Trinity's Fall

by P A Vasey

  “Fuck, the lights are still on …” hissed Stillman.

  “Too late,” I said.

  The sound of a key being inserted in the lock echoed down the corridor, and the door was slowly pushed open.

  SEVEN

  “Honey, did you leave the lights on?”

  The voice was male and croaky, with a southern drawl. Stillman propelled me into the first room off the hallway before the door had fully opened and crowded in behind me. The smell of old clothes and fabrics reminded me of my grannie’s bedroom. The blinds were half-drawn, and everything was in monochrome, silhouettes of bric-a-brac and furniture could just be seen on the walls and in the corners. I could just make out a double bed, a couple of wardrobes and a vanity desk. There was another door leading, I presumed, to an en suite. The ticking of a clock synched with my heartbeat.

  “The window, quickly,” whispered Stillman.

  “Can’t we just wait until they head into the kitchen, and make a run for the front door?”

  She shook her head and pushed me toward the window. It was one of those sash types locked down by a screw. I gave it a few turns and it shuddered open but then stopped with an opening of about twelve inches.

  “That’s a squeeze, to say the least,” I said, pulling a face.

  A cool, crisp breeze fluttered through the gap, blowing a few dust motes in my face and making me clamp my fingers over my nose to prevent a sneeze. Creaky footsteps could be heard outside and coming closer, and there was some scuffling on the doorframe and knob. I wondered if it was worth a dive behind the bed, but Stillman was already climbing out the window headfirst, like an escapologist wriggling out of a straitjacket. The bedroom door started to open and a sliver of light made its way through. A hand snaked in, found the switch, and flicked it on. The room exploded with the luminescence of an atomic bomb. I had nowhere to go so I backed up against the window frame as Stillman dropped heavily onto the sidewalk six feet or so below.

  A woman entered the room.

  She looked to be in her seventies but was sprightly and thin. She had a beaky nose and moved almost bird-like with a strange bobbing of her head and neck. Her hair was frilly white, like she had a lace doily flapping around her face. She was wearing a green two-piece leisure suit, which looked to be made out of some form of velour material, and a scarf was jauntily knotted around her neck.

  She saw me and froze.

  We looked at each other, neither saying anything. I put my finger to my lips and shook my head, eyes wide and pleading. She nodded slowly, her gaze never leaving mine. I beckoned her to come in and she did so, closing the door behind. She gave little sign of being frightened at the sight of an intruder in her house, but clutched her handbag close to her chest with both hands. We stared at each other silently, waiting for the other to make the first move.

  “We have money,” she said in a low tremulous voice. “I’ll give you whatever you need.”

  She held her head high and I felt sorry for her and impressed at the same time. I abstractly wondered if she had been a schoolteacher or a governess of some sort. She looked the type.

  There was a hissing-whistle sound from outside where Stillman was gesturing frantically at me to climb out. It would take me time and effort to squeeze through the window and the woman would have plenty of time to try and stop me or run to get her husband. I shook my head at Stillman and turned back to face the woman who hadn’t moved any further forward into the room.

  “I don’t want your money,” I said. “I’m so sorry for the intrusion. We just needed some clothes.”

  As I said this I realized how stupid it must have sounded. I was standing there dressed in expensive jeans and a leather three-quarters jacket, certainly not the picture of a homeless bum. And all I had stolen was one of her beanies.

  “Let me leave, right now,” I said, “and we’ll be out of your hair. It’ll be as if this never happened.”

  Then the front bell sounded and the woman’s head jerked toward the door, her eyes widening. I gestured furiously at her, swiping my hand under my chin so that she got the message not to do anything.

  “I’ll get it,” came the same croaky voice from down the hallway, footsteps heading toward the front door. “Who’d be calling at this hour? It better not be that Aaron from next door. If he’s lost his key again I’m of a mind to tell him we’ve mislaid the spare …”

  The woman and I continued to look at each other, and my heart was pounding away, all the different scenarios whizzing though my mind. All bad outcomes.

  The front door unlatched noisily and creaked open. There was no further sound and no further talking. I’d just counted to ten in my head when the bedroom door opened and the man, who I assumed was the husband, entered with his hands above his head. He was stooped and had a heavily lined face, a small amount of white hair poking out from under a peaked flat cap. He looked angry and, like his wife, not in the least bit scared.

  Then Stillman appeared behind him, her gun in his back, pushing him firmly but gently. She looked at me, resignation on her face, and shook her head. “What else could I do?” she said.

  “Shit, we’re taking hostages now?” I hissed.

  Stillman just grimaced and pushed the man further into the room. “Let’s find somewhere we can lock them in and get out of here.”

  I frowned. “They’ve seen us together. They can identify us.”

  “Doesn’t matter. We just need a head start.”

  The woman was still clutching her bag tightly and had not taken her eyes off me. She had a quiet defiance that was endearing.

  “What’s your name?” I said softly.

  “Margaret,” she said. “Margaret Bolton. This is Gerry, my husband.”

  “I’m sorry about this. It’s not what it seems. We’re not going to hurt you.”

  Gerry snorted, tipping his head toward Stillman. “She’s got a gun.”

  Yeah, there was that, I supposed. I looked at Stillman and raised my eyebrows. She made a resigned kind of sound and lowered her Glock.

  “We’re not criminals, just desperate,” I said to the Boltons. “I’m sorry about this but we need to secure you for a time. We can’t have you raising the alarm, at least not yet.”

  “We won’t call anyone, so you can just leave,” Gerry said, unconvincingly.

  Stillman gave him a look. “That’s not going to cut it.”

  I pushed open the door to the en suite and took a quick peek. A fairly large freestanding bathtub occupied the middle of the room, with ornate taps and accessories scattered around it. A toilet and matching bidet were surrounded by shelves and assorted toiletries. There was a single elevated window with a cross frame, which was clearly too small to squeeze a person through.

  “This’ll work,” I said, beckoning Stillman over.

  She gave it a quick once over and nodded. She motioned to the Boltons with her firearm. “In you come. This won’t be for long. I’ll make a call when we’re clear and the police’ll come and get you.”

  The Boltons considered this by staring at each other, and then Gerry shrugged. Grudgingly, but without any further delay, they shuffled into the bathroom. Stillman frisked them quickly and found a cellphone, which she confiscated. We heaved the bed and a wardrobe to jam the door closed. It looked secure enough.

  “Let’s go back out through the front door,” said Stillman, putting her gun away. We exited and walked quickly down the stairs to the sidewalk.

  “Which way?” I said, looking up and down the street. A couple walking a dog were approaching from the left, and another guy in running kit was making his way towards us from the right.

  Stillman pointed toward the jogger. “West Morgan Street is that way, I think.”

  At that moment the en suite window above us opened with a loud bang and Margaret’s head appeared. She stared at us for a second and then shouted at the top of her voice, “Help! Help us!”

  The dog walkers, with what looked like a fairly large German Shepherd, stopped
in their tracks, now only ten yards from us. The jogger had also pulled up and was looking at us. He had a cellphone in his hand and brought it to his mouth. His face became illuminated as he was connected.

  “Help! We’ve been robbed!” Margaret screamed again.

  Stillman looked at me and rolled her eyes.

  “Fuck it. Run.”

  EIGHT

  Stillman took off across the street, dodging a slow-moving truck and skipping around a newspaper dispenser on the corner before stopping to check on my progress. I hadn’t moved. The jogger was now a couple of yards from me, a tall well-built athletic-looking man with the huge shoulders and upper arms of a guy who spends too much time in the gym. Despite the cool of the night he was wearing one of those sweat tops with the sleeves ripped off. He continued to talk on the phone, giving my description to someone I guessed was the 911 operator. He saw me backing away, put the phone in his pocket and got in my face, blocking the way to Stillman, who was now watching anxiously from the other side of the road. She was clearly hesitating, not wanting to pull the gun in the street with god knew how many people watching.

  “You and me are just going to wait here now until the cops arrive,” the jogger said, planting his feet in a wide stance. He smiled, secure in his size advantage and masculinity. He had that look about him, the way he held himself, oozing an unassailable confidence.

  “It’s not what you think,” I said defiantly, trying to inject an assurance into my voice that I didn’t feel.

  He gave a derisory kind of snort, and just folded his arms. They looked like a couple of gas pipes intertwined. He shook his head slowly, as if daring me to make a move.

  I took another step back but was grabbed from behind, my arms twisted painfully upward. The German Shepherd was suddenly in my face, barking loudly and salivating. Margaret Bolton continued to scream from the window. Stillman was shouting now, waving her arms and looking up and down the street for a gap in the traffic to come back over.

  “Take it easy,” hissed a voice in my ear, presumably one of the dog’s owners. “We saw you come out the house. Cops are on the way.”

  He brought more pressure to bear and lifted my arms further upward and backward, which pushed me to my knees. Spots started to appear before my eyes and I became dizzy and lightheaded. I was starting to get angry and distressed in equal measure.

  Then Cain’s voice boomed in my head. I have given you what you need. You will know when to use it

  “What the …?” I grunted.

  “Stop struggling,” the voice from behind me came again.

  I have given you what you need

  And just like that, everything changed.

  The world was suddenly moving in slow motion, so accelerated were my thoughts. I could triangulate the exact location of the people around me with my eyes closed. The dog was subtracted to a ghost-like image consisting of pixels and blurred lines. The woman holding the leash was holding him back, but was happy to let him strain and pull in my face to scare me. I could read the thoughts of the jogger, already seeing his name in tomorrow’s local paper having assisted in the arrest of a hardened criminal such as me. The man holding my arms was excited and sure of himself, telling himself he was just wanting to do the right thing, to be a local hero. I sensed the Boltons behind their window, now quiet and watching the events unfolding with some satisfaction. And Stillman, concerned for me and scared about what she would have to do in order to extricate me, and herself, from this situation.

  All this went through my mind in a microsecond.

  My awareness was hyper-acute, my brain working like a supercomputer, analyzing every scenario and probable consequence in real time. My muscles twitched as the neurological signals driving them were accelerated. Everything was in overdrive, supercharged. My reflexes, strength, speed, all were somehow optimized to maximum performance. It was like being a passenger in a supercar, with someone else driving and in control.

  What the fuck was going on?

  Without really thinking about it I span around and launched myself off my knees, the force of my turn easily dislodging the guy’s grip on my arms. I grabbed the front of his shirt and yanked sideways. He flew through the air, landing a good ten feet away, bouncing and tumbling into the gutter. His dog reflexively jerked backward a couple of feet and stopped barking, as surprised as his owner at what had just happened. I shot out a hand and cuffed the dog around the mouth. Its head jerked sideways and it let out a whine before scampering backwards, tail between its legs. I pulled the lead out of the woman’s hand and the animal dashed into the road, dodging between the cars, and vanished out of sight.

  The meathead jogger hadn’t backed off and started to move in toward me, arms out like a wrestler, going for a hold. I took a big step in, invaded his space and thrust my open hand into his face. His nose flattened, and there was a squelchy sound and a snap. He staggered back but didn’t fall, even as the blood sprayed from the nostril that wasn’t closed off by the new deformity. He gave a snarl and dropped into a crouch and bunched his fists before swinging a haymaker into my face. I easily ducked under it and without conscious control my arms became a blur, fists finding his face easily. One, two, three punches, rat-tat-tat. He rocked back on his heels but kept his feet. Shaking his head, he swung again, a large roundhouse punch that if it hit me could have knocked my head off. However, there was no chance of that happening. The punch landed on my forearm, the impact an abstract sensation, and again I threw a dozen or so blisteringly fast punches into his gut, head, ribs. He winced with each impact and twisted trying to avoid being hit, but it must have been like trying to avoid a swarm of flies.

  His size had so far enabled him to stay on his feet but the overwhelming number of blows finally took its toll and he swayed to the side and dropped to his knees, hands over his bloody and battered face. Before he could recover I leaned back and kicked him in the face, using all my weight and speed. The kinetic energy of the blow propelled him backward into the road where he tumbled and rolled uncontrollably while cars screeched and horns blew as the traffic came to a standstill.

  My eyes scanned the street, overhead, everywhere, seemingly in tetrachromatic vision, searching for other threats. But there were none. The dog owner was crouched over her partner, cradling his head in her hands. He looked okay, but dazed. The dog was long gone. The Boltons were still at the window, dumbstruck at what they’d witnessed. They stared at me, their mouths wide open, their brains not quite registering the events of the last minute and a half.

  With the traffic halted, Stillman ran across the road dodging the stationary vehicles with their gawking drivers. She must have seen something in my eyes because she held up both her hands and pulled up a couple of feet away.

  “Whoa there, it’s me. What the fuck happened? How did you do that?”

  The scene was certainly chaotic. Drivers were getting out of their vehicles, many holding their cellphones up taking photos and video, lights flashing. People were starting to overcome their initial fear and hesitation and were beginning to wander over toward us.

  I grabbed Stillman by the arm. “There’s no time. We’ve got to go. Now!”

  We took off and jinked down the first side street we could find. The lighting was thankfully dim, and traffic was sparse. I was still seeing things faster and clearer than normal, but the effects were starting to wear off. I picked the first house on the right and pulled Stillman into an alleyway running down its side. As we ran, my vision and senses continued to take in all the surrounding areas, full alert and geo-mapping in real time. My brain was still on overdrive, and it seemed as if I could remember every detail of the streets and houses we passed. Every image was saved and locked in, every bit of my brain, every terabyte of storage, was able to be accessed and processed and made available.

  We came to the end of the alleyway and turned into another yard, keeping to the side of the fencing. I set a grueling pace which Stillman followed without complaint, only occasionally grabbing my h
and when I periodically pulled up short to sneak a peek around a corner before setting off again. My hair was sticking to my forehead, slick with perspiration, sweat rolling down my back in thick salty drops. My heart was racing but my breathing was easy, and it felt like I could run forever. My feet pounded the tarmac, eating up the yards, as my head swung from side to side taking in the surrounding streets, roads, houses and pedestrians and logging them as potential threats or mere obstructions. Stillman’s rasping breathing was sounding more strained as we bolted down a garden path, the sound of our feet slip-slapping and echoing around the walls of two adjacent townhouses.

  “Where you taking us?” she managed in between wheezes.

  “A shortcut,” I said, glancing backward. “We’ve got a bus to catch, remember?”

  NINE

  I was exhausted.

  As drained as if I’d just completed a marathon. The energy was leaking from my body, like a battery with power dropping by a bar a second, like a deflating bicycle tire. The analogies came thick and fast.

  We were slumped in the back seats of the Greyhound bus. It was about half full, but the nearest passengers were three rows ahead. It’d pulled out of the station only a few minutes after we got on board, the driver announcing that the time to New York was approximately eleven hours including a couple of stops and we should make ourselves comfortable. Stillman had bought a couple of Cokes from a machine, and I’d drunk them almost in one gulp. I was on my second Snickers bar, stomach growling noisily like a bear in springtime waking up from hibernation. I wolfed down the rest of the chocolate, wiping my mouth on the sleeve of my jacket.

  “Refueling?”

  She was watching me carefully, a concerned look on her face. I needed to sleep and felt like a zombie, kinda alive but also dead. My knuckles were red and swollen and starting to hurt. Making fists just intensified the soreness and made me grimace in pain. Stillman reached over and gently ran her hands over them, massaging the joints and tendons. I smiled gratefully and gave her hand a reassuring, if painful, squeeze.