Blackout

by Chris Ryan

  Josh hugged Madge close to him. Their bodies were hot and sticky, her arms still cradling his chest. She reached up and kissed him on the lips, resting her hands against the bandage wrapped around his neck.

  'I was so angry when I thought you'd forgotten who I was,' she said. 'I wanted to kill you.'

  Josh smiled, removing her hand from the bandage. 'If you want to kill me. you'll have to join the queue.'

  Madge turned on to her side, her cheek against the pillow. Room 19 was a compact, pre-designed box, with a double bed, a pair of side lights, and a picture of the Californian coast on the wall. There was a TV, a shower room, and not much else. Grabbing a room whenever she wanted to sleep with a guy was one of the perks of Madge's job, decided Josh.

  'They came to question me,' she said.

  Josh suddenly jerked out of the post-coital slumber into which he had drifted. 'Who?'

  'Federal agents, Josh,' she said. 'They showed me their

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  cards and everything. They said I should talk to them. They said that you were a witness to the shooting of Ben Lippard.'

  Her worried stare met Josh's. 'Is that true?'

  'I think so,' answered Josh. 'I can't say for certain because I can't remember anything.'

  Madge pulled up the white cotton sheet so that it covered her breasts. 'I told them I didn't know anything. I just said Josh is a fine man. He wouldn't hurt anyone.'

  I hope that's true, thought Josh to himself. Right now I wouldn't be so certain.

  'They accepted that?'

  'They looked pretty pissed off. But eventually they went away'

  'How long was I here for?'

  'You?'

  Josh nodded. 'How long was I at the motel?'

  'Nine days,' said Madge. 'I noticed you as soon as you checked in. You had a nice smile.'

  'And what was I doing?'

  'You don't know what you were doing?'

  Josh shook his head.'I told you, I don't remember anything.'

  'Scouting tourist sites,' said Madge, sounding bored by the question. 'You said you worked for a tour company in England.You were planning routes, finding hotels, checking places to eat.'

  I lied to her, thought Josh. Whatever the hell I was doing here, that sure wasn't it.

  Josh squeezed her tight^ caressing her shoulders. 'And who else was staying at the hotel at the same time as me?'

  Madge looked thoughtful. 'Usual people,' she replied. 'Salesmen. A couple of stray tourists. People who were moving house. Husbands who'd been thrown out by their wives. I don't pay much attention to the guests at the Motel 6.' She snuggled up close to Josh. 'I certainly don't do this with them.'

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  'Anyone unusual?'

  Madge's nose tilted disdainfully. 'One guy'

  'Who?'

  'An Italian,' said Madge. 'Carrying an Italian passport when he checked in. I noticed it because I've never seen one of those before, and we don't get many foreigners in Boisdale. Heck, we don't even get that many people who aren't from Arizona. First, an Englishman, then this Italian. I couldn't help but notice.'

  'You said there was something suspicious about him?'

  Madge nodded. 'Just the way he acted. I didn't like it.'

  'In what way?'

  'I don't know.'

  Josh looked at her intently. 'Describe him to me.'

  'I can show you a picture.'

  Josh picked himself up from the bed, and started walking towards the shower. He had to be careful when he washed not to disturb the bandage on his neck. He dried himself off, put the towel on the rack, and slipped on his jeans and shirt.

  'Show me the picture, Madge, and I'll love you for ever,' he said. He could tell that she was enjoying the drama and mystery of all this.

  She followed him outside. It was after eleven at night, but the air was still hot and the breeze had dropped, making the night sticky and sweaty. Josh could see one car pulling up down in the parking lot but the middle-aged man getting out looked harmless enough: the tpwn might be crawling with spotters but he wasn't one of them. Madge took the metal staircase, then used her staff key to let herself into the lobby: the reception was closed at this time of night.

  'Here,' she said, reaching into a grey metal filing cabinet in the small office behind the desk. 'We keep the guest records in here. We photocopy the passports of foreigners, and keep the details on file for three months.'

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  'Can I see mine?' said Josh.

  She took the file and placed it in front of him. For a second, Josh could feel his blood surging through his veins. I'm about to find out who I am.

  Josh looked down at the photocopy of his passport. Josh Bellamy, born in Sunderland.

  That's not it, I'm not a Geordie. I was travelling under a false name, and a false passport. My name might not even be Josh.

  Why would I be travelling under a false name?

  Madge started rifling through the drawer, then pulled out a single sheet of white photostatted paper. On it was imprinted the image of a man. Josh looked down. Like all passport photos, it was small, with a white backdrop, and the person was wearing their most sombre expression.

  The man in this photocopy had dark, smooth skin, just the way Madge had described him. His hair was black, brushed away from his face, and his dark eyes were set far apart from each other. The jaw looked as though it had been chiselled from stone, but the nose was crooked, as if it had been broken. It was a distinguished face, Josh decided: the mask of a man who knew both what he wanted, and how to hide it.

  I've seen him before, thought Josh. I don't know where or how, but I know this man.

  And I feel certain that I'll see him again.

  'How long was he here?'

  'Just the Sunday and Monday nights,' said Madge.

  He arrives just before I get shot, thought Josh. And he leaves straight afterwards.

  It was a four-mile walk back from the motel, taking three quarters of an hour: a mile to get out of town, two miles along the track, then, as the light faded, another mile up into the hills where Kate had told him they would be

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  camping out for the night. Along the way, Josh had been thinking through all the things he had learned from Madge. A hundred different possibilities were running through his head: he needed time to sort them out and start making sense of what had happened to him.

  What do I know? he asked himself. My name was Josh -- maybe. I was staying in Boisdale. I lied about what I was doing, and I may have travelled under a false name. A man I recognise from somewhere came to stay at the hotel. Then I got shot.

  The more he thought about it, the less sense it made.

  His legs were aching from the effort of walking so many miles in one day. The wounds needed rest but that wasn't possible, not yet. There was still too much to be done.

  He took the dirt track, letting the moonlight light up the path for him, until he hit the abandoned mine. Then he took the turning that Kate had described to him. Another mile dragged wearily by. As he drew closer, he wasn't sure how much longer he could keep going. He must have travelled at least twenty miles on foot in the last twenty-four hours: a punishing walk, even for a man who hadn't recently taken some lead.

  Eventually, he saw the boulder formation. Sniffing the air, he could smell a fire, although he couldn't yet see it. Whoever was hiding there was clearly experienced enough to know how to build a fire, yet at the same time shield its light from the main track. Josh stepped forwards, pushing into the collection of boulders, letting his nose lead him.

  Then, in front of him, he made out two men who blended into the landscape the same way a boulder blends into a rockfall. Their skin was tanned, leathery and lined. Both of them had grey hair and grey beards, although they looked no more than forty. A fire was burning in front of a cave, sending tiny plumes of smoke climbing upwards into the clear night sky: on top of the flames, its body pierced by a

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  crooked stick, was some kind
of small animal. A bird of some sort, figured Josh, as he smelled the charred flesh. Christ, maybe even a snake. These guys look like they'll eat anything.

  'You okay?' Kate asked, a trace of anxiety in her voice as she emerged from the shadows.

  Josh nodded. 'Who are they?'

  One of the two men looked up at Josh, then stabbed the tiny creature. The fat from its body spluttered, falling into the fire, sending a sheet of sparks flying upwards.

  Kate took Josh by the arm. 'This is Danny O'Brien,' she said, 'and this is Richie Morant.' She looked up at Josh. 'Marshall sent them out to look for us when we disappeared,' she said. 'They're here to help.'

  'What the hell is this place?' said Josh, looking around the tiny, rough camp.

  'It's a survivalist base,' said Kate. 'Many people believe that the UN is going to invade the United States one day. They've got all the kit here that they need to organise the local resistance. Food, fuel, explosives, some ammunition. The works.'

  Great, thought-Josh. Nutters.

  He looked up. O'Brien was the shorter of the pair. His eyes were a pale grey, and you could see the Irish ancestry in him still: his head was broad and square, like a concrete block, and his shoulders were massive, but his manner was relaxed and genial. Morant, a bigger man, had a thick scar running down his left cheek, and the build of a brickie: he too had huge shoulders and biceps, a beefy torso tapering to a thin waist, then a pair .of legs like tree trunks. Both men looked strong and healthy, and there was something wild about their appearance. Their hair was thick with grease. And they carried with them the dry, dusty smell of the desert.

  'Is it you?' said O'Brien.

  'Is it me, what?' asked Josh, looking towards him.

  'Who's set the Feds crawling all over the place,' O'Brien said.

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  'You can't move for the motherfuckers,' said Morant. 'Nice quiet bit of the desert we had out here. Now it's crawling with agents. United Nations. Foreigners.'

  Christ, thought Josh. Where the hell did Kate find these two?

  'I'm hiding from them myself,' said Josh.

  O'Brien nodded, and a smile suddenly flashed across his face. 'Marshall says you're okay, a soldier.'

  'I think so,' said Josh. 'He told you about me?'

  'Said you might need some help,' said Morant.

  He reached out for the animal roasting on the homemade spit, and took it from the fire. It was long and thin, but it had legs: that ruled out a snake. Its flesh was singed from the flames, but the smell was good: a succulent, fatty odour somewhere between chicken and pork. Josh was famished.

  'Want some?' said Morant, offering him a chunk of meat. 'It's crane.'

  Josh nodded. He took a bite from the greasy lump of flesh now sitting in his hands. It was stringy, with the texture of rabbit.

  'I need help,' he said. 'Marshall was right about that.'

  'What kind of help?' asked O'Brien.

  Josh was sitting next to the fire now. The temperature had dropped, making the warmth a welcome respite from the chilled air. In the light of the fire, he could see the faces of both men more clearly. There was a determination in both of them: an inner core of stjjength. But also a lightness of spirit.

  Josh tapped the side of his head. 'I lost my memory when I got shot,' he said. 'Over in the Sheriff's office, they know who I am. I want to get in there and see my files.'

  'Fucking government,' said O'Brien. 'Got no right keeping files on any man.'

  'When the fucking UN takes over the country,' said

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  Morant, 'they're going to take down anyone who tries to oppose them. This damned country's going to be finished.'

  'Assholes,' said O'Brien. A thick wedge of cooked meat was dangling from his teeth. 'They got no fucking files on us, that's for sure. So far as the law is concerned, we don't exist. And we're keeping it that way.'

  'You'll help me?'

  'You're a fucking foreigner,' spat O'Brien. 'We only deal with Americans.'

  'We don't trust you,' said Morant.

  'We only trust our own kind,' added O'Brien.

  'Even if I'm against the Feds?' said Josh.

  There was a silence while both men paused for thought.

  'Marshall told you--' began Kate.

  'Marshall's pretty pissed with you for disappearing in the middle of the night,' said O'Brien.

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  NINE

  Monday, June 8th. Night.

  Madge gave Josh a long, lingering kiss on the lips. He took

  her in his arms, holding her tight to his chest.

  'My shift doesn't end for another two hours,' she said. 'But I needed to see you.'

  'Why?' asked Josh.

  Madge looked around the drab foyer of the Motel 6. Her uniform was looking tighter today, as if it had shrunk in the wash or she had put on a couple of extra pounds. 'Because some men were snooping around the hotel last night.'

  Josh and Kate had stayed the night in the mountains, hiding out with O'Brien and Morant. They had spent an uneasy night at the survivalist base. Josh wasn't at all sure how much he trusted the other men and he didn't think that they trusted him either.

  In the morning, he'd said that he'd go back into town to draw up a plan of attack on ^he sheriff's office while O'Brien and Morant would put together some kit.

  O'Brien had a red Mustang that he assured them was clean and couldn't be traced by the police. He'd let Kate drive it to drop Josh on the outskirts of town.

  Then, as Josh was walking past the motel, Madge had run out to speak to him.

  'What kind of men?' asked Josh.

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  'Bikers,' replied Madge, steering him back into the motel. 'Here, I'll show you.'

  The back office of the Motel 6 was painted battleship grey, and had just one desk, two telephones and a computer screen. On one side of the desk there was a bank of four CCTV screens, each one just twelve inches square, displaying different views of the hotel: they monitored the car park, the foyer, and both of the two corridors along which the rooms were arranged. Only one flaw, Josh realised. There was nobody watching. The cameras would record a crime, but there would be no one there to stop it.

  'This happened last night,' said Madge. She sat down at the desk, spooling back the tape until she reached the section she wanted. 23.19 was the time recorded on the screen in tiny white lettering. 'Look,' she said, her finger jabbing against the screen. 'Here.'

  Josh leaned forwards, resting his hands on the table and peering into the screen. He could see three men pulling up their bikes in-the parking lot, then walking around to the back of the hotel. They clambered up the fire escape, methodically looking through the back windows built into the rooms. Each man weighed at least two hundred and fifty pounds and had a long beard, but they were surprisingly agile, moving swiftly and silently around the building. They looked different from the bikers who had stood up for Madge in the restaurant parking lot: meaner, and fiercer, moving with an almost .military precision. Next, the man who appeared to be the leader of the group walked up to the lobby, breaking its flimsy lock with his bare hands. Once inside, he started rummaging through the registration book, then spent ten minutes sitting in front of the hotel's computer in the reception. At one point he looked up, and the CCTV camera froze, capturing a perfect image of his face. Even obscured by the crash helmet still strapped

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  securely to his head, it was easy to make out his main features. He had the thick, strapping skull of a pirate, with deep, dark eyes, bored like pits into the front of his face. His hair was long, wrapped up behind his head in a ponytail, while his beard was a foot long, jet black, and neatly combed. His skin, from what little Josh could see of it between the helmet and the beard, looked as if he had been suffering from acute acne for at least four decades. The moon has a smoother surface than your cheeks, pal, Josh decided.

  I've seen him before, thought Josh. I don't know where but I've seen that animal somewhere before.

 
; 'What do you think they were looking for?' asked Madge.

  The,' answered Josh. 'And they'll be back.'

  On the motel computer, he printed out two still frames from the CCTV footage, sliding the pictures into the inside of his shirt. 'Motel 6 aren't going to miss one shot, are they?'

  Madge shook her head.

  Josh planted a resounding kiss on her lips. 'I love you,' he said.

  O'Brien and Morant were already cooking on the fire. The flames were licking around the body of another small animal, and the smell of singed fat and charcoal was already filling the air. 'More crane?' said Josh, looking down.

  'Not crane,' said O'Brien. 'No crane around this evening. At least none that we could catch.'

  'We don't mind fighting the law, but we do so on a full stomach,' said Morant.

  Both men laughed.

  Kate was sitting just behind them, her hair tied up behind her neck. She looked across at Josh and smiled. It was just after eight in the evening, and it was already dark.

  Josh took the leg of meat that O'Brien had just offered him and sank his teeth into the hot flesh. A dribble of fat

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  ran down the side of his chin, and he brushed it away with a handkerchief. It tasted more like wild boar than anything else, but had a sharper, tangier flavour. Don't ask, he reminded himself. If you ask what it is, you'll lose your appetite.

  'You guys ready?' he asked, looking across at the two men.

  O'Brien and Morant nodded in turn. 'For fighting the cops, there's no time like the present.'

  'Let's go through the plan once more,' said Josh. 'We go into town. But first we knock out the FBI agent so that we can use his pass to get us into the Sheriff's office. Once we're inside we look up all the details they have on me, then get the hell out of there.'

  O'Brien nodded. 'The bit I like is at the start,' he said. 'Where we knock out the fucking Fed.'

  The plan was that Kate would drop them off on the outskirts of town, then drive back to Marshall's to wait for them.

  O'Brien made it his business to monitor the movements of every law-enforcement official in the region and prided himself on keeping tabs on all their routines. A Federal agent stopped at the Texaco station two miles outside Boisdale every night not long after midnight, pulling up for coffee and a doughnut. When they'd disposed of the agent they'd proceed into town, using his car.