by Stephen Cole
There was a noise outside the bedroom door. Someone coming. At once, he closed his eyes, curled up on his side, shammed sleep.
The door opened smoothly, silently. Opening his eyes a fraction, Jonah saw that Motti had come to call. Black was clearly the guy’s colour – like last night, he wore black jeans and a T-shirt with an all-but-destroyed white logo on the front.
Motti just stood there, all Gothic and grungy in the doorway for a few moments. Then he advanced stealthily towards the bed.
Jonah tensed, kept up the pretence he was dead to the world. But as Motti reached out for his throat, Jonah lashed out with his foot, landing an evil blow to the guy’s family jewels. Motti bellowed in pain, doubled up. But Jonah wasn’t finished yet. He sprang out of bed, wrestled Motti to the floor.
‘OK, go easy, geek,’ Motti gasped, trying to twist free.
‘The name is Jonah.’ He straddled Motti’s chest, pinning him to the floor. ‘What d’you want from me? Why’d you sneak in here?’
‘To wake you up, asswipe.’ Motti grimaced, stopped struggling and went limp. ‘We were gonna show you around. Answer your questions and stuff.’
Jonah looked at him warily. ‘How can I trust you?’
Motti smiled. ‘You can’t.’
Suddenly he bucked his whole body. Jonah wasn’t prepared, overbalanced. In a second, Motti was on top of him, pinning him to the floor.
‘You two are getting to know each other better, huh?’ Jonah looked across to see Con smirking in the doorway, in jeans and a tight red top. ‘I should shut the door, hang a Do Not Disturb sign, no? Give you boys some privacy?’
‘Funny,’ Motti muttered. He looked down at Jonah. ‘Are we through here?’
‘Whatever,’ said Jonah.
Con nodded approvingly. ‘See you downstairs.’
Motti got up, pushed his glasses back on his nose. ‘Nice move there,’ he said grudgingly, rubbing his balls ruefully. Then, to Jonah’s surprise, he offered his hand.
Jonah grimaced. ‘I’ll take the clean one, thanks.’
Motti half-smiled, swapped hands and helped him up. ‘Learned to take care of yourself in the slammer, huh?’
‘Used to get visits from guys whose idea of fun was to load a sock full of batteries and cosh the crap out of you. If you don’t get in first …’ He shrugged. ‘Sorry. I s’pose.’
‘’S OK. I know how it is.’
‘You’ve been inside?’
‘Few times.’ Motti paused. ‘But you know, man, you gotta learn a whole new way of fighting now. Coldhardt’s taught us some real moves.’
‘Didn’t notice you using them.’
‘Not allowed to kill you on the first day.’ Motti smiled wryly and gestured at the wardrobe. ‘Look, there’s clothes in there – Con chose ’em for you, so bitch at her if they don’t fit. You want to shower first, that’s cool.’ He headed for the door. ‘Meet us downstairs in twenty, ’K?’
Jonah stared after him. ‘Con chose this stuff for me?’
‘And the curtains and shit. All of it. You wanna redecorate, it’s down to you. It’s your room, geek.’
‘My room?’ Jonah stared round bewildered. ‘So, is this place where you live?’
‘Live. Plan. Play. One of the perks of the job.’ Motti was looking impatient, still rubbing at his tender parts. ‘Come downstairs, shut your mouth and open your ears – in twenty. You’ll find out all you wanna know.’
The shower was hot and powerful, the scented gels and foams light years away from the stuff he’d had inside. Engulfed in a thick white towel, Jonah chose a pair of dark boot-cut jeans and a black V-neck T-shirt. They were a perfect fit. His old trainers had been dumped in the bin and he could understand why. They hardly measured up to the Nikes and New Balances crowding the polished floor of the wardrobe.
He looked in the mirror on his chest of drawers, grimaced at how pale and pasty he looked. Then he noticed a tub of hair gel sitting open beneath it. A note had been placed inside the lid, in the same flamboyant pen – For bed head.
‘Looks like Con thinks of everything,’ he murmured, and felt once again that familiar sense of unease. He looked at the PC. A bribe? Or just a tool for him to do whatever it was he was here for?
Cautiously, Jonah opened his door, and felt a cooling breeze. Two enormous fans turned silently in the high ceiling, which was studded with spotlights. He saw now that his room gave on to a wide swathe of polished mahogany, a kind of gallery area extending from the landing. Incongruously, a retro tabletop Scramble arcade game stood beside the intricately carved balustrade.
To his left was a wide wooden spiral staircase. A strip of deep white carpet snaked down its length, bolted into the well-crafted angles with chrome stair rods. ‘Where do you lead, I wonder?’ murmured Jonah, as he crossed to the gallery and looked down on to a huge space that was more like a common room or a club than the expected grand entrance hall. The floor, painted black, was littered with fat brown cracked-leather sofas, arranged around a full-sized snooker table that dominated the room. Drinks and snacks dispensers flanked fruit machines, a wall of flickering neon to the right of the room.
‘Perks of the job,’ he breathed, smiling despite himself.
But it was the wall facing the gallery that really grabbed Jonah’s attention; a giant mural stretched across it, hazy shapes of colour against an unfocused landscape. Darker, spindly figures that might be trees or people lent uncertain detail to the scene, reaching upwards or outwards, or crouched over. It was cool, but kind of creepy, and did little to soothe the uneasy feeling in his guts.
He knew what it was. Nerves. Time and again he’d had to psyche himself up for his ‘please like me’ act – first day at a new school, or a new foster home. New faces checking him out. He’d spent his whole life trying to read the crowd, to fit in.
Except this time he didn’t long to belong.
All he wanted were some answers.
Jonah checked his watch – his twenty minutes were up. He started quickly down the spiral staircase.
But as he reached the final turn, he stopped. They were waiting for him, lined up at the bottom of the stairs: Motti, Patch, Con – and Tye.
It was Jonah’s first proper view of her, and he wasn’t disappointed. She was a black girl, cute, maybe sixteen, dressed in combats. Her hair was no longer straight but scrunched up into little braids and adorned with a couple of gauzy red ribbons. She had an oval face with well-proportioned features – no make-up, and her brows weren’t plucked like Con’s. But her eyes were striking, wide and dark as she looked up at him through thick lashes. There was something hard in her stare, something old beyond her years, and wary. She did not smile to see him.
‘Hey, cipher boy,’ said Con, effortlessly taking his attention. ‘This is the hangout. Welcome to the wrong side of the tracks.’
‘Where is this place?’ he asked, his eyes flicking from one to the other in turn.
‘Want some coffee?’ Patch, dressed in slobby blue track pants and an Anime T-shirt, headed for the rear of the room, the part Jonah couldn’t see from the balcony. It looked like it had been airlifted out of a Starbucks – a chrome counter top with industrial-sized coffee makers, juicers, even a slush-ice drink machine assembled behind it. ‘Latte? Espresso?’
‘No, thanks.’
‘You sure, mate? We got hazelnut syrup, vanilla …’
‘You’ve got a lot of stuff here,’ Jonah agreed, his attention wandering to a large alcove on his right. It had been turned into a full-on amusement arcade, with car simulators, shoot-em-ups and pinball machines.
‘Wait till you see the gym,’ Con told him. ‘The pool, too. Heated, with a wave machine …’
‘And the garage is awesome,’ Motti added. ‘We got a race circuit where we test drive stuff. You like cars, geek?’
‘I can’t drive.’
‘’S not like you need a licence here.’ Motti grinned. ‘Just take out a car and floor it. Best way to learn.’
‘Bes
t way to kill yourself,’ said Tye, crossing to the nearest sofa and flopping down.
‘Tye’s the designated driver round here,’ Con explained with a slightly disparaging look. ‘She takes it all very seriously.’
‘She’s a pilot, too,’ Patch called over admiringly from the counter. ‘She flew us here.’
They’d taken a plane? No wonder they weren’t worried about the van being hot. And if they’d flown here, Jonah supposed he could be just about anywhere.
‘How long did you make me sleep? What’s the date?’
‘See for yourself.’ Con tossed him something. He was glad he managed to catch it. It was a Rolex watch, beautiful, a Datejust with a steel strap. Had to cost a fortune. The date on the cool blue face read 26 – the same day they’d taken him. So he couldn’t be anywhere too far-flung …
Then again, they’d fixed everything else. Why not the date?
He let the Rolex fall from his fingers to the stair. ‘I have a watch, thanks,’ he said coldly.
Con turned her back on him, and Motti smiled. ‘Aw, you’ve hurt her feelings, geek. She stole that specially, just for you.’
‘Poor bastard only wanted to buy her a drink,’ said Tye, a sandpaper edge to her voice. ‘She told him to just give her the money.’
‘That’s one thing you don’t seem short of round here,’ Jonah observed, glancing around the impressive space. ‘I’m guessing you didn’t get all this stuff doing paper rounds.’
Patch rejoined the group with a steaming mug of coffee and a look of amusement. ‘Jonah, you never reckon we stole all this stuff?’
‘We earned everything you see here,’ Motti declared, ‘fair and square.’
‘What, pulling stunts like you pulled on me?’
‘Guys, I think we have got us a choirboy here, yes?’ There was no smile on Con’s face now. ‘I thought we got you out of prison, Jonah. Not a convent. What makes you think you can stand there and judge us?’
Motti joined Tye on the leather couch. ‘See, we heard you helped your last foster dad launch a new business – what was it, Patch?’
Patch didn’t hesitate. ‘Designing secure encryptions for company computer payroll systems.’
‘’S right. Only once he was up and running, you cracked your own ciphers and siphoned off the cash for yourself.’
Jonah started forward angrily. ‘It wasn’t like that.’
Motti smirked. ‘C’mon, who you kidding?’
‘I had reasons.’
‘The best reasons,’ grinned Patch. ‘You wanted cash and you knew how to get it easily.’
‘You just didn’t know how not to get caught,’ Con added.
Jonah glared at Tye, waiting for her to chip in. But she stayed silent, looking down at her hands. ‘I don’t care what any of you think,’ he said. ‘But if you’ve dragged me out here to crack some encrypted bank account or something, so I can make you and this Coldhardt guy any richer –’
Motti laughed. ‘As if! Credit us with some imagination.’
‘Well, what do you want, then?’ He gestured angrily down at himself. ‘The designer gear, the computer up there…You’re trying to buy me.’
‘No. We’re just trying to help you fit in.’ The ghost of a smile returned to Con’s face. ‘This is what life’s like when you’re one of Coldhardt’s children.’
‘His children?’ Jonah stared. ‘OK, this is getting kind of creepy now. I suppose we’re not talking adoption here?’
‘Coldhardt saved us,’ said Con. ‘From ourselves.’
Motti yawned. ‘From total boredom, you mean.’
‘From a lifetime of nothing,’ said Patch, going one better. ‘No breaks, no future. Just marking time, doing what the law says …Trying to fit in with every other no-hoper.’
‘And he brought you all here. I get it.’ Jonah stared round at each of them in turn. ‘You’re all special in some way. You have talents.’
Motti looked at Patch. ‘Think he’s hitting on us?’
‘Talents that Coldhardt can use,’ said Jonah, undeterred. ‘Patch, you’re the lockpick. Tye’s good with transport. Con does her hypnotism –’
‘Mesmerism!’ she protested.
‘You don’t even know what mesmerism really is,’ sneered Motti.
‘I know it sounds cooler than hypnotism, OK?’
‘Motti … I dunno,’ Jonah went on slowly. ‘You handled the electrics. You’re good with security systems, maybe. You get the others in and out, let them do their job.’
‘Oh, is that what I do?’ he said levelly.
‘He gets an A for effort,’ Tye observed.
Con shook her head. ‘He’s barely scratching the surface.’
‘Whatever else you can do, the point is, you’re all exceptional. Exceptionally talented misfits. What was it you said, Con – welcome to the wrong side of the tracks?’ Jonah nodded. ‘That’s where Coldhardt found you, isn’t it? In jail. Or in trouble. Alone – and easy pickings.’
‘Gee, it’s like my whole misspent youth passed before my eyes,’ said Motti sarcastically. ‘Well, listen, man – the pickings didn’t come any easier than you.’
‘I’m not for sale,’ said Jonah firmly.
‘You’re happier on your own, Jonah?’ Tye was holding him fixed with those big dark eyes of hers.
‘I get along fine.’
Con gave him an uncomprehending look. ‘Why settle for fine when you can have fabulous?’
‘Aw, it’s probably best he’s acting way above it all for now,’ said Motti. ‘He ain’t had the valuation yet. He could be leaving here faster than a cat with a firecracker up its butt.’
‘Valuation?’ Jonah looked at them uneasily.
‘You say you’re not for sale. We say we don’t know what you’re really worth,’ said Con, green eyes sparkling. ‘So it’s time you met Coldhardt, cipher boy. In person.’
Chapter Four
Jonah had to admit he was intrigued as the others led him outside. Especially when he found out that the place where they’d been hanging was just an oversized outbuilding in the grounds of a huge chateau, all crumbling stonework and sash windows. It seemed Coldhardt owned the whole estate – you’d think it was home to some crusty earl and a butler or something, not four sociopathic dropouts and their rich benefactor.
If benefactor was the word. What if his ‘children’ got caught – would Coldhardt himself show up to break them out? Or would they sit rotting in a cell till he trained up another miniature teen army?
Maybe Motti hadn’t just been mouthing off for once. If they pulled off stunts like last night’s on a regular basis, they damn well had earned all that they’d got. And none of them seemed to feel shortchanged … Except Tye maybe. The quiet one.
‘So, I’m guessing the locals don’t have you down for a bunch of criminals who hit the big time,’ he ventured.
He’d aimed the question at Tye, but it was Con who answered. ‘They think this is a kind of special school.’
‘An academy,’ Patch corrected her. ‘Like the X-Men, yeah?’
‘Except Patch is the only mutant we got here,’ said Motti. ‘Right, Cyclops?’
‘Why d’you wear a patch when you’ve got a glass eye in?’ Jonah asked bluntly.
‘’Cause Motti’s got a thing about eyes.’
‘Stow it,’ said Motti.
‘He has, and specially when I have to pop it out.’ Patch beamed. ‘Which is often. See, there’s more to my glass eye than meets – er, the eye.’
‘Lame,’ grumbled Motti under his breath.
‘In any case, the villagers are right, in a way,’ Con went on. ‘This is an academy, and Coldhardt’s a good tutor. He has taught us so much.’
‘I can imagine,’ said Jonah. ‘Quite a youth training scheme.’
They were approaching the main door to the chateau, a massive slab of dark oak framed by a thick sprawl of ivy. Jonah swallowed down his nerves. He wasn’t so much angry now as apprehensive. So far, his abductors were treatin
g him well enough. But if he couldn’t deliver whatever it was they wanted, or if he refused even to try … what then?
There was no more time to worry. Tye pushed aside some of the ivy to reveal a small keypad. Her slim fingers beat a brief tattoo on the numbers and the door clicked open.
‘Doorbell not working?’ Jonah ventured.
Patch smiled. ‘You could say the chief is security conscious.’
‘And I designed the defences for this whole place,’ said Motti.
‘It’s what he used to do in the real world,’ said Con. ‘He worked for a firm of security specialists.’
‘Man, I was the firm.’
‘Till he started turning over the places he was making so secure,’ chimed Patch.
Motti straightened his glasses. ‘Had to test my systems worked right, didn’t I?’
Tye must have noticed Jonah’s expression. ‘No, the judge didn’t believe him either.’
‘All ancient history.’ Motti led the way through to a large, immaculate hallway. ‘But it got me noticed – by Coldhardt. Anyway, like I say, I designed the defences. Like that door? It ain’t just wood, geek. It’s lined with steel, two inches thick.’
Jonah nodded vaguely. His attention had been taken by a large, unsettling statue of a man locked in combat with some weird demonic figure. The marble tableau dominated the centre of the hall, bathed in golden sunlight from two enormous windows.
‘Er … is the glass bulletproof?’
‘It’s everything-proof,’ said Motti mysteriously.
‘You’re expecting trouble, then?’
‘Always a possibility.’
Patch yawned again, flipped up his eye-patch and scratched the skin. ‘Motti’s completely paranoid.’
‘Am not.’
‘Yeah?’ Patch pulled a spooky face. ‘How do you know you’re not?’
‘Can we just get on, guys?’ Con pushed through, past the eerie statue and through one of two vaulted archways set into the back of the room.
Jonah followed with the others and turned hard right into a long, wide passage. Or was it just a long, narrow room? Huge arched windows lined the outer wall, affording a view out on to a well-manicured courtyard.
‘Cloisters,’ said Tye softly, as if listening in on his thoughts. ‘Built in 1801. It’s so peaceful here.’