by Stuart Keane
Oedema
By
Stuart Keane
Copyright © Stuart Keane
Cover art copyright © MB Design
Published: October 13, 2017
Publisher: Stuart Keane
The right of Stuart Keane to be identified as author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved.
This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
‘Oedema’ is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
For more information about the author, please visit www.stuartkeane.com
For more information about the cover artist, please visit www.michaelbrayauthor.com
Also by
Stuart Keane
Author
The Customer is Always…
Charlotte
All or Nothing
Whispers – Volume 1: A Collection
Cine
Grin: A Dani Scott Novel #1
Whispers – Volume 2: A Second Collection
89
Awakening
8 Church Field
Amy
Whispers – Volume 3: A Third Collection
Outbreak
Dani: A Dani Scott Novella
All Tied Up With String – Personalised Stories
#1 – Sketch
#2 – Cipher
#3 – B-Side
#4 – Yo-Yo
#5 – Primitive
#6 - Atonia
Collaborations
The House That Hell Built
(With Matt Shaw and Michael Bray)
Gemini
(With Matt Hickman)
Acknowledgements
For me, Oedema will always be known as the horror novel of career firsts.
The title is a result of a six-month struggle with severe creative indifferences. A few months in, Oedema stood tall in my first striking bout of literary self-doubt, and it was present when I had my first career moment of 'shall I jack it all in?' All of these moments were set to awaken me from my realised dream of becoming a horror author.
But, I overcame them for one simple reason: You. The reader.
Therefore, I wish to thank everyone who is reading this title (and any other title, for that matter). To all of my readers, new and old, thank you!
I wish to thank Neil and Julia, as always, for their unrivaled support in the editing room.
I wish to thank Hannah, Nicky, Alex, Matt, Maxine, Joseph, and Scott – all of you helped bring this book to fruition, for various reasons, and you all played a key part in getting this book to publication. Beta reading, vital research, lending your names to main characters, unanimous support, you brought it all. My job was so much easier because of it.
A special thank you to Mandy Tyra. This woman was a creative rock throughout the production of Oedema – her ability to spot not only inconsistencies – a standard part of the writing and rewriting process – but also segments that can be tweaked to elevate a story, is second to no one. Thank you.
And of course, a thank you to my literary inspirations, particularly Richard Laymon and Shaun Hutson. This book is a bi-product of your major influence in my early reading years. I only wish you could be reading it.
Enjoy!
For Ron and Jean Damiral.
You touched our lives in so many ways.
Without you, my childhood would have been incomplete, I may have never discovered the fabled land of the horror genre, one that holds so many rich and valued memories, and my family values would vastly differ.
I would have missed that early inspiration to pick up a book, and the fulfilment of my literary dreams, something I first discussed with you aged seven, would seem a little less special.
In short, without you, there would be no Stuart Keane.
You helped shape my path as much as anyone, and I will always be thankful for that. May you both find peace away from the real monsters that lurk in our realm, united in that endless blue residence in the sky.
Love you.
PROLOGUE
Fiona Markos owed her current life to the people and the government of the United Kingdom, but right now her mission was her top priority, her one and only concern. Sacred loyalty didn’t ooze through her cold veins, and it didn’t inspire her to ambition, or make her a better person; hell, Fiona knew she was a rotten apple, bad to the core, and despite owing her current state of affairs to the people of this country, she'd used them for everything they were worth.
All part of the bigger picture, everything is but a piece in an intricate puzzle.
Fiona finished her espresso and remained seated, her sullen grey eyes observing the social chaos before her. She inhaled deeply, enjoying the fiery smell of fresh ground coffee and the sweet essence of baked pastries. The shop was abuzz with routine early morning activity; morose commuters on their way to work, students taking a detour for their discounted beverage, a vice now as essential to the educated as a large crate of energy drink or untold, late hours of cramming. A brusque woman with two children, both of whom were squirming in her tight grip, ordered a coffee and two fruit juices to go. Her voice was low, baritone, her orders short – the kids instantly fell in line, now listening to their mother, disciplined.
Fiona allowed a brief smile. There might be hope for humanity after all.
And then she noticed the baristas behind the counter, two young women mooching back and forth with no pep in their step, their very movements fatigued with heavy student debt and laziness, and lack of any positive job prospect. The body language said it all – fresh out of university with nothing to look forward to. Her gaze flicked to the student customers and back again; in a couple of years, they would be forced into this exact employment situation, not through any fault of their own, but through the mismanagement of this very country at the hands of the government workers responsible for making sure it didn’t sink into the ocean that held it afloat. Hands that were letting the sand of the country's future slip through their wobbling, cowardly fingers. Simple minds that allowed their racially biased, moronic, unadvised population to vote for something as vitally important to the dwindling economy as Brexit.
Fiona's gaze remained on the bored baristas.
Neither was smiling, and neither had a reason to do so.
Just two more lost souls on the never-ending highway of life, with no turn-off in sight.
Fiona knew the signs.
After all, she'd been there once before.
She'd lived that pitiful existence. Suffered, struggled, towed the burden of the breadline, existed without notice, like many foreign women were forced to do in the modern day. Her daily routine was a crapshoot; who would talk down to her next, which yob on the street would hurl racist insults in her direction, and what trivial event had the potential to send her spiralling into a deep, silent depression? Despite her negative place in life, and her hesitant decision to live it through until something meaningful came along, she always aspired for more, and got absolutely nothing in return.
> Then she married, and found a husband who loved her and adored her.
That’s when her life completely changed.
Jeremy Markos; a cinema manager who, as a result of his tedious, unfulfilling vocation, saw the positive in everything, saw the brightness inside people that simply didn’t exist. She knew this because Fiona was a prime example; full of darkness and unresolved greed, brimming with hatred for her fellow man. It ate her up inside, and it required a measurable amount of will power to keep it hidden, to keep it controlled. She didn’t have a good bone in her slim, attractive body, yet Jeremy placed her atop an unreachable pedestal, luminous and glaring, her lustrous charcoal hair ringed with a perfect golden halo.
He had false hope because Fiona allowed him to.
Because They allowed him to.
She didn’t correct him, didn’t reveal the truth about her alliance with They, a mysterious organisation who resided in the deepest shadows. Why do so? It made her one goal – the first thing in her life that provided her pitiful existence any useful meaning – that much easier. Fiona was in a marriage, she had a 'husband', a meal ticket, her solace in a country that willingly allowed foreigners onto its shores, but didn’t prevent its residents from disparaging them. The marriage provided her a social protective blanket, a shield; the perfect sanctuary until the final moment of truth. Now, aside from the odd remark in the street or a racist chuckle from her workmates, she continued to go unnoticed, but in a completely different way. Business as usual.
Which was the plan until the pivotal time came. After that, she just didn’t care.
And Jeremy would be devastated, but that was none of her concern.
He was nothing to her, in the long run.
Well, not entirely.
He was a glorified patsy, basically. A man who mistook her single selfish goal in life for adoration and love, a buffoon who saw the positive aspects inside her fractured soul, fragments of her personality that existed only through the blurred spectacles of love. Fragments that couldn’t be any further from the murky, hallowed truth.
Love. It really does filter the mind, applies the blinkers to the truth and reality.
Fiona didn’t mind. She had the one goal, and would do anything to obtain it. The blinkers of naïve love not only made that goal easier to obtain, but it would provide her the perfect alibi when the moment was right. Her marriage was a constructed sham, but only she knew that. Jeremy could eventually take the fall, if all went to plan.
The chances of living through this are slim, she thought.
You can't be captured, no matter what. Patsy or not, you can't fall into the oppositions clutches. If you die, Jeremy will take the fall to protect your affiliation with They. Your plan is in place to ensure that happens.
She shrugged. So be it.
All part of the bigger picture, everything is but a piece in an intricate puzzle.
Fiona reluctantly lifted her brown rucksack into her lap. She wiped a streak of dirt from the front pocket and unzipped the bag slowly, drawing the metal sliver up and over in an extended arch. Her nervous eyes danced around the coffee shop, observing the occupants. No one was nearby, no one was taking any notice of her sudden movement.
People have a habit of doing that, she thought.
Sticking their nose where it doesn’t belong.
It makes our mission a little more difficult, but we learn to adapt and fit in.
We always do, despite the adversary.
Taking a deep breath, she glanced downwards, pulled the rucksack flaps apart and looked inside. Her eyes danced over the four items that sat there, innocent and idle, shrouded in darkness. Four items she carried on a daily basis, but only three items that her work security were aware of. The fourth package was completely separate, something entirely different. Every day, she would pass the security checkpoint and, after a routine investigation or chat, be allowed through. After all, to her oblivious workmates, Fiona was a woman who loved her coffee, adored her paperbacks, and was addicted to sugar – or more accurately, chocolate bars.
Or so they thought.
Coffee was a given. It was readily available anywhere, and when working on a budget, or trying to remain inconspicuous, you don’t drink anything that sticks in the mind. Imported fizzy drinks, green tea, exotic beverages that catch a person's curious eye – all out. The last thing you need is someone remembering and latching onto your unique drinking habits. The key was to blend in, to be boring and make zero friends. She stuck to the basics, coffee and water. Everyone has access to free drinks in the workplace.
Fiona loathed reading. She couldn’t think of a worse way to spend her precious time. It was right up there with watching offensive movies and listening to tedious music. Western culture was the epitome of why she chose this particular path, 'artistic' dirt and drivel created by the enemy, creative media that she abhorred. Media that normally scapegoated her fellow countrymen – her real countrymen, not the people of the United Kingdom, the parasites she shared living and breathing space with.
The humans she so despised.
And chocolate bars? Merely a ploy to make the final piece of the puzzle work so … effectively. A red herring, a decoy of the mind, so to speak.
But nothing compared to the fourth box.
That's where the magic nestled.
And today, like a grand finale, the magic would be revealed.
She took one final look at the coffee shop, said her goodbyes silently in her mind – after all, it had been a part of her routine for several months now – and stood up to leave. She patted her bag and headed onwards. Towards her mission.
Towards her goal.
All part of the bigger picture, everything is but a piece in an intricate puzzle.
And the final piece was moving into place.
Fiona walked through the plan in her mind's eye. Step by step, phase by phase, leaving nothing out. She'd done it a thousand times, walked through it meticulously, all in preparation for this single moment. She imagined a permanent, worn indent in the cerebral tissue of her brain, a shallow groove left by a tiny imaginary version of herself, going over the plan endlessly for the past seven months, like someone walking the same path routinely for days. For a few fleeting seconds, her brain was an acre of crisp green grass with a dry dirt track pummelled into it, and the plan was a simple pathway to another destination.
She chuckled inwardly at such a notion.
It lasted two seconds, and she didn’t have time to laugh. Time was precious.
After all, she knew there wasn’t much of it remaining.
Fiona closed her eyes, placed a fist to her lips, murmured something beneath her breath, and opened them again.
It's time.
Fiona Markos opened her car door and eased out into the car park. As she closed it silently, she roamed her gaze in both directions, and took in her surroundings. Several cars sat idle and alone, glistening with slick, dispersed rainfall. She sniffed the crisp, cool air and inhaled deeply; the rain was gone but it would soon return, just as the weather forecast had predicted. Her gaze located the gloomy clouds above, and her honey-coloured skin felt cool in the moist air. She did everything in her power to resist smiling.
She strolled across the car park as she pushed the key fob to lock the vehicle. Her footsteps echoed loudly in the silence, huge clonks of leather on slick cracked concrete. Her rucksack jostled against her back, the weight pushing against the small of her spine. She walked beneath a blue awning that had seen better days, and entered a set of grey double doors, all battered sheet steel and no windows. The doors were heavy, but she opened them easily. She'd managed for seven months, nothing new there.
Right, now I'm in.
Phase one complete. No one saw me.
The first component of the plan was vital. Fiona needed to leave a paper trail, so to speak. She needed to exist in the working system, provide herself an electronic alibi. If the mission was to go south, and it sure could once the shit hit the fan, she need
ed to be safe, tucked away in her small corner office, working her usual nine-to-five, as usual.
With a deep breath, she walked down a narrow brown hallway, shoes squeaking on the clean tiles, and turned the corner.
Which is where the plan became very difficult.
For the past month, five days a week and eight hours a day, from Monday to Friday, Fiona had checked in through security with a large man named Ben. She didn’t know Ben aside from his plastic name tag and his heightened sense of authority, one that regularly oozed off security guards like musk from a cat in heat.
Gradually, with a flirty smile and a nod, with familiarity and recognition, with the natural sense of workplace safety, a lapse in judgement that every human eventually succumbs to, Ben stopped searching Fiona. He would simply nod in her direction, remember her exquisite smile and the innocent walk that accentuated her petite rump. He would let her pass without a second thought. She continued working the angle, adding items to her rucksack on a daily basis, emphasising her hips during her walk, and developing her harmless persona. Over time, her bag went from half empty to full within a few weeks, and Ben was none the wiser. Today, the bag was full also, but for the first time it contained the most vital aspect of her mission. The weeks of practice had been in preparation for this exact moment.
Which was fine.
But Ben wasn’t on duty today.
A short, stout man sat in his place.
Shit.
Fiona stopped short and felt her insides freeze, her stomach plunge a few inches. The weight on her back suddenly became unbearable, unseemly, burning through her blouse like a scorching stove. It was too late now, she was committed, and she couldn’t turn around and leave now, because it would draw attention to her actions. She couldn’t be late either, for the same reason. A new security guard would be itching to find fault with someone on his first day, and she would be putting a big fat target on her back.