Part Six.

“Alright then,” Nick said, a little unsteadily. The first four pints were easy. Now, after an hour and a half plus six more pints, he was starting to wish they’d stopped off for a little something to eat before they started. Stifling a burp, he tried to focus his thoughts into some form of coherence. “So all these things I’ve heard about you. . . how many of them are true?”
Drake laughed, sloshing lager over the table. “Depends mate. You run off a list and I’ll tell you.”
“The basilisk?”
“Sort of. Got round behind it and clawed it’s little eyes out, then snapped it’s neck.”
“Didn’t even think basilisks were real.”
“Oh they are. Little cunts. Cockatrice however. Completely made up.” He knocked back the last of his beer and moved the back-up pint into place. “Carry on.”
“What about summoning a demon just so it  can light your cigarette?”
“Just the once. Martin didn’t half bollock me over that.”
“. . . biting werewolves?”
“Fuckers deserve it.”
“But why? Is it to convert them?”
“Nah, if I wanted to convert a werewolf, I’d kick the cunt over the crossbar at Twickenham. Self-defence mainly. If it bites, bite back… first.”
“Alright then, is it true you nutted the devil and called him a wanker?”
Drake laughed loudly. “Utter bollocks mate. Utter and complete total fucking bollocks.” He sipped his pint, then added under his breath. “I didn’t call him a wanker. I called him a cunt.”
Nick poised himself to ask what (in his mind) was the Big Question – capital ‘B’, capital ‘Q’. “You were the sole survivor of…”
Drake cut him short. “Yes. That is true. Sorry son, I don’t really like to talk about it. Look, Fred’s going to call time in a minute,” he fished into his pocket and brought out a twenty-pound note. “Get another round in. I’ll tell you some day, just not today.”
Nick grabbed the note and headed for the bar.

Part Five.

It was Nick who noticed the hidden door in the cellar. With Taffy and Rabbi Burns standing by with offensive spells at the ready, Drake smashed the door down with a simple shoulder barge. The smell was the first thing that hit them; a choking, nauseous wave of stench that made Nick gag. Even Drake held his breath for a moment as he stepped into the small ante-chamber beyond. A quick wave of his hand, a cleansing spell took the edge off the reek of decay and he found a lightswitch.
Ignoring the sound of Nick suddenly vomiting in the corner of the room, Drake surveyed the scene. There were four mattresses placed around the room, each one with a vaguely human shape stretched out on it. Intravenous stands were placed at the head of each mattress, with clear plastic drip bags hanging from them, the pipes connected to the comatose bodies laying there. Each body was in a bad state – riddled with festering sores, pus seeping from open wounds, their faces gaunt and hollow – barely alive. Drake knelt down to examine one of them. Taking a handkerchief from his pocket, Drake carefully prised open the person’s eyelid. The dry skin cracked, a tiny rivulet of blood leaking out. “Junk farm.”
Wiping his mouth on his sleeve, Nick stood up. “A what?”
“They take a bunch of local junkies and keep them on a perpetual high using whatever drugs they can get, then…” he pointed to the small tap inserted into the jugular vein, “harvest time. The blood drawn retains the high, fetches a very high price on the black market. It’s how vampires get stoned.”
“Fucking disgusting.” Nick spat the sour taste out, accepting the hip flask proffered him by Rabbi Burns.
“Yeah, well we’ve shut this one down. Fuck knows how many more there are round here. Looks like a pretty small-time operation. I’ve seen ‘em as big as a hospital ward before.” Burns slapped Nick on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, everyone pukes first time they see a junk farm.”
“Christ, is there anything can be done for them?” Nick took a deep draw from the hip flask, surprised to discover it contained nothing stronger than peach-flavoured iced tea.
“I’ll sort it laddie. Got some healing stones right here, a couple of Tarshish, stone of Asher. That should draw the poisons from them.” He started arranging amulets on the bodies and casting healing magic. “Bareket, the stone of Levi. To bolster the system. And most important, Sapir, the stone of Issachar, for healing. With any luck, they’ll recover.”
“So that’s four cases of unlawful imprisonment, illicit blood harvesting, possession of banned substances with intent to supply, keeping a werewolf without a proper licence, think that’ll be enough to keep the little fuckers off the streets for a while.” Drake surmised. “Good work Burnsie, those charms should hold them over until a proper healing squad gets here. Taff, call it in. Four arrests, one unlicenced lycanthrope seized and some lives saved. Anyone fancy a drink?”
Burns and Taffy smiled at one another. “S’ok chief. Busy day tomorrow.” Neither of them could handle another night out with Drake, not since the last one. “I’m sure young Nicky here has a window in his schedule…”

Part Four.

Yorrick Hunt swaggered through the door to his office. As the Evening Herald’s top photo-journalist he merited his own little personal space, complete with a water cooler in the corner and a top-of-the-range bean-to-cup espresso machine atop a set of filing cabinets. He felt quite pleased with his day’s work, and was looking forward to seeing the spoils of his little escapade in Nenbury. Switching on the coffee machine, he primed his cup with a little shot of Johnnie Walker from the top drawer and set his camera down on his desk. His computer was still on, as it always was, a little wiggle of the mouse being all it took to bring the screen to life.
“Bollocks,” he muttered as he looked at his email client, scrolling down the list of emails that had come in whilst he’d been away. “Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, baked beans and spam. ‘Make you manhud biggier jest click’ – well if it could improve your spelling too I might be interested.” The light on the coffee machine came on, reminding Yorrick that at least temporarily there were things more important.
A minute later, with fortified coffee in hand, he sat down properly. Click, click, click, delete, delete, move to spam, delete. “Since when was I this popular? Ah fuck it.” He dug in his pocket and retrieved the data cards from the camera. Sorting the cards out, he picked one of them and slotted it into his computer’s card reader. Click, click, click, he started going through the pictures, deciding which ones to send to the editors. Angry face with a headwound? Forward. Copper poised to strike a lank-haired student? Forward. Then he saw something which made him pause. It seemed to show a slightly out of focus view of part of a shopfront. Nothing unusual, except he remembered distinctly there being a face there when he’d taken the photo. He’d zoomed in close to capture the expression of rage on the man’s face, but there was nothing there. Click, next picture. Slightly zoomed out, an empty space in the crowd, one of the riot coppers swinging his baton at apparently nothing. Scrolling through the other pictures, they were all the same. The crowd of protestors seemed to be full of little gaps, each the size of a person. “What the fucking fuckery fuck?”
Shaking his head and swallowing the last of his coffee, Yorrick set the cup down and tried to make sense of what he’d just seen. His musings were cut short by the shrill ring of his phone. Snatching up the receiver, he put it to his ear.
“Yep?”
“Hunt, get in my office now.” It was Stan, his editor.
The photos quickly drifted into the back of his mind. “You want me to drop off the rest of the shots from the protest today?”
“Nah, it’s all bollocks. Just get in here. Got a little assignment for you.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Stanley Doverdare was a career man. He was also a tall man, a wide man and (in the mid-July heat with barely functioning air conditioning) a very sweaty man. Having joined the Herald at the age of 16 as a type-setter, he worked his way up the ranks using nothing more than grit, sheer determinalism and professional blackmail, mixed with a sort of animal cunning and raw talent. But mostly the professional blackmail. He hefted his significant bulk to face his door as Yorrick entered.
“Ever heard of Pessingham, Hunt?” That was classic Stan; no messing, straight down to business.
“Can’t say I have.”
“Had a little tip-off this morning while you were out gallivanting with the bully boys. Quite an interesting little chat regarding some Satanic death-cult rogering their way through middle-class middle England. I want you down there, find out what it is they’re up to, and how you can spin it into a decent story.”
“Satanists? Fuck sakes Stan. That all went out with Dennis fucking Wheatley.”
“Nevertheless, I have a good source says this little band of Satan’s knobsuckers are up to some pretty nasty shit. I want you in on it. Get down there and don’t come back without a story. And pics. Ones of naked birds being done from behind by wankers in white robes preferably.”
“Christ Stan, you’re asking me to go and cover some bunch of sad-arse bank managers shagging the local blondes in the hopes of raising the devil?”
“Yes I fucking am. Now go on. Fuck off.”
Yorrick left, stopping off only to collect his camera and the bottle of Johhnie Walker from the top drawer. He had a feeling he’d need it…