Brian Lumley - Necroscope - Invaders

Concentrating on the map, Trask was only half-listening to what Lardis was saying. But in another moment he looked up from where he sat at the table. 'Eh?'

'Mountains,' Lardis said. 1 understand 'em. And so do the Wamphyri. If this one's a Lord, where do you think he'll be?'

'Where do I think—?' Trask frowned, looked again at the map, then came erect and snapped his fingers.

'In the mountains, aye,' Lardis anticipated him, scowling in his fashion. 'In his aerie, of course. That's a logical con— er, conclusion? — wouldn't you say? And here's another: if it is one of them, it isn't Szwart. What, in all this heat and light? No way — not a chance. It's too much for me, let alone for Lord Szwart. Huh! Darkness himself, that one!'

And: 'Damn! You're probably right!' Trask husked.

At which point lan Goodly returned from the ops room. 'Up and running,' he said. 'And Ben, David Chung's on-screen, wanting to speak to you…'

'I have some hot-off-the-press news for you,' Chung told Trask as he seated himself within the screen's viewing arc.

'Big deal,' Trask answered wearily, with a touch of sarcasm but no real malice. 'Just about any news fits that description! We've been busy, air-mobile, and only just got settled in here. So, what's going down in your neck of the woods that's such hot stuff?'

Chung shrugged. 'In my neck of the woods? Not a lot. But in yours: an opportunity to speak to an old pal of ours, maybe, if that's of any interest?' And then, more seriously: 'It's Gustav Turchin. He's going to be there at the Earth Year Conference in Brisbane. The time in the City is now—' he glanced off-screen '—a little after eight a.m. But just an hour ago Turchin himself was on-screen, unscrambled, from Moscow. He was interested to know if you'd be attending the conference. He was very careful, oh-so-polite, and diplomatic as usual, but John Grieve was doing Duty Officer and read him like a book. Premier Turchin is eager to see you, Ben. It was a last-minute call, probably monitored, before he boarded an Aeroflot VTOL Atmozkim to Brisbane. And John says Turchin stressed the fact that he would be accompanied by "several members of his staff…'

'That's very interesting,' Trask answered. 'His bodyguards will be special police, KGB lookalikes — watchdogs for the real leaders, all the military types like Mikhail Suvorov — who will be making sure he doesn't step out of line. So maybe Turchin is on his way out, his days of power at an end. But of course I'll see him. I have a few questions for him, and while he still has some pull there's a favour I need to ask of him…' Trask glanced at Jake, perhaps musingly, then turned back to the screen.

'So thanks for the information, David,' he continued, 'and you can be sure I'll act on it. But now I'd like you to tell me something about our main problem. How is the search going? Have you picked up anything new to corroborate your original lead?'

Chung pulled a wry face. 'There's something there, I would swear to that. But it's too distant, too shielded, literally on the other side of the world! Your side of the world, Ben. Which is where I have to be if you want any kind of accuracy. I mean, how can I be expected to locate someone or something through eight thousand miles of solid rock and white-hot magma?' 'You want in on this?' Trask's face was a blank. 'Absolutely!'

'And you wouldn't be playing on your talent simply so you can come swarming around out here?'

Chung's face showed his confusion. For the truth was that he would dearly love to go 'swarming around' in Australia with his E-Branch colleagues — and if he denied it Trask would know he was lying! So after letting his face work its way through a number of mutually contradictory expressions, finally he said, 'But isn't that the wrong question? What you should have asked is, do I think I'll be better placed to find what we're searching for if I'm out there with you?… To which I would have to answer, yes.'

At which Trask's stony expression broke and he grinned. 'I know,' he said. 'I'm good at asking awkward questions, right?'

'Too true!' Chung rubbed his chin and looked hurt — until a moment later, when Trask said:

'Okay, so how soon can you be out here? The fact is you'll come in useful apprising Premier Turchin first-hand of all that you've discovered about the Russian navy's illegal pollution of the world's oceans… and in Earth Year at that! Which in turn will afford me a little more leverage on what I would like from him. That's if leverage is required, which I doubt. For, in fact, Gustav Turchin isn't a bad sort of bloke.'

Watching Chung's face come alive with anticipation on the wall screen, Jake thought: Synchronicity again! Like some kind of weird word~association. E-Branch: Gustav Turchin: the down-at-heel Russian military's systematic pollution of the oceans: the Earth Year eco~summit. And all of it coming together right here and now, in Brisbane — along with a whole hunch of other shit, possihly.

And meanwhile, with a smile as broad as his face, the locator was saying, 'I, er, already mentioned the possibility that I mightbe needed to John Grieve. He's happy to take over here, and there'll be no shortage of staff in support. So… when is the next flight out?'

Trask nodded, knowingly. 'I'm sure you'll be able to check that out for yourself,' he said. 'Er, if you haven't already.'

And Chung laughed and said, 'I have an hour and forty minutes to make Heathrow!'

'I thought so,' Trask said. 'Very well, lan Goodly can get his head down now and pick you up in the wee small hours at the airport. You'll travel under an assumed identity, of course.'

'Of course.' And Chung was still grinning his delight when Trask broke the connection…

Chung wasn't the only one who was met at the airport in the wee small hours. Premier Gustav Turchin was there first, along with his minder entourage. No one paid them much attention.

Russia was no longer a world superpower — in fact, she was rapidly crumbling, held under siege not by the world community but from within her own borders by political and ideological intractability, corruption, organized crime, and desperate poverty — but still Turchin was recognized as a world leader of sorts, if only a figurehead without any real power. In any case the Earth Year Conference wasn't diplomacy-conscious; it wasn't that kind of venue: the eco-summit's organizers were not so much standing on ceremony as requiring action.

Australia, now a republic and a very powerful nation in its own right, was still viewed as a 'clean' country and was determined to stay that way. While the all too frequent El Ninos and other ecological disasters were not caused by Australians, Australians were suffering their consequences. Now they and other like-minded — indeed right-minded — countries were considering real action, political, legal, and economic, against nations with bad-to-criminal ecological records. Since Russia was reckoned more than merely 'suspect' in this regard, and since Premier Turchin's attendance had been an eleventh-hour decision, no red-carpet arrangements had been made for him and his party.

A limo and driver had been arranged — which was literally the least that the organizers could do without being seen to be rude — but Trask had seen to it that these had been called off. This hadn't been the easiest thing in the world to arrange, but Trask's connections were second to none.

Diplomatic immunity saw the Russian Premier and his poker-faced party of four clone-like minders through the international airport's red-tape entry procedures without too much fuss, each man carrying his own spartan to modest luggage, until they were met in the arrivals lounge by a pair of'chauffeurs' who introduced themselves as 'Mr Smith' and 'Mr Brown'.

Swiftly escorted to the carport by Smith and Brown, Turchin was bundled into the back of the first limo… the doors of which immediately clicked shut and locked, all except the driver's door, which stood open. And before the jet-lagged, travel-disorientated quartet of grey-suits could even begin to object, Mr Smith slid into the driver's seat and drove away.