When Shade spoke, his voice was just dry breath. “My older brother.”
Esther looked up from her tea and wiped her eyes nervously. “Want me to take them home?”
Shade shook himself, scrunching his plastic cup in a fist. “Time for your Sleeptight, boys,” he said. He got up, began rubbing the life back into his limbs. “Let’s forget this whole damn night ever happened, eh?”
“Ah, come on,” Mace said. “There’s no need … ”
He didn’t get any farther.
The intercom next to the elevator doors buzzed. Shade’s face fell. The room was still. The intercom buzzed again.
Shade made his way across to the elevator, his steps slow and wary. He looked back at the assembled company, his expression uncertain.
Then he leaned into the mic and pressed a button. “Yeah?” he said.
“Jonathan Shade,” a voice said. It wasn’t a question. Preston recognized it immediately and so did Shade—he grimaced like a man with a migraine. “Christopher Armstrong. I and my associates would like to come up.”
Shade glared at his companions, his burning eyes issuing a fierce instruction that was immediately understood. Esther leapt from her seat and began bundling the body of the boy into the tarp and carrying it into the stockroom, breathing hard. Preston and Mace watched, fused still with fear.
“Lads,” hissed Shade. “Disappear.”
Preston pulled Mace by the arm and they stumbled after Esther. Preston looked over his shoulder and watched, agog, as Shade gathered himself and pressed the intercom.
“Mr. Armstrong. We’ve been expecting you,” he said. There was a hollow lightness in his voice. “Come on up.” He pressed the door release and below them, Preston heard the door lock click and buzz, and someone push it open. Armstrong and his colleagues would be up in the elevator in a matter of moments.
Maybe this was shutdown.
Esther placed a hand on each of the boys’ shoulders as they stood in the doorway to the small stockroom. Padded coats hung on a rack of pegs. Rows of boots stood to attention beneath them. There were three filing cabinets huddled along one wall, all the stacked documents and papers cleared from the workspace outside, and a bare lightbulb. Dumped unceremoniously against the back wall, the wrapped body of the boy filled the air with a sharp metallic scent. “Guys,” she said, bringing her face close to theirs. “You need to stay in here. You come out only when we tell you, understand?”
Preston nodded. Esther was kind and calm. For a second, he thought of Mum. “Got it.”
So Preston and Mace found themselves hiding in a room the size of a broom closet next to a dead body, watching through the crack between door and frame. It was hard to see. Preston’s legs cramped. Mace was craning his neck next to him, chewing gum. Armstrong had arrived, flanked by a pair of assistants who began unbundling laptops, wires, phones, and modems. Frosty pleasantries had been exchanged.
Now, Christopher Armstrong was speaking. “Your team’s record isn’t good, Shade,” he was saying, taking off his coat and brushing the rainwater from his suit. “The recent breaches have been a disaster. If the press gets hold of it, someone’s head’s going to roll. And it won’t be mine, I assure you.”
Shade said something—it wasn’t clear. Esther stood next to him, hands clasped behind her back, upright and professional.
Armstrong listened, tapping his teeth with a forefinger, then strode beyond them both. He was closer to the stockroom door now and Preston could pick out his words clearly. “Be that as it may,” he said, straightening his tie, “the prime minister is yet to be convinced this project represents value for money. The public purse is far from bottomless, Mr. Shade. And you’re over budget again, I notice. Colleagues”—he was speaking to his assistants now, a black guy with close-cropped hair and a dark suit, and a blonde-haired young woman with dark-rimmed glasses and a briefcase—“I want a look at the recent deployment data for Category A prisoners BTV. Check systems and processes are robust.”
And so the work began. The tension out there was almost visible—Preston and Mace watched as the government inspectors busied themselves. Christopher Armstrong was a powerful presence. When he spoke he was cold and abrupt. At times, he would lean over the shoulder of one of his colleagues and point something out with a scowl. Esther made him coffee which he didn’t thank her for. He sipped, winced, and put it aside to get cold. Maybe half an hour passed.
“Who exactly are we dealing with here?” Mace hissed eventually. “I don’t like the look of this guy.”
“He’s a politician,” Preston said. He fumbled for his phone. “What do you expect? Let’s see how he checks out on the net.” He powered it up, dreading a missed call from Dad. In a few moments, a simple search had generated thousands of hits: official government websites, newspaper opinion pieces, smear campaigns and character assassinations, speeches and video clips. Preston clicked a local piece from the Evening News. “Westminster Politician Assists Police with Inquiries,” it was called. It was a few months old, and carried a picture of Armstrong taken climbing into a taxi late at night. “Check this,” Preston whispered. Mace adjusted his squat, shifting closer, and the boys read. Much of it was about some sort of routine investigation following a traffic accident.
But then Mace said slowly, “Oh my actual God.” Preston had seen it too.
Police investigating the death of Westminster aide Jacob Ellwood have asked prominent Westminster politician and Justice Secretary Christopher Armstrong to assist them in their inquiries.
“Ellwood,” Mace mouthed. Preston didn’t need a reminder. The missing kid, the one Mace had been building theories around for the last few months, was called Ellwood. This dead guy—Jacob Ellwood—must have been the dad.
Mr. Armstrong, a robust campaigner for prison reform and regular visitor to Manchester’s Strangeways, was reported as being happy to assist. “I will do anything I can do to help clarify the circumstances behind this unexpected tragedy,” Armstrong has said. “I have worked closely with Jacob Ellwood for many years and will miss him terribly as a colleague, strategist, and friend.”
“What about the missing kid?” Mace said, his voice a low hiss. “Run another search.”
It took a couple of tries, but a combination of “missing person,” “Manchester,” and “Ellwood” took them to the article they wanted.
Increasing numbers of Greater Manchester Police officers are being deployed in the search for Chloe Ellwood, the missing daughter of Westminster aide Jacob Ellwood, who was killed in a traffic accident in central Manchester last month.
Mace was leaning in, his breath quickening. Whatever the hell this was, it felt important. They skimmed the rest.
Representatives of the media have speculated that Miss Ellwood’s disappearance is linked to her father’s death and may be the result of a tragic suicide attempt. However, a police spokesperson has ruled out any conclusive judgment on Miss Ellwood’s motives or intentions, and reiterated her family’s message to return home.
“What does it mean?” Mace whispered. Preston ran a hand across his eyes, trying to think. There was some sort of connection here between Armstrong and this traffic accident, and then between the traffic accident and this missing kid Chloe Ellwood. All of that was on the one hand. And on the other was this crazy thing in the basement of M.I.S.T., a valve that worked as some sort of weird prototype prison. Armstrong was surely involved there as well, Preston figured. There was another thought too. A dark one—a thought that chilled him with its doomed inevitability. That text he’d gotten from Alice—Sorry. Going in. She was going into the valve, Preston knew with a cold certainty. She was following Ryan through. Urban exploration—the notebook, the circled streets around Back Half Moon.
Preston minimized the Internet search and opened his text messages. As if looking at that brief communication again might somehow deny his worst fears. He was tired. His fingers jumped. He fumbled the phone and it spilled out of his hands and clattered on the floor.
Dammit. Outside in the workspace, one of Armstrong’s assistants had heard it, he was sure—he could see the black guy in the suit look up from his laptop and rise to his feet. Double dammit.
“Shit. We’re 404,” hissed Mace.
Preston looked up, followed his friend’s gaze. The guy in the suit was crossing the floor of the workspace toward the door of the stockroom, and he walked in that slow slight crouch that suggested a man who knew he was about to find something he didn’t want to. Oh, hell. Preston glanced at the body of the boy wrapped in a tarp and rolled up in the corner.
This was bad. This was very bad indeed.
He slipped the phone into his pocket.
The stockroom door opened.
The guy in the suit was there. He looked as if he’d been slapped. “Bloody hell,” he said.
It was weird seeing Christopher Armstrong for real, close up. This was the guy on the posters up and down Deansgate, the face on the news—the politician with the cold eyes and thin lips, the man with the gray suit and dark tie who talked justice and rehabilitation. Armstrong puffed up, clenched his fists, watching as his assistant led the two teenage boys from their hiding place. Shade closed his eyes, looking for a second as if he were reeling off a silent curse. Esther stared at the ceiling. The ticker-tape roll of the TV news glowed silently.
Armstrong stared at Preston and Mace, running a careful hand across his balding scalp, deciding something. “Just what in God’s name is this?” he said evenly. After a silence in which no one seemed prepared to answer him, Armstrong spoke again. “May I remind you, Mr. Shade, that these premises are the property of Her Majesty’s government, and as such are subject to restricted access rights to members of the public!” He paused, sweat beading on his forehead, and loosened his tie. This time he shouted. Preston jumped at the force of it. “Particularly to a pair of Manchester street rats!” Armstrong bawled.
“Street rats,” Preston said coldly. “Nice.” He clenched his fists hard, staring at Armstrong. Go get dead, he thought suddenly, hotly. And with that thought rushed everything else that had been spinning through his head for the last few days—the text message that had sent Ryan to his death. Alice in his bedroom on Friday night, still in her school uniform, her toes nearly touching his. Sorry. Going in. The little notebook full of maps and colors—mist scrawled in the corner of a page. An open-palmed hand with an eye in the center, watching the unwatched life. The Count of Monte Cristo. A dark squadron of boys trying to escape from the jaws of a box in a basement. Technological prototyping and development for criminal justice. Radical solutions. In Armstrong’s world, that’s what everyone else was—Ryan, Alice, Mace, the Kepler valve prisoners: all just street rats.
“Good God, man!” Armstrong said coldly. Shade’s face had closed up. He’d plunged his hands into his pockets. “How many regulations are you happy to break in one night? Safeguarding? Insurance? Official secrets? What the hell possessed you to think this was a good idea? Classified projects are classified precisely because they are highly sensitive.” Armstrong was jabbing a finger at the wardens. “How do we handle this if it goes public? Have you thought about that?” Esther tried to speak, but a vicious glare was enough to silence her. “Needless to say, it’s an important week for the party. And yes, for me too,” Armstrong fumed. “How much do the kids know? How long have they been here?” He paced, then threw his hands out. “Don’t answer. We’ll just have to clean this mess up as quickly and quietly as we can. They’ll need a heavy dose of Sleeptight. They’ll need taking home tonight. And, Mr. Shade,” Armstrong said, raising a finger. “Clear your desk. You too, Ms. Klein. You no longer work here.” There was a wounded silence. Shade’s face was expressionless. Esther put her hands over her eyes for a second or two, then composed herself. Armstrong started giving orders, snapping his briefcase shut. “Ross, see to it that we run shutdown from tonight. Let’s make sure we clear the tech before the end of the week.” Ross nodded, hurrying back to his position at his laptop and clearing up. “Shade, I expect your badge and belongings boxed up and these boys dealt with. From tomorrow, you are no longer permitted on the premises.”
And that was it—in a few moments of icy silence, Armstrong had swept up his raincoat, disconnected his tablet, checked his phone, and stalked out to the elevator, his assistants in pursuit.
Preston didn’t know where to look. Mace blinked, still shocked. Shade stared at his boots, his face hot and red, anger, shame, fear all written across it. Esther wiped her eyes.
“I’m so sorry,” Preston managed, and his voice was small and dry.
Later, they sat around the low table. It wasn’t yet dawn, but it was close. The first commuter buses had grumbled beneath the windows, heading toward Piccadilly station. Shade had started talking again an hour or so after Armstrong had left. To start with, he’d been all tight-lipped fury, and even when Esther had placed a consoling palm on his shoulder, he’d been coldly unresponsive. Eventually she’d managed to get him back, gently coaxing him into action.
Now, the two nightwardens were communicating, at least. Esther had dried her eyes and apologized to the boys and started to talk it through, to make some plans—going back to the States again, spending some time with her family.
Shade was slower to recover. For a long time he watched the steam rise from his coffee. Then he raised his head and looked at each of them—Esther first, then the boys. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s my fault.” Esther put a hand over his.
Preston took his chance. “I got a text message from Alice. I know she’s in there,” he said. “BTV. Just tell it me straight. How do I get her out?”
Shade shook his head. “You can’t,” he said. “If Armstrong’s running shutdown, no one’s getting out.”
“What do you mean?”
“When the valves are closed down, there’s no way back.” Shade crushed his plastic cup and threw it away. “Imagine a tap. Once the valve is shut, nothing comes back out. Whatever’s already in there stays in the pipes.”
Mace said, “Stays in? So they’re trapped forever?”
“Once Armstrong runs shutdown, they won’t last long. No food and water.”
“So who … ” Mace broke off, figuring it out. “Who usually feeds them?”
“We do,” Esther said.
“So, let me get this straight,” said Preston. “You guys go BTV to drop off supplies?”
Shade nodded. “I’ve been so often now I can’t remember how many times. To start with it’s strange.” He shrugged. “You’d be surprised how quickly you get used to it.”
Preston looked at Esther. “You too?”
Esther nodded. “It wasn’t in the contract. But we’ve done it anyway. Kept it from Armstrong.”
Mace gave a whistle and shook his head, blinking. “So you just ditch the stuff and then go?”
“Pretty much,” said Esther.
“How long has this been going on?” Preston asked.
Shade took a long breath, rubbing a palm across his forehead. “Just over a year,” he said. “It got particularly busy after the riots. The city went crazy that night. The morning after, Armstrong was here before the sun came up, running the show with a whole bunch of desk jockeys in pinstripe suits. We were trucking kids across town between midnight and three, then sending them BTV between three and four thirty.”
“How many?”
Esther looked at the boys. “Two hundred. So far.”
“When the systems were first established and we’d tested them, I was told one thing, but something else entirely happened.” Shade’s gaze had gone distant now, as if he were looking through Preston and Mace, beyond Esther, and back to some other time. “It took us a long time to realize how the government wanted it used. Armstrong was insistent. He forced me and I wasn’t strong enough to oppose him.”
“Forced you to do what?”
“The scale of it, kid. The scale of it. Especially after the summer of riots; we were putting kids BTV in their dozens. And welfare and su
pport stopped. There was to be nothing in the way of food or drink sent through. But the numbers that kept coming in the vans—it was terrible.” Shade looked at the empty desk again. He was thinking of his brother, Preston guessed. “I knew it was out of control. But Esther and me—we needed time to think, to work out what to do to stop it. We started sending supplies in secret, using the Blackstone Edge valve up on the moors. I knew if anyone checked the transit records we’d be screwed. But I was buying time. I knew things must be bad BTV because kids kept trying to come back through and we’d find them shaking to death.” Shade looked at his trembling hands. “I haven’t slept in months,” he said. He looked angry at himself. “I shouldn’t be telling you this.”
“It doesn’t matter what we tell them now,” Esther said softly. She’d leaned close in to Shade, put a hand on his knee. Preston didn’t know much about girls, but he knew closeness when he saw it. He reckoned they’d had some sort of thing together. Maybe they still did.
“So when Armstrong runs shutdown,” Mace asked, “how are you going to get food and water in?”
“We’re not,” Shade said. “Whoever’s already BTV just … ” He seemed to find it hard to carry on. His voice was a croak. “They just stay there,” he managed eventually.
“And starve,” Preston put in. “He can’t do that! He’s killing them! Nobody deserves that.”
Esther had placed her palms together between her knees and was staring at them. “The difficulty is,” she said, “that the project is a prototype. It’s secret. There’s trial without jury, covert sentencing. Parents and family are given misleading information and denied access to the convicted. And nobody knows about this stuff.”
Preston clenched his fists and stared at the wardens. He suddenly saw the workspaces around him for what they were. Shade and Esther were running a prison from this room. Neither of them looked as if they wanted much to do with it. Neither of them had started out to achieve this. Both had dreamt of doing something good. And yet they came in for each shift, clocked in, and kept working.
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