12 Steps

by Iain Rob Wright

  “Yes, and it’s a little hard to stomach. I’m going to go inside and see for myself what’s going on. Now, would you kindly let go of my arm?”

  Tasha didn’t let go of her. “What’s going on is that there’s a madman trying to kill us, and you’re wasting time we don’t fucking have.”

  Margaret glared at Tasha, but then she seemed to finally get it. Her expression gradually fell. “We’re really in danger? You’re being serious?”

  Tasha nodded. There were tears in her eyes – desperate, pleading tears. “Please, just get us out of here and to the police.”

  Margaret nodded. “Okay, get in the car.”

  Finally. Adam let out a massive sigh of relief. So did Tasha, and then they were both rushing for the car. Adam yanked open the front passenger door and threw himself down onto the warm seat while Tasha threw down her broom handle and jumped in behind him. The slamming of the door was like a promise of safety, the windscreen like a shield. Perhaps their attacker had fled when Margaret arrived.

  Please let it be over.

  Margaret was still standing in front of the car, illuminated by the sidelights. She stared off towards the community centre, maybe considering their story one last time. Then, mercifully, she turned towards the car.

  The thunder returned.

  Margaret’s head seemed to evaporate in a crimson mist. The rain on the windscreen turned red, and globs of flesh slid down the glass. In the glow of the sidelights, Margaret’s body slumped to the tarmac.

  Tasha screamed in the backseat.

  A white face appeared in the darkness.

  Adam cowered in his seat. We’re not getting out of here alive.

  Adam cowered in the front passenger seat, staring at the body of a dead woman. The third death tonight, assuming Betty wasn’t still alive somewhere.

  We haven’t found her yet.

  The white face watched them from the edge of the glow cast by the car’s sidelights. It seemed in no rush to approach them.

  Tasha punched the back of Adam’s seat. “Drive! Drive us out of here!”

  Great idea.

  Adam clambered over the handbrake and gear lever, knocking his injured elbow on the dashboard and making himself nauseous. He slid down behind the steering wheel and looked ahead. The white face had gone, moved out of the light, but he knew it was still out there somewhere watching them.

  It’s toying with us.

  It’s enjoying this.

  No, not it. It’s a person. Just a man.

  Adam reached for the ignition key, but there was nothing there, only a silver button. “H-How the hell do I start the engine? There’s only a button.”

  Tasha leaned forward between the seats. “It’s one of those keyless start thingies. Just press it.”

  Adam thumbed the small round button but the engine did nothing. A message flashed up on a small screen behind the steering wheel: PRESS BRAKE. He shoved his foot down on the pedal and tried the button again. The engine still didn’t start, but this time the message on screen was different: NO KEY ID.

  “What the hell? Why won’t this stupid thing start?”

  “The key,” said Tasha. “Margaret must have it on her. It won’t start unless you have the key in your pocket.”

  Adam punched the steering wheel, which shocked his elbow again and made him want to throw up. “Goddamn this stupid little car and its stupid technology.”

  “We need to get the key.”

  Of course we need to get the key, because the alternative is to sit here and do nothing until we get shot or stabbed or eaten. “Okay, I’ll go. Just… sit tight.”

  “Yeah, I’ll take a load off.”

  Adam opened the door and let the rain in. The warmth of the car left his bones and he was once again in the cold. His shoes came down in a puddle and it soaked right though to his socks. He wouldn’t have thought he could be any more miserable.

  Margaret’s body was on display, lying in a wide triangle of light with glistening streaks of rain falling down on her. It was almost beautiful, until you looked at the red and grey mush where her head had been. She was wearing a dark green anorak. Was the car key in one of the pockets?

  Only one way to find out.

  Adam kept his eyes on the darkness ahead, searching for that white face. He moved towards Margaret, his hip creaking with each step. Being hit by a car was actually one of the least concerning parts of his night, and he was just glad to still be breathing.

  He knelt down next to the body and reached for the hip pocket.

  Blood exploded from Margaret’s chest as another gunshot cracked.

  Adam froze, his hand still outstretched. He knew he should leap for cover, but he was caught out in the open. Once again, he froze, but this time it was from pure terror.

  Another shot hit Margaret’s body, sending another plume of blood into the air.

  The next shot hit one of the car’s headlamp arrays, cutting off half the light. The following shot hit the other side and brought back total darkness. Tasha was inside the car, yelling out. “Get back inside.”

  Adam reached out, needing to get the key. Without it they were doomed.

  It must be right inside her pocket.

  Another bullet struck Margaret’s body, only an inch from Adam’s fingertips. He had no choice but to give up. He was being warned. Don’t go for the key.

  He turned and ran back to the car, throwing himself into the driver’s seat and ducking down. Tasha was in the footwell at the back. “That didn’t go well,” she said.

  “I’ll admit, I was hoping for a different result. Are you okay?”

  “Better than Margaret.”

  Adam sighed. The sight of the headless woman would stay with him for the rest of his life – but that might not be so long. “Poor lady. She only came here to check on the alarm. I thought this was about our group, but it seems this psycho is prepared to kill anybody.”

  “You still think it’s some guy with a screw loose?”

  “If I was ever close to believing in monsters and ghosts, it would be tonight, but supernatural beings don’t tend to unload on people with rifles, do they?”

  Tasha narrowed her eyes and paused a moment. “When that thing came at you in the vegetable garden, it wasn’t carrying a rifle.”

  “Maybe it left it in the woods.”

  “I don’t think that thing with the white face is the one shooting at us.”

  Adam groaned. “So we’re back to the two people theory?”

  “Or maybe one person with a gun and one ghost with a grudge.”

  “No, if there are two people doing this, they must be working together. The white face was right there before Margaret hit me with her car, but the shot that killed her came from the woods.”

  “So what did Costa see when he signalled for us to go? Did he see the white face, or a man with a gun?”

  Adam tried to get lower in the seat. He feared a bullet taking off the top of his head at any second. “I’ll ask him when I see him. What are we going to do, Tasha? You were motivated earlier to face this threat head-on. Still think that’s the right call?”

  “That was when I thought we were up against a guy with a knife. High-powered rifles aren’t really something you can face head-on. Just ask Margaret.”

  Adam groaned. “You have a real gift for speaking ill of the dead, you know that?”

  “Better to joke about something than actually think about it. I have enough survivor’s guilt as it is.”

  “Your brother?”

  “Yeah. His name was Ben. He was in a wheelchair his entire life and I looked after him. We were close. I was so used to basing my life around his needs that when he was gone, my life just seemed suddenly…”

  “Empty. My wife’s name was Katy. My son was James. I spent most of my time avoiding them, hiding in shame while I drank. I always thought there would be time to get clean later – to make it up to them. Once they were gone, it was like I lost the air I was breathing. They were the only
part of me that was still human – the only part of me that hadn’t been completely eaten away by the booze. When they died, they took the only good part of me with them. Now I’m just a pointless shell.”

  “Who’s one year sober. You’re doing the best you can.”

  “I just wish I’d done that when they’d been alive.”

  The car shook. Adam dropped down lower in the seat. The car shook again, rocking back and forth on its axles. They were mice at the mercy of a cat.

  Then the shaking stopped.

  Several minutes went by.

  Tasha whispered from the rear footwell. “What’s happening?”

  Adam could see nothing from low down on the seat. “I don’t know. Maybe he’s gone to torment the others.”

  “What should we do? Run for the road?”

  The windscreen shattered, raining glass down on them.

  “Maybe not,” said Adam. “Looks like our sniper has come back to play.”

  “Then we’re stuck in this car,” said Tasha. “At his mercy.”

  “Maybe not. We’re safe inside the car, right?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “I have an idea. Just… stay low.”

  And try not to die.

  Tasha squashed down as much as she could, but when Adam opened the car door, she asked what the hell he was doing.

  “Moving us somewhere safer.” He leant over the driver’s seat and released the handbrake, then heaved against the steering wheel while sliding his legs out of the car and pushing with his legs against the tarmac. At first it seemed like the car wouldn’t budge, but slowly it began to roll. Once it was moving, keeping it going was easy.

  Get your motor runnin’…

  Head out on the highway…

  Lookin’ for a sniper, and a ghost that’s ruining my day.

  I’m losing my mind.

  Adam flinched as a shot hit the car. He pushed harder, his legs already stiff and battered. Tasha remained completely silent in the back, probably wondering why they were suddenly moving.

  Adam dared a quick glance over the dashboard and adjusted the steering to direct the car towards the community centre. Another shot cracked from the direction of the woods, but he was fully committed now, kept on going, and saw the building come into view through the broken windscreen.

  This is actually working. It’s a mobile shield.

  The car bucked and came to a sudden halt. They had hit something, and Adam wondered if he had pushed them right into the building, but they were still several metres away from the community centre.

  They had struck the low circular wall that housed the elm tree outside the community centre. It meant they were positioned right outside the front entrance. Ten feet short of safety.

  Another shot hit the car and the open driver’s side door rattled. Adam wondered how close the bullet had been from passing through the steel and hitting him.

  “What the hell just happened?” Tasha rose up slightly from the footwell. “Are you okay, Adam?”

  “We’re right outside the front doors of the community centre.”

  “You think we can make it back inside?”

  “If we’re quick, maybe. Hard to hit a moving target, right?”

  Doesn’t mean it’s impossible though.

  Tasha crawled over the centre console and halfway into the front of the car. She looked up at Adam. “How should we do this?”

  “Climb down into the passenger footwell and open the door.”

  Tasha pulled herself forward with her hands, keeping her head below the dashboard. Awkwardly, she managed to dump herself into the front passenger footwell. She reached up and opened the door, shoving it open. “Okay, now what?”

  Adam moved behind the open driver’s door. “I’m going to have to race around the car, but you’ve got a straight shot to the doors. After three, run as fast as you can. I’ll be right behind you. Understand?”

  “Yeah. I’ll be waiting for you at the doors.”

  “Okay, after three. One… Two…”

  “Three!” Adam heard another gunshot and prayed it wasn’t aimed at Tasha. To his relief, by the time he made it around the back of Margaret’s vehicle, Tasha had already made it to the front entrance. She rushed inside the foyer and grabbed the interior doors to the hall.

  Thank God.

  Now it was his turn to make a mad dash across open ground. He moved up behind the passenger door that Tasha had left open and tried to control his breathing. The thought of exposing himself to the sniper made him pant in fear. But he’d made his decision; he had to follow it through.

  “Okay, here goes,” he told himself.

  And then he ran.

  He let out a low wail as he moved, knowing he might die in each second that followed. Would the sniper ever run out of bullets? Or had he brought an endless supply? Where did you even get guns and bullets in rural Britain? A shotgun he could understand, but a rifle?

  A crack sounded and the pavement spat up in front of him. He wailed louder, his psyche snapping like a handful of twigs.

  Then he was inside the unlit foyer.

  I made it. Shit, I actually made it.

  Tasha was waiting at the double doors for him, urging him inside. The sniper could reposition at any moment. He couldn’t slow down. He headed for safety.

  A door opened to his left. The women’s toilets.

  A white face appeared.

  Adam felt a thud against his ribs and it stopped him cold. His momentum should have kept him going, but he had run into an immovable object and was now face to face with a nightmare. A pair of dark eyes bore into him. Adam’s body went cold, warmth seeming to escape through a hole in his side.

  “Your judgement has arrived,” said a gruff voice barely louder than a cat’s purr. Adam realised then that he’d been stabbed, because the white-faced attacker raised a bloody knife between them. “Enjoy Hell, Adam.”

  It knows my name.

  It knows what I’ve done.

  Adam was powerless, his body numb and cold. The only part of him that moved was his right arm, which he threw out desperately. His thumb jammed into one of those dark eyes while his fingers raked at a bright white cheek. He clawed furrows, not in flesh, but in some sort of waxy substance. The white-faced monster recoiled, clutching at its eye while swiping the knife through the air defensively and missing Adam’s throat by a hair’s breadth.

  I hurt it. Ha, I hurt it.

  Him. I hurt him.

  Tasha leapt out from the doorway and grabbed Adam, pulling him backwards into the hall. Then she slammed the doors shut and slid a stack of chairs up against them. She finished it all up with an angry yell. “Motherfucker!”

  Footsteps at the back of the hall made Adam flinch and turn around. It was Patrick, waving his wind-up torch and looking frantic. “Thank the Lord you’re both okay. All those gunshots…”

  “The plan failed,” said Adam, lowering himself to the ground while he bled. “Margaret arrived to reset the alarm. She’s dead.”

  Her head was blown off.

  Patrick reached out a hand to the nearest wall to steady himself. He clutched his stomach and moaned. “No, I don’t believe you. Not dear old Margaret.”

  Adam groaned. “Can we focus on me bleeding to death, please? I’m hurt.”

  Tasha dropped to her knees. “Let me take a look.”

  She ran her icy hands under his shirt and started rolling it towards his neck. Seeing his own blood sent a wave of revulsion up through his guts that ended in his bulging throat.

  “Don’t puke on me, Adam. It looks horrible, but I think you’re okay.” She prodded at his naked torso, wiping away blood in gory smears. It was too dark, and too acute an angle for him to study the knife wound himself, but Tasha leant closer and squinted. “It’s quite deep,” she said, “but it’s low down on your side. I think it’s mostly just flab.”

  Adam grumbled. “Are you really calling me fat?”

  “No, just middle-aged. And lucky. You aren
’t about to die, so stay calm.”

  Yeah, sure, no problem. I get stabbed all the time.

  Patrick seemed to take that as his cue to talk again. “Are you sure Margaret is dead? It was definitely her?”

  “She turned up in a light green hatchback,” said Tasha. “A Renault, maybe?”

  Patrick nodded and doubled over. “Yes, yes, that’s her little runaround. She only just got it.”

  “Yeah, it was pretty new. We almost couldn’t work out how to start it.”

  “What? You mean you have her car? We can leave?”

  Adam shook his head. He felt nauseous and a little feverish. Every part of his body was soaked in either blood or rainwater. “Margaret has the key, and the sniper out there doesn’t plan on letting us get it.”

  Tasha stared at the ground as if she was thinking. Then she looked down at Adam with a grim expression. “We got our confirmation that there are two people out there, fucking with us. That white-faced maniac was hiding in the toilets while the sniper was still taking potshots at us from the woods.”

  Adam looked down at his hand. It was bloodstained, but a thick waxy substance coated his fingertips “It’s just someone in make-up. His face is meant to scare us.”

  “It does scare us,” said Tasha. “Men who wear make-up have issues.”

  “That’s not very progressive of you,” said Patrick. “Men and women can both do whatever they want.”

  Tasha rolled her eyes. “Doesn’t mean they should, but hey, you want to wear your wife’s knickers then that’s your fucking business.”

  Patrick’s lips turned in an unattractive smile. “Watch your mouth, young lady. There’s no need for rudeness.”

  “Young lady? You aren’t my dad, Patrick, so try to be a little less demeaning when you talk to me, yeah?”

  “Did you even have a dad? We haven’t delved into your upbringing yet, but I’m sure we’ll find no surprises. Was he violent like you?” He held up his injured hand. “You showed your true colours when you shoved me.”

  “Whoa, Patrick.” Adam remained on the ground, too weak to get up, but he still needed to keep things under control. “Back off a little, okay? It’s uncalled for.”

  Patrick folded his arms and looked away. “She started it.”