“Another beer Erin.” said Brendan, staring morosely into middle space.
“Are you sure, now, Brendan?” said Erin.
“Just give me the beer.” said Brendan.
He sat drinking it in much the same attitude that he’d drunk the others: staring blankly at the shelves of spirits, his eyes a little bloodshot.
Suddenly Brendan began to cry. His face creased into a mask of despair, and large tears rolled down his craggy face.
Someone clapped him on the shoulder, but he didn’t respond. He showed no sign at all that he’d even noticed the clapper: a man by the name of Connor. Instead, he continued to cry.
“Go home and be with your wife and daughter.” said Connor softly.
“What’s the point?” said Brendan. “What’s the point to anything?”
“Come on now, if we all took that attitude we’d none of us be here at all.”
Connor pulled him firmly but gently off the bar stool and led him to the entrance of the pub.
“You’ll go home, so?”
Brendan nodded dumbly.
“Do you want me to come with you?”
“No.” said Brendan. “I’m going straight home. I am.”
Connor watched him walk off down the dark lane, swaying and stumbling.
“Poor old Brendan.” said Erin, coming up behind Connor.
“That’s a broken man if ever I saw one.” said Connor.
Soon Brendan reached his house, but he didn’t enter. Instead, he stood outside, gazing up at the light in the window of his daughter’s bedroom, and again he burst into tears. Unable to control himself, he stumbled away towards the woods.
When he’d calmed down enough to talk to himself, he said, “You need to get a grip on yourself, man. This kind of thing doesn’t do at all. You’re not helping anyone with this.”
He looked up at the stars. Due to his intoxicated state, the stars seemed to spin this way and that.
“Majestical roof, fretted with golden fire.” he mumbled.
Then he tripped on a tree root and fell on his face.
He picked himself up and continued on his way, brushing off a piece of clay that had stuck itself to his cheek.
The woods seemed different to him somehow, when he walked in among the trunks of the ancient trees. At least, he assumed they were ancient. The old oak had certainly been there all his life, and still had his grandfather’s initials carved on it. Yet, something seemed unusual. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Perhaps the woodland was quieter than usual; he could hear only the wind rustling the leaves, and absolutely nothing else.
Then he realised that he could hear something else: a faint cry, almost like a human voice.
“That’ll be a vixen.” he said to himself, but his own words fail to convince him.
He began to walk towards the source of the noise, straying from the path, pushing branches aside.
In spite of the full moon it dawned on Brendan that lack of light was a distinct issue, and he took out his phone and activated the torch.
The noise rang out again, and this time it sounded undeniably human. It sounded a lot like a child.
As he approached the source of the sound he slowed his stumbling pace and his heart began to beat faster.
“Who’s there?” he shouted.
“Help! Help me!” came the reply.
The voice was high-pitched, but not quite the voice of a child.
Brendan emerged into a clearing and there he saw, by the light of the phone, a small man with his ankle in an animal trap, grimacing in pain.
“Please, please help me!” said the man.
He could be no more than four feet high; perhaps even three feet, Brendan thought, and he was dressed rather strangely.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” Brendan exclaimed.
“My leg’s trapped!” shouted the man. “It hurts!”
Brendan rushed forwards, almost tripping again, and began attempting to open the trap.
“Must be some idiot trying to trap deer.” he said. “What kind of evil swine would do this to an animal?”
“Never mind an animal, what about me?” said the man.
“Try to relax.” said Brendan, and with an enormous effort he managed to pull the jaws of the trap open, and the man pulled his ankle out of it.
“Oh my words.” said the man, massaging his ankle.
“You’re going to need a hospital.” said Brendan.
“I don’t believe in doctors. I’ll be fine, so I will.”
The man was still grimacing in pain and could barely get the words out.
“Your ankle must be horribly messed up.” said Brendan.
“No, ’tis just a bit bruised.”
Brendan looked the man up and down as he lay on the grass in the clearing, rubbing his ankle.
“What the hell are you, a leprechaun?”
The man jumped angrily to his feet, then began hopping due to the pain in his ankle.
“Oh so that’s how it is, is it?” he said. “Rescue me from a trap and then assault me with hateful words? I can’t help my size, now, can I? Do you think everyone who’s not a massive ape like you is subhuman? I could go to the police with this! This is a hate crime!”
The man’s head barely reached Brendan’s waist.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean nothing by it.” said Brendan. “It’s just …”
“Just what?”
“Why are you all dressed in green like that?”
“I’m a children’s entertainer.” said the man. “I was just entertaining children at the school earlier on. That doesn’t make me a fecking leprechaun!”
“I’ve apologised, haven’t I? I’ve rescued you from a trap, show some gratitude.”
“You’re lucky I don’t report you to the Garda.”
The man stomped off into the darkness, his limp largely disappearing as he walked.
“Ungrateful little …” began Brendan, but then the man abruptly stopped, and turned around.
“Don’t I know you from somewhere?” he said.
“I’ve been —” Brendan began.
“I’ve seen you on TV.” said the man. “You’re the man with the sick daughter. You’re trying to raise four million Euros to get her treated by some fancy doctor.”
“That’s me.” said Brendan.
“How’s that going then?”
“Very badly.” said Brendan.
“Sorry to hear.” said the man, and he turned and began walking off into the darkness again.
Brendan’s face crumpled, and tears began to stream down his face again.
Again the man stopped, and turned around, and this time he walked all the way back till he was standing in front of Brendan, looking up at him.
“There, there, come on now.” he said. “There’s no need for that kind of thing.”
“Sorry.” said Brendan, wiping the tears from his face.
“Great big man like you, crying like a baby.”
“I know. You’re right.”
“Listen, I’ve travelled the world and I’ve met a lot of different folk. I’ve seen both the poles, and all the big deserts, and the highest mountains. I’ve been to all the continents, and the rainforests, and the salt plains, and —”
“Is this going somewhere?”
“You’re a very rude man. I was going to say, I heard a story that might interest you.”
“Oh?”
“There was a man who lived in Italy, a long time ago. An alchemist. He was looking for the Stone.”
“The Stone? What’s that then?”
“The Philosopher’s Stone, you ejit. The mystical stone that cures all ills, turns base metals into gold and confers immortality.”
Brendan squinted at the man, swaying a little.
“I take it he didn’t succeed then, so?”
“That’s the thing. He did succeed, sort of. He created a substance that cures all ills.”
“That’s impossible.”
“There’s much that’s unknown to science now, that was once known. Mark my words.”
“Then where is this substance now, exactly?”
“They hid it under a church. The church of San Felicita. It’s somewhere in the Alps. It’s too powerful for the likes o’ mortal man to handle, but I think a man like you could use a drop.”
“Why are you telling me all this?”
“Figure it out yourself.” said the man, and he turned and walked off into the gloom.
“Wait!” shouted Brendan. “Who did you say you are?”
But the man had already disappeared.
Brendan staggered drunkenly home, the ground tilting left and right unsettlingly, but finally arriving at his door.
“What time of day do you call this?” said his wife, who was making a chamomile tea in the kitchen. “Are you drunk again, Brendan O’Kelly? You’ll be the death of me, so you will. And your daughter lying sick in bed! You should be ashamed o’ yourself.”
“I am ashamed of myself.” said Brendan.
He staggered past her and went upstairs to his daughter’s room, where he pushed open the door as quietly as he could manage.
She was sleeping peacefully with a little night-light on next to her, her face almost devoid of colour, and an IV in her arm connected to a machine set up by the hospital nurses.
Brendan’s face crumpled again but he managed to pull himself together before more than a single tear had fallen down his cheek.
Not until the next day did Brendan tell his wife about the man in the forest.
“You’re making it up.” she said.
“I swear I’m not.” said Brendan.
“You imagined it. You were drunk as an English Lord.”
“I didn’t imagine it. I’m never been so drunk that I imagine entire people.”
“There’s no such thing as any Philosopher’s Stone.”
“I know there isn’t.” said Brendan. “I’m just telling you what he said.”
“Ridiculous story.”
Brendan sighed and rubbed his face with his hand from top to bottom.
“We’re not going to be able to raise four million. I’ve tried everything, Niamh. TV, radio, newspapers. I’ve tried things that I don’t even know what they are. Podcasts. Vlogs. We’re not anywhere near the money that doctor wants.”
“You have to keep trying, Brendan.” said Niamh. “It’s no use listening to a leprechaun.”
“He wasn’t a leprechaun. I keep telling you. It was just a normal man, but very short, wearing a green suit.”
At that moment, the bulb hanging over them in the kitchen, supplying a little extra light in the grey morning, made a popping sound and went out.
Niamh jumped, grabbed Brendan’s arm and crossed herself.
“Maybe it’s a sign.” she said.
“Come again?” said Brendan.
“At the exact moment we’re talking about the leprechaun you saw, the bulb goes out. What are the chances of that, Brendan?”
“I don’t think it’s a sign.” said Brendan dubiously.
Mrs. O’Kelly was already praying, her hands pressed together and her eyes closed.
Brendan sat down at the table and looked up at the light, then down again, shaking his head wearily.
Niamh opened her eyes and said, “Brendan, I believe our Holy Mother sent us that leprechaun. She wants you to find this magic cure.”
And so it was that, one chilly day in September, Brendan O’Kelly found himself at Dublin airport, waiting for a plane to Verona, Italy. There was just no arguing with his wife. Not once she’d become convinced the Holy Mother was involved.
Even so, Brendan had put up fierce resistance, but in the end it had occurred to him that his journey in search of a magic cure that might be his daughter’s last hope could be something the newspapers would be interested in, and that might help him with the fundraiser, even if the goal of four million euros seemed very far off.
The flight was two and a half hours, and Brendan spent it reading about the hills around the church of San Felicita and trying very hard not to think about his daughter, since, even while sober, he was prone to breaking down when the thought of losing her forever came to his mind. He refrained from ordering anything alcoholic from the in-flight service, and settled for orange juice and a sandwich instead.
When he landed he was thirsty, but upon entering a bar at the airport, he realised he didn’t even know the Italian for “water”. He ordered a coffee and was taken aback when the man handed him a tiny espresso.
Then, thinking of something he’d seen on TV and had always wanted to try, he decided to order a latte, expecting a large milky coffee, but instead the man gave him a glass of milk.
“Needs must when the devil drives.” he muttered to himself, and he poured the espresso into the milk and drank it contentedly.
He hired a car at one of the car hire desks and then drove off north out of the town.
Soon he found himself driving endlessly up and down the sides of valleys along winding roads nestled between mountains, which became steadily more impressive the further north he drove.
Around 6.30pm he managed to purchase a takeaway pizza, half of which he ate in his car, before continuing on his route. An hour later he stopped the car in lay-by on the side of a hill to take a break and eat the other half, and a fox emerged from the trees and watched him with hungry eyes. He fed it a piece of pizza and was delighted to see the fox eat it with apparent enjoyment.
It was almost dark by the time he arrived at the top of a hill somewhere in Alto-Adige. There it was: the church of San Felicita. It appeared well-maintained, although there was no sign of any other human being in the vicinity, and the nearest houses seemed to be at least 300 vertical metres downhill, four miles distant.
Brendon put the driver’s seat back as far as it would go, took a sleeping bag from his suitcase, and settled down for an uncomfortable night in the car.
In the morning he awoke suddenly, with a jump, to find a low sun illuminating the edge of the mountain range. He got wearily out of the car and lit a cigarette, shivering. The air was cool enough that he could see his own breath.
The church was beautiful in the early morning sun, and he began to wonder exactly how he was going to tackle the next phase of the plan.
“Hello, I’m looking for the Philosopher’s Stone.” he muttered to himself. “Would you happen to have it in the crypt there, at all?”
Then he tried again.
“Hello there. Ciao. Do you, by any chance, speak English?”
Then again.
“Hello my friend. I’m an idiot who’s been sent on a wild goose chance by a fecking leprechaun and my wife.”
Nothing sounded right, or even useful.
He carefully stubbed the cigarette out and took a few crusts from the pizza box for breakfast.
Then he said to himself, “Right then. Bit early but I might as well have a look.” and he walked towards the church. He paused in front of the church to take a few photographs with his phone.
To his surprise, he found the front door of the church open. Inside, the church was well-kept, and modestly beautiful, with sunlight streaming in through the stained-glass windows, creating spots of colour on the pews.
“Hello?” Brendan shouted. “Anybody there?”
But no-one replied.
“Where’s this crypt then?” he muttered to himself, and soon he was descending a flight of steps in the back of the church.
Shining the light on his phone into the darkness, he was able to discern stone pillars and a passageway leading off an indeterminate distance into the hillside. He began to walk slowly forward, periodically shouting, “Hello?” in case someone was there.
Soon he came to a metal door. He tried the handle, fully expecting it to be locked, but it was open. He stepped into another dark passageway, with rough stone walls.
“This must be where they keep the valuable stuff.” he said.
The door sprang shut behind him, by itself, and he was dismayed to discover there was no handle on the inside.
He shone the light into the darkness. It seemed to go on infinitely.
“In for a penny, in for a pound.” he said, and continued into the black depths.
The air seemed to have a faint mist in it, which struck Brendan as unusual for a tunnel, although his experience of tunnels was very limited so he was unsure how often mist is found in them.
He had walked perhaps a hundred yards when an odd sound made him stop suddenly. He listened in the darkness. He thought he had heard a faint human groan.
For several whole minutes he listened carefully, hearing only the beating of his own heart, his own rapid breathing, and the whooshing sound of the blood in his ears. At times he stopped breathing in order to hear better, but he still heard nothing.
And yet, he felt something. A presence. The space, however large its extent, did not feel unoccupied. It felt unsettlingly occupied.
“Hello?” he called out again, his voice quavering. “Is there anybody here?”
There was no reply.
“I must be imagining things.” he said to himself, and he began to walk forwards again.
Out of the darkness, a hideous form lurched at him, moaning. He turned the torch on it, and saw a decaying human face. It didn’t seem possible for the face to be alive, and yet it was. It began clawing at him with fingers that were scarcely more than bone and sinew.
Brendan gave an enormous shout and ran back towards the metal door. When he reached it he began clawing at the edges of it. Behind him, he could hear the thing shuffling towards him, making a hideous sound halfway between hissing and groaning.
“Holy Mary Mother of God, help me!” he shouted frantically, and somehow he managed to get his fingernails behind the door’s extended rim, and to his enormous relief he was able to pull it open. He ran though the doorway, pulling it shut behind him, and he didn’t stop running till he’d gone out through the church and was standing next to his car.
He started the car and took off down the hill, tires screeching.
In his haste to get away he took a wrong turn and somehow ended up driving through a cluster of houses, hardly even a village, that he previously hadn’t noticed. A van blocked the road in front of him and he slowed down, tapping his fingers nervously on the steering wheel, and he was relieved when the van turned off down a narrow path.
Then he noticed a shop, to which the van was apparently taking supplies.
He stopped the car and got out, hoping he could find someone associated with the shop to tell about the thing in the church cellar.
“Someone around here must speak English.” he muttered to himself. And then, “What’s a shop even doing here? There can’t be more than thirty people in the whole place.”
The shop was closed, unsurprisingly, since it was still very early, and he decided to see where the van had gone. He walked down the narrow path and soon came upon a strange sight.
Two men were unloading crates from the van and lowering them into a hole.
“What kind of insanity is this?” Brendan said to himself.
Somehow he sensed that the men might not appreciate his presence, and he walked briskly back to his car. Realising he’d taken a wrong turn somewhere, he turned around and drove back the way he had come.
Soon he arrived at the spot where he’d gone the wrong way. From there, one road led off back down the hill, and another led back up to the church. He turned the car to go down the hill, then stopped.
In his youth, Brendan had been a rather accomplished amateur boxer, and it occurred to him that the bony half-human that had clawed at his face was probably no match for him, and it might even have wanted help. Its appearance had been so degraded that its existence seemed to hint at the supernatural, but it was even just about conceivable that the thing was in fact an extremely emaciated person who was being kept prisoner in the church cellar.
If he were to rescue someone from a cellar, that would surely interest the newspapers. Then perhaps he’d get a chance to talk about the fundraiser. Maybe they’d even have him on Breakfast TV.
Rolling his eyes, he reversed the car into the wrong turning and drove back up towards the church.
When he reached the church he lit a cigarette and marched straight in still smoking it.
“Apologies, Holy Mother.” he said. “Exceptional circumstances.”
He went straight down to the crypt and walked to the metal door, where he stubbed the cigarette out, straightened his back, and pushed the door open.
“It’s me again, so it is!” he shouted into the void. “I’m coming in now. If you need help, just say the word, like, and I’ll give yous a hand.”
This time he made it two hundred yards into the tunnel before the thing appeared, quite suddenly, in the light of his torch. It groaned pitifully, stumbling towards him. Half of its face seemed to be missing, and the other half grotesquely decayed.
“D-do you need help?” stuttered Brendan.
The thing groaned in reply.
“Shall I call an ambulance? I mean, I’ve got no signal here but if I go up, probably …”
The thing lashed out at his face, scoring a bloody line along his cheek and nearly taking out his eye.
“You ungrateful ejit!” he shouted, suddenly enraged, and he knocked the thing to the ground with a right hook. “That’s exactly what you deserve, so it is, to be sure!” he shouted at it.
Then he continued on his way determinedly, stepping over the thing, which was now making a gargling sound.
He had gone no more than a few further paces when a chorus of moans arrested his progress. Shining the torch around he saw more than a dozen of half-human creatures similar to the first, and a nauseating stench of decaying flesh hit him in the face like a palpable force.
“Oh, for crying out loud.” he said, and he rolled up the sleeves of his shirt.
Most of the creatures were easily dispatched with a blow from his fist, and several he grabbed and threw against the walls of the crypt for variety.
After some time he thought he saw a white light in the distance, and he switched off the electric light and pocketed the phone. There could be no doubt about it. A white light was flooding out of a door-like aperture, illuminating the mist in the tunnel. As he approached it, squinting, he thought he could make out figures draped in white robes moving about in the aperture.
“Jesus?” he said to himself, the Catholic teachings of his youth suddenly reasserting themselves in his now-exhausted mind.
But as he approached he saw that none of the figures were Jesus, nor the Holy Mother; instead, he saw the alarmed face of a man in a lab coat, who, when he saw Bra
Brendan approaching, tried to hastily shut the door, but his lab coat caught in the doorframe and prevented it.
Brendan ran forwards and seized the edge of the door.
“No you don’t!” he shouted, and he yanked the door open and ran inside.
“You shouldn’t be here.” said a nervous man, in English.
Another man, also rather scientific-looking, was gawping at him with an open mouth, almost hiding behind the first.
“What is this place?” said Brendan.
“Come with me.” said the first man. “You can’t be in this area.”
The man guided him, dazed, through vast corridors of seemingly frenetic activity. The place resembled some kind of military installation; perhaps a submarine hangar, except there was no water and no submarines.
Technical apparatus and machines stood everywhere, and at a certain point men were taking hold of crates that were being lowered from the roof on a pulley system. They passed by cages filled with laboratory animals and rooms that looked like cells, with tough riveted steel doors, until the man finally deposited Brendan in what appeared to be some kind of office.
“Wait there.” he said. “I’ll fetch someone to explain.”
Brendan looked around at the pictures on the walls. In amongst photographs of labs and scientists was a picture of a creature in a cage that looked strikingly like the things that had attacked him.
“I should probably leave.” he said to himself, and he tried the door but found it locked. He began to throw himself against the door, trying to break it open, and finally succeeded, only to find himself grabbed by two men in face masks and combat gear, carrying guns.
“What the feck is going on here?” he shouted. In reply they hit him in the small of the back with what felt like a truncheon and dragged him away.
He was taken to a bare room with grimy stained white walls, and strapped into a chair. While he was shouting and cursing at the masked men, another man appeared, wearing a white coat and spectacles.
“You can leave us.” he said to the masked men, and they saluted and left through the door, shutting it behind them.
“I’m going to give you a little injection.” said the man, in English.
He took a small green vial from his lab coat pocket and used it to fill a syringe.
“Who are you?” shouted Brendan.
“I am Dr. Alberto Mori.” said the man, rolling up Brendan’s sleeve.
“Stop that right now.” said Brendan. “I have rights. I don’t want any injections.”
The man smiled and plunged the needle into Brendan’s arm.
“In here, you have no rights.” he said.
Then, from an inside pocket, he produce a pocket knife, which he locked open.
“I’m going to stab you with this.” he said.
“What?” said Brendan, and the man plunged the knife into his stomach.
“Why?” gasped Brendan.
“Don’t worry.” said Dr. Mori. “You won’t die. You see, eight hundred years ago, a man known as Spizo of Padova discovered a most remarkable substance here. He used a mineral found in the hills to produce a substance with incredible healing properties. Some call it the Philospher’s Stone, which is of course a silly exaggeration.
It cannot transmute lead into gold, but it can literally revive the dead. The substance was kept a closely-guarded secret until just a few decades ago, when it happened to come to the attention of certain factions in the Italian governmental apparatus.
We have been studying it ever since. It’s quite clear to us that it’s too powerful for ordinary people to possess. Even in cases where healing is impossible, it is somehow able to restore a semblance of life to the dead.”
“Like those creatures outside in the church crypt?” said Brendan, gasping for air as blood gushed out of the wound in his stomach.
“Precisely.” said Dr. Mori. “We spray the substance into the air to keep them alive.”
He smiled grimly.
“Well, half-alive. As for you, you will remain here. But you are in good company. None of us are allowed to leave. Everything we need is brought to us. We sacrifice our freedom for the advancement of science. As a matter of fact, we desperately need more experimental material. My own particular interest is in the ability of Spizo’s substance to partially regenerate severely damaged brains. Once we have made certain that the substance can heal your ordinary wounds, we will progress to examining its effects on damage to your nervous system.”
Brendan’s vision was blurring, and he felt his heart twitching erratically. He watched dazedly as Dr. Mori turned and left. At some point after that—he was too groggy to be able to determine quite when—he passed out.
Brendan awoke some time later to find a man slapping his face.
“Wake up!” said the man.
Brendan awoke with a gasp. The pain in his stomach had gone. He felt, actually, quite good.
“We have to get out of here.” said the man.
“Who are you?” said Brendan.
“My name is Marco. Dr. Marco Rossi. I haven’t time to explain everything, but they’re keeping me a prisoner here. We are all prisoners. I never agreed to this. We have to get out. You have to help me. You’re a fighter, yes? Good with your fists. Together, we can escape.”
Marco was a thin, short man with a pronounced nervous air. He unfastened the straps that held Brendan’s wrists to the chair, and Brendan stood up and looked down at himself. His thighs were entirely covered in his own blood.
“Don’t worry about that.” said Marco. “The substance temporarily alters cell metabolism in ways we don’t even understand, but a bit of blood loss won’t bother you.”
“Do you have a plan?” said Brendan, rubbing his wrists.
“They deliver supplies via a pulley.” said Marco. “One cable goes up while they other goes down. I’ve built devices that will enable us to grip the ascending cable.”
He rummaged about in his lab coat and produced a device with a handle, a wrist straps and a kind of clamp.
“It’ll be dangerous but it’s our best hope. They guard the doors to the crypt closely but they don’t pay so much attention to the pulley.”
“Let’s go then.” said Brendan, walking to the door.
“Wait!” said Marco. “I brought you some clothes. You need to look like one of us. They bring in new people all the time, from all over the world. They won’t look at you twice in this.”
He held up a lab coat, loose brown-green trousers, a greenish top and a pair of spectacles.
“I replaced the lenses with perspex.” he said. “I had to judge your size by sight but none of our clothes fit well anyway.”
“Listen, I need to get hold of a vial of this substance of yours before I go.” said Brendan as he pulled on the trousers. “My daughter’s ill. That’s why I came here.”
“No problem with that.” said Marco, and he handed Brendan three vials.
“You star!” said Brendan. “I can’t thank you enough.”
“Thank me by helping me get out of here.” said Marco. “Hopefully they won’t try to stop us. I’ve engineered a distraction, but if there’s any punching to be done, I need you to do it.”
Brendan cracked his knuckles.
“No problem with that.” he said.
They walked briskly out through the door. Then they encountered a piece of extremely bad luck. Walking directly towards them was none other than Dr. Mori himself.
They tried to walk past him, but at the last moment he said, “Just a minute.” and turned Brendan around by yanking his arm.
Brendan landed a fist on Mori’s chin, and Mori fell to the floor with a gasp.
“It’s, how do you say, kicking off.” said Marco, and he pulled a small remote control out of his pocket and pressed a button on it. A loud explosion rang out, followed by a series of smaller explosions.
“That should keep them busy.” he said. “Quickly.”
They hurried towards the loading area, where the pulley brought crates of supplies down from vans parked at the back of the village supermarket.
They were almost there when two masked men dressed in black shouted, “Stop!” and levelled guns at them.
Brendan ran at the men and began wrestling with one of them, swinging the man’s body into the other man’s line of fire. The first man managed to temporarily push Brendan away, and the other fired at him. Brendan fell to the floor.
Dr. Rossi yanked the gun in the man’s hand and the gun discharged again, this time at the other man, who also dropped to the floor. Then he began trying to pull the gun away from the man.
With his dying breaths, hands shaking like a leaf, Brendan broke open one of the vials Dr. Rossi had given to him and drank the contents of it, hoping it would be effective without being injected.
When he came to his senses, the bullet wound in his chest had healed and Dr. Rossi was begging for his life as the masked man threatened him with his gun. Brendan stood up silently behind him and, looking around, spotted the gun still in the hand of the fallen man. No sooner had he taken it than the masked man followed Dr. Rossi’s gaze, even though Marco was trying not to look at Brendan, and wheeled around. Brendan promptly fired the gun.
“Your stuff really works.” said Brendan. “The substance, I mean.”
“You took it!” said Marco.
“I certainly did. Fixed me right up.”
“We must hurry.” said Marco.
They ran towards the loading area and soon saw the wire that ran to the ceiling.
“It’s not running.” said Brendan.
“Don’t worry.” said Marco. “There’s a switch that activates it.”
Suddenly a groan attracted their attention and they turned to see an entire horde of the half-human half-alive creatures stumbling towards them.
“The explosions must have disrupted the cell system.” said Marco, turning pale.
“I’ll deal with them.” said Brendan, and he turned the gun, which he was still carrying, towards them.
Marco laid a restraining hand on his arm.
“Bullets barely affect them.” he said. “They’ve inhaled too much of the substance.”
Brendan sighed.
“Never mind.” he said, and he ran at them and began knocking them to the ground.
Soon he stood proudly among a sea of fallen bodies.
“They go down pretty easy.” he said.
“They’ll get up again.” said Marco. “Let’s get out of here.”
Brendan turned, and at that moment another of the creatures flung itself at him, sinking its teeth into his neck. He sunk to the ground with a cry of pain.
Marco hurried to him and, dodging the creatures’ clawing hands which it swung at him like a cat, grabbed the gun and fired at it until its head had almost completely disintegrated, at which point it too fell to the ground. He rummaged about in Brendan’s pocket and found the second vial of the substance, which he promptly loaded into a syringe and injected into him.
Brendan sat up.
“What’s going on?” he said.
“One of the things nearly killed you but I gave you an injection.” said Marco. “You’re lucky you still had a pulse, otherwise there’d be no blood flow to carry the substance around to where it’s needed. Come, we’re leaving.”
They ran towards the pulley and, on arriving, Marco pressed a button and started it up.
“Put your wrists through the wrist straps.” he said, handing two of his devices to Brendan. “They tighten automatically.”
Soon they were being dragged upwards by the cable, Marco’s devices holding their wrists.
“How do we get out at the top?” said Brendan. “Surely we’re going to get minced, aren’t we?”
“Nobody’s getting minced.” shouted Marco, above him. “The devices will detach automatically.”
Around them, complete chaos was unfolding. The semi-human creatures were attacking the guards and the scientists, and the entire area was gradually filling with smoke.
Suddenly one of the masked guarded spotted them. He pointed upwards, and another guard shot at Dr. Mori, who screamed in pain and then hung limply as the device pulled him upwards.
The two guards were promptly attacked by a small crowd of the creatures and fell screaming as the semi-humans bit into their necks, faces and arms.
As Dr. Mori’s body reached the top, it detached, and fell past Brendan all the way to the bottom, where it lay unmoving.
Brendan felt the remaining vial, still in his pocket and looked sadly at Marco’s corpse.
“I’m sorry, my friend.” he said. “I need it for my daughter. I’m so sorry.”
At the top he found himself pulled up through an opening, where three astonished delivery drivers gawped open-mouthed at him.
One of them shouted “Santo cielo!”, which he guessed meant something probably to the effect of, “What’s going on?”
“Best go home, lads.” said Brendan, clambering out of the hole. “It’s all gone wrong down there. Horrors beyond human comprehension and what-not. The whole works.”
Brendan walked shakily back to his car.
When he arrived home, his wife ran to him as soon as he entered the door. He grasped her arms.
“I’ve got a cure for Aoife!” he said.
“You’re too late, Brendan.” wailed his wife. “She’d dead!”
“Where is she?” said Brendan.
“She’s at the undertaker’s, Brendan, where do you think she is?”
“I’ll be back soon.” said Brendan, and he ran out, leaving his astonished wife staring after him and shouting, got back in his car, and drove to the undertaker’s, failing to respect all speed limits.
The undertaker let him in to see his daughter, who was laid out on a table. They were preparing her for burial.
“Would you like a moment alone with her?” asked the undertaker, a sombre man in a black suit.
“Aye, I would that.” said Brendan, and the man dutifully made himself scarce.
Brendan pulled the vial out of his pocket, opened Aoife’s mouth, and crunched the glass vial between his forefinger and thumb.
“Please.” he said. “Please come back to us.”
Her face seemed to turn red, and then a healthy pink, and she sat up.
“Where am I?” she said. Then she felt her side. “The pain’s gone.” she added.
Brendan flung his arms around her.
“You’re all fixed up now, my darling, don’t you worry.” he said.
The undertaker, hearing the commotion, came in to see what’s happening. When he saw Aoife sitting up and smiling, he said, “Dear God! It’s not possible.”
“Mistakes are made.” said Brendan. “It happens. Don’t worry about it. I know the doctor who would have certified her death. I’ll have a word with him.”
“My death?” said Aoife. “What’s going on? Where am I?”
“Let’s go home and I’ll explain.” said Brendan.
Soon they were entering the door of their home, and Niamh appeared. When she saw Aoife, she froze, a terrified expression on her face. Then the terror turned to joy, and she ran to Aoife and hugged her in a tight embrace.
“Thank you, Holy Mother!” she exclaimed, tears of joy running down her face. “I knew you were listening!”
