turning away the moment I looked at them. To take my mind off this, Julien pointed out that many of the nurses working in the Hospice were actually probationary nuns, from the Salvation Army Sisterhood. That got my attention. The SAS were the most hard core, extreme Christian Sect in the Nightside. Certainly not anyone you’d want to argue with when they said you needed an enema. Apparently probationary Sisters were sent here to put their faith to the test and to harden them up. Before they could join the Sisterhood proper and go forth to smite the ungodly where it hurt.
And then suddenly the lobby was full of sirens, bells, flashing red lights, screams and shouts and people yelling at each other. Julien was up on his feet immediately, looking quickly round for people to help and evil to fight. I was still struggling to get to my feet, and looking around for anything that might be coming my way. Everyone else was heading for the front doors, with great speed and determination. Including security people, reception staff, nurses, and robots helping patients, and absolutely everyone in the waiting area. Many of them showed a remarkable turn of speed, considering how ill they were supposed to be. I looked at Julien, to ask whether or not we should be leaving, too, but he was busy looking around to see where the fire was. Or possibly the attack. I grabbed a passing nurse by the arm, and she nearly pulled me over before I brought her to a halt. She was a big girl. Her arm muscle bulged dangerously under my hand, but then the probationary nun recognised who I was and settled for jerking her arm out of my grip.
“What’s going on?” I yelled at her, over all the sirens and alarums.
“Red Alert!” she yelled back at me. “Major Emergency and Get the Hell Out! Look, it’s Ward 12A, you idiot! If you’re not going to run, get out of the way of a nun who can!”
In an instant, she was off and running again, not even looking back. I turned to look at Julien, only to find that he was off and running, too, but heading in the opposite direction, deeper into the Hospice. I looked round the deserted lobby, sighed deeply, and went after him. Thinking, That man will be the death of me, one day. I knew he was going to Ward 12A to see if he could help anyone and put down whatever trouble had broken out there. Because he was still the Great Victorian Adventurer, and that was what he did. And if he was going, I had to go as well. Because that was the trouble with Julien Advent; he made you be a better person, in spite of yourself, if only because you couldn’t stand to let him down.
We pounded through the Hospice corridors, following the signs on the walls that pointed the way to Ward 12A. We passed a hell of a lot of people going the other way, running as though the Devil himself was hot on their heels. Many of them looked at us incredulously and yelled for us to get out while we still had a chance. Julien kept going, so I had to go on, too. And, of course, along the way we ran into Dr. Benway herself, also heading for Ward 12A. I only knew it was her because Julien actually said her name out loud and smiled with something very like relief. Dr. Benway nodded briefly to Julien and kept going, too.
We soon caught up with her. Benway was a short, stick-thin figure in the usual white doctor’s coat. She had flat grey hair, cropped short in a functional way, and a hard-set face, lined with all the marks of a long, busy life, filled with more losses than successes. Her eyes were a cool, thoughtful grey, and her mouth was set in a thin, flat line. She looked strong and capable, someone you’d be glad to have around in a crisis. If only she wasn’t leading you right into the heart of it.
“Good to see you again, Julien,” Benway said brusquely, looking straight ahead as she ran. “We can use all the help we can get.” She glanced at me. “Even him.”
“You’ve heard of me,” I said reproachfully. “And you know Julien Advent personally. What a surprise.”
“I know everyone,” said Julien. He wasn’t even breathing hard, the bastard. “How else do you think I know everything?”
“I know a lot of people, too,” I said.
“Ah yes,” said Julien. “But you know people like Dead Boy and Razor Eddie, while I know people who matter.”
“Shut up and run,” said Benway. “Save your breath and your strength. You’re going to need them.”
She actually increased her speed, racing along with her arms pumping at her sides, sprinting through the deserted Hospice corridors with a turn of speed that was frankly astonishing in a woman who had to be well into her sixties. She darted in and out of a series of short cuts, ignoring the directions on the walls, and soon I hadn’t a clue where I was. The corridors were starting to remind me uncomfortably of the hedgerow maze. But I knew when we were finally getting close to Ward 12A because I started to hear things. From up ahead of us, to every side, and, even more worryingly, behind us, I heard a series of heavy, slamming sounds.
“That’s the steel security doors dropping down into place,” said Dr. Benway. “Sealing off the corridors. No-one in, no-one out, until this mess is sorted, and the danger is over. If all the security doors are dropped, that means all the patients who can be moved have been; so we’re pretty much alone in here, with the problem.”
“What about the patients who couldn’t be moved?” said Julien. Typical of the man, to be concerned with innocents even as he raced into danger.
“They’ll have to take their chances,” Benway said curtly. “They’re under guard; God bless the Fortress. Concentrate on what’s ahead of us, Julien. If we can’t bring this under control quickly, we could lose the whole Hospice.”