The Red Slayer

It’s a fun journey, but short. It’s uplifting to think we’re going on a road trip instead. Something we must do next summer if we’re still alive. The quiet London streets pass by until we reach Dagenham and pull up on a road beside a wire fence. The toolbox in the back of the car carries a pair of cutters for us, as well as pairs of handcuffs, bolt cutters and cable ties. A mound of rock, gravel and earth is our next obstacle. I slink to the top, expecting armed guards, searchlights, guard towers and barbed wire.

In a way, I’m disappointed. It looks like every abandoned factory sat in an abandoned, arid lot, surrounded by earthen mounds that have stood long enough to grow grass. Blank stretches of concrete go from the spiked, stainless steel gates to the building. It looks derelict enough to avoid suspicion, but reinforced against trespassers. Two thirds of the building are built from old-fashioned brick with bricked up windows. No alternate entrances. The only way in appears to be three shutters in the metal and concrete third of the building, where trucks would drop off their cargo. The approach is lit like a stadium; an ambush if ever I saw one.

My friends look over the top of the mound with me. Their frowns below their masks don’t inspire much confidence. Olga switches on her infrared vision and inspects the dark landscape between us and it. ‘Odd. There’re no guards patrolling the outside.’

‘They think we’re cocky enough to approach and demand Tara’s release,’ I reply. ‘But at the same time, they limited our approach so we only have one option.’

Dante sits back and deflates. ‘Does that mean we’re not getting in?’

‘No,’ I reply. ‘Don’t you see? Michael is expecting a fight so he can escape unnoticed, possibly with Tara.’

‘We’re on our own then,’ says Luke. ‘Perhaps if we lower their defences from inside, we can call in backup.’

I study the building again, wishing Sophia had included digital binoculars that zoom in gives me details in tiny text boxes. Instead, we’ve thrown ourselves into the hardest level of Metal Gear Solid with all the difficulty settings turned to eleven. I watch until the slightest parting of the clouds let a sliver of moonlight escape and shine onto the gabled roof in the middle third of the building. Rising high with a steep angle, dotted with shaded skylights.

I place my hand on my corset, feeling the laser cutter Sophia never claimed back.

‘Follow me,’ I say. In single file, we go from mound to mound, hiding behind it and checking for any guards we may have missed. Nothing. I take care to step on dirt instead of gravel, hopping from patch to patch to cushion my footsteps. We flatten ourselves against the wall when we reach it. No security cameras. Not even a sensor to trigger silent alarms.

The wall here is three storeys high, the best place to climb up. I fire both grappling hooks over the top, hoping they’ll latch onto something. When they do, the wire retracts, taking me with it. I pull myself up, only to realise the other side of the rim is lined with coils upon coils of barbed wire. I warn the others as they climb up after me and we balance on the rim along the first third of the building.

urging them to balance upon the rim. Fortunately, it’s just wide enough to stand on so we’re not performing a tight-rope act along the first third of the building. A ladder follows the angle of the gabled roof to the top. I shimmy across to the first glass pane and take out the laser cutter. Just like with the Shard, I cut around the edge until there’s just enough metal to hold it in place and give us enough room to squeeze through the gap. I gently lower myself onto a catwalk barely ten feet below.

I give the all-clear and my friends follow, lowering themselves in with their grapple lines. We approach the rail cautiously, realising this catwalk lines a giant room spanning everything under this gabled roof.

A sterile white light hangs from a rig in the ceiling, shining into the dead centre of the ground floor. Thirteen chairs are lined up perfectly; all occupied by young, healthy men, bound, gagged and blindfolded, save for one gap in the centre. Guarding them are six men, kitted out in black balaclavas, combat boots and trousers, and sweaters. I wonder why they’re not wearing Kevlar. Perhaps vampires can withstand bullets.

A door opens and closes to the right. A trio of scientists dressed in lab coats step into the light, an old man with little hair, a young man and a young woman, possibly students. With them are two more guards bringing the final occupant for the line of chairs. Their hands are bound, their legs trailing behind them. Though their face is obscured by a black bag, I recognise my own pyjamas.

‘This is bad,’ Luke whispers.

‘What do we do?’ says Olga.

I reach for my radio and speak softly into it. ‘Red Slayer to base. Hughes and his friends are setting up some kind of execution. Over. What do we do? Over.’

I wait for answers, but I only get static. ‘Dammit,’ I hiss, hooking it back onto my belt. ‘Something must be messing with the signal in here.’

‘What do we do?’ Olga repeats, voice straining.

I sigh. ‘Change of plan. Olga, Luke, find a way to lower the defences and contact MI5. Dante, with me.’ I grip the hand rail, jump up into a handstand and let gravity take me over the other side.

Their footsteps scatter as I grab the rail of the catwalk below, just as a voice echoes through the room, directly beneath me. ‘Is this everyone?’ says Michael through a megaphone. He steps out from beneath me and walks to an extended platform to look down on his victims and allies with four bodyguards on either side of him. He lowers the megaphone and turns to them. ‘Wait for my signal.’

The guards dragging Tara thrust her limp body onto the middle chair as the scientists join in the small gathering of other thugs. They don’t tie her to it like the others. At first, I take her for unconscious, until I see a dark red stain across the left shoulder of the white floral top.

If I could grip any harder, the metal I cling to would bend.

Michael brings the megaphone to his mouth again and announces, ‘Thank you all for your cooperation. Sadly, our efforts have been interrupted thanks to some thuggish teenager. We only managed to make one specimen before our computer network was corrupted. The other subjects we have collected will have to be written off. I’m scuttling this procedure as of this moment.’

He steps back, allowing his bodyguards to occupy the rail with their backs to him. The guards and scientists exchange raised eyebrows and confused mutters. The four bodyguards take weapons out of their coats. Crossbows. They take aim at the guards closest to them and fire. Bolts enter their hearts just as they realise what’s happening. The weapon reloads instantly and four more bolts find their way into four more guards. The scientists are left, screaming and shuddering as they watch them shrivel to a pile of dust and black clothing. The guns I’d have taken for authentic assault rifles bounce when they hit the floor. Heavy enough to seem real, but no better than a prop.

‘Sir, please!’ shouts the old scientist. ‘You wouldn’t have a specimen without me.’

‘Exactly,’ says Michael, stepping between his bodyguards again. ‘I can’t have you blabbing my secrets. I will posses the only Feral in the world.’

I gasp. The five men turn around and see me. Rather than ask questions, the bodyguards fire their crossbows. With a swish of my cape, they bounce off.

‘You!’ Michael bellows. Just like that, the angry uncle who beat me for tracking mud into the house has returned.

I jump down from the catwalk above before the bodyguards can fire another shot. They charge towards me at once and I cartwheel out of the way just as Dante jumps over the rail to stand beside me.

‘What’s the plan?’ he asks, getting into a fighting stance. The bodyguards steady themselves and come charging at us again. They haven’t the fangs nor the red eyes I’ve seen of all the other vampires who have charged at me until now.

‘I think they’re human. Just knock them out if you can.’

We jump out the men’s way once more. If I didn’t have priorities, I could invent some wonderful quip about making this a bullfight. One tries to go after me this time as I thread my fingers into the brass knuckles. I duck away from his bear-hug-ready arms and send my fist, propelled with adrenaline into his upper lip. His teeth shatter under the pressure and he lands on the floor with a bloody mouth.

Dante stands with his back to the rail as another goes to him, using his opponent’s momentum to toss him over the side where he lands on his chest. Bye-bye ribcage.

The other two grab us as their colleagues go down; Dante by the upper arm, me by the cape. The former two push against each other, grappling clothes, hair and skin until someone gives out. I pull against the tension of the man pulling on my cape until it’s too much for the hooks to bear.

With a snap, it breaks away from me. My adrenaline’s high enough to do a forward roll while the guard with my cape stumbles back. I turn swiftly and sprint towards him, skidding suddenly onto my side and along the floor to trip him up completely. He tumbles, hitting his head, out like a light.

Dante, meanwhile, lifts his knee into the man’s groin. His opponent whines but doesn’t let go, bending Dante backwards over the rail further and further until he barely has his feet on the floor.

I find my hand on my whip. It’s light and long. The tassel at the end sparkles malevolently as I crack it and embeds itself in the man’s shoulder, dragging him away from Dante, who takes out some handcuffs and binds the goon’s ankles and wrists.

Michael drops the megaphone and begins to run. I toss the whip again, aiming for his ankles. It’s meant to wrap around them and drag him back to me. Instead, the tassel hooks onto his leg and digs in.

‘Shall I leave you two to get reacquainted?’ says Dante.

I nod and give the whip a good tug. Michael screams. He pulls himself onto his knees to ease the tension. Dante cuffs the other two bodyguards and lowers himself to the ground floor with his grapple to release the prisoners.

I step closer to my uncle. His Ted Bundy hair is messed up, his plain black suit ruffled.

‘Look at that,’ I say. ‘It’s not as fun when someone’s doing it to you, is it?’

Michael glares up at me. ‘You came all the way here to be petty?’

I shoot my hand forward. His face crumples, expecting a punch, but I merely grab the front of his shirt and pull him towards me. ‘I’m here to stop you hurting more people than you already have. But while I have you here…tell me why you did it.’

‘Why did I do what?’

‘Why you treated me the way you did? How can you possibly justify hurting a child? A child whose mother and sister had just been murdered. I needed compassion to get through my trauma and I was met with your abuse and that of your children. What could I have possibly done to deserve that treatment?’

Michael sighs as if he has to give up a priority seat on a bus. He deliberately averts his gaze and says, ‘It was a long time ago…’

For some reason, I don’t slice his throat open with my commando knife. I toss him to the floor in anger. ‘I don’t care how long ago it was. It was unforgivable. I can’t forget what happened when your children mutilated.’

Michael laughs, propping himself up on his elbows. ‘Do you think I wanted to take you in? Your aunt said the press would grill us for not doing it. You were nothing to us but PR.’

I give the whip a quick shake and the tassel detaches itself from Michael’s skin. I glance over the rail to see Dante cutting the bonds of the male prisoners, who pull off their gags and blindfolds. Able to move, they go to help release their fellows or apprehend the three scientists. Dante reaches Tara and removes the bag from her head. She looks around, squinting at the bright light.

My eyes turn to Michael again, examining his bleeding leg. ‘When you started dating Tara’s mother,’ I ask him, ‘How long was it before you found out I knew her?’

‘Not long at all,’ Michael replies. ‘The moment I got out of prison your face was everywhere I looked. The “Teenage Hamlet”, the “spitting image of her mother”.’ He scoffs. ‘If I hadn’t networked on the inside and come out with the offer to supervise this project, I would never have gotten a job again.’

‘That’s not my fault,’ I reply, crossing my arms.

‘I tried to make a new life for myself. And what do I get? A stepdaughter who’s not only a stubborn bitch, but also a deranged lesbian dating the very girl who put me in jail.’

I’m not going to ask how he knew we were dating; we were hardly subtle at the school gates. But the deranged part deserves a kick in the balls on behalf of lesbians everywhere.

‘And this project you supervised, this Feral, who are you making it for?’

Michael rolls his eyes and cradles his family jewels. ‘That I won’t tell you. I already sent the majority of my workers to die at your hands so they wouldn’t spread our secrets.’

My arms drop with disbelief. ‘What?’

‘Oh yes. When they cornered you in the cemetery, that was part of the scuttling procedure. Either they’d kill you or you’d kill them, and you had those gas bombs so I knew you’d win.’

‘Well lucky, lucky me,’ I say, voice quaking with rage. ‘Because I’m still alive to rip you to pieces.’ I raise the whip. He hides his face behind his hands.

I lower it again. I can’t. Not like this. Not while he’s a helpless human lying on the floor. Not while Tara is down there. He’s not a vampire, and I’m not fighting for my life. I’m not like him.

I grab his wrist and drag him to the rail. With a pair of handcuffs, fastening as tightly as possible.

‘I know you won’t tell me who you’re working for, Michael. The second I do, you’re a marked man. You don’t have to tell me. Tell MI5 when they get here. They’ll make sure the big bad criminals can’t hurt you.’

I leave him there and lower myself from the rail to the ground floor. Tara pulls herself up from the chair, only to collapse down again under her own weight. I rush to her, wrapping her left arm around my shoulders and lift her up.

‘It’s going to be okay,’ I whisper.

‘Iorwen…’ she groans.

‘I’m here, Tara, don’t worry.’

‘No, they…’ she sighs with a great effort before holding out her right arm. There’s a dark bloodstain her inner elbow. Dante steps close and pulls up her sleeve for her. An open vein where a needle once was. Dante quickly bandages the wound using the first aid kit.

It’s a good thing I’m carrying her, otherwise, I would take back my decision not to whip Michael to death.

‘How do we get out of here?’ asks the nearest man to me, possibly a Polish accent.

I look to the door that the scientists emerged from. Dante leads the way, holding a stake tightly enough for his hand to shake. On the other side is an empty corridor.

‘Surely there’s a fire exit somewhere,’ mutters another man, a Scouse.

‘I don’t think this place is completely up to code,’ I reply, following Dante down the corridor until it opens out into a room not unlike the lab from the Shard. This one is bigger, sleeker; with desks sectioned off and narrow glass chambers. This is where the tortures took place. My stomach is turning.

‘Through there,’ says a third man, possibly Nigerian, pointing to a door directly opposite us. ‘They bring us through that door on gurneys to experiment.’

I take a few deep breaths. ‘Okay. I think there’ll be fighting ahead of us, and we still don’t know where Luke and Olga are.’ I turn to the man standing closest to me: tall, muscular, likely a body builder before he was kidnapped. I hand Tara off to him and his obliging biceps scoop her up.

My right hand finds a stake and my left, the handle of my whip. I lead a charge down the corridor. Every now and then I see a door, kick it down and throw in a gas grenade, just to be safe. At the end of it, the narrow corridor spreads out into the loading bay. There are no trucks, just the empty lot, the risen walkway, the three shutters we saw from the outside, and a large metal door directly across from us. The men stop to look around. Much like the women we freed all those months ago, relief spreads across their faces, knowing freedom is close.

The moment of hope vanishes when the metal door bursts open. Luke and Olga come falling out of it before picking themselves back up and slide an enormous bolt into place.

‘Iorwen! Dante!’ Luke shouts and they sprint across the bay to us, completely out of breath. I hadn’t noticed at a distance, especially when they’re in masks, but I see it now. Dilated eyes, cold sweats. Utter terror.

‘What is it?’ I say, holstering my weapons to steady Olga while Dante does the same for Luke. ‘Did you lower their defences?’

‘We can’t lower their defences!’ Olga babbles. ‘If we do, it’ll get out.’

‘It?’ says Dante. He turns his head slowly to the door and his mouth drops open.

Something punches at the door from the inside, denting the surface. It punches again. Another dent. Followed by scrapes, scratches. My eardrums are screaming.

‘The Feral,’ Luke whispers in fright. ‘It’s been set free to kill everyone in the building except Michael and his bodyguards.’

‘But it can’t get through the door,’ I say. ‘Not thick metal like that, surely.’

‘I’m afraid it can,’ says a voice from a floor above.

‘Michael?’ I gasp. ‘What—?’

He smirks, pulling out a small pair of bolt cutters from his jacket and dropping them to the floor at my feet. ‘That’s meant to be a double door. One silver, one titanium. Today, we drugged our single specimen to and took away the silver door. And he’ll be hungry.’

The Feral attacks the door again, leaving even deeper scratch marks.

‘You overestimated yourself this time,’ Michael continues. ‘Everyone here will die, and it’ll be all your fault.’

I thrust Olga behind me and throw my arms in front of Luke and Dante. A hand, pale and clawed, tears through metal as easily as if it were made of paper.

© Alice of Sherwood, July 2020