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Austin Macauley Publishers - Duane Ratswander

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'You'd better come home right away... because, brother, we're expecting you.' The year, 1991. The town, Colonnades, Victoria. Sixteen-year-old Aleck Bride lives with his divorced mother and his big brother, Craig. His mum's boyfriend is a pathetic alcoholic named Dietrich, who often takes out his frustrations on Aleck. But soon he discovers he has much worse things on his plate than Dietrich's violent outbursts. When the school misfit begins to single out Aleck for a campaign of harassment and intimidation, he, at first, dismisses it. But as the stalking turns into full-blown psychosis, it rapidly escalates into a campaign of terror that will threaten the lives of everyone in Colonnades, for as the mystery begins to unravel, it soon becomes clear that somewhere beneath the town, there lurks an ancient terror worse than all the horrors of Colonnades combined; an ancient terror that has the power to turn nightmares into reality. So why not come pay a visit? You might discover that it's closer to home than you think. Come home to Colonnades today. Because, brother, we're expecting you... Authorised by the Ministry of Adrian (Formerly Colonnades City Council).

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Publié par	Austin Macauley Publishers
Date de parution	28 février 2019
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781528948296
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0175€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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The Ministry of Adrian
The history. The mystery. The horror.
Duane Ratswander
Austin Macauley Publishers
2019-02-28
The Ministry of Adrian About the Author Dedication Copyright Information Acknowledgements Prologue Now I Book I: The Ministry of Adrian Part I: Then (1991) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Part II: Homecoming Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Now II Book Two: The Horror of Colonnades Part IV: The Night Terror Epidemic Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Chapter 38 Chapter 39 Chapter 40 Chapter 41 Chapter 42 Chapter 43 Chapter 44 Chapter 45 Chapter 46 Now III Part VI: The Battle of Colonnades Chapter 47 Chapter 48 Chapter 49 Chapter 50 Chapter 51 Chapter 52 Part VII: Escape from the Old Gaol Chapter 53 Chapter 54 Chapter 55 Chapter 56 Chapter 57 Now IV
About the Author
Duane Ratswander was born in Regional Victoria. He studied Australian Literature and History at Macquarie University and holds a Masters in Writing for Performance and Publication from the University of Leeds. He has travelled extensively, working as an English Teacher in Hong Kong, Japan, China (Beijing), Poland and Kuwait. He is also the author of Hobbyards (2017). The Ministry of Adrian is his second novel. He lives with his wife and their two children in Leeds, UK.
Dedication
For my daughter, Winona.
Copyright Information
Copyright © Duane Ratswander (2019)
The right of Duane Ratswander to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781528904605 (Paperback)
ISBN 9781528948296 (E-Book)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published (2019)
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
25 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London
E14 5LQ
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Dr Adam Strickson at the University of Leeds. Dr Strickson provided expert advice while I was writing The Ministry of Adrian , which I worked on for my MA Writing for Performance and Publication. Although the book is long and complex, with dozens of characters and multiple settings in various epochs, Dr Strickson helped to pare the narrative and so make it a more unified story.
Prologue
The shimmering air was filled with the squawk of the gulls and the bite of salt water. Captain Basquiat hovered in the doorway of his cabin for a moment, before stumbling across the deck. Once past the mainsail, he stopped at the bulwark. His body trembled uncontrollably. It was all he could do to keep his legs from buckling beneath him. He shielded his eyes from the sun’s unrelenting glare and squinted out to sea. The distant horizon was marred by naked rock, covered in a wisp of grey-green.
‘If you turn the ship towards shore, Captain, you will discover a small bay hidden behind that outcrop of land…’
As he glanced around the deserted quarterdeck, fresh waves of exhaustion forced him to grip hold of the bulwark. After losing three quarters of his crew, he knew that imagining voices was the first sign of contracting the mysterious disease. Soon after, the sufferer fell into a deep sleep from which it was impossible to awake. Basquiat saw the situation clearly: if he and the remainder of his crew fell ill with the disease, the La Pacific would be lost.
Past the shimmering water and circling gulls, a long outcrop of land branched away from the shoreline. If there wasn’t a bay hidden behind the outcrop, the ship might be wrecked on the rocks. But if he didn’t take the risk, within days he and his crew would be doomed.
Basquiat reached out and rang a bell attached to the mizzenmast; the tinny rattle echoed off the deck. Soon after, a couple of ragged figures appeared from below deck. Though there hadn’t been so much as a whisper in days, a fresh breeze sprang up, almost by design. The sailors shuffled past the billowing mainsail, over to where Basquiat wilted on the stern. After he had ordered them to prepare to make anchor, he took hold of the ship’s wheel and steered a course towards the small bay.

Now I
The gigantic hole swallowed up an entire city block. Inside, men in hardhats scurried among heavy machinery. As the sun sank low in the sky, the enormous crater was flooded with shadow, suggesting something other than steel beams and fresh concrete. As though, hidden within the crater’s depths, there waited something more sinister than the foundation of progress—something ancient and malign. An entity, perhaps, that after decades of fitful slumber might wake and leave its lair, and crawl forth to spread terror while the earth slept.
Aleck Bride turned away from the window and peered around. The apartment was fully serviced, leaving him with plenty of spare time. And in this city, there was never any shortage of fun and excitement to occupy his time. After turning forty-three, though, he felt like he wanted something more meaningful from life. As for what that might be, he had no idea.
He was born and raised in the small regional-Victoria town of Colonnades, but these days he no longer had any family to call on. He’d made a couple friends during his long sting in East Asia, but they were more like acquaintances; people he met up with when he felt like sampling the nightlife. Otherwise, he was alone in the world.
Maybe it’s time to leave…?
He tossed his shoes on the carpet. As he was loosening his tie, a soft chime filled the room. He couldn’t even recall the last time anyone had called on the landline—these days everyone communicated by mobile phone. He reached across the fresh linen but the line was dead. But he didn’t hang up. Somebody was breathing on the other end of the line.
‘Aleck,’ rasped a voice, ‘you’d better come home right away.’
At the sound of that voice, his pulse raced and his hands trembled. After a moment, he cupped the handset to his mouth. ‘After all this time,’ said Aleck, ‘why now ?’
Silence followed, as though a tremendous time delay existed between them. Aleck waited. The sound of his own shallow breathing loud in his ears. Then the voice resumed:
‘Because, brother, we’re expecting you…’
For a long while, Aleck lay there, receiver pressed to his ear; until he realised the conversation was over. The speaker was gone. On the surface, everything was in its proper place—nothing had changed. But in the wake of that brief phone call, nothing would ever be the same again.
He stood before the window which took up the whole wall and searched the vast cavity, watching for any sign that the ancient terror had reawakened. When he saw men in hardhats—and not some unspeakable horror—climb from the construction site at the end of a humid day, he breathed a sigh of relief. A year from now another skyscraper would be added to the forest of concrete, steel and glass. The city was always moving, and that was why he felt so comfortable there. But after a while even change became mundane, and he didn’t like to stop in one place for too long.
Turning away from the window, he found the telephone again. After four years, he phoned his employer to say he was quitting his job. When he was done, he called the travel agent to book the soonest possible flight back to Australia. Finally, he gathered everything he owned in one rucksack and left the apartment.
Book I: The Ministry of Adrian

Part I: Then (1991)

Chapter 1
The Milky Way scrawled across the night sky like cosmic graphitti. Matt Topolski dragged on his cigarette and stared out at the night as if willing it to reveal some great mystery. As he crushed the smoke in the ashtray, a high-pitch drone sounded. He climbed from the sedan and peered at where the bright lights blazed in the darkness.
Moments later a gust of wind swept past.
‘Here goes nothin’,’ he thought.
Shutting the boot, he headed across the tarmac towards the sleek craft. A collection of figures wearing dark suits climbed down a flight of steps and gathered in the glow of the landing lights. Some of them carried short menacing objects. Matt stopped before them. ‘Nice airplane ya got there,’ he said. ‘Last time I did business with someone who owned a jet, he was sentencing me to three years’ good behaviour.’
‘Ha! You got Mr Nagashima’s goods? He doesn’t rike to be dissapointo,’ said a young Asian with a thick accent. The man’s name was Kenichi. He was dressed in black suit and tie, and sported a close-cropped haircut.
‘No drama, brother,’ Matt said. ‘I got everything just like we arranged in Sydney.’
Several weeks earlier, Matt had been introduced to the elderly Mr Nagashima and his young understudy, Kenichi, by a mutual acquaintance. During their meeting in a King’s Cross strip-club, he’d agreed to steal a couple-dozen Samurai swords. The weapons had wound up in private collections in Sydney after being stolen from Japan at the end of World War II, and now their owners wanted them back.
Kenichi stepped forward and accepted the sports bag, before crouching down on the tarmac. Matt took notice of the ceremonial tattoos covering the back of Kenichi’s hands. Once the bag was unzipped, a couple of Japanese thugs, also wearing dark suits and carrying Uzis, pushed forward for a closer look; their expressions mercenary. When Kenichi saw the collection of katanas inside, he beamed. ‘ Sagoi