The grin faded from Alex's face as he remembered who was in the last case. The others, not knowing, made tracks towards it, though Ben flicked an apprehensive glance at Alex before following. Wolf was moving the lid. John's face didn't even twitch, but Helen's eyes widened. "It's Ash!"
"I noticed, dear."
"What –"
"We'll dig him out."
Alexandra darted forward, claws ready, but Alex said quickly, "Don't."
"Why not?"
Alex shut his eyes and poured out the story.
"Ash was burned because of the fiasco in Malta. You know that. He went to Scorpia. To prove himself to Julia Rothman, he blew up the plane he thought you were on –"
"The decoy plane."
"Right. Anyway, he was shot a few months ago in Indonesia. I was on a mission for the ASIS. I didn't find out about him until I thought he died. He betrayed you." Alex opened his eyes. "We can't bring him back." John was pinching the bridge of his nose and Helen's hands were over her mouth.
"I believe you."
"John! How can –"
"It sounds exactly like the type of thing Ash would do. After he was burned, he didn't have any reason to be loyal to MI6 any more. I believe you."
"So we don't bring him back," said Wolf. "What do you think's through there?" He pointed at the tunnel the Scorpia operatives had come through when he they were attacked.
"Let`s find out."
The room through the tunnel was cavernous and there were steps leading down from the door. The ceiling was on level with the other room, but the floor was much lower. It was littered with cages, stacked in their hundreds. The largest were at the bottom. Small ones were at the top. From his point at the top of the staircase, Alex could see an extremely strange bird in one of the small cages at about eye level. The feathers were the iridescent blues, greens and golds of a peacock, but the bird itself was the size and shape of a sparrow. The beak was hooked like an eagle's and shone metallically. The bird eyeballed Alex with one large, intelligent black eye, and appeared to smile.
"Oh, my God," muttered Snake as they walked down the stairs. "They must have been testing the genetic fusing on animals before moving to humans."
"That's right."
Snake whipped around. "Wolf, did you say that?"
"No."
"Up here." Their eyes followed the stack of cages to one of the medium sized ones at a little above head height. A taloned paw waved at them from between the bars. A lion's head appeared above it. Alex looked at it, then at the others. Wolf was doing a remarkable impression of a fish.