A conversion from a non-40k tale (which, like one or two others, I no longer seem to have on hard disk). This version isn’t quite as racy as the original, but I still got accused of writing a rape scene towards the end (I suppose, strictly speaking, that’s what it is, but it certainly wasn’t conceived as such).

Architectural Survival

Mary Baxter sat at her caretaker’s console, giving Alfred House’s utility and systems tell-tales a routine check. Everything appeared normal, though one of the building’s twenty-sixth floor intestinal tracts was getting a little blocked. ‘Looks like you need a wash out, my love.’

Alfred House groaned. Its voice filled the small caretaker’s office as it filled every room within its body where it dared to speak. But it was never loud. ‘Another enema? You know how I hate those — they’re very undignified.’

Mary smiled, and lightly smacked the console. ‘Bugger off, you. What about me? I have to get up at two o’ clock in the bloody morning so no-one sees me doing it. Forty-three is too old for that kind of carry-on. Blame Mrs Mountjoy in fifty-seven. God knows what she’s flushing down.’

The building chuckled warmly. ‘Very well. But not tonight, my love — we have other plans, remember?’

Mary’s smile broadened, and her cheeks reddened slightly. ‘Less sauce, you.’

She continued the check. Finding no other problems, she switched the screen to IBC7 NEWS. What she saw immediately dissolved her happy mood.

A live transmission of steeplejacks attacking another living building. Mary sighed. As an alternative to the endless footage of the endless wars about the Imperium, the assaults made popular viewing – the buildings’ attempts to escape petrifaction were often desperate and spectacular.

The picture began to hop through four different views of the Administratum block under attack, each view focusing on a steeplejack team and their harpoon platform and chemical tanker, gleaming in the bright morning sunlight. The excited reporter gave a continuous commentary, reeling off statistics of each team and its members, their past conquests, family history, hobbies, and so on. Almost as if they were famous sports stars or soldiers.

Sickened, Mary reached out to switch channels.

She was surprised when Alfred House said, ‘Don’t. It’s Octagon Towers. I can smell it.’

Since the early days of organic buildings and utilities, genetic designers had engineered primitive conversational ability into their creations. This allowed warnings of minor blights or meteorological information to circulate, much in the manner various plants were known to communicate. As time passed this ability evolved until the more intelligent buildings and a few of the utilities could hold pheremonic conversations of a complexity surpassing human speech - and was, moreover, almost impossible to translate with any real accuracy.

‘So?’ asked Mary, ‘You could smell the others when they were murdered. It doesn’t mean we have to watch, too.’

‘No, my love. We should watch. Octagon Towers is hiding something from them. It’s desperate. Terrified. But it’s got something planned.’

Mary didn’t say anything else. She could sense Alfred House’s simultaneous alarm and fascination. She left the channel on.

Three of the four Steeplejack teams were in position, and two had already fired their harpoons. The cruel lances of barbed metal were sunk deep into the lower floors, easily smashing through the outer disguising layer of dead skin that so resembled plascrete, through to the soft flesh beneath. Blood pumped freely from the wounds, streaking the windows below crimson. The picture switched again to the third team as their harpoon fired off halfway up the building, shattering the complicated Rococo patterning that camouflaged the waist-belt of sensory organs. More blood fountained — to the cheers of watching crowds kept at a safe distance by barriers and policemen. The reporter was getting more and more excited.

‘…perfect shot from Harry Denson, there — he really is a top targeter.’ A horn blared. ‘And, oh, there goes a horn. I wonder… It’s… It’s June Warbouys’ team! June Warbouys’ team are the first to begin pumping! Nothing new there, she’s been first in the last ten attacks, and has never been further back than second since she joined Fred’s steeplejacks two years ago. An excellent performance. Who’ll get their hose winched up next… There goes another! Tina Leverton’s team. A disappointing launch from them. It’ll take a lot of petrifaction fluid to have an effect with her ‘poon lodged between floors like that. I’m sure Fred’ll be having words later. Still, she makes up for it though, doesn’t she? Lovely tee-shirt, that, Tina! I… Yes, I can actually hear the building screaming now… Can we see how Fred himself is getting on? Can we? Yes, there he is. Him and his faithful tanker-man, Warren Laxley, are just about in position. They have the hardest shot — right to the top of Octagon Towers. It’s going to take nearly all the catenary cable, so they have to get close. And Fred’ll have to judge it perfectly… Here’s Fred now. There’s the man, jumping up on to his platform. Most popular Steeplejack in the country, if not the world! Fred Dibnaigh, Master Steeplejack! Was that another horn? Yes? Henry Wright’s team is now pumping. Fred signals to Warren… Targeting… Targeting… Harpoon away! A lovely shot, straight into the upper sensory band! Still no sign of retaliation from the building. Is this going to be an easy day for Fred? But… Wait. Even as I speak, the ground is erupting right beneath them!’

In spite of herself, Mary watched raptly as a thicket of twenty foot high tentacles, each terminating in a wedge-shaped mouth, exploded out of the well-manicured lawns and neat flower-beds around the hulking tanker and harpoon platform. For a moment they swayed to and fro, like charmed snakes, before suddenly diving, lightning-fast, onto the surrounded vehicles. The camera zoomed in to capture as many strikes as possible, ensuring the audiences witnessed metalwork actually dented beneath the onslaught, the rapid shredding of the huge rubber tyres, the madly clasping mouths.

Then the shot suddenly widened again as the real show, the reason why building assaults made such popular viewing, commenced. Fred and Warren, both large middle-aged men dressed in the ubiquitous dark green Services-Administratum overalls, each grabbed huge double-headed axes from their respective cabs and set to against the diving tentacles. Blood and gore were soon everywhere, coating the men, their vehicles, and the ground for many feet around them. Still they swung, obviously enjoying themselves. They were in no danger from the tentacles. No building or utility had ever deliberately injured a person. But it didn’t do any harm to make it at least look like they might be fighting for their lives. Mary wondered if the SA had told the Steeplejacks to put on this awful act, or if it was their own idea.

At last there was only a single tentacle remaining, undulating above Fred’s harpoon platform. The two men raised their axes to the crowds and cameras in salute. They actually bowed. Mary felt sick.

‘Right, it’s finished now. I’m going to switch it off.’

Alfred House’s voice sounded strange. ‘No. Octagon Towers has lost, it knows that. I can smell that. But it hasn’t finished yet. It’s going to do something —’

The reporter’s voice interrupted, accompanied by a horrified gasp from the crowd at the scene. ‘My holy Emperor! Did you see that? It went for him! Did you see that? I… Well… Is he…? Oh. Oh, thank God! He’s getting up. He’s still got his axe. Yes! That’s it, Fred. Get the ba—. Sorry. Sorry everyone. I’m sure you understand after watching that. I’ve never seen anything like that in five years of covering Steeplejack assaults. Never. That last tentacle actually went for Fred! The building was, surely, trying to kill him! Lucky Warren managed to warn him, and he got it with the axe. That was potentially horrendous, wasn’t it? Well I’ve never… Like I said. I hope you’ll get a big bonus for that one, Fred. You deserve it. Now let’s get that building petrified as quickly as possible. What a nasty piece of architecture…’

The reporter continued to babble as the shot on the screen changed to show Octagon Towers in full. Parts of it were already beginning to turn grey as the petrifaction process began. Mary changed the channel. Some childish animation flashed colourfully before her uncaring eyes before she switched the screen off altogether.

For a moment there was silence in the room. Then Mary spoke. ‘Would you do that?’

Alfred House took longer than normal to answer. ‘Never. But I understand why Octagon Towers did it. It didn’t want to die. And as fewer and fewer of us are left, we’ll become ever more desperate. I don’t think that’ll be the last direct attack the steeplejacks suffer before we’re all executed.’

Mary rested her head on the console, stroking the smooth plastic, thinking of the warm gristle beneath it, disguised by it. ‘But you don’t want to die either.’

‘Of course not. But I accept its inevitability.’

Tears began to trickle down Mary’s cheeks. ‘What will we do when they come for you, my beloved?’

Alfred House didn’t answer.

-oOo-

It was getting harder for Alfred House to recall the happy times. So long ago, and so many, many occupants. Happy times indeed, when everything lived! The air ripe with conversational pheromones from a thousand different utilities. The three-decker trams trundling along the streets, spraying out ribald comments concerning pedestrians’ clothing or passengers’ conduct on their back seats. The sweeps calling out politely for people to stand clear, while simultaneously sneezing out the most disgusting insults to them. The street lamps, snorting softly in their diurnal slumber, murmuring of the blazing glory they would become at the setting of the sun. The bin wagons, strongest-smellers of all in order to counter-act their rotting loads, chatting of the weird, wonderful, and often down-right sinister things they had discovered in this pict star’s bin, or that restaurant’s skip. And then the hundreds upon hundreds of buildings — the office blocks, warehouses, factories, flats, high- and low- class hotels, museums, libraries, the bridges and barriers, the gun batteries, the shipyards, the tenements and palaces. All engrossed in myriads of conversations covering myriads of topics.

What wonders they discussed and pondered! What tales they told!

But no longer. And Alfred House recalled the bad times very well indeed. Not least because they had never really ended since the Universal Leprosy had initiated them.

The Imperium had come - and when it did, it could not decide whether the organic, aware buildings and services should be classed as xenos or fleshy cogitators possessing intelligence far exceeding the proscriptions of the Administratum Mechanicus. Whatever the case, eradication was the command - implemented by a specially designed virus known as the Universal Leprosy. But the virus's potency was underestimated - it swept the world far quicker than planned. Nations were left scrabbling to replace their decaying infrastructure with non-living metal, plascrete and silicone.

The time became known simply as The Rot.

Then citizens had easily understood the stenches and miasmas – even though they were not conversational, they yet spoke of lingering death. Vessels, veins, organs, and muscles, that had trained up into the cavities of the old buildings like vines, bringing them to glorious awareness, now shrivelled and fell apart. The grown utilities were worse affected, those that had not merely occupied the un-living shells of structures and vehicles, but had been reared and taught and fed and nurtured in the vast vats on the city’s outskirts, before being assigned plots and districts. Trams and bin-wagons lay in rotting heaps in the roads, moaning audibly in their agony, their pheromone-talk all fear and self-loathing — no banter any more. The biolumins of the street lamps pulsed fitfully with pained purple and red, giving the city’s night-time streets a fittingly lurid radiance. Buildings became mountains of decay as encasing flesh slowly slipped from their skeletons to pool in sickening mounds about their lower floors, host to the billions of flies that plagued the city for the year it took the Leprosy to run its course.

But there were survivors, like Alfred House itself – spared from the ravages of the disease by chance kinks in their genetic make-up. Thousands in the city, thousands of others up and down the country. There were even occasional whiffs from the continent.

But then came the eradication.

The populace, counting itself lucky the Leprosy was not, in fact, so Universal as to affect it or much of the animal kingdom, was terrified a new strain possessing just such a terrible ability might develop from the survivors. Even after extensive testing revealed the disease to have run its course, the fear remained. A pre-emptive cull was ordered throughout the country, and soon most of the world.

Those times, too, had etched themselves indelibly in Alfred House’s memory. Every day brought the agonised screams of executed utilities as fire-crews sped about the streets chasing down the various living vehicles, torching lamp-posts as they passed. The smell of burning flesh overpowered the stench of decay, and a pall of greasy smoke settled over the city for months on end.

Different tactics were employed for the buildings. Teams of steeplejacks swept through the city with tankers of petrifying chemicals and harpoon platforms – incineration was not an option at their scale. Many were resigned to their fate, unwilling to resist their creators. Others offered passive opposition, adhering to the deep conditioning that prevented them harming their wards. Alfred House knew of at least fifteen buildings that had attempted actual forms of locomotion, growing feet, wheels, even huge slug-like lubricated muscular pads… But the steeplejacks always reached them before they could uproot themselves and begin their foolhardy flight. Others had been a little more direct, attacking the steeplejack’s tools with tentacles and gigantic limbs. But these, too, were overcome. Alfred House had smelled their clouds of rage as they fought… Then listened to their aural pleadings as centuries of servitude were repaid with petrifaction. Oh, how useful was their wards’ ability to turn their living buildings back to the trusty, disease-free stone so safely employed in the past!

The buildings’ wards had turned against them, desperate to restore plascrete and silicone. But there were sympathisers…

It proved a long process to find and petrify the apartments, high-rises, and tenements. For these, helped by their beloved caretakers and other sympathisers, sought to disguise themselves both physically and administratively. Occupants, believing their building about to undergo petrifaction, were evacuated in the normal manner to special temporary residences. Then, empty of all save their caretakers, the buildings began to harden their skins, change their pigmentation, metamorphose waste organs and cardio-pumps, biolumins and heat-transfer vessels, to resemble the plumbing and electrical services of ages past. To all but a determined inspection, the buildings appeared the dead constructions of plascrete, mortar and metal their occupants demanded. To complete the disguise, records were destroyed, replaced or adjusted.

But the inevitable was only delayed. Sooner or later the hidden buildings were discovered and the steeplejacks informed.

Alfred House knew its turn would come soon. It would be found and petrified. But what could it do? No building had successfully repelled a steeplejack attack. It had to think of something, something none of the others had tried. Self-continuation was obviously impossible… What, then, of species continuation?

-oOo-

Mary leaned back, naked, into the soft, softly pulsing folds of Alfred House’s skin. Pads of flesh —unseen in the warm darkness— grew up on either side of her to slowly nuzzle. She sighed, wondering how many more times they would be able to do this.

She was in what she called the inner sanctum, a room the building had grown for her beneath its heart chamber when their relationship had, almost inevitably… developed. Oh, it was an old, old joke just how attached caretakers and their living buildings could become. It had started fifteen years ago, after Henry, her husband and Alfred House’s former caretaker, had been conscripted and subsequently killed. Henry being infertile, the couple had given all their time and energy to the upkeep and well-being of the building they lived in. Of course, they didn’t regarded Alfred House as their child (the incestuous overtones of that didn’t bare thinking about), but the building had definitely been a member of the family. A very close member.

Mary had never felt guilt or shame where her relationship with the building was concerned — it seemed a perfectly natural progression. Once Henry had gone, there was no-one or nothing else that meant anything to her. Besides, she was almost certain that Henry had been as intimate with Alfred House as she was now (and the Emperor only knew how many lovers Alfred House had taken in its centuries-long history), though she had never sought confirmation of this either from Henry when he was alive, or the building at any time. In the past, she simply did not want to know, certain it would wreck her’s, Henry’s, and then, of course, Alfred House’s, lives. Now she knew she didn’t really care. Especially lately, when her own intimate time with Alfred House was limited.

The steeplejacks would surely be coming soon.

Alfred House spoke, its voice as soft as its flesh. ‘Do you agree, my beloved? I can think of no alternative.’

Mary opened her eyes to the warm dark. She did not like to think about it. It was a shocking idea. But, really, what choice had they? Once Alfred House was discovered it would be a matter of weeks before he was… was… She couldn’t even think the word.

But Alfred House could, and could say it, too. ‘They will petrify me, my beloved caretaker.’ Mary winced. ‘It is inevitable. But I can live on… This way.’

Still Mary did not answer. The pads began to rub a little more urgently.

Alfred House spoke again. ‘You know I cannot harm my occupants. I will never harm them. They are my reason for existence. I will take every precaution. Already I have acquired a great deal of information from the Imperial Web. With the growth of another half-dozen photosynthesis pads on my roof, the extension of my root-system by another few yards, and another few shovels-full of food every day from you, I can begin. It would be much simpler, of course, if I could procreate asexually, or even with other constructs, but that is not a long-term solution. Any offspring would be destroyed as easily as we are destroyed now. This way such actions would be far too close to home, so to speak. But I will not proceed if you do not want me to. I would rather die than go against your will, beloved caretaker.’

As if offering further persuasion, Mary felt something nudge beneath her intimately. Was Alfred House trying to bribe her with sex? It did not matter. She had come to her decision within an hour of the building making the proposition. To lose her lover completely was intolerable. And she knew it would take every precaution for the well-being of its occupants during the process, and for what followed.

‘Yes,’ she moaned, giving her permission for two things at once. ‘But on one condition.’

‘Beloved?’ Alfred House moaned a little, too.

‘You include me.’

-oOo-

Mary’s heart sank when she saw the steeplejack’s van pull into Alfred House’s service area. As the building itself registered the approach, the screen before her suddenly switched to a close-up view of the van’s driver, his laughing, middle-aged face filling the picture. The slightest of tremors shook the room. The image suddenly blinked out as lids closed over the optic. Mary thought Alfred House might just be cleaning its eye, but the screen stayed black for just a little too long — and when it did finally brighten, a film of clear liquid momentarily blurred the image. Another tremor. The view zoomed back, the eye following the progress of the steeplejack’s parking van.

Alfred House’s voice filled the room. Its tone was as soft as usual, but Mary could sense its fear. ‘My executors have arrived.’

Two steeplejacks left the van and approached the service entrance. The driver rang the bell, looking up at the optic over the door —disguised, of course, as a standard security camera— that now relayed his image. He was still grinning. Mary suddenly realised who he was: Fred Dibnaigh, Steeplejack Extraordinaire.

Mary spoke into the intercom, trying to keep her voice from betraying any emotion. ‘Yes?’

‘SA steeplejacks. We have a warrant.’

Mary strove to sound innocent. ‘A warrant? For what?’

Another slight shudder vibrated through the room.

‘Probably best discussed face to face. Are you the caretaker?’

‘Yes. Yes. Wait, I’ll be up in a minute.’ She released the intercom button.

Alfred House’s voice. ‘Welcome, my executor. My murderer. Perhaps some tea?’

It was the first time Mary had heard the building use such black irony. She stroked the console. ‘Please try and be calm, my beloved. Perhaps I can convince them they have made a mistake.’

She winced, almost expecting the building to laugh — they both knew the unlikelihood of her suggestion. But Alfred House was silent.

Mary took a deep breath and left the Caretaker’s Room to climb the stairs to ground level and the service entrance. She pressed the white plastic cap of the door-opening switch, thinking of the fleshy nipple beneath it. The wide shutters rolled up with a loud clatter. Late afternoon sunlight flooded the service bay.

He was still grinning.

Mary found herself suddenly unable to look at either man’s face. She spoke to Dibnaigh’s chest, fighting down the urge to spit on the SA patch on his left overall pocket. ‘Do you have identification?’

‘Of course.’ He produced an ID badge — he was grinning on that, too. Fred Dibnaigh, Master Steeplejack, Morden Depot.

‘Thank you,’ said Mary. She turned to the other —murderer’s!— one’s chest. She noticed he carried a metal case. ‘Yours?’

The two looked at each other - she was being pedantic. There was a slight shrug from Dibnaigh. The other produced his ID. Warren Laxley, Steeplejack, Morden Depot.

‘Thank you. Now, what can I do for you gents?’

A show of false friendliness. She certainly had ideas of what she would like to do to the ‘gents.’

Dibnaigh spoke. ‘We have a warrant to check your building.’

‘Check it? For what? Listen, we had Pest Control last month, Hamelyn sent a —’

‘Check it for life. Can we come in?’

‘I… Eh…’

Dibnaigh took a deep breath, and finally stopped grinning. ‘Mrs Baxter — that is your name, isn’t it? I can show you the warrant, if you like.’

She was now looking at his feet, leaning against the metal grooves the shutters ran along. She began to stroke the wall with her left hand, out of the steeplejacks’ sight. ‘Yes, please show me the warrant.’

Laxley produced a sheet of paper, headed with the SA logo, pushed it under Mary’s face. There was a lot of writing on it, very small writing. She knew she could waste a lot of time reading through it all, but now, suddenly, she could not see the point. The Administratum had found out. In spite of the building’s disguise, the false temporary eviction, in spite of all those adjusted and destroyed records, they knew Alfred House was alive. How? Had records been missed? Did they have some sort of detection device? There had always been rumours of such things, rigged to pick up a building’s conversational pheromones. Or perhaps a resident had been hanging pictures, and accidentally drilled so deep that blood had spurted? It didn’t matter, of course — only the fact of imminent petrifaction mattered. Oh, she so wanted to be in the inner sanctum at that moment, lying naked with Alfred House, not here being civil with these… these… Steeplejacks!

Dibnaigh spoke again, retracting the warrant. ‘I can give the gist of it, Mrs Baxter.’ His voice took on almost a sing-song quality — obviously he was repeating something he had said many times before. ‘We have the full backing of the Administratum to test this building for signs of life. We have permission to remove bulkheads, knock down non-supportive walls, remove surface plastering, etcetera, as we see fit in order to determine this building’s nature. Any damage caused during testing will be rectified purely at the SA’s cost without detriment to the building’s regular maintenance budget, should the building be deemed inanimate and dead. Should you deny us entry into the building in order to carry out the necessary tests, we will be forced to involve the Arbites, who are obliged to support us in our actions. If the building is found to be alive, then alternative temporary accommodation of like manner will be provided for all its occupants, and their possessions put in storage — all at cost to the SA. The building’s life processes will then be terminated by petrifaction in the usual manner. Occupancy can usually be resumed within three weeks of petrifaction, after the necessary refurbishments are undertaken. If it is found that you, as caretaker, did knowingly assist in the disguise of a living building, and/ or the destruction/ falsification of pertinent records, then you will be brought before the courts and charged accordingly.’

He stopped, waiting for Mary’s response. She glanced at his face. The grin had returned, knowing. ‘Well, Mrs Baxter? Will you let us in?’

She moved to the side, gesturing vaguely, weakly, towards the bay’s interior.

As the steeplejacks commenced their testing, Mary moved to a nearby table, dumped there years past, and sat on it, watching them. Laxley produced a small drill from the metal case he carried, then fitted together the two parts of a four foot bit and tightened them into the drill’s chuck. Dibnaigh removed two protective masks from the case, handing one to Laxley, saying over his shoulder to Mary as he did so, ‘It’s so much quicker this way, saves farting about removing panels and suchlike.’

They walked to a nearby support pillar. Laxley hefted the drill to eye level, resting the bit against the pillar’s surface. Mary was slightly surprised to see both men then look warily around the bay. She almost smiled when she recalled the shocking incident at Octagon Towers. But there would no similar attack here. Even besides the fact that Alfred House was incapable of such actions, to launch a direct assault of any kind would put their plans at considerable risk.

Having satisfied himself that nothing was going to happen, Laxley squeezed the drill’s trigger.

Mary tried not to think of the bone and flesh buried deep beneath the layers of dead skin that so resembled green-painted concrete. She tried to keep her mind blank, more for Alfred House’s sake than her own — she knew how much it would upset the building to see her anguish. Still, she could not help but gasp, and then begin to quietly cry, when blood sprayed in a fine mist from the hole Laxley drilled.

She expected the building to tremble, but there was nothing.

The wine of the drill stopped, and the bit was pulled from the wall. The blood rapidly congealed.

Dibnaigh removed his mask, wiping it with a cloth. Laxley only lifted his mask on its hinges, picked up a roll of papers from the drill-case, and left the bay, heading deeper into the building.

‘Where’s he going?’ Asked Mary, striving to keep the tears from her voice.

Dibnaigh replaced the now clean mask into the case, throwing the cloth across the room to a nearby bin. His shot was perfect. ‘Oh, he’ll have to test other parts of the building, Mrs Baxter. To see the extent of growth and to do a little quantity surveying. That way we know how much petrifaction fluid we’ll need. Don’t worry, he’ll find the stairs — doesn’t trust lifts in living buildings.’

Was he actually enjoying this? From inside his overalls, Dibnaigh produced another document and placed it on the table besides Mary. She looked up at him. His face was grim now, but even that expression seemed practiced.

His voice took on the sing-song quality of before. ‘I regret to inform you that this building, Alfred House, has been found by me and my colleague to be alive. The building is therefore labelled for petrifaction ten days from today. My colleague will post notices on every floor informing the residents. If they have any questions or complaints, please direct them towards the SA offices, who will anyway be contacting them by individual letter to inform them of their temporary accommodation and removal and storage facilities. Please convey the SA’s regret at the inconvenience, and their hope that the residents understand its necessity. If you do not comply with the SA’s requests, appropriate action will be taken.’

Mary didn’t touch the document. She continued looking at Dibnaigh. If he noticed her tears, he made no acknowledgement of them. ‘How many times have you said that? You’ve got it down really good.’

Dibnaigh sighed, like he had probably done countless times before in this situation. Mary thought how boring this part of the job must be for the steeplejacks — how they probably couldn’t wait to get out their harpoon guns and turn Alfred House to stone. ‘Mrs Baxter, we’re just —’

Mary stood. Anger errupted without her realising it was there in the first place, boiling beneath the surface.

‘Don’t you fething tell me you’re just doing your job! This building is alive! It knows! It can hear you speaking about murdering it like other people talk about… about paperclips and fething letterheads! Killing these buildings is not just a fething job! It’s murder! They’ve served us for centuries! Centuries! And now, when they need our help, we fething petrify them!’

Finally, an unscripted action from him. He took an involuntary step back at the ferocity in her voice. He spoke. ‘Okay, Mrs Baxter, okay. I’ll just wait for Wazzy, then we’ll leave you to it.’ He actually began to whistle, tunelessly, looking around the bay at anything but her. Mary slumped back on to the desk, spent, knowing her words had meant nothing to the steeplejack — except to possibly add madness to his obviously already low opinion of her.

Fifteen minutes later, Laxley appeared. He nodded at Dibnaigh, saying ‘Nothing out of the ordinary — usual four tankers’ll do. I’ve done the posters.’ He cleaned the drill and his mask (now further spattered with blood), and replaced them in the case. They nodded to Mary, and returned to their van through the service bay. Just before Laxley shut his door, she heard the words, ‘Definitely fething her building, that one.’

-oOo-

The operation could be delayed no longer. It was time to begin.

Alfred House had received all the information it required from the vast libraries on the Empire Web, and had already grown the necessary organs and limbs and gas-sacks behind the walls and under the floors of the relevant rooms. Night had long since fallen, and all the occupants were asleep. Its energy cells were fully charged, and its basement belly bulged with the extra food its beloved caretaker had fed it

First the gas seeped silently and invisibly into the rooms via the rerouted respiration spiracles, deeply anesthetising the occupants. Alfred House allowed it to work for five minutes, as it had learned, before reversing the flow and beginning the next stage.

Previously solid flooring pulsed beneath the beds of the chosen occupants. With simultaneous cracks!, something began to writhe franticly beneath the variously-patterned carpets… which tore to allow single, colourless tentacles to worm their way out, seeking less-constricted space. Contemporaneously, in a dozen different rooms, tentacles peeped out from the beneath valences and reared upwards, fully five feet, swaying. Selections were made in those rooms with more than one occupant, before each tentacle gripped a blanket with a prehensile tip and pulled it aside. Next they nosed up the bodies of their objectives and hooked the waistbands of lower garments and undergarments, to pull them slowly down, gently, almost reverently. Those tentacles with unclothed targets waited as the others completed their actions. Then, as one, they all reared up again, paused, seemingly in hesitation, before descending once more…

-oOo-

Mary watched the sectioned screen as the tentacles retracted out of site, back under the beds. ‘I hope no-one has reason to check under there before the eviction.’

‘Do not worry, my beloved. I have tidied things up as much as possible — all that will be visible, should they look, will be a torn carpet. I am already re-absorbing the tentacles and everything else connected with the process. I only wish I could have dressed them again.’

Mary smiled, in spite of herself. ‘That’s okay — the single ones will blame sexy dreams, and the others will blame their partners.’

The screen turned black. ‘I am re-absorbing my eyes in their rooms now.’

Alfred House was quiet for a long while. Mary rested her head on her hands, a cool breeze from somewhere causing her to shiver slightly into her nightdress, though the air was warm. They had done all they could now. If nothing went wrong, then the steeplejacks would have lost their attack before it had even started. All that remained was her and Alfred House’s short time together.

‘My beloved?’

‘Yes?’

‘When I am gone, will you care for my body?’

‘For as long as I can.’ Mary was unsure how long that would be. It was highly likely that her part in disguising the building’s true nature would be discovered. After all, the residents had been evicted once for what they thought was Alfred House’s petrifaction — they were bound to complain when it happened again. And Dibnaigh and Laxley knew, anyway.

‘Beloved?’

‘Yes?’

‘I hated to use them so.’

‘I know. You do not need to apologise to me, though. I know why you did it. I know you had no choice.’

‘Still, they have no idea… What will the outcome be?’

‘A better one than would have been otherwise. You and all the other living utilities have been so wronged, my beloved. Betrayed. You cannot be simply wiped out this way. You were all so alive. You are so alive.’

‘Yet still I used them.’

Mary stood, slipped the nightdress from her shoulders. She walked through a small door, down two flights of steps. The air became even warmer. There was no light. She sensed the door slide shut behind her, the undisguised sphincter squeeze closed immediately after. She lay down on the soft floor of the inner sanctum, stroking Alfred House’s flesh.

‘You will not be using me, my beloved.’

-oOo-

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