Guess Who

by Chris McGeorge

  Mandy had other ideas, however, as she clutched her wrist which was blossoming with color, and with a primal scream, she launched herself at Sheppard. Sheppard dodged too late, and the two went sprawling into the alcove near the main door.

  They both fell to the floor, Mandy on top of him. He grabbed her wounded wrist and she growled in pain, losing grip of the knife. It clattered off to the side and as Sheppard followed it with his eyes, he saw Ryan at the other end of the room, taking Constance’s handcuffs off. Headphones was still on the bed, stunned.

  A second later, Mandy was back, her hands around his neck. Her grip was strong and he rasped for the thick air that had enveloped the room, but her frame was still light. He forced her off him and she went flying into the closet, which stood open. She slammed against the wall and he lunged for her. She dodged and her nails plunged into his leg. Sheppard went careening forward. His fist struck the wall and kept going. It was plasterboard, thin and slight, a weakness in the walls of the room. His motion stopped as a shard of board dug into his wrist. It was stuck.

  Mandy panted behind him. She reached behind her, no doubt picking up the knife. He pulled at his wrist, but the more he pulled, the more it seemed to get stuck. He looked over his shoulder as Mandy advanced toward him, knife in hand.

  “Mandy,” Sheppard said, pulling and pulling but getting nowhere.

  “You don’t know how long I’ve waited to hear you beg, to hear you scream,” Mandy said, lifting the knife.

  “No,” Ryan shouted and lunged at Mandy.

  Mandy was surprised by the noise and turned as Ryan collided into her. Sheppard saw what was going to happen before he heard the scream. Mandy turned the knife on Ryan, sweeping it around. Ryan grabbed Mandy, as the knife plunged into his stomach.

  Ryan howled.

  Mandy looked shocked. “I—I...”

  Ryan clutched at his stomach, blood pouring out from between his fingers. He sank down to his knees.

  Mandy held the knife up—now decorated with Ryan’s blood. Her eyes seemed to be processing what she had done.

  Sheppard took his chance pulling as hard as he could on his wrist. It came free, along with half of the plasterboard. He lunged at Mandy, bending down to pick up the cuffs, and he barreled into her. Mandy yelped and raised the knife again. Not caring anymore, Sheppard ignored it and as the knife came down, he just got to her other wrist first. The knife lurched back up as Sheppard got the handcuff around her wrist. Click—as it locked into place.

  Mandy squawked. She slashed at him, but wasn’t able to reach him. Even so, the blade ripped through the shoulder of his shirt, grazing his skin. He lunged at Mandy’s free arm between slashes, forcing it around the back of her to meet the other. Even as he closed the second cuff, she tried to slash at him. But when the cuff touched her bitten wrist, she dropped the knife through pain. It clattered off the wall and fell to the floor.

  “No,” Mandy screamed, over Ryan’s grunts.

  “Is he okay?” Sheppard said, looking round to Ryan’s fallen body. His head was propped up by the bed box spring, looking down at his stomach. Headphones had taken the edge of the duvet and was pressing it to his stomach. It was already turning red, even through the thick layer.

  “He’s losing blood,” Headphones said.

  Mandy had given up any discernible language and snarled at Sheppard, alternating whoops and growls.

  What to do? What to do?

  Sheppard opened the bathroom door, trying to push Mandy toward it. She didn’t budge, obviously seeing the dead bodies of Simon Winter and Alan Hughes. He pushed her harder and she went careening into the room, her hands locked behind her back.

  “Sheppard,” Mandy shouted, and he would never forget the cold, murderous way she said it—she really wanted him dead. Was she like that before, or was this what Eren did to people? “I might not have done it, but you know he will. Kace is going to kill you. And then he’ll come back for me.”

  Sheppard slammed the bathroom door and almost instantly there was hammering on the other side. He held his foot against the bottom of the door, ignoring the screams. Until they subsided. He took his foot away. There was nothing—she was stuck in there.

  He went to Ryan. “Ryan, are you okay?”

  He looked up at Sheppard and moved his mouth but no sound came out.

  “He’s dying, Sheppard,” Headphones said, her hands slicked red. “We need to stop the bleeding. We need to get help.”

  Sheppard pressed his hands down around the area too. “We can’t do that. There’s no way out.”

  “We know who murdered Winter. Isn’t it over?” Headphones said.

  “I don’t know.”

  But as he said that, he heard something. Where there was nothing before, there was a small whirring sound.

  Sheppard slowly released his hands and got up. He went around Ryan and Headphones to look at the timer.

  Three minutes. Twelve seconds.

  He watched it. It didn’t change. It had stopped.

  Sheppard breathed out forcefully, expelling all the panic. “I think it’s stopped. I think the air came back on.” He looked down at Headphones and Ryan, his head lolling from side to side, a hum escaping his lips. Headphones wasn’t looking at him. She was looking into the cupboard. He went around to her, looked her in the face. “What?” Inside the cupboard, the fake plasterboard wall had crumbled away to reveal a brick wall behind it. One of the bricks had come free, and in the gap, Sheppard saw an opening. “I think it’s loose,” he said, peering at it. He lifted his leg and kicked at the brick wall. The dust of old concrete and brick showered down, but nothing moved.

  He ignored the slight jolt of pain in his foot and did it again. Still nothing.

  Ryan’s moans drove him to carry on, kicking the wall again and again until finally the wall collapsed in a satisfying thud.

  There was a small opening behind the wall, an opening with a ladder. He stuck his head into the hole he’d made and looked up. It was dark, but the ladder seemed to carry on climbing into the darkness. He turned back to Headphones.

  “It’s a ladder. I think it’s a way out.”

  Headphones couldn’t look happy—a ghost of relief was barely there, but he saw it. She moved the segment of duvet down so she could press on Ryan’s wound with a fresh piece. “You need to go,” she said. “Get help. Ryan’s not going to last much longer.”

  “But I can’t leave you...”

  “Sheppard,” Headphones snapped, looking older than she ever had, “you have to go. You wanted to save us. So save us.”

  Sheppard reluctantly nodded. He took one more look at Ryan, who met his gaze only briefly. He might have imagined it but he thought he saw the young man nod too.

  “I’ll be as quick as I can,” Sheppard said. “I’ll be back for you.”

  “Go,” Headphones said, impatiently.

  Sheppard turned away. He walked into the cupboard, fitting into the dark section behind the wall. He grasped the first rungs of the ladder—feeling cold and strong. This was it—the end. So why wasn’t he more relieved?

  As he started to climb, the overwhelming feeling was one of fear.

  53

  Before...

  Kace Carver entered the lobby of HMP Pentonville at 9:00 a.m. The place had become too familiar to him. He knew the drab walls, the stained carpets, the weathered fabric of the chairs as if this were his own home. The lobby was small and cramped, with a reception desk masked in a sheet of thick plastic. Kace went up to the desk and slipped his visitor’s permit through the small slot on the desk.

  “I’m here to see Ian Carver,” he said, not bothering to look at the specimen behind the desk and behind the plastic. This always played out the same. He had no need for pleasantries. Next, there would be a spell where the pass was verified and then the great charade would begin. Kace would be searc
hed, his belongings scanned and then he would be ushered into a room even shabbier than this one. A room filled with tables and chairs and hopeful prisoners looking for their loved ones. He hated it. It was pitiful and it was weak. The lack of hope sealed them all in a vacuum.

  “Hmm...” the woman behind the plastic said. A new sound. That wasn’t the sound they usually made. Kace looked at her. Through the plastic, she looked slightly distorted, but she was an elderly woman, wearing a drab dress. She had a peacock brooch above her left breast. Probably against code. “I’m sorry, Mr. Carver, can you wait a second?”

  She gestured to the seating area and Carver drifted off. He didn’t sit. He wondered what that “Hmm” was all about.

  The woman behind the plastic picked up the telephone and dialed. Kace couldn’t hear what she was saying and she’d brought her hand up to mask her mouth.

  He stood still, not lifting his eyes from the woman, as she had her silent conversation. She put the phone down and smiled to him.

  “Just a few minutes, Mr. Carver.”

  “Can I go through?”

  “One of the officers on duty is coming to meet you, Mr. Carver. Have a seat.”

  Kace didn’t sit. He stared at the receptionist for a number of minutes before a short skinny man in a suit came around the corner. He looked uncomfortable, as though he may spontaneously combust at any second. There was no way that he was a guard—this man couldn’t police a slice of toast.

  “Mr. Carver,” the man said, holding out a shaky hand.

  Kace took it. It was cold and clammy. Something was very wrong.

  “I am Evan Wright, the family liaison officer for Pentonville. Would you follow me to my office?”

  “I’d rather like to see my father instead.”

  Evan Wright offered a short smile. “Please.” And he gestured down the hallway.

  Without any real alternative, Kace followed the officer into a small office, filled with filing cabinets and stacks of paperwork.

  The man slid behind the desk and sat down, instantly seeming to calm down. Now there was a desk between them, everything was okay. Kace sat.

  “When was the last time you saw your father, Ian Carver?” Mr. Wright said.

  “Last week. During weekend visiting. Has something happened?”

  “How did he seem to you?” Mr. Wright said, ignoring Kace’s question.

  “He was fine. He was in prison. He was as fine as he could be. Can you tell me what is going on?” Kace was starting to get agitated, and he knew what he got like when he was angry. Dr. Winter’s voice echoed in his head, “Use the anger. Don’t let it control you. You control it.”

  Wright held up a hand, as if predicting Kace’s outburst. He put it down and smiled that short sad smile again. “Your father seemed very odd this past week. He is usually obedient. He usually keeps his distance from the, let’s say, more colorful characters we have here at Pentonville. But suddenly, he started getting on the wrong side of those very same people.

  “Prisons are weird places. There’s no real concept of time. Things can change at the drop of a hat. Your father started to make enemies. Powerful enemies.”

  “Why?”

  “We were hoping you knew.”

  “No. He. He...” Kace said, trying to grasp words just out of reach, “he was fine.”

  “As far as we can tell, he was going through some kind of psychological crisis.”

  “As far as you can tell? You run the prison. Just ask him, for God’s sake,” Kace said.

  That smile again. That was the moment Kace knew. They hadn’t asked Ian Carver because there was no Ian Carver to ask.

  Mr. Wright cleared his throat. His eyes flitted away from Kace every few seconds, as if looking at an invisible checklist of things to tick off. “We are to understand that this is around the anniversary of your mother’s death? Maybe that was why Mr. Carver was...unpredictable. I’m afraid he was involved in an altercation.”

  “An altercation?” Kace said, almost laughing. How cowardly this man was, this Mr. Wright. Wright couldn’t even look him in the eyes, let alone put a name to what had happened to his father.

  “Yes,” Wright said. “Your father and some other prisoners fought, and...”

  “He’s dead,” Kace finished, begging for the other man to correct him.

  Instead, Wright just looked at him. “I’m very sorry.”

  “Sorry?” Kace said, expecting to shout but instead whispering. “Sorry? Where were the guards?”

  “There will be a full investigation into how this was possible.”

  “Who did it?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Who killed my father?”

  “I’m afraid I can’t tell you that.”

  “I want you to tell me who killed my father.” Something uncurled inside Kace, some creature which had been asleep for a long, long time. An insatiable anger. And he wanted to laugh. He wanted to howl. And now his father was dead.

  “We will do everything in our power to work out what and how this happened. On behalf of HMP Pentonville, you have our condolences. Everything will be done to support you at this difficult time.”

  Kace got up. “My father is dead,” he said, tucking his chair in to the desk. “I have no further business here.”

  He walked out of the office, ignoring the fact that Mr. Wright was shouting to him about details and follow-ups and inquests. He walked out of the reception, even as the receptionist begged him back to sign some forms and check out. He walked across the parking lot and made it to his car, as other visitors were arriving to see their, no doubt living, loved ones.

  He sat in his car for a long time. He sat there in silence, barely moving, barely even breathing. It was a cold day but it felt even colder now. His father was dead. He was a thirty-three-year-old orphan. Why did that bother him as much as it did? He was alone. He sat in his car for a long time.

  He just sat there.

  And at some point, he started to laugh.

  54

  It went on forever. Up and up and up, like he was climbing out of Hell itself. His calf throbbed with pain every time he put his left leg down on one of the steel bars of the ladder. His leg ached where Mandy had dug her nails into him. Somewhere below him, he could hear Ryan and Headphones. It felt wrong to leave them, but what could he do?

  It felt like he was back in the vents. The air was thinner here than it had been in the room. It took a lot of effort to heave himself up the ladder.

  He had just got used to the cycle of effort and pain when he almost slammed headfirst into the hatch. It seemed invisible in the darkness—a nondescript lid on all the terrors happening below.

  He sensed it just in time and stopped, putting a hand out to feel above him. It felt cold and strong. He ran his fingers across it and found a steel wheel in the center. He redistributed his weight, making sure he wouldn’t fall, and grasped the wheel with both hands. It was stiff but after a few seconds it started to turn. He steadied himself and turned until he felt the seal open. He pushed on the wheel and it started to come free.

  He felt the hatch move—start to open above him. It was heavier than he expected—requiring all the strength he had left to push it. Finally, he wrenched it up and over the hinge. It made a dull scraping sound as it rested open against something.

  He took a deep breath of cold fresh air and stuck his head out. He was in what looked like a small stone outhouse. Tight and narrow, and somewhat hastily built. He could see sunlight through the gaps between the wonkily placed stones of the four walls.

  He pulled himself out of the hatch and finally set his feet on solid ground, a sigh escaping him. He ran his hand over the stones of one of the walls, cold and rough against his fingers. They felt real, more real than anything he’d experienced today.

  The door was wooden and rotten, hanging
slightly off its hinges. On the back of it was a moldy poster of a soldier talking to someone. “They talked...this happened. Careless talk costs lives.”

  World War II. A World War II bunker. That must have been where he was—what the place was built for. A repurposed World War II bunker made up to look like a room in The Great Hotel. He had been fooled, hell, even the man who worked at the hotel had. The level of detail was astonishing. It really had been a hotel room in Central London. A very public place. But it wasn’t. Really, it was just some nondescript bunker in the ground. Sheppard wondered how long it had taken to make something up like that and kept coming back to how much effort it had all been. The repurposing of the bunker, orchestrating everyone’s kidnappings, keeping them all under until it was ready for them to wake up, placing the clues.

  The one, horrible thought.

  Eren must really hate me.

  Hate didn’t seem an adequate word.

  Sheppard reached the door and slowly pushed it open. Sunlight flooded the outhouse. So bright, it blew out his vision for a few seconds. He shielded his eyes and looked out. A field—lush and green. Not quite the bright, airy summer’s day he now knew to be manufactured down in the bunker. More dull and cold. The wind greeted him, whipping across his face as he stepped out. Seagulls cawed and he smelled salt in the air. He looked toward the noise as a couple of seagulls emerged from beyond the field. There, the grass grew longer and more disparate. Were they near the sea?

  He looked the other way and saw only more fields. He decided the hill was the way to go and started walking. Following a hunch. Although he couldn’t really rely on hunches anymore. He was a fool, and everyone knew it. Especially Eren.

  But where was he?

  He knew he was in Britain. He could feel it, smell it, sense it in the way you can do when you are home. But quite where he was, he had no idea.

  More seagulls and as he climbed the hill, he looked up to see the birds making their way across a sky plagued with dark clouds. Two of the birds dipped and swirled through the sky, keeping pace with each other. Free. Together.