Chapter 1
Trainee Patrol Officer Daniel Whyatt was scared. His supervisor, Nathan (Nate) Olsen, did not know his trainee well, but he suspected that the man was asking questions to try to distract himself from his fear.
“Why do you call the creatures below us Morlocks?” Dan said. “You’re the only one who does that.”
“We don’t know if Morlocks are below us at this moment, and patrol officers often use the name,” said Nate, mildly. “It’s a reference to a very old, classic book in which the main character ends up in a world where the good Eloi are above ground and the evil Morlocks, ape-like troglodytes who feed on the Eloi, live below ground.”
“But the Morlocks aren’t ape-like?”
“True,” admitted Nate. “They’re more like maggots with arms, feet, and a very nasty set of teeth and…” The patrol officer saw that his discussion of The Morlock’s appearance was not helping and switched back to the original topic. “There are academics in Rasand City who tell us we should have a more respectful name for the creatures. I tell them they should come out on patrol with us, see the creatures up close, and then tell us what to call the Morlocks.”
“Right – but they can’t get at us here, can they?”
“That’s the theory at any rate,” said Nate. “Part of the reason we’re on patrol is to test these new boxes.”
Both men were sitting on cushions in what amounted to a concrete box with windows and a steel door. The box was sitting on a two metre thick concrete slab, which was supposed to deter the Morlocks from burrowing up from below. The Morlocks were such enthusiastic burrowers, using just their claws, that the desert around Rasand City the two men patrolled was honeycombed with tunnels. Mostly, these were dug without causing any cave-ins, unless the Morlocks chose to have cave-ins as part of an ambush of surface dwellers. Their preferred trick, however, was to emerge suddenly from a hole they had previously dug out and then covered over by one means or another. Once out, the Morlocks would drag their victims into the tunnel, much like crocodiles lunge out of rivers and drag their prey underwater. The victims were never seen again.
Dan Whyatt, a small, round-faced man fresh out of the Rasand academy, was still coming to terms with his fear of the creatures, but Nate, a tall, broad figure tanned by long exposure to the desert, did not begrudge his trainee that fear. He had a small scar above one eye inflicted by a Morlock, and he had stayed alive in a high-risk occupation thanks to being wary, even fearful, of Morlocks.
As part of that general wariness, Nate had brought in a shallow plastic bowl from the armoured patrol carrier parked outside, filled it with water, and placed it on the floor.
“What’s with the bowl of water?” asked Dan.
“It’s an old trick,” said Nate. “Armies besieging fortresses on Earth before the invention of gunpowder might tunnel under the walls. Those inside the walls would put out bowls like this. If there were ripples in the water, then the ground was being disturbed. There was tunnelling nearby.”
“You don’t trust our equipment?” said Dan, gesturing at the box beside him. The box, which had a screen on top, contained a seismograph for detecting movements underground. It was connected to the various radar and infrared sensors on top of the building, designated station five, as well as the sensors in the carrier parked on the concrete outside.
“Always cautious with Morlocks,” said Nate. He thought he saw a small ripple in the water, but it coincided with his trainee shifting his weight and dismissed it. “We should change the subject.”
“What’s the music you play while we’re driving?”
“British pop of the '60s, mostly,” said Nate.
“60s? Which century?”
“Twentieth, so 1960s. There was a lot going on in that decade. There were the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, of course, but also the Kinks. If anyone wants to invoke that era, they play the Kinks’ You Really Got Me.”
Nate thought he saw another tiny ripple in the water. “There’s nothing on the detector screen, is there?”
Dan studied the screen on top of the device. “No, all risk factors within normal range. The algorithm isn’t popping at all.”
“Okay, as I was saying, there were plenty of other bands of the era remembered to this day. The Animals, say. Their song "We’ve Got to Get Out of This Place" later became associated with a war in a country called Vietnam, although the song was probably originally about getting out of Liverpool in England. Then there were The Troggs, The Zombies, The Who, Gerry and the Pacemakers, and The Hollies, although I think The Hollies' best work, Long Cool Woman and The Air That I Breathe, didn’t come out until the early 70s. There were also the different sounds of Petula Clark and Joe Cocker. And let’s not forget The Moody Blues and The Yardbirds, which launched the career of one of the greatest guitarists ever, Eric Clapton…”
A distinct ripple formed in the centre of the plastic bowl and spread to the rim.
Nate stood up. “Nothing on the threat box?”
“Nothing,” said Dan. “The system is happy.”
“I’m not,” said Nate, stepping over so that he was closer to Dan, as well as to the door. “Stand up. Safety off.” Each man carried two pistols with two spare clips for each weapon. If the ammunition ran out, as it did, they had what could be described as mini swords, which an earlier age might have labelled dirks. In three years as a patrol officer, which made him a veteran, Nate had been forced to use his dirk once and hadn’t liked it.
“Oh my, oh my!” said Dan, standing up and fumbling with his pistols.
“Calm, now,” said Nate. “Flick the safeties off on both weapons and switch on the generator.”
“Right – right! Generator.”
Dan put one pistol under his left armpit and touched a button on the screen. Nate did not hear the generator start. It was in the patrol carrier outside. But he saw the lights on the grids slotted into metal guides around the windows light up. There was no glass in the windows, just the metal grids that would fry any Morlock that touched them.
The water in the glass shook again.
“Remember, head shots only and fire deliberately,” said Nate. “Put one down and move on. You see, I’ve got a grenade?”
“Ye – yes,” said Dan. “Am I supp... supposed to have one?”
“Just me for now. I’ll throw it so that they can’t block it, then draw my second pistol.”
The water in the bowel shook violently.
“Any moment,” said Nate.
The centre of the floor gave way. The bowl of water spun into the depths, and a heaving mass of Morlocks boiled out, all teeth and claws and rolls of white flesh – intent on grabbing the pair of patrol officers and dragging them into their underworld. Nate fired twice, clean head shots that killed each Morlock targeted, making it loll to one side, tongue hanging out, then threw the grenade. He lobbed it carefully so that it fell behind the mass of Morlocks and inside the hole. Beside him, Dan was firing into the Morlocks indiscriminately, forgetting about head shots.
The window grids sparked. Morlocks screamed at each one and fell away. They were pounding on the door behind him. Then the grenade went off, with a whump! It was designed not so much to explode as to burn, spreading a close relative of napalm on the Morlocks still crowding to get out of the hole they had dug. They screamed. The smell of burning flesh permeated the box. Nate shot two more as the pressure eased, and he spared a second to glance at the screen on top of the threat box. Now, it was showing a red alert and warning of imminent attack. So much for the technology.
“They’re behind us,” shrieked Dan, still firing wildly into the mass of creatures.
“Dan, stop firing! Reload.”
Nate shot two more of the creatures, clambering over the bodies of their fellow, still smoking from the grenade, while Dan fumbled with his pistols. The pounding on the door increased in urgency. Through the din, Nate could hear Morlocks hissing on the other side. A line from a film of long ago went through Nate’s mind – “What can men do against such reckless hate?”
“We can’t stay here,” said Nate, as more Morlocks climbed out of the hole. “We have to get back to the carrier.”
“But they’re outside!” exclaimed Dan, nearly sobbing. “We’ll never get there.”
In response, Nate put his combination earpiece and microphone unit in one ear.
“Carrier two, prepare for orders.”
“Copy,” said the carrier.
“On my command, strafe side of station once. Then strafe top of station.”
“Understood.”
“Dan, grab the threat box.”
“You… You’re kidding,” said the trainee.
“We have to check it back in. Now unplug and grab it.”
“I – I can’t,” said Dan, mouth working in panic.
“Just grab it,” said Nate. “Now.”
Dan holstered one pistol and grabbed the box, jerking it so that the lead came out of the wall plug.
“From now, don’t fire unless you have to,” said Nate. “Carrier two, fire.”
The carrier, which bore a strong resemblance to the armoured personnel carriers used in wars on Earth, opened up with a .50 calibre in an unmanned turret on top of the vehicle, spraying the side of the box with bullets. Old technology, maybe, and very noisy, but still brutally effective. The pounding stopped.
Nate pulled the bolt on the door and kicked it open as the carrier sprayed the top of the box, with an ear-splitting ripping sound, killing the Morlocks waiting to drop on the two patrolmen as they emerged. Dan was about to push through when Nate stopped him with one hand.
“Look down,” he said.
Dan looked to see, in the light from the station, a Morlock emerging from a small hole in front of the door to grab at his leg. The trainee shrieked. Nate shot the creature carefully in the head, then dropped a grenade so that it fell past the body.
“It’s a small hole. Step to one side.”
Dan did so as the grenade went off. More screaming from below. Then he stopped dead. There were more Morlocks on top of the carrier and on the side where the 50-cal could not shoot them.
“Oh no,” he sobbed.
“Remember, head shots,” snapped Nate. “Carrier two, officers approaching hatch. Fire at hostiles when you can get a shot.”
“Copy,” said the carrier. “It was smart enough to tell the difference between Morlocks and the patrol officers with ease, and knew all about hostiles.
Nate noted that it was a beautiful starry night of the type that made him, sometimes, look forward to patrols. He shot two Morlocks directly in front of the carrier hatch. Four others sprang from the side of the carrier. Dan shot at them, hitting one that Nate could see before the 50-cal spluttered into life, sweeping them away. They were at the carrier hatch. Nate shot two more Morlocks that wanted to drop on them, open mouths full of pointed teeth. Pushing and kicking one to the side when it dropped on him. Then he pulled the hatch lever, and they were inside.
Dan dropped the detection equipment behind the carrier driver’s seat with a distinct thud.
“That was terrifying,” he said, breathless. “Can they get us in here?”
“We’ll change position and set the 50-cal to auto fire. That should discourage them enough until daylight. But there is one thing you should do now,” said Nate, looking down.
“What’s that?”
“You should change your pants.”
