Blood Water

CHAPTER 24

When they lifted the headmaster again, Sean could see that the tie round his mouth was sodden with something dark that wasn’t water. It could have been blood, or slime from the creature, but either way it was a bad sign.

James pointed the way along a corridor, past a lecture theatre and two laboratories. Titus’s feet scraped along the floor as they pulled him along, a mud slick forming behind him like a snail trail. Sean glanced into the labs as they went by, wondering what would have been going on there on a normal day. A day very different to this one. At the end of the corridor, James indicated a doorway on the right that led to the offices.

‘That’s it over there,’ James said, pointing to a door with a poster of a cartoon Loch Ness monster on it. ‘I’ll see if it’s unlocked.’ He went over and twisted the door handle, relieved to find it open. He went in and switched the light on. The room was tidy and clean; there were empty drink cans in the bin, post-it notes with handwritten messages stuck to a computer monitor, and a bowl of fruit, still fresh, on one desk. They dragged Titus inside and dumped him in one corner.

‘Sean, you keep an eye on him – tell us if he wakes up or moves. James and I will look for something that might help us,’ Waites said.

‘OK,’ Sean replied, though he wasn’t entirely happy with the arrangement. He sat down on a chair and kept his eyes on the headmaster, while he heard papers being shuffled around behind him. He didn’t think he’d seen anything as sad, pathetic or disturbing as the man slumped awkwardly in the corner. For the first time he felt genuinely sorry for him. Although strict, Titus had been well-respected, and certainly didn’t deserve anything like this. But, like the others, he would soon be dead, nothing but a bleeding mess. When this was all over, when the floods had gone, when the creature had hopefully been destroyed, his family would have to face up to their loss. There would be tears, questions, outrage, but at least he hoped they would be spared seeing him like this. Doing and saying things that were beyond his control. Sean was close to tears himself now. The man before him was dying and there was nothing anyone could do about it. What an undignified end for such a dignified man.

‘Shit,’ Waites said, throwing random papers to the floor. ‘I don’t know if this is any good or not. It’s just reports and surveys… How are we meant to know if we’ve found something?’ He looked at James, who couldn’t think of anything encouraging to say in reply. He too was sifting through sheets of handwritten and printed notes, looking for a key word or phrase that might be significant. What were they expecting though – an answer written in big bold red letters somewhere, emphasized with a few exclamation marks? It could take hours to go through all Sally Cooper’s papers, and then there was her computer. She was bound to have a password-protected user account. The more Waites thought about it, the more Morrow’s dying message seemed too vague, too cryptic. If he knew he had seconds left to communicate something, why write something so… unhelpful?

‘Maybe we should try Morrow’s office,’ James said. ‘It’s next door.’

‘All right. You stay here, Sean. Don’t take your eyes off him,’ Waites said, pointing at Titus. ‘And shout if he wakes up.’

‘OK.’

Sean watched them leave the office, and almost immediately felt ten times more vulnerable. The man’s hands weren’t even tied behind his back. He’d already proved that he could move fast if he had to. What if he had already regained consciousness, and was just waiting for the right moment to attack? Sean shuddered and wheeled his chair away from the inert figure in the corner.

James knew Morrow’s office well; his notes were written in a notebook that was kept in his top desk drawer. Morrow only used his computer to access the internet and send and receive emails. When he needed to make notes he always wrote them by hand. James took out the book and flicked through to the most recent entry. Disappointingly, it was four days old and mentioned nothing of the specimen he’d found, which was odd, because James remembered seeing the man writing in a similar book after examining the strange creature. If he’d been writing in a different book, where was it?

‘No good?’ Waites asked.

‘No. It’s the wrong one. He definitely made notes about that thing though.’

‘Did you ever see it?’

‘The specimen? Yeah, but I just thought it was some kind of fish or slug. I couldn’t understand why he was so excited about it. He didn’t really talk about it to anyone else. Holland must have found out somehow though… He was a nutcase. I think it got to him first.’

‘So where’s this missing notebook then?’

‘It could be in his room.’ Seeing Waites’s quizzical expression James added: ‘His bedroom, I mean. Morrow sometimes stayed here when he was working late. A few of the other scientists have rooms here too.’

‘All right, we’d better go check it out. Let’s just make sure Sean’s OK first though.’

They returned to the next-door office, where Titus still lay unmoving. His skin seemed to have broken out in more sores in the brief time they’d been away.

‘Any problems?’ Waites asked Sean.

‘No,’ he replied. ‘He’s still unconscious… I think.’

‘We need to go upstairs to see if Morrow left his notes up there. Are you going to be OK for a few more minutes?’ Waites could tell from the panicked glance towards the body that he wasn’t.

‘Yeah, but I want his hands and feet tied,’ Sean insisted.

‘Yeah, you’re right.’ Waites could now see a black liquid oozing through the gag. It made him feel ill. ‘Just need something to tie him up with…’

They all looked around the room.

‘The blinds,’ James said, pointing at the windows. Waites nodded, walked over and started tugging on the long cord, eventually pulling the whole blind down before removing the cord.

‘This will have to do. I’ll tie it round his hands and feet in one go.’ Waites carefully turned the headmaster over, trying to avoid the weeping sores that covered his skin as he did so. He ran the cord round the man’s ankles a couple of times, pulled it tight, then used the remainder to bind his wrists, knotting it securely. When he’d finished, he rolled Titus onto his side. He wondered how difficult it was for him to breathe with the tie round his mouth and whatever gunk had collected inside. But there was no way he was removing the gag – he couldn’t risk letting that thing out.

‘Right. That should do it. Don’t take your eyes off him, Sean, and for God’s sake don’t go near him. We’ll be as quick as we can, but if you have any trouble, shout as loud as you can.’

‘What if I need to find you?’ Sean was looking more and more uncomfortable with the situation.

‘Just come up the stairs,’ James said. ‘They’re out here on the left. Just shout for us and we’ll come and meet you.’

‘Right… OK.’

As the other two left Sean looked at the headmaster again; he didn’t like being left here with him – he didn’t like it at all.