Shadow Line

by Stephen Edger

  7

  Asif Patel scratched his head as the spreadsheet on his monitor continued to flash up the same error message it had been displaying for the past thirty minutes.

  ‘What is wrong with you?’ he asked the computer, not expecting anyone to hear him.

  ‘Everything okay, Asif?’ enquired a male voice to his right.

  He looked up and saw the guy seated two desks away looking over in his direction.

  ‘Oh, I’m fine, Mike,’ he said smiling. ‘I was talking to this infernal database. The stupid macro is not working.’

  Asif was in his mid-twenties and had been living in the U.K. since his parents had emigrated six years ago. He had been on a career plan to attend medical school and become a doctor, but, once his eyes had been opened to the excitement of the western world, that plan had swiftly changed. Dropping out of University during his first year, he had told his parents that he wanted to explore the world and find himself. With his father often away on long business trips, it was only his mother he needed to convince and she was a relative pushover and had agreed to him terminating his studies. She had stated it was on the proviso that he return to study once he had finished exploring. He had agreed wholeheartedly, although well aware that it was never likely to happen.

  After brief ventures in Thailand, Vietnam and Bangladesh, he had returned to the U.K. much like a prodigal son, penniless and with no clear future any closer to being mapped out. His mother agreed to let him move back in to the family home, but only if he secured some employment to pay rent. The first job he applied for, working in the call centre of a Scandinavian insurance company, was soon his and he was more than satisfied with the fourteen thousand pounds salary. What made it all the better was that his mother never once asked him to pay her any rent.

  His time in the call centre had been pleasant enough, but the real benefit was that it afforded him the ability to go out drinking and partying at night. His mother should have admonished him for his behaviour but she didn’t. He had stayed in the call centre for four years before being promoted, albeit only very slightly, to a Technical Support Assistant in the company. His daily duties required him to reset system passwords and to fix broken macros in spreadsheets. He was pretty good at what he did but this particular example had him perplexed.

  Asif’s ability to think clearly was being heavily affected by the hangover that was slowly building behind his eyes.

  ‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ Mike asked, noticing him rubbing his temples.

  ‘I drank a bit too much last night I think,’ he replied, taking some breaths to try and clear the fog on his memory.

  ‘I heard it was a good quiz night,’ Mike replied smiling. ‘There were all sorts of photos on Facebook.’

  ‘Of me?’ Asif asked, suddenly concerned at what he might have done, as glimpses of the previous night’s activities started to appear in his subconscious.

  ‘Amongst others,’ Mike laughed. ‘How much did you drink?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Asif replied honestly, belching as he tried to count what he had drunk the night before. He lost count after the sixth pint. ‘More than I should have,’ he eventually conceded.

  ‘That’s an understatement,’ smiled Mike. ‘What exactly did you say to Steve?’

  ‘Steve? What do you mean? I didn’t say anything to Steve…’ The words trailed off as new memories of him confronting his manager sprang into his mind’s eye. ‘Oh shit,’ he added.

  ‘Oh shit indeed,’ Mike repeated. ‘I saw you posted on his wall that you were really sorry for what you had said, and that it would never happen again. What exactly did you say, Asif?’

  ‘Oh crap, I don’t know,’ he replied holding his head in his hands. ‘I remember us being stood at the bar and shouting something at him and then people were pulling us apart and telling me to calm down. Oh crap, what have I done?’

  ‘I’ll tell you what,’ Mike began, rising from his desk and picking up a mug that read ‘World’s Greatest Dad’, ‘I’ll go fix us a nice cup of coffee and then we’ll see if we can’t piece the picture back together before he arrives at nine and chews you out for two hours.’

  Asif didn’t reply, but picked his own mug up and held it aloft so Mike could take it from him.

  ‘Milk and two sugars?’ Mike asked, as he began the long walk down the office.

  Asif nodded in confirmation and then watched as Mike wandered down the office, to the floor’s exit, placing headphones in his ears. The company operated a policy that allowed workers to use the latest digital music devices, so long as they didn’t include any kind of camera. Mike’s iPod Nano was probably full of ‘old man’ music, Asif had often quipped.

  Floor-4 was split into several desk-groupings or ‘pods’, as they called them. Each ‘pod’ was three desks long, with a computer terminal on each desk. Pods lined each wall, with a central walkway down the middle that provided access to each pod and ultimately to the exit and fire exit. Asif and Mike were in the furthest pod of ten from the door. The small kitchen cubicle for the floor was located next to the gents’ toilets, out behind the lift lobby that ran through the core of the complex.

  Asif looked back at his screen and tried once again to figure out why the macro would not run correctly. The clock on his monitor said it was eight thirty four, as he lowered his head onto his arms and closed his eyes.

  8

  The lift doors opened while Daniel was still crouched down examining the semi-automatic pistol currently resting in his open hands. From what he had been told, once the safety mechanism was released, the weapon would reload itself each time the trigger was pulled, saving him the hassle of fiddling with it. The magazine carried nine 19mm shot casings and there were an additional nine rounds in the spare magazine in his pocket.

  Thankfully, nobody had been standing waiting for a lift when the doors had opened. He took a deep breath and stood back up, moving before the doors closed themselves again. There was no need for the briefcase anymore; it had served its purpose, and there wasn’t going to be any need for him to smuggle the weapon out of the office. He left the case casually discarded on the elevator’s floor.

  For a man racked with fear and guilt, he felt calmer than he had done for the last three weeks, and since he had been invited to carry out this assignment. As he recalled the meeting they had had at the club, what choice had he been given, really? It was this or watch his family murdered before his eyes. What choice would any man make in that situation, right?

  A cool breeze was blowing down from an air conditioning unit above his head, sending a chill down his back where he had been perspiring for so long.

  He had been told that the target would be in the office by quarter to eight, but that he was to make it look like a massacre rather than an execution. He had demanded to know who the target was or what they had done to warrant such retribution, but a one-two to the face had swiftly silenced any such demands. So far, everything they had said had come true. He had made it in past the security guards who were only really employed for show. The guards were all so overweight that the chance of them actually apprehending anyone that they were called upon to do so, was slim at best. Not that any such incidents were likely to occur. Daniel snickered at the thought; he was about to cause such an event himself. He wondered whether the moustached guard downstairs would venture anywhere near him.

  After the meeting at the club, he had spent the best part of two weeks trying to get his head around what was being asked of him. Deep down he was a good man; sure he had his flaws and vices, but everyone had secrets. He had never even imagined killing another person before. He was a soft man: he cried at movies where animals were harmed, for Christ’s sake, did they not realise the demand they were making of him? How had they been so certain he would comply?

  A fortnight later he had still not figured a way out of the predicament and that meant the proposal would become a reality. After accepting the inevitable, he set about considering how he could minimise the pain
and hurt his actions would cause. They wanted a massacre, but ultimately, so long as the target was removed, they would be satisfied. He had temporarily ignored the fact that he would have to kill someone and vowed that he would do all he could not to kill anyone else. It was highly plausible, he deduced, that if only one person actually died, but others were injured, the police and press would believe that the survivors had just been lucky. After all, he had no military training, and no criminal record, and so these actions would be out of context of his otherwise good character. They would just deem him an incompetent killer.

  This was why he had wanted to arrive at work as early as possible. Whilst the target would be on site by quarter to eight, most other workers would not get in until after eight, so the earlier he arrived at work, the fewer additional casualties there would be.

  Daniel hated what he had become: a lone gunman on the road to oblivion. He could feel tears welling up in his eyes and desperately wanted to turn around and leave the building but that would mean his wife and son would be murdered. Similarly, he could just turn the weapon on himself and end it now, but that would still end up with his family at their mercy. They had promised they would look after his family financially if he carried out the deed and that was the only light at the end of this otherwise very dark tunnel.

  He took another deep breath and exhaled it audibly, moving towards the entrance door to the floor. ‘This is it,’ he thought to himself: no turning back.

  He waved his security pass over the door’s sensor and waited for the LED to turn from red to green. When it did, he pulled the door open and poked his head through, scanning for his target. His eyes darted from pod to pod, looking for the target’s bulky frame and shaved head, but he was nowhere in sight. The first tingle of paranoia started to enter his mind: what if the target was stuck in traffic and yet to arrive? Or worse still, what if the target was off sick today?

  The men at the club had been adamant that he had to be taken out today; tomorrow would be too late. He began to panic: what would happen to his family if the target wasn’t here?

  Before he could contemplate a response, a woman sitting at a desk fewer than four feet from the door let out a piercing scream. He turned to face her and realised she had seen the weapon in his hand. It was now too late to go back. He watched as his right arm began to rise involuntarily, his index finger squeezing the SIG’s trigger. It was like having an out-of-body experience; no longer was it Daniel Simpson firing the weapon, he was merely a spectator.

  The monitor in front of the screaming woman erupted in a shower of sparks as plastic and metal were ripped apart by the shot. The screaming woman tried to dive for cover, but was sent sprawling as another bullet entered and exited her upper torso before she could blink. The screaming stopped as she fell to the floor, her cream blouse quickly reddening as a pool of blood spread out through the visible hole. More computer screens exploded and foam fired up as seats were punctured as his finger involuntarily squeezed the trigger. What was happening to him?

  He returned to the lift lobby through the door and using the butt of the weapon as a battering ram, he smashed the door’s security system over and over until it was just a mess of plastic and wires. That would stop any unwanted security guards from getting in.

  He returned to the floor, moving right, waving the gun at head height, hopeful that most smart workers would drop for cover, and therefore, avoid the chance of being hit by a stray bullet. There was a deathly silence, intermittently interrupted by a shriek of panic as he came upon another victim.

  He continued to move forward, hunting for the target. He had no idea where the man’s desk was, only that it was on this floor. He could see a couple of people crouched down behind a cabinet whispering to each other, probably discussing whether they should make a run for it or even attempt to overpower him. He didn’t care. If they came for him, he would take them down. He still had three or four bullets left in the magazine, plus the spares in his pocket.

  The smell of burning gunpowder hung in the air and permeated his nostrils, causing him to sneeze. It was at this moment that one of the crouching workers made his move, standing upright and running towards him. He recognised the man from various work events, though he didn’t know his name. What he did know was that this guy played rugby at the weekends and, from the look of him, Daniel guessed he was probably quite the opponent. Before he realised what he was doing, his defence mechanism kicked in and he quickly fired at the oncoming obstacle, catching him in the forehead and instantly halting the attack.

  Daniel moved quickly towards where the victim had been crouching to ensure that his colleague wouldn’t have similar ideas. As he rounded the cabinet he saw that the colleague was in fact a woman in a trouser suit rather than the butch male he had expected to encounter. She raised her eyes slowly up to him and he could see a fear in them like he had never witnessed. Her lips pulled apart in a tearful claim to spare her life.

  ‘Oh God, no!’ he heard her whimper as his finger squeezed the trigger once more and she dropped to the floor in silence.

  It was the single most surreal moment of his life. As he went from pod to pod, surveying the damage his actions had caused he was appalled to see how many co-workers were covered in blood. His plan to wound, rather than kill had failed. Whilst it wasn’t obvious if these victims were alive or dead, it was highly likely that the latter was true. His eyes scanned the bodies, looking to see if any of them was his target, in case he had already achieved his goal and not realised. There were half a dozen bodies on the floor, but neither of the male victims was the target.

  A noise behind him caused Daniel to turn. By the door that he had disabled were two out-of-breath security guards, trying to gain entrance. Both ducked down for cover as he turned to face them.

  ‘You come in, you die!’ he shouted, waving the gun so they could see he meant business. He hoped they bought it.

  Satisfied that they probably wouldn’t give him any more trouble, he moved to the other end of the floor. At the far end was a fire escape that led from floor to floor back down to ground level. It wasn’t used, except for in an emergency but he could see a woman racing towards it. He couldn’t afford to let anyone get out at this point, and he again watched as his right arm rose once more and watched the orange flash as two more bullets left the weapon, the first smashing into the thick oak door, the second connecting with the woman’s right shoulder. The shot wouldn’t kill her, but as she scurried back behind a filing cabinet, he was confident that she wouldn’t bolt for it again.

  Concluding that the target must still be alive at this far end of the office, cowering like the rest, he continued his pursuit. He could hear whimpering and loud whispers from those hiding beneath desks, each silently praying that he would not notice them. He wanted to allow them to live, but that was now out of his hands: if fate wanted them to live then his bullets would not cause major impact.

  9

  Asif had been as quick as anyone to glance up when Angela had shrieked wildly out of the blue, but he had been just as quick to duck back down when he had seen the suited gunman fire in her direction. A raft of panic and disbelief had descended on him as he had crouched as low down as he could. It was like a nightmare. He had pinched big handfuls of skin between his fingers, desperate to wake up in the safety of his own bed, but no matter how hard he squeezed, the security of his bedroom never appeared.

  There was gentle relief as the shooter moved to the opposite end of the office first, though the cold-blooded way he seemed happy to kill all those he met, brought little comfort. From his crouched position, Asif had spotted a handful of his co-workers in similarly precarious positions, each making eye contact with the other with a shrug of, ‘What the hell is going on?’

  The sound of the gun ejecting round after round was like the worst kind of thunder storm, or intense firework display. It was all he could do to shut out the noise by covering his ears with his hands. The gunman seemed to be have a real hatred for the co
mpany too, judging by the way he was destroying computer equipment that happened to get in the way.

  Asif, like those around him, was quietly praying to any God that would listen, that his life would be spared the inevitable death the gunfire would bring. His panicked mind sought any means of escape but there was simply no adequate hiding place. From the floor he could only make out the shooter’s legs, and they now seemed to be moving from pod to pod, pausing to fire upon any prone bodies discovered.

  Asif saw a pair of woman’s legs make a dart for the exit nearest to them, but this only seemed to rile the gunman who fired and struck her with his second shot. He had been considering bolting for the same door, but seeing her crawling back to her original hiding place, her shoulder bloodied, had stopped any such delusions. But what was the alternative? Remain hidden under the desk and hope he wasn’t noticed? It was a case of die now or die later; hardly a choice.

  He watched as the gunman’s legs continued to move up the office. It was only a matter of time until the legs stopped at his pod and that would be the end: he had sixty seconds at best, he calculated.

  *

  Mike had been in a cubicle in the gents toilets when the shooting had started. Having put the kettle on in the small kitchen adjacent to the toilets, he had decided to do as nature had intended. He had downloaded a Phil Collins’ greatest hits album the night before and was eager to reminisce. Had he not placed both headphones into his ears, he might have heard the first gunshot that had killed the screaming Angela. He also might have heard the further shots echoing around the complex, but he didn’t. Instead he remained seated behind the cubicle door, humming away to himself.