H2G2 Storytime III: From Prussia with Love. Part LVI
Created | Updated Dec 10, 2006
Daltmooreby and Sreka walked side by side down the corridor that led from the hanger, deeper into Alpha Complex: neither trusted the other enough to have their back to them thus the enforced mutuality persisted in grim silence.
Eventually Daltmooreby suggested that they split up to cover more ground - an idea Sreka was suspicious of accepting but eventually relented.
Thus it was that Daltmooreby found himself on his own once more. Von Trapp had been whisked off to be treated by the apothecaries, and he had a meeting scheduled with this Grand Master figure.
'I still have the diamond' he thought a touch smugly and those who know are few indeed.
He turned a corner, a sign on the wall by the corner indicated he was heading towards the lab area. On his way he passed a door that had on it "Storage lvl 1."
There were many varied items in here: boxes of clothes, some tools here and there, a few disused pipe cuttings, a filing cabinet, some shelves with disinfectant and detergent, a mop and lots and lots of wooden crates, the same sort that had been onboard the train before it crashed.
Inside, crouched low behind some of these, Arthur, X, Ody and Jamila were hiding.
"Well we're inside." Ody said phlegmatically, "now what?"
"Well.." Arthur pondered aloud "we...er"
"I should have thought it was simple", Jamila cut in abruptly. "I gave Ody's father that diamond from the Temple in Egypt, having gone through everything we have - the very least I want to know why they want it so badly, and what they do once they realise the one I gave them is a dud."
"It was a dud?" Arthur asked.
"Didn't I mention that?", Jamila said coyly. "I could have sworn...hmm.. anyway - well not a dud just one of the diamonds from the plinth network. The diamond they have is not flawless, no it bends light in a certain direction to create the light-latice that illuminated the cavern. It will be useless to them if they want to focus a beam exactly, of that I am quite certain."
"So what your suggesting is?" X enquired.
"I'm going to see what out there" Jamilla began hastily getting in a shawl she had found in a draped over a crate near where they were hiding "and don't you even think about trying to stop me.
"I..er..would never dream..." Arthur muttered.
"Good. Keep it that way." And to Ody's mild alarm and Arthur's considerable discomfort, she gave Arthur a quick peck on the side of his cheek.
"I shan't be long." she said and taking the shawl about her shoulders wrapped it over her arms, opened the door a little and peered out into the corridor, which was empty. After waiting to make sure the way was clear she slipped outside and closed the door with a click.
After a moment full of pause and quite reflection pause as if to process her tour de force negotiating. X turned to Ody full of inquisitiveness and asked "Is she always like that?"
"You have no idea", Ody said grimly in the way only bruised male machismo can manage.
Jamila walked was brazen confidence down a curved corridor lined with metal struts and cables. 'I wonder where they go?' she thought and began to follow them as they snaked their way deeper into the heart of Alpha Complex taking in all that there was to see.
There were many tunnels and intersections of corridors but she kept going straight following the cables, she had a feeling she was walking down in a spiral as the corridors were gently sloped.
Eventually the ceiling disappeared and the tunnel opened out into a cavern of immense proportions in which was contained on stratified layers that reminded her of Peruvian Terrace farming writ large on a terrific scale. Above her criss-crossing this gigantic space were monorails in which carriages like roller-coaster buggies zipped across occasionally with a sound and commotion like fairground dodgems.
She carried on walking on a wide ledge that overlooked this bustling centre of commerce and civilisation that was the cult's civilian society. Eventually she re-entered a new maze of corridors and continued to follow the thick black cables until they abruptly terminated in a bulkhead. She was about to give up and head back when something caught her eye.
It was a temporary sign that read Viewing Platform V.I.P.S and invited Guests.
She glanced about no-one was watching so she slipped under the fabric guard rail and ventured down this new corridor.
A short distance away this entered a box for dignitaries that resembled seats in a stadium. This area was overlooking another impressively huge hall - a hollow chamber inside the extinct volcano that stretched from one side of the conical dome to the other so far distant they were almost beyond sight.
Illuminated in the middle was something impossible.
It made Jamila's eyes water from staring and he jaw hung loose. She simply could not believe what she was seeing. It was almost beyond comprehension that something this unlikely could be here.
She had to show the others.
Just then a gruff voice from down the rows of seats called up to her: "Oi you aren't supposed to be here - clear off."
"I...er..." she stumbled and stuttered, "I...er...just wanted to see it."
"Yeah well come back and quese down there tomorrow like everyone else and you can see it from the public gallery - this ones reserved for dignatories and The Grand Master. Now sling thy hook before I losses me temper or me job!"
"Yes, yes, of course sorry, very sorry." she said backing away fast , colliding with the wall ushering another "sorry" and running back down the corridor she had come from.
Back across the bustling hub of the market square alive with the voices of people, back up the sloping corridors that wound it's way up to the surface, back and back further and further she ran until at last she recognised the level she had emerged onto originally, just around this corner was storage room one and her friends.
She turned into the corridor and darted back around sharply, pressing her back into the cold wall, preying she hadn't been seen.
Daltmooreby was stood side-on to her, in the doorway of Storage lvl. 1, he was holding the revolver he'd hit Ody with, his armed crooked at the elbow gun held at out in front.
"Come out from there so I can see you all" He breyed in a gloating manner and took a step inside.
She peered around. Good he hadn't seen her. She advanced toward the room a little further. She could hear him. "Such a shame Dr Najil couldn't be here - I regret what Mary did son, I really do."
"Go to hell." Ody barked.
"Arthur." She heard Daltmooreby say cordially.
"Sean."
She peered round the door.
Daltmooreby had his back to her and lined in front of him where Ody and the two agents.
"and who are you?" Daltmooreby asked in a manner vaguely reminiscent of English Princes at public functions.
"I'm Arthur partner." X said.
"I don't suppose he told you that he murdered my wife, Junior's mother in cold blood. This man, your partner. He did that."
"Don't call me junior." Ody seethed.
Daltmooreby shuffled over to look his son in the eyes. "why ever not?" Daltmoorey sneered.
"ahem"
The cough was demure but polite. Daltmooreby turned and Jamilla smacked him across the face with a heavy section of pipe cutting that had been leant against the inside of the door.
"Because his name is Ody." she said firmly and dropped the pipe at his feet and it landed with a resonant clang.
breaths and composed herself to address them. "There's something I think you all really ought to see." she said.
Meanwhile in the hanger, a monk who kept a vigil by the window was staring at his feet not thinking about much in particular when a momvment outside caught his eye.
It was brief but it looked like a figure staggering through the snow and the gale.
"Raise the gate!" he shouted and the door ground open one more time emitting a terrible wind full of gusting blasts and drifts of snow
A emancipated figure caked in snow and ice, rigid from cold and shivering, stumbled in and collapsed into the arms of those who raced to support him.
The gate slammed home with a loud bang and in the quiet the man's ragged, frozen breath ranged louder.
I am k-k-k-k-Küld...o-o-o-o-o-thers sr...ar....arr.. d-d-d-d-d dead." hrrr....hrrrrr... imposters...hrr....hrrr...r-r-aise....hr.....the ....alarm."Somebody threw a blanket round him and a stretcher was procured and he was carried off to the apothecaries who would try to save what frostbite had not already claimed.
A deep red light enveloped the base and a wailing klaxon began to wind up as a general alert was triggered.
In her offices, Annabel heard the siren some way off and then as the signal travelled down the wires, it arrived in her quarters. She closed a file she was reading and took off some reading glasses and set them down.
She depressed a buzzer on her desk and her PA in the next room answered it. "Find the cossak!" Annabel snarled into the intercom.
"Yes Ma'am" came the reply.
Sreka looked up as the light flashed red and the alarm sounded where he was.
"Damn." was all he could bring himself to utter.
Arthur and X looked up in surprise as the alarm sounded as well. Jamila and Ody reappered from behind the crates which is where they had dragged Daltmooreby's unconscious body.
"Oh bugger." said Arthur, "There goes the element of surprise. Now they'll be looking for us."
