Lair
by
James Herbert


'Not for the nervous'

Daily Mirror

The mutant white rat had grown and mated, creating offspring in its own
image.  They dominated the others, the dark-furred ones, who foraged
for food and brought it back to The Lair.  Now the dark rats were
restless, tormented by a craving they could not satisfy.  But the white
sluglike thing that ruled them knew.  Its two heads weaved to and fro
and a stickiness drooled from its mouth as it remembered the taste-of
human flesh ...

REMEMBER WITH FEAR

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Also by James Herbert

The Rats

The Fog

The Survivor

Fluke

The Spear

The Dark

The Jonah

Shrine

Domain

Moon

The Magic Cottage

Sepulchre

Haunted

Creed

Portent

The Ghosts of Sleath

'48 Others

Graphic Novels The City

(Illustrated by Ian Miller)

Non-fiction By Horror Haunted

(Edited by Stephen Jones)

James Herbert's Dark Places

(Photographs by Paul Barkshire)

JAMES HERBERT

Lair

MACMILLAN

First published 1979 by New English Library

This edition published 2000 by Macmillan an imprint of Macmillan
Publishers Ltd 25 Eccleston Place, London SW1W 9NF

Basingstoke and Oxford

Associated companies throughout the world www.macmillan.co.uk

ISBN 0 333 76123 5 Copyright James Herbert 1979

The two lines from Teddy Bears' Picnic' by Jim Kennedy and John W.
Bratton,

1907, are reproduced by permission of B. Feldman & Co.  Ltd,

138-140 Charing Cross Road, London we2 OLD

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced,
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photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written
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in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution
and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library.

Typeset by Set Systems Ltd, Saffron Walden, Essex

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Mackays of Chatham plc, Chatham,
Kent

If you go down in the woods today You're sure of a big surprise...
Contents

PROLOGUE 1

SIGNS 3 ONSLAUGHT 73

LAIR 169 EPILOGUE 271

Prologue

The rat had been trapped in the basement for five days.  It had crawled
into a dark corner behind a row of shelves to give birth to its litter
and, when it had tried to follow the sound, the sound that buzzed
through its head, it had found the way blocked by a heavy iron door.
The sound had continued for five long days, almost driving the
mother-rat and its tiny offspring mad with its incessant, monotonous
pitch.  But they had found food in abundance in the basement.  The
owners had ignored the government warning to leave all doors open so
that every building could be cleared, for they knew that when the
city's population returned from its short exile, food would be scarce
for the first few days, and their shop would be ready to cash in on the
shortage.  The rat and its litter gorged themselves on the food, for
the young ones seemed only to need their mother's milk for the first
three days, finding greater replenishment in the food around them. They
grew larger and sturdier day by day, dark brown, almost black hairs
were already beginning to grow on their bodies.  Except for one. Only a
few white hairs sprouted on its pinkish white body.  It seemed to
dominate the others, who brought it food and kept its body warm with
their own.  A curious lump seemed to be growing on its broad, lop-sided
shoulder, next to its head.  Patiently, they waited for the people to
return.

Signs

TWO

"Bloody vermin," Ken Woollard cursed aloud, raising his head to examine
the 'loop' smears around the rafters of his low-ceilinged barn.  The
grease marks against the whitewashed walls had been caused by small
furry bodies sliding under the beams into the recesses of the rough
ceiling.  And the only creatures he knew who did that were rodents.
Mice and rats.  The stains looked too big to have been caused by
mice.

"Bloody cats aren't earning their bloody keep," he said to himself.
Turning and walking from the gloomy building, he examined the floor for
droppings.  He found none, but it was hardly reassuring.  The vermin
were there all right, the smears were proof enough.  Well, the poison
would go down tonight, no messing about waiting for serious damage to
be done.  Farming the land was hard enough without pests destroying
anything edible they could find.  Fluoroacetamide should do the trick,
no sodding about with pre-baiting.  A good dose of it, clear them out
right away.

The bright October sunlight made him narrow his eyes as he paused at
the barn door.  Have to report it, I suppose, government law after the
Outbreak.  They'd gassed the buggers then, but they were still nervous
it might start all over again.  Still, that was the city, a great big
filthy breeding-place for vermin animal and human.  Unfortunately,
Epping Forest was close enough to London for them to get the willies
again.  They'd be down, snooping around, putting the whole bloody farm
into quarantine until they were sure it wasn't the bloody rats.

Fuck 'em.  Got no time for that nonsense.  Get rid of them before all
the fuss starts.  Where's those bloody cats?

Woollard trudged through the mud of the small farmyard hissing through
his teeth to attract the two cats he kept not as pets, but as working
animals.  Until now they had managed to keep the number of rats down
you could never keep them away altogether but the vermin were now
getting into the buildings, and that could lead to big trouble.

Woollard's weathered face was creased into deep trenches of anger as he
turned the corner of an outbuilding, when suddenly he caught sight of a
small white object lying in the mud.  At first he thought it might just
be a bird feather, but the tinges of red along one edge aroused his
curiosity.  He squinted as he approached, deciding it wasn't a feather
at all but a tiny, obviously dead, animal.  He was used to finding dead
mice around the place, for his cats usually did their job well enough.
This time, though, there was something odd about the furry corpse.

Stooping to examine the body more closely, he suddenly drew in a sharp
breath.  He reached for the object he now knew was not a dead mouse.
Blood had matted the fur at one end and two of the claws at the other
end were missing.  He dropped the cat's paw in disgust.

Pushing himself erect, he quickly searched the area around him for the
rest of the cat's body.  The stupid bloody creature must have got
tangled up in some farmyard machinery, or maybe some wiring, and had
the paw torn from its body.  It must have crawled away somewhere to
nurse its wound or die, most likely.  It was then he saw the
blood-streaks against the wall of the outhouse.

They stretched all the way along the wall's length, dark red, clots of
black and brown hair sticking to the viscous surface.  One of the cats
they had no names, he wasn't that sentimental was black and brown, with
white paws.  Whatever had got hold of the poor bloody creature had
dragged it along the wall, and the frantic red scratch marks gave
evidence that the cat had still been alive at the time.

"Good bloody God," the farmer said in a hushed tone.  He followed the
gory trail, anger quickening his strides.  What manner of creature
could do such a thing?  A fox?  Been none of them around here for
years.  Anyway, he'd never heard of a fox fighting with a cat before.
Some bloody dog's done it!  One of them belonging to someone living in
the forest.  Never kept their bloody animals locked up!  Bad enough
with horses trotting all over the place!  Well this one'll get my
bloody shotgun up its arse.

He reached the end of the wall and hurried round, anger blurring his
vision so that he failed to see the object lying on the ground before
him.  His heavy boot crunched it down into the mud before he realized
he had trodden on something hard.  He stopped, turned, and once again
stooped to examine the object on the ground.

Two sightless slits stared up at him, mud covering the lower portion of
the crushed skull.  He pulled at a pointed ear and the cat's head came
free with a sucking sound, startling Woollard and making him throw the
skull into the air.  It landed in the mud again with a plop, and lay
half on its side, a wicked, feline grin seeming to mock the frightened
farmer.

The man crawled on his stomach through the damp grass towards the prone
woman.  She lay unaware of his stealthy approach, her face turned
towards the sun, surprised and happy to receive its warmth so late in
the year.  She flexed her shoulders against the rough blanket, its
thickness protecting her from the wetness of the grass which even the
sun could not draw out.

The creeping man smiled and a gleam came into his eyes.  A sound behind
him made him turn his head sharply and he frowned at his two
companions, silently urging them to remain quiet.

The woman sighed and raised a knee provocatively; the smoothness of her
legs caught the man's attention.  His smile widened and he felt the
pressure of the earth against his loins.  He was close now, close
enough to reach out and touch that wonderfully soft body.  He tried to
control his breathing so that she wouldn't hear.

Bringing his arm forward, he snapped off a long blade of grass, then
pointed its quivering tip towards the woman's face.  She twitched as
the fine point ran down the side of her nose, then twitched again as
the tickling sensation persisted.  She suddenly sat upright, vigorously
rubbing at her skin as though to dislodge an errant insect.

Terry," she shouted when she saw his shaking body, and grabbed a
handful of grass and threw it into his face.

The two children behind the man laughed excitedly, the small girl
jumping on his back and pounding his head with the palm of her hand.

"Oil"  he yelped, reaching behind and toppling her over his shoulder.
"S'enough of that!"

The woman smiled as her husband rolled the four-year-old over in the
grass.  "Mind her clothes, Terry.  She'll get wet."

"All right, monkey, you heard what your mother said."  Terry tossed the
girl onto the blanket where she immediately jumped into the woman's
arms.

"Game of football, Dad?"  the boy asked, eyebrows raised in
anticipation.

"Okay, Keith, get the ball.  It's in the back of the car."

The boy, seven years old, and ready to play for England -maybe West Ham
would do scampered off towards the red car parked fifty yards away on a
hard piece of ground not too far from the road.

This is nice, Terry," the woman said, allowing her daughter to scramble
free and chase the boy.

Teah.  We should do it more often, you know."

The woman looked at him meaningfully.  We could always do it on
weekends.  It would be better than keeping Keith away from school for
the day.  Wouldn't do any harm to take them down to Southend now and
again.  They like the sea."

Terry grunted noncommittally.  He didn't want to make any promises just
because he was in a good mood.  "Come on, you two, hurry up," he
shouted after the children.

The woman knew there was no point in pursuing the subject.  When do you
think you'll go back?"  she asked.

Terry shrugged.  When the Union says so, I suppose."

"I don't know how they get away with it.  It's a wonder the company
don't go bust.  It's the fifth dispute this year."

"Sixth.  We were on a go-slow last month."

The woman groaned.  "How you get any cars out at all beats me."

"Leave it alone, Hazel.  I have to follow the Union rules."

"Yes, you all do, don't you?  You're all bloody mindless."

They get us more money, don't they?  And better conditions."

"And what are they going to do when there's no car plant left?  When
the Americans pull out?"

"Leave off.  That'll never happen."

"No, not until it does."

The couple sat in silence for a few moments, each annoyed with the
other.

"At least it gives me more time with the kids, don't it?"  Terry said
finally.

Hazel sniffed.

The two children returned, the boy kicking the ball ahead and the girl
running after it, trying to smother it with her body.  Terry leapt to
his feet and ran towards them, kicking the ball away from the girl who
shrieked with glee.

Hazel smiled at the three of them and pushed thoughts of strikes and
unions and weekends spent indoors away from her mind.  "Lazy bastard,"
she said softly, still smiling, as she watched her husband kick the
football with his knee onto his head.

"Okay, Keith, in goal," Terry told the boy who immediately pulled a
disgusted face.

"I'm always in goal.  Can't you go in for a change, Dad?"

"Yeah, I will.  When I've scored three, all right?  In between those
two trees, go on."

The boy slunk off and stood between two horn beams hands on his hips,
facing his prancing father.

The girl tried to grab the ball from her father's feet and giggled when
he pulled it away from her with the underside of one foot.

"No you don't, Josie.  You're up against a pro here."  Terry kicked the
ball clear of his daughter then gave it a hefty kick towards the
makeshift goal.  Keith met it with a kick of his own and sent it
skimming back past his father.

"Show off!"  Terry called out and ran after it, slipping and falling
onto his back as he stretched a foot out to halt the ball's progress.

Hazel and the two children laughed aloud as Terry struggled to his
feet, a rueful grin on his face.

"All right, you asked for it," he called back to Keith.  "Get ready for
this one!"

He retrieved the ball, placed it firmly on the ground, took a few steps
back, then kicked it high and hard towards the goal mouth  Josie
bravely jumped up and tried to catch the ball, but the boy was older
and wiser: he ducked and let it sail over his head.  The ball
disappeared with a rustle of protesting leaves into the heavy clump of
bushes behind the trees.

"Oh, Dad!"  Keith moaned.

Terry, that's too hard," said Hazel, reproachfully.

Well, go and get it, son," said Terry, unabashed.

But Keith squatted on the ground, arms folded across his chest, a set
expression on his face.

"I get it, Daddy," Josie cried out, scurrying towards the bushes.

Watch her, Terry, don't let her go out of sight," Hazel said
anxiously.

"She's all right, it didn't go far."  Terry stretched his arms and
gazed at the greenness around him.  "Beats bloody working," he muttered
under his breath.

Josie peered into the bushes, then jiggled her body through the small
opening she had found.  She squirmed further into the undergrowth, her
eyes darting from left to right in search of the lost ball.  Her
mother's voice followed her through the tangle of leaves and branches,
but the girl's mind was too concentrated on her quest to listen.  She
squealed in excitement when she saw the white round object of her
search nestling beneath a leafy bush, and pushed herself forward,
wincing as the branches scratched at her legs.

She reached the ball in a final determined rush, then squatted on her
haunches to retrieve it.  Something moved just beyond the football.
Something dark, hiding in the darker shadows of the thick
undergrowth.

Josie's fingertips reached for the ball and flicked it free, rolling it
back towards her.  She hugged it to her chest and was about to rise
when her sharp little eyes caught sight of the animal.  She moved
closer, ducking beneath the leaves to get a better view.  The football
was forgotten for the moment and left to one side, shiny and wet. Josie
crawled forward on all fours, oblivious to the damp earth which muddied
her hands and knees.  In the dimness she could just distinguish a
black, stiff-furred body and two close-set highlights reflected in the
creature's eyes.  It did not move, but waited for her to draw near.

"Good doggy," Josie said happily.  "Come here.  Come on."

A thick branch blocked her way and she pushed at it impatiently, but it
would not budge.  She reached over, wanting to stroke the animal's
head.

The pointed head jerked once, then stretched forward towards the
approaching fingers.  The girl giggled, overjoyed that the animal
wanted to be friendly, and pushed even harder against the branch so
that she could touch the furry body.  Hot breath from the creature's
mouth warmed her pudgy hand.

The sudden crash of broken undergrowth from behind startled her and she
drew her arm back in a reflex action.

"Josie?  Where are you?"  came her father's concerned voice.

"Here, Daddy," she called out.  "Got a doggy."

Terry brushed the leaves and branches aside and found his daughter on
her knees in the mud, the white football near her feet.  Her face
beamed up at him in excitement.

"You wait till your mother sees the state of you," he scolded, and
reached down to scoop her up in his arms.  "Dog in there, Daddy.  Can
we take him home?"  Her father peered into the gloom behind her, but
when she turned to point to the spot where the animal had been hiding,
it had gone.

The horse, chestnut in colour, cantered easily along the hoggin path,
its rider immaculately clad in a light brown uniform and dark riding
cap.  Charles Denison, Head Keeper of Epping Forest, was content on
this fine, October morning.

It was the season he loved best: the greens, yellows and browns of
autumn gave the forest new life, changed its personality in a most
beautiful way.  The dying leaves replenished the earth, the golden,
myriad carpet they formed on the woodland floor injecting the soil with
fresh vitality which would be slowly processed through the winter
months.  The air was fresh, its sharpness exhilarating.  And best of
all, the people were gone.

The vast acres of woodland, rolling fields and agricultural land were a
retreat for thousands upon thousands of Londoners or those living in
the urbanized areas around the forest.  The hordes invaded at weekends
and public holidays in the summer months, scattering their litter,
terrifying the shy forest creatures with their bludgeoning excursions
into the wooded areas, shouting, laughing, mutilating trees and
undergrowth.  The public thought they owned the lush strip of land,
assuming its upkeep came from the rates they paid; but it wasn't so.
Private money preserved this sanctuary.

Still, they were gone now, leaving the forest to those who cared, those
who loved the vast nature reserve for its peacefulness, its constantly
changing pattern, its timid wildlife.  Fewer squaw ling brats, less
bawling transistor radios.  Weekends were still busy they always would
be, whatever the weather but, ah, weekdays.  Weekdays, such as this,
were a joy.  Denison brought his mount to a halt to examine fresh
markings at the base of a birch tree.

The bark had been stripped away by some small animal, revealing the
virgin wood beneath, bright and naked, a fresh wound.  He lightly
kicked against the sides of his mount and urged it forward for a closer
inspection.  Squirrels, he told himself.  Damned pests, despite their
bushy-tailed precociousness.  If he had his way, he would trap or
poison the lot of 'em.  The grey squirrel, usually in early summer,
attacked trees, gnawing at the main stem for the sweet, sappy layers
beneath the rough bark.  A tree could often die from such attacks,
particularly if completely ringed.  The ordinary layman just did not
understand the nuisance value of these tiny creatures, didn't seem to
appreciate that they were rodents.  Of course, there had been no sign
at all of the red squirrel.  The red had been ousted from the forest by
the grey many years ago and the amount of greys had increased
uncontrollably; but this year, strangely, their numbers seemed to be
down.

He pulled the horse away from the birch, lifting its head up from the
succulent grass.  Guiding it back to the path, Denison gazed around
him, looking for signs of further damage.  A sudden flurry of movement
to his left brought him to a halt again.  A section of thicket across
the path from him shook frantically, then settled into an uneasy
stillness.  It often happened in the forest an animal or bird startled
by the approach of man, a sudden attack by one animal on another it was
this that made the woodland so alive.

A sudden, spasmodic twitching of leaves and a tiny, almost inaudible
squeal told him that a forest creature had fallen victim to a larger
enemy.  He felt no sympathy, for that was the law of nature, but he was
curious to know who was prey and who was predator.  He clucked his
tongue at the horse and lightly kicked its flanks again.  The chestnut
took a few steps towards the thicket, then stopped, its neck and legs
suddenly stiff.

There was no movement from the undergrowth, not even the rustle of
unseen leaves beneath its many layers.

"Come on, girl," said Denison, irritated at his mount's unexpected
nervousness.  "On you go."

But the horse refused to budge.  It regarded the thicket with bulging
eyes.  Denison became impatient with the horse's inexplicable fear and
fear it was, for the keeper could feel the rising tension in the beast.
He knew horses, knew their moods, and he certainly knew this mood. The
horse was ready to bolt.

"Steady now, Bettina.  There's nothing there to worry you."  He patted
the chestnut's long neck, speaking in soft, soothing tones.  Bettina
was normally the most docile of animals, rarely spooked by the abrupt
actions of startled wildlife.  "Calm yourself, girl, and we'll go on
our way."

The horse skipped from hoof to hoof, jerking its head up and away from
the now silent thicket.  The keeper exerted pressure with his left knee
and pulled the reins towards the right, trying to steer his mount down
the path and away from the menacing undergrowth.

And then the horse was off.  There had been no other sound, no other
movement from the thicket, but the tension inside the skittish horse
had finally boiled over, and the mare fled away, hoofs pounding,
digging deep into the path and throwing clumps of earth high into the
air behind it.

Denison tugged at the reins, his legs stiff against the stirrups, his
body thrown backwards in an attempt to control the chestnut's gallop.
But the terror in the animal was stronger than the pull of its master's
hands.  Low branches came dangerously near Denison's face as the horse
sped along the churned-up path, and he decided to let his mount have
its head, to run itself out, to disperse its energy until its strength
and will was more controllable.

They cleared the trees and Denison silently thanked God; open grassland
was before them.  The horse left the path and headed into the lush
fields, the keeper praying that it would not step into a rut or a hole
and break its leg.  And possibly, his neck.

He tugged at the reins again and sensed some of the excitement leaving
the horse now that it was out on open ground.

Whoa, girl!  Stop now, girl!  Whoa, Bettina!"  Denison tried not to
shout the words, but it was hard to keep the urgency, the near-panic,
from them.

A sudden dip caused the horse to stumble, but it managed to keep its
feet, though one leg twisted badly.  It staggered forward, the impetus
of its wild gallop carrying its powerful body onwards; but the sudden
check in speed threw the head keeper forward, almost over the beast's
head.  He clutched desperately at the long neck, his legs losing their
grip on Bettina's flanks, his body slipping from the saddle.  He was
fortunate, for his feet touched the earth while he was still supported
by the horse's neck.  He clung to the horse, his riding boots scraping
through the long grass, and his weight slowed the animal down even
more.  It came to a gradual halt, body twitching and eyes rolling,
froth foaming from nostrils and mouth.  Bettina's body gleamed with
sweat as she tried to pull her neck free of the man.

"Steady, steady, girl," Denison gasped, relieved to be still in one
piece.

He let his legs take his full weight and continued to talk soothingly
to the horse, stroking its head, calming it.

It proved difficult to settle Bettina, though, and from the way the
animal favoured one leg, Denison realized it had injured an ankle.  He
rested his own head against Bettina's, telling her it was all right
now, nothing could harm her, when a movement on a grassy slope not too
far away caught his eye.

His face jerked away from the horse and he stared towards the hillock.
He rubbed a hand across his eyes in disbelief and stared even harder.
But the vision had gone.

"I'll be damned," he said in a hushed breath.

There should have been no deer in this part of the forest they were
kept in a special compound on the other side, near Theydon Bois, where
they were safe, away from cars, away from people.  They were precious
creatures to the forest, especially now in the rutting season.  The
numbers had been reduced so drastically over the past fifty years, that
special measures had been taken to protect them.  It was odd enough to
see a deer running loose nowadays, but this was even more strange.  It
had been thirty years since a white buck had been seen in Epping.

And the superstitions and folklore of the forest were entrenched deeply
enough in Denison for him to feel uneasy.  He knew the sudden
appearance of a white deer was a bad omen.

TWO

The car began to reduce speed as it approached the entrance to the
laboratories, the driver easing his foot from the accelerator and using
his gears rather than brakes to slow the vehicle.  Crisp fallen leaves
had scattered across the road's surface and, as the car turned into the
long winding driveway that led through the trees up to the huge
red-brick building, they formed a patterned surface on the road.

It was a pleasant location for a company involved in the control and
destruction of pests, Lucas Fender mused as he kept the Audi down to
the authorized speed limit.  Deep in the heart of Surrey, surrounded by
ten acres of lawns, fields and woodland, it would have made an ideal
home for retired generals, or perhaps a health farm.  It was difficult
to guess from the building's appearance that its main function was the
investigation of new methods in rodent destruction.  Ratkill, the
company he worked for, was involved in other operations, the building
itself containing various divisions which handled woodworm and dry rot
elimination, damp proofing, insulation, wood preservation and hygiene,
manufacturing its own products for these particular markets; but the
business it was renowned for, and the business that was responsible for
its incredible growth over the past few years, was the extermination of
rats.  The massacres perpetrated by rats in London four years before
had made companies such as this a growth industry.  Ratkill had become
the biggest and most reputable.

At the time of the Outbreak, as it had become known, Fender was an
entomologist researching for a company dealing mainly with wood
preservation.  He had produced various papers on insect life, which was
good for prestige, and contributed material for an encyclopedia
publisher, which was good for the pocket.  His company had been based
in Huddersfield at that time, so he had been fortunate to have missed
the nightmarish invasion of London and the consequent evacuation.  The
rodents, a new breed of monster Black rats, had finally been gassed,
rooted from their underground lairs by the use of ultrasonic machinery
and, apart from a few more minor skirmishes with those that had somehow
escaped the gas, the threat had appeared to be over.  But it had proved
difficult to convey that to the public at large, for the disease
transmitted by rat-bite had meant death for hundreds.  And the memory
of those torn to pieces by the vermin was impossible to erase.

The government inquiry had laid the blame squarely on the shoulders of
the ministry involved and as the minister directly responsible had
himself been killed by the rats, the outcry had been neatly directed
towards his negligence.  No chances would ever be taken again: all
sewers, underground rail tunnels, cellars, storage units were
inspected, fumigated, and those thought to be a high risk potential,
demolished.  It was a massive operation and cost the rate payers
millions, but no one complained.  The horror of it all had been too
great.

Perversely, the greatest sigh of relief came when the first Brown rat
was discovered.  Always enemies to the Black and, until then, the
dominant species, they had been ousted by the new breed of Rattus
rattus, the Black rat, for these had become not only more powerful, but
more cunning too.  The return of the Brown rat was a good sign, for it
meant the Black really had been vanquished.  And, of course, these
lesser creatures could be more easily dealt with.

The rodent companies had flourished, for it had become law that any
signs of vermin had to be reported to the local council immediately,
and they had the power to quarantine and investigate.  The Ministry of
Agriculture and the Department of the Environment worked hand-in-hand
with the various control companies, but Ratkill had the biggest
government contract, thanks to the determined efforts of Stephen
Howard, a young researcher for Ratkill at the time of the Outbreak who
had played a large part in the final defeat of the rats.  He had made
many friends in government circles at the time of the siege, impressing
them with his drive and knowledge of the subject, and Fender suspected
that his special contacts within the ministries had contributed more to
his rise in the ranks of the Ratkill organization than his skills as a
biologist and administrator.

Nevertheless, they were old friends from student days, Fender, at
thirty-one, a year older than Howard.  They had both studied zoology at
university, but had lost close contact on leaving, going their separate
ways and into different fields.  A phone call now and again, a meeting
once a year that was all their relationship had boiled down to.  But
soon after the Outbreak, when the city had been cleared of infestation
and life had returned to normal, they had made contact and Howard
invited Fender down to London.  By then Howard was Ratkill's Director
of Research and business was booming because of a large government
contract, and other countries were also plying Ratkill with
commissions, for the fear in England had spread worldwide.  Howard
needed good men, fast, and Fender had his own reasons for wanting to
join the organization.  Within five weeks he had become what was known
as a 'troubleshooter' for Ratkill, a rodent investigator.  The public
term was 'rat-catcher'.  A high salary came with the job, for it now
had an element of danger to it, and it hadn't taken Fender long to
absorb the techniques concerning the tracing and destruction of vermin.
He studied the animal itself, its life cycle, habits, preferences, and
he learned of the various poisons used to eradicate them.

In the first year of his working for the company, only three groups of
Black rats were discovered and these had been quickly and easily dealt
with.  No one was sure how they had resisted the ultrasonic sound waves
that should have drawn them into the gas-filled enclosures, but it was
assumed they had been trapped somewhere below ground at the time the
beams were emitted.  It was a relief to everyone that the rats' normal
reproduction rate had been hindered, for the sound wave machine had
inflicted a particularly heavy stress on the mother rats, causing their
breasts to run dry, which resulted in the starvation of new-born
rodents.  The groups found were old and half-starved, and those
captured alive soon died.  It was the theory of many biologists that
their brain cells had been permanently damaged by the high-frequency
sound waves and this had upset their normal bodily functions.  It
seemed a reasonable assumption.

The startling fact about this new, now vanquished, breed was that they
were a mutation.  It seemed a zoologist, William Bartlett Schiller, had
illegally brought back a rat it may have been several, no one was sure
from an island near New Guinea.  An island that had been used for
nuclear tests.  Their lair had been discovered in the cellar of an old
house near London's dock land a house that had been owned by the
zoologist when he was alive.  He had allowed the creature -or creatures
to breed with the normal Ship rat, or Black rat, as it was commonly
called, introducing a new strain.  Papers written by Schiller dealing
with radiation effects and mutations were found in his study as well as
drawings of dissected animals.  The facts of the matter had been
well-documented by the media and even the government inquiry findings
were published in their entirety, yet ... Yet even in his many
subsequent talks with Stephen Howard, Fender had felt something was
being withheld.

He left the Audi in the estate's car park and entered the red-brick
building, waving to the receptionist as he passed her desk.

"How was Cheshire?"  she asked.

"Chilly," he replied with a grin.  "Is Stephen Howard in his office?"

"Yes, but he won't be for long.  A party is coming down from the
Ministry of Agriculture and he'll be showing them around the
laboratories before taking them off to lunch."

"Right, I'll try and catch him before they arrive."

Fender climbed the stairs and walked down the long corridor leading
towards the back of the building, Windows overlooking the grounds were
on one side and office doors on the other.  The clatter of a typewriter
greeted him as he approached an open doorway.

"Hello, Jean, is he in?"  he asked, entering the office.

Howard's secretary looked up from her typewriter and gave Fender a
beaming smile.

"Hello, Luke.  How was your trip?"

"Okay," he replied, noncommittally  He inclined his head towards the
door of the Research Director's office and raised his eyebrows.

"Oh, no," said Jean.  "He's gone down to the laboratories to make sure
everything's shipshape.  We've got a visit from..."

"I know the Min of Agro."

She nodded.

"I'll just dump my briefcase then 111 find him.  He wanted to see me, I
believe."

"Yes, he did.  He's got another trip lined up for you."

"Christ, I've only just got back.  I've got to make out this last
report yet."

"It's only a quick job, I think, Luke," the secretary said.

Fender sighed.  "I suppose I should be grateful for that.  How's the
boyfriend?"

"Around," she said.  "I'm free for lunch."

He walked to the door and grinned.  "I'll let you know," he said, then
ducked around the doorway to avoid the pencil hurled at him.  He
chuckled as he retraced his steps down the corridor, wincing at the
one-word abuse that followed him.

He found two of his colleagues in the large office he shared with
Ratkill's troubleshooter unit.  Two were out in different parts of the
country investigating pest complaints and the sixth had resigned the
month before, sick to death of 'hairy little beasts'.

The two men, one an entomologist like himself, the other a biologist,
waved their greetings and continued pounding at their typewriters.
They, too, hated the paperwork involved in their job, but realized the
only way to clear it was to get on with it.  Fender opened his
briefcase, took out several papers bearing his scribbled notes and
placed them on his desk.  Then he left the office and went off in
search of Stephen Howard.

He walked through the downstairs laboratories, occasionally stopping to
look into cages at the captive rats and mice.  Many looked drowsy, for
they were slowly being dosed with various poisons to gauge their
reactions.  Others seemed active and bright-eyed, pushing their
quivering snouts through the thin metal bars, eager to be free.  Fender
glanced at several ultrasonic generators grouped together on a bench at
one side of the laboratory.  These had been sent by manufacturers from
all over the world, keen to have RatkiU's seal of approval on their
product.  Most of them worked on the principle of driving vermin away
from buildings rather than drawing them in, and the manufacturers
claimed they were invaluable for clearing factories, shops and any
other buildings with a pest problem.

He joined a technician at the bench who was carefully examining the
inside workings of a machine.

"Any good?"  Fender enquired.

The technician looked up with a start.  "Oh, hello, Mr.  Fender. Didn't
see you."  He bent his head low to get a better look inside the
machinery.  "No, none of them seems to do much.  Their frequency's too
low, really.  I thought this Japanese model might be effective because
it's got variable range and, at the top end, quite a high sound
pressure.  But the rats get used to even that after a while."

"What area does it cover?"

"About 3,000 square feet.  It has an intermittent transmitter which
confuses the rats for a while.  Eighteen kilohertz is the frequency the
buggers hate most, but that's a bit unpleasant for the likes of me and
you, too.  The trouble with rats is that they adapt too fast, so even
that frequency doesn't bother them too much after a time."

"But it works for a limited period."

The technician nodded.  "For a short time, yes."

"And the ultrasonic machine that attracts them?"

"Same thing.  It worked in London that time because it hadn't been used
before the rats had no chance to grow accustomed to the sound.  It was
just as well they were all killed first time round."

"A few escaped."

"Not enough to worry about.  And they were soon finished off."

"But if they had lived and continued to breed, they might have
developed some resistance to the sound waves

"It's a possibility."

Fender shuddered inwardly.  All things considered, London had had a
narrow escape.

"Is Mr.  Howard around here somewhere?"

"He came down with Mr.  Lehmann about twenty minutes ago.  They've gone
out the back, over to the pens."

Fender left the technician to his work and made for the laboratory's
exit.  He carefully closed the door behind him, then entered a long
shed-like structure which had a "Danger Poisons in use' sign on the
door.  He walked through the building, the smell of straw and rat
droppings pungent in his nostrils, occasionally seeing a dark streaking
body in the enclosures on either side of the gangway.  Feed-hoppers
containing various compounds mixed with food were placed at strategic
positions inside the enclosures, each a different attractant for the
rat whose sensitivity towards odd flavours or odours made pre-baiting
encouraging the rodent to eat a certain food over a period of time
before the lethal poison was administered a difficult operation.  The
attractant compound most favoured by the rodents would be a valuable
aid in their destruction.

The building was empty of humans and he assumed that Howard and Mike
Lehmann, the laboratory's Chief Biologist, had gone through to the
outside pens.  He was glad to leave the shed; it was filled with the
smell of death.  A gravel path led him towards a garden area, then on
to a grassy field beyond.  He saw the figures of the two men ahead,
both peering into a wide rat pen.

They turned at his approach and Lehmann, at least, looked pleased to
see him.  Because of their working relationship, Howard and Fender's
friendship had cooled somewhat.  Pender, Howard thought, sometimes
forgot he was working for the Director of Research and not alongside
him.

"Hello, Luke," he said.

"Stephen, Mike," Fender acknowledged.

"How'd it go, Luke?"  Lehmann asked, enthusiastic for discussion as
ever.  By rights, Mike Lehmann should have become Director of Research,
for he was a good deal older than Howard and had been at Ratkill for
more than fifteen years.  However he seemed to show no outward
resentment towards the younger man, the man he had engaged in the first
place, but every so often, Fender noticed a certain disdainful tone in
his voice when arguing a particular technical point with his
superior.

Well, they're Warfarin-resistant all right," Fender said, leaning
against the fence surrounding the enclosure.  "No doubt about it."

"So it's spreading?"  Howard asked anxiously.

Fender looked at the Research Director and, not for the first time, was
surprised at the way age seemed to be forcing its way into Howard's
features.  No, it was more that Howard himself was forcing age into his
features, almost as if the added years would make him seem more
appropriate for the position he held.  The thinning hair was severely
brushed back and a fine, blond moustache adorned his upper lip.  Even
the glasses he wore were heavy and unattractive.  All you need now is a
pipe, thought Fender, then directed his attention back to the
question.

"Yes, it's certainly spreading.  Montgomeryshire, Shropshire,
Nottinghamshire, Gloucestershire and Kent used to be the only areas
where rats resistant to the poison could be found apart from a couple
of places in Denmark and Holland, of course."

"And our own labs," Howard interjected.

Yes, but they were specially bred to be resistant These creatures
acquire the resistance naturally.  Anyway, they're in Cheshire now and
a few weeks ago I found several groups in Devon."

"But they were not the Black rat?"  Howard looked almost hopeful.

"No, just the common Brown.  No monsters there, but I think we'll soon
need to find some new poisons if we're going to control them."

Fender looked down at the earth around the concrete base of the fence.
"Someone trying to get in?"  he asked, pointing at the burrows that had
been dug.

Yes, the wild rats from the fields," Lehmann told him.  They know
there's plenty of food in there so they try to join their tame chums
inside.  Life as a prisoner can be a luxury.  The concrete goes two
feet down, though, so they can't get under."

"I'm going to need your report as soon as possible," said Howard. "I've
got the ministry people arriving at any moment it's a pity I haven't
got your findings to show them.  The problem appears to require some
more government investment."  He looked slightly miffed that the rat
catcher was unable to hand over his typed report there and then.

Fender smiled pleasantly.  "It took some time to gather in the facts,
Stephen.  I didn't think you'd want any wild assumptions."

"No, no, of course not.  I'm sorry, Luke.  I didn't want to sound
impatient, but it could affect the direction we take over the next few
years."

"Well, I don't think machines are going to be the answer."

It was Lehmann who spoke and from his brusque tone, Fender guessed it
was a point of conflict between the two men.

"Now you can't say that, Mike."  Howard did not try to disguise the
irritation he felt.  "New generators are being sent to us all the time,
and each seems to be an improvement on the last."

"I know our Products Division has been spending a lot of time on it,
using the best ideas from other manufacturers."

The Research Director's face flushed angrily.  We are in this business
to make money you know, Mike.  If we come up with a competent machine,
then the government will make a substantial investment to mass-produce
them."

That's if they ever will be really effective.  What do you think, Luke,
poisons or ultrasonic sound machines?"

Fender was not eager to be drawn into the argument, especially on a
subject to which he didn't have the answer.

"I don't know, Mike.  With our poisons beginning to fail, generators
might be the only way.  I think there has to be more study into the
rat's communication system itself, though.  We know they produce
ultrasonics themselves and use echo-location for orientation, so there
may be a way of using a machine against them rather than just trying to
disrupt their endocrine system."

"But alpha-chloralose, coumatetralyl and chlorophacinone haven't been
fully tested against them yet," Lehmann said.

"No, but they will be," Howard interrupted.  "At the moment, we're
exploring all avenues.  Look, when can I have your report, Luke?"

"I could have started work on it today, but Jean tells me you've got
another little "trip" in store for me."

"What?  Oh yes, I'd forgotten.  Sorry, I would have sent one of the
others, but Kempson and Aldridge are both making out their reports for
me, and Macrae and Nolan are in the north.  You're the only one
available."

"It's all right, I don't mind.  What's the problem?"

There's a Conservation Centre on the other side of London.  They've
seen evidence of rats around the place and the ordinary rodenticides
don't seem to have had much effect.  They don't think it's anything to
worry about, but as the law says it has to be reported, they've done
so.  I'd like you to go out there today."

"Surely you don't need me to investigate.  Couldn't the local council
do it?"

"I'm afraid not.  London is still a sensitive area and our contract
with the Ministry states that we'll send in an expert to look into any
rodent problems within thirty miles of the city."

Why didn't they call us before they started messing around with
poisons?"  Lehmann said in an annoyed voice.  That's how this whole
Warfarin-resistance business started -amateurs not administering the
right dosage, letting the rats build up a defence against it."

They didn't consider it a big enough problem.  They still don't, but
they're playing safe."

"Just where is this Conservation Centre?"  Fender asked.  "I've never
heard of one that close to London."

"It's been there some time," Howard replied.  "It's in the green belt
area, the woodland that starts somewhere on the outer fringes of East
London.  Epping Forest."

THREE

The Reverend Jonathan Matthews watched the two men filling in the grave
and mentally said his own personal prayer for the deceased.  His was an
unusual parish, for most of its members were forest people.  The term
could be used lightly; very few actually worked in the forest itself.
The great woodland was surrounded on all sides by suburbia, the forest
fringes cut dead by bricks and mortar.  Less than ten miles away was
the city's centre where better paid employment could be found.  Some
still worked the land, but they were few and far between, the work
being arduous and offering little reward.  Several forest keepers and
their families attended his church at High Beach and he welcomed their
patronage.  They were a breed of their own, these forest minders, as he
preferred to call them.  Stern men, most of them, almost Victorian in
their attitudes; but their commitment to the woodland and its animals
was admirable.  He felt their harshness came from the very harshness of
nature itself; their open-air existence, whatever weather prevailed,
and the constant struggle to maintain the correct balance in forest
life despite its location, had given them a dourness which few people
understood.

The Church of the Holy Innocents was ancient, its grey-stoned steeple
badly in need of repair.  A small building, its size adding to the
historic charm, it was seldom filled to capacity.  The Reverend
Matthews had presided as vicar for more years than he cared to
remember, and he deeply regretted the loss of a stalwart parishioner
such as Mrs.  Wilkinson.  At seventy-eight, she had been one of his
more active church members, never missing Sunday service and always
attending Morning Prayer; her work for the needy of the parish even in
her latter years had been a shining example of true Christianity.

The funeral ceremony an hour before had been well attended, for Mrs.
Wilkinson had been a much-loved character in the community, but now the
small graveyard adjoining the church was empty apart from himself and
the two grave-diggers.  Their shovels dug into the soft mound of earth
beside the open grave with dull thuds and the soil falling onto the
coffin lid caused a shiver to run through the vicar's thin body.  It
had the sound of finality.  It represented the end of life in this
world, and no matter how much he told his flock of the glorious life to
come after, he, himself, was afraid.

The doubts had come of late.  His faith had once been unshakeable, his
love for humanity unscathed through all the bitter times.  Now, at the
time when his own life was drawing towards its concluding years, be
they five or fifteen, his mind was troubled.  He had thought he
understood, or at least accepted, the gross cruelties of the world, but
his body had become fragile, and his faith with it.  It was said man
was reaching a new point in civilization, yet the atrocities continued
and, if possible, seemed more hideous than before.  His personal trials
had been overcome but, rather than strengthening his spiritual self,
had progressively undermined it, leaving him vulnerable, exposed.  A
question often asked of him by grieving parishioners was how could God
allow such madness?  His answer that no one understood the ways of

God, but ultimately they were just, had given them little comfort; and
now it gave him little comfort.

Those such as Mrs.  Wilkinson and his dear departed wife, Dorothy,
would surely find their spiritual reward, for they epitomized the
goodness that still existed.  But the heavy sound of earth on wood
somehow diminished the ideal; it gave death a stark reality.  What if
their God wasn't as they thought?  He wiped a hand across his forehead,
swaying slightly.  His parishioners must never know of his doubts -they
needed his firm guidance.  His misgivings were his secret and he would
overcome them with prayer.  The years had taken their toll, that was
all.  He would regain his old beliefs, vanquish the sinful questions,
and soon.  Before he died.

The two workmen were breathing heavily by now, their task almost
completed.  He turned away, not wanting to gaze at the shallow indent,
death's seal of earth, and looked around at the quiet, sunny graveyard.
The constant rustle of the surrounding trees was more comforting than
the sounds of the grave diggers  But he was in a depressed mood and he
wondered if it was this that made the forest seem so oppressive.  The
vicar felt he was being watched.  Or was he merely exhausted mentally?
Could that be why there seemed to be dozens of eyes watching from the
shadows beneath the leafy trees, stripping away his facade, looking
deep into his guilt?

He shook his head, knowing he had to repress this dreadful feeling
before it broke him.  Yet the forest did have a different atmosphere
lately.  None of his parishioners mentioned it, but he had caught
certain looks in the eyes of the forest keepers.  An uneasiness as they
studied the undergrowth.

He searched the distant foliage and tried to penetrate the dark areas.
Was that a movement?  No, just a fern stirred by the breeze.  He had to
snap out of this destructive mood, had to get a grip on himself. Epping
Forest and its inhabitants were his life.  He loved the forest. Why then
did it seem so menacing?

Brian Mollison was a broad-shouldered, deep-chested, thick-thighed man
of forty who hated his mother and detested the children he taught.  If
he had married if his mother had allowed him to marry he might well
have overcome his problem.  Love and sexual fulfilment might have
smothered or at least diverted his unnatural inclination.  But not
necessarily.

It had started in his late 'teens and he had managed to keep his odd
tendency to himself.  Lonely, quiet places -places free of people were
best, because then there was no danger.  As the years went by he found
it wasn't enough.  Something was missing.  Then he discovered exactly
what that something was, and it was, of course, the danger.  Or, more
precisely, the excitement of danger.

His problem was that he liked to expose his body, or again, more
precisely, his genital area.  Exposing himself to the elements in
secluded places sufficed at first, but exposing himself to people
proved to be much more thrilling.  He discovered this one day at a new
school in which he had been appointed games master.  His mother stupid
cow had neglected to mend the elastic in the trousers of his tracksuit
and when he had demonstrated to the boys it was a boys' school -just
how to jump into the air from a squatting position thirty times without
a break, the trousers had slipped to his knees revealing all to the
delighted pupils.

It could have been the beginning of a persecuted career -at least in
that particular school but he had cracked down hard on them.  His rage
had been more to cover his embarrassment than real anger at the boys,
for he realized after he had whipped up his trousers again that his
body was responding to the secret pleasure he had experienced.  It was
just as well the tracksuit was a loose-fitting, baggy garment.  Whether
he would have been just as nasty to the boys and his future pupils had
the incident not occurred was debatable for he was already of an
unpleasant disposition, and if his mother hadn't loved him, then he
would have been unloved.

Through the years he was very careful with his perversion, for he
needed the job as PE instructor to keep himself and his semi-invalid
mother silly bitch and the slightest hint that he might be in any way
peculiar would mean an abrupt end to his career.  Not that he
considered himself peculiar.  It was more of a hobby.

To stand on a crowded tube train in the rush-hour wearing his
loose-fitting raincoat, the one that had bottomless pockets, would
almost make him faint with excitement.  The thrill of knowing that only
a thin layer of material separated his monumentally erect organ from
the female body crushed up against him would make his knees grow weak.
It was his breathing he had to control.  They often realized what was
happening the rod of iron pressure against them could hardly be
mistaken for anything else but they usually just flushed with
embarrassment and moved away at the next stop, or turned to give him a
scathing look which he returned with a stalwart stare.  His hard
features the short-cropped hair, the heavy jaw, the nose twisted
slightly from his boxing days always won the day.  He wasn't a man to
be tackled lightly.

Cinemas were good, sitting there in the dark with his trousers gaping,
his raincoat across his lap ready to be slid aside at odd moments.

Public lavatories he didn't care for too much.  He'd tried standing
there at an urinal, penis in hand, but the presence of other men
engaged in the same activity, whether devious or normal, disturbed him
too much.  Twice he'd been approached and that really frightened him.

Railway platforms were good if he could find a solitary woman on a
lonely bench.  To stand in front of them and watch their bodies freeze
with fear was extremely pleasant, then, to slowly un flap his raincoat
was a joy beyond compare.  Of course, he had to make a quick getaway,
but that was half the fun.  That really set the heart pounding.

He would never try it in a railway carriage again, though.  It had been
quite a successful pastime for a while, changing carriages at each stop
until he found one occupied by a lone female.  They were usually
shocked rigid and he always jumped off at the next stop before they had
a chance to raise the alarm.  But one night, the startled passenger had
had bloody hysterics!  He'd nearly jumped out the window in fright!
Pleading hadn't prevented her from tugging at the communication cord,
and falling on top of her when the train had lurched to a grinding halt
hadn't soothed the situation.  She'd really panicked then.  He could
still hear those shrill screams ringing in his ears to this day!
Christ, it was no wonder some of them got bloody murdered.

He'd had to jump from the compartment there and then, hurting his knee
as he'd stumbled in the dark.  He was lucky he hadn't been knocked down
by a passing train!  He'd managed to escape, but it had been a long
walk home because he hadn't dared use British Rail again that night. He
hadn't gone out for a fortnight after that.  He'd been too shaken.
Mother sodding bag had fussed and fretted and wanted to get the doctor
in, thinking he was really ill, but he'd told her he was only run down,
and that a few days in bed would soon put him right again.  When the
recuperation period stretched into the second week she'd reverted to
her usual quavery voiced nagging, and in the end he had been relieved
to go back to school.  Sometimes he wondered where such a frail little
woman found the energy for such unceasing ranting.  And sometimes he
wondered if she suspected something.  He'd caught her giving him
strange looks lately.  No, she couldn't know.  He'd always been
careful, always scrubbed the inside of his raincoat after each trip.
She was just getting older and more senile, that was all.  Afraid he
might leave her.

The incident had made him more cautious than ever and after that he
avoided enclosed places where he might possibly be trapped.  Epping
Forest became his most invigorating haunt.

He was surprised he hadn't used it as a location in his earlier years;
it was such a natural.  There were so many lonely spots where foolish
women strolled with their dogs, or young girls rode on horseback, or
children played football; and there was so much undergrowth to hide in,
so many trees to skulk behind.  You had to keep a wary eye out for the
forest keepers of course some of them didn't even wear uniforms and
police cars often patrolled the quiet lanes.  But a man in a tracksuit
was hardly a suspicious character in such an open environment.  It was
a perfect place for his particular activity, a paradise for flashers.
And it was healthy, too.

He had left his car, a battered Morris 1100, in an area just off the
main road, the drive from their small, terraced house in Leytonstone
not taking much more than ten minutes or so.  It was his afternoon off
from school and he had decided to take advantage of the clement
weather: standing around in the pouring rain and exposing your organs
to the cold wasn't much fun.  Bad weather also made it more difficult
to find a viewer and just doing it on your own took away much of the
joy.  He had caught a bad chill last winter.

Today was a good day for picnickers and strollers because it was a
weekday.  There wouldn't be many sightseers around, but there was
always the bored housewife with her non-school able offspring to be
found.  It just required a little patience.

He drew in a sharp breath as he realized that his patience was about to
be rewarded.  In the distance, strolling casually and quite alone, was
the figure of a woman.  The stretch between them was open grassland,
but she was using a path that led towards the trees.  He knew the path
and was aware it ran through a heavily wooded area.  If he was fast he
could skirt the edge of the open grassland, duck into the woods and
reach a secluded point in the trail ahead of her; and at times like
this, or when running away, he could be very fast.  He sprinted off,
his aroused penis acting as a pointer.

Making his way as swiftly and quietly as possible through the trees and
undergrowth, Mollison kept well away from the path itself.  If she
heard him or caught sight of his running figure, she might turn back.
When he judged he was some distance ahead of her he cut back towards
the track at a slower and more cautious pace, quickly finding an ideal
spot.  The path widened into a relatively large clearing, several other
paths leading off from it.  He could hide in the bushes opposite the
point where she would emerge and catch her completely unawares.
Perfect!  He crouched in the bushes, gasping for breath after his
hard-paced run, and was disappointed to discover that his erection had
become somewhat subdued.  A little manipulation soon corrected that
matter, but his breathing became even more laboured.

His lungs had settled down to a heavier but more steady rhythm by the
time she came into view.  He drew in an excited breath: this was more
than he had hoped for she was a good-looker!  Although she was still
some distance away he could see she had a good figure, rounded but not
plump, short brown hair, nicely shaped ankles.  In her late-twenties,
early thirties?  Hard to tell at this distance, but certainly not
older.  He was sure she was pretty.

The woman had reached the edge of the clearing now and, for some
reason, she paused.  Had she seen him?  No, not possible his cover was
too good.  She was looking to her left, slightly ahead of her, and
seemed to be listening.  Bloody hell, she was good-looking!  This was
an added bonus: it wasn't often you found a stunner.  He couldn't
afford to waste this one; he decided to give her the full works.

Trying to control his rising excitement, he pulled the tracksuit top
over his head and lay it on the ground behind him.  He peered through
the bushes and saw she was coming forward again.  He licked his lips
and cleared his throat of juices.  She stopped again and this time he,
too, heard the rustle of undergrowth from a point to her left. Mollison
frowned and tried to see into the thicket.  Must be an animal in there.
Come on, you silly cow, it can't hurt you!  He tugged at the trousers
of his tracksuit, pulling them down his legs, the elasticated bottoms
catching at the heels of his plimsolls.  Sod it!  he said to himself. 
No time to work them free, she'll be off down another path in a
minute!

His whole body was trembling now, a light sheen of perspiration
covering his well-developed muscles.  He began to rise but suddenly
fell back, his trousers tangled in a root.  Spiky leaves scratched at
his buttocks and he pushed himself up, ignoring the sharp jabs as his
hands were prickled by brittle foliage, knowing she must have heard him
by now.

He leapt from the hiding-place, his arms outstretched and legs out as
far as his fallen trousers would allow, a wide grin on his face and
pelvis thrust forward, all in an announcement of his enlarged organ.

But she was gone.  He just caught sight of her retreating figure as she
scurried off down the path.

His surprise gave way to disappointment and then to resentment and
frustration.  He looked down bitterly at his fast-shrinking member and
swore.  She couldn't have reacted that fast to the noise he'd made when
he'd stumbled!  Then he heard the other sound again and realized it
came from the same spot as before.  The bushes were rustling as though
something was moving through them.  Oh Christ, there was someone else
hiding in there.

He hoisted his trousers, hastily retrieved the jacket, and ran off in
the opposite direction.

The children called excitedly to each other as they lowered their
long-stemmed nets into the murky water.  It wasn't very often that
their school organized a day out at Epping Forest's Conservation
Centre, so it was a special treat for them.  All under eleven years of
age, not many truly appreciated the lessons on the woodland's abounding
wildlife taught by the Centre, but with the ever-growing threat to the
natural environment, it was judged to be a worthy aim to inst il in
them a respect for nature rather than a deep knowledge of it.  That was
why the Centre was prefixed with the title "Conservation' and not
"Nature'. Outside pressure from primary schools and colleges whose
pupils attended the Centre meant lessons had to be orientated towards
future examinations, but the tutors' main purpose was still to make the
children more ecologically aware.

Jenny Hanmer was one of the Centre's four tutors, and it was her class
that had gathered around one side of the water's edge.  Because a whole
section of the pond was overshadowed by the forest, the bottom was
choked with dead leaves covered with a purple scum due to sulphur
bacteria, making its depths very dark and its vegetation restricted to
algae and a few clumps of starwort.  Nevertheless, the oxygen-scarce
water still contained many forms of life: water-lice, tubifex worms and
blood worms; mosquito larvae and rat-tailed maggots; pond skaters,
water crickets and water beetles.  Jenny had described all these
creatures to the children in the classroom.  Now she wanted her pupils
to discover them for themselves in the much bigger, outdoor classroom.
It was exciting for them to 'fish' in this way and even more fun when
they studied their samples under a microscope back at the Centre.

"Careful now," Jenny called out to one adventurous nine-year-old whose
name she didn't remember, and who was stretching out precariously over
the water in order to net an interesting looking insect.  She regretted
never getting to really know her pupils individually, but it was almost
impossible with so many different schools visiting every week, each
class made up of twenty-five to thirty-five children.  Some of the
older groups, those taking "O' levels or CSE exams, would take longer
and often concurrent day courses, and it was possible to build up
something of a relationship with them; but not with the younger pupils,
although she found them more fun.

"It's all right, Miss, I can reach," the boy said, his net extended to
its limit.

"Patrick, will you step back!"  The sharp command came from the boy's
schoolteacher, a small, round woman whose eyes never seemed to agree in
which direction to look; Jenny could have sworn she was talking to a
boy innocently standing well away from the pond's edge.

The guilty Patrick took a grudging step backwards, disappointment
evident in his face.  "I won't be able to get it now," he complained.

"Look," Jenny said, pointing at a small insect skimming across the
surface of the water.  That's a water skater, the one I told you about
back in the classroom.  We won't be seeing much more of him now the
colder weather is on its way."

She smiled as the children followed her pointing finger with their eyes
and exclaimed triumphantly when they caught sight of the swift-darting
insect.  It was fine to talk about such animal life in the detached
atmosphere of a classroom, but it certainly added a new dimension when
the children could see that Me for themselves in its natural
surroundings.  Five nets were immediately plunged into the water to
capture the startled skater.

"No, children," Jenny said, laughing.  We're looking for algae.
Remember I told you about the rootless, flowerless plant?  Volvox is
what we're after.  Let's see if you can spot it."

The children stopped tormenting the insect which had the sense to head
towards the centre of the pond.

"Come on, boys and girls, do as Miss Hanmer says," their stray-eyed
teacher said heartily.  She clapped her hands as if to emphasize the
command and the giggling children scattered around the pond's muddy
bank.

"Keep to this side!"  Jenny called out anxiously.

"Keep to this side!"  their teacher instructed.

Thank you, Miss Bellingham," said Jenny, inwardly amused.  They're very
well behaved."

Miss Bellingham gave a small, self-conscious laugh, both eyes defiant
of one another as they singly followed the children running off in
different directions.  "You have to keep them under control, mind."

Jenny nodded, blinking and shifting her gaze from the teacher's
undisciplined eyes.  They seem to enjoy coming out here," she said.

"Oh, yes, it's a great lark for them!"  Miss Bellingham quickly
realized her slip.  "And so educational' she added.  "How long have you
been with the Conservation Centre, Miss Hanmer?"

Jenny had to think hard; the time had flown by.  "Nearly a year, I
think.  Yes, about eight months.  I was with the Juniper Hall Field
Centre in Dorking before."

"It must be a lovely life, my dear.  Very interesting," Miss Bellingham
enthused.

"It is, most of the time.  I had planned to be a geologist, but I
somehow got sidetracked into ecology.  I'm not complaining, though."
Jenny dug her hands into her loose-fitting cardigan and looked around,
checking that the children hadn't got into any awkward situations.

Miss Bellingham was about to ask another question, her interest aroused
by the attractive young tutor, wondering why she should choose what
seemed to her an almost monastic existence at the Centre, when a shout
from their left distracted her attention.

"Look, Miss, look over there!"  One of the children, a coloured boy,
was pointing towards the shaded side of the pond.  "What's them?"

Jenny and Miss Bellingham looked towards the spot, the rotund teacher's
eyes swivelling past and taking several seconds to settle back onto a
moving object in the water.  "What is it, Miss Hanmer?"

Jenny wasn't sure for a moment; she moved further down the bank for a
closer look.

There's three of 'em, Miss," shouted the sharp-eyed boy.

At first the tutor thought they might be water-vole, but remembered
that voles usually swam beneath the surface, and rarely in a group like
this.  These swam in an arrowhead formation.

As they entered a sun-lit area, she saw only their long,

pointed heads above the surface, the water barely disturbed by their
progress.  They ignored the excited clamouring of the children and
continued on their way, making for the bank on Jenny's left.  The boy
who had first seen the creatures picked up a thick piece of rotted bark
and hurled it towards the centre of the pond, a point just reached by
the three animals.

"Darren, you naughty boy!"  Miss Bellingham was outraged by the youth's
action.  Jenny felt a good clout from the teacher might be appropriate.
She quickly turned her attention away from the culprit and back to the
pond.  The bark had landed with a loud splash directly in front of the
animals and she was relieved none had been hit.  They had merely
changed direction and were now heading for the shadowed bank directly
opposite.

Their sleek, black heads glided through the murky water at an almost
leisurely pace and Jenny's eyes widened as they emerged on the other
side.  She recognized the creatures, but something told her she must be
wrong.  They were too big.  The long, black-haired bodies, shiny with
water, were far too large for rats!

Their tails, slimy and grey-pink, slivered from the water behind them
and the tutor suddenly felt repulsed: the tails alone must have been a
foot long.  Without waiting to shake themselves free of water, two of
the creatures disappeared smoothly into the gloom.  The third, the one
that had been leading, turned to face the group across the pond.  It
squatted there and Jenny shuddered as she felt herself being observed.
Several of the children began to cry and the young tutor knelt down to
comfort the nearest.

When she looked up again, her attention diverted for no more than a few
seconds, the rat if the creature had been a rat was gone.  The forest,
and the pond, were perfectly still.

FOUR

Fender pushed his foot down hard on the accelerator pedal, glad to be
free of the city again.  The journey from the Ratkill laboratories in
Surrey had taken him through London's vehicle-choked centre and the
constant frustration of stopping, starting, waiting, avoiding, had made
his mood grim.  Although he didn't regret moving back down to the south
again he often missed the more open country of the north.  Huddersfield
had provided a splendid base for trips into the surrounding counties,
and, although he was city-bred, he appreciated their coarse beauty.
Perhaps the people-crowded years had heightened his respect for the
countryside's seclusion.  The car gathered speed and, as the woods on
his left thickened, so he began to relax.  Soon it was woodland on both
sides of the road.

Fender knew the area, but not too well.  The Epping New Road ran
straight through the forest, but he would have to turn off onto one of
the quieter roads branching into the forest itself.  The car was doing
seventy-five when he slowed for the roundabout ahead.  He saw the sign
for High Beach and swung into the narrow winding road leading from the
roundabout.  The trees almost met overhead, the bright sun sparkling
through dying leaves, and he felt the last ounces of tension drain
away.  Another narrow road to his right took him past a small church
into a slightly wider road, and then the scenery opened out as if the
car had been squeezed through a funnel.

The high ground fell away to his left down into a vast green valley,
its lower slopes filled with trees of every kind, stretching for miles
into the distance.  Beyond them Fender could see the hazy suburbs,
glints of sunlight reflected here and there off glass surfaces.  He
stopped the car for a moment to take in the vista, feeling heady with
its abrupt freshness.  Driving along the winding road, he hadn't
realized the swift ascent the car had been making.  He remembered
reading once, long ago, the theory of how the rolling hills of Epping
Forest had been formed.  A great sheet of ice had slid down eastern
England at the end of the Ice Age and split in two on a high bank north
of the forest, each section scouring out two valleys on either side of
the bank and, as they pushed forward like the pincers of a giant crab,
the soil was squeezed between them into rugged contours.  From his
vantage point he could see the truth of the theory.

A few cars were parked on a muddy area on the rim of the valley, their
occupants gazing out at the view through windscreens, as though to
leave their metal cocoons and make contact with fresh air would shrivel
their bodies.  Fender drove on, looking for a sign which would tell him
the location of the Conservation Centre.

A huge public house stood on his right, a lofty and cold perch at the
top of the long, grassy slope, and beyond that he saw the sign pointing
towards his goal.  He drove down the curved road, almost doubling back
in direction, and came upon the entrance to the Centre.  Passing
through the narrow gate posts, he found a small, gravel car park.  He
sat and studied his surroundings before leaving the car.

The white-bricked single-storey buildings were set in a square
horseshoe shape around a close-cropped lawn, a ribbon of gravel cutting
across the grass from the car park towards a glass-doored entrance to
the building on his left.  The low-ceilinged building had no windows at
least, not on that side and a sign in front of him indicated it was the
school section.  An arrow, pointed in the same direction as the path,
bore the heading: INFORMATION DESK.  Directly ahead and slightly apart
from the main building was a continuous row of chalet-type structures
joined at right angles by a similar row leading back in his direction.
They were of the same neat, functional design as the school and
reception section and Fender guessed they were the staff's living
quarters.  Stephen Howard had briefed him on the Centre before Pender
had left, explaining that the Warden, as the principal was ominously
called, and his tutors were resident at the establishment.  Trees
loomed up darkly behind the Centre, dwarfing the buildings, making them
seem more squat than they really were.  He crossed the lawn, keeping to
the gravel path, and entered the reception area.

The rectangular hall was cluttered with single-panelled exhibition
stands displaying pictures of various animals and plants, accompanied
by written information on each subject.  The area was empty but there
was a reception window to his right.  He peered into the room beyond; a
woman was at one end typing busily and a man sat reading a book at a
table nearest the window.  The man, youngish, intense-looking, glanced
up at Fender.

"Yes, sir, can I help?"  he asked.

"My name's Fender.  I've come to see Mr.  Milton."  Fender had learned
to be discreet about his profession: people were still nervous of rat
catchers

"Oh yes.  From Ratkill, aren't you?"

Fender lifted his eyebrows in surprise.

The man grinned as he got up from the desk and came over to the window.
"It's all right, there's no secrets among the staff.  I'll just see if
he's in his office."

The young man disappeared through a door and reappeared a few seconds
later.

'Yes, he's there.  If you'd like to go through the door round to your
right, I'll take you to his office."

Fender followed the instructions and was met in the corridor beyond.

"I'm not sure we really need you people," the young man said as he led
the way.  We've seen signs of vermin, but they haven't done any bad
damage yet.  It's just the uh, law, you know?"

Fender nodded and went through the door which had been opened for him.
The Warden of the Conservation Centre stood and offered his hand across
the desk as Fender entered.

"Mr.  Fender?  I'm Alex Milton.  Didn't take Ratkill long to get
someone up here, did it?"

Fender shook the proffered hand and sat in the seat opposite.

Thank you, Will," Milton said to the man at the door.  "I'll see you
about the arrangements for tonight's lecture a little later on.  Would
you like some coffee, Mr.  Fender?"

The rat catcher felt like something stronger after the wearing drive,
but he smiled and said, "Coffee'll be fine."

Would you mind asking Jan for me, Will?"

"Right."  Will closed the door behind him.

The two men faced each other across the desk, Milton smiling and
slouched back in his seat.  He seemed to have forgotten why Fender was
there.

"Interesting place you have here," the Ratkill man said, breaking the
silence.

"Yes, it is," the Warden agreed enthusiastically.

"Have you been here long as Warden?"

Milton thought for a moment, his smile still beaming.  "Just over two
years, I think.  The Centre itself the Epping Forest Conservation
Centre, to give it its full title was only opened nine years ago, so
it's still in its youth."  He gave a small almost embarrassed laugh.
"In fact, most of my staff are rather youthful apart from myself and my
wife, of course."

Fender nodded politely, smiling at the man's self-deprecating humour.
He hoped the Warden would soon get to the business in hand.  Tell me
about your rodent problem," he prompted.

"Oh yes.  Mustn't waste your time."  The Warden leaned forward, elbows
on the desk, his face serious and his tones hushed.  "It started a
couple of days ago, actually.  Nothing much, just signs, you
understand."

"What kind of signs?"

Well..."  A light tap at the door interrupted the Warden's next words.
"Yes, come in," he called out.

The door opened and a small, thin girl, clad in jeans and sweater,
entered the room.  She carried a tray bearing two coffees, milk and
sugar, which she placed on the Warden's desk.

This is Jan," said Milton and the girl pushed her gold-framed glasses
back towards the bridge of her nose, giving Fender a nervous smile.

"Jan saves our lives every day by cooking our meals and providing us
with gallons of coffee," the Warden said as Fender smiled back at the
young girl.  "She's only filling in a year between school and
agricultural college, actually, but I must say, she'd make an excellent
chef.  Perhaps we can persuade you to remain one, eh, Jan?"

The girl shook her head and said in a quiet voice, "I don't think so,
Mr.  Milton."  She left the room, keeping her face low to hide a blush.
Fender hadn't seen a girl blush for quite some time.

"You were saying?"  he said as Milton handed him a coffee from the
tray.

"Saying?"

"About the rodent signs."

"Oh, yes, forgive me.  Yes, the signs.  Well, we keep examples of
forest wildlife in pens outside the classrooms the children love to see
the animals, you know.  Rabbits, hares, squirrels even had a fox until
recently.  A couple of nights ago, the pens were broken into."

Fender poured milk into his coffee, then looked steadily at the Warden.
Were the animals killed?"

"Good gracious, no!  Nothing like that'

Fender relaxed in his seat.

"No, it was just their food that was stolen.  But the animals, when we
found them next day, were in a state of shock, do you see?  Absolutely
terrified.  Hadn't even attempted to escape through the holes in the
wire left by whatever broke in."

"It could have been anything.  Maybe the fox you had before returned it
would if it knew it could find food here."

"Oh, no, the fox died."

Then another."

"Yes, it could be possible.  There are about fifty foxes that we know
of still living in the forest.  But we found droppings, you see.  And
they certainly weren't those of foxes."

"Did you keep them?  Can I see them?"

"Of course you can.  That's why you're here.  I'll take you along to
the laboratory in a moment."

What shape are they?"

"Roundish, spindle-shaped, I'd say."

Were they in groups?"

"Yes, yes.  Small groups."

Milton could read nothing in Fender's expression.

"Anything else?"  the rat catcher asked.

We have an outhouse round at the back of the buildings where we keep
the refuse.  All the kitchen waste is put there.  Yesterday morning we
found the bottom of the door had been gnawed through."

Fender sighed.  "Yes, rats would do that."

"Of course.  But you must understand we are in the middle of the forest
and are used to night-time marauders.  The Centre was built to keep out
our more persistent friends.  The bottom of the outhouse door is
reinforced with a metal strip.  A corner of the strip had been
completely pulled away."

Fender sipped his coffee.

The metal was securely attached to the door, Mr.  Fender.  It would
have taken a crowbar for a man to tear it loose."

"I'll have a look at it.  Have you laid any poisons?"

"No, we thought that best left to you.  The rule is to inform the
Ministry immediately rodent signs are found.  We're still not sure it's
rats, of course, but we thought the two unusual events warranted
investigation, don't you agree?"

Fender nodded.  He placed his coffee cup back on the Warden's desk and
began to rise.  "I'll look at those droppings ..."

The loud rap at the door startled both men.  It burst open without
waiting for a reply from the Warden, and a young girl dressed in denims
and a loose-fitting cardigan entered the room, closely followed by the
man called Will.  The girl looked breathless and she leaned with two
hands on the Warden's desk, her long dark hair falling across her face.
Milton was too surprised to speak.

"I've seen them, Mr.  Milton," the girl said, trying to keep her voice
calm.  They're down by one of the ponds."

"What are, Jenny?  What are you talking about?"

"Jenny's seen the rats, Mr.  Milton," Will said anxiously.

Milton glanced at him, then back at the girl.  "You have?"

Yes, yes.  I'm sure they were rats.  But they were so big," the girl
said, her face earnest.

"Sit down, Jenny, and just tell us exactly what you saw."  The Warden
indicated a chair opposite Fender's and as she sat, the girl noticed
the rat catcher for the first time.

"It's rather opportune, really," Milton said.  This is Mr.  Fender,
Jenny.  He's been sent from Ratkill.  I'm sure he'd very much like to
hear what you have to say.  Jenny Hanmer is one of our tutors."

Fender looked at the girl and, now that he could see her face fully,
realized she was very attractive, not at all 'tutorish'.  She brushed
her shoulder-length hair back and gave Fender a faint smile, her mind
too busy with what she had just witnessed to pay him much attention.

"Now, Jenny, tell all."  Milton smiled benignly at the tutor.

"I took my class down to the small pond the one before you get to the
Wake Valley Pond.  We'd only been there a few minutes when one of the
boys saw something swimming across the water.  I couldn't make out what
they were at first, but there were three of them."

"Not necessarily rats, then?"  said the Warden.

"We got a better look at them when they were climbing out.  The boy
threw something at them and they changed direction and made for the
bank.  We saw their whole bodies then."

"But it is rather, er, gloomy down there, isn't it?  I mean, are you
sure they weren't some other animal?  A water-vole would be the obvious
choice."

That was my first thought.  They were too big, though."

"Big enough to be dogs?"  said Fender.  Black dogs, mistakenly taken as
the giant Black rat, had caused several scares over the past few
years.

"No, I'm sure they weren't," the girl said, looking directly at Fender.
They had long pointed heads, and their ears were long too, and pink.
Their tails ... their tails were horrible."

"Did the children see them?"

"Yes, and their teacher, Miss Bellingham.  I didn't imagine them, Mr.
Fender."

"Where are the children now?"  The Warden had a worried look on his
face.

"I brought them back right away.  Miss Bellingham's with them in Class
Two.  It's all right, they're not frightened; we played it down, told
them they were coypus."

Fender grinned.  "And they believed you?"

"Most of them did it was rather shady down there.  It's not so unlikely
anyway.  Coypus live mainly in Norfolk and Suffolk, so it's not
improbable that some should find their way south.  A few of the
children were a bit doubtful, though."

"I think I'll just go along and have a word with them," said Milton,
rising.  We don't want them spreading false rumours about the forest
until we've checked this out."

We may have to stop people coming into the forest anyway," Fender said
quickly.

"Stop them?  That would be impossible, Mr.  Fender.  Have you any idea
how wide an area the forest covers?  And what about those who live
here?"

They'd have to leave."

"Now just a moment, let's not jump the gun.  Let's find out if these
monsters really do exist first."  Milton looked down apologetically at
the girl.  "Not that I doubt your word at all, Jenny.  It's just that
you may have been mistaken."

"I wasn't.  They were rats and they were over two feet long."  The
tutor's face was set firm.

"Yes, well, that's what Mr.  Fender is here to find out.  I'll have to
inform the Superintendent of the Forest, Mr.  Fender.  No doubt he will
want to see you."

"Fine.  But first I'd like you to take me back to this pond, Miss
Hanmer."  All eyes turned towards Fender.

"Do you think that's wise?"  asked the Warden.

These ... animals, whether they're rats or not, haven't attacked anyone
yet.  I don't think there's any danger in going to the spot where Miss
Hanmer last saw them they'll be well away by now.  We might find some
evidence which would help identify their species."

"It's up to you, Jenny," the Warden said.

"I'll take Mr.  Fender there, I know the pond," Will volunteered.

"It's okay, Will," Jenny said.  "I'll go.  I can show Mr.  Fender the
exact place."

"I'll go with you then," the young man offered.

"No, you'll have to take charge of Jenny's class," said Milton.  "I
really don't want the children or their teacher to think there's a
problem."

"But Miss Bellingham..."  Jenny began to say, before Milton
interrupted.

"I know Miss Bellingham quite well.  I don't think her eyesight is all
that reliable, do you?"

Jenny was lost for words for a moment.  "Now just wait a minute..."

The Warden held up a restraining hand.  "Please, Jenny, let me handle
this.  You go along with Mr.  Fender, will you?"

The tutor stood, glanced at Fender, and walked from the room.  Milton
grinned feebly and Fender followed the girl.

She was halfway down the narrow gravel path before he caught up with
her.

"Just wait a minute, Miss Hanmer," he said, taking her arm and bringing
her to a halt.  He selfconsciously dropped his hand when she pointedly
looked down at it.  "He is right, you know.  These things can snowball
into panic if they aren't handled carefully."

"But I saw them," she said resolutely.

"No one's doubting that.  But it has to be checked out before the alarm
bells go off."

She began striding down the path again and he kept pace, walking on the
grass beside her.

"Look, ever since the Outbreak people have been panicking over real or
imagined rats.  Usually, the ones we've found have been normal, either
Black or Brown, but no giants.  More often than not, they've been
animals of a completely different species.  Bad light, optical
illusions, over-nervous people all sorts of things account for the
sightings.  It's become as popular as spotting UFOs."

"I am not over-nervous.  Nor do I imagine things.  Nor do I believe in
flying saucers."

Then you're a better person than I am."

"Possibly."

He grinned at the sarcasm.  "Probably," he said.

She stopped and faced him.  "I'm sorry, Mr.  Pender..."

"Luke," he told her.

"Luke?"

"Short for Lucas."

"Lucas?"  She couldn't help smiling.

"Not my fault.  Parents.  I was conceived on honeymoon in a place in
lower Italy.  Lucania."

She laughed aloud.

"I was lucky.  They could have gone to Ramsgate."  His smile broadened
as she laughed again.

You sound like something out of a bad western," she said.

The way certain people regard my profession, I sometimes feel like
it."

"Okay, I'm sorry, Luke.  I didn't mean to get hurry with you."

"It's all right.  You've had a shock."

Jenny frowned.  "I meant it, you know, I wasn't mistaken."

"Let's check it out, then, eh?"

They began walking again and the tutor glanced down at Fender's feet.
You're going to get awfully wet."

"I've got boots in my car, and an old leather jacket.  I have to be
prepared to get mucky in this job."  He pointed towards his Audi and
they headed in that direction.

"How did you get into rats?"  the girl asked as he opened the back of
the car and reached in for a pair of hefty high-ankled boots.

"I wouldn't say I'm into them, exactly," he replied, removing his shoes
and lacing up the boots.  "It's just a living.  I was an entomologist
until an old friend of mine from Ratkill told me rodent control was the
thing of the future.  Big money, he told me, and all the vermin you can
eat."

Her reserve was beginning to break down.  People were usually wary of
him because of his profession, even though he and his colleagues had
become latter-day heroes due to the 'dangerous' work they carried out,
but he sensed a natural wariness in this girl, as if she rarely took
people at face value.  Maybe she had learned not to the hard way.

"And is it?  The thing of the future?"  she asked.

He took off his coat and reached for the short, worn leather jacket
inside the boot.  Well, it's big business now, but I suppose the fear
of rats will fade with time."

"It'll be a long while before people forget what happened in London."

"Yes, it will.  But that was a freak.  They'll forget it eventually."

"Unless it happens again."

He said nothing and lifted up a folded bundle of silver material that
lay on the floor of the boot.  He pulled out two pairs of large gloves
made from the same tough fabric and handed one pair to the tutor who
looked quizzically at him.

"Just a precaution," he told her.  "If by any chance we do run into
your friends, slip these on.  They'll give you some protection."  He
saw the fear in her eyes.  "Don't worry.  It really is just a
precaution; nothing's going to happen.  If I thought there was any real
danger I'd make you put the whole suit on here and now."

"I hope to God you're right."

So did he.

"Over there, the other side of the pond."  Jenny pointed towards the
opposite bank and Fender scrutinized the area.  We'll have to go
round," he said.  "Get a closer look."  The tutor wasn't happy about
the situation, but nevertheless she followed him as he skirted the
pond, their boots sinking into deep mud at the water's edge.  As they
walked, he pulled on the heavy gloves and told Jenny to do the same.
The undergrowth was much thicker on that side and he trod warily,
brushing aside foliage and examining the ground before him as he went.
Jenny kept close behind.

"It's just a little way ahead, I think," she said, looking over towards
the side they had just come from to check their position.  "Look, you
can see where they disturbed the reeds when they climbed out."

Fender approached the spot with even more caution and crouched down to
examine the mud for tracks.  The splayed claw marks told him what he
wanted to know.  "Let's see where they lead to."  Keeping low, he
pushed his way through the undergrowth, but soon he stood upright.  The
tracks have run out too many fallen leaves, I'm afraid."

"I want to go back."

Fender turned to study the girl.  She stood there, body stiff, eyes
shifting uneasily from left to right.  Her face was drained of
colour.

"What's wrong?"  he asked taking a step towards her.

"Can't you feel it?  The forest the forest is standing still."

The remark puzzled him, but as he looked around he began to sense it
too.  It was an eerie sensation, for the forest had become quiet,
hushed, the normal chatter of birds, the discreet rustle of timid
animals even the sound of the breeze hissing through the trees were
gone, leaving an unnatural, foreboding silence.  It seemed to weigh
down on him, a heavy thing.  An oppression.

"Let's go," she said again, her voice very quiet.

Fender was reluctant, despite his unease.  "I've got to find some
evidence of them, Jenny.  Those tracks back there could have been made
by any number of animals."

She knew he was right, but the anger still flared in her eyes.  She was
about to reply when a sudden crashing of branches made them both jump.
Fender scanned the area ahead, looking for the cause of the noise, and
he saw the swaying bush, its thin branches weighed down by something
that must have fallen from the tree overhead.  The object looked like a
red scarf, but from the way the bush was sagging, it had to be
something heavier than loose material.

He made his way towards the bush and Jenny said, "Don't," but he
ignored her.  She followed, not wanting to be left alone.

Fender swallowed hard when he realized what the object was.  The
animal's body had been torn apart, its insides exposed and half-eaten.
The rising steam told Fender the creature had not been dead long.

He felt the girl's presence beside him and heard her breath sharply
drawn in.  "It must have run up the tree to get away," he said.
Whatever did this followed."

"Rats climb don't they?"  Her voice was faint.

The Black rat does."

Only the animal's head and tail were intact, its fur shredded and
covered in blood.  He tried to identify it from the pointed skull and
dark markings on its tail.

"It's a stoat," Jenny said, and she walked away, round to the other
side of the tree.

Fender looked up into the branches overhead, suddenly aware that
whatever had killed the animal might still be there.  He found it hard
to believe a rat could have done this, for usually the stoat was the
hunter.  But then a group of giant Black rats could tear a human to
pieces.  Jenny's sudden cry startled Fender and anxiety swept through
him when he failed to see her.

He crashed through the undergrowth, brushing past the bloody corpse
which fell from its resting place, and swung round the tree, one hand
resting against its rough bark.  She was standing with her hands up to
her face, her whole body trembling and knees beginning to sag.  He
rushed forward and held her to him to prevent her from falling.

"Jesus Christ," he said when he saw what had caused her shock.

The tree was hollow, the opening facing him.  And the hollow and the
area just outside were soaked in blood, small lumps of wet flesh lying
all around, tiny, disjointed bones, smeared red, scattered in the dirt.
There were no recognizable animal parts among the debris; the stoats
must have either been dragged off or eaten whole there and then. Fender
cleared his throat uncomfortably.

There must have been a family of stoats," he said.  The rats must have
slaughtered all of them."

The girl did not reply and he realized she was weeping against his
chest.  He looked around at the undergrowth nearby, seeing the short
trails of blood disappearing into the shadows.  They were darker now.
The sun was beginning to dim and early evening was approaching.  The
trees around them suddenly seemed black and threatening.

"Come on," he said gently, "I think I've got all the evidence I need.
Let's get back to the Centre."

He led her back through the darkening forest, his eyes wary and
searching.

FIVE

The walls of the large house glowed pinkly as the last rays of the
fast-setting sun reflected off the white surface.  Fender had left his
car in the small car park at the entrance to The Warren and made his
way up to the house on foot.  He had passed two attached cottages
which, he assumed, belonged to forest keepers or whoever maintained the
grounds of The Warren, and taken a lane branching to the left.  He
approached the house from the rear, the rough road winding round till
it formed a circle enclosing a centre lawn set out before the house
itself, another road leading off from it towards the estate's main
entrance.  Before Fender had branched off, he had noticed the sign
pointing towards The Warren's offices and realized the forest's
administrative staff were kept separate from the main house in which
Edward Whitney-Evans, the Superintendent of Epping Forest, lived.

His own shadow was cast darkly before him as Fender strode past three
high windows, their glass reaching down to the ground.  White-painted
lattice-work covered with deep green foliage clung to the lower half of
the house, rising up on either side of the windows and joining above
them.  If the house came with the job, then the Superintendent's lot
was a happy one, Fender thought as he rang the doorbell.

The door opened almost immediately and a small, waspish woman peered
out at him.

"Mr.  Fender, is it?"  she said and before he had a chance to correct
her, she ushered him in.  "Mr.  Whitney-Evans is waiting for you."

She moved aside to allow him entrance and he stepped through the porch
into the main building.

Through there, sir," she said, indicating a door on the left of the
hallway.  He thanked her and entered the room finding it empty.  He
walked over to one of the deep windows and gazed out; the grounds
sloped away from the circular lawn and, even in the dusk, Fender could
see the estate was beautifully situated.  The Epping New Road, with its
heavy traffic, was completely screened from the house by trees and
shrubbery.  Beyond he could see the hills of woodland and it was hard
to consider he was so close to the world's largest city.

"Ah, Fender."

He turned to see a man in a dark grey suit standing in the doorway.

Tender, actually."

The man looked puzzled for a moment.  "I thought Milton said Fender
over the phone.  Not to worry.  Tell me what this is all about,
Fender."  He strode forward and settled himself in an armchair and
indicated a chair for Fender.  He was a squat man, who appeared to be
in his late fifties; a few streaks of hair were combed carefully across
his bald head, compensated by wispy locks curling around his ears and
resting on his shirt collar.  Enlarged eyes stared out at Fender
through thick lenses.

Slightly irritated by the man's gruff, no-nonsense tone, Fender sat and
deliberately took his time in answering.  There was silence for a
moment or so, each sizing up the other, the superintendent finally
becoming impatient.

Well?"  he said.

Fender cleared his throat.  "I was sent to the Conservation Centre by
Ratkill to investigate complaints by Mr.  Milton ..."

"Yes, yes, I know all that; Milton discussed it with me first.  When I
spoke to him a little while ago on the phone he said you'd found some
evidence.  That's why I asked him to send you over here.  I thought you
might have got here sooner -the Centre's only five minutes away."

"I wanted to examine the rat droppings Mr.  Milton had collected first.
Also, I wanted to see the door of the refuse building that had been
broken into."

"And what did you deduce from all this?"

"I'd say it's fairly certain that you have the Black rat living in this
forest."

Whitney-Evans frowned in displeasure.  "Fairly certain?  What does that
mean?  You're either sure or you're not."

Fender struggled to keep his voice even.  "I said fairly certain
because I haven't yet seen the rat itself.  All the evidence points to
it being the Black, though."

"But you could be wrong.  It could be another type of rodent."

"One of the tutors at the Centre, Jenny Hanmer, saw three of them."

"Yes, the Warden told me that.  He also said the pond in question is
extremely shaded and the only other adult witness has questionable
vision."

"But I went down to the pond myself with Miss Hanmer."

"And you found evidence that a family of stoats had been
slaughtered."

Torn to pieces."

"Yes, yes, but by what?  You, yourself, did not actually see the
assailants."

"No, but there's enough evidence now to assume ..."

"No, Fender.  We mustn't assume anything.  Do you realize the harm such
an assumption could bring to the forest?"

That's not the point.  If people are killed ..."

"Of course we don't want anybody to be killed by these creatures if
they exist.  But first, let's make sure they are a reality.  Surely you
can you must investigate further before you reach such an extreme
conclusion."

"Look, Mr.  Whitney-Evans, I can appreciate not wanting to spoil the
image of your beautiful forest, but if lives are in danger, there is no
choice in the matter.  Epping Forest will have to be cleared of
people."

"Impossible!"  The Superintendent stood, his face flushed red.  "Don't
you realize how densely populated Epping Forest and its neighbouring
forests are?  You can't just suddenly shift all those people on the
slight evidence you've produced."

The evidence is enough for me," Fender replied.

Whitney-Evans walked to the window.  Silent for a moment, he then
turned to face Fender again.  "It may be enough for you, but will it be
enough for your superiors?  Or the Ministry?"

"I think they'll listen.  They wouldn't want to risk another
Outbreak."

"I'm sure they wouldn't; that is not under debate.  What I -and I'm
sure they will take the same view am questioning, is your evidence."

"Look, I don't understand this.  Why are you resisting my attempts to
avert a dangerous situation?"

Whitney-Evans regarded Fender coolly.  "Have you any idea how much it
costs to maintain Epping Forest?"  he said finally.

What?  What's that got to do with... ?"

"It costs over 100,000 a year, Fender.  Money, I may add, that does not
come from the government, nor the public.  It comes from private City
funds."

"I don't see what that has to do with this matter."

The forest is governed by the Corporation of London; they are the
Conservators.  The actual management is carried out by a committee of
twelve, all an elected representative body of the City of London; they
are joined by four Verderers."

"Verderers?"  Fender asked, wondering where the sudden lecture was
leading.

They are members elected by the public to represent local interests.
The committee meets several times a year and, in fact, there is a
meeting due to be held in two weeks' time.  I intend to ask for a
considerable increase in the funds allocated to the forest."

"I still don't understand how that affects ..."

"Can't you see, man?"  Whitney-Evans' face had flushed red again.  "Can
you imagine the cost of evacuating the whole forest?  The cost of
quarantining 6,000 acres of woodland?  Do you think they would even
consider a rise in management allocation knowing the cost of such an
operation as you are suggesting?"  He raised a hand when Fender tried
to protest.  "But even worse, do you imagine they would even consider
taking on such a huge responsibility?  Absolutely not!  It would be
passed on to the government, who have tried unsuccessfully for years to
gain control of this green belt area.  Can't you see what they, the
great bureaucratic they, would do with this land?  It would become one
vast concrete estate!  Not all at once, I grant you, but a little at a
time under the guise of economic necessity!  Do you realize the value
of this land so close to the City?  My God, man, they'd eat away at it
until there was nothing left!  Oh, a few parks scattered here and there
just for cosmetic purposes; but it wouldn't be a nature reserve
anymore."  The Superintendent began to pace the room in his anger and
it seemed as if he had forgotten Fender's presence for a moment.

"Look, I can appreciate your worries, Mr.  Whitney-Evans, although I
feel they're a little exaggerated."

The Superintendent stopped his pacing.  "Exaggerated?  I can assure you
they are not.  I can show you countless court cases we've had in the
past over the acquisition of forest land, not to mention the constant
battle with the government who want to dissect and destroy the woodland
with their monstrous motor ways

"All the same, the law is quite clear on this: rat-infested areas have
to be sealed off immediately."

"Infested?  What evidence do you have of that?  You've seen a few signs
that rats may be living in the forest and you can't even say for sure
they are of the Black variety.  Don't you think if the place were
infested, the forest keepers would have discovered them by now?"

"I don't know.  There may just be a small group at the moment."

That, even if it's true, would hardly justify putting the whole damned
forest into quarantine."

"Or," Fender continued, undaunted, 'there may be hundreds of them.
Remember, after their near-extermination in London, those that survived
would have become even more elusive than usual."

Those that survived the extermination would have died of old age by
now."

"But their offspring would have inherited the fear.  The monster Black
has developed incredible intelligence according to all the reports:
they would certainly know how to keep themselves hidden."

Then, if that's the case, there can be no immediate danger, can there?"
Whitney-Evans' voice had taken on a new tone, softer, almost coaxing.
Fender decided he liked the man even less than before.

Then why this sudden evidence of them?"  he said firmly.  "Why are they
suddenly losing this timidity?"

"Just a combination of circumstances, Fender.  If and that's a big if
as far as I'm concerned if they do exist, they still haven't attacked a
human, have they?"

"Not yet.  But they might."

"Look, Fender, I've stated my case quite frankly to you.  Now, I'm not
trying to prevent you from doing your duty, Lord knows I haven't that
power, but I am asking you to reconsider your action.  Why not
investigate further before you recommend evacuation and quarantine?  I
have a staff of over seventy who I'm sure would be only too pleased to
assist you in any way possible.  My forest keepers and woodsmen could
help you in your search.  I'm not saying you shouldn't inform the
Ministry, of course, you must do that, but all I'm saying is, don't
jump to hasty conclusions.  By all means, bring your people in, but
surely we can keep what's the expression?  yes, a "low profile" on
this.  Until you're absolutely sure.  What do you say?"

Fender shook his head wearily.  "I'm sorry, Mr.  Whitney-Evans, I
really am.  But the risk is too great.  If anything nasty should happen
while we're still searching, then it would be my responsibility."

The Superintendent's tone was acid.  "No, not your responsibility,
Fender.  Your company's.  But I wonder what they would say about this
inflexible attitude of yours?"

Well, you can find out."  Fender rose and made for the door.  "Why
don't you ask them?"  He paused and looked back at the Superintendent,
whose face was, yet again, flushed bright red.

"I'll do just that, Fender.  I also have some very good connections in
the Ministry of Agriculture we work closely together, you know.  I'll
see what they have to say about the matter."

Fender could not be bothered to reply.  He resisted the urge to slam
the door behind him, and made his way out of the house.

"Bloody idiot," he allowed himself to say as he crunched his way back
down the lane.

By the time he got back to the Conservation Centre, phone calls had
been made.  His intention had been to inform the Warden of his
decision, then to get in touch with Stephen Howard at Ratkill, who
would advise the appropriate authorities.  But Alex Milton was waiting
for him in the reception area of the Centre, a concerned look on his
face.

"Ah, Mr.  Fender," he said, striding forward to meet the rat catcher We
weren't sure if you'd return to the Centre this evening.  We thought
you might go straight back to your company to make your report."

"No, I wanted to have a word with you first.  Can we go into your
office?"

"Of course.  In fact, I've just had your Research Director on to me. He
said he'd like you to ring him immediately if you showed up here."

Fender looked at the Warden quizzically.

"He said it was important," Milton said somewhat lamely.

Fender had his suspicions before he even picked up the phone.  He
dialled the Ratkill number and asked to be put through to Stephen
Howard.

"Stephen?  It's Luke."

"Ah, Luke.  Good.  Now what have you been up to there in Epping Forest?
Seems you've stirred things up."

"Meaning?"

Well, I've just had old Thoraton from the Ministry of

Agriculture on to me.  Says you've been upsetting a chum of his by the
name of Whitney-Evans.  Superintendent of the forest, isn't he?"

"Oh, for Christ's sake!  The man wants to do a cover-up.  He doesn't
want the forest to be evacuated."

The Warden looked both embarrassed and startled.  He sat down.

Howard's voice on the other end of the phone was sharp.  "Evacuate.
That's a bit drastic, isn't it?  What makes you think the Black rat is
in the forest?"

Fender quickly told him what he'd seen, been told, deduced.  The phone
buzzed with static for a few moments.

"Sorry, Luke, I'm afraid that's not enough."

"Not enough?  You've got to be kidding."

"No, old boy, I'm not.  Look, I'm going over there for a meeting.
Thornton's already set something up with this Whitney-Evans for nine
o'clock.  Can you hang around until then?"

"Yes, I can hang around."  Fender felt a heaviness dragging him down.
Howard had obviously been asked to soft-pedal by Thornton, who was a
Private Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food,
and a major contact between Ratkill and the government.  Ratkill had
always worked closely with the Ministry's Safety Pesticides and
Infestation Control Division, even though the Ministry of Defence had
become involved in the London Outbreak, and in the subsequent years
after the supposed elimination of the Black rat, they had become even
more united in their joint work.  Howard was unlikely to go against the
wishes of one of the Ministry's private secretaries, and it was obvious
Thornton was one of Whitney-Evans' 'good connections'.

"Are you still there, Luke?"  Howard's voice interrupted Fender's
thoughts.

"I'm still here," he said.

"Right.  The meeting will be held in the Conservation Centre itself.
Apart from the Warden, I'd like this girl, the tutor who says she saw
the rats, to attend, as well as the forest's head keeper.  Dugdale from
the Safety Inspectorate will also be there.  Don't worry, Luke, we'll
soon sort things out."

We'll need to.  Fast.  You know how the situation in London got out of
hand."

"Of course I do.  I was in the thick of it.  But look, I feel certain
this is just an isolated case."

"I wish I shared your confidence."

"I don't want you to discuss this any further, Luke, not until the
meeting."  The forced lightness had left the research director's
voice.

"In case I upset anybody else?"

"No, because the matter must be treated in the strictest confidence,"
came Howard's curt reply.

"A party of schoolchildren and their teacher saw the rats, too."

"Yes, but I understand they've been convinced they saw something
completely different."

"Oh, have they," Fender said flatly.

"Until later then, Luke?"

"Okay."  Fender replaced the receiver and found himself looking into
the eyes of Milton.  "I need a drink," he said.

"I wish I could join you," Milton replied, smiling apologetically. "I'm
afraid I have a lecture due to begin shortly and I have to greet our
guest speaker."

Fender nodded and left the Warden's office, suppressing the anger he
felt.  If anything disastrous happened while they wasted time ... And
yet, he could see their point of view.  It would be a massive operation
to clear the whole woodland area, and would undoubtedly send waves of
panic, not just through that green belt area, but through all the
surrounding districts.  London, itself.  And if it did prove to be a
false alarm ... He pushed the thought of consequences from his mind.
The girl had seen the rats, and she didn't seem the type who would put
the fear of God into everyone if she thought there might be some
doubt.

He walked the length of the corridor and entered the reception area.
Jenny Hanmer, talking to a tall, bearded man, saw him and gave him a
smile.  The bearded man turned at Fender's approach.

"Hello, Luke," Jenny greeted him.  This is Vie Whittaker, our Senior
Tutor."

Fender nodded.  He judged the tutor to be in his late-thirties,
prematurely grey hair streaking his close-cropped, black beard.
Whittaker looked fixedly at the rat catcher

"I'm rather disturbed at what Jenny tells me, Mr.  Fender," he said.

"It's something to be disturbed about," Fender replied.  He turned to
the girl.  There's going to be a meeting tonight, Jenny, here at the
Centre.  The powers-that-be want you to attend."

"But aren't they going to do something right away?"  Jenny asked.

They'll decide exactly what to do at the meeting.  First we've got to
convince them there really is a threat."

That's ridiculous!  Surely..."

"I know, I've just been through all that.  I suppose it's sensible to
hold an inquiry before they decide on a plan of action.  So far, you're
the only reliable witness, so it'll be up to you to assure them you're
not just over-imaginative.  The other evidence we have will help."

"Do you think they will be convinced?"  asked Whittaker.

Fender paused before he spoke.  To tell the truth, I just don't know.
My guess is that they'll play for more time.  All I want to do now is
to get a bite to eat and a beer.  Care to join me, Jenny?"

Jenny said, "Yes, I would," and Fender caught the sharp look the senior
tutor gave her.

"What about the lecture this evening?  Aren't you coming to that?"
Whittaker said.

"I don't think I'm really in the mood for "A Naturalist's Journey to
Iran and the Persian Gulf" at the moment, Vie," she replied.  "After
what I saw today, I could use a stiff drink myself."

"I'll see you later then."  Whittaker turned and strode off down the
corridor leading to the classrooms.

Fender ignored the exchange.  "Okay," he said, smiling at Jenny, 'lead
me to a pub."

They drove past the huge public house close to the Centre and headed
south, using the car's lights at full-beam because of the total
darkness that had descended on the forest.  The road had sudden dips
and Fender kept to its centre because of the rough banks on either
side, adjusting his headlights and pulling over to the left when the
occasional car approached from the opposite direction.  He noticed they
passed several high, bricked walls which he guessed hid some large
properties.  In a clearing to his left he saw lights shining.

That's a forest keeper's house," Jenny told him.  There are quite a few
scattered throughout the woodland."

"And what's that coming up on the right?"  he asked, pointing to a sign
ahead of them.

That's the Suntrap Field Study Centre."

"Anything to do with your place?"

"Not really.  We work together from time to time."

The moon suddenly appeared from behind rolling clouds and the landscape
was bathed in its silvery light.  They passed a farm, and then the road
swung hard to the right and they found themselves ascending a steep
hill, more houses on their right, a riding stable on the left.  The
public house was on the top of the hill, opposite a group of buildings
surrounded by a high wire fence.  "What's that?"  Fender asked.

"Oh, that belongs to the police.  It's a training camp for cadets. They
also have a firing range and a place for training their dogs."

Fender turned the car into the car park at the rear of the pub and
stopped.  He shivered in the cold night air as they crossed the tarmac,
heading for an entrance to the bars.  Looking around, he saw they were
quite high above the forest, gentle fields leading down into dense
woodland below them.  But what he saw in the flattened area immediately
next to the pub brought him to a halt.

"What is that, Jenny?  What are those buildings?"

Jenny followed his gaze.  "It's a mobile homes estate.  You know, like
caravans but with no wheels."

"Do you know how many houses there are?"

There are two estates over there, one of about twenty, the other about
thirty or forty.  They're separated by a farm.  Another one is at the
end of Hornbeam Lane, but not many people know about it it's very
secluded.  I think there are twenty homes on that."

"Christ," he said.  "I didn't realize the forest had such a heavy
population.  It may make us look silly, Jenny, but I just hope-to-God
we're wrong about the rats."

As he spoke, a heavy cloud covered the moon's brightness and he
suddenly felt vulnerable to the night.  He took Jenny's arm and guided
her into the welcoming warmth of the pub.

Onslaught

The creature shifted position in the bed of straw and damp earth, obese
body making movement difficult, legs no longer able to support the
great weight comfortably.  Others moved around in the darkness, mewing
sounds and the slivering of bodies occasionally breaking the silence of
the black, underground chamber.  They did not approach the creature in
the corner, fearing its wrath, knowing to approach could mean the
tearing apart of their own grey, swollen bodies.  Not by the creature
itself, but by the three black-haired guards that crouched nearby.

Tiny bones lay scattered around in the darkness and occasionally they
would be picked up and ground to a fine powder by powerful jaws.  There
was a restlessness among the sluggish bodies and the creature in the
corner sensed their mood.  A gurgling sound came from its throat and it
was joined by another, similar noise, close by, almost from the same
point in the darkness.  All movement stopped.  They listened.

The gross body thrashed around in the straw and the other creatures
flattened themselves against the ground, pushing themselves into the
rubble and exposing their fleshy necks in a ritual of self-abasement.

It was old now and did not remember the journey to this place, the long
journey through the underground tunnels, crouching, terrified in the
dark, as the huge things thundered over their heads, urging the others
on with high-pitched squeals, keeping them together, fleeing from where
they were hunted, where the extermination of their species was taking
place, instinct for survival their only ally.  They had been freed from
the cellar and had slain their liberators, eating the bodies before
venturing forth.

Inherited knowledge drove them below ground, for they had no adult to
lead them; they had devoured their mother in the final days in the
cellar.  The creature had dominated its brothers and sisters from the
beginning; although they were part of the same evolvement, its body was
different from theirs.  They were dark, covered in a blackish-brown
fur.  It was not.

It had led them through the tunnels, resting only when they were
completely exhausted.  The two weakest had been used for sustenance and
had hardly protested their deaths.  The group had gone on, following
the tracks, cautious when they heard human voices, knowing this was the
enemy, these were the hunters.  The fresh biting air that reached their
nostrils had shocked them and they had cowered in the darkness.  But
the dominant one had ventured forward and the others had followed.  The
night sky was above them and they clung to the shadows.

The others had wanted to leave the tracks then and go out to where
there were houses and living flesh, but it would not let them.  They
were still in the city, and that meant danger.  They hid when daylight
came, trembling, fortunate to have found another tunnel further on.
Then with the night, they found something completely new to them, and
they welcomed it.

They had never experienced the long flowing grass before, but they
relished its softness and the cover it afforded them.  It teemed with
small, living things and because they were still young, they forgot
their fear and wanted to play.  But their leader would not let them; it
knew that danger was all around.  It led them up the grassy embankment,
away from the railway track, away from the tunnels in which the trains
sped beneath the city, and into the woodland, a new world where they
could breathe the air and run free.  It could sense that the humans
were still there, but the further they went into the woodland, so the
presence became less noticeable.  They crossed hard, concrete strips,
fearful of the racing monsters whose eyes shone far ahead into the
night, and eventually, as dawn approached, they rested.  They were
still afraid, but it seemed the badness was over.

The group soon adapted to their new life and they never lost their
cunning.  They grew to a size that made them fearful to the other
animals of the forest, and they mated.  But the one whose body was
different from the others would not rest; it could not adapt as the
others had, for it knew they were not yet safe.  And it missed
something.  It felt unprotected in the open.

They journeyed further, always at night, always in a tight-packed
group, flowing through the grassland and skulking in dark places when
the sun rose.  They found the heart of the forest, and the dominant one
found the resting-place it needed, somewhere it could feel safe, where
it could hide its deformed body in constant darkness.  It had found the
perfect lair.

It had grown old, living twice the normal life-span of the creatures it
was derived from; and it had mated, creating ofFspring that were in its
own image.  Not many completely of its kind lived, and those that
survived were weak and not always able to fend for themselves.  Yet
they dominated the others of the litter, the dark-furred ones, and the
two strains lived together, the latter foraging for food and bringing
it back to the lair for the leader and its natural heirs.

It never left the confines of the lair now, for its misshapen body had
become too heavy, too bloated.  It still ruled over them all, but it
could sense the mounting tension.  Its followers were becoming
increasingly restless, both the black and those more like itself
craving for something they could not understand.  Although they were
now many in numbers, they had remained hidden for several years, their
inborn fear of what lay beyond binding them to the woodland, away from
the eyes of humans.  But it was as if their numerical strength was
making them bolder, giving them a courage they had not possessed
before.  And the craving grew stronger each day, the forest animals
they killed failing to satiate their strange yearning.

The thing in the corner knew what that craving was, for the group
hunger came from their leader.  The creature hungered for something
tasted before, long ago.

Its two heads weaved to and fro in the darkness and a stickiness
drooled from the mouths as it remembered, after so many years, the
taste of human flesh.

SIX

"Can't we stay in the car, Alan?  It's so cold out there."  The woman
pulled her coat tightly around herself and hunched down into the
passenger seat.

"Come on, Babs, it's not that cold.  I'll soon warm you up."  The man
leered across at her, and slipped a hand around her shoulder, pulling
her towards him.

"It's creepy," the woman complained.

We're too near the roadside here, Babs.  There's too many passing
cars."

Well, drive a bit further in."

Alan tried to keep the irritation from his voice.  "I can't do that,
darling.  The car might get stuck in the mud.  I won't be able to see
the ground properly in the headlights.  I might get jammed on a tree
root or something."

The woman sighed with resignation.  Why bother to protest?  Alan always
got his way in the end.  And she had to admit, she usually enjoyed it
when he did.

Alan Martyn was an estate agent, his offices in the nearby Loughton
area, and Babs Mrs.  Newell in the office was his secretary.  At
twenty-nine, he was up and coming; at thirty-five, she was down and
hadn't been coming enough.  Fifteen years of marriage and raising two
sons who were now teenagers had almost smothered any overt desires in
her; her lifestyle had reached its level and the sudden bumps, the
rises and falls, were only slight.  She should have been content, for
she was married to a good, if dull, man, and the boys had grown into
fine, if boisterous, young men.  The house was nice perhaps a little
small, but nice and they had a colour telly.  Even the dog was
obedient.

Sometimes she could have screamed with the niceness of it all.

Reg, her husband, was solid, salt of the earth, A GOOD MAN.  He didn't
wear carpet slippers around the house, nor did he smoke a pipe he
wasn't that bad.  But he did roll his own to save the expense of buying
cigarettes; and he did keep rabbits in the back garden; and he did bath
every Sunday and Wednesday, without fail; and he did always find time
to help the boys with their homework or answer their questions; and he
always took the dog out for a walk in the evening, no matter what the
weather; and he always offered to wash the dishes, even if she wouldn't
let him; and he always left his muddy shoes outside the front door; and
he had never raised a hand to her; and he always made love on Saturday
morning without fail; and he never asked her to try a new position; and
he never used anything other than his penis on her; and she had never
caught him masturbating.

Oh Reg, why are you such a fucking bore?

Alan's lips brushed against hers, roughly, greedily.  Alan was bad,
selfish, but he excited her.  Babs was aware that it was his difference
to safe, reliable Reg that made him so attractive.  He was a bastard,
beyond doubt, and he used her just to fulfill his own lusts.  But that
was all right; that was how she used him.

She would never leave her husband and the boys she loved them dearly.
But she was a woman, and she needed more than just cosy affection.  Reg
had his rabbits, she had -this.

Babs had always wanted to return to work, missing the contact with
outsiders, people whose lives she knew little of and therefore would
find more interesting than her neighbours or relations.  Housework was
humdrum, hard but un challenging and the house no longer held any
stimulation for her.  But outside work had come by as a necessity
rather than an indulgence: Reg's salary had become steadily worth less
week by week, inflation became the master of household decisions.  Reg,
as a production controller in an advertising agency, had no union
behind him to make sure his earnings kept reasonably level with the
ever-increasing price rises and so, at the instigation of Babs herself,
it was decided she should take a job again.  The boys were now old
enough to be less dependent on her, so there was no great problem in
that respect, and Reg was sensible enough to realize his wife needed an
outside interest.

"Come on, darling, it's been a long time since we've done it out in the
open."  Alan pushed his hand against the rough material of Babs' coat,
kneading her plump breasts in a circular movement.  "I'll get the rug
out of the back so you won't get damp."

She felt the excitement in her, a flush spreading across her chest
beneath her clothes.  "What if someone comes along, Alan?"  she asked,
but her tone told her weekday lover she was willing.

"Don't be daft, Babs.  There won't be anyone walking in the forest when
it's this dark."

"I won't be able to stay too long."

He looked at the luminous dial on his watch.  "It's only ten-to-eight.
What time did you say you'd be in?"

"About half-past.  I told Reg we'd be going over the books tonight.  He
said he'd do the boys' dinner."

"Good old Reg," Alan said distractedly, his lips finding and moistening
Babs' ear and, equally distractedly, he thought, fucking idiot.

Babs' breasts were rising and falling as though air was being blown
into them, and she squeezed her thighs tightly together, feeling the
moistness between them.  Alan was such a good lover, so thoughtful, so
unselfish And she shivered with pleasure so demanding.  Babs wondered
if he was as demanding with his young wife.

"Come on then, Alan," she said, an urgency in her voice now.  "Let's
find a sheltered place, though."

He was out of the fawn-coloured Capri in a flash, opening the boot and
reaching for the rug inside.  Babs stepped from the car, closing the
door behind her and making sure it was locked.  It was one of the
things Alan was serious about, his car.  She looked around, the chill
night air almost quelling her excitement, and thought the forest looked
very unreal in the moonlight.

"Okay, Babs?"  Alan was beside her and she knew his shortness of breath
was due to excitement.  He loved to experiment, did Alan, loved to try
new things all the time.  In the seven months she had known him six of
them carnally they must have investigated every position there was.
Even though she was the more mature in years, she had come to it as a
young girl, eager to learn, almost desperate to experience. Lunch-times
in the office, when the others had gone out and she and Alan had
pretended to work on, they had disappeared into the back room where the
records of all their clients were kept and made love among the filing
cabinets -on the floor next to them, up against them, even on top of
them.  He had beaten her buttocks with a belt, used her anus as a
vagina, bitten her breasts until she screamed, almost choked her with
his spurting semen.  She had sat on his face and made him drink her
juices, had painfully bound his penis and testicles with his own tie
and yanked him yelping around the filing room, had straddled, ridden
and raped him, had smeared him with face cream and manipulated him.  He
had loved it all.  And she had loved it all.

On the few occasions they had managed to get away together to Reg it
was business conventions, to the office, who were not fooled, it was
coinciding holidays or, surprise, surprise, mutual illnesses they
indulged themselves to the full, rarely leaving the hotels they had
booked into.  Masochism and sadism were attempted but only by mutual
consent and only at amateur status; neither liked to hurt or be hurt
that much.  Bondage was fun but it made the wrists chafe.  Wearing each
other's underwear was okay if the lights were off.  After a while, when
their imagination for new experiences seemed to have become exhausted,
they both realized there was more enjoyment in normal intercourse.  It
just depended on where you did it.  Neither cared to look into the
future, to where their relationship was leading, for their excitement
was always in the present, never tomorrow or the day after.  They were
not in love, but they loved what they did, and when it ended, that
would be the end.

The moon suddenly disappeared and they were plunged into darkness.

"I don't like this, Alan," Babs said, nervously.

"It'll be out in a minute, don't worry.  Come here, and have a
cuddle."

He pulled her to him and pressed his body hard against hers, his eyes
staring over her shoulder into the darkness.  He didn't care too much
for the dark himself.  He breathed a silent sigh of relief when the
moon appeared once more.

Taking her hand, he pressed on farther into the undergrowth, pushing
the higher foliage away with his hand, the rug draped over one
shoulder.

"Not too far, Alan," Babs pleaded.

"No, darling, just a bit further.  It's nice and thick just ahead.
It'll screen us from the road."

A scuttling noise made them stop.

What's that?"  Babs whispered.

Alan listened for a few moments, but heard nothing more.  "Must have
been an animal.  We probably scared it."

He moved on and she meekly followed.

This'll do," he said leading her down into a slight dip, wondering why
he had whispered.  He stamped on the grass, trampling any gorse that
might be there, then threw down the rug, pulling each corner
straight.

"Okay, lover?"  he said, his face faint and white in the moo night

"I'm not sure, Alan," she answered, but he knew she wanted him as much
as he wanted her.  He pulled her down on the rug and began to unbutton
her coat and she forgot about the forest and night creatures.  Babs'
plumpness was of the firm, springy kind, her figure rounded
provocatively rather than flabbily, and Alan's excitement grew when her
breasts and stomach became exposed to the moonlight.  He bent his head
and kissed her neck, lowering himself so his lips brushed against the
tops of her breasts which threatened to spill over the silky material
of her bra.  His tongue drew a slivery trail over her stomach, sudden
goose-pimples making her flesh hard and brittle.

Although the cold made her shiver, it seemed to add a new dimension to
their lovemaking, the chill numbing her on the outside, warmth flooding
through her on the inside.  And the stars above her, the air around
her, gave the feeling that they were being observed and that added to
the thrill.  The goose-pimples made her body lose its numbness, made it
tingle, tickle when he touched her.  He pulled her arms free of the
coat and began to slip the blouse from her shoulders.

"No, Alan," she protested, 'it's too cold for that."

He kissed her lips and ignored the protest, pulling the blouse free. He
looked down at her white, bare shoulders, at her face staring up at
him, yearning yet innocent, and, for a moment, he almost loved her.
Almost, and only for a moment: desire quickly overwhelmed emotion.  He
reached behind her and undid the clasp holding the bra together, then
slid it down along her arms.  He pushed her back onto the rug and began
to tug at the skirt.  After the initial struggle over the hips, it
pulled away easily from her legs.  Her tights came next, along with her
shoes.  He took his time with the panties, touching her first through
the flimsy material, making her squirm and causing her to grab his hand
to guide it more skilfully, urging his fingers to reach inside.  He
pulled away, knowing her pleasure would take her too far, upset their
timing.

Her body looked like white marble as he stood and gazed down on her:
soft, yielding marble that could absorb his own body.  Her hands hooked
into the sides of her panties and pulled them down over her hips, over
her ankles, over her feet.  She delicately placed them to one side,
then lay back on the rug, her legs slightly apart, a small black
triangle the only contrast against her pale skin.

Alan quickly threw off his clothes, letting them fall in an untidy
heap, knowing he would regret it later when he would be scrabbling
around in the dark searching for them and feeling the cold; but for
now, it hardly mattered.  All he cared about was being joined with that
wonderfully passionate body lying at his feet.  He fell to his knees,
then smothered her with his own body, pressing against her, moving and
sliding, squeezing and caressing.

Her arms encircled his waist, moved up to his shoulders, back down to
his buttocks, pulling him against her, sinking her fingers into the
fleshy parts.  Her knees rose on either side of his thighs and she
hooked her heels around his calves, using her legs to pull him in
tighter.

His mouth encircled a nipple and he drew his breath in, making the
nipple erect and angry red.  He sought her lips, his hand giving the
abandoned breast rough comfort.  Soft moans of pleasure were escaping
her now and he had to control his own murmurings, not wanting to make
too much noise just in case there really were others in the forest. But
as their movements became more frantic, so their appreciation grew
louder.

Babs reached down for him, wanting him inside her, no longer prepared
to prolong the foreplay.  She found his penis and heard him groan, then
she pulled it towards her, her legs spread wide, heels off the rug now
and making indents in the earth.  He jerked his hips back, when he felt
the lips of her vagina, and kept his organ there, teasing her with its
touch.

"Alan, please," she implored, and he was smiling in the darkness and
she was smiling too, wanting him inside but wanting the game to go on.
He deliberately pushed himself away and changed her small cry of
disappointment to one of delight when he sank his head between her
thighs and thrust his tongue into the deep moist passage.  Her hips
rose from the rug, her whole body moving frenziedly, and he had to hold
her in a tight grip so he would not lose her.  She thrust her body out
to meet his teasing lips and tongue and he brought his knees forward to
support her weight more easily.  He lifted one thigh so it was over his
shoulder, then the other, her legs closing around his head in a grip he
thought might flatten his ears permanently.  He was finding it
difficult to breathe, but she refused to loosen her hold, using her
hands and the backs of her legs to draw him in further, her neck and
shoulders supporting the weight of her upper body.

Alan thought he might suffocate and was ready to panic when he felt her
body go stiff and taut in the last paroxysms before orgasm.  Her hand,
reaching beneath her buttocks and finding his penis erect in his lap,
encouraged him to make the final effort and he plunged as deeply as he
could, stretching the retaining tendon at the base of his tongue until
he thought it might tear, her moving hand causing the pleasure in his
lap to mingle with the pain in his head and lungs, the pain somehow
enhancing the pleasure, the pleasure somehow nullifying the pain.

She failed to hold back her cries and, at that stage, didn't care;
Alan's flesh-enclosed ears did not even hear.  Her arched back became
wet from him as both bodies convulsed with their separate releases, and
their figures created a bizarre, trembling sculpture in the moonlit
clearing.  They became locked rigid for the last dying seconds of
orgasm, then their bodies slowly crumpled to the ground.  Lying there
breathless, chests heaving, they allowed their frantic hearts to slow
before moving together again.

Alan pulled her coat over them and they huddled together, their bodies
warm but aware that the chill would soon bite its way in.

"Alan, Alan, thank you," Babs said when her breathing had become more
controlled.  "It was lovely."

Alan could only grunt, the sound muffled, for his head was snuggled
against her breasts beneath her coat.  He felt utterly exhausted and
his lips were sore.

Babs ducked under the coat and lay her head close to his.  "Didn't you
think it was lovely?"  she said.

Alan stretched his legs down and the grass tickled his feet.  He
quickly drew his knees up again.  "Yes, Babs, terrific."  But now,
satiated and beginning to feel cold, he thought about getting home;
he'd told Marjie he wouldn't be too late.

Babs lifted her head to kiss his cheek, then turned and lay on her
back, limbs stretched akimbo, a contented smile on her face.  Her body
was still warm from their lovemaking and even her exposed feet refused
to acknowledge autumn's frigid presence.  Something prickled one foot
and she moved it away, closer to the other.

"Darling," she said, watching a cloud swallowing the moon, 'have you
ever wondered why it's so good with us, I mean."  She lifted the edge
of the coat and looked down at him, waiting for an answer.

"No, Babs," he replied.

She returned her gaze to the heavens.  "It's never been this way with
Reg, not even when we were first marrried."

The top of Alan's head appeared as though he were testing the air
before emerging fully.  "I suppose we're just physically compatible,"
he said.  "Some people are.  Some are compatible mentally, others
physically.  Me and you are physical."

"Not just that, Alan."  She was a little hurt at the suggestion.

"Oh, no, not just that, Babs," he quickly assured her.  "It's just that
some people are more, er, more energetic than others.  But I think our
minds are tuned in as well.  We do seem to understand each other."  He
wondered if he could sneak a look at his watch without her seeing.

Babs tucked her arms beneath the coat, the chill beginning to reach
her.  Why fool herself?  Alan wanted one thing from her and she wanted
one thing from him.  Sex was also a thing of the mind, and that was
where they both tuned in mentally.  She wondered if Reg had given the
boys their dinner yet.

Something prickled her foot again and this time, her senses beginning
to lose their dullness, she became alarmed.

It might not just be a leaf, or grass, or a twig touching her; it might
be an animal.

"Alan!"  she said sharply and began to sit up, the coat falling and
revealing her ample breasts.  It took a fraction of a second to
register the pain, then she screamed and jerked her leg up, reaching
for her injured foot, and she screamed again, louder, when she felt the
two bloodied stumps that were left of her toes.

Alan jumped up, frightened by her cries, and looked around, trying to
see what had happened, what had hurt her.

"Babs, what is it?"  He grabbed her shoulders and tried to hold her
still.  What happened?  Tell me!' His own voice had risen to a
shriek.

"My foot!  Something's bitten my toes off!"  she screeched.

"Oh God!  It's all right, Babs.  Calm down.  Let me have a look!"

But there was no time to look, for the rat, excited by the blood, ran
forward and attacked her foot again, sinking its incisors deep, through
the hand that clutched the injured limb, and into the foot itself. Alan
shrank away when he saw the black creature, not knowing what it was,
thinking it must be a wild dog because of its size.  The moon suddenly
burst from its cloud covering and dread hit him as he recognized the
beast.  The pointed nose, the long sleek body with its hunched lower
back, the stiffened tail it was a Black rat!

Babs' screams startled him from his paralysis; he grabbed the rat at a
point near its neck and pulled.  The screams reached a new pitch as
Babs' flesh was ripped and Alan fell backwards, the struggling creature
still in his grasp.  It twisted its head and bit into Alan's thigh,
gnawing at the flesh and swallowing blood as it burrowed deeper.  The
main artery was severed and more blood gushed into the rodent's throat,
almost choking it, forcing it to withdraw its head.  The blood jetted
from the wound in a high arc and the air was full of its smell.

"Oh, no, no!"  Alan cried, for he knew damage to that artery could be
fatal.  He clutched at the leg to try and stem the flow, but the blood
spurted through his fingers and splattered his face.  The rat,
squirming between his legs and expelling Alan's blood from its throat,
turned and leapt at his chest, raking the skin down to the bone with
its claws.  It clung there and, as Alan toppled backwards, it began to
snap its way into his throat.  The others, those that had been more
hesitant, crept out from beneath the clearing's surrounding
undergrowth, still cautious, for the fear of man was inbred, but
becoming bolder as the sweet blood aroma aroused them.

Through tears of pain, Babs saw the approaching black shapes, and she
too knew their meaning.  She wanted to help Alan, but she was too
afraid; she wanted to run, but her fear made her freeze.  All she could
do was bury herself beneath the coat, her knees tugged up into her
chest, her hands clutching at the material, holding it tight around
her.  The pain in her foot was excruciating and the terror in her mind
incapacitating.  She prayed, the words tumbling from her lips in a
garbled flow, that the creatures would leave them, would fade back into
the night, would return to the hell they had come from.  But Alan's
screams told her they wouldn't.  And the tugging at the coat, the
sudden sharp, exploratory nips, told her the rats wouldn't leave until
she and Alan had been devoured.

As the bites began to puncture her flesh and the agony made her body
unfold and writhe, she saw Reg and the boys sitting around the dinner
table, Kevin, the youngest, saying, "Mum's late, Dad ... Mum's late ...
Mum's late ..."

It was past midnight and no sounds had come from the inside of the tent
for at least an hour.  It stood alone, like a canvas sentinel, in a
corner of the wide field, the forest a dark backdrop.  Liquid, almost
frozen, clung to the stiffened blades of grass around the tent, but
inside it was snug and warm, heat from the boys' bodies providing its
own central heating.  A small night-light glowed weakly in the centre
of the floor space, the seven slumbering boys and their supervisor
spread around it in giant cocoon shapes, dreading the cold dawn which
would force them to shed their sleeping-bag skins.

Gordon Baddeley, the supervisor, slept to one side, a one-foot gap
between him and the nearest boy as though the dividing line were a wall
behind which authority rested.  Gordon maintained that such abstract
symbolism was important.

The boys, their ages ranging from twelve to fifteen, were all from a
Barnardo's home in Woodford, and this was their outdoor 'survival'
week.  There hadn't been much to survive, for the nearest shop was
under two miles away, and wild lions, tigers and crocodiles were not
reputed to inhabit that part of Epping Forest.  The younger boys,
however, did believe bears roamed free in that particular area.  The
field was empty of any other form of life, for it was not one of the
official forest camp-sites, but a certain benevolent Lord
Something-or-Other the boys could never remember his name allowed the
Woodford orphanage to use that corner of a field on his estate for
camping purposes.  As he did not live on the estate any longer but
rented the land out to local farmers, he was only a mythical figure to
the boys, vague and aloof, like God.

Gordon Baddeley had been a Barnardo boy himself a few years before and
was, so everyone said, a shining example of the goodness and honesty
that could come from an orphanage background.  After only three years
in the outside world, working in a supermarket as a shelf-filler,
winning promotion to assistant on frozen meats, he had returned to the
orphanage that had reared him, turning his back on success because he
wanted to help those like himself, the underprivileged.  The home had
been proud to accept him, although it wasn't common practice to take
back those who had left, for Gordon had been an exceptional boy.
Well-mannered, soft-spoken, hard-working, no outward emotional problems
he was a boy the staff could point at and say: "You see, it works. 
Even though we can't give them the love and affection of true parents,
we can turn out well-balanced young people like this."

Not that Gordon was regarded as soft by the other boys; on the
contrary, he was looked upon as 'a tough nut'.  He was friendly but
firm, could be rough but not unkind, funny when he wanted to be and
serious when others wanted him to be.  No chip on his shoulder, no
nurtured grievances; he seemed to like most people and most people
seemed to like him.  All in all, they said, he was the perfect Dr.
Barnardo boy.  And after three years on the outside, he had come to
realize that was all he ever wanted to be.

The world frightened him.  It was too aggressive and too big.  There
were too many strangers.  When out on the streets, he ran everywhere;
it was as though he were naked and that by moving swiftly he could
shorten the period of exposure.  It was a common enough syndrome among
fledgling orphans, that awkward reaction to the world in general, but
most managed to overcome their uneasiness in time.  But not so Gordon;
he missed the home and its security to a distressing degree.  The
orphanage had found him a bed sitter in the house of a friendly and
tight-knit family, and their very closeness towards each other had made
him feel even more the intruder.  They tried to make him feel welcome
and he accepted their hospitality with due gratitude, but the more time
he spent with them the more he was aware of what he had missed in his
own upbringing; he felt no resentment, but he did feel different.

Girls were a problem, too.  He was attracted to them and several in the
supermarket where he worked were kind towards him, yet again he felt
there was a barrier between him and them, that he could only watch
their world through an invisible glass screen.  Given time he would
have joined the people inside, but the loneliness of the interlude
between became too hard to bear.  Inside the home he had been someone;
outside he was nothing.  He returned and they turned his defeat into
triumph.  The home was his home, and it was there he wished to stay.

Gordon turned in his sleep and his eyelids twitched, then opened wide.
He stared at the tent's sloping ceiling for a few moments, his
dream-thoughts tumbling over themselves to disperse.  The night-light
gave the slumbering shapes in the tent an eerie, green tinge as he
looked around to see if anyone was awake.  He listened for the
tell-tale and not uncommon sob in the night, the sudden spasmodic jerk
from a curled-up form beneath a tightly clutched covering, but the
snores and sighs of the sleeping boys assured him all was well.  Then
what had caused him to awaken?

He lay in the gloom and listened.

The soft scratching noise made him turn his head towards the canvas
wall of the tent and the sound stopped.  He held his breath.

Something pushed against the coarse material, something low, near the
ground.  The bulge was at a point near his hips and it suddenly began
to move towards his head.  Gordon carefully slid his sleeping-bag
encompassed frame away from the protuberance and the movement outside
came to a halt.

It was as though whatever was out there had sensed his presence, had
been aware of the movement inside.

Gordon had to restrain himself from crying out and leaping away from
that side of the tent.  It would frighten the younger boys, he told
himself.  Besides, it was probably only a fox or some other curious
night animal and it would never penetrate the tough canvas.  He slowly
unzipped the sleeping-bag and eased out his arms.

The bulge began to move again, upwards, towards his face, and he saw it
was at least a couple of feet long.  It had to be a fox!  Maybe, but
not likely, a badger?  Whatever the creature was, it wasn't very tall.
Or was it just crawling along on its stomach?  It could be a dog.  The
movement stopped again and the bulge seemed to press even further in.
Gordon drew his head away, but it was still less than a foot from the
straining canvas, and he had an uncanny feeling that the creature
beyond could see through the material, could smell his fear.  Gordon's
free hand groped down towards his side and scrabbled around for the
torch he always kept close by when camping.  The boy nearest to him
stirred restlessly as Gordon's hand brushed against his sleeping-bag,
but the searching fingers finally closed around the cold tube of metal.
The torch had been pushed to one side by Gordon's sliding body and had
come to rest against the nearest boy's sleeping form.  Gordon gripped
the handle tightly, then froze as the thin, scratching sound came to
his ears once more.

With a barely suppressed cry he swung the heavy torch in an arc and
struck hard at the swelling and the canvas became slack again, the
creature obviously having fled.  He thought he heard a high-pitched
squeal as the makeshift weapon had struck, but couldn't be sure it
could have been the screaming inside his own head.

Gordon switched on the torch, keeping it low, his own body screening
the light from the rest of the dimly lit interior, and studied the
bright, circular shape of canvas before him.  He settled back into his
sleeping-bag, but kept the torch on, studying the loose material to see
if the creature's scratching had caused any damage.  No, it was still
intact; it would take more than a nosey old fox to make a hole in such
tough canvas.  His body began to relax and his breathing became more
even; his thumb moved against the switch to turn off the harsh beam of
light, and it was then that a heavy weight threw itself at the tent's
side, the bulge showing clearly in the centre of the circle of light.

The scratching sound became frantic and Gordon gazed on, mesmerized as
a small tear appeared in the canvas and a long curving claw pushed its
way through.  The rent tore downwards in a violent movement, then the
claw disappeared to be replaced with tiny, scrabbling protuberances on
either side of the hole.  Gordon screamed as the two sets of claws
broke through and ripped the material to shreds before his eyes.  The
black, bristling-furred body that launched itself through the gap
lunged at Gordon's exposed face and sank its teeth deep into the open
jaw, knocking him backwards, rolling with him onto the startled boys
trapped inside their sleeping-bags.

They cried out in alarm, not realizing what was happening to their
supervisor, the thrown torch shining uselessly into the folds of a
sleeping-bag, the dim night-light not strong enough to explain the
writhing shapes.  The boy nearest the torch managed to push his arm
free and make a grab for it.  He shone the beam towards the screaming
figure, but none of the boys understood just what clung to their
supervisor's bloody face.  A boy near the tent's wall shouted as he saw
something black scramble through a gaping hole in the canvas, and the
boy with the torch shone it in that direction.

Gordon choked on his own blood as he tried to push the creature away
from his face, its claws raking his chest into a bloody mess.  Its
teeth were locked into his jaw bone and he could not tear them loose.
He knew the animal had the strength and the weapons to kill him, but
what he saw made him react almost automatically, as though once more he
was viewing life through a glass window.  This time, though, he was on
the inside he was part of that life and the others, the black
creatures, were breaking through the glass to reach into his world.  He
knew he had to stop them.

The pain was blinding, yet it meant little as he rolled his body
towards the gap, dragging the creature with him.  He could feel the
bone in his jaw splintering and cracking, and the blood was running
down inside his body, hindering his breathing, but his mind seemed
almost apart from it, telling him one thing over an dover again: Stop
them coming through, block the hole with your body.

He knew he was there, knew his back covered their entrance, preventing
them from pouring in.  And he knew they were eating him, their teeth
gnawing into his back, snapping around his spine and pulling.  He knew
the creature at his face was trapped by its own teeth at his jaw, but
nevertheless was busy sucking his blood, draining him of life's
fluid.

But he didn't know that other bulges were appearing all around the
tent's walls, the scratching sounds mingling with the panic-stricken
cries of the boys inside, and the canvas material puncturing in long,
tearing gashes.

Dawn had begun to tip the treetops with a golden rim as the rising sun
decisively cut its way through the mists.  It was not unusual to find
the Reverend Jonathan Matthews trudging down the lane from his vicarage
towards the old church at such an early hour for, in recent years,
sleeping had played a less important part in his life.  The first rays
of light projecting their leafy pattern onto his bedroom wall had
become an increasingly welcome sight as the approaching day gave relief
to the night's loneliness.  Since his wife's untimely death eight years
before, the vicar had had no one to confide in, no one to give him
comfort.  He had often considered speaking to his Bishop of his
latter-day doubts, his spiritually debilitating fear of death, but had
decided he would fight the battle alone.  God would surely give him the
grace to overcome his lack of faith.

He pulled the scarf concealing his clerical collar tighter around his
neck, his frail body all too vulnerable to the morning dampness.  Again
and again he asked himself why such troubles of the mind should plague
him in his later years when his beliefs had been so strong before?  He
felt somehow it was connected with the forest itself.  In his
imagination the brooding menace in the surrounding woodland seemed to
represent death's constant presence, always there, lurking just out of
sight, watching and waiting for the precise moment in which to reveal
itself.  For him, the forest had once been a place to love; now it had
become a symbol of his own trepidation.

The vicar entered the covered gateway to the church and paused to gaze
up at the ancient building's steeple.  It wasn't high, the pinnacle
barely topping the highest branches of the surrounding trees, yet it
reached upwards in solid defrance of its earthly base as though it
could pierce the heavens themselves, and feed through its funnel shape
the souls of the faithful.  Its spiritual brashness gave his heart a
sudden uplift.  Doubts were a part of serving, for if there were none
there would be no searching for answers, no obstacles to surmount no
tests to be judged by.  This was his time of testing and when it was
through he would have sturdier faith, a stronger belief in God.

The little church always gave him this sudden surge of optimism, which
was why he often visited it so early in the morning.  The negative
thoughts of the night had to be swiftly allayed if he was to survive
the day, and a quiet hour at the altar helped him build his barrier.
His feet crunched along the narrow gravel path running between the
gravestones towards the church porch, his eyes avoiding the slabs of
grey on either side, and it was only when his hand was on the circular
metal handle of the door that he heard the scrabbling sounds that came
from the rear of the building.

He slowly turned his head in that direction, a curious coldness
stiffening his spine.  Listening intently, he tried to place the sound.
It was as if earth was being scattered, the sound of someone or
something digging.  It would have to be an animal of some kind, for he
could not recognize the familiar thud of a spade biting into the earth,
nor the dull clump as the tossed soil struck the ground in one loose
lump.  This was a ceaseless barrage of scattered dirt.

The splintering of wood made him jump.

Dread rising in him, he left the porch and continued on down the path,
his footsteps loud, wanting to warn whatever was behind the church of
his approach, wanting the area to be deserted before he reached it.

Who's there?"  he called out and for a moment, there was silence.  Then
the scrabbling noise began again.

The vicar reached the corner of the church, the ground beside the path
dropping away to a lower level, stone steps leading down to the
grass-covered graveyard.  From there he could see the freshly opened
grave.

It was the plot in which old Mrs.  Wilkinson had been laid to rest the
day before, untidy piles of earth lying in scattered heaps around the
rough, circular hole.  The gnawing of wood told him the worst.

Rage made him tear down the steps.  What animal would burrow into the
earth for the flesh of a human corpse?  He reached the edge of the hole
and cried out at the sight below.

The hole was wide and deep, a pit with acute sloping sides.  At the
bottom was a mass of squirming, black furry bodies.  He could not
recognize the animals at first, for the pit was darkly shadowed, the
sun still hidden behind the trees, but as he watched, he began to
establish individual shapes.  Even then he wasn't sure what the
creatures were.

One emerged from the writhing mass, its mouth full of dried meat, and
scrambled over the backs of the others towards the side of the pit.
Just before the gap it had left behind was closed by other eager
bodies, the vicar saw directly into the damaged coffin.  The sight of
white broken bones stripped of all flesh made him sink to his knees,
bile clogging his throat to be expelled onto the undulating mass below.
He wanted to run from the terrible scene, but the convulsions wracked
his body painfully, causing him to sway precariously, his fingers
digging into the soft earth.  He knew these creatures now they were the
harpies of his own conscience, come to torment him, letting him know
death was not sacrosanct, the body could be further defiled.

The Reverend Matthews hadn't noticed the other rats in the graveyard,
hidden in the grass, behind the trees, crouching beneath gravestones;
those that had silently watched him enter the church grounds, followed
his progress along the path with black, evil eyes, creeping forward,
their bodies close to the earth.  He wasn't aware that they were all
around him, moving closer, haunches quivering in anticipation.  It took
long seconds for him to realize what was happening when the first one
bit into his ankle, calmly eating into his flesh without haste or
aggression.

And by the time he had screamed and struck out at the rat it was too
late, for the creature's companions were already launching themselves
at his body, landing heavily against him, teeth snapping and claws
scratching for a hold, toppling him over, down into the pit among the
others, who welcomed the new, warm meat and the satiating blood that
ran from it.

In an effort that was brought about by terror overriding all pain, he
gained his feet and tried to scramble up the steep incline, long black
bodies clinging to him and pulling him back, but there were still more
waiting for him up there.  His hands grabbed at the grass, trying to
haul himself from the pit, and the rats bit off his fingers one by one,
the small bones proving no problem for the razor-sharp incisors. Unable
to grip, he slid back down, one foot falling into the open coffin,
sinking in the remnants of the old woman's now masticated flesh.

One of the creatures followed him down and for a few seconds he gazed
into its black eyes, the twitching pink nose only inches away.  The rat
slid onto him, its jaws opening wide.  The vicar's body was smothered
by other giant vermin, the pit filling and brimming over with their
agitated, struggling bodies, and his screams were muffled.  He wondered
why it took so long to die for he could feel a rat inside him, one that
had eaten its way beneath his ribcage and was now gorging itself on his
heart.  Surely he should be dead by now?  The pain had stopped moments
before or had its intensity become subliminal?  Why did he still
wonder?  Why did the questions, the doubts, persist?  Surely now there
would be an answer?  But no revelations came.  There was only the
awareness that he was being eaten.  And then he realized his body was
dead, that only his thoughts remained, and ... The rat fed on his
brain, its pointed head buried deep into the open skull, swallowing
cells and tissue that no longer functioned, the impulses finding no
receptors and fading to nothing.

Sunlight pushed its way over the treetops and bathed the church and its
grounds in a fresh, vibrant glow; but no birds greeted its arrival. The
only sound to be heard was a faint scuffling noise from somewhere
behind the ancient building.  Soon, even that was gone.

SEVEN

Fender was tired.  He and the head keeper, Denison, had spent the
morning touring Epping Forest, visiting various farmsteads, private
dwellings and official organizations within the area, looking for
rodent signs, questioning the many occupiers.  Most had had some
trouble with vermin at one time or another, but none was of a serious
nature and they could all identify their particular pests.

The day had started early for the investigator and the night before had
ended late.  He found himself biting into his lower lip in frustration
as he mulled over the outcome of the previous night's meeting at the
Conservation Centre.  He knew Stephen Howard had become more of a
businessman than a technical researcher, but hadn't realized to what
extent.  Rat-kill's director of research had patiently listened to both
sides of the somewhat heated argument that had continued between Fender
and Whitney-Evans, his face impassive, occasionally nodding in
agreement at points made by either protagonist, but rarely adding his
own comment.  Fender soon guessed Howard was waiting for a reaction
from Thoraton, the Private Secretary for the Ministry of Agriculture,
Fisheries and Food, before he, himself, allowed his views to be known.
Fender had seen Howard take this noncommittal line often in company
meetings where superiors were involved and it had always mildly amused
him; but now there was much more than private ambitions involved and
the research director's attitude irritated Fender.  It became obvious
that Whitney-Evans and Thornton had discussed the matter before the
meeting when the private secretary suggested that matters should
proceed with the utmost caution, that he would refuse to recommend a
full-scale operation until it was proved conclusively that the Black
rat was breeding in the forest.

Stephen Howard agreed that more evidence was needed before such drastic
and costly action was taken; besides, the Black rat, if it did still
exist, had been pretty inactive up until now and it was fairly safe to
assume it would remain so during the few days it would take to firmly
establish its presence.  He could see no reason to ring alarm bells at
this time.

Jenny had lost her temper then, her eye-witness report having been
dismissed almost out-of-hand, and the theory that it might indeed have
been a group of coypus she had seen emerging from the pond seized upon
and used against her.  Fender, seated next to her in the Centre's
library which was being used as the conference room, clasped a hand
over her arm beneath the table to calm her, knowing her rage would be
wasted on men like Whitney-Evans, Thornton and Howard.  He, too, was
angry, but he had long ago learned to control anger and direct it
purposefully.  He had begun to tell them of the dangerous consequences
procrastination might bring.  He had made a detailed study of the
London Outbreak and he reminded them of the mistakes made at that time,
the underestimation of the rats that had cost the lives of hundreds,
the inadequate measures at first used against the vermin, the warnings
that had been ignored beforehand.  Would they take the responsibility
for another "Outbreak?

Eric Dugdale, of the Safety Inspectorate, agreed with Fender: the risk
was too great to take any chances.  The head keeper, Denison, was
unsure.  None of his men had reported any strange happenings in the
forest, although he had noticed a certain unease in them lately; his
own sighting of a white deer, traditionally a bad omen, had disturbed
him greatly.  Thornton and Howard had smiled openly at that, but
Whitney-Evans' reaction was more sober he was too knowledgeable of
forest folklore to scoff.  Nevertheless, he still felt absolute proof
of the Black rat's existence was vital before the ultimate decision was
taken.  Alex Milton, silent until then, reluctantly agreed.  Thornton
nodded.  Howard had leaned forward and spoken gravely for the next ten
minutes, explaining to the group his considered plan of action, how his
team, organized by his head biologist, Michael Lehmann, and Fender,
would search every square inch of the forest, discreetly but
painstakingly, until they were sure the Black rat was not alive and
well and living in the wooded suburbia of Epping Forest.  At the
slightest evidence that the rat was there provided it was sufficiently
substantiated the panic button would be pushed without further delay.
They were all aware of the seriousness of the situation but he felt
sure they were also all aware of the panic they would cause if they
made their decision for evacuation too soon.  He had looked towards
Thornton for approval and the private secretary had given it with a
further lecture on the merits of caution.

Fender knew he had lost and further protestation was useless.  The next
two hours were spent discussing how the search would be set up and how
the Superintendent's staff could coordinate with the Ratkill people.
All would be sworn to secrecy, of course, and Thornton would personally
inform the Home Secretary of the proceedings.  It was decided that
Fender would conduct a superficial search of the area the following
day, accompanied by Denison, who would act as guide and introduce him
to the many residents of the forest to be questioned.  The questions
would be asked under the guise of a census on pests in the area; if
anything was seriously amiss, the locals would certainly mention it
without pointed prompting.  Fender would then be able to organize a
more thorough search in specific areas the more likely ones which could
then spread into more widespread locales.

Throughout, Jenny sat in silence and Fender could feel her
disappointment in him.  Over their drinks earlier that evening, they
had relaxed in each other's company.  It had been a pleasant interlude
and both had left the pub reluctantly to attend the scheduled meeting.
He had soon become involved in the plans for the next day's
perfunctory, but necessarily so, search, and on the few occasions his
eyes had met hers, the friendliness seemed to have disappeared from
them.  He could understand her resentment towards the meeting in
general, but was puzzled as to why she had turned cold towards him.  A
mental shrug had tucked the question neatly away and he had
concentrated on plans for the search; after the meeting, she had
quietly slipped off without giving him the chance to talk to her.

He had driven back across London to his flat in Tunbridge Wells that
night, set his alarm for 5.30, and wearily sunk into bed.

Now he was back in the forest, having met Denison at the Centre in the
early hours of the morning.  There had been no sign of Jenny, but they
had talked briefly with Alex Milton and the senior tutor, Vie
Whittaker, explaining the areas they would cover and in which order,
just in case the Centre needed to contact them urgently.  Steaming
coffee had been supplied by Jan Wimbush, the student-cum-cook, before
Fender and Denison had set off, both men refusing the offer of a full
breakfast.

By midday, they had become a little tired of repeating the same
questions to the forest residents, and the apprehension caused by brief
explorations of the quieter glades of the woodland, knowing the danger
from the vermin they sought, had set their nerves on edge.

Fender studied the woodland on either side of the road as the
Land-Rover trundled along at a steady speed.  It had become another
fine, clear day, the mists having vanished as the sun rose higher and,
when on an open road like this and within the safety of the vehicle,
Fender found it almost impossible to imagine there could be anything
sinister lurking out there in the trees.  He looked quizzically at
Denison as the Land-Rover turned off from the main road into a wide,
muddy track to be confronted by rusted iron gates.  Tall, brick columns
supported the gates and on either side stood two more single gates,
apparently to allow access for anything on foot.  It was obviously the
entrance to some kind of estate, and he assumed the two gatehouses on
opposite sides of the road inside were inhabited by whoever maintained
the grounds.  The road continued beyond, cutting through a forest of
pine trees.

"What is this place?"  he asked as Denison brought the Land-Rover to a
halt.

"It's the Seymour Hall estate," Denison replied, jerking on the hand
brake  "Nobody lives here now, not since the main house was gutted by
fire over sixty years ago, but the grounds are cultivated for lumber,
the fields rented out to farmers.  It's a sizeable estate."

Leaving the engine running, he pushed the door open and got down from
the vehicle.  It took considerable effort to swing open the iron
gates.

"If you want to look down the road awhile, I'll question the people
living in the gatehouses," Denison called out, walking back to the
Land-Rover.

"Okay," Fender said as Denison climbed back in and drove through the
entrance.  "Who lives in these places?  Keepers?"

"No, they're privately rented, nothing to do with the estate now."  He
stopped the Land-Rover again, turned off the engine and jumped out.

Fender joined him and looked around.  "It's quiet," he commented.

Denison nodded.  "Private land.  A public footpath goes through the
property, but not many know about it.  They see the gates and assume
there's no access."  He walked over to one of the houses, its
yellow-grey bricks faded and crumbled.  "You go ahead," he said,
turning back to Fender, "I'll catch you up."

Fender began the journey up the long, straight road, constantly
glancing into the pine forests on either side.  He soon felt completely
alone and more than once he turned to see if the head keeper was back
there in the distance.  He had the same sensation as the day before
when he and Jenny had gone off in search of the creatures she had
claimed to have seen that same feeling of being watched.  He smiled at
his own fears.  It was the isolation that exaggerated everything, the
quietness of the forest, the leafy screen that hid so much animal life.
His upbringing had been in cities, among people, nothing ever still in
his vision; here only the breeze seemed to make things move.  He froze
when he heard a scuffling noise to his right and then dropped into a
defensive crouch as something broke free from a thicket a few yards
away.

Fender straightened and grinned, shaking his head sheepishly at himself
as the pheasant shot across the muddy road and disappeared into the
trees on the other side.  The investigator shoved his trembling hands
into the side pockets of his green combat-jacket and resumed his
journey.

Jesus, he said to himself, this is really getting to me.  Was there a
genuine tension in the air or was it imagination?  Maybe he was
over-reacting to Jenny's statement.  But still, there had been the
rat's droppings and the chewed-up door back at the Centre.  And the
stoats that had been slaughtered; if rats hadn't done that, then it
must have been something pretty fearsome.  Yet the local farmers he'd
questioned that morning hadn't reported anything unduly worrying, and
it the Black breed really were in the area, surely they would have been
detected by now?  Unless, of course, they had developed a new kind of
cunning.  He shuddered at the thought.

The trees gave way to his right and the land sloped gently away from
the road; lush, bordered fields dipped, then rose into the horizon.  A
perfectly shaped round tree copse, about a hundred yards in diameter,
stood in the nearest field and for some curious reason it made him feel
uneasy.

He reached a low, farm-style gate and leaned his elbows against it, a
frown creasing his forehead.  The ground rose upwards beyond the gate
and on the crest of its hill he could see a huge mansion.  He assumed
it was Seymour Hall itself, but from this distance it was hard to tell
the building was only a shell.  He counted six square-shaped
chimney-stacks silhouetted against the sky, the building itself having
three levels.  Only the black glassless windows gave any hint of the
ruin inside.  But the real cause of Fender's puzzled expression was the
land between the gate and the house.

The road leading up to the mansion was made of rubble and the field it
ran through was completely barren, the dark earth churned and pitted as
though any worthy soil had been scoured away, leaving only the ugly,
rock-strewn crust below.  It was an unpleasant sight among the lush
forestland, and Fender wondered what could have caused such
destruction.  His eyes narrowed.

He had seen something moving in the distance, up near the house itself.
An animal of some kind.  Something pink.  Something bloated.

His hand gripped the top of the wooden gate and he unconsciously held
his breath.  It was too far away to make out any discernible shape.  It
moved slowly towards the house, having appeared behind some nearby
shrubbery.  It was difficult to tell its true size from this
distance.

The sound of the Land-Rover's engine made him snap his head around.
Denison saw the curious look on the rat catcher face as he brought the
vehicle to a halt.

What's up?"  he asked urgently, jumping out.  "Have you seen the
rats?"

"I've seen something, but I'm not sure what it is."  Fender pointed
towards the house, his finger searching for the pink, slow-moving
creature.  But it was gone.

What's the matter, Fender?  What did you see?"

Fender shook his head in bewilderment.  "I don't know.  It's
disappeared."

"Well what in God's name did it look like, man?  Was it a Black rat?"

"No, no, it was pink, bloated.  It moved as though its body was too
heavy for its legs.  It was somewhere near the house."

To Fender's amazement, Denison burst into laughter.  What is it?"
Fender asked.  What's so funny?"

The head keeper controlled his laughter and leaned one hand on the
gate, the other against his hip.  "Pigs," he said.

What?"  Fender looked at him with curiosity.

"Pigs, old man.  The place is alive with 'em."  Denison grinned at
Fender, enjoying the man's confusion.  This field is let out to a local
farmer for his free-range pigs.  It's his bloody animals that have made
such a mess of the land here; they've sucked and chewed every living
thing from it'

"Pigs," Fender said flatly.

Denison, still smiling broadly, nodded.  They've got a shelter up by
the house used to be stables.  You usually get them all over this
field, but I suppose they've gone in for their afternoon snooze.
Nothing deadly about those old boys, Fender."

The investigator was forced to smile at his own error.  "Guess I'm in a
spooky mood today," he admitted.

"Well, there's one thing for sure," Denison said, looking up at the
house.  There won't be any rats up there, not with the pigs around.
They don't tolerate vermin too well, y'know."

"Yes, you're probably right.  We'll have to check it out later, though,
just in case.  Where to next?"

Well, there are a couple of farms and private homesteads on the estate.
We'll have a look..."

Both men's attention was caught by the beeping of a car's horn.  They
looked back down the long road leading from the entrance gates and saw
a green van approaching at an unwise speed for the rutted track. Fender
recognized it as the Ford Transit belonging to the Conservation Centre,
yellow lettering painted on its sides giving it its official title.

He saw the driver was the young tutor he'd met at the Centre the day
before Will, he thought his name was.  As the van slid to a halt, the
passenger door flew open and Jenny Hanmer sprang lightly to the ground.
There was no reserve in her eyes this time as she ran towards Fender,
and there was a fear in her voice that made him want to reach out to
her.

"Luke," she said breathlessly.  "You've got to come back to the Centre
immediately!  They've found something up at the old church!  Something
something terrible."

He looked down into her tear-blurred eyes and then he did reach out to
her, holding her close, just for a moment.

EIGHT

Brian Mollison jogged past the fawn Capri and glanced into the
interior.  He felt disappointment on seeing it was empty.  The woodland
area was a well-used copulation centre for the romantic and the
desperate, and cars parked on roadside clearings in the forest often
offered stimulating views of thrashing, half-naked limbs.

He continued running, a light sheen covering his skin beneath the
tracksuit.  The day before had been a frustrating failure for him: he
had failed to expose himself to anyone, the shock of nearly being
caught having subdued any further inclinations for the rest of that
day.  It was a pity, for the woman he had been about to show himself to
had been a stunner.  Who the fuck had been in those bushes?  Had it
been an animal?  Or some bloody deviant lurking there?  If he hadn't
had his tracksuit trousers around his ankles he'd have sorted them out.
He had to admit, though, he had been a little alarmed.  Running and
dressing at the same time was no easy thing and by the time he'd
reached his car his whole body was shaking.  It was a wonder he hadn't
killed someone with the reckless way he'd driven home.  His mother
Christ, he'd love to stop her prattling once and for all had got
short-shrift from him for the rest of that day!

School had been unbearable the following morning.  He wasn't sure if it
was because the woman had been such a good-looker or because his secret
pleasure was making stronger demands on him, but his frustration was
extremely upsetting.  In fact, he knew he would have to do something
about it or his un besmirched record at the school would be ruined,
which accounted for the quick drive out to Epping Forest in the lunch
hour.

The journey had taken twenty minutes, but he had a free period after
lunch; he would have plenty of time.  It would mean not eating, of
course, so his mother God, one day he'd show her had better have a
decent dinner for him that night!  Or else!

The grass had made his plimsolls damp, but he had a spare pair back at
the school and he wasn't unduly worried.  He would have to find someone
fast couldn't afford to be choosy today.  Even an old woman would do as
long as she didn't resemble his mother.  He headed for a wide track
frequently used by strollers, keeping a steady pace, anticipation
already causing a stirring inside his tracksuit.  Sometimes he likened
his penis to a bloodhound's nose it seemed to sense its quarry from
miles away.

He stopped when he heard the sound of laughter coming through the trees
ahead.  Knowing he was close to the track, the PE instructor trotted
forward with more caution, keeping his body low and avoiding
brittle-leaved bushes, slowing to a walk when the dead leaves at his
feet gave warning of his approach.  The laughter came again and then a
woman's voice, calling.  The trees and undergrowth thinned out and he
found himself at the edge of the grassy track.  He stepped back out of
view and waited.

It wasn't long before a child of about four came scooting by, chased by
another, slightly younger.  A boy and a girl.  The mother wouldn't be
far away.  He crouched behind a stout oak and his breathing became more
laboured.

They came into sight a few seconds later, two of them, two women.  And
they looked quite young late twenties, both of them.  One was quite
plain and dumpy, but the other wasn't bad.  A bit sturdy, perhaps, but
no, not bad at all.  Let them go by, follow them for a bit, make sure
they haven't got a dog with them, as well dogs could be a bloody
nuisance.

He clasped a hand to his mouth to muffle the sound of his breathing and
let several seconds lapse.

All clear?  Good.  No one behind them.  Have to be fast with this one.
Do a bit in front of them, then off into the trees, finish off in
private.  Then straight back to school.  One on her own would have been
better, but beggars couldn't be choosers: two would have to do.  They
were braver when they weren't alone, and more inclined to complain to
the authorities afterwards.  Two had thrown stones at him once.  Taught
him to keep away from gravelly paths.  Still, he wouldn't hang around.
Quick flash, little jiggle, then off.  Christ he'd show them
something!

He crept forward, his hand reaching inside his tracksuit and squeezing
as though assuring himself his erection was still there.  He had been
foolish to wonder.  A high bush blocked his view and he stood straight,
peeking over the top.  It was unfortunate that one of the women the
plain, dumpy one happened to glance round at that moment.  He saw her
jaw drop open and her body go stiff just before he ducked down again.
Through a chink in the bush he saw her say something to her companion,
who looked towards him, her body stiffening.  Abruptly they turned and
began marching briskly down the track away from him, calling to the
children in tight voices as they went.  He knew he would have to act
fast, the element of surprise now gone.

Leaping into the centre of the wide track, he quickly dropped his
trousers and pulled his tracksuit top up with both hands, calling out
his greeting of Want a fuck?"  to catch their attention.  They stared
in horror which quickly turned to disgust.  Loathing even.  The
children beyond stared in fascination.

"Piss off, you dirty bastard!"  the short woman shouted and her
companion looked at her as though she had committed the greater
offence.

Well used to the rudeness of such females, the PE instructor wriggled
his buttocks from side to side, his swollen penis swaying like the boom
of a sailing boat in a shifting wind.  He only became aware of the
little pale blue and white Austin's presence behind him when he heard a
burly voice call out, "Just a minute you!"

The police officer in his Panda patrol car had been too stunned to move
at first.  He had been on routine patrol through the forest, enjoying
the tranquillity, heading for his favourite lunch spot where he could
have his sandwiches and flask of soup in peace, and perhaps get his
head down for twenty minutes or so.  Travelling almost silently down
the bumpy track at little more than 5 mph he had been amazed to be
suddenly confronted by a pair of white, naked buttocks.  The man's
trousers were around his ankles and his upper clothing pulled upwards,
revealing a broad, hairy back.  It was so unexpected, even though the
purpose of his patrol was to seek out such offenders, that his initial
reaction was to sit and stare, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, until his
foot slipped off the clutch and the car jerked forward as the engine
stalled.  The movement galvanized some action.

"Just a minute you!"  he bellowed as he pushed open the door, failing
to find words more appropriate to the situation.

Brian Mollison turned his head and this time it was his turn to be
horrified.  The thing he had dreaded most, the thing he had constant
wide-awake nightmares over, had happened.  Caught in the very act!  Oh
my God, what would mother say?  Oh my God!

He dropped his hands and stooped, tugging at his trousers and trying to
run at the same time.  It was fortunate for him that he stumbled, for
the policeman was grabbing for his shoulder at that moment and found
himself clutching thin air instead.  The momentum carried the uniformed
man forward and he tripped over the PE instructor's scrambling body,
landing heavily on his elbows.

In his panic, thrashing limbs and shrivelling genitals, the instructor
endeavoured to push himself away from the heavy, mean-looking
policeman, and his fitness allowed him to gain his feet before his
adversary.  He shrieked when he saw the two women bearing down on him,
the short, plump one wielding a stout tree branch, a determined look on
her face.

He was running before she had a chance to use it on him.  But she did
manage to hurl it just before he disappeared into the trees and he let
out a yell of surprise rather than pain as the rough wood struck his
still bare backside.  It did spur him on, however, and soon he had been
swallowed up by the forest; the two women could hear his crashing
progress through the undergrowth.

Mollison knew the policeman would give chase and his eyes blurred with
self-pity.  What if he were caught?  It would mean the end of his
career.  He'd be reviled.  His mother would never forgive him!  Could
he go to prison for such an offence?  They would certainly send him to
a psychiatrist.  The shame of it!  One more chance, dear God, just one
more chance.  I'll never do it again.  Oh please, please!

He staggered as a hidden root, obviously on the side of the Law,
tripped him.  He fell to his knees and stayed there in a crouched
position, hands clasped together in his lap as though in prayer,
drawing in deep breaths and trying to listen over his heartbeats for
the sounds of someone giving chase.  Oh please, God, don't let them
follow.  I'll do anything you say from now on.  I'll be good.  The fact
that he had never been to church nor said a prayer since he was ten
years old did not embarrass him and he certainly didn't think it was
worth mentioning at that particular point in time.  Besides, God
welcomed repenting sinners.  The crashing of undergrowth somewhere
behind told him he wasn't as welcome as he'd have liked.

On his feet again and wiping tears from his face with a rough hand, he
pressed onwards, his feelings of shame, unjust persecution and basic
fear being replaced by one overriding objective: survival.  He knew in
which direction his car lay and he headed for it.  No fucking flatfoot
who spent the day on his arse driving around the countryside would
catch him!  Not on foot!  He ran on, still afraid but confident he
could outdistance the policeman.  Yet when he turned once, just to see
if he had lost his pursuer, he nearly collapsed at the sight of the
blue uniform gaining ground.  Extreme panic returned and once more he
was a blubbering wreck, all running rhythm gone, pace spasmodic.  A
message beat its way through his jumbled senses as he caught sight of a
yellowish-brown speck in the distance.  The Capri!  The fawn Capri he'd
passed earlier, near the roadside, not far from his own car!  He had a
chance now.  If he could His thoughts were cut off as he fell headlong
into the dip, sliding down to the bottom, his face and hands torn by
clutching brambles.  Oh God, he was finished!  The Law had him now!  He
buried his head into his hands and began to sob quietly.

But the policeman ran by.  The PE instructor could hear the thudding
footsteps, the swishing as thin branches were brushed aside, the
muffled cursing as the law officer became confused.  Then all noises
receded as the policeman passed his position and ran on towards the
road.  It was unbelievable!  The man had missed him completely.

Mollison realized he must have been screened from his pursuer by trees
or bushes before he'd slipped into the dip.  He was surprised the
policeman hadn't heard him fall, but guessed the man had been making
too much noise himself.  And the dip had been shielded by more
undergrowth around its edges.  It was a perfect spot to hide in, a
perfect place for lovers.  Yes, someone had obviously used it already
for clandestine purposes there was a torn old blanket, twisted and
leaf-strewn not three feet away from his very nose.  And unless he was
mistaken, that was a woman's shoe ... His eyes widened as the objects
scattered around the small, hidden clearing became recognizable.  There
was torn, mangled clothing, another shoe a man's this time what looked
like a pair of women's tights hanging loosely from a twig.  A gold
wristwatch.  Why would someone leave a gold ?  Whatever had caused the
mental delay, it was gone now and he realized the full horror of what
surrounded him.

Deep red bloodstains smeared everything: the ripped clothing, the
blanket, the shoes, the earth even leaves on the undergrowth were
discoloured.  He knew the white gleaming objects were bones and the
lumps of mushy substance that clung to them were flesh, but he could
not understand why the bones did not form a recognizable shape; he
failed to see that they had been torn apart, that the deep indents and
the jagged endings had been caused by gnawing teeth.

He opened his mouth to scream but, partly because he was too stunned
and partly because he still wanted to escape, no sound emerged.
Instead, he began to sob again and, when he finally found the courage
to take his hands from his face and look around once more, an
irrational question entered his mind and he began searching the
clearing.  Although their bones were scattered, they could still be
pieced together and buried complete; but after a while he gave up.  He
couldn't find them.  He sat and wondered where the heads had gone.

Ken Woollard trudged across the muddy farm towards the farmhouse.  His
usual ill-tempered disposition had been worsened by the unwelcome visit
from the 'authorities'.  One of them had been the head keeper, Denison,
a busybody if ever there was, and the other a man from Ratkill, the
pest exterminators.  Asking bloody fool questions, meddling.  Of course
he had problems with bloody vermin what farmer didn't?  But nothing he
couldn't handle himself.  He'd laid down poison two days before,
immediately he'd discovered the remains of one of his cats.  Lord knows
what had happened to its companion he hadn't seen hide-nor-hair of it
since.  Anyway, the fluoroacetamide hadn't been touched and he'd
discovered no new evidence of rats in the area, so why should he report
any trouble to the two snoopers?  The cat could easily have been killed
by dogs.  Or maybe a fox had been crazed enough to have a go.  Or a
badger.  He didn't know of any badgers in this part of the woodlands,
but with Epping Forest, anything was possible; new breeding grounds
were always springing up.  Some said they'd even seen a white deer
roaming free in the forest lately.  Yes, a badger could have caused the
damage to the cat.  Violent bloody creatures they were, when aroused.
Powerful.  There were rats around, all right the loop smears in the
barn were proof enough of that but not the big ones, not the Black
rats.  No, he'd have seen 'em.  Big as dogs, they said.  No way they
could run around without being seen.  Nelly had wanted him to report
the trouble, but then she always panicked, the silly woman.  She was a
countrywoman, born and bred, and had never feared any living creature.
Until the London Outbreak, that is.  That had shook her bad.  She
couldn't even stand mice after that.  Just as well the two snoopers
hadn't gone up to the house and asked her questions!  She'd have told
'em, all right.  She'd have blurted out everything.  A good strappin'
was what she wanted.  That'd make her hold her noise.  Been what? seven
years since he'd given her a strappin'.  Ten years since he'd given her
a good layin'.  The land took it out of a man.

No, no trouble 'round here, misters, he'd told 'em.  Nothing he'd call
trouble, anyway.  Of course he'd contact The Warren at any signs of
unusual vermin activity.  Be in his own interests, wouldn't it?  The
two men had departed satisfied, leaving the farmer sitting on his
tractor staring thoughtfully at their backs.

Well, more poison would go down tonight, and a stronger dosage, at
that.  He'd take all the necessary precautions, but he wouldn't be
panicked by them who knew nothing about working the land.  He could
take care of his own.  Thing to take care of now was his belly.  He was
starvin'.

The farmer stomped his boots down hard on the cobbled yard, unloading
the mud clinging to the under soles  He wouldn't mention the two men
and their questions to Nelly, she'd only get into a tizz and start
naggin' again.  He tramped across the yard, muttering to himself,
wondering why he hadn't had the sense to pack up farming thirty years
ago when he was a young man.  His two sons, miserable bleeders both,
had gone off as soon as they saw the sense of it.  Merchant navy, the
two of 'em.  Should have been here helpin' him out.  That's what
education did for you.  He paused at the front door of the farmhouse,
an aged and crumbling two storey building, and lifted one booted foot,
a hand held against the door-frame for balance.  With a grunt, he
jerked off the boot and let it fall to the ground.

It was while he stood there, balanced on one leg, that he became aware
of the unusual silence in the farmyard.  Not that farmyards were noisy
places, but there was usually some activity going on.  Now there wasn't
a sound.  Not even from the birds.  Except... His head swung round to
the door and he stared at the wood panelling.  Except... for the faint
scuffling noise from inside the house.

Curious, he placed his ear against the wood and listened.  More
scuffling noises, the sound a cat makes when scuttling across the floor
after a ball of paper.  Or after a terrified mouse.  Perhaps the
surviving prodigal cat had returned.  Yet the noise was too great to
have been made by one animal.  Woollard stood erect and cursed himself,
annoyed at the silly way he was behaving.  He was acting like an old
woman, listening at bloody doors!  It was those two snoopers they'd put
the wind up him with their bloody stupid questions about bloody stupid
rats!  He grabbed the door handle and pushed hard, barging into the
narrow hallway without further thought.

"Oh, Lord God..."  he said quietly, for once his anger overwhelmed by
what he saw.  The hallway was filled with black, furry bodies that
wriggled and climbed over each others' backs, that scuttled in and out
of doorways, that leapt up at the walls as though trying to escape from
the squirming, tightly pressed mass, that ran up the stairs and tore
flesh from the bloody shape that lay sprawled there.

Nelly's eyes stared down into her husband's, but there was no life in
them.  A hand still clutched at the bannister rails and held her in
that position, halfway up the stairs, on her back,

as though she had slipped while fleeing, turning and grabbing for a
rail as the rats dragged her back down, nipping at her legs, running up
her body, sinking their teeth into her breasts.

Even as he watched, her fingers began to open as one creature ate its
way into the tendons of her wrist, and she began to slide down, the
dark bodies coming with her, refusing to let go of their prey.  Her
head was held up as though she was unwilling to take her eyes off him,
but he saw it was because of the rat burrowing under her chin, pushing
up the jaw as it worked its way inside.

She slumped to the bottom of the stairs, her knees high, feet held by
the mass of bodies in the hallway, her head now rolling sideways,
mercifully breaking the spellbinding gaze on him.

The farmer ran forward, his anger finally breaking forth, the one boot
he wore stomping down on the vermin's backs.  He slipped, for there was
no firm footing, the floor a moving carpet of bristling fur, and his
hands clutched desperately at the walls for support.  He was on his
knees, trying to crawl forward through the creatures, but they struck
out at him with sharp incisors, clinging to him as their companions had
clung to his wife.

The farmer moved forward, slowly, painfully, his exposed foot already
torn and shredded.  He tried to keep them away from his face, but his
hands were weighed down by bodies and he was unable to even lift them
from the floor.  He became motionless, resting there in the hallway on
hands and knees, unable to see his wife beneath the sea of black
creatures.  Soon the weight of the rats on his back crumpled his body
into a heap and he too disappeared beneath the ever-moving mass.

NINE

Fender looked into the open grave and shuddered.  The remains of what
were once two human beings lay down there, their bones stripped almost
clean.  The identity of the skeletal corpse still half-inside its
coffin was known to the group of people in the graveyard it was an old
woman who had been buried the day before but they could only guess the
identity of the second.  It was an educated guess though, for the vicar
of the Church of the Holy Innocents could not be found.

Blood had soaked into the walls of the grave giving the soil a rich
viscous quality; the shattered wood of the coffin lid was stained red.
Fender wondered how it had happened.  Had the vicar, on his way to his
early morning devotions inside the church, heard the noises coming from
the graveyard and gone to investigate?  Had he fainted when he had seen
what was happening and fallen into the grave?  Or had he been pushed
into it?  Could rats, no matter how large, have caused this?  Fender
shook his head in disbelief.  Rats were not burrowers; they wouldn't
dig into the earth to reach a corpse.  At least, normal rats
wouldn't.

A voice broke into his thoughts.  "Mr.  Fender?  I'm told you can throw
some light on this."

Fender almost smiled at the policeman's solemn optimism.  "I'm not
sure," he said.  He turned away from the grave and walked towards the
single, foot-high railing that bordered the church grounds, the
uniformed policeman following.  Fender squatted on the iron bar and ran
a hand across his rough chin.  He could see the group of people near
the entrance to the graveyard, all eyes turned away from the open
grave.  Whitney-Evans was there, so was Alex Milton, both deep in
conversation.  Denison was talking to Eric Dugdale, the safety
inspector, obviously making a report of their fruitless questioning
that morning.  There were several other figures that Fender did not
recognize but assumed were staff from The Warren offices.  Jenny was
being consoled by the senior tutor from the Centre, Vie Whittaker, who
had an arm around her shoulders and was talking to her quietly.  Why
didn't he get her away from this bloody place, Fender asked himself.

"Can you help, sir?"  the policeman hovering over the rat catcher
prompted.

Fender looked up at him and shrugged.  We think it was rats," he
said.

The uniformed man paled visibly.  "Do you mean Black rats?  The ones
that were in London?"

Fender nodded.  "It seems likely."

He stood once again and faced the policeman.  "Look, I think you'd
better get whoever's in charge of your station down here right away.
Things are going to start happening and the sooner the local police are
involved the better."

"I'll get on the radio now.  But is there any more you can tell me
before I do?"

"Only that I'm from Ratkill and at the moment investigating evidence of
Black rats in the forest.  I think this confirms it beyond all
doubt."

"Bloody hell!  Why weren't we informed?"  The colour had returned to
the policeman's face with his anger.

Fender held up his hand in apology.  "Sorry, but nothing was confirmed
until now.  We didn't want to cause a panic."

The policeman turned away in disgust.  "All the bloody same, you lot,"
Fender heard him say as he stomped off.

"Just a minute," he said, bringing the policeman to a halt.  "You're
not to mention what I've told you to anyone."

"If you think..."

"Not to anyone.  I'll speak to your inspector when he gets here.
Clear?"

The policeman's answer was unintelligible, but it was obvious he
understood.

"Now," Fender went on.  "Who discovered the ..."  the word was hardly
appropriate but he used it anyway'... bodies?"

The policeman pointed towards an elderly man standing uneasily on the
fringe of the group near the gate.  The old boy over there.  He
maintains the grounds around the church.  It's frightened the life out of
him."

"I'm not surprised.  Where did he report it from?"

The rectory.  He went there to tell the vicar.  Fortunately, Mrs.
Paige, the housekeeper, was in.  She told us she hadn't seen the vicar
all morning that's why we think it could be him down there."  He nodded
towards the freshly dug pit.

"Okay.  You'll have to keep them both quiet for the moment."

"Are you kidding?  Half the forest knows by now.  Mrs.  Paige has
probably been on the phone all morning.  The bloody forest
superintendent was up here almost as soon as we were."

"All right, but they don't know about the rats yet, do they?"

"Of course not'

Then that's the way it has to stay for the moment."

"Until when?"  The policeman's tone was belligerent.

Fender sighed.  "Until we start moving the people out.  Look, I know
how you feel.  I'd like to get this out into the open right now,
myself; but things have to be organized first'

Recognizing the frustration in the rat catcher words, the stiffness
left the policeman's voice.  "Fair enough, Mr.  Fender.  We'll do our
best."  He strode off towards his patrol car.

Fender walked over to Jenny and Whittaker, conscious of the shock they
were in.  The girl managed a weak smile as he approached.

Will they do something, Luke?"  she asked.  "Will this make them
act?"

Yes, Jenny, they'll do something more constructive now.  They'll have
to."

What happened, Fender?"  asked Whittaker.  "Could rats really have done
that?"

"I think the Black rat could.  It's obvious they were after the dead
body, although how they knew there was a fresh corpse down there beats
me.  The other person if it was the vicar presumably disturbed them and
they got him too."

"But, rats digging?"

"I know.  I've never heard of it either.  But it sure as hell wasn't
the vicar digging the body up no spades around."

"Fender, may we have a word?"  It was Whitney-Evans' voice calling.

"Be right there," Fender answered.  Then he turned back to the two
tutors.  Why don't you take Jenny back to the Centre," he said to
Whittaker.  "She should rest after a shock like this."

"I'm okay, Luke," the girl said.

"He's right, Jenny."  Whittaker looked concerned.  "Let's get away from
here."

She reluctantly agreed but gazed up earnestly into Fender's face.  Will
you be coming back, Luke?  I'd like to talk to you."

Fender nodded.  You'll be seeing a lot of me from now on, Jenny."

Whittaker frowned, unsure of the meaning in Fender's words.  "Come on
Jenny, let's go," he urged, and gently led her away from the church
grounds.

Tender."  Whitney-Evans again.

"Coming," the rat catcher said wearily, and walked over to the
superintendent and the Warden of the Conservation Centre.

"What caused this?"  Whitney-Evans demanded to know.

What the hell do you think caused it?"  replied Fender, anger
broiling.

You think it was the rats?"

"I'm bloody sure it was."

There's no need to adopt that tone, Fender.  I'm only asking your
opinion."

"My opinion didn't count last night'

"Of course it did.  We took the correct action."

"We could have avoided this."

"Perhaps.  I still maintain, from the knowledge we had at the time,
that we took the appropriate action.  Now, is there definite proof the
Black rat was involved in this terrible business?"

Fender stared at him in disbelief.  "No," he said deliberately.  "I
believe there's a tribe of cannibals living in this forest and last
night or some time this morning, they decided on a little feast."

The superintendent's face became outraged.  There's absolutely no need
for your ill-manners, Fender.  Just who do you think you are to talk to
me in this way?"

Fender controlled his anger and ignored him.  He turned to the Warden.
"I suggest we set up an operational HQ at the Centre immediately, Mr.
Milton.  If you could start by sending any classes you may have back to
their schools, I'll get things organized from the Ratkill end.  I've
asked the constable to get his station inspector over here I think he
should be put fully in the picture ..."

"Aren't you exceeding your authority?"  Whitney-Evans interrupted.

"My job is to prevent another Outbreak, Mr.  Whitney-Evans, and I
answer only to my organization and the government in times of
emergency.  My authority overrides that of any outside bodies.  If you
want me to produce the official papers giving me that power, they're in
my car.  I can

That won't be necessary.  But I think there should be another meeting
before you put any plans into action."

"Oh, we'll have another meeting all right.  And another.  Then another.
But while we're talking, I'm going to make sure something is happening.
You can help by calling in all your staff.  Anyone connected with the
forest, not just the keepers.  Someone, somewhere, in the forest must
have seen signs of these rats.  I want to know when and where."

This time Alex Milton spoke up.  "Why, Mr.  Fender?  How will that
help?"

We have to find a pattern.  We have to know their haunts, their
hunting-grounds.  Rats are scavengers and if they find a good source of
food, they'll stick to it until it runs out."

"But we've had no reports of damage or losses," said Whitney-Evans.
"Not serious losses, anyhow."

Fender shook his head.  "No, that's what I don't understand.  I'll need
to speak to the farmers I questioned this morning again.  I think one
or two may not have been exactly honest."

"Surely not?"  said Milton.  The farmers know how serious the vermin
problem is."

"Yes, and they know how serious it is to have their farms put in
quarantine.  They'd suffer heavy losses."

What then?"  asked Whitney-Evans.  What if someone admits they have had
trouble?"

Then we can start pinpointing locations on a map.  We already have
three the Centre itself, the pond and this graveyard.  We can begin to
work out their boundaries, trace their movements.  It'll give us a more
defined area to work in.  You see, to eliminate the rats, we have to
find where they're coming from, we have to rout them out.  So our
priority is to find their lair."

TEN

It was early evening before the meeting finally got under way and the
Centre's small lecture hall, though less than full, seemed crowded to
Fender.  He quickly scanned the many anxious faces, estimating there
were over thirty people present.  Personally he would have chosen a
more select gathering; in his experience, the bigger the crowd, the
more confusing the outcome.  He supposed, however, each was necessary
to the operation to be discussed.

He recognized the Private Secretary for the Ministry of Defence, Robert
Shipway, talking with Antony Thornton from the Ministry of Agriculture,
at a long table hastily brought in for the occasion from the Centre's
library.  Beside them sat the Director-General of the Forestry
Commission with one of his commissioners and someone from the
Department of the Environment Fender could not remember his particular
title, nor the names of any of the three.  Whitney-Evans was seated
next to Stephen Howard, Alex Milton sitting slightly away from the
table.  The police commissioner for the Essex area occupied the other
end of the table, together with Mike Lehmann and a major from the Armed
Forces.  It was to be a high-powered meeting and Fender could already
see that Stephen Howard was revelling in it.

The others in the room sat facing the select group at the table in the
lecture hall's rows of rising seats, Fender among those in the front
row.  Eric Dugdale of the Safety Inspectorate was there with two
members of his staff; several local councillors spoke together in
hushed voices; the inspector from the area's nearest police station sat
in deep silence; Charles Denison, seated next to him, equally silent;
Vie Whittaker and an attractive, middle-aged woman introduced earlier
to Pender as Alex Milton's wife, Tessa, sat immediately behind.  Other
seats were taken up by several men referred to as Verderers of Epping
Forest, and a few members of the community considered important enough
to be invited along.  Thankfully there were no journalists present, but
Fender knew it would not take long for the story to break.

The general low-voiced din was interrupted by Antony Thornton tapping
sharply on the table top with the blunt end of his fountain-pen.

"Gentlemen, I think we should proceed with the meeting without further
delay.  I believe everybody who should be here is here."  He looked
around at the forest superintendent and Stephen Howard for affirmation.
Both men nodded.

Thornton continued.  This is just a general meeting to let everyone who
will be concerned with the operation know exactly what is happening.
Details will be discussed in subsequent smaller gatherings by those
directly involved."  He paused and looked around, his voice losing some
of its briskness.  "Most of you have some idea of why you were called
here, but for the benefit of those who haven't, I'll start at the
beginning.  Over the past few days, damage has been done that suggests
a powerful vermin is at large.  Droppings have been found which
indicate the vermin is the Black rat."

A buzz of voices broke out behind Fender.  Thornton held up a hand to
still them.

Yesterday, three of the creatures were sighted by a tutor of this
Centre.  It was not a definite sighting..."  Fender flinched '... so we
thought it wise to investigate further before pushing the panic
button."

Where were they seen?"  a voice from the back asked.

"Quite near here."  Thornton looked towards Whitney-Evans who said: "A
small pond near the larger Wake Valley Pond."

Thornton continued.  "Ratkill had already been notified and a rodent
investigator, Lucas Fender, was at the Centre examining damage caused
by these creatures when the sighting took place.  He immediately
searched the area around the pond and discovered the remains of a
family of stoats; they had been slaughtered.  He also examined the
droppings left by the vermin at the Centre and his conclusion was that
there was, indeed, a strong possibility that the Black rat was
inhabiting a certain part of the forest."

Fender smiled grimly.

"However, in the meeting that followed, we all agreed that further more
concrete proof was needed before we put into action plans for
quarantine and the evacuation of the forest population."

"Couldn't my station at least have been informed?"  demanded the police
inspector.

Thornton regarded him coolly.  "I'm afraid not.  I repeat: we had no
definite proof of their existence, therefore we deemed it unnecessary
to alert anyone at that time."

"And is that your proof?"  said the inspector, undaunted.  The incident
up at the churchyard?"

Once more, a babble of voices broke out in the lecture hall and
Thornton's fountain-pen was tapped hard to bring order to the
meeting.

"What does Inspector Reid mean?"  asked a verderer above the other
voices.  "What happened up at the church?"  The question had more
effect than the fountain-pen and all noise died down.

Thornton straightened in his chair and looked stiffly around the room.
"Firstly, let me say this meeting will be conducted in an orderly
fashion.  We need to progress rapidly if we are to implement immediate
action.  Further questions will have to be put at the end of this
statement and the subsequent statements by any of my colleagues at this
table.  Now, Inspector Reid, I will answer your question.  Yes, the
churchyard incident does give us further reason to believe in the
existence of the Black rat in the forest."

"But it's still not definite proof," said Whitney-Evans.

Thornton turned on him with barely disguised anger.  "Even you, Edward,
can't close your eyes to that atrocity."

Would you please tell us what has happened?"  It was the same voice
from the back, obviously undeterred by Thorn-ton's previous remark.

The private secretary's head snapped round.  The remains of two humans
were found in the churchyard this morning.  One had been buried
normally yesterday and the other ... the other we believe to be the
body of a Reverend Jonathan Matthews, vicar of the Church of the Holy
Innocents."

A loud gasp went round the lecture hall.

Thornton went on, his voice brisk and emotionless.  "Both bodies had
been stripped of flesh.  We believe the vicar discovered these
creatures digging up the corpse and was killed by them.  Indents on the
bones and their fractured state indicate that sharp implements were
used to tear off the flesh: sharp teeth in other words.  What's left of
the clothing is being examined to ascertain whether it was the vicar or
not, but we fear there can be little doubt.  Even more odd in this most
bizarre of incidents, the skulls of both bodies were missing."

Thornton did not allow the disquieting news to disrupt the meeting
further.  "Although we still have only one actual sighting of these
creatures, I think we can assume beyond all doubt that it is the Black
rat behind these incidents.  We know of no other creature in England
that could cause such damage.

"Now, our plans to combat this menace.  All homes in the immediate
vicinity will be evacuated by midday tomorrow.  The superintendent's
men are at this very moment warning all householders to stay inside and
keep their windows and doors firmly closed even to erect barricades if
necessary.  Many will obviously prefer to leave their homes right away,
even though they are quite safe for the moment."

"How can they be safe with giant rats roaming the forest?"  asked a
councillor, leaning forward in his seat.

The rats haven't broken into any houses yet," said Thorn-ton, now
resigned to the interruptions.  "Besides, to our knowledge, they have
only attacked one living person so far.  It seems unlikely they would
suddenly go on the rampage after being undetected for all this time."

"But isn't it escalating?"  the councillor insisted.  "I mean, at first
just damage to property, then killing other animals.  Now they're onto
humans."

Fender turned to stare at the man, realizing he was right.  Considering
the rats had not been seen in the forest before yesterday, there seemed
to be a rapid and frightening increase in their activity.

"I think the vicar was attacked because he disturbed them," replied
Thornton.  "He may even have foolishly tried to chase them off.  No,
I'm sure people will be safe for the moment -as long as they stay
indoors.  If my colleagues agree, I think we should start a phased
evacuation: the immediate area first, then moving out towards the
surrounding woodlands.  Major Cormack will organize the quarantining of
the entire forest, working in conjunction with the Essex and London
police forces."

"How do you propose to keep the whole area out of bounds?"  asked the
director-general for the Forestry Commission.  "I mean, there's over
6,000 acres of woodland to cover."

We'll concentrate on the logical area say within two or three miles of
this spot."

"It's still a hell of an area."

"I agree.  But there are plenty of broad roadways running through the
forest; these can be marked out at various intervals.  We'll also use
helicopters for surveillance.  I can't actually imagine anyone wanting
to get into the forest once they know what's in there, can you?"

"I thought the idea was to keep in whatever's there," the police
commissioner commented drily.

"Quite.  But we'll come to that later.  The Ratkill people will move in
at first light tomorrow morning and it will be their job to root these
monsters out and destroy them.  But I'll let Stephen Howard, the
research director of Ratkill, explain his operation."  He looked
encouragingly at Howard, who almost stood before he realized he was not
addressing a public meeting.

What we'll need," he began, 'is full cooperation from everyone in the
forest..."  he smiled disarmingly '... and detailed maps of the whole
woodland area.  Most important will be plans of sewage works running
beneath the forest, because you can be sure, that's where the rats will
be.  My crews will need army protection.  Your Green Goddess fire
engines, Major Cormack, will be invaluable; since they've been brought
up to date with new, high-powered hoses, they'll prove ideal for
protection that's one thing we can thank the last firemen's strike for.
Flame-throwers might come in handy, too, although I don't like the risk
to the forest itself nor to my own men.  They don't appreciate singed
backsides."

The remark barely raised a smile around the room.

"My crews will all be wearing protective clothing, similar to but more
advanced than that used in the London Outbreak.  A team of
investigators will go in first and find the likely spots, then the
destruction crews will move in.  I'll let Mike Lehmann, our head
biologist, explain exactly what will happen."

Lehmann was uncomfortable under their gaze, but he struck out boldly.
"If it really is the new breed of giant rat in Epping Forest, then
we're in serious trouble.  And if these are the descendants of the
Black rat from the London Outbreak and all the evidence points in that
direction there are a couple of questions that need to be answered: how
did they escape the annihilation of their species in the city; and how
have they remained undetected for so long?"

They could have found their way into the forest before the
extermination took place," the defence secretary suggested.

"It's possible, although the previous attacks suggested they were
confined to certain areas of the city," said Lehmann.  The other
possibility is that they were somehow unaffected by the ultrasonic
sound waves we used to draw the rats from their nests into the gas
enclosures, and fled afterwards when they realized the game was up.
Nowadays the machines are used to drive the vermin away, not draw them
in; but either way, our experiments with them at the Ratkill
laboratories show that the ultrasonics become ineffectual eventually;
the rats adapt, learn to ignore them."

"I must point out here," said Howard, 'that tests are still in progress
with these machines.  I think we can develop one that will be extremely
effective once we find the correct wavelength or indeed,
wavelengths."

To do that, we'd need a mutant rat itself.  Our own over reaction
killed them all off four years ago apart from the few that obviously
escaped.  We'd have been wiser to have saved some for study."

"Surely," said the defence secretary, 'you can experiment on ordinary
rats?"

We've been doing just that," the biologist replied.  "Unfortunately,
the giant Black is no ordinary rodent: it's a mutation, its genes are
different.  They're not just bigger and stronger, they also have a high
degree of intelligence.  They'd need it, to have remained hidden these
past few years.  Of course, the fact that rats are nocturnal has
helped; but what puzzles me is why there's been no evidence of them
until now.  Even more puzzling and, I may say, more ominous: why now?

"My guess is that after the mass destruction of their breed, the
survivors developed an even stronger fear of man, which was passed on
to the following generations.  We already know of their abnormal
brain-power.  I'd say this has advanced with the new generations, too.
They've kept out of sight, foraged in places safe to them, left little
evidence of their presence."

"It could be that there is just a small number of them," Whitney-Evans
suggested hopefully.

Yes," agreed Major Cormack.  "A small group would be hard to detect in
a forest full of wild animals."

"It's unlikely," said Lehmann.  The life-span of a rat is from fifteen
months to two-and-a-half years; the female can have five to eight
litters a year with as many as twelve new-born in each litter.  She's
ready again for mating within hours of giving birth, and the young ones
reach the reproductive stage after only three months.  You can figure
out for yourself just how many could be bred in the space of four
years."

Fender could almost hear the clicking of mental arithmetic going on
around the hall.

"I think there's plenty of them," Lehmann continued, 'but they've gone
literally underground.  I believe they're in the sewer network beneath
the forest; that's where we'll look for them.  The perverse thing is
that the normal Black rat, or Ship rat as it's sometimes known, is
arboreal it can climb trees, high buildings; the mutant has been forced
to live below ground.  It could explain why they dug up the corpse at
the church: they've learned to be burrowers."

"But that's impossible," Milton began to say.  "It would take decades
for them to evolve ..."

"For any normal animal, yes," the biologist cut in.  We're dealing with
the abnormal."

Thornton spoke.  "So your recommendation is to tackle them at their
source: the sewers."

Lehmann nodded.  "If they're there.  We'll pump gas into the network,
using a proprietary powder that produces hydrogen cyanide gas when it
comes into contact with damp soil or damp air.  Our main problem other
than attack from the rats themselves will be to block all holes leading
from the sewers."

"I'm afraid many of the sewers have overflowed into some of the
streams," said Whitney-Evans.  "We've complained to the local
authorities often enough."

Those outlets will have to be plugged.  We'll need the help of your
forestry staff to locate them and any other outlets from the sewers."

"Perhaps we can help too," said Milton.  "My staff at the Centre know
the forest like the backs of their hands."

"Fine, the more, the merrier."

Why not use rodenticides?"  the defence secretary asked.

That could be our biggest problem, I'm afraid," Lehmann said grimly.
There are two main types we could use.  One is of the single dose
variety: sodium fluoroacetate and fluoro-acetamide, which is normally
used in sewers; zinc phosphide;

nor bromide which is harmless to most other animals; arsenious oxide,
which is dangerous to most other animals; alpha-chloralose, normally
used only against mice.  The big disadvantage with these is that rats
have a built-in instinct against anything strange to them.  We call it
neophobia new object avoidance.  It makes it difficult to get them to
accept new bait.  They might try it after a while, but only in small
amounts.  If they feel any ill-effects at all, they leave it alone
completely.  A single dose poison might just kill a few, but even that
would serve as a warning to the others."

"And the other type of poison?"  the defence secretary asked.

The others are anticoagulants.  They kill by their reaction on the
rodent's blood system: they interfere with a substance called
prothrombin which causes the blood to clot when vessels are broken. The
rat suffers a haemorrhage at the slightest damage to blood capillaries:
a tiny scratch can kill it.  Females having litters are obviously very
susceptible.

Three kinds are in current use: Warfarin, coumatetralyl and
chlorophacinone.  They're administered gradually, building up to a
lethal dosage.  The rat gets used to the bait, feeds on it regularly,
then suffers the effects."

"And all this takes time," said Whitney-Evans.

"Yes, but the process can be speeded up.  However, that isn't our
problem.  Over the past few years, rodents in this country have been
building up a resistance against anticoagulants.  It began in a couple
of countries on the Continent, now it's spreading over here.  Luke
Fender, there, has just returned from the North where he's been
investigating the matter.  Luke?"

The resistance was first noted in Wales and the Midlands, but now it's
spread as far up as Cheshire and down to the south-west coast," Fender
told them.  We've bred Warfarin resistant rats in our own laboratories,
but these others have developed their own immunity.  The point is this:
the Outbreak rats had developed that same immunity before gas was used
as the final solution.  It seems likely that resistance will be
inherent in those descended from the rats that escaped from London.
That's why I agree with Mike: gas, providing we can trap them in the
sewers, has to be the answer.  If the machines can't be relied on to
lure them out, we have to keep them in and destroy them there."

"I think we're all agreed, then," said Thornton.  "Gas it shall be.
Gentlemen?"  he asked the room at large.  A murmur of assent was
given.

A councillor raised his hand.  "What about disease from these rodents?
How will we combat that?"

"I don't think we need worry ourselves about that problem at the
moment," Stephen Howard said smoothly.  The disease caused by the
vermin at the time of the Outbreak was a particularly hideous
distortion of Leptospirosis or Spirochaetal Jaundice.  Fever first,
before jaundice set in.  The victim became prostrate, blind, then all
senses were lost.  Coma, then the skin began to stretch and tear, and
the victim died.  The horrifying thing is that the whole process took
only twenty-four hours.  Fortunately, an anti-toxin was soon produced,
so we needn't fear the disease any more.  The other, more normal rodent
diseases are too minor nowadays to worry about.  No, the main danger it
would seem is attack from the beast itself.  Of course, everyone "out
in the field" as it were will be wearing protective suits."  Howard
reached behind his chair and drew out a large, mounted photograph of a
dead mutant Black rat.  "At this stage, I think it might be an idea to
remind ourselves just what our old enemy looks like."  He stood,
resting the photograph's base against the tabletop so everyone could
see.

Fender groaned inwardly.  The research director was obviously enjoying
throwing the fear of God into his captive audience.  No doubt he felt
it valuable to impress on them the dangers his company faced.  It would
make the company bill seem cheap.  The move was effective.  Fender
could feel the shudders run round the room.

"Ugly brute, isn't he?"  Howard said jovially.  This is actual size.
Over two feet in length more than three, counting the tail; long,
pointed head with deadly sharp teeth the incisors are particularly
large; ears pink, naked, pointed.  The fur is actually dark brown, but
mottled with specks of black that give it the appearance, from a
distance, of being completely black.  It's much like the normal Black
rat apart from its size, the main difference being its large brain and
strangely humped back powerful hindquarters, you see.  Its claws are
lethal."

One of the forest verderers had gone deathly white.  "My God, are they
all like that?"  he asked.

For a moment, Howard seemed flustered.  "What do you mean?"  he said.

"Are they all that size?  It's monstrous."

"Yes.  Afraid so.  All that size."

Fender hadn't missed the research director's reaction and he was
puzzled by it.  He could have imagined it, but Howard had almost looked
shifty for a moment.  As though he had been caught out.  Now he seemed
relieved that the question was only to do with size.  Fender frowned.

"I have a question."  It was the police commissioner who spoke, a
straight-backed, sombre looking man.

"Yes, Commissioner?"  said Thoraton as Howard swept the photograph from
the table and placed it behind his chair.

"Earlier, Mr.  Lehmann was puzzled by the fact that the rats had
remained hidden for so long.  Someone else asked why their noticeable
activities seemed to be on the increase.  It all appears to be pointing
to one thing, doesn't it?"

He left the question unanswered and there was silence around the
room.

Fender cleared his throat.  "Er, I think I know what the Commissioner
is getting at.  There does seem to be an escalation in the rats'
activities.  Why have they been seen lately after all these years of
hiding?  What's given them their new boldness?"

"And your explanation, Mr.  Fender?"  Thornton asked.

"One of two things; or perhaps a combination of both.  At the time of
the Outbreak the mutant rat was motivated by the desire for human
flesh.  The new breed may also have decided it would no longer be
dominated by man, or fear him as it had in the past.  It decided to
strike back.

They possessed a new brain-power and soon they had the essential
ingredient which gives any army the confidence to become the aggressor:
the power of numbers.  Perhaps that was the real turning-point for
them."

"I see what you're getting at, Mr.  Fender," the defence secretary
said.  "You're suggesting the rats in Epping Forest have reached a
sufficiently high number to bring out that aggressiveness."

"As I said, it may be a combination of two factors.  They have the
strength now, although I doubt they've reproduced in the quantity Mike
suggests the forest would be overrun with them if that were the case.
These are a mutant strain: their reproductive capabilities may be
different to that of a normal rodent.  We know from the few groups left
after the Outbreak that their reproductive system had been impaired
either by the ultrasonic sound waves or their mutant genes, so it may
well have become an inherent thing.  The other factor is that the old
blood lust has returned.  Their strength in numbers may have triggered
it off, or the taste of fresh animal flesh may have awoken an old
memory, a desire that's been lying dormant for years.  And if that's
the case, the attacks are going to get worse.  Remember, they've now
tasted living, human flesh."

The statement caused a stir and once again Thornton was forced to use
his fountain-pen as a gavel.

"I think it's time we got down to the details of the operation," he
said.  "I shall inform the Minister myself of what has happened and
what action we shall take.  There is no way we can keep this from the
media, but I suggest that all statements are issued directly from my
offices; perhaps then we can avoid alarmist reactions.  Fortunately we
have been alerted to the danger in good time; we are in a position to
control the situation.  There has been only one human killing so far
let's restrict it to that number."

The next half-hour was spent discussing plans for the forthcoming
operation, Fender and Lehmann putting forward their requirements for
dealing with the vermin, the police commissioner and Major Cormack
agreeing on the most effective ways in which to deploy their separate
forces.  Maps were brought in and ruled off into sections, phone calls
were made, certain members left on various assignments, lists were
drawn up.  Things, Fender reflected with some satisfaction, were
beginning to move.

He hardly noticed the Conservation Centre's secretary-cum-girl Friday
when she nervously entered the lecture hall.  She whispered something
into Whitney-Evans' ear and he quickly left, his expression one of
concern.  He was back within seconds and brought an abrupt halt to the
proceedings with a message that sent a chill through everyone
present.

"I'm afraid I have some rather distressing news," he began, his voice
grave, devoid of its usual pomposity.  "One of my forest keepers has
just returned.  As you know, my men have been out warning the forest
residents to stay indoors.  He ... he visited a small holding not far
from here, within a mile.  The door to the farmhouse was open, but when
he called out, nobody answered.  So he went in.  In the hallway he
found two ... bodies, presumably those of the owner and his wife, a Mr.
and Mrs.  Woollard.  Identification was not possible because the bodies
had been eaten; not much of them was left."

ELEVEN

Fender tapped lightly on the door.  It was late, well past eleven, and
there was nothing more anyone could do that night.  The lecture hall
was deserted now and only a few lights shone in the working area of the
Centre itself.  He had left the main building and walked over to the
separate residential annexe.  He knocked again, a little louder.

Who's there?"  he heard Jenny's voice say.

"It's me.  Luke."

The door opened and Jenny peered out at him.

"I'm sorry if I disturbed you, Jenny.  I couldn't get away any
sooner."

"It's all right, Luke.  I wasn't asleep.  I'm glad you came."  She
opened the door wide and motioned for him to enter.

The room was small, two beds occupying most of its space with a door
presumably leading off to the bathroom.  A lamp glowed in one corner,
giving the room an intimate feeling, and glass-covered but frameless
prints, together with delicately painted ornaments, bestowed some
warmth upon the functional interior.

"Cosy," he commented.

She smiled.  "I share it with Jan Wimbush.  We've tried to put some
life into it."

"I've just left Jan.  She told me where to find you."

"Where is she?"

"In the kitchen, washing up.  She's had a busy evening."

Jenny looked angry with herself.  "I should have helped her out.  I'm
afraid today's events have disorientated me."

"It's okay, Will has been helping her.  They're doing fine.  Are you
still feeling bad?"

"No, I'm okay now.  It was just the shock.  The vicar's housekeeper
came running round to the Centre, you see.  The poor woman didn't know
what to do when the grounds man told her what he'd found.  I went there
myself to check.  It was so ..."  She quickly lowered her face, forcing
back the tears; she'd cried enough that day.

Fender felt strangely awkward.  He wanted to hold her as he had done
earlier, but he was unsure of her mood.  One moment she was cold,
reserved, the next she seemed to be reaching out, seeking contact.

She lifted her head, pushing away her anxieties.  Would you like some
coffee?  You must be dead beat."

He grinned.  "I could do with something stronger, but coffee will
do."

"How about both?  Jan and I always keep a bottle of scotch handy for
our frequent mutual sob stories."

"You're terrific," he said.

"Sit down and relax while I get it."  She pointed to the only armchair
and he sank back into it with relief, closing his eyes and resting his
head back.  The tutor disappeared with an electric kettle into the
adjacent room and he heard the sound of running water.  "Have to be
instant, I'm afraid," she called out.

"Anything," he answered.

Soon a heavy measure of scotch was in his hand and Jenny was feeding
coffee and boiling water into two sturdy-looking mugs.

"Make it black, one sugar," he told her.  She placed the steaming mug
at his feet, then sat on the single bed, facing him.  He took a large
swallow of whisky and studied her, wondering how good her legs were
beneath the tight jeans.  Pretty good, if outward appearance were
anything to go by.  The baggy, loose-fitting cardigan had been replaced
by a tight-fitting man's shirt, her breasts swelling against the
material in a very un masculine way.  It was her face that intrigued
him, though: it was somehow both soft yet determined, her brown eyes
liquid, but penetrating, as though she could see into his innermost
thoughts.

"I'm sorry for yesterday, Luke," she said.

Yesterday?"

"At the meeting.  I'm sorry if I seemed to blame you for what was
happening.  Or, I should say, what wasn't happening.  I get so sick and
tired of people who refuse to take on responsibilities, who are content
to talk, talk, talk, and do nothing.  I'm afraid I put you in with the
rest."

"What's changed your mind?  If it is changed, that is."

"Further thought.  You did your best they just wouldn't listen."

They're listening now."

Yes, and look what it took to make them."

"It's the way things are, Jenny.  You'll go mad with frustration if you
don't acknowledge that.  You don't have to accept it; just realize it's
there.  There are other ways to fight against it, whether you call it
apathy, evasiveness, self-protection I call it fear.  The thing is not
to let it get to you."

"And you don't?"

He smiled.  "I try not to."

She looked deep into his eyes.  "Luke, what's going to happen?"

For a moment he thought she meant between them, their growing interest
in each other; then he realized the feelings could be entirely
one-sided from his side.

You mean the rats?"

She nodded and, from his initial hesitation, he knew she had read his
thoughts.  He carefully explained to her the details of the operation
which was to begin at first light the following day and which would
continue till all the mutant rats had been exterminated.

"So we at the Centre will be involved?"  she asked when he had
finished.

"I'm afraid so.  We'll need everyone who knows the forest.  Don't
worry, there'll be no danger to you."

"I wasn't worried.  I'd intended to stay and help in any way, even if
it was only making tea for everybody.  I can't stand the thought of
them being in the forest, you see.  Those monsters, feeding off the
wildlife, destroying.  They make the forest seem ... unclean.  I
despise them, Luke."

Fender sipped his coffee, the whisky having warmed the way for it.  Why
are you here at the Centre, Jenny?  It seems a strange, almost lonely
life."

"It isn't.  Not really.  I love the work, it's as close to nature as
you can get without kissing all civilization goodbye.  The children I
teach are fun.  And the staff are marvelous; we all work together."

"And Vie Whittaker?"

The old reserve came back into her eyes for a moment.  What about
him?"

"Oh, just a feeling.  He seems to care about you."

"He does, but he's foolish.  He has a wife but they're separated.  Kids
too."  Her voice softened.  "He thinks he's in love with me, but half
his mind is still on his family.  Sometimes I think he accepted this
job to prove he's independent of her, but, I think soon, he'll discover
he isn't."

"And you?  How do you feel towards him?"  He half-expected a rebuttal
to his question, but she smiled sadly and looked down at her hands.

"I don't intend to be used in a situation like that.  Not this time."

And there, he thought, lay the answer.  At some time or other she had
been involved with someone who had let her down badly.  It explained
her reserve, the coldness that sometimes masked and marred her true
nature.  The Centre was her escape, a kind of nunnery without the
harshness or the religion.  Nor the total rejection of the outside
world.  He wondered how long it would take for her to adjust again.

"What about you, Luke?"  she countered.  "Why aren't you married?"

"I love my work too much."  "You hate your work."  It startled him.

"Why do you do it, Luke?  Why rats?"

"I told you yesterday: the money's good."

She shook her head.  "No, that's not it.  There's some other reason."

He drained the last of the coffee and placed the mug on the floor.

"I think I'd better make a move.  It's an early start tomorrow..."  he
glanced at his watch '... I mean today."

She rose with him.  "I'm sorry if I was probing."  She moved closer.
"Really."

He smiled down at her.  "I started it.  I got what I deserved."

"Will I see you tomorrow?"

"Of course.  I'll be pretty busy, but as of now, Jenny, you're part of
the operation, so we'll be working together."  And then he wanted to
kiss her, but foolishly ridiculously he was afraid to.  He hadn't felt
that heart-shaking fear since he'd been fifteen, on his first date.  It
was crazy, but irrefutable: he was afraid his advance would be
rejected.  He stood there like a naive fool, too nervous to take a
forward step.  So she kissed him.

It was a light touch, and on the cheek; but a pleasurable shock ran
through him dispersing his uncharacteristic timidity.

"Jenny..."

"It is late, Luke.  Walk me over to the main building so I can help Jan
clear up.  Then you go and get some rest; it sounds like you're going
to need it."

He relaxed, no longer the schoolboy.  "Okay.  I'm staying at the hotel
in Buckhurst Hill.  It shouldn't take me much more than ten minutes to
get there, and only two minutes more to be sound asleep.  It's been a
long day."

But it wasn't over for him yet.

Jan Wimbush wiped the steam from her spectacles with the end of her
sweater.  All the cups and saucers were washed now, the ashtrays
emptied and clean, the big table in the lecture hall wiped of all
stains.  Tomorrow would be a busy day but, thank God, there would be no
classes and all the Centre staff would be helping.

Alex Milton had spoken to the staff earlier that evening, explaining
the rat problem to them and how the Centre was to be the operational
headquarters.  If any of his members wanted to leave, they could do so
he wouldn't blame them in the least.  But their help was needed by the
men who were coming to destroy the vermin.  He had been assured by
Ratkill's research director that there would be no real danger to the
staff, providing they did exactly as they were told and wore the
protective clothing that would be issued when outside the confines of
the building itself.  Everybody volunteered to stay, of course, most
looking forward to the drama.  The fact that the local vicar had
apparently been eaten alive by the monsters seemed hardly real to those
who hadn't visited the graveyard, although the warden did try to stress
the deadly seriousness of it all.

The three classrooms had been cleared, the desks in each room pushed
together to make two big tables.  The laboratory itself was to be used
as a storeroom for the gas tanks and rodenticides the Ratkill people
would be bringing.  The protective suits would also be kept there.  The
lecture hall would be used as the main operations room, while the
library would be reserved for smaller, more select meetings by the
inner committee.

Jan put her spectacles back on and tried to look out into the night
through the large, single-frame window; all she saw was her own
reflection.  She didn't much fancy walking over to the residential wing
by herself.  Anything could be out there in the dark.  Most of the
staff had retired for the night, but Will Aycott had stayed to help her
finish up.  He was around somewhere checking that all the windows and
doors were secure; he also had the keys to the main door.

Jan turned from the window, not too keen on her own reflected features,
and switched off the kitchen light.  Will would see her back to her
room he'd tried to get into it often enough.  Luckily, Jenny Hanmer was
a good chaperone to have around in fact, they were useful chaperones to
each other at times.  Not that she disliked Will.  Sometimes she wished
she had her own room.

She wondered if Jenny was feeling any better.  She'd had a terrible
shock up at the churchyard; Jan wondered what had possessed her to go
up there in the first place.  She wouldn't have had the nerve.  Still,
Jenny was different.  She had guts.  She stood up for herself.

Will, where are you?"  Jan called along the darkened corridor.  There
was no reply so she walked its length, peering into doorways as she
went.  The lights in the end classroom were still on, throwing a
rectangle of brightness across the corridor.  She marched towards it,
assuming he would be there and hadn't heard her call.

Will, are you in there?"  She peered round the door and saw that the
classroom was empty.  He must be at the other end of the building, near
the library.

Jan glanced around the room, checking that it was in order and the
sliding windows closed.  The large windows ran the length of the
building without a break on that side, compensating for the lack of
glass at the front.  Satisfied all was in order, she reached for the
light switch, then groaned silently when she noticed the lone coffee
cup resting on the work top beneath the windows.  Will must have missed
it.

She crossed the room and stared disgustedly down into the cup.  Someone
had dropped a cigarette end into it.  Sighing, she looked up at her
reflection in the black glass again, brooding on her physical
inadequacies.  Too thin, neck too long, chin a little too firm.  No
breasts to speak of.  Her hair was too straight and always lank two
days after washing.  And the glasses.  No matter how well she groomed
herself for a special occasion, no matter what make-up she used, what
perfume, how beautiful the dress, she always had to detract at least
twenty percent of the overall effect by donning the glasses.  It was
unfair.  Still, Will seemed to find her attractive; maybe she was being
too hard on herself.

Jan suddenly had an uneasy feeling.  It must have been the total,
obscuring blackness outside, the lightless forest something to which
she had never quite adapted.  But now it worried her more than ever
before.  Obviously, the fact that there were monster rats roaming
around out there had a lot to do with it; for her, Epping Forest had
rapidly lost all its charm.  She shivered.  Silly, but it was almost as
though the creatures were out there watching her.  She leaned forward,
pushing her face close to the window and shielding the light from
behind with her hand.  She stared out into the night through the shadow
her own form had created.  Then the window exploded into her face.

Fender and Jenny were just entering the main building when they heard
the crash of glass and the shrill scream that accompanied it.  They
looked at each other in shocked surprise, then rushed into the
reception area, almost colliding with Will Aycott as he emerged from
the corridor.

"Where did it come from?"  Fender asked, grabbing the young tutor's arm
to steady him.

The other end.  One of the classrooms."

"Come on."  Fender ran down the corridor, Jenny and Will hard at his
heels.  They made for the lighted room at the end, further screams and
scrabbling sounds urging them on.

"It's Jan!"  Jenny shouted, fearing the worst.

Fender stopped at the doorway, his eyes widening and the skin at his
scalp tautening.  The two tutors crowded in behind and he held them
back, preventing them from entering the room.  Jenny screamed at the
sight before them.

Jan Wimbush was dragging herself along the floor towards the door, her
spectacles gone, her face a bloody mess, glass slivers projecting from
her cheeks and forehead glinting like silver shards in the overhead
light.  Rivulets of blood ran down her arms and her chest was stained
red.  She raised a quivering hand towards them as though beseeching
help, strange gurgling sounds coming from her throat.

Clinging to her back, weighing down her frail body, was a huge,
evil-looking black creature.  Its head was buried beneath the hair at
the back of her neck, its shoulders jerking spasmodically as it drank
in her blood.

"Oh, God, help her, Luke!"  Jenny implored and she saw the rat catcher
face was a mask of sheer hate.

"Get help, Jenny," he told her, his voice tight.  "Don't go outside the
building.  Use the phone."

She stood there, mesmerized by the awful scene, and he had to shove her
hard.  "Move!"  he shouted.

Fender held on to Will, feeling the younger man's fear, but knowing he
was courageous enough to run forward and help the girl.

"For Christ's sake, we've got to save her!"  the tutor shouted.

Fender motioned towards the window with his head.  "Look," he said.

Perched on the work top before the shattered window squatted another
huge rat, its body hunched, hindquarters quivering.  It stared at them
through evil, dark eyes.  It was suddenly joined by another.

Jan's screams had died into a low, heart-rending wailing, and she still
pulled herself forward, the pain in her neck pushing her on, her eyes
imploring the two blurred figures to help her.  She tried to reach
behind her with one hand in an effort to drag the deadly weight off,
but the creature ignored her feeble struggles.

"We've got to get rid of those two first," Fender said grimly, shutting
the girl's cries from his mind.

"But Jan..."

The other two will attack while we're helping her.  Come on, we'll have
to move fast.  We've got to prevent more getting in."

Fender pulled the young tutor forward towards the arranged desks in the
middle of the room.  "Quickly.  Grab two legs we'll use the desk as a
battering-ram."

As they snatched up the flat-topped desk, Fender glanced towards the
broken window.  There were now three rats perched on the sill.

He knew they would attack at any moment, for their hindquarters were
bunched and trembling, building up pressure.

"Now!"  The two men ran towards the window, the desk held before them,
its top a strong, flat shield.  They hit the vermin with all the force
they had, sending them scurrying back, through the broken window, out
into the night.  But one managed to slither clear; it scrambled off the
work top and disappeared beneath, scuttling into a dark corner.

"Hold the desk against the window-frame, Will.  Don't let them get back
in.  I'm going to help the girl."

The tutor could only watch as Fender dashed away.  He felt a blow
against the wooden surface and the desk shifted back a few inches.  His
muscles stretched taut as he pushed it further against the frame.

Fender already knew the weapon he was going to use against the rat; he
had seen it from the doorway when he had forced himself to think
clearly and not be panicked by the situation.  His loathing of the
creatures had helped override his natural fear.  He reached up for one
of the metal skewers used for soil-testing mounted on the far wall of
the classroom.  They were between three and four feet in length, having
a single-bar crossing handle at one end and tapering into a corkscrew
point at the other, resembling an oversized wine bottle opener.

He ran back to the girl.  She was still crawling, almost at the door
now, but her movements were weak, her wail diminished to a dull moan.
The black creature clung to her,

oblivious to the two men.  Jan suddenly rested her head on the floor,
as though she'd given up, the effort too much.  Fender prayed he wasn't
too late.

He stood above the mutant, his legs astride the girl's recumbent body,
and raised the skewer high, one hand halfway down its shaft, the other
over and around the handle.  He plunged down, using a slight sideways
movement for fear of impaling the girl.  The rat emitted a high-pitched
squeal as the sharp point struck into its flank.  Its pointed head
arched upwards, its mouth wide, revealing blood-soaked teeth, red
liquid spurting from its throat as it choked.

Fender used all his weight, pushing hard, sinking the skewer deep,
dislodging the squirming creature from its perch.  It fell against the
floor, claws tearing at the wood surface and causing long scars. Fender
began to twist at the handle, the corkscrew point churning into the
rat's intestines, bursting through its stomach, sinking into the floor
itself.

The mutant rat struggled, its squeals almost pitiful, childlike; but
Fender did not relent until the skewer was imbedded into the floor,
pinning the black creature there, its struggles becoming weaker until
they became just a nerve-twitching reaction.  He left the improvised
weapon standing rigidly upright and bent down towards the girl.  He
winced at the sight of her mutilated face when he turned her over.  Her
eyes were closed, but he was relieved when a low sob escaped her.

"It's all right now, Jan," he softly told her.  "You're safe."

Fender knew he had to stem the flow of blood from the back of her neck
if she were to survive her ordeal.  He turned her over again and parted
the blood-clotted hair to examine the damage.  He almost retched when
he saw the open wound.  The top of her spine was exposed but,
fortunately, the rat had burrowed beside it and not into it.  She would
have been permanently paralysed, if not killed, if it had.  He reached
for a handkerchief and placed it over the wound, pressing it against
the flow of blood.

"Luke, help me, help me!"

The rat catcher whirled at the sound of Will's voice and saw a rat
biting into the young tutor's calf.  Will's arms were still pushing at
the upturned desk and Fender could see the claws and pointed snout of a
mutant on the outside as it balanced on the window-sill trying to push
its way through the narrow gap between table and frame on that side.
The tutor was kicking his leg out, afraid to let go of the desk; the
rat refused to be shaken off.

Fender quickly looked around for another weapon and his eyes rested
upon the red and white surveyor's stakes propped up in one corner. They
were at least five feet long and about two inches in diameter; these,
too, had pointed ends for sinking into the ground.  He hurried over and
grabbed one, the others clattering to the floor as he disturbed them.

Holding the stake before him like a lance, the rat catcher ran at the
rodent clinging to Will's calf and struck.  The point slid off the
rat's back, cutting a red groove beneath the bristling, black fur.  It
lost its hold on the tutor and turned to face its aggressor, long front
teeth baring in a ferocious snarl, one front paw raised, claws
outstretched.

Fender poked at it with the stake, aiming for the eyes, trying to blind
it.  The rat tried to duck beneath the point, but Fender immediately
lowered it, keeping the creature at bay.  He stabbed again, striking at
the head, hoping to pierce the skull, but once again, the blow glanced
off.  It caused the rat to stagger back though, and Fender pressed his
advantage, stepping forward, pushing, stabbing.

The mutant reared up and it was frightening to see its full length.
Fender aimed for the stomach, but the rat fell back wards, turning over
and scrambling round to face its assailant again.  It clawed at the
tormenting stake, its jaws open wide, hissing a stream of pink-flecked
saliva.  Fender lunged, the point disappearing into the creature's
mouth and cutting into the throat.

Once more, the rapid, high-pitched squealing as the rat scuttled
backwards, trying desperately to escape the choking weapon.  Fender
went with it, not allowing the rat room to break free, but it suddenly
shook its body violently, twisting and turning until it was loose.
Fender struck again and this time the point cut into the creature's
hindquarters, penetrating, but not deeply.  The rat broke away and
scuttled for the open doorway, passing between the impaled rat and the
limp body of the girl.

"Luke, I can't hold them off much longer," came Will's desperate cry.

Fender hurried over to the young tutor who was ignoring his leg wound
and keeping his arms taut against the desk, his hips resting against
the work-top unit.  Fender struck out at the lethal-looking claw
curling around the wood and when it disappeared, helped Will to shift
the desk along, filling the gap.

Will, can you get to Jan?  Drag her out into the corridor?"

What are you going to do?  You can't hold them off forever."

"Pretty soon they're going to have the sense to break through the other
windows.  That's how they got in in the first place.  When they do
we'll have no chance this room will be swarming with them."

He gasped as a body thudded against the other side, the desk-top
juddering and moving back an inch.  They pushed it back.

"Get the girl out, Will, then stand by the door.  I'll be coming
through fast and you'll have to get it closed behind me."

"Okay.  Ready?  I'm going to let it go now."

Fender redoubled his efforts as the bodies thudded against the wood. He
could hear claws scrabbling at the surface as they ran up its length. 
"Hurry, Will, for Christ's sake hurry."

The young tutor limped towards the prone body, his teeth clenched
against the pain, his face deathly pale.  He almost wept when he turned
Jan over and saw the damage the broken glass had done, but he knew
there was no time for grief.  He grabbed her beneath the shoulders and,
in a half-crouched position, began to drag her through the doorway.

"Look out for the rat that got into the corridor," Fender warned him.

The pressure against the table was becoming too much, the thumps
against it increasing in frequency.  He propped the bright-coloured
stake against the wood, hoping it would hold the desk in position long
enough for him to make it to the door.  Then the indescribable
happened.

The long windows on either side all shattered at once.  The noise of
falling glass was deafening and the sight of the black, furry bodies
hurtling through, squealing their fury, skidding off the work top onto
the floor, was almost enough to make his heart stop beating.

Fender ran.

The rats were too stunned and confused to attack at once, and Fender
gave them no second chance.  He dived when he was still feet from the
door, rolling into the corridor and crashing against the wall
opposite.

"Shut it!"  he screamed, and Will lost no time in doing so.

The door rattled in its frame as the vermin threw themselves against
it.  They could hear the scratching sounds, the splintering as the
creatures gnawed at the wood.

Fender shook his head to clear his senses.

"Are you okay?"  the tutor asked anxiously, holding on to the
door-handle as if to keep it closed.

Yes.  I knocked my head, that's all."  He got to one knee and crouched
beside Jan and felt her pulse.  It was weak.  We've got to get her to a
hospital.  I don't think she'll make it, otherwise."  He looked up at
Will.  You can let go of the door I don't think they're that clever."

Will sheepishly dropped his hand.  "My God, listen to them.  It won't
take them long to gnaw their way through."

"No, and we'd better be out of here before they do."

"Luke, I've called the police."  It was Jenny, standing at the end of
the darkened corridor, by the reception area.  "I've also called the
Warden, on the internal phone and warned him to keep everybody inside
the living quarters until the police get here."

"Good girl.  Stay where you are, we'll bring Jan..."  His voice broke
off when he noticed something dark moving along the corridor, something
low, crouched close to the wall.  It was making towards Jenny.

"Jenny, run!  Get away from there!"  He was on his feet, running down
the corridor.  Jenny stood transfixed, her eyes wide with terror.

The rat moved with incredible speed, Fender's shouts and footsteps
galvanizing it into action.  It broke free from the shadows.  Jenny
could only step back as it sped past her, its stiffened fur actually
brushing her legs.  It scuttled madly around in the wider reception
area, looking for an opening, a crazed look in its eyes.  Jenny leaned
back against the far wall and watched in fascinated horror.  Fender
reached her and shielded her body when he saw the rat's frantic
actions.

A full-length window stood by the glass door, giving half the reception
area a glass wall appearance.  The rat ran at the lower pane and
bounced off its rigid surface.  It tried again, throwing itself at the
glass with desperate strength.  Fender was conscious of a police siren
in the distance, the unmistakable wail growing louder with each
second.

The rat scrambled away from the glass and made towards them.  Fender
got ready to kick out at it, but the creature turned before it reached
them and hurtled itself at the window once more.  This time, the glass
shattered and it was through, disappearing into the shadows outside,
leaving scraped-off hair and blood on the remaining window fragments.

"Oh, God, Luke.  It's vile.  It's so vile."  Jenny leaned against
Fender's back; he was too afraid to take his eyes off the broken pane
in case the rats came swarming through.

"Luke.  Come here, quickly."  It was Will calling from the gloomy end
of the corridor.

Fender grabbed Jenny's arm and took her with him.

"What is it?"  he asked when he reached the crouched figure.

"Listen!"

Fender heard nothing.  Then he realized what the young tutor was
getting at.  The rats," he said.  They're gone."

TWELVE

It was the dogs who aroused the slumbering Police Training Camp on
Lippits Hill.  For the cadets and training officers who survived, it
was to be a night they would never forget, a horrific memory that would
fill their dreams for years to come.

They staggered from their barrack huts, half-dressed, half-asleep,
cursing the animals for the terrible noise, cursing the handlers for
not keeping them quiet.  Yet they knew from the sound that the dogs had
been disturbed by more than just a prowler; their frenzied barks had
merged into a fearful howling ululation that pierced the bitter night
and sent shudders down the spines of all who heard.

"What the fuck's got into them?"  one young cadet asked as the men
gathered in groups outside the huts.

"Where the bloody hell's their handlers?"  another cursed.

They began to move in the direction of the pens, but a sergeant,
hastily donning a heavy coat, brought them to a halt.

"Listen!"  he commanded, and those nearest to him held their breath.
The word spread back to those at the rear, and the excited voices died;
they stood shivering in the dark, each man's senses keened to the
night.

"What is it?"  one finally asked, mystified and a little afraid.

"It's screaming," another answered.  "I'm sure it's screaming.

If someone could get the bloody dogs quiet we could tell for sure."

"No, no, it's not screaming," someone else said.  "It's the ducks.  The
noise is coming from the duck farm.  They sound like human voices from
a distance."

They all listened again, while the dog-handlers hurried towards the
pens, anxious to calm the agitated dogs.  Not far from the training
centre, a quarter of a mile at the most, in a remote but mainly un
wooded area, a large, wire-fenced pound had been erected.  Inside,
various breeds of duck were raised, some for their meat, most for their
eggs.  It was a specialist enterprise and held hundreds of birds within
its boundaries.  Now the policemen and trainees had something to relate
the sound to, they began to agree: it wasn't human screams but the
cries of disturbed fowl.

The camp supervisor joined them and they could not see how drawn his
face looked in the darkness.  He had received a phone call from his
superior earlier that evening, and the news had been bad.

The supervisor quickly gathered the senior officers and instructors
around him and explained just what his fears were, and within ten
minutes firearms had been issued to the officers and most capable
trainees.  They set off in force from the camp towards the duck farm,
trudging over the fields behind the training centre, the route being
more direct than the long detour by road.  Beams of light from powerful
torches struck into the night; the dogs, eager to confront an age-old
enemy, pulled at their leashes, snarling and yelping in their desire
for combat.  A token force was left to guard the grounds, the camp
supervisor remaining with them, trying to make contact with the deputy
assistant commissioner, who would inform the assistant commissioner,
who would inform the commissioner.  The order for all officers and
cadets to remain within the confines of the camp came too late; by
then, the policemen were approaching the duck pound itself.

"Hold it!  Hold it!"  No one was sure who was giving the order, but
they all came to a halt and looked uneasily around.

"Keep those bloody dogs quiet!"  came the voice again and the burly
figure of the sergeant in charge of firearms came striding forward from
the rear.  "Just listen, everyone."

The handlers tried to muzzle their dogs with their hands, but the
animals were too restless.  They pulled away from their masters, deep
growls coming from their throats.  The ducks were frantic: the men
could hear the flurry of wings above the squealing clamour.  But other
sounds began to come through and it slowly dawned on the policemen that
they were human voices.  Human screams.

"It's coming from the mobile home site!"  the sergeant shouted.  "It's
not just the ducks.  It's on the other side of the pound!"

He ran forward and the men followed, skirting the high, wire fence,
running downhill to the small track that led to the secluded estate.
Lights were on in the large private house that stood near the entrance
to the mobile home site and they could see figures at the upstairs
windows, waving.  One window opened and a man began shouting down at
them, but his words were lost in the overall clamour.

There were thirty houses in all, constructed of timber and glass,
resting on concrete bases.  They were called mobile homes because they
had been brought fully built to the site on wheels and planted in
position like giant dolls' houses, ready for occupation.  Most of the
inhabitants were young couples who could not afford the high price of
more permanent, brick-built homes, or retired couples who sought small
accommodation in peaceful surroundings.  They all enjoyed the community
spirit in the tiny, one-street estate, and agreed that the timber
houses were as solid and permanent as any built of brick.  That night
they discovered just how vulnerable they were.

The policemen were suddenly aware of the dark shapes running through
the grass around them, streaming from the site, meeting them and
scurrying through their midsts.  The lead dogs went wild, attacking the
black creatures, while the men stood perplexed.  The torch beams probed
the long grass and the cry went up: "Rats!  They're the Black rats!"

The policemen kicked out, sickened and frightened.  Those with weapons
began firing at the vermin, cautious of hitting their companions, but
anxious not to be touched by the creatures.  The officers tried to
bring some order into the chaos, but they themselves were near to
panic.  A young cadet went down, a bullet in his leg.  As two of his
companions pulled him up, they found two rats clinging to his body.
They tried to tear the tenacious beasts from him, but soon found they
had to defend themselves from similar attacks.  The wounded cadet fell
again and his scream was added to the others.

The officers ordered the men on, urging them not to attack the vermin,
but to press on to the mobile home site.  It was too much for some of
the young cadets; they ran off into the night, seeking refuge from the
nightmare.  Unfortunately for them, their fleeing figures attracted the
attention of the rats more than those who had stayed to fight, and they
were followed.  From different points in the darkness came their
solitary cries as the rats sought them out and attacked.

The main body of men found themselves on the estate, the vermin sifting
through them as they ran on.  Each policeman had tried to avoid the
scurrying black shapes beneath his feet, unwilling to provoke attack,
anxious to get to the people at the site.  The handlers stayed with
their dogs who were in a mad frenzy, snapping at the vermin, lifting
them into the air, shaking them furiously like rag dolls.  The dogs,
fierce and brave as they were, had no chance against the swarming
vermin, the razor teeth cutting into their flesh like sharp knives,
their bodies brought down by the sheer weight of the leaping creatures.
The handlers tried to help but they, too, were engulfed by the rats,
and they cried for help as they fell.  Several armed policemen turned
back and fired into the scrabbling heaps, no longer caring who or what
they hit.

The two lamps that lit the street dividing the facing row of houses
revealed a carnage that stopped the policemen in their tracks.  Gaping
holes in the wooden structures showed where the rats had torn their way
through to reach the people inside; broken windows gave evidence of the
other means of entry.  There were black, bristling-bodied creatures
swarming all over the houses, scuttling in and out of buildings, over
the rooftops, through the tiny gardens.  The policemen saw groups of
them fighting among themselves over bloodsoaked objects objects they
realized were dismembered parts of human bodies tugging, ripping apart.
An old man, his naked body thin and wasted, crashed through a glass
door, falling into the tiny garden area, twisting over an dover in the
flowerbed, one rat clinging to his shoulder, another at his buttock.  A
woman appeared shrieking at a window, trying to tear away a rat
entangled in her hair.  She slumped forward, and jagged shards of glass
jutting from the window-frame cut into her ribs, piercing her lungs,
stilling her cries.  A man stood fully-clothed on the roof of his
house, a small bundle that must have been a baby cradled in his arms,
kicking out at the rats as they scurried up the walls in an effort to
reach him.  In the garden below lay the crumpled figure of a woman, the
rats feeding off her body while their companions tried ceaselessly to
gain purchase on the roof-top.  An elderly couple, both clad in
dressing-gowns, marched defiantly down the centre street, the man
striking out with a heavy-looking walking-stick, the woman wielding a
metal dustbin lid, using it as a shield.  When the man went down, she
tried to cover him with her own body, the lid protecting their heads;
but the rats found other, more vulnerable, parts.  A man wearing only a
pyjama jacket sat on the steps to his house and stared down
disbelievingly at the dozen or so rats eating away at his legs.  A boy,
barely fourteen, hacked away at the mangled body of a rat with a
carving knife.  He knelt on the ground, the creature between his knees,
while three of its companions nipped away the flesh from his back.  An
obese woman, her voluminous pink nightie patterned with red stains,
wildly smashed a black creature against a wall, both hands wrapped
around its neck, cursing the vermin, screaming in hate rather than
fear.

One of the houses was ablaze, the flames creating dancing shadows, the
scene a madman's dream.  A figure impossible to tell if it was a man or
woman appeared in the doorway and ran screeching into the turmoil
outside, body aflame, lungs already seared by the heat.  Black
creatures followed, their stiff fur on fire, squealing and dashing to
and fro in their own terror.

And above it all was the screaming, the wailing, the moaning, the
crackle of flames, the squealing of the vermin themselves.  The cries
for help.  The crash of wrecked furniture.  The thuds of makeshift
weapons.  The overturned radio, volume accidentally turned up full,
blaring out sentimental ballads linked by the silky voice of the
late-night DJ.

Wherever the stunned policemen looked was a new horror, and finally
their minds refused to accept any more, everything becoming a confused
blur.  They attacked, using guns, firing indiscriminately, hardly
needing to select targets for the rats were everywhere, merged almost
into one struggling heap before them.  Hundreds, hundreds, hundreds.
The men without weapons used anything they could lay their hands on,
tearing off strips of low fencing, porch support, anything they could
use as a club.  They tried to work in large groups for self-protection,
but so many went down under the vast numbers of rats that they found
themselves battling in smaller pockets.  Smaller and smaller.

The mutants left not because their acute hearing could pick up the
sirens approaching in the distance, but because their hunger was
satiated, their bellies glutted.  They fled almost as one, many
carrying awkward loads they had patiently severed from lifeless bodies.
Across the fields they went, heading for the forest areas, the
scuttling thuds of their many feet the only sound they made.  The other
woodland creatures froze, too terrified to move as the vast black river
passed over them.  Soon the forest was silent again.  Only the sound of
low-pitched moaning rolled over the fields and this was soon drowned by
the blaring sirens.

Lair

The rat, a peculiar white scar running the length of its skull,
threaded its way through the rubble, its load hardly hindering the
journey.  Others followed behind, a few bearing similar burdens to that
of the leader, while still more carried dismembered limbs and meat
chunks.  Their own bellies were full; the food was for their masters.
The main force had returned to their dark sanctums beneath the forest,
the excitement of killing still with them, their bodies tired but still
trembling from their recent onslaught.

The leader had broken away from them, its squeals commanding certain
others to follow, for they still had a duty to perform.  They came with
their burdens, submissive to their leader, who in turn was submissive
to others.

There was little light when they began to descend, the moonbeams
finding only small openings to penetrate, casting silvery Pools of
reflection in scattered patches.  But the creatures were used to the
darkness, and those below had little use for the sun.  The leader was
aware of the stirring all around as it dropped from the last incline
and landed in the lower level.  The burden dropped from its jaws and
the rat hissed menacingly as others scudded towards it.  It retrieved
the sticky, dripping thing and padded forward, making for the far
corner where its master lay.  The underground room was alive with
rustling and spasmodic movements, filled with excited mewling sounds.

The rat was challenged by others of its kind as it approached the
bloated thing in the corner, but it hissed back, dropping its burden
and baring its teeth.  They backed away and crouched low, ready to
spring forward at the slightest provocation.  Further, more strident
hissing came from the blackness in the corner, and the creature there
shuffled around in its bed of straw and damp earth, impatient, hungry
for the food the Black rat had brought.

The rat lifted the heavy object once more and moved closer to the obese
creature, fearful yet fascinated, almost mesmerized.  It vaguely
remembered a time before when the dominant rat had been more powerful,
its claws sharp enough to have caused the searing injury to its head,
subduing it, making it obey.  The creature still held that terror for
the Black rat.  It dropped the food into the straw and the thing
shuffled its fleshy bulk forward, its two heads weaving to and fro in
the air, snouts twitching, the teeth curled back, tusk-like from the
lack of gnawing.  The two mouths plunged at the bloody object, seeking
the natural openings, sucking noisily at them.

The rat edged forward, wanting to share in the prize, afraid of its
master, but arrogant enough to express its own leadership.  The thing
screeched in rage, sending the rat scuttling back, the guards following
and lashing out with their claws.  The scuffle was brief, the rat
breaking away and rolling over, exposing its neck in the submissive
gesture, bleating for mercy.

The guards returned to their crouched positions and the rat heard the
sucking, gurgling noises as the creature in the corner resumed eating.
The others in the underground chamber, those like the dominant mutant,
bloated, hairless, began to attack the food brought to them, tearing it
away from the black vermin, hissing and squealing in their lust.

The big rat turned and padded away towards the incline leading from the
chamber.  It stopped just once and glared around at the dim, gorging
shapes.  Then it scuttled up the slope, its companions following.

THIRTEEN

Two days after the massacre at the mobile home site in which
sixty-three residents and forty-eight policemen and trainees had been
killed, the task of locating and blocking all sewer openings in Epping
Forest was still in hand.  Although no one had been foolhardy enough to
enter the sewers, the operatives knew the vermin were in there: they
could be heard.  The main exits had already been sealed with concrete
and small apertures were left to take the tubes through which cyanide
powder would be pumped.  The search was now on for the smaller holes
that would be used as escape exits by the rodents when the underground
tunnels were filled with the killer gas.  Groups of men wearing
protective clothing and guarded by armed soldiers scouted the woodland,
looking for rat 'runs', the paths made from constant use by vermin,
tracing them back to their source.  Each group carried detailed plans
of the sewer network with accurate positioning guides related to the
ground above.  It was painstaking work, but necessary if the operation
were to be successful.

The idea was to create a vast underground tomb for the vermin.  The gas
would be poured in through thick tubes from machines bearing no
resemblance to the old-fashioned hand-pumps that had once been used.
The machines, which looked like huge vacuum cleaners, had been hastily
developed after the London Outbreak, and were powered by their own
generators.  Their air-blast enabled the cyanide powder to penetrate
the deepest sewers without risking the lives of the operatives, as long
as all the openings were tightly sealed.  Should they accidentally come
in contact with the toxic fumes because of a leakage, each man carried
amyl nitrate capsules to counteract the gas.

It was realized that not all outlets could be found in the dense
undergrowth of the forest, but it was hoped the channels would be so
heavily impregnated with the gas that the rats would have little time
to break out.  The few that did could be dealt with in the following
days.  The purge would be relentless, with no thought to other woodland
wildlife the consequences if any of the mutants escaped would be too
serious.  The Prime Minister himself had promised the country that the
whole of Epping Forest would be razed to the ground if necessary.
Encouraged by this statement, certain members of the public had been
discovered starting their own forest fires, and had been promptly
arrested.

The outcry against this second rodent invasion within five years had,
of course, been enormous.  The government true, it had been a different
government at that time had promised that a catastrophe such as the
London Outbreak would never happen again.  So much for the 'official'
word.  Members of the ruling body shuddered as they anticipated the
recriminations to follow, while the Opposition rubbed their hands in
vengeful glee, remembering the humiliating beating they had taken from
the public years before.  The principal department involved, the
Ministry of Agriculture, was already busy preparing documents to prove
there had been no negligence on its part.  The Ratkill board of
directors gloated with satisfaction while their executives revelled in
the sudden storm of activity.  It had been a Ratkill investigator who
had confirmed the infestation and who had recommended instant action,
only to be overruled by the private secretary for the Ministry of
Agriculture, who had wanted matters to progress more cautiously.  Of
course, that 'delay' would not be denounced publicly by Ratkill unless
a later inquiry brought it out in the open.  No, it would be a matter
between themselves and Antony Thoraton; it might prove useful to have
the gratitude unspoken, of course of such an influential man.

Epping Forest itself was now devoid, apart from those involved in the
eradication itself, of all human life.  It was decided after the
massacre that not just a confined area would be cleared of residents,
but Epping Forest's entire population.  The more nervous considered the
whole green belt area to be in danger, but were assured that this was
not the case.  There were very clear indications as to the extent of
the vermin's penetration, and this was well within the forest itself;
there would be no danger to those living in the surrounding areas.

The evacuated area was ringed by a human chain troops spread as wide as
possible without breaking visual contact, armoured vehicles constantly
patrolling the perimeters.  Their numbers were strengthened by the
metropolitan and county police forces and even local fire stations
stood by in readiness.  Gazelle helicopters swooped low over the
treetops and scanned the ground below.  Chieftain tanks stood immobile
and menacing, facing into the forest, ready to rumble into action at
the first command.

The only occupied area within the guarded boundary was the Conservation
Centre, its small car park and front lawn crowded with military, police
and Ratkill vehicles, the main building itself buzzing with activity.
No one was allowed to enter the restricted area without an army escort,
and the same applied when leaving the Centre.  Eight Green Goddess
fire-engines stood along the road cresting High Beach,

glaring down into the valley like mechanical predators.  Army scout
cars, their personnel feeling secure and protected inside the rough
metal carriages, raced carelessly along hoggin paths, keeping a sharp
lookout for misguided or just plain stupid civilians who had ignored
the warnings and slipped through the cordon.  Why anyone should do so,
knowing full well the dangers, was beyond the soldiers' comprehension,
but they had learned from past experience never to underestimate the
imbecility of certain individuals on occasions like these.

More atrocities had been discovered in the two days following the mass
attack: the tattered remains of a tent in a remote corner of a field,
the inside splattered with dried blood, the floor littered with the
remains of twelve missing Barnardo boys and their supervisor; bones of
what had obviously been a courting couple in a small clearing not far
from the roadside, the couple's fawn-coloured car nearby; an empty
rowing boat drifting an one of the few lakes where fishing was allowed,
the missing occupant's rod and sandwiches still lying in the bottom of
the dinghy; an empty lorry, the driver's door wide open as though he
had jumped down to clear the winding forest road of some obstacle or
animal cattle often wandered across the roadways; an abandoned but
sparkling new bicycle; a saddled, riderless horse; a house, close to
several others, but empty and bloodstained.

It had been impossible for the warnings to reach everyone despite the
frequent radio broadcasts, the patrols with loudspeakers, the knocking
on doors there was always someone whom the news did not reach.  Most of
the residents had fled without further prompting, but there were
several surly old farmers who had to be forcibly 'persuaded', and a few
of the wealthier residents who considered themselves above the
attention of mere rats, who had to be ordered out.  But finally,

the woodland had been cleared and the mass execution of the vermin was
underway.

The forest was quieter than it had ever been, the wildlife nervous. The
sun shone bright but impotently on the verdant acres, the autumn chill
dissipating its warmth.  The country held its breath.

Fender spoon-fed the powder into the hole, ensuring there was no breeze
to blow the substance back into his face.  The fumes could easily enter
the grille in the strong, plastic visor, part of the protective suit he
wore against rodent attack.  The group around him were also dressed in
the silver-grey suits, the material a combination of tough fabric and
fine strands of close-knitted, flexible steel.  The helmets, with their
plastic face coverings, gave the men a sinister, alien appearance, but
each was confident that no sharp teeth could penetrate their armour.

Fender cursed the clumsiness of the heavy gloves, but felt no
inclination to remove them.  For all he knew there could be a mutant
rat lurking only feet away in the passage he was preparing to block,
ready to snap off his fingers.  The hole looked hardly big enough to
contain a giant rat, but he knew from the map Whittaker was holding
that there was a sewer below, so he was taking no chances.  There was a
definite run leading from the tunnel which showed it was in constant
use.  He shook the long-handled spoon free of the deadly powder and
withdrew it, wiping the surface against the soil as he did so, then
pulled up a clod of earth from the ground nearby and plugged the hole,
turning the grass roots so they faced outwards.  That way the powder
would not be covered with loose earth.

Fender stood.  "Okay, Joe, block it," he said.

Joe Apercello, another Ratkill operative, stepped forward, bringing a
large tin of ready-mixed, quick drying cement with him.  He struggled
with the tightly sealed lid for a few seconds, then began to remove a
glove for better purchase.

"Leave it on, Joe!"  Fender snapped, and the man shrugged, pulling the
glove back.

"It's bloody awkward," he complained.

"It's more bloody awkward without fingers," Fender told him.

The lid came away with a sucking sound and Apercello dug in with a
trowel, thickly spreading the compound over the hole.  Sealing every
opening with concrete was an added precaution: generally, earth would
have been sufficient, the powder itself acting as a death-dealing
sentry, but it had been agreed that extreme measures would be taken the
mutant rats would never be underestimated again.

Vie Whittaker had the network map spread out on the ground before him
and was marking the position of the now-plugged exit with a felt-tipped
pen.

That's the fifth this morning," he said with some satisfaction The
channel runs dead ahead..."  he extended his arm in the direction he
meant'... north-east."  He looked up and added, The undergrowth has
certainly covered the area since the sewer was dug.  Well have a hard
job locating any openings."

We're bound to miss more than a few," Fender said, 'but that's not the
point.  Once the machines start pumping the gas into the main exits,
the rats will have little chance of escape.  They'll be finished before
they know what's hit them.  The object of this exercise is to stack all
the cards in our favour."

Whittaker nodded, the movement barely noticeable inside the helmet.  He
stood, folding the map so only the next relevant section showed.

"Do you think we'll be ready by tomorrow?"  he asked.

We've got to be.  We can't..."  Fender frowned.  "Captain,

tell your man to get his bloody helmet back on."  He pointed towards a
soldier who was wiping his forehead with his sleeve.

The captain flushed behind his plastic screen.  You, get it back on
immediately!"

The startled soldier hastily began to don his hood.  "Sorry, sir, it's
so bleedin' hot in here," he said lamely.

Captain Mather glared at the small squad which formed a protective
semicircle around Fender, Whittaker and Aper-cello.  An army truck
stood waiting in a clearing nearby, its engine idling, ready to move at
the slightest hint of trouble.

You all know the danger," the captain said, 'so let's not have any more
silliness.  Clear?"  He neither expected nor received an answer as he
turned back to the rat catcher  "Sorry, Mr.  Fender, it won't happen
again."

That should do it, Luke," came Apercello's muffled voice as he patted
down the fast drying cement.  "No bugger'll get out of there."

"Right," Fender said, picking up the container of cyanide powder.
"Let's move on."

The senior tutor fell in beside him as they trampled down foliage with
heavy boots, helmets bent in constant examination of the ground before
them, searching for signs.  The soldiers fanned out on either side,
also searching the ground but keeping a wider alert for any impending
danger.

You were saying we have to be ready by tomorrow... ?"  Whittaker
prompted.

We can't risk holding them inside any longer," Fender continued.  We
drilled probes with microphones attached, so we know they're there.  I
listened in myself it was bedlam.  They seem to know they're trapped
and they're panicking."

"But we know these mutants can burrow why don't they dig their way
out?"

"Oh, they will.  That's why we have to move fast.  At the moment
hysteria is preventing them from using whatever sense they possess.
Pretty soon, though, they're going to get the notion to tunnel their
way out.  Fortunately, these sewers have been firmly constructed
they'll hold the rats for a while."

"And these holes we're sealing?  Why haven't they come pouring
through?"

"Don't tempt providence: they could do just that.  My guess is that the
rats are afraid.  Remember, their ancestors were virtually wiped out in
London.  Call it race-memory, or sheer instinct, but they know they're
under attack from their worst enemy: man.  They're just plain terrified
at the moment, too scared to come out and show themselves.  How long
they'll remain in that state is anybody's guess."

They trudged on, both men lost in their own thoughts.  It was Whittaker
who finally broke the silence.

"I don't understand why the other animals haven't been slaughtered by
the vermin.  I mean, if they're so ferocious and there are so many of
them, why haven't they overrun the forest?"

"Firstly, we don't know exactly how many there are.  My guess is that
there are a thousand or so they haven't reproduced like the normal
rodent.  It would still be enough to make them aggressive."

"A thousand?  My God, that's terrible."

"Not really, not in an area this size."

"What makes you so sure?  There could be several thousand."

Fender shook his head.  "I'm not sure, but I don't think so.  If there
were, they'd have been seen sooner.  They would almost certainly have
begun slaughtering the other wildlife.  I'm sure their build-up has
been gradual.  Remember, compared to the normal rodent they're giants,
and Mother Nature isn't keen on allowing her bigger creatures to have
large litters."

They're no bigger than dogs.  Even pigs ..."

"In the vermin kingdom, the mutants are as big as elephants.  Anyway
there's the other side of the argument: these are freaks, mutants their
genes have been altered in some way.  Maybe the ultrasonics used on
their ancestors did it, maybe not, but their difference could easily
have changed their reproductive cycle."

"But there were many thousands in London!"

They were mating with the normal species of Black rat.  It's all theory
on my part, but here, I think, we have the pure strain.  I'll bet
they're even stronger and more cunning than the first.  They've been
clever enough to keep out of sight -until now."

"It makes you wonder if we really are going to beat them."

We will."  Whittaker could not see the grim determination on the rat
catcher face.

"All right, if there really are as you say just a thousand or so, it
still doesn't explain why they haven't attacked the local wildlife
before now."

"Rats can survive on practically anything.  You can be sure they've
killed other animals, but on an unnoticeable scale.  Their main supply
of food has obviously been scavenged from other sources: houses, farms,
allotments, the countryside itself.  I bet if we were to check now,
we'd have reports of all sorts of vermin trouble that in the past has
just been put down to rare and isolated cases.  It's frightening to
consider, but I wouldn't be surprised if these mutants have
deliberately been keeping a low profile regarding their raids."

"It's a little hard to believe."

"What's happening now is a little hard to believe.  One thing we do
know for sure: their restraint has gone.  They're out to kill anyone or
anything."

Apercello, who was some distance ahead, turned and waved at them.  His
words through the plastic grille were hard to catch, but he began
pointing towards the ground quite near his feet.

"Looks like Joe's found another opening," said Fender, hurrying
forward.

The hole the rat catcher colleague was standing over was much larger
than the one they had just plugged.  Its sides were smooth, as though
used by many bodies.

"Christ, that's one all right," Fender muttered, bending low and
examining the hole.  "It's the right size.  Captain, let me have the
torch, will you?"

Captain Mather passed the square-shaped torch over to the rat catcher
who shone its powerful beam into the tunnel.

"Nothing there," Fender said, straightening.  "Let's get some powder
down fast.  The sooner it's plugged, the happier I'll be."

They went through the process of laying the cyanide and sealing the
exit again, Fender helping Apercello pack the cement.

"Okay.  Number six done.  Mark it..."  He didn't know what had made him
look up into the trees at that moment, but Fender suddenly felt even
more uneasy than before.  Had he seen something move?  The other men
regarded him curiously.

"What is it, Mr.  Fender?"  Captain Mather enquired.

Fender studied the nearby trees for a few seconds longer before
replying.  "Nothing.  I thought I saw ... heard something, that's
all."

The officer looked around nervously.  "Perhaps we should be
moving..."

There's something up there!"  It was Apercello's voice.  "I saw it
move.  It was darting along a branch."

The soldiers who were nearer to the trees began to back away
apprehensively, their firearms pointing into the foliage overhead.

There's another!"  shouted Vie Whittaker pointing to a different
tree.

All eyes swivelled.  They saw a swaying branch, but nothing else.

A sudden rustle to their right had everybody spinning in that
direction.  A flurry of dead leaves fluttered to the ground, but the
tree's branches were still too full of brown foliage for the men to see
what had caused the downfall.

"Keep still, everyone," Fender ordered.  Now scan the trees around us.
If you see any movement, don't shout, just point."

Their heads turned slowly as they studied the treetops, each man
scarcely daring to breathe.  Fender kept an eye on the men,
occasionally, irresistibly, glancing upwards.  His eyes riveted on a
soldier who suddenly began gesticulating towards an overhead branch.

"Captain," Fender said quietly.  "One of your men has spotted
something."  He nodded towards the pointing man.  The others became
aware of their companion's excitement.

There it is!"  someone shouted.  "Creeping along that branch!  It's one
of 'em, one of the rats!  Jesus, there's another!"

It became too much for the soldier.  He raised his rifle and aimed into
the tree, his gloved finger pushing its way awkwardly though the
trigger guard.

The explosion and consequent high-pitched squeal seemed to act as the
signal for the rats to attack.  They fell from the trees almost as one,
dropping through the air on to the men below, the forest suddenly alive
with their screeching squeals and flying black bodies.

FOURTEEN

Fender rushed forward, crashing through the brittle undergrowth, making
towards a fallen soldier who was desperately trying to push away a rat
clawing at his chest.  All around, the soldiers were struggling with
vermin that had landed on their shoulders and heads, several of the men
on their knees, others running wildly in circles, completely unnerved
by the attack.

The rat catcher pulled at the creature on the fallen man's chest,
grasping its twisting neck and tugging and squeezing at the same time.
A sudden weight on his back sent him tumbling forward over the soldier.
He kept rolling, hoping to crush the creature, but it clung
tenaciously.  The pain was excruciating as the rat bit into the tough
material of the protective suit, the teeth not piercing but pinching
the skin together.  As he tried to roll his body free, Fender realized
there was not just one, but two rats attacking him.  He lay on his
back, endeavouring to still their movements with his own weight,
reaching behind to grab at their scrabbling legs.  He was conscious of
the screams around him, the sharp reports of gunfire, the thrashing of
bodies both human and animal.  More black shapes were dropping from the
trees, leaping from the branches, running down the rough bark, filling
the forest glade with their numbers.

He tried to rise, but a rat landed on his chest and for a brief moment
he found himself staring through the plastic screen into the monster's
slanted eyes.  It was almost as if the rat were studying him, looking
deep into his mind, a cold hate stabbing its way through.  The
creature's jaws opened and Fender stared in fascinated horror at the
cruel, yellow teeth, the deformed an dover-large incisors honed
razor-sharp from constant gnawing.  Spittle smeared the plastic visor
as the mutant hissed at its prey.  The pointed head snapped forward and
Fender jerked his head back in a reflex action.  The teeth skidded
across the plastic, leaving deep grooves and a trail of saliva.  The
rat catcher forgot about the struggling bodies beneath him and began to
pummel the creature on top with his fists.  The rat staggered sideways
but recovered, the blows driving it to a new fury.  Its powerful jaws
locked around one of Fender's wrists and he screamed at the intense
pain, the thickness of the gauntlet gloves saving him from serious
injury.

He managed to pull the arm free, but the rat's head was poised above
him, ready to strike again, this time at his throat.  Even the
steel-lined clothing could not save him if those teeth locked onto his
windpipe.  Fender tried to turn his body, but the two rats beneath him
held him back.  The rat's head plunged.

And then exploded in a cloud of blood and tissue.  The gunshot ringing
in his ears and his visor splattered red, Fender pushed the slumped
body away from him.  He quickly cleared his vision with a gloved hand,
wiping away the running blood and clots of bubbling substance.  Captain
Mather towered over him, a revolver still smoking in his hand.

"Over.  Quick!"  came the command, and Fender felt his body turned with
a rough kick.  He waited for what seemed an eternity, knowing the
captain was taking careful aim, ensuring the bullets would not pass
through the vermin into his body, and shuddered when the sharp reports
came and the paw grips on his back were released.

Mather helped him to his feet and once more Fender was allowed a clear
view of the frantic struggle taking place.  The rats seemed to be
everywhere, swamping the soldiers with their numbers, pulling and
tearing at the terrified men.  Automatic gunfire stopped the soldiers
from being completely smothered, and the armoured suits prevented them
from being torn to pieces.  Nevertheless, for the soldiers it was a
losing battle.  The pain inflicted by the clamping jaws was evident
from the screams that rang out, and it could not be endured for much
longer.  The rats were dying in large numbers, their bodies leaping
into the air in shock as bullets struck, a strange shriek, like a hurt
child's, bursting from them as they died.

Fender looked around for Whittaker and Apercello, but it was impossible
to recognize anyone in the bizarre uniforms.  They didn't carry guns,
but then there were so many now who had dropped their weapons and were
using their hands to ward off the vermin.

Captain Mather dropped to his knees beside him, a rat perched
precariously on his shoulders, another biting into the material at his
stomach.  Fender grabbed the rodent that had its teeth sinking into the
top of the officer's helmet and pulled it free in one swift, sharp
movement, tossing it as far away as possible; Mather carefully shot the
one at his stomach, ignoring the pain, refusing to succumb to panic.
The rat that Fender had thrown came scurrying back, leaping at its
attacker without breaking stride.  Fender kicked out and was lucky
enough to make contact.  The rat's long body jack-knifed in the air and
fell into the undergrowth.  The rat catcher dashed forward and brought
his heavy boot crashing down on its head, crushing the skull.

He turned back to the army officer who was trying to shake his arms
free of two more mutants that were weighing him down, making it
impossible for him to use the revolver.  Three others were scrambling
up his body and his knees were beginning to sag with the load.

Fender ran to him and began tugging at the bristling bodies, ignoring
another creature that had attached itself to his leg.  He pulled and
the thing he had been dreading happened: as the rat came away, its
teeth firmly clamped into the suit, the material tore.  It was a small
rent, but it proved the suits could be penetrated.  Under the onslaught
all the suits would soon be in tatters.  He grabbed the rodent's snout,
avoiding the teeth, and twisted with all his strength.  The neck broke
and he dropped the twitching body.  Then he grabbed the gun from the
officer's hand, hoping there were still enough bullets in the chamber.
He had never handled a gun before, but pulling a trigger seemed an
uncomplicated operation.  Regardless of the two rats that were now
nipping at his legs, he carefully took aim and shot the relentless
vermin clinging to the soldier.  He groaned aloud when he turned the
weapon on his own aggressors and found that now it was empty.  Instead
he used it as a club, beating down on their exposed heads until they
dropped away senseless.

He almost went under the wheels of the heavy army truck as it ploughed
its way through the bracken and juddered to a halt beside him.  It was
Captain Mather who pulled him aside in time.  From the window above
came automatic fire, the driver and his mate firing into the melee.

"Into the truck, Fender!"  he heard Captain Mather command.

We've got to help the others," he gasped, but a hard shove sent him
reeling towards the back of the truck.

Well see to them!  Grab a rifle if you can and get onto the tailboard.
You can use it from there!"

Fender scrambled along the side of the vehicle, kicking out at vermin
as they threw themselves at him.  With each blow they would stagger
back, then advance on him again.  Someone fell at his feet, his body
almost invisible beneath the covering of bristling vermin.  His cries
were terrible to hear and Fender saw the red gushing liquid that
sprayed over the backs of the frenzied rats.  The man's suit had given
and now the vermin were driven on by the smell of blood.  He knew the
man was beyond help, his mind cold to the fact, and he staggered around
the struggling heap, the rats now bypassing him for more easy prey.

Fender saw the weapon lying only yards away from the truck, its
black-metal surface soiled with mud.  He lumbered towards it, clumsy in
his suit, for the moment ignored by the vermin.  He went down on one
knee to retrieve the fallen weapon.  Just in time he saw a rat launch
itself into the air at him and he rose to meet it, grabbing the
automatic by the barrel and swinging it like a club.  The butt met the
leaping animal in mid-air with a sickening crunch and the rat fell
limply to the ground.

Without further thought, Fender reversed the weapon and began pumping a
spray of bullets into the nearest vermin, avoiding the figures of his
companions but well aware of his lack of marksmanship.  He began to
back away towards the rear of the truck, staggering under the impact of
the rats that managed to escape the hail of bullets, but determinedly
keeping his feet.  His back bumped something solid and he was surprised
when he felt himself rising, two hands gripped under his shoulders. Two
soldiers pulled him into the truck, while three others fired down into
the glade.  One of the two who had lifted him quickly and efficiently
dealt with a rat that had refused to let go of its quarry, using the
edge of a bayonet to slice the mutant's throat.  He kicked the body
down among its thronging companions.

Fender pulled himself to his feet, realizing these men had been lucky
enough to make it to the truck, and were now using it as a fort from
which to strike back.  The two that had rescued him were guarding the
entrance, hitting out with bayonets at the vermin trying to scramble up
into the cavernous interior, while the other three killed as many as
possible with gunfire.  Captain Mather suddenly appeared below,
extending a hand to be pulled up.  Miraculously, he was free of
clinging rats as Fender reached down and grabbed his wrist.  The rat
catcher heaved and Mather came up into the interior.

"Help's on the way!"  the officer shouted over the din.  The men in the
truck radioed HQ as soon as they saw us in trouble."

We've got to help the others," Fender shouted back.  Those suits won't
hold out much longer.  The rats are too strong!"

"Right!  We'll get them!  I've told the driver to reverse slowly. He'll
stop and start at my signal."  Captain Mather suddenly thumped his hand
against the side of the truck and it began to trundle slowly backwards,
bumping over sudden rises, jolting down into small dips. The army
officer banged twice again as they neared two struggling figures
slightly to the right.  The truck stopped.

"You and you!"  He patted two soldiers on the back.  "Get them up here,
help one at a time!  The rest of you use concentrated covering fire!
Go!"

Without hesitation, the two assigned soldiers leapt from the tailboard,
bayonets grasped in their fists.  They launched themselves at the first
man, mercilessly using their weapons against the vermin, the soldiers
in the truck keeping them reasonably protected with well-aimed
fire-power.  The relieved man was hauled back to the vehicle where
others dragged him into shelter.  The two soldiers dashed back to the
other man and the process was repeated, again successfully.  Captain
Mather struck the side of the truck again as the two soldiers clambered
up, their bayonets thick with blood.

"You two next!"  Mather ordered, slapping the backs of two different
soldiers as another figure was reached, this one rolling over an dover
on the ground.  They disappeared over the side, but this time yet
another soldier had to be sent out as a rescuer and was almost overcome
by black bodies.  They made it back to the truck and virtually threw
their companion into it, quickly climbing up behind him.

Mather ran deeper into the interior and, lifting his visor, shouted at
the soldiers in the cab.  "Bring your wheel down hard left!  There's a
group of men about ten yards in that direction."

The vehicle lurched forward, the wheels churning up mud, bouncing over
the prostrate forms of dead or wounded vermin.  Mather banged the side
again as they approached a figure lying ominously still in the
undergrowth.  Fender turned his head away in shock.

The man's helmet had either been knocked accidentally or pulled from
his head.  Five rats squatted around the exposed face and gorged
themselves.  Others systematically tore at his suit, gnawing at the
material, wearing it thin.

In a rage the soldiers began firing into them, regardless of the human
body, knowing the man was dead.

"Leave them!"  Captain Mather ordered dispassionately.  We can't help
the poor sod now, and at least his body is keeping them occupied!"  He
kicked at the side of the truck and it drove on.

Fender was horrified at the officer's cold logic, but he knew Mather
was right.  The living had to be their main concern.  He leaned against
the side of the truck, grasping an iron support to keep balanced.  It
wasn't the scratching sound that attracted his attention, for the noise
of the rifle fire was deafening: it was the furious indents that were
appearing all over the thick canvas covering.

"Mather!"  he yelled.  They're trying to get through the roof."

Mather glanced up.  "Shit," he said.  Then "Forget them.  If we shoot
through the canvas we'll only make holes that the others can use to
their advantage.  We'll keep an eye on them and shoot only when it's
necessary."  With that, he turned his attention back to the action
below.

Fender raised the automatic rifle to his shoulder, spotted a rat
wriggling its way into the vehicle at one corner, kicked out with
venom, sending it toppling back, then began firing at random.  It felt
good to kill.

The next man to be hauled in was Vie Whittaker.  He lay on his back on
the floor of the truck, his chest heaving with exhaustion.  His suit
had held, but Fender could see several places where the material had
begun to give.  The tutor had been rescued just in time.

Fender knelt beside him for a moment.  "Are you okay?"  he yelled.

Whittaker reached for his visor, intending to push it up, and Fender
grabbed a wrist.

"I can't breathe," Whittaker moaned.  "I must have air."

"Just for a moment, then!"  Fender shouted, lifting the plastic
face-mask with his gloved fingers.  The tutor gratefully sucked in
air.

"Where was Apercello?"  Fender asked.  "Did you see him?"

Whittaker shook his head from side to side.  "No ... no ... he went
down ... then I lost sight of ... him.  I think ... his helmet... came
off as he ... fell."

Fender rose, his face white and drawn.  He now knew whose face it was
the vermin had been eating.  He began firing into the scuttling bodies
again.

They managed to rescue one more man before the first rat broke through
the canvas roof.  There were at least a dozen men inside, seven
including Fender, crowded into the opening, firing down at the rats.
The others, those that had been rescued, lay on the floor groaning,
clutching their bruised and, for some, torn flesh.  It was these the
rat dropped down onto.

Fender and Mather wheeled round at the sudden outburst of cries and saw
the injured man kicking out at the Black rat which ran among them,
confused and frightened.

The roof!"  Mather shouted as another black shape dropped through the
gaping hole.  "Quickly!  Shoot them!"  He shot the second rat as it
fell, its body jerking in mid-air.

Fender and another soldier began spraying the canvas ceiling with
bullets, tearing it to shreds, but instantly killing the rats that were
clawing their way through.  The bodies plummeted into the truck and the
men drew themselves away, not sure if the creatures were dead.

The interior was suddenly bright as daylight broke through the tattered
roof and Fender saw one of the injured men struggling in the far corner
with what presumably had been the first mutant to gain access.  The
man's visor was up and Fender saw it was Whittaker.

The rat catcher scooped up a bloodied bayonet which lay at the feet of
a soldier now using his automatic rifle, and stumbled over the
recumbent figures and dead vermin towards Whittaker, knowing it would
be too dangerous to use the rifle in the confined space.

There was a nasty gash in the tutor's cheek where the giant rat had
slashed him either with teeth or claws.  He was desperately trying to
hold the rat's gnashing teeth away from his face, his hands around the
creature's neck.  The rat's eyes bulged as Whittaker squeezed and its
hind legs raked the tutor's body in a demented motion.

Fender fell to his knees before the struggling tutor, locked an arm
beneath the rat's lower jaw and began pulling it away from Whittaker's
exposed face.  He raised the bayonet and carefully, deliberately, slid
the tip to a point beneath the rat's ribcage.  Then he struck deep,
twisting the blade and drawing it down.

Dark blood poured from the creature's abdomen, flooding over the tutor,
soaking him.  The rat twitched spasmodically, trying to turn its head
and strike at the man who had inflicted the mortal injury.  But it was
no use; Fender held it tight until the twitching had stopped and life
had gone.

"Oh my God, oh my God," was all Whittaker could say.

Fender looked up as a shadow was cast over him.  Captain Mather banged
three times on the back of the driver's cabin and the vehicle suddenly
lurched to a halt.  It then began to move forward, gathering speed as
it went.

Mather turned towards Fender.  That was the signal to get us out of
here," he explained.  There's nothing we can do for the others without
all of us being killed.  It's regrettable, but that's how it is."

Fender felt the shock again.  Leaving men to die in that way.

"As far as I could ascertain," the officer said apologetically, 'there
were only two men still alive, and they looked pretty much done in.
There was blood on them.  These useless bloody suits..."  he left the
sentence unfinished.  "I'm sure the others were dead."

He rose and made his way to the rear of the truck where the soldiers,
relieved to retreat, were firing back at the creatures in the forest
glade.  Fender joined them and saw the vermin were making no attempt to
pursue but, for the briefest of seconds, he found himself staring
directly into the eyes of a mutant which stood apart from the others, a
curious white streak running the length of its head.  He was thrown to
one side as the vehicle jolted into a dip and when he looked again, the
rat was gone.  He closed his eyes and breathed a silent prayer.

Soon the soldiers stopped firing, for their targets were out of sight.
None felt like cheering as the truck jolted its way back to the road,
not even when other army vehicles came racing towards them.  They were
too exhausted.  And they felt too defeated.

FIFTEEN

He found Stephen Howard in the lecture hall, a large map of Epping
Forest before him, with Mike Lehmann and Antony Thoraton seated on
either side.  There were others present at the long table, but Fender
strode briskly towards the research director without looking at their
faces.  The Centre itself was alive with activity which increased
considerably on the arrival of the recently besieged men.  The injured
had been able to walk, albeit painfully, to the classroom set up as a
makeshift medical room, although one or two had to be half-supported.
All their companions wanted to do was to calm their jangled nerves with
a quiet smoke.

Howard looked up as Fender approached the table.

"Luke.  The radio message said you were under attack..."

We were."  Fender began to remove the heavy gloves, his plastic-visored
helmet already discarded and lying somewhere in the reception area.
There were rats on the outside, in the trees."

"But we thought they were all in the sewers," said Lehmann.

They've either got an exit we haven't discovered yet, or ... they were
outside all the time."

"Our patrols would have spotted them."

Fender turned to regard Major Cormack who was seated at the table, his
back to the rat catcher  "I don't think so.

They've remained hidden for a long time now.  Besides, who would think
of looking up into the trees?"  He turned his attention back to the
research director.  We've got to use the gas immediately, while we've
got the majority trapped."

"But we don't know that all the exits have been blocked yet," said
Thornton.

"We have to take that chance; we can't waste any more time.  If they
suddenly make up their minds that they want out, nothing will stop
them."

"I agree with Luke," said Lehmann.  "It appears to be too dangerous to
send out small groups to seal the holes anyway."

"How many of these groups are out at the moment?"  asked Thornton.

"Seven," Howard answered promptly.  "Roughly in these areas."  His
fingers stabbed seven times at the map before him.

"Call them in," said Thornton, firmly.  "No point in risking further
lives.  We'll do as Mr.  Fender requests: use the gas immediately."

"But if they should break free?  If they can't be contained ... ?"
Fender recognized the voice and turned towards Edward Whitney-Evans.

The cyanide gas will work within seconds and the pumps are powerful
enough to penetrate deeply.  They shouldn't have a chance to escape."

Major Cormack tapped the map thoughtfully.  I think we have enough men
to cover any area above the sewers we think particularly vulnerable. We
could cover the whole blessed network if necessary, although that would
mean thinning our perimeter considerably.  Flame-throwers and
machine-gun fire should take care of any beggars breaking loose,
provided we keep a sharp lookout."

Stephen Howard leaned forward.  You realize we can't provide your men
with protective suits.  There just aren't enough."

Fender smiled grimly.  "I'm afraid the suits don't give enough
protection.  We left six or seven men back there in the forest who
would testify to that if they were still alive."

There was an uncomfortable silence for a few moments, which was
eventually broken by Thornton.  "How many rats attacked you?  Have you
any idea?"

Fender shook his head.  "It seemed like thousands they were everywhere
but in reality I don't think there were more than a couple of
hundred."

"Good God, that many?  We imagined they were a small isolated group."

"Hopefully, there's even less now.  We ran into your reinforcements on
the way up.  They should have destroyed quite a few."

"I'm afraid not."  Captain Mather had appeared at the rat catcher side.
We've just had word by radio.  When the troops got to the area, there
were no rats in evidence.  Plenty of dead ones those we killed but no
living rats.  Apart from what was left of our men, and the vermin
corpses, the area was deserted."

Fender made his way towards the improvised medical room at the end of
the corridor the same room where Jan Wimbush had been attacked only two
nights before.  He glanced into a classroom to his right as he passed,
surprised at its dramatic transformation.  It now had the total
appearance of a military operations room, banks of radio equipment
stretched along one wall, blocking out half the light from the picture
windows, an enlarged, mounted map displaying numerous coloured pointers
spread out on the joined tables in the centre of the room, and
machinery some looking like television monitoring sets, others like
radar scanners that Fender could not hope to recognize.  A constant
hubbub came from the room and he wondered how anyone could think, let
alone direct operations from there.  Mingling with the brown uniforms
of the military were the dark blue uniforms of the police.  A joint
operation.  He hoped they wouldn't get in each other's way.

He passed on and entered the last classroom where the injured soldiers
were being treated.  It wasn't meant to cope with any serious crisis,
for there were enough proper hospitals in the surrounding suburban
areas; it was only a place to attend to minor injuries, cuts and
bruises.  The Warden's wife, Tessa Milton, was busy organizing tea and
coffee for the soldiers who were good-humouredly asking for whisky and
gin, while the medical officers were dabbing at their wounds with
treated pads.  He saw Vie Whittaker near a window, Jenny clearing the
blood from the gash in his face, and he headed towards them.

Tessa Milton caught him lightly by the arm as he passed.  "Oh, Mr.
Fender.  Is there any news of the other groups?"

They're being called back in," the rat catcher told her, realizing she
was concerned about her husband who was with one of the search-parties.
They haven't run into any trouble yet they'd have radioed in if they
had.  We were just unlucky, that's all."

She smiled up at him, the anxiety still in her eyes.  "I'm sure you're
right.  Did you get hurt?"

"A few flesh pinches, bruises.  No cuts."  He was suddenly aware of
just how painful those 'pinches' were.

"Jolly good," she said brightly.  Would you like some tea?  Or
coffee?"

"No thanks.  I've got to get back out there.  We're going to gas the
sewers."

Tessa frowned and was about to ask another question, but Fender excused
himself and walked over to Jenny and Whittaker.

Jenny's smile was radiant when she saw him.  "Are you okay, Luke?  I've
been so worried about you ... all."

"I'm fine," he assured her.  He looked down at Whittaker and studied
the deep wound on his face.  You'll have a handsome scar there," he
told him.

"It's the rest of my body that really hurts," said Whittaker.  "I feel
as though every inch of skin has been bitten."

We had a lucky escape.  If it hadn't been for Captain Mather keeping a
cool head, we'd have been finished."

Whittaker looked down and studied his hand which was red and raw with
teeth marks.  "I want to thank you for helping me back there, Pend ...
Luke.  I don't think I could have held that bastard away from my face
much longer."

Fender said nothing.

"You're going to need stitches, Vie," said Jenny, 'so I'll let the
experts take care of that.  Let's have your shirt off and I'll treat
the bruises."

As the senior tutor peeled off his shirt Jenny turned to Fender,
concern in her eyes.

"Are you sure you're all right, Luke?  Let me have a look at you."

Fender grinned.  "Jenny, I've got bruises in places you wouldn't
believe; but I haven't got time to let you examine them."

You're not going out there?  There's nothing more you ..."

We're going to gas the sewers a little earlier than planned."

"But they don't need you for that."

"I'm going to be there."  Any warmth had left his face and she knew it
was pointless to argue.

What if they get out?"  Whittaker said and both Jenny and Fender winced
as they saw the red patches and teeth indents all over his torso. Large
areas of skin were already turning a yellowish purple.  By tomorrow, he
would hardly be able to move.

The troops are moving in," said Fender.  "It's something we should have
done in the first place.  Instead of sealing any exits with cement,
they'll keep them blocked with fire and bullets."

"And the rats that are already outside those that attacked us?"

"Disappeared.  When the other soldiers got there, the rats had all
gone.  Hopefully, they found their way back into the sewers."

"And if there are others running free?"

We'll deal with them later.  Our first concern is to eliminate the main
force and they're in the sewers.  The rest should be just a tidying-up
exercise."

"I hope you're right."

Fender pulled the sleeve of his protective suit up, tugging at the
elasticated wristband to examine his watch.  The soldiers should be in
position within the hour.  In the meantime, I'll do a quick tour of the
main pumping sites to make sure they're ready.  I'll see you both
later."  He turned and headed for the door.

"Luke?"  Jenny's voice made him pause, and he was surprised at her hurt
tone.  "I'll come with you to your car," she said, catching up with
him.

They walked out into the busy corridor leaving the senior tutor staring
after them.

"I won't be using my car, Jenny," Fender said, "I'll be under armed
escort.  There's no way I'm going back into the forest on my own."

Then I'll walk you to your escort," she replied.  "Luke, do you really
have to go?  Haven't you done enough for one day?"

He stopped and placed his hands on her shoulders, looking intently into
her face.  "Jenny, I won't stop until those bastards have been wiped
from the face of the earth."

The venom in his words frightened her and she dropped her eyes from
his.  His grip slackened and his hands fell away.  Jenny kept up with
him as he strode towards the reception area.

Once there he stooped to retrieve his fallen helmet, then pulled the
tutor to one side, away from the figures that bustled to and fro.  He
smiled down at her, the old warmth returning.

"Stop worrying.  Everything will be under control after we've used the
cyanide, you'll see."  He leaned forward and kissed her cheek.

Jenny responded by clasping a hand around his waist, but drew it back
hastily when he winced.

"Luke, you really are hurt."  She looked anxiously down at his side.

He drew in a deep breath, smiling.  That doesn't help."

"Please, let the medical officer look at you."

Fender shook his head.  "It's nothing serious.  Just bruises.  Hey, you
didn't tell me how Jan Wimbush and Will are doing."

"Jan is still under sedation.  Oh, Luke, her injuries are terrible. Her
face ... The wound at the back of her neck is the one the doctors are
really worried about.  Fortunately, the spine was undamaged, but the
wound beside it is so deep.  It was touch-and-go for the first
twenty-four hours.  They think she'll pull through, though."

The coldness had crept back into Fender's features.  "And Will?"  he
asked.

"He should be out tomorrow.  He's got a nasty wound in his leg where
the rat bit him, but no muscles or tendons were torn.  They're only
keeping him in to make sure there isn't any infection.  Or disease.
He's terribly upset about poor Jan..."

"Ready, Mr.  Fender?"  Captain Mather stood two yards from them, Mike
Lehmann at his side.

You're going back for more, Captain?"  said Fender, surprised.

Why not?"  came the reply.  Then, with a grin, They're only rats."

Mike Lehmann rolled his eyes heavenwards, but seemed in good humour now
that the gassing was underway.

"Okay, Luke.  Check the north first, then the southern outlets. There's
no way the vermin can get into the surrounding sewer networks every
connection is sealed tight.  So we won't be getting any complaints from
the local authorities saying we've driven monsters on to their patch. 
We've got 'em boxed in, Luke, no way out."

"Okay.  I'll report back to you from each base.  I'll stay with the
last one until they've completed pumping."

"Right.  Good luck."

Fender looked down at Jenny.  "I'll see you later," he said.

"Be sure you do."

Then he was gone, tramping down the path in his awkward suit, Captain
Mather striding briskly by his side.  They headed for a scout car, two
lounging soldiers snapping to attention as they approached.

"Why did he have to go this time?"  Jenny said aloud.  "He's done his
job."

"His job?"  Lehmann had joined her at the reception area's long window.
"It's more than just a job to Luke, miss, er ... Jenny, isn't it?"

She nodded, turning towards RatkiU's head biologist.  "What do you
mean, more than just a job?"  she asked curiously.

"With Luke, it's more of a vendetta.  He despises the rats."

"But why?"

You didn't know?  I thought..."  Lehmann left the sentence unfinished,
and turned his gaze back to the window, his face expressionless.

"Please tell me," Jenny persisted.

Lehmann let out a deep breath.  "Luke's parents and younger brother
were killed by Black rats in the London Outbreak, four years ago.  He
was living in the North at the time because of his work."

Jenny closed her eyes.  She had known, sensed instinctively, that there
was an underlying seriousness behind Luke's flippant remarks regarding
his job.

"It was months after the incident that Luke contacted Ratkill.  I
suppose it took that long to get himself together.  Stephen Howard was
an old friend of his.  He knew the full story and discussed it with me
before he decided to take him on.  I must say, I was against the idea,
even though we needed as many men as we could get at that time: I
didn't want any of my staff taking unnecessary risks, you see.  Anyway,
Howard overruled me, said Luke was a professional, whatever his
motives.  When I got to know Luke, I had to agree."

Jenny shook her head.  "I didn't realize."

"I'm sorry.  I assumed he'd told you.  From what I've seen over the
last couple of days, you two seem, er ... close?  It's not something
Luke talks about much, although I think it would be better for him if
he did.  It might get it out of his system.  Maybe he'll tell you in his
own time.  I wouldn't mention that I..."

Jenny shook her head again.  "I won't.  At least now I know why he does
this godawful job.  I'm sorry, I didn't mean ..."

"It's all right," Lehmann said, chuckling.  "You're right: it is a
godawful job.  But thank God some of us are inclined to do it.  Now
I've got to get back next door and synchronize the gas pumping.  We
want all the machines to be used at the same time so there's nowhere
for the vermin to run to."

Lehmann smiled at the tutor.  "Don't worry about Luke, Jenny.  This'll
be good for him.  It'll help purge some of the hate that's been
building up inside him for all these years.  You can be sure of one
thing though, he won't be happy until every last one of them is
dead."

They pumped the cyanide into the underground tunnels and prayed.  There
was no reason why the deadly fumes should not eliminate the vermin
completely, for they were trapped, sealed in their own tomb; yet every
man felt uneasy, as though they were dealing with more than just
animals, but something unknown, something alien to their world.  They
listened to the sounds from below through earphones, the microphones
sunk deep into the earth, penetrating the dark chambers, and heard the
cries of the dying creatures, their panic as they fought to free
themselves, the frantic scraping against solid walls, their terrified
squeals as they scrambled over each others' backs to get clear of the
destructive, seeping gas.

Some, just a few, managed to scrabble their way through an undetected
opening, close to where Fender's group had been attacked earlier, but
the soldiers were waiting for them.  The first through were burnt to
black ash by the flamethrowers, and those immediately behind had their
lungs seared with the heat.  Their corpses blocked the narrow
passageway as effectively as the cement, for although their companions
tried to gnaw their way through the bodies, the creeping fumes stole
over them and they quivered in final, painful death-throes.

The men above the ground could not see the carnage that was taking
place below, but they could feel the death in the air, they could
envisage the desperate struggle inside the black catacombs.  Even the
forest itself seemed to maintain a respectful silence.

On the faces of the men who listened into the receivers was a mixture
of disgust and pity.  The cries in their ears seemed to belong to
hundreds upon hundreds of children, screaming their panic, wailing as
they died.  It did not take long for the gas to penetrate every dark
hole of the sewer network and soon the radio men at their different
points began removing the headphones, feeling no gloating victory, just
an ebbing of their spirit.  They looked up at the silent men around
them and nodded.  The rats were dead.

SIXTEEN

"Luke, you look done in.  Come and join us in the Warden's office, we'd
like to discuss something with you."

Fender wearily tossed the helmet into the corner of the reception area
and stared into Stephen Howard's smiling face.

"If it's all the same to you, I'd like to get back to my hotel and take
a long, hot bath.  Can't we meet later?"

"Afraid not.  I promise you, it won't take long."  The research
director turned on his heels, still smiling pleasantly, and strode from
the reception area, taking the corridor leading to Alex Milton's
office.  Fender followed, his limbs stiff from the bruising he'd
received earlier that day.

The only people in the small room were Mike Lehmann and Antony
Thornton.  The research director immediately walked over to a cabinet
on one side of the office on which stood an assortment of drinks.

The Warden sent these over from his private stock," Howard explained,
his smile now beginning to irritate Fender.  "Still Scotch, no ice, no
water?"

Fender nodded and sank into a straight-backed chair beneath the room's
only window.  He pulled off the thick gloves and dropped them on the
floor, flexing his fingers and examining the red marks on them.  Howard
handed him the Scotch, his expression one of sympathy.

"I'm sure you must be rather sore in places after that dreadful attack
today.  Thank God we had these suits reinforced after the Outbreak."

Fender took a long swallow of his drink, momentarily closing his eyes
at the liquid warmth.  "As I said earlier, they'll need to be made even
tougher.  They didn't stand up well enough."

"Of course.  Now the danger is over, well have time to improve them."

Thornton, seated at the Warden's desk, raised his own glass.  "I think
congratulations are in order, Stephen.  Once again your company has
provided an invaluable service to the country.  God knows where we'd
have been without your expertise."

"It's not all over yet," said Mike Lehmann staring down into his glass.
There may still be others running free on the outside.  Those that
attacked Luke, for instance."

"I quite agree," said Howard, his smile gone.  He sat in a seat facing
Thornton and reached for his own drink that had been perched near the
edge of the desk.  We have to be pessimistic, Antony.  You may think us
over-cautious, but we can take no chances whatsoever.  It is possible
the rats that attacked Luke and his group returned to their companions
in the sewers after all, the one unblocked exit that was discovered
when the gassing started was quite near the spot where the attack took
place.  But we cannot assume that is the case: the forest has to be
searched thoroughly before we can give the all-clear."

"Yes, yes, of course.  But the point is, the main force has been dealt
with," said Thornton.  The rest is surely a "mopping-up" exercise."

We hope so, Antony," said Howard, 'we certainly hope so.  However, it
will be weeks before we can be absolutely sure.  First, we have ..."

"I think it's time we put Luke fully in the picture."  Fender's eyes
shot towards Mike Lehmann who had just spoken.  There was silence in
the room for a few moments and the rat catcher gaze shifted to Stephen
Howard, who looked distinctly uncomfortable.

"Yes," the research director said, 'it is time."  He looked first at
the private secretary, then at Fender.  "I'm sorry I've never spoken of
this to you before, Luke, but it was decided at the time that time
being immediately after the London Outbreak

that it should be a matter of secrecy.  The less who knew of it, the
better."

Fender leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, the Scotch held
in both hands.  His eyes never left Howard's.

"As you know, we discovered the source of the mutant Black rat when
London had been cleared of people and the vermin had been successfully
gassed.  Their original breeding-ground had been in an old disused
lock-keeper's house on a canal near the docks in East London.  You know
how the zoologist Schiller had smuggled a mutant rat into the country
from the radiation-affected islands around New Guinea.  He mated his
mutant with the normal Black rat the area in which he lived, of course,
was infested with them.  The result

the terrifying result was the giant Black rat, a new strain, stronger,
more cunning than any other rodent.  They dominated the indigenous
Black rat and utilized their strength of numbers."

Lehmann had become impatient.  We thought we had killed them all off,"
he said, 'but we hadn't.  We didn't discover their nest, you see.  We
didn't know about the canal-house, the lair of the original mutant."

"It was discovered by a man named Harris, a teacher who knew the area
well, and who was helping us at the time."  Howard placed his glass
back on the desk and swung round to face Fender.  "In the cellar of the
house, he came upon a monster.  From the description he gave, you could
hardly call it an animal, let alone a rodent."

Wait a minute," Fender said evenly.  Why haven't you told me about this
before?  Do any of the Ratkill investigators know?"

This time Thornton interrupted.  Tour company has been acting under
strict government instructions, Mr.  Fender.  We saw no reason to panic
the public any more than it had been.  The slightest leak ..."  He
spread his hands, leaving the sentence unfinished.

"So what happened to this ... monster?"  Fender asked impatiently.

Howard exhaled a short, dissatisfied breath.  "I'm afraid Harris
destroyed it.  Chopped it to pieces with an axe."

Fender almost grinned.  To Howard and his colleagues, it must have
seemed like the vandalization of a valuable work of art.

Lehmann sensed the rat catcher inner amusement.  We could have learned
a lot from the animal's genetic structure, Luke," he said seriously.

"But you must have had thousands of corpses to study."

"Not like this one."

We know what the creature looked like," said Howard, 'from the
description Harris gave us.  Also there were many drawings of it in the
zoologist's study.  The body itself was too mutilated to piece
together; it was almost as if it had literally exploded."

"Exploded?"  Fender sat straight in his chair.

Yes.  The body, you see, was not like that of the mutant rats.  It was
almost hairless, bloated, pinkish in colour.  The skin was so taut the
veins could be seen through it.  It was like a huge, fat slug, crippled
by its own obesity.  And the most ghastly thing of all..."  He paused,
made nervous by his own description.  "It had two heads."

Fender stared at him in disbelief.

"It's true, Luke," Lehmann said quietly.  "I've seen the drawings
myself.  And what was left of the animal.  According to Harris, it was
blind and too heavy to move itself; totally defenceless.  It really was
a pity he hacked it to bits."

"I don't blame him," said Fender.  "I'd have done the same."

Lehmann came straight back at him.  "No you wouldn't have.  You know
the value of such a freak animal.  We could have studied it, discovered
what had caused the mutation

"Bred your own mutant..."

"Yes, even that.  That way we might have stood a chance of controlling
them in the future.  If we knew more about them..."

Howard held up a hand.  "All right, Mike.  I think Luke takes your
point."  He stood, then leaned back against the desk, looking down at
the rat catcher  We need to know if that particular strain has come
through again.  After a generation, it's quite possible."

"You mean there might be two kinds of mutant rat."

Howard nodded.  "Just that.  If there are, we still consider it best
that it be kept secret.  The giant Black rat on its own is terrifying
enough."

A suspicion began to creep into Fender's mind.  "So?"  he asked
warily.

"We've taken you into our confidence, Mr.  Fender, because you have
been involved in this particular operation from the start," said
Thornton.  "Indeed, your contribution has been remarkable."

"And, as one of the few people who know of the original mutant's
existence, there is something we would like you to do," said Howard.

Fender's eyes widened and he felt his back stiffen as he listened.

He drove with Jenny to his hotel where they ate a dismal meal, mostly
in silence.  Fender was too fatigued and his body too sore to make
light conversation.  And his thoughts dwelt too much on the task he was
to perform in two or three days' time.

Jenny sensed his mood and she, too, found it difficult to talk of
trivial things.  She drank her wine, then ran a finger around the rim
of the glass.

"Luke," she said, breaking the silence between them.  "I don't want to
go back to the Centre tonight."

He looked at her in surprise.  It's perfectly safe there, Jenny.  The
whole area's floodlit, it's surrounded by troops.  There's no possible
danger."

"It's not that.  I am afraid, yes, but I know it's safe.  I haven't
slept too well the last couple of nights, knowing the forest has been
infested.  It'll never be the same for me again."

"It's over now, Jenny.  They're gone."

"Are they?  Can we be sure?"

We will be in a couple of weeks' time.  That's all it will take to
search the area.  Then you can go back to your work without any
fears."

"I don't think so.  The forest used to be a wonderfully pure place to
me, somewhere I escaped to; now it's different.  It's tainted."

He sighed.  "I'm sorry it's been spoiled for you."

She took her eyes away from the glass and looked directly at Fender. "I
want to stay with you tonight, Luke," she said.

A strange sensation ran through him: a thrill, but not of the
triumphant kind.  He realized he was deeply touched.

"Jenny, I..."  he began to say.

"Please, Luke."

He reached for her hand.  "Jenny, you don't have to say please to me. I
should be hopping up and down with lecherous glee, but..."

'... but you're not.  I know that, Luke.  I know your feelings towards
me."  Her eyes went back to the glass again.  "At least, I think I do,"
she added.

He gripped her hand tightly and smiled.  "My feelings are confused just
at this moment, Jenny.  There's so much going on and I have to admit my
nerves are a little frazzled.  But one thing's for sure: there's no way
I'll let you leave me tonight."

Her eyes lifted and she smiled back at him.  His depression evaporated
and he felt he could sink into that smile.  Her hand trembled in his,
just slightly, and he knew she, too, experienced the same confusion of
emotions.

"Vie Whittaker, Jenny?"  he forced himself to ask.

Her face became serious, her eyes almost earnest.  There's been nothing
between us, please believe me.  Some understanding, some mutual
sympathy, but nothing beyond that.  If Vie felt there was more, then it
was in his own mind."

"And us?  Is it just an understanding?"

"No, it's not just that.  We're both aware there's more to it.  Just
how much is something we have to find out."

"Okay," he said.  "Let's not try to analyse it.  Let's just see what
happens."

Now it was her turn to grip his hand tightly.  "One thing, Luke," she
said.  "No games.  I'm not playing games."

"Jenny," he replied, and her name felt good to say.  "I couldn't be
more serious."

They left the dining-room and Fender felt his weariness begin to
disappear.  They climbed the stairs and he let her into his room,
thankful that, at Ratkill's expense, he always booked himself a double
room when on field trips.  Jenny placed her shoulder-bag on the floor
and stood in the centre of the room waiting for him to close the door
and switch on the light.  Then she was in his arms, looking up at him,
examining his face as though for the first time.  His lips reached down
for hers, but the movement was slow, almost tentative, both of them
giving the moment its full meaning.  When their lips joined, the kiss
was soft, moist.  Then it became firm and they felt themselves swimming
into each other, seeking but becoming lost, plunging until their
probing was done and they had found each other.  All in a simple kiss,
and Fender was almost afraid of it.  Never had he felt so vulnerable.

He was suddenly aware of the crushing tightness with which he held her
and the pain in his bruised back told him her grip was just as tight.
She felt the sudden flinching of his muscles and realized she was
hurting him.

"I'm sorry, Luke," she said, relaxing her hold.

But he was smiling at her and she wasn't surprised to see the mistiness
in his eyes, for she looked at him through her own blurred vision.  She
rested her head against his chest, conscious of his heartbeat, feeling
small in his arms.  He kissed her hair and ran a hand beneath it,
touching her neck, caressing the skin behind her ears.  Her arms
encircled his waist and this time he cried out as she squeezed him.

"Oh, Luke, Luke, I'm so sorry."

He laughed and held her away from him.  "Me too, Jenny.  It looks like
I'm going to be a disappointment to you."

We'll see," she said, smiling wickedly.  "Let's try and do something
about your wounds first, shall we?"  She reached down into her bag.
Take off your jacket and shirt and let's have a look at you.  I brought
some ointment from the medical supplies that should do your bruises
some good."

Fender winced as he shed his jacket, slowing the operation down to
cause the least movement in his sore limbs.  She watched him struggle,
concern on her face.

"Here, let me help you."  She eased the jacket from his shoulders and
laid it over one of the room's two armchairs.  Then she began to
unbutton his shirt.

"Oh God, Luke.  They really did get at you."

His shoulders and back were covered in small, red weals where the rats'
teeth had sunk into the material of the protective clothing and pinched
his skin together.  Still in evidence, but to a lesser degree, were the
long undefined scratch marks where the creatures' claws had raked him.
Much of the skin around his shoulders and upper arms was turning a
sickly purplish yellow and there were clear indents made by sharp teeth
on either side of his wrist.

"Why didn't you say it was this bad?"  Jenny said.  "You must have been
in agony."

"I didn't realize myself.  It's only now it's really beginning to
hurt."

"I'm going to run a bath for you.  That should stop some of the
bruising."  She made for the bathroom.  "Get out of the rest of your
things.  I'll rub the ointment in after you've bathed."

"I'll look forward to it," he said, grinning.

He heard the sound of running taps and looked down at himself
sheepishly.  He shrugged, then whipped off his shoes and trousers.  His
underpants barely disguised his feelings.  Sitting on the bed, he
stripped off his socks, then sat there, feeling a little awkward.  A
towel came sailing from the bathroom.

"Use this if you're feeling bashful," Jenny's voice called out.

He pulled the towel from his head where it had landed and stood,
tugging briskly at the last garment as he did so.  The towel was round
his waist within seconds.  Fender looked up to see Jenny smiling at him
from the doorway, steam from the hot water billowing over her
shoulders.

"My, my, such modesty," she said.

She came towards him and her expression changed to one of concern once
again.

Tour poor legs.  Lucky you were wearing the protective clothing you'd
have been eaten alive if you hadn't."

Jenny touched his shoulders, his arms, his chest, her fingers gentle.
He pulled her close and she said, "Careful, Luke," but her words were
smothered under his kiss.  When their lips parted, she was breathing
sharply, an urgency in her eyes.  Her hand reached up to his cheek and
he could feel himself pressing into her, the rough towel threatening to
loosen and fall at any moment.  His lips sought hers again.

She pulled away.  "No.  Not just yet.  Let's see to your wounds
first."

Fender drew in a deep breath and tightened the towel at his waist.
"You're the boss for now," he said.

She kissed his chest, quickly and lightly.  "Into the bath with you.
I'll be there in a minute."

The splash of water and his muffled groans told her he had immersed
himself as she picked up his clothes, folding them and placing them
neatly over the arm of the chair.  She walked towards the bathroom,
unbuttoning the sleeves of her blouse as she went.

Jenny looked down at his naked form in the bath, the still-running
water rippling over his body and distorting it.  Leaning forward, she
turned off the taps, then stirred the water into swirling eddies with
her hand, mixing the hot with the cold.  When the currents settled down
she examined his body, for the moment ignoring the injuries to study
his shape.  She smiled approvingly.

Jenny began unbuttoning her blouse.  She slipped the silk from her
shoulders in a fluid movement and hung the garment on a hook behind the
bathroom door.  She was bra-less and Fender gazed at her breasts, the
twin points risen and pink.

She knelt beside the bath and rested her arms on its edge, looking into
his face and loving what she saw.  He stretched his neck forward and
they kissed once, twice, three times.  He opened his mouth to speak,
but she pressed a finger to his lips, then reached for the flannel and
wiped the moisture from his face.

Fender closed his eyes and let Jenny bathe him, her hands soft and
caressing, smoothing the soap over his limbs, spending more care and
attention than necessary on his aroused penis, leaning over the bath to
gently kiss it.  He groaned, but in pleasure this time, reaching for
her, cupping a breast in his hand.  Then he leaned forward, his upper
body clear of the water, one arm encircling her naked back, his head
bending low, lips seeking a thrusting nipple.  He caressed it with his
tongue, leaving a trail of moisture across her chest as he sought the
other.

Jenny moaned and closed her eyes, wanting him badly now, the muscles in
her thighs becoming taut.  She pushed him back, gently but firmly,
determined to ease his pain first.  She sponged the soap from his body
in silence, relishing his touch, his fingers running smoothly over her
breasts, the insides of her arms, along her neck.  Then she drew him
from the water, and gently patted him dry, pulling the towel over his
aroused organ, then beneath it, squeezing his testicles without force
but nevertheless causing him to draw in his breath.  Once more she
kissed him there, allowing his penis to enter her mouth, drawing the
first drops of sticky fluid from it, holding his hips as he moved
slowly.

Then he was pulling her up, knowing he was losing control and wanting
her fully.  He held her against him, pressing her nakedness into his,
their kisses no longer tentative, but hard and thrusting, their tongues
meeting and tasting each other's sweetness.  His hand fell to her waist
and he pulled at the zip fastener, the skirt falling away from his
grasp.  Her tights came next, her shoes already gone, and as he drew
the nylon down her thighs, he kissed her stomach causing it to contract
as though stung, her hands closing over the back of his head.  He
allowed his lips to linger, drawing them down to the silky material of
her panties, feeling the soft resistance of hair beneath them, pressing
into it with his tongue.

He rose and she moved closer into him, saying his name softly.  His
hand, trembling and nervous, touched the outside of her thigh, then
stole inwards, reaching into her panties, smoothing its way through her
hair, sinking low and reaching the moist entrance to her body, his
fingers piercing gently.  She shuddered and leaned her head against his
chest.

She reached for him, pressing herself against his hand, wanting more of
him.

"Jenny," he said, knowing neither could hold back much longer, and she
paid heed, relaxing her grip, desperate now to have him inside her,
filling her body with his own, wanting every inch, every nerve-end
pressed against his skin.

He led her from the bathroom and laid her on the bed, drawing off the
last piece of clothing, standing over her, gazing down at her body, the
long, long legs, the smooth flatness of her stomach, the breasts so
full, hardly losing their shape now she was lying on her back.  She
raised a hand towards him and he sank down on to her, finding her lips,
and kissing them with a tenderness that overrode desire.  Her arms
clasped around his shoulders and she pulled him tight, forgetting his
bruises.  His legs were between hers, her knees raised just slightly on
either side, and his penis pressed against her stomach, a thin trickle
of fluid leaving a narrow, silver trail as he lowered himself.  He
reached down and guided himself into her, wanting to be gentle,
resisting the screaming desire to thrust himself forward.  Her head
turned to one side as he entered and her hips rose to meet him, urging
him on, demanding him there, deep, penetrating, wanting his whole
length, her hands reaching down to his lower back, pulling him in.

Her soft moans turned to a whimper and he paused, raising his head so
he could look into her face.  She turned her head back to him and her
eyes shone, her smile strained, her expression pleading.  Then he could
hold back no longer: he pulled away and thrust forward again, hard,
rigid as iron, but as soft as velvet.  She thrust with him, her
excitement rising with his, her eyes half-closed, her knees striving to
press together, gripping him, silently calling for more, more, more.

His teeth bit into her neck, making her cry out and he couldn't be sure
if it was from pleasure or pain.  Or both.  He felt her limbs
stiffening, felt her breath held, felt her silent scream, felt his
muscles becoming taut, the liquid beginning to flow, seeming to draw
itself from every part of his body, stretching every nerve until he
thought they would tear, then the sweet ascending, the bursting
through, the tightness of her inner muscles, the relaxing of nerves,
the floating fall, the sighs that told him their pleasure had been
shared, the sinking against her and the draining contentment.

They held each other for a long, silent time, she softly stroking his
back, he with his head tucked into her hair that flowed across the
pillow.

You weren't," she said finally.

He raised his head slightly.  "Huh?"  he murmured.

"A disappointment."

He grinned and allowed his head to slump back into her hair.  Twisting
his body, Fender withdrew from her and slid an arm beneath her neck. He
pulled her close, kissing her cheek, then her lips.  Both felt at
peace, the traumas of the last few days laid aside for the moment.

After a while, Jenny said, "I wish we never had to go back."

"It will be all over soon."

"It never will be for me.  Not now.  I thought I'd find something here
some respite.  It's been shattered in a way I never dreamed of."

"Respite from what?"

She turned her head away from him and became quiet.  Fender touched her
chin with his hand and drew her face back towards him.

Tell me, Jenny."

She searched his eyes for several moments before speaking.  "Coming to
the Centre was a kind of retreat for me.  I suppose I wanted to get
away from life for a while.  I thought living there, working with
children, helping them understand the simple way of nature would un
complicate my own life.  It hasn't really worked."

"What were you running away from?"

The obvious; I think you can guess.  The ironic part is that I promised
myself I'd never get involved with a married man.  My father left us
years ago under those circumstances.  We never even knew he was unhappy
until the day he told us he was leaving.  I'd always taken his love,
his being there, for granted; I think my mother had too.  To have that
security taken away so suddenly and irrevocably was shattering.  I
watched what it did to my mother, how it changed her, the bitterness it
left in her, and it frightened me.  Sixteen years of marriage wiped out
as though it had been a trivial affair.

"I still saw my father, I still loved him.  But the change was in him.
It was as though his guilt was tearing him up inside -and the full
realization of that guilt was when he was with me.  I suppose in the
end it made us both uncomfortable.  We don't see too much of each other
now."

Jenny's voice had become distant and Fender turned on his side, pulling
her even closer.  He was surprised to see there was no emotion in her
eyes, just a dull flatness, as though emotions had long since been
cried out.

"At fifteen I vowed I would never be like the woman that had caused
such grief.  God, how I hated that bitch.  And then, five years later,
I was that woman.  Can you explain it, Luke?  How can you become the
very thing you loathe?"

She looked at him as though he really might provide her with an answer,
but he shook his head.  Things just happen, Jenny.  You can't always
control them."

"I tried, oh, how I tried; but he meant too much to me.  I just
couldn't stop myself, Luke, even though I hated what I was doing.
Please try to understand."

Her body trembled as she closed her eyes, and he could see the
moistness creeping through the lashes.

"Jenny, Jenny, you don't have to explain anything.  That was in your
past; it had nothing to do with me."  But it hurt, just the same.

"I want you to know, Luke.  Like I said, no games between us."  She
kissed him, her eyes opening, allowing tiny rivulets to run from each
corner.  "He was the one that ended it and I guess I didn't put up too
much of a struggle.  I wanted him more than I could ever say, but I
couldn't let myself beg; I couldn't fully become the woman I detested.
I'm over him now, Luke, please believe that.  I still ... respect him;
I still even like him.  But the love has gone."  She stared at the
ceiling for a few moments.  "I just drifted for a while after we broke
up, then, when the opportunity came to join the Conservation Centre, I
jumped at it.  It seemed better than joining a convent."

He smiled at her attempt to make light of it.  "And then you met Vie
Whittaker," he said.

"I told you, there's nothing between us.  He's a nice man, and
interesting, but I only ever wanted to share the work with him, nothing
else."

"I'm glad, Jenny."

Her head buried itself into his chest, her arms encircling him.  "And
I'm glad you came to the Centre.  It's another irony that something so
horrible should bring you there but I'm almost pleased the rats invaded
the forest.  Luke, don't get me wrong, I'm not putting any
responsibility on you; but I feel alive again.  The past may not be
dead, but it's faded into another time.  All I ask is that you be
honest with me."

He pressed against her, his leg going between her thighs, and they held
on to each other, the touch of their bodies an assurance in itself.

"It would be easy for me to say so much to you now," he whispered, 'but
give me a little time.  Let me finish this job first.  I have to be
sure they're really gone."

"You really hate them that much, Luke?"

"So much, I thought at one time I'd never have room for any other true
feelings.  You're breaking it down, Jenny, and I can't let you.  Not
until it's over."  And then he told her why he despised the vermin, how
his mother and father, his younger brother, had been slaughtered by
them four years before, their bodies devoured, leaving hardly enough to
bury.  How he had pleaded with Howard to give him a job so he could
fight all vermin not just the mutants to ensure that a disaster of that
nature could never happen again.

Jenny cried as he spoke, feeling pity for him and a sad joy that he was
speaking to her of things he had kept buried for such a long time. When
he had finished, she held him till his body had lost its rigidity, had
become relaxed, the tenseness gone.  And he knew he loved her then, yet
he could not allow himself to say it, fearing that with no barrier left
between them, he would not have the courage to face what was still left
to be done, knowing she would try to stop him.

It was only later, when he lay stretched out on the bed and she knelt
next to him applying ointment to his injuries that he told her of the
task he had been asked to perform within the next few days.  Her hand
stopped its soothing motion and she looked down at him in dismay.

"But surely there's no need?"  she said "Surely they can just clear out
the sewers with machinery?  Why, Luke?  Why do you have to go in there
first?"

They want me to look for something ... I can't tell you what.  I have
to search the sewers before anyone else is allowed in.  I won't be
alone Captain Mather will be with me and there shouldn't be any more
danger."

"How can you be sure?  How can anyone be sure of anything with these
monsters?"

It was a question he had asked himself many times that evening.

They entered the sewers wearing breathing apparatus, the stench of the
rotting corpses wafting up from the opened manhole cover and sending
their unmasked helpers reeling back.  Fender and Captain Mather climbed
down the metal ladder into the darkness below, both men fighting
against their natural fear, expecting to hear the scurrying of clawed
feet and squealing shrieks at any moment.  They had waited three days
before the final decision to go in was made; three days of pumping in
more cyanide, listening for sounds through their receivers, praying it
really was the end of the vermin menace.  No signs of the creatures had
been found above ground, but the soldiers and the operatives were still
wary, their eyes continually looking around, searching the trees, the
undergrowth, never venturing into the forest alone or unprotected.
Those gathered near that particular sewer entrance on the third day
after the initial gassing did not envy the two men now descending into
the infested labyrinth.  The residue of lingering gas had been
suctioned clear by the very machines that had pumped it in, but the
thought of wading through the piled-up, decomposing bodies sent
shudders through them.  The soldiers were relieved that only two men
were going down on the first mission, none of them keen to be part of a
spearhead.

Both Fender's and Captain Mather's limbs were still stiff from the
bruising their bodies had taken in the rat attack and they found their
descent awkward, the protective suits and oxygen cylinders on their
backs impeding their movements even further.  Fender stood at the
bottom of the ladder and swung the powerful torch he was carrying in a
wide arc.  A feeling of revulsion swept over him when he saw the heaped
bodies, many with bloated stomachs, the result of a build-up of
internal gases, others with jaws wide in silent agony, their legs
extended stiffly into the air, their skin flaking and rotting.  Mather
joined him and regarded the nightmare scene with equal disdain,
sweeping his torchlight into both directions of the tunnel.

He shone the torch on the boldly drawn map of the sewer network and a
gloved finger pointed to their location.  He then indicated the
direction they had already agreed upon and Fender gave an exaggerated
nod.  The rat catcher moved off, Mather following close behind.

Two hours passed, then three.  The men gathered around the point of
entry began to grow anxious.  They knew the two men had a wide circuit
to cover, their route eventually leading them back to the starting
point, but it was nerve-wracking to stand by completely inactive.  Mike
Lehmann and Stephen Howard eyed each other nervously.  Antony Thornton
was, at that moment, reporting personally to the Prime Minister and his
Inner Cabinet, assuring them in soothing tones that all was well in
Epping Forest, and the situation was under complete control.  Jenny
Hanmer sat alone in her room at the Conservation Centre and stared at
the window.  The curtains were drawn together.

Another hour passed.

Mike Lehmann tucked his wristwatch back inside his sleeve and pulled
the thick glove back on.  He turned to the research director.  "I want
to go down there with some men," he said firmly.

"Not just yet, Mike," Howard replied.  "Give them time.  They've got a
lot of ground to cover."

They've had time enough.  I'm going."  He reached for the helmet lying
at his feet.

"You know you can't take any soldiers down there just yet!"  Howard
snapped.  "We agreed with Thornton."

To hell with Thornton!  Luke may be in trouble."

"Keep your voice down, Mike.  Listen, if he ..."

They're coming up!"

Both men wheeled around at the sound of the soldier's voice and looked
towards the opening to the sewer.  The soldier who had called out, his
mouth and nose now covered with a handkerchief, was reaching down with
one hand into the hole.  An arm appeared over the edge of the opening,
then a helmet and shoulders.  The figure clambered through followed by
another and a cheer rang out among the relieved soldiers.  The first
figure stood erect and the hands pulled at his helmet, then pulled away
the oxygen mask.  The only expression on Fender's face was one of
weariness.

He spotted Lehmann and Howard and began walking towards them, his
strides heavy, awkward.  They saw his face was shining with
perspiration and steam from his mouth escaped into the cold air in
swirling billows.  He stopped before them, dropping the torch and
helmet onto the grass, and looked at each man in turn.

He shook his head.  "Nothing," he said.

SEVENTEEN

Charles Denison smiled to himself as he steered the Land-Rover along
the rutted track.  It was over.  His forest was free.  He looked out at
the bright sky.  Even the weather seemed to acknowledge that all was
well.  The sun had shone brightly, like an omen, since the sewers had
been cleared of dead vermin two weeks before.  There was a clean
dryness in the air, the brown-gold leaves crisp and brittle on the
ground, shattering underfoot into flaky powder, ready to replenish the
soil.  The animals were more in evidence now, venturing forth from
their habitats, still cautious, but becoming bolder by the day.  The
troop activity had probably frightened them more than anything else,
the heavy tanks and army vehicles lumbering through their domain like
great metal prehistoric monsters.  The constant drone of helicopters
searching overhead had not helped, either.  The main force was gone
now, leaving behind a sufficient number to patrol the woodland, but not
enough to intrude unpleasantly on the life there.  The residents would
be allowed to return soon perhaps in two or three weeks' time when
every building, every cellar, had been thoroughly scoured.  It had been
a mammoth job, for there were more homes and deserted buildings on the
vast woodland estate than people realized, but it had been carried out
with typical military efficiency.  Just a few more and the task would
be complete.

Of course, anyone entering the forest still had to wear the damned
uncomfortable protective suits, but everyone knew they were now just an
unnecessary precaution.  The soldiers had complained at first because
they had not been kit ted out with the silvery clothing there simply
had not been enough to go round but now they laughed at their
companions in house-searching parties who had to wear them.  Everyone
had relaxed. Except Whitney-Evans.  His concern was now of a different
nature.

It looked as if Epping Forest might lose its financial independence.
The extermination exercise had cost more than the City coffers could
afford at that time and the Greater London Council had rubbed their
hands in glee at the prospect of becoming joint owners of the green
belt area.  The battle was on: Whitney-Evans and his City friends were
endeavouring to sue the government of the day for the disaster.  The
local authorities who each owned a slice of the green lands around
Epping Forest were screaming for tighter controls in the area,
demanding that the government itself should take total responsibility
for the woodland's upkeep, and the GLC were claiming that the forest
was a natural extension of London itself, therefore it should come
under their jurisdiction.  The clamour from the public over the scare
they had received and, of course, the many deaths that had occurred was
being nicely stirred by the main opposing political party, with the
smaller antagonists jumping up and biting the government's ankles with
furious relish.  The media had had a field day, dreaming up a new title
for the circulation-stimulating event, their elected title following
aptly on the heels of The Outbreak': they called it The Outrage'.

Denison slowed the Land-Rover as a squirrel hopped on to the track
ahead, cocked its head at his approach, and darted back into cover.

"You're one vermin I don't mind any more!"  Denison called out,
chuckling to himself.  The vehicle gathered speed and the head keeper
began to hum a tune to himself, happy to be carrying out his normal
duties in the almost deserted forest.  It would be a long time before
the day-trippers returned and the thought made him even happier.  It
also warmed him a little to think of the insufferably pompous
Whitney-Evans squirming under the sudden pressures inflicted upon him.
The man undoubtedly loved the Epping Forest, but he had a tendency to
regard it as his own domain, his own back garden, and all those
employed in its care as his personal gardeners.  Denison hoped
fervently that the City would retain control of the woodland, but had
to smile at the upset now taking place.

He brought the Land-Rover to a halt before a large gate, the entrance
to a six-acre enclosure in which the forest deer were kept.  They had
been herded together and brought here for their own protection years
before, because their numbers had depleted rapidly through cars and
lorries knocking them down when they wandered across the many roads
running through the woodland.  Dogs had also been a menace to them,
chasing them, savaging their young.  They had sustained injuries on
fencings, cut themselves on broken glass and choked on plastic bags
left by tourists.  The occasional poacher had left his mark, too.  It
was decided that if the deer population were to survive, it could only
do so in the safety of a reserve.  One of Denison's biggest fears
during the rodent invasion was that the deer would be attacked.  He had
begged for a guard, or at least a patrol, to cover the perimeter, and
the army had complied with his wishes until the threat was over.  Of
all the forest wildlife, he loved these gentle, skittish creatures
most.

He pulled the gate open wide, climbed back into the Land Rover, and
drove through.  He left the engine idling while he closed the gate
again.  There were no deer immediately in evidence, but that wasn't
unusual: they were shy creatures.  He drove around the perimeter,
checking for breaks in the fencing, ensuring there were no deer strung
halfway over the boundary, their efforts to wander free foiled by their
inability to clear the wire.

He sensed the presence of the bodies before he saw them.  They were
scattered over a wide area as though their panic had made them flee in
different directions.  They lay motionless in the grass, bloody,
half-eaten carcasses.  He jumped from the Land-Rover, leaving behind
the two-way radio that had now become standard equipment, and stumbled
towards them, shaking his head as he went, his cheeks glistening wetly.
Five, six, seven, more.  Nine in all.  Oh God, no.  Another, a hundred
yards away.  One by the fence, another ... He stared at the slumped
form, unsure, too much blood to be certain, but the unstained areas
light in colour... He moved closer to the particular animal, his grief
making him oblivious to any danger that might still be lurking in the
vicinity.  As he drew nearer, he became more certain.  And as he stood
above the ravaged body, a raw, gaping hole in its skull beneath the
antlers, the blood still viscous as though death had been recent, he
knew from what was left untouched of the light, fawn-covered coating,
that the rats had slaughtered the white deer.

Whittaker swung the rusted iron gates wide and Fender drove the Audi
through.  He waited for the senior tutor to close the gates again and
stared through his windscreen at the long, straight road ahead, the
forest of pine trees providing a high, green wall on either side.  In
the distance he could just make out the sombre, square shape of Seymour
Hall, its chimney stacks a dark silhouette against the clear sky.

The passenger door opened and Whittaker climbed in.  The car moved
forward at a slow speed, both men looking keenly into the trees,
searching for any scarred barks, any sudden movement.

What do you think?"  Whittaker asked, his eyes still scanning the
forest.  We haven't seen any signs for two weeks now, not since the
gassing."

Fender shook his head.  "I don't know.  I'd like to think we got them
all, but I still feel uneasy."

"Why?  Nearly every inch of the forest has been covered and there's
only a few buildings left to search.  Even the one ahead has been
cleared by the helicopter reconnaissance -the pigs running loose up
there all seemed healthy enough."

"I still won't be happy until every building has been crossed off our
list."

"Maybe you're right.  I'll certainly feel relieved when the whole area
has been given a clean bill of health.  Even then I think I'll be a
little scared of the forest for a few years to come."

Fender brought the car to a halt before the rough wooden gate and
cattle-grid that barred the entrance into the rising field leading up
to the desolate mansion.

You won't get the car up there," Whittaker said.  "It's hard down here,
but the pigs have churned the track into a muddy swamp at the other
end."

"Okay, we'll walk."  Fender quickly ran his eyes over the surrounding
fields, studying the wooded fringes.  He was glad to be clear of the
pine forest, the memory of the mutant rats leaping from the trees still
all too vivid.  Ahead, to his right, he saw the small round copse that
had made him feel uneasy on his last visit to this place.  It would
have to be searched later.  He reached for the two-way radio lying on
the back seat and informed the Operations Room at the Centre of their
precise location, a strictly adhered-to procedure for any of the search
parties in the forest.  Then he strapped a gun holster around his
waist.

"Okay," he said when he had finished, let's take a look."

Whittaker pushed open the door and clambered out, the sun reflecting
sparkles of light in his silver-grey protective suit.

"Hey!  Helmet," Fender said reaching down into the front floor-space
where the tutor had carelessly thrown the headgear.

"Oh, Christ.  Is it still necessary?"  Whittaker complained.

"Carry it.  You never know."

Whittaker took the plastic-visored helmet and tucked it under his arm.
He gazed around him, fingers scratching his beard.

"It's so bloody peaceful," he said.  "It seems impossible that it all
happened such a short time ago."

Fender closed the car door, and smiled grimly.  "Let's hope it stays
this way," he said.

They walked towards the gate, carefully negotiating their way across
the metal cattle-grid.  Fender released the catch and swung the gate
open a few feet, lifting it clear of the rutted earth at its base.  The
tutor passed through and Fender made sure the entrance was closed
properly before catching up with him.  They trudged along in silence,
the track becoming muddier as they went The rat catcher examined the
rough soil on either side.

The pigs don't leave much, do they," he commented.

"No, they eat anything and everything.  That's what makes them so cheap
to keep.  These free-rangers virtually look after themselves."

"I don't see any," said Fender, craning his head round.

They'll be up at the house in the shelter there.  We can look in on
them to set your mind at rest."

The mud began to pull at their boots now, making walking awkward.

"I'm surprised this hasn't dried up," Fender said, 'with all the bright
weather we've been having."

"It's become too water-logged over the years.  It'll never dry up now.
It gets worse further on."

Once more there was a silence between them as they plodded through the
oozing mud, and Fender felt the tutor's resentment towards him.  He'd
been conscious of it before, on the other days he and Whittaker had
teamed up as a search-party, and had ignored it.  The tutor hadn't
actually said anything antagonistic towards him, nor indicated his
feelings over Jenny and Fender's relationship it was more an underlying
animosity tempered by the fact that Fender had pulled the rat from him
during the attack, possibly saving his Me, or at least saving him from
serious injury.  But it was coming, and Fender could sense it.

He almost smiled when Whittaker said, "Look, Luke, about Jenny..."

Fender kept walking, his eyes searching the empty windows of the
building ahead.  "What about her?"  he said.

"You know she's in a confused state at the moment.  This business with
the rats has upset her terribly."

Fender remained silent.

"What I'm trying to say is, she's very vulnerable right now ... I don't
think she knows her own mind."

"I don't agree.  She seems to me to be very clear-minded."

Whittaker reached out a hand and brought the rat catcher to a halt.
"Look, what I mean is, I'd hate to see her taken advantage of when
she's in this state."

Fender faced him.  "Listen," he said through tight lips.  "I understand
your problem, but it is your problem.  It's nothing to do with Jenny
and me.  Jenny's neither confused nor being taken advantage of.  I
could explain to you how we feel about each other, but that has nothing
to do with you."

There was a flush to Whittaker's face.  "Before you came along..."

"Before I came along nothing!  Jenny told me you were good friends, but
that was all.  Anything else was what you assumed yourself."

The tutor wheeled away, his boots making sucking noises as he stomped
towards the house.  Fender hurried after him.

"Hey, Vie, I didn't mean ..."

But Whittaker marched on, ignoring Fender's words, and the rat catcher
fell silent once more.  When the tutor's foot slipped and he went down
on one knee in the mud, Fender reached out for him and, suppressing a
grin, helped him to his feet.

Whittaker looked at him sullenly.  "Okay, maybe I did imagine much of
it.  But I do care about her, even though I've got my own ...
responsibilities.  I don't want to see her hurt."

"I understand, Vie, believe me, I understand.  I've no intention of
hurting Jenny; I'm in too deep for that I'm sorry you're the loser, but
try to see: you were never really in the race."

Whittaker shrugged slowly.  "Perhaps you're right.  I don't know.
She'll make up her own mind."

You poor idiot, Fender thought.  She already had.  And strangely, right
at that moment, so had he.  When he left the forest, his work done,
Jenny would be leaving with him.

"Come on," he said, 'let's look at the house."

They continued their journey, boots squelching noisily as they sank
deeper into the mud.  A low, barbed-wire fence appeared on their left,
presumably to keep the pigs from the lush vegetation on the other
side.

That was part of the gardens," Whittaker explained, not looking at
Fender, his voice low.  They stretch right back and around the house
itself.  It's like a jungle round there."

By now they were close to the gutted manor house and Fender was
surprised at its true size.  He had only had a side-view as they
approached along the track but now, as the rough-hewn road swept on
past the entrance, he could see the whole frontage.  The large
ground-floor windows and arch-shaped door were barricaded with
corrugated iron, decorated with mindless, sprayed-on graffiti.  Rubble
was heaped against its walls as though, year by year, more and more
brickwork had dislodged itself from the upper floors and formed a
defensive barrier around the perimeter.  The first- and second-floor
windows were no longer black and ominous, for he could see the sky
through them, as most of the building's roof was completely demolished.
The many chimney stacks were perched precariously on inner walls,
rising above the main shell like solemn sentinels.  A balustrade ran
round the roof-top, joined at the centre by a triangle of grey
stonework that stood above the projecting wall of the main frontage.
From where they stood, the whole structure seemed to dominate the
surrounding countryside.

"It must have been some place in its day," Fender said.

Whittaker made no comment, but turned off the main track, taking an
even muddier path that ran alongside the building.

There are old stables around the side here," he called back.  They've
been converted into pig-pens."

Fender followed, treading warily through the mire, clutching his
protective helmet in one hand.  He concentrated on one foot at a time,
choosing the firmer patches of mud and avoiding the water-filled
troughs.  When he looked up, the tutor had disappeared round the corner
of a wall jutting out from the side of the main building which
obviously formed the outer wall of the stables.  As he rounded the
corner, he saw Whittaker with his back to him, looking into the gloomy
interiors of two facing stable blocks.  The floors of both sections
were covered with deep layers of straw and, as Fender narrowed his eyes
to pierce the shadows, he saw bulky, pink shapes lying amongst it,
their bodies half-concealed.  He almost choked on the nauseous smell
and wondered how even an animal could live with such a stench.

Whittaker turned his head towards him.  There they are," he said.
"Sleeping like babies."

"What a lovely life," said Fender, moving past Whittaker for a closer
look.

"If you like muck and dirt," the tutor said.  He saw Fender suddenly
stiffen.  What's wrong?  What is it?"

Fender's voice was low, almost a whisper.  Take a closer look."

Whittaker frowned and peered into the gloom.  "I can't see..."

"Closer.  Look, just over there.  That one."  Fender was pointing at a
nearby recumbent form.  The tutor edged forward until Fender grabbed
his arm.  "No further.  Can't you see from here?"

This time it was Whittaker who stiffened.  "Oh God," he said.  "It
looks like blood."

"Look at the others.  There's no movement, no breathing.  And listen
there's no noise at all."

Whittaker slowly shook his head.  They're dead."

The rat catcher moved forward, his senses alert, eyes searching for
dark-haired shapes among rough bedding.  He knelt down and pulled at
the straw, clearing an area around one of the still bodies.  The pig
had been torn to pieces, its neck ripped, the head almost severed from
its body.  There were only stumps where its legs had once been and the
stomach was punctured with large holes from which its insides had been
dragged through, presumably to be devoured.  Fender now realized that
the terrible stench had come from corrupted flesh.  The pigs had been
dead for a long time.

Whittaker was uncovering another decomposing body and as Fender stood,
his eyes becoming accustomed to the gloomy interior, he saw they were
littered all around the stable, a carnage of destroyed animals.  Most
of the bodies were shrivelled, bearing little resemblance to the
creatures they once were, the flesh of their underbellies gone.

The rats must have attacked them at night while they were sleeping,"
Fender said.  They had no chance at all.  Not even to get out into the
open."

"But they're only half-eaten.  Some of them..."

The rats have probably been feeding off them since they were killed."
He paused, then added wryly, Their own private supply.  Jesus."  He
surveyed the area in disgust.  "Come on, I think we'd better get out of
here."

But Whittaker's eyes were transfixed on something ahead of him.
"Fender, one of them is breathing.  It's still alive."

That can't be."  Fender looked in the direction of the tutor's gaze and
saw that the body, unlike most of the others, was still grossly
swollen.  And there was a slight movement from it.

We can't help it now," he said.  "Let's go."

Wait, wait.  We can at least put it out of its misery.  Let me have the
gun."

"No.  The sound would arouse anything else that might be lurking around
here.  Leave it be."

But Whittaker was insistent.  "Please, I can't leave it like this."

Fender reluctantly undid the flap of the holster and handed Whittaker
the Browning.  Tush it into its neck try to muffle the sound.  And make
it quick."

He watched anxiously as the tutor removed his glove and curled his
finger through the trigger guard, making towards the unfortunate
animal.  The mystery was how the pig had managed to survive all this
time.

Tender, look at this."  Whittaker was crouched over the pink,
bloodstained body.  The rat catcher quickly joined him, eager to be
away from the place.  He frowned when he saw the long, gaping tear in
the bloated belly.

"It's dead.  Nothing could survive that," he said.

"But look, the lungs are moving.  It's breathing."

Fender bent forward.  The skin was undulating, yet the rest of the body
was stiff with rigor mortis.

He realized what the movement was just before the sleek, black head
pushed its way through the jagged slit in the pig's stomach.

Whittaker screamed as the rat scrabbled its whole body through the
opening, leaping at the tutor as he fell back into the straw.  Fender,
too, fell back in surprise and for a moment could only watch the
struggling bodies in frozen horror.  Then he was on his knees shouting
at Whittaker, trying to be heard over the man's screams.

The gun!  Use the gun!"

But the weapon was no longer in the tutor's hand; it was hidden
somewhere in the straw, released in shock.  Fender quickly searched for
it, but it was no use, the gun had disappeared.

Whittaker had a hand clamped inside the rat's mouth, his fingers curled
round the lower jaw, and blood was flowing down his wrist as the
creature's teeth sank in.  Claws were frantically raking his chest,
scoring the suit's material, threatening to penetrate at any moment.

Fender crouched, then leapt forward, grabbing the giant rat at the back
of the neck with one hand, the other going beneath its jaw.  He pulled
back with one mighty heave, trying to snap its neck, but the mutant
twisted, spoiling the leverage.  It momentarily released Whittaker's
hand and the tutor pulled it clear, his head swimming with the pain.

Fender lifted the rat, keeping his arms outstretched, using all his
strength, holding the squirming body with its lethal teeth and claws
away from him.  He lost his balance, the struggling weight too much for
him.  He crashed down into the muddy yard between the facing stables,
falling on top of the rat, crushing it with his own weight.  He clung
desperately to the thrashing creature's neck, pushing the head down
into the ooze in an attempt to suffocate it.  The wet earth flew
furiously in all directions as the rat panicked and Fender knew he did
not have the strength to hold it there for long.

"Find the gun!"  he yelled at the tutor who still lay in the straw
moaning in pain.  "Shoot the bloody thing!"

Whittaker scrambled around on hands and knees, but could find no sign
of the weapon.

"It's not here!  I can't find it!"  he screamed.

The mud was making Fender's gloved hands slippery and he could feel the
creature forcing its way loose, pushing its haunches down and pulling
its neck up.  Fender squeezed, trying to choke the rat to death.

Then Whittaker was slivering in the mud next to him, something held in
his uninjured hand.

"Hold its head out, Fender!  Hold it where I can reach it!"

Fender allowed the creature to raise its head from the well it had
created in the mud, and Whittaker struck down hard with the brick he
had found, bringing it down on the small, pointed skull.  The rat
squealed but continued struggling, almost breaking free of Fender's
grasp.

"Again!"  Fender shouted.  "Again!"

Once more the brick descended, but the mutant's struggling became even
more frantic.

"Again!"  Fender was almost screaming now.  The heavy weight struck.

"Again!"

The rat stiffened momentarily.

"Again!"

They heard the crunching of bone.  Yet still it moved.

Fender leapt to his feet, dragging the limp body with him and, without
pause, swung the rat by the neck against a stout wooden beam supporting
the stable roof.  He felt the snap in the creature's neck and let it
fall to the ground, its body twitching in death throes.

Fender collapsed on to one knee and drew in deep gasps of air.  His
face and body were caked in mud, but that was the least of his
concerns.  Whittaker sat hunched in the slime, clutching his injured
hand in his lap.

"Are you okay?"  Fender asked.

"I can't... move ... my fingers.  I think all the tendons ... are
gone."  His face was screwed up in agony, tears running freely down his
face into his beard.

Fender staggered to his feet and put a hand beneath the tutor's
shoulder.  "Come on," he said, pulling him up.  We'd better move fast.
No telling how many others are around here."

The two men stumbled from the stable yard, helmets forgotten, fear
giving them impetus, the mud making them slip and hold on to each other
for support.  They rounded the corner and made for the track leading
from the house to the car on the other side of the field.  As they
reached the front of the building, Fender now half-supporting the
injured man, they bolted down the gentle slope leading away from the
house towards the open fields.  And something made Fender pause to take
in the peculiar circular tree copse in the middle of the nearest
field.

The trees seemed to be quivering with hidden life, the branches moving,
shedding leaves, trembling as though shaken by a swirling wind.  It
seemed to be almost thrumming.  A coldness gripped him as he saw the
hundreds of black shapes pour from the copse and come streaming up the
slope towards them.

EIGHTEEN

"Run!  Get moving!"  Fender shouted as Whittaker stood mesmerized by
the advancing horde.  The tutor stumbled forward, intending to run
towards the parked car, but Fender caught his arm and swung him
round.

"No!  Towards the house!  We'll never make it to the car -they'll cut
us off."

He pushed Whittaker towards the old building, giving one last look at
the black vermin streaking across the field.  The two men soon reached
the piled bricks and rubble which sloped up the side of the house, and
they clambered over it, the rat catcher slipping and rolling back down,
the heavy clothing preventing any severe damage.  He clawed his way up
to the top again and saw Whittaker pushing against the iron sheeting
that covered one of the large ground-floor windows.  The rat catcher
added his weight, using his shoulder to push against one corner of the
corrugated iron.

He turned to see the black shapes darting beneath the two-strand wire
fence that bordered the field, their bristling bodies momentarily lost
in the undergrowth, then bursting forth, racing across the widened
track that formed the frontage to the ruin.  He stooped and picked up a
brick, throwing it at the leading rodent, which swerved to avoid the
missile.

Then it seemed as though every square foot of the frontage area was
covered in black bodies, the air filled with their high-pitched
squeals.  Fender began using his boot on the metal barrier just as the
first rat reached the bottom of the slope.

Whittaker saw the creature and managed to lift a fair-sized portion of
brickwork from the rubble, hurling it down at the rat as it began
climbing.  The rat was crushed, killed instantly, but its companions
were now at the base of the rough slope.

The corrugated sheet began to give and Fender redoubled his efforts. It
came away from the top with a grinding tear and he squeezed an arm
through, creating a triangular gap big enough to allow them entry.

"Get inside!"  he yelled at Whittaker, pulling him roughly.  The tutor
complied without hesitation, squeezing his frame through the gap,
grunting with the effort.  Fender turned in time to give a rat that was
only inches away a hefty kick, sending it hurtling back down to its
companions.  He wasted no time in pushing his way into the building's
interior, gasping in pain as he felt strong teeth bite into his calf,
one leg still on the other side of the barrier.

Whittaker was already pushing at the metal sheet, trying to close the
gap in an effort to keep the attacking vermin out.  Fender dragged his
leg through, the rat still clinging to it.  He pushed his foot down
towards the floor once it was inside, the rat's shoulders becoming
trapped at the narrow end of the triangle between wall and metal sheet.
Whittaker had managed to close the gap at the top and was pressing
against it with his shoulder.  Fender forced his leg down even further,
the edge of the metal sheet pressing into the rat's neck, choking it.
The suit material tore under the strain and suddenly Fender's leg was
free.  He turned and brought his boot crunching down on the rodent's
skull, forcing its neck further into the wedge shape.  It struggled to
pull back, the metal edge now cutting into its throat and Fender, in a
furious, hate filled madness, rained kicks upon the trembling head.  At
last the eyes became glazed and the head slumped, but Fender could not
be sure it was really dead.

He could see other mutants through the small opening left above the
rat's body, climbing on its back trying to push their way through, and
he joined Whittaker, his back pushing against the corrugated iron. They
could hear the vermin leaping at the barricade, their claws scrabbling
at the surface.  They winced at every thud, the metal shaking with each
blow.

Fender looked around the interior of the ruin, seeking a means of
escape.  Many of the inside walls had caved in and he could see through
to the rear of the building, the windows there also covered in metal
sheets.  He wondered what chance they would have if they made a break
for it and tried to get out the back way, but realized that by the time
they had forced an opening, the vermin would be through on this side
and swarming all over them.  He looked upwards to see if there was a
way to reach the upper levels.  The blueness of the peaceful sky seemed
to mock him, for there were no floors above; the upper levels had been
completely gutted.  Even the staircases had gone.  There was one way of
getting above ground level, though.  It was dangerous, but their only
chance.  And what he saw next told him there was no choice anyway.

Not far from where they stood, through the half-collapsed wall to the
hallway, he could see a black body perched on top of a metal barrier.
It was the section blocking the main entrance, a curved gap left
between the doorway arc and the corrugated iron barrier.  The rat waved
its pointed head in the air, its nose twitching.

"It's no good," Fender cried out.  They've found another way in!"

Whittaker followed his gaze and drew in his breath.

Fender nudged him and pointed to a jagged rise of brickwork, the
remains of a wall which had once divided that room from the next.

"If we can get up there, we may have a chance!"  he yelled over the
clamour of squealing rats and thudding sounds.  There's just a small
corner section of flooring up there.  If we can get to it we may be
able to hold them off until help comes!"

"Help?  What help?"  came the frantic reply.

They know our location at the Centre.  They'll send someone out when we
don't return."

"But that will be bloody hours, man!  We'll never last that long!"

"It's all we have!  So move.  Get up there!"

Fender could see the gap above the door was now empty; the rat had
dropped down, was among the debris.  Two more shadows appeared in the
opening, then these, too, disappeared from view.

They're in here, Whittaker!  Climb up or, by Christ, I'll leave you to
hold the barrier!"

Whittaker ran across the rotted floor, avoiding a large hole near its
centre, leaping over debris, a trail of blood streaming from his
injured hand.  He began to climb, brickwork crumbling away under his
touch as he pulled himself upwards, using hands, feet, knees.  The
broken wall was irregular in shape, sometimes steep, sometimes a more
manageable slope.  Fender gave him a chance to reach a good height,
knowing the tutor would only block his own path if he broke too soon.
The appearance of three rats scurrying around the wreckage of the next
room made him decide it was now or never.  He sprang away from the
barricade and sprinted towards the makeshift stairway to the upper
level, hearing the sound of tearing metal behind, knowing the rats were
pouring through.

He leapt over the gaping, black hole in the centre of the floor and
when he landed on the other side, the rotted boards cracked and gave
under his foot.  His impetus carried him forward and he was fortunate
not to fall into the cellar below.  He scrambled to his feet and ran
on, praying he wouldn't trip on all the loose rubble.  The mutants in
the next room were scurrying towards him, leaping over obstacles in
their way, skirling round the larger objects.  Behind him the rats were
swarming through the ever-widening gap in the metal barrier.

He reached the foot of the broken brick wall a second or two before the
lead rat approaching from the opposite direction, and leapt onto the
first easy step, immediately moving upwards, pulling away loose bricks
as he went, blindly throwing them down in the hope they would deter the
vermin from following.  The lead rat went with him, scurrying up his
back, making for his exposed neck.  Fender twisted his body, almost
falling from the precarious perch, bringing his elbow around sharply to
hit the rat's side.  The mutant had no firm grip on Fender's clothing
and the blow sent it tumbling down into the rubble again.

Fender climbed and when he looked up saw that the tutor had reached the
next floor level.  He was sitting astride an even outcrop of wall, a
large chunk of masonry held above his head, ready to be thrown down. He
was staring at Fender and their eyes locked.

For one dreadful moment, Fender thought the tutor was about to hurl the
brickwork down into his face, his jealousy over Jenny erupting into
violence.  His fears were unfounded; Whittaker's arms heaved forward
and the heavy weight sailed over Fender's head to land squarely on the
back of a climbing rat.  Within seconds he was beneath the tutor's
feet.

He turned to look down at the swarming rats and kicked one away from
his heels.  It slid back, then fell, taking a companion with it. Fender
was relieved to see only one rat at a time could advance up the
incline, and its steepness in parts made their ascent difficult.  The
floor below seemed alive with the creatures, those at the base of the
wall on their haunches, stretching their bodies upwards, leaping and
tumbling back when their claws could not gain purchase.  The sounds of
their strident screeching echoed around the immense, stone cavern,
rebounding off the walls, magnifying the noise.  He saw others had
found another source of entry near the back of the house and were
filing through, joining the throng on the floor below.  It seemed they
were no strangers to the deserted ruin.

He was thankful that the ceilings of the old house had been high, for
the further away he was from those slashing teeth and claws, the safer
he felt.

Where have they come from, Fender?"  Whittaker yelled down at him. They
should be dead!"

"It looks like they weren't all in the sewers," Fender replied, aiming
a swift kick at the twitching snout of an advancing rat.  "Get onto
that ledge over there.  There should be room enough for both of us."

The tutor eased himself up slowly then stepped over to the outcrop, the
corner remains of the first-floor level.  He tested its strength before
resting all his weight on it and when satisfied left his crumbling
perch completely.  Fender scooted up after him.

Will it hold us both?"  he asked before stepping across.

"I think so.  It seems strong enough," came the reply.

There wasn't much room on the small platform and both men clung to the
wall it jutted from for support.

"I can reach any rat that gets to the top of the wall with my boot from
here," Fender said.  They'll find it difficult to get over that last
stretch anyway; it leans out at an angle."

As if to prove his claim, a rat tried to scramble over the projection,
easy enough for a man to do, but difficult for a smaller animal.  Some
of the brickwork crumbled and the rat went crashing down to the floor
below.  It rolled over and came to its feet again, shaking its body as
if stunned.

"We should be safe here," Fender said.

"For how long?  What happens when it gets dark?"

The Centre will send out a search party before then.  Well be okay."
Fender wished he could put some confidence behind the statement. "How's
your hand?"  he enquired to change the subject.

Whittaker brought the injured hand away from the wall and Fender
frowned when he saw the deep rent above the knuckles.

"I still can't move it!  God, it hurts!"

Fender's worry was that the tutor might faint with the pain.  A fall
into the vermin below would be fatal.

Try to hang on," he said, feeling helpless.  They know where we are;
they'll get us out."

He eased his body round on the platform so his back was against the
wall, giving him a better all-round view.

"How many of them down there, Fender?"  said Whittaker, his teeth
clenched against the pain.

"Maybe a couple of hundred.  They've stopped coming in now; I don't
think there are any more."

That's enough to kill us, isn't it?"  There was a note of hysteria in
Whittaker's voice.

"Just keep calm and we'll be all right They can't reach us here."

But he was wrong.  Even as he spoke, some of the black vermin were
breaking away from the mass and climbing sections of other broken
walls.  Fender watched in horror, guessing their intention.  If they
climbed well enough, they could reach the next level above their
precarious perch, then skim down the wall on that side to reach them.
With astonishment, he noticed one of the climbing rats had a white
marking on its pointed head; could it be the same rat he'd seen in the
forest two weeks before among the group that had attacked his search
party?  Perhaps that was the reason these were still alive: they hadn't
returned to the sewers, they had fled into the forest instead.

"Vie," he said, trying to keep his voice calm.  They're coming up the
walls around us."  He felt the tutor's body stop trembling, as though
shocked rigid.  You'll have to turn around.  We may be able to dislodge
them before they get above us by throwing whatever we can break off the
walls."

"Can't we climb up further?"  Whittaker said, closing his eyes and
pressing his face against the rough brickwork.

"No, the broken wall we came up runs out just above my head.  The rest
is smooth to the top.  Come on, turn, it's our only chance."

Whittaker numbly did as he was told, his body beginning to shake again
when he looked down at the bristling bodies below and the creeping
black shapes on the walls around them.  Some of the flooring beneath
his feet crumbled and he cried out as he pressed himself back into the
wall.  The falling remnants of flooring seemed to excite the vermin
even more and their squealing took on a new pitch.

Fender pulled a brick free from the wall they had climbed and aimed it
at the lead rat, the one with the scar, which was patiently working its
way up the opposite corner section of the same wall.  More by luck than
judgement, it struck the rat on one shoulder, causing it to lose its
grip and tumble down.  It scurried off and Fender lost sight of it in
the shadows.

He aimed more pieces of masonry and Whittaker joined him, but they
managed to strike only a few of the climbing vermin.  Every so often,
Fender had to kick out with his boot at the pointed snouts that
appeared over the overhang in the wall by his side.

"It's no good, Fender!  We'll never stop them!"

He saw that the tutor was right.  There were just too many, and the
missiles were becoming more difficult to pull from the wall, the looser
ones used up now.

"Okay.  We'll have to climb," he said.

"But you said we couldn't!  The walls are too smooth!"

We'll have to try!  We'll have to dig out handholds as we go the walls
might be soft with damp."

Whittaker looked at him as though he was mad.  That's impossible!  We
can't claw our way to the top!"

There's no bloody choice!  We can't stay here.  Look, I'll have to go
first; you won't be able to use that hand much.  Try and keep close
behind me I'll help where I can."

Fender clambered onto the brickwork that jutted out at right angles
from the wall they were leaning on and began his ascent, testing every
grip on the crumbling stone.  He was relieved to see Whittaker
following his example.

He soon reached the highest limit of the climbing wall and he stood
erect, keeping his hands flat against the facing surface.  Kicking into
the brickwork, careful not to overbalance, he created a small foothold.
Then he undid the empty gun-belt and used the metal buckle to dig into
the wall's surface.  The outer layer crumbled like powder, but the
going became tougher when he reached the stone underneath.  There was
just the slightest chance the idea might work, though.  If he could
just create enough holds for their hands and feet, they might... He saw
there was no chance at all.  Above, on the top of the building's inner
wall, a pointed, black shape appeared, looking over the edge, nose
twisting and waving in the air.

The rat opened its jaws wide and gave out a snarling hiss as it saw its
quarry below, revealing its enormous, yellowed incisors.  It was joined
by other black shapes and Fender saw still more running along the
wall's length.  They had found another way up.

Whittaker clutched at his leg.  "What is it, Fender?  Why have you
stopped?"

The tutor saw the vermin above and screamed aloud.  The next moment,
the rats were stretching their bodies over the edge, digging their
powerful claws into the brickwork, then letting themselves go, hurtling
towards the heads of the men below.

NINETEEN

Fender managed to throw his arm up in front of his face before the
first giant rat landed on him, but the sudden force knocked him from
his perch, sending him crashing downwards, taking Whittaker with him,
other black bodies following their descent.  It seemed ages to Fender
before the impact came, as though his body had floated down in slow
motion.  His muscles tensed for the blow, but he barely felt it when it
happened.  The squirming bodies of the vermin cushioned the initial
impact and the rotted floorboards beneath them gave way with a dry,
cracking shriek, breaking the fall even further.  They fell headlong
into the dark cellar beneath the house, squealing vermin toppling in
after them.

Fender's breath was knocked from him and everything was a mad blur of
swirling dust and black, leaping shapes.  Bodies were landing on top of
him, claws slashing at his face and hands as he tried to protect
himself.  But the rats were too confused and startled to attack.  They
scrambled around in the underground chamber, snarling and clawing at
each other in their panic, trying to climb the walls of the cellar as
though this was a place in which they had no desire to be.

Fender wiped the grit from his eyes and looked up at the gaping hole
above, the sunlight shining down through the old mansion's shell,
flooding the basement with shafts of dust-filled light.  Their fall had
caused at least hah" the floor above to cave in and the rats were
spilling over the jagged edges.

Tender!"

He turned his body to see Whittaker crawling in the rubble, free of any
clinging rats, blind terror driving him forward.  Fender tried to reach
him, but he had not yet recovered his breath.  He started to call his
name but only sharp gasps came from his throat.  The tutor was crawling
away from him, trying to get from beneath the vermin still tumbling
down.  One landed on his back and crouched there, its claws digging in,
sending the tutor into an even wilder frenzy.  His screams filled the
cellar with their shrill sound, rising above the squeals of the vermin,
and he staggered forward, still on hands and knees, heading into the
darkness beyond the shafts of sunlight.

Fender managed to raise himself on one elbow and tried to call out to
the tutor, but was still unable to do so.  A terrible, cloying stench
filled his nostrils, making breathing even more difficult.  A falling
rat knocked him back amongst the rubble and he pushed the creature away
in a frantic movement.  It nipped at his hand and darted away;
mercifully, Fender was still wearing the tough gloves.  He gained his
knees and rose up from the sea of bristling fur.  He could see
Whittaker's figure just beyond the area of light, now standing, the
black shape gone from his back, others scurrying around his ankles. His
figure was still as though shocked rigid, and he seemed to be gazing at
something in the corner of the cellar.

Abruptly, as though a signal had been given, all movement in the
underground chamber stopped.  Only the disturbed dust swirled and
eddied, trickles of earth running down from the broken floor above. For
a brief second, Fender felt a curious ringing in his ears, but he
couldn't be sure if it wasn't just the sudden silence playing tricks.
He looked down at the vermin around his feet and saw they were all
crouched, their bodies quivering, eyes staring, slightly bulged.  Their
ears were stiffened as though they were picking up a sound too high in
pitch for him to hear.  Something white caught his eye.  Something
lying in the dust close by.

The light from the sun above shone through the skull's empty eye
sockets, entering through a large hole in the cranium.  Fender felt his
body sway as a dizziness hit him.  The skull was human.  And beyond it
was another.  Beyond that, yet another.  He desperately tried to keep
upright, not wanting to fall among the vermin.  There were more white
objects around him, gleaming bones of severed limbs.  But mostly there
were the skulls, some in shattered pieces, others like the first with
just their craniums cracked open.  He slowly began to back away from
the area of light, careful not to step on the crouching rats, afraid
that one wrong move would set off the whole demented bedlam again.  He
moved towards the wall that should be somewhere behind him, hoping
there would be a way up from the cellar there, wanting to call out to
the tutor, but too afraid.  If he found a way out, then he could guide
Whittaker towards it without wasting time.  A rat let out a sharp
squeal as he trod on its claw.  He froze, but the rat merely shifted
its position and crouched low.  Nothing else moved.

Soon he found his back brushing against the rough surface of the cellar
wall and he quickly looked from left to right in search of an exit. The
staircase, what was left of it, was to his right.  He groaned inwardly
when he saw the top was blocked with boards and rubble.  He looked
around for another way out.

The cellar was much larger than Fender had first thought; it stretched
to the back of the house, most of it still in shadows.  As he peered
into the murky greyness he saw things moving against the gloom.  Shapes
that were light in colour, animals that were larger than the rats
around them.

Whittaker's cry made Fender quickly turn his attention back to the
figure standing on the other side of the patch of light.  The tutor was
moving backwards, his eyes still on some object before him, his body
moving stiffly as though automated.  His mouth opened and closed and
whimpering sounds came from it.  Sunlight burst onto his head and
shoulders as he passed into the light.  He stumbled over a crouching
rat and the creature scampered away.  Whittaker regained his balance
and then emitted a swift-rising scream as a black shape scudded from
the shadows and launched itself at him.

To Fender it looked huge, bigger than the other giant rats; another,
equally big, joined in the attack.

Whittaker went down, holding the first creature off with his hands and
kicking out at the other with his feet.  Miraculously, almost as if
panic had lent him strength, he caught hold of the first rat's head
with one hand and snapped it backwards, breaking its neck.  He tossed
the twitching body away from him and struck out at the rat now nestled
in his lap and trying to burrow a hole through the protective clothing
into his stomach.  Another Black rat of the same size ran from the
shadows and leapt at Whittaker's exposed face.  It seemed to be the
signal for every rodent in the cellar to throw themselves at the
struggling man.

Fender could only watch in horror as Whittaker's body was engulfed in
black, bristling bodies, the tutor's screams becoming a blood-choked
gurgle.  Fender was about to rush forward, knowing it would mean his
own death, but unable to stand by while the tutor was killed in such a
terrible way, when a great explosion of blood spurted into the air from
the undulating heap, telling him it was already too late.  The rats, as
though incensed by the fresh smell, went into a new paroxysm,
scrabbling over each other's backs, snapping and scratching out at
their companions in a demented effort to get to the man's body.
Incredibly, a form began to rise from the heap, a figure so covered in
blood, so mutilated, it was almost inhuman.  Whittaker's face had been
torn away, his eyes gleaming whitely amongst a mass of red, glutinous
substance.  His exposed, blood-stained teeth, no lips or beard to cover
them, opened wide in a silent scream, red fluid gushing from his throat
to splash onto the backs of the clinging vermin.  The protective suit
hung in tatters and the rats had their incisors clamped onto his chest
and arms.  A black body shot upwards and Fender saw it was one of the
larger giant rats; it bit into the deranged man's throat and his body
went over backwards, falling stiffly like a stone statue.

Fender closed his eyes as the slumped form was once more covered by the
jostling vermin and when he opened them all he could see of the tutor
was a hand, the fingers missing, twitching in the air above the gorging
bodies.  The tutor was dead of that there could be no doubt and the
macabre action was caused by the elbow tendons being gnawed.

Fender felt vomit rising and suddenly he was leaning forward, the
sickness pouring from him.  Something strange had taken place when he
had wiped his eyes with his sleeve and straightened, his back pressed
against the wall.  The larger rats were driving the other mutants back,
away from the mangled corpse, snarling and hissing at their
fellow-creatures, their sharp claws lashing out.  The smaller vermin
seemed afraid even though they could easily have swamped the two larger
beasts with their numbers.  They backed off, many dragging strips of
flesh with them.  One, more bold than the others, ran forward again and
bit into Whittaker's mutilated body, but the larger rat pounced, teeth
sinking into its neck.  The imprudent creature squealed, then died, the
windpipe severed.  The big rat shook itself free of its victim and
turned to face the others.  They pushed away, heads low, haunches high
and trembling.  It was then the huge, bloated creatures shuffled
forward into the light.

Fender felt nauseous again, hardly able to believe what he saw.  The
creatures were from a nightmare, deformed monsters, freaks from hell!
They were almost hairless, just a few white wisps clinging sparsely to
their obese, grey-pink bodies.  Their long pointed heads and thick,
scaled tails gave them some identification with the vermin they were
derived from, but there the resemblance ended.  Their swollen bodies,
almost too heavy for their legs to carry, were covered in a network of
blue, throbbing veins.  Some were hunch-backed, their spines twisted
upwards to a high peak, descending towards their haunches in a sharp
swoop.  Several had long, curling tusks; incisors deformed from lack of
use.  Two or three had shrivelled limbs projecting from various parts
of their bodies, hanging uselessly, a few with twisted claws
attached.

Fender suddenly understood what they were, why they were here in this
dark cellar.  These were the extreme mutants, their rodent bodies
genetically corrupted into these obscene shapes.  These were of the
same kind Stephen Howard had spoken of, descendants of the creature
that had been destroyed in the canal-house!  These were the monsters
who governed the more numerous black-furred mutants, controlling them,
using them as hunters.

And this was their lair.  This was where they hid their ugly, distorted
bodies from the world, this underground chamber so like the dark
underworld their precursors had once fled from.

That day he had looked up at the ruined house from the field beyond and
seen what he and Denison had thought to be a pig it had been one of
these creatures!  The house had been left alone because the arsenals
seen from a distance wandering in the ground were thought to have been
pigs, and it was assumed that pigs would have been slaughtered by the
Black rats if they were in the vicinity!  But the pigs were already
dead, killed earlier by the rats and used as a food supply, the cold
weather preventing the corpses from rotting completely.  How had it
started?  The main force, the hunters, living in the sewers, existing
on anything they could find, killing small animals, bringing the
corpses into the cellar, down to their masters?  The sudden awakened
yearning for fresh blood, warm flesh?  The slaughter of the pigs they
had been cunning enough to leave alone until then, blood lust
overpowering their caution?  The growing need for human flesh, the
desire to strike back at their mortal enemy?  The growth and strength
in their own numbers the catalyst that drove them forth?  The questions
tumbled through Fender's mind.

He became aware of the cold silence in the cellar once more.  He could
see the dark trembling shapes, the basement floor littered with the
creatures, and the bigger, pinkish mutants gathered around the still
form of Whittaker, blood bubbling from his stripped body, filling the
air with its sickly heavy odour.  He could hear the shuffling, dragging
sounds coming from the dark place Whittaker had backed away from only
minutes before.

The beast emerged from the shadows into the glaring sunlight, two of
its eyes flinching in the brightness, the two on its other head white
and sightless.

Fender felt his knees beginning to give, his back sliding down the
rough wall.  He steadied himself, his hands pressing into the brickwork
behind.

The creature dragged itself forward, its two heads waving in the air,
separate noses twitching.  One head had long descending tusks sprouting
from the upper jaw, keeping the mouth permanently open; the other,
sightless, head had normal incisors and these were bared in a furious
snarl.  A peculiar rasping came from both throats.

It seemed to be sniffing the air, relishing the fresh blood smell.  The
other mutants backed away, allowing it to drag its gross form towards
the dead human.  It paused when it reached the body, its head wavering
over it, quick, snuffling sounds escaping from its nostrils.  One of
the larger Black rats crept forward, its body crouched low as if in
obeyance to the master.  What happened next made Fender's senses
reel.

The giant Black rat moved around to the tutor's head and opened its jaw
wide.  It lunged forward, clamping its razor-sharp teeth down in the
top of the dead man's skull, the sickening crunching sound of shattered
bone rebounding off the cellar walls.  Fender could only watch in
mesmeric fear as the gnawing sounds continued.

The rat finally withdrew its head, the snout covered in a sticky
redness.  Something dark bulged against the gaping hole left in
Whittaker's skull.  The two-headed beast shuffled forward and the head
without the tusks plunged into the open wound, digging deep, then
withdrawing, dragging out the meaty, veined substance with its teeth,
blood and watery slime oozing from the emptied shell.  The monster
dropped its prize onto the dirt, then both heads attacked the brain at
once, ripping it apart and swallowing the meat and tissue.

Fender's legs finally gave way completely and he slid to the floor.  He
knew he would be next.

TWENTY

Fender looked up at the open ceiling, desperately wondering how he
could reach it.  He cast his eyes around, trying to ignore the terrible
sucking sounds coming from the centre of the cellar.  In the gloom to
his left he could just make out a bulky, square-shaped object, its
surface rusted dark red.  He'd noticed it before, but then he had been
looking for a staircase so had paid it little attention.  It looked
like the remains of a large water-tank or at least something of that
nature.  Whatever it had been used for didn't matter; if he could move
it, he might just be able to use it as a platform to reach the opening
above.  The question was: how to shift the object if that was possible
without arousing the rats?

The other gross-shaped mutants were now crawling over the body, gorging
themselves, while the dominant creature hunched over its particular
spoil.  The lesser, black-furred creatures were becoming agitated,
their own desire for the human flesh unquenched.  They edged forward,
but the two larger of their species warned them off, haunches high in
the air and shoulders low to the ground.  Fender realized that these
two, and the one Whittaker had killed, were probably guards to the
dominant mutant.  They had attacked Whittaker when he had unwittingly
approached their leader.  A Black rat darted forward and pushed its way
through the grey-pink bodies to get at the corpse.  Another Black
joined it and the guards set on them, leaping onto their backs and
dragging them away.

The movement was almost too fast for Fender to see as a rat dashed
forward and sank its teeth into one of the guards' neck.  A furious
struggle ensued and the mutant with the two heads turned its obese body
towards the aggressors, emitting a high-pitched mewling sound.  But the
fight had gone too far, the two rats tearing at each other with a fury
that carried them into the shadows.  Fender could hear their thrashing
bodies, then came one strident scream followed by a hushed silence. The
victor appeared again in the area of light, its jaws red, fur scuffed
with dirt and scratch marks.  Fender saw the now familiar scar running
the length of its long, pointed head.  Suddenly, the whole cellar
seemed to erupt into movement as every rat converged on the ground
around the dead human.  They leapt on the grey-pink mutants, swamping
them, covering the gross bodies with their own.  Fender saw the
remaining guard rat leap into the air, three smaller creatures clinging
to it, each with deadly grips that would kill or maim.  The bloated
animals were helpless under the onslaught, hardly able to move beneath
the crush, screaming like human babies, their fragile bodies bursting
open, dark liquid gushing from them.

The Black rat with the scar scrambled over the mass of bodies, making
for the dominant mutant which was, as yet, untouched, the other rats
still afraid to go near.  They glared at each other, only inches
separating them, the mutant's two heads weaving in the air in
agitation.  The Black rat lunged, ignoring the harmless tusked head,
striking for the throat of the blind head, dodging beneath the sharp
incisors.  It bit deep and the two heads screeched their agony.  And
fear.

Others joined the Black rat, pouncing on the obese hairless body and
tearing into it It seemed to Fender to shrink in size, almost like a
punctured balloon, but he realized the mutant was sinking to the
ground, blood pouring from the ripped veins.  Its piteous mewling
increased and the head that was blind suddenly slumped sideways, its
neck almost severed by the Black rat.

The tusked head tried to pull away, rising in the air, but unable to
move far because of its collapsed body.  The Black rat bit out an eye
before turning its attention towards the throat.

Fender felt no pity for the beast as it wailed in agony.  Its remaining
eye became glazed as the scarred Black rat tugged at its throat, and
the head began to tremble, finally slumping to the ground.  The monster
died, helpless in its own obesity, no longer able to dominate its
lesser subjects.  Bloodlust was the instigating traitor in their ranks.
They had served the creature, brought it food, protected its lair; but
now they were beaten and the desire that had exploded within them could
no longer be quenched.  They turned on their leader in rage and its
obscene body became their food.

The floor was a dark, seething mass as the rats devoured the creatures
that were of the same mutant strain, yet had developed into bizarre
monsters.  Fender knew he had to act now or he would have no chance at
all of surviving.  He pushed himself to his feet and stood for a few
moments with his back to the cellar wall.  Then he inched his way along
the uneven floor, keeping in the shadows, trying to move soundlessly.
When he reached a point opposite the square, tank-like object, he
allowed his breath to escape.  So far, so good; the vermin had ignored
him, too intent on their own activity.  He stepped away from the wall,
carefully avoiding fallen rubble.  His head sank down onto the rough
surface when he reached his goal and he tried to control his breathing,
certain the short gasps would remind the vermin of his presence.

The tank reached chest height and he prayed it would be tall enough for
him to grasp the collapsed ceiling.  He gave it an exploratory push; it
didn't budge.  Oh God, don't let it be fixed to the floor.  He pushed
again, this time harder, and clenched his teeth at the sudden grinding
noise it made as it shifted.

Fender crouched behind the metal tank, holding his breath and waiting
for the vermin to come pouring round from the other side.  Nothing
happened.  The sound of their eating and squealing relish continued. He
rose and pushed against the tank again.  It moved with a heavy rumbling
noise and this time he did not stop, deciding speed was now his only
ally.  He stopped pushing when the tank was directly beneath the edge
of the opening, afraid to move it any further because it would infringe
on the area covered by the rats.  He gazed upwards and saw the shell of
the house stretching into the clear blue sky above; he felt like a
condemned man being given his last glance at the outside world.

Pulling himself onto the improvised platform, he froze as the rusted
metal gave out a loud crack, the surface buckling.  It held, though,
and he was on his feet stretching towards the jagged edge over his
head, reaching for a hold, grabbing for life itself.

Fender managed to grip a broken beam and then he jumped, using it as a
lever, trying to throw the other arm over onto the floor above.  His
legs were swinging in space, his elbow crooked over the rotting boards;
and he was rising, his head drawing level with the floor above, his
arms shaking with the strain.

And then he was falling, the flooring giving way, tumbling back down
into the rat-infested basement.

The tank broke his fall and he rolled off its surface, wood and rubble
crashing down with him.  He landed on the vermin and they scattered in
surprise, giving him a brief respite.

Fender wasted no time on examining any injuries he might have
sustained.  He was on his feet, staggering, tripping, going down on
hands and knees, sheer instinct driving him towards the staircase.  The
fact that it was blocked at the top had no relevance in his thinking;
it led upwards, that was all that mattered.  He felt the scudding at
his back and ducked forward, the rat toppling over his head, but
causing him to lose his balance and fall heavily.  He screamed when he
felt the furry bodies engulf him, the claws scraping their way through
the protective suit's material.  Teeth slashed across his face and as
he turned his head he felt a layer of flesh come away from his cheek.
He brought his gloved hands up to protect himself, striking out at an
evil, leering rat's head as it bared its incisors and prepared to bite.
The rat scuttled away from him, to be immediately replaced by
another.

A choking cry escaped Fender as teeth ground into his forehead and he
desperately tried to turn his body over to protect his face, his eyes.
But they were too heavy for him; they held him pinned to the floor.  He
lashed out with his legs, rats clinging to them and making movement
impossible.  He folded his arms across his face, covering the exposed
flesh as much as possible, twisting his body to prevent the vermin
gripping firmly.  The pain was terrible as they bit into him, every
inch of his body, it seemed, caught in vice-like grips.  The suit
material began to tear and he knew it would soon be over, just seconds
of searing pain and then blessed oblivion.  His senses began to float,
spiralling into a soft downward plunge, away from the terror.  His eyes
began to close, but they could still see the blueness above through the
narrow gap between his forearms, and he was reluctant to let the sight
go, unwilling to leave the world above but desperate to escape the hell
below.  His eyelids had almost completely closed and he was beginning
to drift.  Everything went black.

And the noise was deafening.

His consciousness returned with a shock and his eyes snapped open.  The
sky above had been blocked out by something huge and dark.  The roaring
sounds should have told him what was happening, but his mind was too
confused, his senses not yet fully awakened from the lulling slumber
they had been sinking into.  The weight on his body was relieved as the
vermin screeched in new panic and scattered into the deeper shadows of
the underground chamber.  Grit swirled in the air, driven down from the
ruin above, stirring and mingling with the dust in the cellar, turning
the cellar into a cauldron of thick, flying particles.

Fender choked as the dirt clogged his open mouth and his wracked
coughing stirred his body, making him sit and lean forward, shoulders
heaving as he tried to breathe clean air.  He covered his eyes, wiping
away the dust with a gloved hand.  Rats scuttled over and around him,
ignoring him in their confusion.  His mind began to sharpen when he saw
there was still a chance left.  He looked up, keeping his lids closed
as much as possible, squinting through the hole above.  The dark shape
seemed to fill the opening, almost blocking out the sky completely, and
it seemed as if he were looking up into the belly of a huge dragonfly.
The sound of the whirring blades thundered in his ears as they created
a vortex in the shell structure of the building, making a huge chimney
of disturbed air.  Reason told him the helicopter was hovering over the
collapsed roof of the ruined house, but he felt he could almost reach
through the tunnel and touch the great machine.

He cried out in pain when he tried to rise and his hands went to his
face again as a sticky substance threatened his vision.  He wiped away
the dust-encrusted blood and forced himself to stand.  Fender caught a
glimpse through the swirling mists of the crouching black creature
watching him.  He ran, pain forgotten, body disregarding its injuries.
He staggered blindly towards the stairway, crashing into the wall,
scattering the frightened rats lurking there, feeling his way along,
reaching the bottom stair, dragging himself upwards, kicking down at
the vermin clustered around his feet.  They began to nip at his legs,
striking back in fear but aware again that this was the enemy in their
midst.  Fender knew they would soon be all over him and he pulled at
the rubble blocking the stairs, frantically clawing at the bricks, the
dirt, the broken timber.

The blockage suddenly collapsed inwards and he covered his head as the
debris fell around him, pushing himself up, thrusting himself through
to the floor above.  He rose from the rubble like some filthy, bloodied
monster from the earth's underworld, scrabbling free, crawling forward,
rising on shaky legs and staggering through the burnt-out mansion.  The
interior walls, disturbed by the fierce down-draught of air, were
beginning to crumble, stonework falling to the floor below.

Fender kept going, his movements painfully slow, oblivious to the
falling masonry, wanting only to be free from that dark, evil place. He
did not know if the helicopter's crew were aware of his presence, nor
did he care; he just wanted to be outside.  He reached the room into
which he and Whittaker had first scrambled in their attempt to escape
the pursuing vermin, and made for the bent sheet of corrugated iron. 
He clambered up the debris to the opening and squeezed his body
through, swiftly glancing back to see if he was being followed.  He
almost cried out in despair when he saw the big Black rat scuttling
through the rubble to reach him.  It may have come through the now
unblocked stairway or, more likely, through its own escape hole the
rats obviously had their own entrance into the cellar, a hole he had
been unable to see in the gloom.

Fender leapt from the outer window-sill into the beautiful, fresh,
sunlit air, rolling down the incline of rubble, jumping up immediately,
and running, feet dragging, but keeping going, refusing to fall.  He
saw the dark green van racing up the track over the field towards him,
skidding when it reached the worst of the muddied area, hitting a fence
post and knocking it flat.  The wheels threw up showers of damp earth
as the driver tried to get the vehicle clear.

Fender ran towards it, gasping in air, using his last reserves of
energy to reach the van.  He twisted his head to see the rats slipping
through the gap in the window, running down the rubble, and chasing
towards him.  Almost exhausted, adrenalin pumped through his system as
he redoubled his efforts to get away.  He knew he would never make it,
the van was too far.  Fender wanted to scream in frustration and his
body sagged as his knees began to give.

The sudden rush of air and whirring of the Gazelle's blades made his
head jerk upwards.  He turned and saw the helicopter swooping low over
the pursuing vermin, making them crouch, then scatter.  Bullets from
the sub-machine-gun thudded into the earth, sending up fountains of
blood when they struck the running bodies.

Fender groaned with pleasure at the sight and rose, stumbling onwards.
The green Conservation van had freed itself from the mud and was racing
towards him once again.  He went down, falling to his knees, one hand
resting against the ground.

"Luke!"  he heard Jenny's voice scream.

He looked up as the van skidded to a halt in front of him and the door
flew open.  Suddenly Jenny was there, arms around his shoulders,
lifting him, pleading with him to move.

Her voice shook with emotion and tears ran freely down her cheeks as
she pulled him towards the van.  He hardly looked human, his body and
face covered in blood and dirt, his clothes hanging in tatters.
Apprehension had filled her as she had headed for the lumbering,
bedraggled form, for there was no telling which man it was: Whittaker
or Fender?  It was only when she brought the van to a screeching halt
that she recognized him.

"Luke, you must move please!"  she begged.

Fender willed himself to walk and Jenny pulled open the passenger door
of the vehicle, helping him to clamber in.  She slid the door shut and
hurried round to the driver's side, aware that several rats were
streaking towards her.  She slammed the driver's door just as a rat
leapt.  It thudded against the metal and fell back to the ground.  More
muffled thumps followed as the rats ran round the vehicle and jumped up
at it

"Oh, Luke, Luke, what have they done to you?"  Jenny moaned, taking
Fender's torn face in her hands.

He hardly had the breath or the strength to speak, but he managed to
say, They're there in the house ... in the ... cellar.  It's their ...
lair.  That's where ... they were ... all the time."

Jenny screamed as the windscreen shattered and a rat perched on the
jagged glass, head and shoulders not two feet away from Fender's face.
With a shout of sheer rage, the rat catcher lashed out with his fist,
hitting the black creature squarely on the forehead, knocking it back
onto the earth below.

"Get us out of here, Jenny!"  he shouted.

The van roared round in a tight circle, crushing several rats beneath
its wheels.  Fender was thrown against the door and as his head hit the
window, he saw the big Black rat with the strange scar crouched in the
mud, its mouth open wide revealing long, yellow teeth.  Its eyes glared
up at him.  Fender lost sight of it as the van completed the
semicircle and raced back down the track in the direction from which
it had come, skidding through the worst of the mud but gathering
speed.

Fender managed to turn in his seat and look through the rear windows.
The helicopter was still hovering low, discharging its deadly spray.
The rats, those not killed or badly injured, were scurrying back to
safety back into the house itself.

They've got to get them now!"  he shouted at Jenny.  "Now, before they
have a chance to lose themselves in the forest!"

They will, Luke!  Look ahead!"

Fender looked through the opening in the fractured glass on his side of
the van, the air rushing in and stinging his raw face.  He managed to
smile grimly when he saw the convoy of army vehicles speeding down the
lane leading from the gatehouses.  He looked at Jenny.  "How... ?"

"Denison found slaughtered deer in the reserve.  He radioed the Centre.
I was in the operations room when his call came in."  She carefully but
swiftly steered the van through the open gate at the end of the field,
rattling over the cattle-grid and narrowly avoiding Fender's parked
Audi.  "I knew you and Vie were here so I came for you.  I couldn't
wait for them to get organized, Luke, I just felt something was
happening up here."

Thank God you didn't," Fender said, looking at her profile and loving
every inch of it.

They were directing the helicopter to your last location when I left.
Oh Luke, I'm so glad I came straight away."

Fender tried to touch her shoulder but either the van was jolting too
much or his hand was too shaky.

The Conservation vehicle came to an abrupt halt, throwing

Fender forward.  Jenny's arm shot across his chest preventing him from
hitting the dashboard.  He turned to face her and realized why she had
stopped so suddenly.  Her door flew open and Captain Mather was staring
anxiously at her.

"Good God!"  he said when he saw Fender.

The rat catcher pushed forward across Jenny's lap, his face a red,
grime-filled mask, a flap of skin hanging loosely from one cheek.
You've got to destroy the house, Mather," he said urgently.  The ...
the last of the rats are in there.  Underground.  In the cellar.
They're trapped."

"Luke," Jenny cut in.  Where's Vie?  Is he still in the house?"

Fender paused before answering.  He looked at Jenny.  "He's in there.
But he's dead.  He didn't have a chance."

"How many vermin are still alive?"  asked Mather.

"I don't know a couple of hundred maybe."  His voice became low.  The
mutant's in there what's left of it.  The creature we searched the
sewers for."

Mather's mouth dropped open.  "So that was their hiding place," he
said.

Fender nodded.  "It was their lair just the main force hid in the
sewers.  You've got to move fast, Mather finish them off now!"

The officer turned away without another word and within seconds the
whole convoy was moving forward towards the house.

Jenny engaged first gear.  "I've got to get you to a hospital, Luke.
You've been hurt badly."

He stretched out a hand, this time managing to close it over hers on
the gear stick  He gently eased it back into neutral.

"Not yet.  I want to see them destroy the house first.  I want to see
it completely demolished.  Then it will be over for me, Jenny.  No more
rats, no more hate.  Just us, from now on."

She smiled, a sad, tearful smile, and reached for his face, careful to
touch it lightly.  She brushed some of the dust away from his eyes.
Then she nodded slowly.

They watched the Scorpions pound the walls of the old mansion until the
shell collapsed inwards, falling with a tired but almost triumphant
roar.  Then mortars blasted the debris until the house was nothing but
piled dust and rubble, while soldiers armed with flame-throwers and
machine-guns stood by at a safe distance, ready to destroy any living
thing that tried to escape the destruction.  But nothing tried to
escape.  Nothing could.

When the guns fell silent, the smoke drifting away, the dust sinking, a
calmness seemed to settle over the woodlands.  The green van's engine
started up again and the vehicle moved slowly along the rough track
through the pine forest, heading for the estate's main gate.

A breeze sprang up and it seemed to Fender, who was gazing back through
an open window at the vermin's funeral pyre, that the very trees were
breathing a gentle sigh of relief.

Epjjogue

The rain poured from the night sky giving the forest below a heavy,
glistening coat.  A man crouched in the undergrowth, shivering in his
blue tracksuit, his eyes on the concrete path that fringed that part of
the woodland.  He hadn't visited the forest for a long time, not since
discovering the remains of two bodies when he had fallen into a dip.
They said the woodland really was clear now, that there was no danger
at all; but not many people believed them, not many wanted to take the
chance.  This part was hardly forest at all and certainly had nothing
to do with Epping Forest, even though it was adjoining.  The suburbs of
the city stretched for miles in front of him, the concrete pavement the
woodland's boundary.  Yet still he was nervous and every so often he
would glance over his shoulder and peer into the darkness.

His need had been too great to resist any longer.  His mother God, how
he wished he could have fed that cow to the rats -had nagged, nagged,
nagged for the past week, not stopping once to draw breath, driving him
mad, driving him out.  Just because he had refused to go in to school.
She didn't understand: he couldn't when he felt this way it might lead
to his committing a misdemeanour there.  He would be all right after
tonight.  For a while, anyway.  The rain ran off his forehead and down
to the end of his nose where it formed an overhanging droplet.  He
tensed when he heard clattering footsteps.

From the dark of the undergrowth behind, four pairs of small, slanted
eyes watched the man.  Their bristle-haired fur was sleeked black with
wetness, their bodies thin and wasted as though they had not eaten well
for a long time.  Pointed noses twitched in the damp air, sensing prey.
One began to creep towards the hidden man, its incisors bared and
haunches raised, quivering.

Another of the creatures moved swiftly in front and forced the creeping
rat to run.  The sound of approaching footsteps grew louder.

The rats melted into the night, stealing away but not venturing far
into the forest they now feared and hated.  The ground sloped upwards
and the vermin kept their bodies low in the grass, using every inch of
cover, crawling and skulking, the only way they could survive.  One led
the way, the other three keeping close, subservient and dependent upon
it.  The group reached the crest of the hill and were dazzled by the
millions of silver and orange lights spread out for miles before them.
The lead rat gazed at the city, the pinpoints of light reflecting in
its eyes, the raindrops finding a crude channel in the scar that ran
the length of its head.  The Black rat's mouth opened and a hissing
noise came from its throat.

It moved forward, down the hill, heading for the lights, back to the
city.  The others followed.

JAMES HERBERT is not just Britain's number one best selling writer of
thriller horror fiction, a position he has held ever since publication
of his first novel, but is one of our greatest popular novelists, whose
books are sold in thirty-three other languages, including Russian and
Chinese.  Widely imitated and hugely influential, his nineteen novels
have sold more than forty-two million copies worldwide.

The Trrvi.llion Picture Library

Author photograph Terry O'Ncill