10.
An hour. Norma knew that it was a slippery thing. Given too much attention it could drag on seemingly forever, but given too little it would vanish before one's eyes. She needed a plan, but had no idea where to start. Biting her lip she noticed the others just watching her silently and refused to allow them their victory. There had to be another way. She looked at them, shook her head in dismay and walked away.
Her intent was to clear her mind, to check out the large room, perhaps tinker with the computers. She walked over to one of them, there was nothing but a blank white screen with a black rectangle flashing the words “system failure”. Immediately she recalled Geoff. Geoff could help, if he was still alive. She turned and quickly paced back to the group, she could hear the dog talking.
“It doesn't, and you can't.” was all she could make out.
Norma wasn't interested in finding out what they were discussing so said “Tommy, I need the torch.”
Tommy seemed a bit reluctant to hand it over. “What for?”
“I'm going to find Geoff.” Norma stated.
“Who?”
“The guy that we contacted earlier.” She answered.
Tommy paused for a second. “Alone?”
“Well if you are all dead set on murdering someone, I guess I'm going alone.”
“But those things...” He said, letting it trail off.
“Can I have the torch?” she asked, letting her impatience show.
Tommy shrugged. “I don't think you should.”
“Then come with me. Surely if he knows how to stop this without killing her, that's a net gain for everyone?”
Tommy thought about that. “Okay… but if we don't find him?”
“If we don't, then I'm out of options.” She confessed and put her hand out for the torch. Tommy slapped it into her palm, it was a heavy thing.
“We all go.” Andy said.
“That should prove interesting.” said the dog. “Lead the way.”
They set off, Norma heading in the opposite direction from the way they entered. There was another heavy iron door torn off it's hinges and warped. She noticed that the area they were in, the epicentre, was free of the catastrophic damage that had beset everywhere else, nor was any of the matter from the other dimension evident at all. It wasn't a big thing, it was just curious to her. She kept walking through the room until she entered the corridor. The narrow passage was practically clogged with rubble, as well as dozens of body parts and shredded clothes, not all of which belong to human workers. She tried to ignore it as she waded through the charnel clutter. It was obvious they'd been fleeing when the catastrophe hit.
The corridor was long and eventually the ugly mess thinned out and became a crossroads, though the devastation was so bad there way no way to tell which way to go. Norma decided to go straight ahead. She marched ahead, her head throbbing from the awful wailing song, the lack of food and the booze she'd drank earlier. As she headed down the corridor there was a noise from behind her, the sound of running. She turned sharply, hitting the light of the torch on her colleagues just as, from the right, three dark figures lunged at them. Tommy pivoted out of the way and Kelly swung her wrench, hitting one of the figures with a thump. Andy moved out the way too but staggered back as a flash of gleaming light left a red line on his throat, with a gentle croaking noise he wobbled, blinking in disbelief as blood sprayed from his neck. He went down beside the Sidhe who was in the middle of being bludgeoned by a now furious Kelly.
Tommy wielded the shotgun like a baseball bat and was swinging it at the other two Sidhe. Both held long knives, one of which was covered in blood. They seemed to be looking for a way to get at Tommy. Norma found herself screaming, running towards them and felt the cleaver connect with the back of one of the Sidhe's skulls, with such force that it shuddered right up her arm and into her shoulder. As she did this Tommy took the advantage and smacked the butt of the shotgun across the other Sidhe's twisted mockery of a face. Both tumbled to the ground.
“Andy!” Tommy exclaimed, getting to his knees.
“The child is gone.” The dog said, it's voice no longer filled with mockery, just stating a matter of fact.
“Awww fuck.” Tommy cried. “Fuck this fucking shambles. He was fifteen. Fifteen!”
Norma felt responsible but didn't want to bring it up, didn't want to say she was sorry, not yet, there would be time for that later. “We need to move.”
“We need to kill that thing next door before any of the rest of us end up like the boy.” Kelly said as she climbed off the corpse, her face spattered with blood.
“Aye. No more fucking about, Norma. We do this and we do it now.” Tommy insisted, his eyes were red and it was clear he was both angry and trying to hold back tears.
“I have to find Geoff.” Norma answered, weakly, uncertainty making her voice crumble. “He might still be alive.”
“Aye well Andy's not. And if these bastards keep coming through, there's a good chance were all fucked.”
“I know.”
“So we go back.” Kelly said.
“I have to find Geoff.” Norma repeated. “You do what you want.”
“We continue.” the dog said.
“What?” Kelly and Tommy said in unison.
“You promised an hour.”
“That was before Andy got killed.” Kelly said.
“Very well, return, see if you can do what you set out to do, I will accompany Norma.”
“That's not necessary.” Norma protested.
“No, but it is interesting.” The dog answered.
“Fine.” Tommy said. “Come on Kelly.”
“Your Eminence, I can't just disobey...”
“Then I order you.” the dog said.
That shut her up. Kelly stared wide-eyed for a second and then said “As you command.”
She walked back the way she came as Tommy paced behind her. Norma was alone with the dog and four dead bodies. She looked at the great beast and it glanced up at her. “What are you?” She asked.
“An idea, little more.”
“An idea?” Norma replied incredulously. “In the form of a dog?”
“Gods, demons, Aos Si, whatever supernatural entities you care to consider are creations bound by the belief of the humans that invent them. They cannot have any autonomy, only identity. I am a creation that was forgotten, I gained autonomy at the price of my identity, I was, therefore, granted absolute freedom, unbound by the prisons of belief or perception, I was merely a conscious will that willed myself into existence, created my own belief in myself. With absolute freedom I could perceive all the tricks and traps that bound everyone and everything.”
Norma stood there waiting for a conclusion to the dog's explanation, but it seemed that it had said enough. “I see. I need to find Geoff.”
“He should not be far from here.” the dog said.
They walked through another set of rooms filled with destruction and death, the walls turning to rubble, pools of sticky blood and patches of weird fungus everywhere. Norma was becoming immune to it all, it was no longer shocking, or grotesque. She reached another corridor and sighed. “This place is a maze.”
“Not far now.” The dog said, with no sense of encouragement.
Nor was it. At the end of the corridor was a door, still attached and locked. She knocked on it. “Geoff?” she said.
A voice came from behind it. “Who's there?”
“Norma, we spoke some hours ago.” She said.
“Norma. From Duntreath Community Centre?”
“That's me. Let me in Geoff. I need to find out how to close the aperture. My colleagues want to kill her.”
“Hold on.” Geoff answered. There was sounds of furniture being dragged, clattering noises and eventually the door creaked open a few inches. Norma could see Geoff, his face covered in blood, the wound across his nose. His eyes flicked towards the dog. “You brought your dog?”
“Sort of.” She answered hoping the dog would not speak and frighten Geoff into closing the door again. Luckily it stayed quiet. Geoff opened the door and invited them in. The room wasn't big, a small office, with a desk and several monitors all of which still showed static. It was much as Norma had imagined it to be. “So, do you know how we stop this?”
“Did you turn off the power?” Geoff asked
“It was already off.”
“Oh.” Geoff said, obviously disappointed. “Then she should have died on her own.”
“She didn't. In fact she seems very much alive.” Norma replied. “I'd like to make sure she stays that way. Do you know any other way we can close the portal?”
Geoff thought. “No, I'm sorry, all that stuff was really above my pay grade.”
“Dammit.” Norma hissed. “They're going to kill her, Geoff.”
Geoff shrugged. It was then the dog spoke. “I told you I could help.”
Geoff freaked out, actually screamed and jumped behind his desk for protection. Norma realised why. “It's alright Geoff, he's with us.”
This didn't allay Geoff's fears at all. “Th- the dog… talks?”
Norma decided to ignore his drama and confront the dog. She'd had enough, enough of all this weird horror, of all the death, the savagery and above all, the supernatural strangeness that she had no intention of accepting. It was time to be done with it all, to put it to an end, no matter the cost. What exactly could an imaginary talking dog actually want from her. “Yes you did, you also told me it would cost. How much would it cost?”
“My existence, like all, requires maintenance. Nor is this an easy task. I would be saving your town if not, indeed, your world. I do not think it too much to ask for your first born, do you?”
“My fi-” Norma was about to repeat his request but was too stunned to even finish it. Was this beast some old testament demon? Its demand was outrageous, preposterous and impossible. When she'd fled Duntreath all those years ago, when she had the abortion, something had went wrong, nothing that had threatened her own life, but something that had left her infertile. It hadn't ever bothered her, not until she'd met Stephanie and Stephanie had so wanted a child, a son or a daughter.
For the previous two years Stephanie had been trying, IVF treatment using sperm from a donor, but it hadn't worked. The doctors had been kind but they'd been the ones who'd suggested adoption. It had almost broken Stephanie's heart, she was still trying, in vain, but both of them had filled in the adoption papers and were waiting on a result. Norma realised then that she might be able to trick the dog after all. If she and Stephanie were both unable to have children of their own, the dog couldn't really have their first born, could it? She found herself smiling on the inside, for the first time all night. She nodded. “Deal.”
11.
By the time the Military arrived Kelly, Tommy, Norma and Geoff were emerging from the ruined base. They were all caked in dried blood, rubble dust and all looked as if they'd climbed out of a bomb-site. The sun was rising and Norma could see the plant-life of that other world withering, turning to grey dust even as soldiers in black hazardous environment suits rushed towards them. All of them were escorted into vans. There were questions, so many questions, none of which she felt capable of answering.
They were taken to a facility, each placed in a brightly lit cell. She was subjected to all manner of poking, prodding, blood tests and examinations, both physical and mental. She didn't care. Norma was willing to tolerate it all. What was left of Duntreath had been saved. All the folk at her Dad's party were alive and that was all she cared about. That and getting home finally. She wanted to be gone from Scotland and never return.
It took them three days to give her the all-clear. Three days in which she sat alone in that cell trying to process what had happened in those final moments. Her brain, try as it might, could not really make sense of it. “Deal” she had said and then everything became stranger than all the other events of the night combined.
First of all the dog, had not been a dog at all, but some kind of unravelling brightness, a brightness which was not light, nor sound but something between the two, like a musical thread, like those old visualisations she used to have on her computer's music player. It had spread, just like the exotic matter had spread, rapidly and with great force. She and Geoff had been left alone in the small office as it stretched outwards from there. The distant screaming echoing down the halls. Both had rushed from the office, towards the aperture, where they found Kelly and Tommy standing there, frozen in amazement as they watched the fairy Arwyl stretch and warp like plasticine, and be dragged through the portal she had made. It vanished as she did. Then all the chaos stopped and there was nothing but silence.
They held onto that as they moved back through the Mantik facility. There were occasional sighs and exclamations of horror from Geoff but apart from that they said very little. No-one felt like speaking.
It had suited her fine, not speaking, being left in a cell for three days. It took her that long for normality to regain itself. After the doctors had given her a clean bill of health then there was more paperwork. Official secrets acts, non-disclosure agreements, compensation acceptance notes. She even had to sign the official narrative they had constructed. A gas escape, a chemical that had caused wild hallucinations and people to become violent. She scratched her signature into all the papers, she never argued, was completely compliant, she just wanted to go home.
Eventually she got to see her parents. Both were fine physically but when she asked them what happened, neither of them wanted to talk about it, which was fine, the feeling was mutual. She was released and they took her back to Duntreath. Those in charge of the whole affair had cleaned the town up rather well but it felt like a ghost town now. All in all sixty three men women and children from Duntreath had died. No one bothered telling her the number of dead in the Mantik facility, nor did she care enough to find out.
Stephanie was waiting for her at her parents house and there were tears, lots and lots of tears and hugging and desperate kissing. There was celebration too, as Stephanie had managed to convince both Henry and Agnes to sell up and move closer to the both of them. Norma had been amazed by this, even after all that had happened she never thought her parents would ever leave Duntreath.
“Why now?” She had asked.
“Would be nice to be near our grandchild.” Agnes had answered. “To see him or her grow up.”
This had left Norma confused. “Grandchild?”
Stephanie hugged her again. “It's not all been bad news since you've been gone.”
“What are you talking about?” Norma asked. She could feel, once again, in the pit of her stomach that strange nausea.
“Well, I tried to call you but… Anyway, I'm pregnant. That last set of injections worked. The Doctor confirmed it on the day you left, sweetheart. We're going to be parents.”
Norma burst out laughing and crying at the same time. Stephanie held her close, her parents joined in with the hug, thinking she was overwhelmed. As they did Norma just stared out the window. Walking down the street was a huge black dog.
She could swear it was laughing.
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