Hard Return

by Rosie Claverton

  ‘Clean this up. If I catch you doing shit like that again, I’ll put you on report.’

  ‘Who the fuck do you think you are?’

  ‘I’m the one who’s telling you to back the fuck off.’

  The hand left her arm. The breathing continued. A minute passed, as she heard the broken china clinking against the floor, the gush and hiss of the hot water machine, and the warm pressure of a hand returning to her back.

  ‘Hey? Let’s get you back to your office.’

  She walked as she was pushed, her vision slowly swimming back into focus, the corridor appearing beneath her feet, and her office door materialising in front of her. Her fingers found the code automatically, opening the door, and letting them in. The door shut and she sank back against it. Focus. Breathe. Focus. Breathe.

  ‘Are you all right? Did he hurt you?’

  Twofer was still here. Why was he still here?’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, but her voice sounded strange and far away.

  ‘That was bang out of order. Those dickheads make me so angry.’

  She looked up at him, at the intense righteous indignation on his face.

  ‘I’ll be all right.’ I’ve survived worse things.

  He reached down and smoothed her hair, setting it back into place and sending a shiver down her spine.

  ‘I hope so,’ he murmured, and leaned in to kiss her.

  He tasted of coffee, of something else bitter and unfamiliar, and his hand was so gentle on her face, handling her as if she might break. He moved closer, pressing her up against the wall, trying to deepen the kiss, but she held up a hand to his chest, pushing him away.

  ‘Are you okay?’ he said.

  ‘I have to work,’ she repeated, the only words that would come to her mouth.

  ‘You can’t work after a shock like that. You need to relax.’

  Relax.

  He tried to kiss her again, but she pushed him away, hard. Twofer looked confused, then tried to kiss her again, but she stepped aside, wrenching the door open. Anger was fuelling her now, setting every nerve alight as her body screamed DANGER DANGER DANGER.

  ‘Is this a game you play?’ she said, furious. ‘Are you trying to make me your damsel in distress? You came to rescue me so you could…so you could…’

  She couldn’t even say it. Twofer started to protest, then thought better of it, stepping out into the corridor. She guarded the gap, her body swinging wildly between the desire to punch him and the desire to run and hide forever.

  ‘They really wanted to hurt you,’ he said.

  ‘So did you,’ she said and slammed the door in his face.

  Chapter 37: Burn

  Jason had slept badly, second-guessing himself into the early hours of the morning.

  It had seemed like a good idea at the time, sending a message to the folks down-below, cutting off the lines of communication and making them doubt everything that followed. Even if they didn’t accept his message as genuine, they would know that someone else had found the hatch and that they couldn’t be sure which messages that followed were legit.

  But if they had another way of communicating with their agent up here – and they must do, because that hatch was surely only one-way – they would be letting him know that there was someone who was onto him. Which made Jason a big fat target. What the fuck had he been thinking? He'd already been pushed off a bloody roof!

  As he was waiting for the shower, balancing on his crutches on the wet tiles of the bathroom floor, he tried to think of a way to salvage this. Of course, he should let Amy know what he had done so she could help him figure it out, but he knew she would be pissed off. If he was honest with himself, she probably had a right to be. They were meant to be a team, but he had continued to run solo, even though he had a way of checking in with her. He hadn’t even replied to her messages from yesterday. She was probably worried sick about him.

  Gareth came out of the shower, adding to the puddle on the floor, and nodded to Jason as he went past. Maybe there was an opportunity there to drop a few hints about there being someone dodgy on the inside. Dodgier than everyone else because they weren’t meant to be there. It was a risky strategy, because he was also a plant and he didn’t want there to be a general suspicion about that. But he needed this guy flushed out, needed to know how a member of the team running this place had let a murder happen on his watch. He had to wake the sleeping dragons inside the compound and force them to ask the hard questions.

  A piercing scream cut through his thoughts, the shower curtain flung open before him. Bo was standing in front of him, pale palms reaching out blindly, the top of his head covered in white foam that was dripping down over his eyelids towards his open, screaming mouth. Red angry welts were rising in its stead, blistering on contact with the air.

  Jason leapt forward, shoving him back under the shower spray and reaching up to wash the foam off. Bo tried to fight him, pushing at him, but Jason held fast, even as his own palms burned with the contact.

  ‘Fucking hold still!’

  ‘You fucker! You’re killing me!’

  ‘I’m trying to fucking help!’

  Jason turned the dial down to freezing, physically holding Bo’s head beneath the spray. As the white froth washed away, Jason saw red blistering marks, but the skin was pale beneath the burn. On the shelf, the shampoo bottle was still open, the strong smell of bleach filling the room.

  Bo got his hand up and caught Jason in the face, knocking him out of the shower and onto his backside. Two bodies rushed forward to take his place, keeping Bo under the stream of water.

  ‘It’s bleach,’ Jason yelled. ‘Watch out for the bleach!’

  Anchor knelt down beside him, and Jason held up his bright red palms for inspection. He nodded, then moved past him and into the shower with the others. Lewis helped Jason to his feet and over to the sink, where he rinsed his hands under the freezing water until they went blue beneath the red.

  Bo continued to scream.

  Jason heard Dreadlock’s voice behind him, as his hands shook beneath the icy water.

  ‘Who the fuck did this?’

  ‘We should ask the man with the proof on his hands.’

  A hand caught Jason’s shoulder, jerking his smarting hands out from under the water. It was Nikolai, face unnaturally red, scowling at him. Jason saw him draw back his hand.

  ‘Jay Bird’s burned because he dived in to help Bo, he did,’ Gareth piped up. ‘He was just waiting for the shower. I don’t see you helping no one but yourself, Kolya.’

  Nikolai rounded on Gareth, turning his punching arm on the towel-clad gang boy. Gareth put up his hands, ready for a fight like all good Canton boys – but he wasn’t quick enough, Nikolai’s punch laying him out on the floor.

  A klaxon suddenly wailed from the ceiling, filling the confined space with deafening noise.

  ‘On the ground!’ Dreadlock yelled. ‘Hands on heads!’

  He grabbed Jason’s shoulder and leaned in, voice loud in his ear. ‘Keep your hands up.’

  Jason watched the dominos fall, ten men lying down on the wet bathroom floor while Bo cried in the shower and Jason closed his eyes. Waiting for whatever to hit them.

  Within a minute, armed men in black opened the bathroom door. The masked leader pointed his gun at Jason, who raised his hands higher.

  ‘Status?’ he barked.

  After a long pause, Jason realised he was talking to him.

  ‘He has bleach on his face,’ he said, as loud as he dared. ‘It’s on my hands.’

  The soldier-like figure nodded briefly, before lowering his weapon.

  ‘Lock down the inmates,’ he shouted to the others. ‘First aid for these two right here.’

  One guard stepped forward to Jason, examining his hands, as another went towards Bo. The rest shepherded the prisoners ou
t of the bathroom, as the klaxon abruptly stopped and the only sound remaining was water dripping on tile and quiet sobs.

  ‘These are superficial,’ the man in black said to Jason, tapping the back of his hands. ‘We’ll order in some cream.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Jason said, clenching and unclenching his fists – and then wincing.

  ‘Stop that too, idiot. Come on – time for beddy-byes.’

  Jason followed the man out into the corridor and back down towards the dormitory. He was directed to the left side, his side, and he heard the door lock shut behind him. They really did have eyes on them all the time, total control over every aspect of the environment. Except when someone tried to bleach someone’s face – or when someone was murdered.

  ‘What the fuck happened?’

  Jason turned round to find Dreadlock and Lewis staring at him. Joe was lying on his bunk, apparently uncaring, and – the Governor was sitting on Dreadlock’s bunk, staring at his own hands as if they were also red-raw.

  ‘He just started screaming. I think there was bleach in his shampoo bottle – that’s what it smelled like. It’s burned him, burned me too.’

  ‘That’s convenient, isn’t it?’ Joe’s voice drifted down from his bunk. ‘No one will suspect you then.’

  ‘You and Bo weren’t exactly friends,’ Dreadlock said, carefully neutral.

  ‘I punched him,’ Jason said. ‘I do my business upfront. Not sneaking around putting bleach in little bottles, to burn a man in the shower.’

  ‘It’s not how he does business,’ Lewis agreed.

  ‘You'd know, wouldn’t you?’ Joe said. ‘You’re best pals from back in the day. You want to bum him more than you want Stoker.’

  There it was again – the insinuation, the sneering. Lewis scowled, skin tinged red, but didn’t argue. Maybe his recent zen outlook made him feel all ‘live and let live’ about the mockery. Jason didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t want to be here either, with his stinging hands, and everyone thinking he'd probably done for Bo.

  The minutes passed, slow and silent, until Jason heard the door unlock with a loud click. Dreadlock barged past him and out the door. They followed after him, as he led them to the mess. The others were already gathered there and, as Jason scanned their faces, he realised Bo was missing.

  ‘Fuck, it must be bad,’ Lewis murmured next to him. ‘I don’t think they’ve ever taken a prisoner out before.’

  ‘Except in a body bag,’ Joe said, loud enough for everyone to hear. ‘It’s the way we’ll all be going if this carries on.’

  ‘Shut the fuck up, Joe,’ Pansy said. ‘You’re such a fucking downer.’

  ‘I’m a fucking realist, Pansy. Mole’s dead and now Bo’s been bleached.’

  ‘It was this Jay Bird. We know this.’ Nikolai was still after him, it seemed.

  ‘Yeah, whatever. How did I kill this Mole before I was even in here?’

  ‘Perhaps your little partner did – little Lulu did a murder.’ Nikolai laughed at his own pathetic joke.

  ‘It was an accident,’ Dreadlock said. ‘Or we would’ve all been sent back to lock-up.’

  ‘Would we?’ Roshan said, the first time Jason had really heard him speak. ‘Wouldn’t they just cover it up? Keep Calm and Carry On, they say.’

  ‘They are fucking sick,’ Joe said, with venom. ‘What the fuck do they want? For us to kill us all like dogs? Is that what this is?’

  ‘Calm the fuck down,’ Dreadlock growled. ‘All of you.’

  ‘Burning Bo was not an accident.’ Nikolai was still angry, spoiling for a fight. ‘Bleach in a bottle is not an accident.’

  Gareth rubbed at his black eye, taking another step back from Nikolai. ‘It doesn’t mean it was Jason. Bo wasn’t exactly anyone’s favourite – except maybe yours, Kolya.’

  ‘I am not one of them!’ Nikolai yelled, and stormed out of the room.

  ‘What the fuck do we do now?’ Pansy asked, sounding a little scared. ‘We’re all going to die in here, aren’t we?’

  ‘You heard Roshan,’ Dreadlock said. ‘We do the keep calm thing. We carry the fuck on.’

  Chapter 38: Familiar Faces

  Amy took the lead in the Eye Room while Owain rang through to Control to work out what to do with a prisoner blinded by bleach.

  The guards had quartered P5 in the Hide, constantly rinsing out his eyes with sterile fluids from an IV bag. She'd learned that each Security team had two first-aiders and the Eye teams had one each, which was good to know if she ever needed something stronger than paracetamol. The response was immediate, ordered, and effective. She now understood why SD1 thought she was an idiot for failing to raise the alarm properly about the drone. When it counted, the security team was a well-oiled machine, and she watched them remove the inmates, treat the wounded, and evacuate P5, all in under five minutes.

  It was impressive. It was terrifying. She didn’t want to cross them.

  Something strange had caught her eye, though. When the prisoners were being moved back to the dormitories, one of the guards had acted oddly around an inmate. It was P6, the man who had replaced Alby, the one with the sailor’s tattoo. They had spoken at length, seemingly about P5’s condition, but the guard had placed a hand on his shoulder. Like a friend, a close friend.

  Surely the NCA would’ve checked everyone’s background, ensuring the agents had no connections to the prisoners, even the newer ones. Had someone somehow slipped through? Though, if they had, why was this guard comfortable letting everyone around him know that he knew the guy? Sure, his friends were busy, but secretive people were generally more cautious than this. This guard knew P6, and he wasn’t afraid to show it.

  Maybe this man wasn’t P6 at all. Maybe he was actually the snitch.

  The more she thought about it, the more it made sense. If a guard acknowledged a prisoner, he didn’t care who was watching, on camera or in person. Because he knew him professionally, and perhaps so did everyone else. It was an open secret that this man was undercover.

  If that was the case, why was the record for G locked? What was it about him that needed special protection, when an operative inside the compound had his movements recorded just like everyone else?

  Or did he?

  Amy brought up the previous day’s footage on her laptop. Zipping through the frames, the day log matched exactly with the evidence before her. But the night…

  She watched P6 rise from his bunk and walk casually down the hallway at 03:24. Yet the log said he'd done nothing but sleep soundly all night. The night shift was dull, but surely that just made every little thing that happened more memorable? P6 walked down the corridor and into the blank area at the end. The area that contained the kitchen – and its chute for secret messages.

  Something didn’t sit right with Amy. Were ID3 and IN3 recording two versions of their logs – a public one and a private one, the second sent directly to a higher power? If so, why was the information that an agent was on the ground being kept from everyone else? Though that made no sense, because the security agent knew him…

  Amy’s head was beginning to hurt. She massaged her temple and took a large slurp of lukewarm coffee. Around her, the room was starting to return to its usual function, the prisoners released and Jason narrowly avoiding another fight.

  She was worried, of course, but something kept her from looking directly at him, even though he obviously couldn’t see her. Would he know what she had done, kissing another man? Just thinking about Jason kissing another woman raised her blood pressure and had frequently pissed her off in the past.

  Not that she had wanted to kiss him. But the shock and the emotion had been too much – which is what Twofer had been counting on. She knew it was his fault, but she still felt guilty as hell. Detonating a bomb over their relationship before it had even got started.

  Not that Jason knew, or needed to know.
Would she tell him? Should she? She didn’t know, and she knew there were more important things to be thinking about, but this was the one that lodged in her mind and prevented her from giving her full attention to the other hundred things needing her oversight.

  She forced her attention back to her laptop screen. P6 was still frozen in the corridor, with the log calmly lying about it. Something wasn’t right here, and there were only two people who could explain it to her: P6 and IN3. As P6 was currently out of reach, it would have to be IN3, currently sleeping in the dormitory down the corridor.

  Amy tried to think of a reason for rousing her but couldn’t see a way to do it without alerting all the other sleeping agents to her suspicions. She would have to wait until the night shift, several hours away. In the meantime, she had to do some investigation work. Everything in IN3’s logs was now suspect, but the footage didn’t lie. She would have to watch night after night of video, finding out what P6 was really up to in the compound.

  Owain entered the room, flustered with red right up to his hairline, his cheeks scarlet. He was furious, she could tell.

  ‘Contact prisoner transport for emergency transfer.’

  ID1 looked at him curiously, his head slightly on one side. ‘Not an ambulance?’

  ‘You heard me.’

  ID1 nodded and left the room.

  ‘Agent Lane, you are relieved. You will be supervising the night shift from now on – get some rest.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ she said, scooping up her laptop, and quickly following ID1 out into the corridor.

  She caught sight of the agent at the end of the tunnel, stretching away from her. It was hard to see through the gloom of the poor lighting, but he seemed to be climbing the ladder to the Hide. That was where the landline communication was, then – inaccessible to ordinary agents unless they had a specific task to complete.

  Still carrying her laptop, Amy ducked into the locker room, her old sleeping place. She reached deep into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out a tiny key attached to a plastic label that read LOCKER MASTER. It was good to be tech support in a high-security building.