Nobody paid him any notice, and by then it was too late anyway. Somebody, Banks guessed it to be at the colonel’s order, swung one of the floodlights around so that it lit up the shore and the surface of the loch beyond. The beast lay in the deeper water some 20 yards offshore, the now telltale three humps all that could be seen of it, its head toward shore, tail end swaying slowly from side to side as it maintained its position. The sound of the chanting from the laptop was almost obscured by the click of photographs being taken, and yells of what sounded more like awe than fear. As the chant reached the end of another loop, the huge head came up, just for long enough to give out an answering bark before lowering again.
“Wiggo,” Banks said. “I’m going to give it a poke. If it starts to come forward, try that other button and see if it stops. If not, you have my permission to shoot the fucker. Let’s do Cally proud.”
Banks raised his rifle and took aim. He waited for the last syllable of the looped chant to come ‘round, anticipated the head coming up, and fired three quick shots that echoed and rang across the water.
As before, the reaction was immediate; the beast came forward, as solid and implacable as an oncoming steam train, nostrils flaring, mouth agape, the mane flying behind the huge head.
Banks tried to take aim right down its throat, but the gawpers on the shore had suddenly realized their peril, and in their flight ran right in front of him. To make matters worse, Wiggins got knocked by a flailing arm, and the laptop went flying, landing with an ominous crack on the rocks at their feet. Hynd at least got three shots in, but if they hit the beast, it didn’t show it.
They were out of time; the thing was almost on them. Banks threw his body to the ground and tried to take aim in the same motion. Hynd and Wiggins both leapt and rolled aside as the beast reached them. Banks tried to get his weapon up, hoping at least to do some damage before he got flattened, but the beast raised its head, barked — more like a roar of defiance — and kept on going. Banks had to roll away fast as a foot that would have caved in his chest stamped down where he had just been, then had to roll away farther when the tree-trunk thick tail whipped just in front of his eyes. He smelled it as it passed over him, musky and thick, and felt its heat as if he stood near a roaring fire.
Then they were left on the shore as the creature headed directly for the tents of the camp, scattering people ahead of it. One poor sod was too slow, and the beast, barely slowing, barreled directly over him, leaving only a trampled, broken sack of flesh behind it.
“It’s heading for the lights,” Hynd shouted.
Banks rolled to his feet. Wiggins had bent to the laptop but left it on the ground, taking only the thumb drive from its socket and stowing it in his flak jacket.
“It’s buggered, Cap.”
“And so are we all if we don’t take that thing down right now,” Banks replied. “With me, lads.”
He set off at a run, heading back toward the camp.
The creature had already trampled or torn down most of the tents, and was in the process of biting down hard on the largest of the floodlight gantries. The light itself wobbled then fell to the ground with a crash that could be heard all over the camp. The power to the other lights shorted out with a crack and flash of blue sparks. The beast immediately turned its attention to the portable office, perhaps thinking it to be an enemy, for it was little more than a long, squat, shadow in the darkness. Banks saw the tail swing ‘round, as effective a weapon as a swung iron bar, caving in the whole of one side of the trailer and sending the vehicle rolling and tumbling across the car-park in a screech of tearing, buckling, metal.
The squad was too far away to get a clear shot now that the camp was in almost total darkness. The only light came from the road beyond and the assembled news crews. Banks waved forward six other armed men who looked to be seeking an order, any order.
“With me,” he shouted. “Try to distract it from the civilians.”
But that option was already gone; the car park lit up in a cluster of flashes as the massed ranks of press tried to get a picture. The beast reacted as if it had been shot again, and launched itself out of the car park and straight at the press corps.
The carnage started with the demolition of a BBC van that lasted even less time than the helicopter had earlier; when the beast moved on, there was only a flattened and torn pile of bloodied scrap left behind. The reporters had packed themselves so tightly across the narrow roadway that they had nowhere to go, nowhere to run. The beast rampaged through them, tossing vehicles and bodies aside, tearing flesh and bone apart with teeth and claws, and feeding as it tore a bloody swath 20 yards long along the road.
Banks fired three shots toward the beast even as he ran toward the carnage, aiming high so as not to hit anybody.
“Hey, come on, you fucker,” Wiggins shouted. “I’m tastier than any of those wankers. Come and get a bite out of me.” He too fired high, but the beast seemed too intent on feeding to take any note.
“If you don’t get back here, I’m going to put a round up yer arse,” Wiggins shouted, and fired again, but the beast did not turn. It continued to rend and tear in frenzy, its excited barks even louder than the terrible wails and screams from what remained of the press corps.
It was Hynd who surprised them all by shouting out, not a curse, but the Gaelic command they’d heard Seton use earlier.
“Dhumna Ort!” Dhumna Ort!”
Everything fell quiet save for wails and weeping from the dying and injured. The beast stopped feeding and turned slowly. It looked straight at the armed soldiers. Banks motioned that they should form a line across the road, cutting off the thing’s path back to the loch.
The beast, wary now, backed away slowly. In the gloom of the night, and at still 30 yards away, it was a looming, black shadow, although the glint of its eyes as it stared at them could be clearly seen.
“Okay, Sarge, you’re in charge,” Banks said.
Hynd turned to face him.
“I don’t have a fucking Scooby what to do now, Cap,” the sergeant said. “I just remembered what the wee man shouted earlier.”
“Aye, well, it seems to be working. Try it again.”
“Dhumna Ort!” Hynd shouted, and the beast barked back, twice, as loud as the earlier gunshots.
Banks had them all take a step forward.
The beast took a step back, staying in the dark shadows.
They appeared to be at an impasse. It was broken by a shout from behind them.
“What are you bloody waiting for? Shoot the buggering thing,”
Banks knew the colonel’s voice well enough that he didn’t have to turn. And he knew better than to disobey a direct order, even when he also knew it was too far, too dark, and the beast was too big, too fast for them.
“Fire,” Banks shouted.
The noise was deafening. At first, the beast stood in the face of the volley, and even made a move as if intending to come for them. They were close enough to it for Banks to see a red mist across the thing’s face as blood sprayed; they were wounding it.
“Again!” he shouted, and another volley rang out from nine rifles.
The beast gave out one last bark of defiance, then turned and fled, off and away south down the roadway, as fast as any delivery truck in a hurry.
It was lost in darkness in seconds.
- 11 -
Wiggins turned to the colonel, his face full of fury.
“Cally deserved better than that,” he said. “We had it under control.”
“Stow it, Private,” Banks said, stopping Wiggins before he got himself a spell in the brig, or worse.