Will Hill - Department 19

Frankenstein pressed the accelerator and the car moved slowly forward. As it did, Jamie craned his neck, looking for the tunnel they had emerged from. He saw it, a wide black semi-circle disappearing as the gate they had passed through slid back into place, but what lay to the sides of the tunnel caused him to gasp, audibly. A road, branching off the one they were slowly travelling along, curved back and ran parallel to the tunnel, the exterior of which was a flat, nondescript grey. Fifteen metres before the tunnel disappeared into the tree line it curved again, this time into a long, shallow arc that ran parallel to a huge metal fence. Jamie’s eyes widened.

“Wait,” he said. “Stop the car. I want to see.”

Frankenstein grunted, and shot him a look of annoyance, but he drew the car to a halt. Jamie threw open the door and stepped out. His head was spinning as he tried to take in what he was looking at.

The inner fence was at least fifteen metres high, made of thick metal mesh and topped with vicious snarls of razor wire. Set into the fence at one hundred metre intervals were guard towers, cubes of metal on top of sturdy-looking pylons. There were no lights in them, but Jamie’s eyes caught movement in the one nearest to him. He turned to look at the next tower, a hundred metres further away, and the next, and the next. The fence ran for as far as he could see, in what appeared to be a vast circle. It passed the end of the runway before it disappeared from view beyond a series of low rectangular buildings on the far side of the landing strip. He turned slowly, taking everything in.

Past the low buildings his view was obscured by the dome. Further to the right, a large building sat flush against the runway, its huge metal doors closed. Beyond it Jamie again picked up the path of the fence, the towers evenly distributed along its incredible length. He continued his turn, ignoring Frankenstein, who was looking at him with a certain amount of gentle bemusement. The road running along the inside of the fence continued until it met the tunnel again, then curved back to join the central road no more than twenty feet from where he was standing.

Beyond the inner fence was a wide strip of dirt, crisscrossed with hundreds of thousands of red laser beams; the complexity of the patterns would have made the world’s greatest jewel thief weep. This strip of no-man’s-land was bordered on the other side by a second fence, almost as high as the one by the road. Beyond it lay the woods, a wall of twisted branches and leaves, running a perfectly even distance from the outer fence. Every square inch of the space between them, a dirt run five metres wide, was illuminated by bright purple ultraviolet light, shining down from black boxes set at three-metre intervals along the outer fence.

Excitement surged through Jamie as his eyes drank in the sheer strangeness of what he was seeing.

What is this place? Why are there so many fences and lights and towers? What are they keeping out?

As his eyes adjusted to the brilliant red and purple illumination before him, he saw that set in between the flickering laser grid was a series of giant spotlights, the wide round lenses pointing into the sky. He looked up, and his mouth fell open.

“Oh my God,” he whispered.

There were no visible beams rising from the spotlights, but their purpose was clear as soon as he tilted back his head. Above him, shimmering gently in the night air, an enormous canopy of trees hung in the sky, extending seamlessly from the edges of the woods and covering the whole of whatever this place was. From underneath the image was flat, and faintly translucent, like a film of oil on a puddle of water, but he could see erratic shapes and uneven rises bristling the upper side. The effect was disorientating.

“What is it?” he asked, his voice full of wonder.

“It’s a hologram,” Frankenstein answered. “It keeps away prying eyes.”

He fought off the urge to ask who those eyes might belong to, and instead asked how it worked.

“There’s a suspended field of reflective particles that lies over the whole base. The spotlights project a moving image on to it from underneath.”

“Like a big cinema screen?”

Frankenstein laughed, a strange barking noise that did not sound as though it came naturally to him.

“Something like that,” he replied. “From above, all anyone sees is the forest. Have you seen enough?”

Jamie hadn’t, nowhere near enough, but he told his companion that he had, knowing it was what the giant man wanted to hear.

“Good,” Frankenstein said, not unkindly, and got back into the car. Jamie did the same, and they moved forward, towards the low grey dome.

In front of the building were several military vehicles, a heavy-looking truck with an open rear, a row of jeeps and a surprising number of civilian cars. Between one of the jeeps and a 3-series BMW that had seen better days, a parking bay was stencilled on the tarmac in white paint. Frankenstein guided their car into it and pulled it to a halt. The giant man and Jamie stepped out of the car and walked back around to a flat indentation where the dome faced the road they had just driven along. Set into the grey material of the building was a door. It stood open, waiting for them.

Frankenstein motioned for Jamie to enter, then followed him in when he did so. They were standing in a white corridor, featureless except for a sculpted crest that looked down at them from high on the wall opposite them.

“What now?” asked Jamie.

“We wait,” replied Frankenstein.

Jamie studied the crest as he did so. A crown and portcullis sat above a wide circle, in which had been carved six flaming torches encircling a plain crucifix. Beneath the circle three words of Latin were etched into the wall.

Lux E Tenebris

“What does that mean?” asked Jamie, pointing up at the crest.

“ Light out of darkness ,” translated Frankenstein. “It was the favourite phrase of a great man.”

“Who?”

The door closed behind them, sliding silently until it met the opposite wall, where it thudded into place with a loud clunk. There was a sound like spinning gears moving heavy machinery, then a quieter, yet somehow ominous second clunk. Instantly, the wall at the far end of the corridor slid aside to reveal a silver metal lift.

“Not now,” said Frankenstein, and walked down the corridor. After a moment’s hesitation, Jamie followed him.

The lift car had no buttons, and as soon as they stepped inside the door closed and they began to descend. It was such a familiar, mundane feeling, the shift in his stomach, the vibrations in his legs, that the mild hysteria Jamie realised he had been feeling ever since the thing in the grey coat had walked through the door of the house he shared with his mother threatened to pitch him into a fit of laughter. He steadied himself, and waited for the door to reopen. As they settled to a halt and it began to slide open, his mind raced with the possibilities of what he might see next.

It was a dormitory.

A long, wide room, lined on both sides with thin beds covered in olive-green sheets and blankets. The beds were pristine, as though they had never been slept in, and the metal lockers that stood between them shone like new.

“What is this place?” he asked Frankenstein.

The monster opened his mouth to reply, but a deafening siren drowned out the words. Jamie pressed his hands to his ears, and when the siren paused, Frankenstein looked at him with a worried expression. “You’re about to find out,” he said.

Chapter 6

THE LYCEUM INCIDENT, PART 1

THE STRAND, LONDON 3 RD JUNE 1892

The carriage clattered to a halt on Wellington Street, in front of the tall pillars of the Lyceum Theatre. A fine rain was falling, and the driver pulled his cloak tight around his shoulders as he waited for his passenger to disembark.