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The others waited, but that was all I was prepared to say for the moment.
“If I remember correctly, most of these science cities were shut down or abandoned in the nineties,” said Honey. “Too expensive to run in the more austere days of the new order, with the economy crashing down around everyone’s ears. A lot of scientists weren’t being paid, so they voted with their feet and walked out. The soldiers didn’t try to stop them, because they hadn’t been paid in months either. A few cities survived for a while by switching over to commercial research, with corporate or mafiosa backing, but by the turn of the century all of these backwater places were deserted and abandoned. Expensive leftovers from the Cold War, pretty much forgotten in the new corridors of power. No one cared. No one even remembered what most of them had been working on.”
She stopped and looked at me. So did Peter and Walker. I sighed and reluctantly continued.
“X37. Genetic research and manipulation. And not the kind you stumbled across, Peter. No Frankenfood, no goldfish that glow in the dark, no mice with human ears growing out of their backs. And no alien intruders going ski
“Why didn’t your family do something about it?” said Walker.
“Most of what we know, we only found out afterwards,” I said. “When it all went bad, and the Soviet military tried to shut the place down and failed. It’s a big world, and even the Droods can’t be everywhere at once. Though I understand we’re working on that . . .
“The scientists working here were struggling to identify, stimulate, and just plain poke with sticks every part of human DNA they didn’t understand. All this information coded into each and every one of us on the most basic level. If they could access and learn to control even a part of it, maybe they could produce something more than human. So . . . here they were, working blindly in the dark, pushing buttons pretty much at random. Like walking into a room full of gas and striking a match to see where the leak is.”
“What happened?” Peter said impatiently.
“We don’t know, exactly,” I said. “The first clue the Soviets had that something had gone terribly wrong was when X37 suddenly went quiet. No comm traffic at all. No answers to increasingly urgent inquiries. The Soviet authorities followed their usual procedure and sent in the military. And not just soldiers either; these were Spetsznaz, their equivalent of the SAS. Hardened veterans of hard fighting on the Afghanistan front. They were ordered to go in, restore order at any cost, and ask pointed questions until someone provided answers.
“But even they couldn’t deal with what was ru
“Five hundred heavily armed men went in; nineteen came out. Broken, hysterical, traumatised. Screaming about . . . monsters. The Kremlin was preparing to nuke the city, but by then we’d picked up on what was happening, and we stepped in to stop them. It hadn’t been that long since Chernobyl, and there was no way the world would have stood still for another travelling radioactive death cloud. World War Three was a lot closer than most people realised, in those days. We were run ragged, stamping out bushfires and making people play nice. Anyway, we sent in two of our local agents to look the place over from a safe distance, but the city was, to all extents and purposes, quite dead. So we just declared the area off-limits to everyone, on pains of us getting really peeved at them, and let sleeping dogs lie.
“And now here we are, breaking every rule there is just by being here. If we had any sense we’d get the hell out while we still can.”
“And go where?” said Honey. “There is nowhere else.”
“And the teleport bracelets won’t move us on till we’ve solved the mystery,” said Peter.
“I don’t like this city,” said Walker. “It’s unsettling.”
We all looked at him. “Oh, come on,” I said. “You police the Nightside! One of the most dangerous and distressing locations in this or any other universe. And you’re . . . unsettled?”
“Something bad happened here,” said Walker. “I can feel it. I feel . . . vulnerable. Not something I’m used to feeling. It’s . . . invigorating, I think. Yes . . . Been a long time since I faced a real challenge, with no backup, no Voice, just . . . me. The fate of the whole world could be resting on our shoulders, depending on what we do next. Isn’t it marvellous?”
“You’re weird,” said Peter.
“No,” Honey said immediately. “That’s Eddie.”
“I am not weird!” I said. “I’m just differently normal.”
No one had much to say after that, so we moved on, pressing farther into the city. Like most Soviet-designed cities, the streets were set out in a simple grid, and each street was just wide enough to let a tank through in case of insurrection. No signs of life anywhere, past or present. But after a while we began seeing signs of fighting, of armed struggle and mass destruction. Doors kicked in, or out.
Windows with little or no glass left in them. Fire damage, smoke-blackened walls, burnt-out homes. Whole buildings blown apart, reduced to single walls and piles of rubble. Some gave indication of being blown out from the inside. And lots and lots of bullet holes.
“There was a major firefight here,” said Walker. “Lots of guns, all kinds of calibre. Grenades and incendiaries too. So why aren’t we seeing any bodies?”
“The few soldiers who staggered out of this place spoke of monsters,” I said. “That is, those who weren’t so traumatised that they never spoke again. So who, or what, were they firing at? There must have been bodies at some point, soldiers and civilians. So who moved them?”
None of us had any answers, so we just kept walking. We passed one building so weakened and precarious that just the rhythm of our footsteps was enough to bring it down. It slumped forward quite slowly, almost apologetically, giving us plenty of time to get clear. The walls just folded up and fell apart, and the whole thing slammed down into the street. A great cloud flew up, as much dust as smoke, but the sound of the collapse was strangely muffled, and the echoes didn’t last. The silence quickly returned, as though it resented being disturbed.
Honey had her shimmering crystal weapon in her hand, glaring around her, ready for an attack or a target, but nothing showed itself. Part of a wall crumbled forward unexpectedly, and Honey whirled around and shot it. The vivid energy blast blew the brickwork apart, sending fragments flying through the air. We all ducked, and then straightened up and looked at Honey accusingly. She gave us her best I meant to do that look and made the crystal weapon disappear.
“Well done,” said Walker just a little heavily. “That wall will never jump out at anyone ever again. And if there are any survivors here, they now know for certain that they have visitors. Visitors with guns and a complete willingness to use them. Perhaps you’d like to shoot one of us in the foot while you’re at it?”
“Don’t tempt me,” said Honey.
“In dangerous situations, self-control is a virtue,” said Walker.
“Don’t you patronise me, you stuck-up Brit,” said Honey. “Sometimes you just have to shoot something.”