The Rhesus Chart (A Laundry Files Novel)
Charles Stross
Language: English
Pages: 384
ISBN: 0425256561
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
The Hugo Award-winning author of Neptune's Brood returns to reveal the secrets of The Laundry Files in an adventure of Lovecraftian horror and espionage hi-jinks...
As a newly appointed junior manager within the Laundry—the clandestine organization responsible for protecting Britain against supernatural threats—Bob Howard is expected to show some initiative to help the agency battle the forces of darkness. But shining a light on what’s best left in the shadows is the last thing Bob wants to do—especially when those shadows hide an occult parasite spreading a deadly virus.
Traders employed by a merchant bank in London are showing signs of infection—an array of unusual symptoms such as super-strength and -speed, an uncanny talent for mind control, an extreme allergic reaction to sunlight, and an unquenchable thirst for blood. While his department is tangled up in bureaucratic red tape (and Buffy reruns) debating how to stop the rash of vampirism, Bob digs deeper into the bank’s history—only to uncover a blood-curdling conspiracy between men and monsters...
unavailable. And I want to say, What we had has been over for years. It’d be better to say, I think you misunderstood the context of my invitation, but that’s too complicated a construction for me right now. What comes out is, “I’m exhausted and a bunch of my friends are dead and I don’t want this.” “Poor Bob—” “And my wife gets home tomorrow, and it’s nearly tomorrow already.” I yawn. “And yesterday I killed a vampire-hunting psychopath and then an ancient and powerful vampire, and I
way that makes Alex wonder if there isn’t something to the old legend of Fae changelings. Despite being predestined for a life as a butcher, the baby was swapped at birth to fill the empty crib of a banker . . . “Pig’s blood?” he asks. “Or sheep? Or cow juice?” “Don’t be daft, cow juice is milk—” “Look, let’s just fucking ask, okay? Excuse me, yes, you sir—” “Eh, what d’you—” The balding middle-aged bloke in the white coat and rubber boots turns a suspicious expression on Alex.
Sheer animal magnetism. Hey, baby!” He looks smug. “They were looking for action: I just upped my visibility.” From brown dwarf to supernova by the look of it, Alex thinks. “Did you take them home?” he asks. “Do I look stupid? I took them to Claridge’s! On Mr. Petrov’s dime.” He grunts. “Bodyguards turning up on my doorstep the next morning: do not want.” Janice shakes her head. “It’s the fucking end times,” she husks. “Dick scoring.” “Anything else?” Mhari adds sharply.
and formal logic, others thrive on it. And so we have the everyday working stiffs, folks who in another age would have spent their days grinding out COBOL reports in a dinosaur pen somewhere. And we have the wizards, the people who write the COBOL compilers. In our case, they’re literally wizards. We call them Mahogany Row—a little piece of misdirection, as most of the folks in the bureaucracy think that Mahogany Row is about management. The actual corridor with the plush offices and the
end-of-year target. I’ll be lucky to get a bent paper clip and a shirt button for a bonus. You, too, for that matter.” Mhari sits down next to him, smoothing her pencil skirt. She sips at the wine, pulls a face: it tastes flat, lifeless and flavorless even though it’s nearly the color of venous blood. “Remember why we’re doing it.” “Remind me again?” “You need one of these.” She puts her glass down on the coffee table, then pops her clutch open and pulls out a slim wallet. Flips it