From the Torment of Dreams

by Iain McKinnon

  Shaking his head he pulled the handle inwards.

  Nothing. The door was locked.

  He knocked on the hard metal surface.

  “Yo! Anybody home?”

  A key turned in the lock and the door swung outwards.

  Through the crack Zinner could see a hallway which he knew from the satellite scans ran to the radar tracking control centre. Standing in the entrance two guards waited.

  “What do you want?” a guard asked.

  “I'm with Services,” he pointed to the badge on his jacket, “I got a call about the elevator being out of order.”

  The guard at the rear walked over to the lift and pressed the call button.

  “What do you know, it is broken,” he said nudging the unresponsive call button.

  “Yeah? Let's see some paper work,” demanded the closest guard.

  “Um, I forgot to pick it up, sorry,” Zinner shrugged apologetically.

  “I'm sorry too pal. I can't let you in without clearance. Those idiots on the door should have told you that.”

  “They did but they let me in cause they knew the foul mood the shift supervisor would be in if he had to hike up these stairs,” Zinner thumbed back the way he came.

  The guard slowly shook his head his lips twitching as if he were shifting an imaginary toothpick, “Not half as pissed as my C.O. would be if he found out I'd let you in.”

  The guard at the door looked back at his colleague, “Anyway would do the fat fucker some good to get the exercise.”

  At the elevator door the second guard laughed.

  This was Zinner’s opportunity. Before the guard could turn back round Zinner had his pistol in his hand.

  Muzzle almost touching the man's neck, Zinner’s shots all but severed the mans head from his body.

  By the elevator the second guard had started to raise his rifle when a volley of three shots punched into him.

  He fell to the ground, rifle clattering by his side.

  Zinner knew the noise of the shots would have been heard in the Control Room. He dropped to one knee, pushed the aluminium briefcase behind him and crouched hard against the wall.

  The door at the opposite end of the hall sprang open.

  Two soldiers emerged, one stood with his rifle trained while the other threw himself down the corridor to lie prone.

  It was a standard cover and move formation. Zinner knew it better than his opponents.

  “First target: support man,” Zinner's mind ran on autopilot.

  “Three shots. One to adjust aim. Two and three to neutralise objective.”

  All three rounds thudded home, grouped neatly around the heart.

  At the edge of his vision Zinner subconsciously registered the first defender falling to the ground but his attention was already on his next mark.

  The second man was lying prone but it was the same procedure. He aimed his three shots between the man's helmet and his shoulder to try and hit him in the neck. He watched the impact of the ammo as it seared through flesh.

  All but one.

  The last shot hit the man's shoulder and with a visible spark it ricocheted.

  “Body armour,” Zinner mentally registered the meaning, “My targets might not have been neutralised.”

  Zinner released the clip and let the magazine clatter to the floor. It wasn't yet empty but he decided it was best to discard the used magazine in case he didn't have the opportunity to reload later. He secured his next magazine picked up the briefcase and edged forward.

  His cursory examination assured him that the man nearest him was dead. Drawing closer to the second body Zinner could see the rise and fall of the man's chest.

  As he lay dazed and panting a cluster of scorch marks circled around his heart. Zinner shot him in his face and stepped past.

  A red light flashed on and off at the door to the monitoring room. Zinner stepped inside, gun at the ready.

  The room was empty and still.

  “Where is everybody?” Zinner thought, “Was there another exit from the tracking station the intelligence reports might have missed?”

  It made no difference to Zinner. The hardware he had been sent to take out was sitting row after row in front of him.

  He cleared a space on one of the consoles and set the aluminium case down. Keeping his gun trained on the far side of the room he covered the only other doors, each bore a small pictogram denoting which sex the rest facility was intended for.

  He released the catches and unsealed the case with his free hand.

  Zinner checked the heavy metallic contents and the ceramic connectors. All was in order.

  The timer was pre-set so all that was needed was the press of a button to start the count down.

  A loud sob of emotion broke the silence. Zinner turned round gun aimed at the source of the crying. Calmly he crept round a bank of computers to see two men and a woman crouched under a desk.

  They wore formal shirts and ties, and all were too terrified to move. Their eyes were wide open and the men had their mouths slightly agape completing their look of shock. The woman's expression was obscured by the masculine hand clamped over her mouth, a hand that was now thoroughly drenched in tears. Zinner looked over them intensely. He could see the warm vapours rising up from the woman's evaporating tears, the hot glow of blood racing around their torsos and cold rectangles of the I.D. badges that hung around their necks. Nowhere could he see the bulge or the chill of a concealed weapon.

  “Waste bullets shooting them, or waste time killing them?” Zinner wondered as he checked the time on his watch.

  “They can't disarm the bomb anyway,” he thought and stepped back to the case. He checked the count-down on the bomb to match the one on his watch and pushed the timers one after the other.

  The numbers on the liquid crystal display whirred down towards zero. Zinners stop-watch fractionally behind.

  Zinner locked the case and leaving it on the consol he backed out the way he had come, gun covering his retreat.

  At the door to the stairs he paused to retrieve the key for the lock. He left the passageway and secured the door behind him, snapping the key in the latch. Reaching the stair he holstered his weapon and started running up the steps.

  At the entrance to the bunker a squad of military police ran up to the guards on the door.

  Much of the base was burning. Multiple explosions had ripped through the complex simultaneously.

  The corporal in charge of the six military police yelled at the sentries who flanked the doors to the command bunker, “The alarm in the control room's gone off. You two stay here and cover the entrance. Don't let anyone in or out.”

  “A maintenance guy went down about five minutes ago. You don't think it was him?” asked the guard.

  “Shit! That's our man. Come on you lot, let's move,” the corporal waved to his men and they filed in, oblivious to the subterfuge.

  Oddly enough the elevator was jammed open.

  “What the...” the NCO steadied himself from slipping on the soaking wet floor. Propped against the wall was a sodden mop.

  “The maintenance man?” the corporal said in a puzzled tone as he swung the door to the stairs open.

  Just inside the landing, stripped of their uniforms, were two dead guards. Each man had a trickle of blood emanating from a single hole in his forehead.

  The corporal's realisation came too late. A hail of fire cut into the packed group of men.

  The Corporal fell through the doorway screaming to land atop the two naked corpses. A bullet had lanced through part of his upper right arm causing his gun to slip from his grasp.

  Swearing and shaking, he scrambled to retrieve his lost weapon.

  As he grasped the pistol's handle a polished boot came firmly down across the barrel pinning it to the floor. He looked up to see the figure of a maintenance engineer.

  The maintenance engineer levelled his gun at the Neotran officer.

  “Shit,” with his last word the Corporal bera
ted his own stupidity.

  Zinner shook his head gently.

  “You two are messy!” he said wading through the dead bodies in the corridor.

  “Sorry, Sir. Got a little excited,” Speg grinned.

  The earth beneath them shuddered and a deep rumbling could be heard through the floor.

  Zinner raised his voice above the explosion, “OK, let's get out of here!”

  Outside diversionary explosions ripped through the base as planned. The three intruders wearing Neotran uniforms melted into the chaos outside.

  Section 9

  It was cramped even with Mornan away being interrogated. When all four of them were locked inside there was no way of moving without dislodging someone. The stench of excrement from their latrine bucket mingled with the smell of stale sweat and blood. Days, maybe even weeks had passed since their capture and they were all in a bad way, their open sores a hazard in such unsanitary conditions. Since their incarceration, water had been scarce and food was only used as a reward. There wasn't a word spoken between them as they languished. The strength and the will to communicate had been lost to the brutality of their tormentors.

  They all retreated into their own imagined sanctuaries. For Jackson his was back home with his wife.

  “If you'd stayed at home we would be celebrating our first anniversary by now. If you'd stayed at home...” Jackson chastised himself “Why did I leave her to go on this foolhardy mission?”

  Jackson knew the answer. It hadn't been patriotism but greed. Jackson was offered a Captaincy. Ordinarily it would be another ten years before he was offered the same position. So he had taken the promotion and reeled off excuses as to why he had to go and how he'd be OK.

  “Well, I'm far from OK! But I'm not going to die during some damn interrogation. I'm going to get back home and tell Kathy how much I love her!

  “If I co-operate maybe they will stop the torture. What harm would it do to talk?” Jackson rationalised his capitulation, “I don't know any vital secrets. I'd only be telling them what they already know. Then they'd stop the beatings. If I co-operate there'd be no reason to torture me any more.”

  The door swung open and Mornan was thrown back into the room.

  “Captain Jackson! You're coming with us!”

  Jackson looked up in surprise.

  The guards dragged Jackson out for a fresh round of beatings.

  As he was manhandled out of the cell he saw Shen fly at Mornan, laying punch after punch about him. Her blows were weak and ineffective. Her bound hands couldn't really inflict any damage but she released her frustrations on him.

  “You little shit! You told them!” she screeched, “You bastard!”

  “I'm sorry,” Mornan blubbered over and over.

  “You lied to us,” the inquisitor said. “You didn't tell us you were in charge of the whole thing,” the inquisitor moved closer. “That upsets me. After all the time we've spent together, getting to know one and other I don't feel I can trust you any more.”

  Jackson decided to tell his captor what he wanted, “I wa...”

  Smack! The inquisitor's hand slapped Jackson's face.

  “Shut up,” he yelled.

  “I've heard enough of your lies,” he paced round Jackson and whispered into his ear, “You had your chance to talk to us and when you did you told us nothing but lies.”

  The inquisitor pulled up a chair and sat next to Jackson, “Did you think it was funny?”

  He reached out his hand grabbing Jackson by the chin and forced his head up.

  “Look at me when I'm talking to you!” the inquisitor rapped Jackson's forehead solidly with his index and middle finger, “Did you think you were smarter than us? I bet you were laughing to yourself about how smart you were!”

  He stood up and screamed at Jackson, “Well, were you? Were you?”

  Jackson shook his head, “No... I...”

  The inquisitor picked up the chair he had been sitting on. In a vicious instant he’d swung it back and brought it clattering across Jackson's face.

  The blow knocked a dazed Jackson to the floor.

  The inquisitor towered over him and swinging the chair high he brought it down on top of his writhing captor.

  “Is that funny!” the inquisitor bellowed as he battered his victim.

  He brought the chair down on Jackson again, “How smart do you feel now? How smart?”

  The door opened and Jackson's unconscious body was flung into the cell.

  “Come 'ere bitch,” one of the guards called out to Shen.

  “Yeah, we've got an in-depth probing for you!” the second guard grabbed his crotch and laughed to his companion.

  “No,” Shen said weakly and tried to retreat into the corner of the cell.

  The guard grabbed her by the hair and hauled her out.

  “Where have you been?” Nicola demanded.

  “I'm sorry. I slept in. I tried to call you but I couldn't get through,” Lan tried to put his arms around her to give her a hug but she shrugged him off and started to walk away.

  “Look, I'm sorry,” Lan's voice didn't carry the full weight of his regret, “let me make it up to you.”

  “No,” Nicola said her back turned to him.

  “No.”

  Lan opened his eyes to dispel the dream.

  Shen was twitching, wrapped in a nightmare of her own.

  “No,” she spat out punctuating defiance with the kick of a leg.

  The other occupants of the room appeared to be asleep, oblivious to her nocturnal struggle.

  There was no sense of time in this eternally lit room so they slept as best they could between interrogations.

  To start with Jackson had tried to keep their spirits up by chatting, but the guards had suppressed that with their beatings. It had been wasted on Lan's deaf ears anyway.

  Lan winced from the pain in his shoulder as he tried to make himself comfortable. It ached worse than the rest of him. The dressings on the wound had, except during a cursory examination by a medic, remained in place since his rescue. A brown smudge of dried blood graced the centre of the yellowed bandage. Lan felt the physical pain that was his body, the damage from his escape from the stricken Coma Berenices. The broken ribs, the slashed tissue and his abrasion coated skin, the pain generated from these wounds served as a welcome relief from the torment in his mind.

  Robbed of perspective, all Lan could do was dwell on his memories. The despair at losing his love and despondency that for the rest of his life he would feel this loss were overwhelming.

  Softly he whispered a prayer, “I want to be dead.”

  But not even he heard it.

  Section 10

  Starved of light, the jungle floor was dank and foreboding. There were large predators in these jungles, the kind that could eat a man whole.

  They weren't Nasim's biggest concern. If a big carnivore were to cross his path it would be fearful of the strange scent humans had. If a confrontation did occur a frenzied bout of yelling would see off most potential diners.

  Nasim was not unfamiliar with this twilight world of shadows and humidity but it was fraught with dangers. As with most of life, the real threat came from what could be so easily overlooked. The flies that would transfer their virus laden juices into your blood as they fed. Plants capable of raising blistering burns on any skin they came in contact with. Streams laden with larvae, the worms of which would burrow their way out of your system by the most unsettling of routes.

  Nasim recalled a survival litany, “Be careful where you walk, be cautious of what you touch, be vigilant about what you drink.”

  Tired from his day's walk Nasim found a likely clearing and made camp for the night. Before long the last rays of light slipped away from the jungle's canopy leaving the interior dark and lonely.

  Flame licked at the air, belching out a thick corrupt smoke. The warm, dancing glow illuminated the surroundings with a billowing contortion of amber.

  Nasim's back was kissed with
a cold night breeze, a stark contrast to the scorching heat of the fire. The dwindling dusk zephyr brought with it the nocturnal tunes of the darkness outside the clearing.

  The silhouette of a man stood out against the flames. A wave of fire engulfed him and the man was gone.

  Nasim was in a corridor. A long stretching passageway, its walls and ceiling were light grey. The floor was marbled crimson. Nasim bent down to look more closely. The ground was wet and warm to the touch.

  A voice echoed down the corridor, “I am a man of honour.”

  Nasim's eyes shot wide open. He was on his own by the campfire surrounded by the sounds of the jungle.

  Nasim stood by his fire and called out at the darkness, “What does it mean?”

  Abruptly the night creatures hushed.

  “What does it mean?” Nasim called out.

  He didn't know, but it frightened him. Even with his talents he still missed his family, he still hurt from the loss and for the first time since the massacre he felt alone. Nasim felt abandoned.

  Slowly the creatures in the dark worked up the courage to start chattering again. Gradually the jungle noise grew back to its ambient level. The crackle of a fire and gentle sobs of a young man crying blended into the rest of the nocturnal chorus.

  Nasim followed the winding roads into a bustling market. It was the first time he had been to Mendus, the first time he'd been to any city. He remembered his father describing its huge size and complexity. Nasim now appreciated that what he took for exaggeration was really understatement.

  Buildings loomed above him choking out the daylight like he was stranded in the depths of a chasm. People jostled through the narrow streets as if driven by the flow of powerful currents and eddies. Nasim was swept up by the throng and carried along like flotsam. As the traders' stalls whirled past he felt his head fit to burst. The bright colours, the loud noise, and the strong smell of sweet foods all combined to disorientate him. He felt the weight of their minds babbling and pressing in on him. Concentrating he pushed the hubbub back as far as he could. But it wasn't far enough. His temples ached with the tumult outside. Nasim was lost both physically and mentally. His home and his family gone, he did not know had compelled him to this place.