Tania Carver: The Creeper

‘Run!’ shouted Phil.

It broke the spell. Suzanne turned and ran.

Along the walkway and into the shadows. Phil lost her then. He turned back to the scene before him. Welch was still on the floor, eyes screwed up in pain, hand to the side of her head, blood seeping between fingers. The Creeper’s face had, if anything, turned even redder. Phil didn’t know much about burns and scarring but he was sure this wasn’t a positive development.

He was right. With an angry roar, he set off after Suzanne, his limping, shambling frame surprisingly fast, and was soon lost to sight in the shadows, the only sounds the heavy clang and clatter as his boots came down heavily on the metal floor.

Phil pulled himself to his feet, looked down at Fiona Welch. There was nothing he could do for her at the moment. He pulled at his wrists behind his back. But it was no good. The cuffs were tight. He needed something sharp, an edge to cut them with. He looked round. Couldn’t see one.

The Creeper had reached the ground and was bellowing once more.

Wrists tied or not, thought Phil, I’ve got to stop him.

Treading as carefully as he could and trying desperately to keep his balance and remain upright, Phil ran along the gantry into the same shadows that had claimed the other two.

Suzanne was getting out of breath. The sudden exertion after so much enforced stillness was beginning to take its toll. Her lungs were starting to burn, her legs shake. Her breathing was coming hard and fast and she was sure he would be able to track her just from that alone.

She had no idea where she was going. She was trying to find a way out but there didn’t seem to be one. The light from above cast faint rays on the ground, more than she had expected. Perhaps too much if he was following her.

And he was. She could hear him.

She ran.

The Creeper was angry. Very angry.

He didn’t know what was going on but he knew he didn’t like it. The husk had tried to hurt him. It was time for the husk to stop.

He reached the bottom of the steps, looked round. Listened. Heard movement to his left, breathing and fast footsteps. Bare feet slapping on the concrete floor.

He smiled.

Easy.

But just in case, he had something that would give him an advantage.

The night-vision goggles were still in his pocket. He had used them earlier when he came to meet Rani – or thought he was coming to meet Rani – to get into the building and dodge the police. He always used them at night. Something else he loved that gave him power.

He put them on, activated them. The world turned ghost-green and he could see.

And there she was. Almost to the far wall, by the boxes and beyond them, the water.

The electric water.

She disappeared from view. Hiding. Or so she thought.

He smiled.

Too easy.

By the time Mickey had emerged from the interview room, the whole station was in action. He found Anni.

‘Did you hear?’ he said. ‘The old Dock-’

She cut him off. ‘The circus is ready to go. We had an idea it might be there. The last call from the boss came from there. We haven’t been able to reach him since so there was a squad already being put together.’

‘Right,’ he said, disappointed that his thunder had been stolen.

Anni sensed that. She managed a smile. ‘You were good in there. Well done.’

‘Thanks.’ Was he blushing?

‘Come on,’ she said, ‘let’s go.’

He didn’t need to be told twice.

The team left the building. Marina was still in the observation room, watching Mark Turner.

She had seen the same patterns of behaviour before. When a suspect had given a full confession, got all their crimes out of their own souls and into a police report, they often slept. Turner, with his drooping eyes and lolling head, looked to be no exception.

Marina was curious. She left the observation room, crossed to the interview room. Stood outside, poised. Should she go in? Would that violate his confession in any way? Speak of harassment, coercion? She didn’t know. But it was a good opportunity to talk to him before he was taken away.

‘D’you mind?’ she said to the uniform on the door.

He stood aside, let her enter.

The room smelled of sweat. Hardly surprising, considering the way the two men had being going at it. Turner sat, barely registering her as she sat down opposite him.

‘Hello,’ she said.

He didn’t reply.

‘I’m… the new profiler on this investigation. Can we talk?’

He shrugged.

‘It’s just,’ she said, ‘that this is such an unusual case, I feel someone should be writing it up. Would you let me do that, interview you with that in mind?’

He looked up, seeing her for the first time, she thought.

He smiled.

‘They’re too late, you know.’

She frowned. Not what she had been expecting. ‘What d’you mean? Who’s too late?’

‘They are. The police .’ He said the word like he was describing a virulent, hateful illness.

‘Too late for what?’

‘To save them, of course.’

Her heart flipped. ‘What d’you mean? Has he killed them? Is that it? Are they dead already?’

He shook his head. ‘Not yet…’

‘Then… what?’

‘The building. The Dock Transit building.’

‘What about it?’

If things got too bad, too out of hand. There was a plan in place.’

‘What kind of plan?’

‘Remember what he did to the boat?’ Then, just in case Marina didn’t get the picture, he gestured, his fingers exploding slowly in the air, like a gently opening flower.

‘ Boom …’

Marina ran out of the room as fast as she could go.

Phil reached the bottom of the steps. It hadn’t been easy. There were times he had had to steady himself with both hands to stop himself from either going over the side or tumbling down the metal staircase. But he had managed it.

At the bottom he looked round. Pulled at the cuffs tying his hands together. Searching for something sharp enough to cut through.

Wind was blowing through the gaps in the rusted corrugated sheet metal walls. That gave Phil an idea. He crossed over to one wall, going slowly in the dark, watching his footing, until he came to the outer wall and, putting his back to it, felt along for a gap.

There were plenty. He eventually found one at waist height with a rusted, jagged edge.

Perfect.

He found the sharpest point, put his wrists over it, worked the plastic up and down as hard and as fast as he could.

His arms ached, shoulders burnt with the exertion, chest heaved. But eventually it started to give. Encouraged by that, he rubbed all the harder, ignoring the growing pain until he could feel it coming and started to pull. It stretched and sharpened, digging in as it got thinner and eventually came apart. He was free.

He fell to his knees, gasping, rubbing his wrists.

Looked around, searching for any sign of the Creeper or Suzanne.

None.

He set off into the shadows, listening, watching, hoping his eyes would soon be acclimatised.

Hoping he wasn’t too late.

The Creeper felt the thrill of the hunt coursing through him. This was what it was about. Never mind all that is she/isn’t she Rani, this was the real thing. What he lived for.

Stalking, hunting down, trapping his prey. He loved it. Came truly alive then.

This was when he remembered his father, could honour the man’s memory. Even if he had run away and left him.

Not that he blamed him. Not with those bitches in the house.

He thought of all those holidays camping in the woods, tracking an animal, hunting it down and killing it. That, his father had told him, is what a real man does. How a real man lives.