Different

by Tony Butler

  “I understood that I owed fifteen thousand,” Rebecca said, puzzled.

  “Five thousand pounds was deducted yesterday by Missus Schoefield. Your balance is ten thousand pounds now.”

  “Here’s fifteen thousand pounds in cash,” Rebecca said, handing her the envelope that she’d collected from the bank. “I’d like a receipt and you can tell Missus Schoefield from me that if ever she interferes with my account again, I’ll personally arrest her for false accounting and close this place down!”

  Pocketing her receipt, Rebecca left the casino and drove back to her flat. She needed to get on her computer. She had a killer to find and perhaps a closer look at Janine Schroeder might be useful. The Schroeder’s property was near the village of Catherstone. She’d drive down there tomorrow and have a sniff around for a couple of days, and anyway she could do with a break.

  * * * *

  Janine took an instant dislike to the policeman. She’d met his type before. They were unbending martinets of the law until pension day was on the horizon, and then all their scruples were abandoned as they frantically built themselves a nice little nest egg. She’d pay him the money because he’d earned it but from now on he’d be her creature and it would be fun bringing him to heel.

  “I’m extremely grateful, Vincent,” she said, giving him her best smile. “Now it will take about half an hour to make up your cash. Perhaps you’d care to have a drink and relax while you wait?” She pressed a button on her desk and a few moments later an extremely attractive girl entered. She saw the policeman sneak a look at the pale smooth flesh of the girl’s thigh, highlighted by the split in her skirt.

  “Ah, Celeste, will you take Mister Smith up to guest room number four and make sure he gets anything he wants—anything at all.”

  For a moment Janine thought he was going to refuse the offer but he took the girl’s hand and allowed her to lead him out of the office. As soon as the door closed, she checked the monitor to make sure the hidden cameras in room four were operational and pressed the button to start them recording. She watched as the door opened and Celeste led Vincent over to the bed. Smiling, Janine switched off the monitor. She would watch the tape later. She wondered what Vincent would do when he learned that Celeste’s real name was Charlotte Davies, a fourteen-year-old runaway.

  “I’m getting worried about you, David,” she said, and was gratified to see the colour leave his face. “First there’s the cock up over my brother’s security and now I find out that you not only lied to me, but have involved me in setting up a straight DI. A DI who, incidentally, called at the cashier’s office and paid fifteen thousand pounds, that she hadn’t lost, off her fucking non-existent account!”

  “I told you why—”

  “That was bullshit and you know it. Get out of here, David, and I want Carlyle taken out of the picture permanently. I want her to simply disappear and to never be seen again. She’s a threat.”

  He’d have to go, she thought after he’d left the office. He wasn’t reliable anymore and that DI, Carlyle, was trouble. Perhaps after she’d been taken care of it would be time to bury David as well.

  Taking out her mobile, she punched in the number she’d memorised and could hear it ringing on the other end of her and Russell’s very private line.

  Chapter Nineteen

  It was getting lighter. Looking up, Adam saw the sun shining above him in irregular patches. He could see the opening of the shaft had been almost blocked by branches that lay across it. He’d found Dr. Maylor’s body and three others that were withered and unrecognisable. He assumed that the doctor had been entombed in the ice with him and thawed out before him. The top of his skull was missing and his hands were reduced to bony stumps. There was an empty metal cylinder with

  ‘LIQUID OXYGEN’ stencilled on it in red.

  Suddenly, he had a picture in his mind of a laboratory and he heard Dr. Maylor’s voice clearly.

  “Adam is the first male out of the fifteen produced in the lab and he will be our breeder of the new species. We will use his sperm to impregnate the first female child that Eve and her mate produce.” He saw another picture and now he was looking into the tall man’s eyes and heard Maylor’s voice again. “You have to give us more time.” Adam knew then that what he was seeing were Maylor’s memories! But how? Then he remembered the rats that he’d eaten – they must have been the same rats that had devoured the doctor’s brain. Somehow, he’d retained some of Maylor’s memories. Strangely, the thought didn’t frighten him. It intrigued him, and just perhaps, the Doctor could help him get out of the mine.

  He didn’t question his new bank of knowledge, just accepted it. He searched the pockets of the dead and found two cigarette lighters, which surprisingly still worked, a pack of cigarettes, and the doctor’s wallet. There were some items that he didn’t recognise and a clipboard that lay by one of the corpses. The sheets of paper fastened to it gave him an idea. He balled them up and pushed them into a shoe taken from a body. Taking the branch with which he’d beaten off the rats, he tied the shoe to it, using the laces. He knew that the paper would flare only briefly in the updraft of the shaft. But it should be enough for him to see if an escape from this shaft was possible. If not, he would be forced to follow the draft in pitch darkness until he located its source. Standing in the centre of the shaft, he used one of the lighters and lit his makeshift torch.

  The flames of the torch illuminated the shaft clearly and he could see something hanging down a few feet above his head. It was a blue nylon rope. He piled the four corpses on top of each other and, when he balanced himself on top of them, the rope was only a yard away. He bent his legs and, after fixing the position of the rope in his mind, he dropped the torch and leapt upwards. He felt the rope brush the side of his hand before he fell back to the ground. Climbing back onto the bodies, he hurled himself towards the rope again and when it brushed against the palm of his right hand, he clamped his fingers around it. It took him a long time to haul himself up the shaft and out into daylight. For a while he lay amongst the debris of the trees, grateful for the feel of the leaves and small branches on his skin. He savoured the sound of the insects that buzzed around him and the warmth of the sun. Climbing to his feet and grasping the trees for support, he forced his way through the branches that tried to bar his progress, and headed in the direction of the huts. The trail he’d used before was now completely overgrown and he wondered how long he’d been trapped in the ice. Then he remembered the girl’s scream that had awakened him. She was a Repro and alive! He had to find her.

  Adam emerged from the trees and smelt food. His stomach rumbled and as he looked down towards the huts he stopped in shock. Now there were not two huts but six, and he could see people moving around. He approached them cautiously, although he was fairly certain that the men in white suits had gone, but there were other children males and females of about his own age and younger wandering about. These people were not of his kind, though, somehow he knew that, just as he knew that another of his species was alive. He’d heard her scream and he needed to find her. Were these strangers prisoners too?

  He stepped into the open and walked towards them. One of the boys stood up from where he was sitting by the fire and came towards him.

  “Who are you? Where did you come from?” he asked and the others gathered around him curiously.

  “I’m Adam and I have always been here. I was one of the four children used in the experiments.”

  “Are you mad or what? I’ve been here nearly three years and I’ve never seen you before.” He turned to the rest of them. “Have any of you ever seen him?”

  They shook their heads and he could see that they thought he was lying, but that wasn’t important.

  “Why are you all here?” he asked. “Are you prisoners, too?”

  It was one of the girls, obviously carrying a baby in her stomach, who answered. “We have to breed and have babies so that they can be sold for adoption, and some of us will have our organs remov
ed and sold for transplants. They’ve got Emma up at the house now because they want both her kidneys. Josh tries to protect us but there’s nothing he can do.”

  Adam felt himself growing angry. The evil on this land continued. He wondered just how long he’d been trapped in the ice, and where were the older males and females?

  “Why haven’t your elders tried to help you escape?” he asked.

  “Because we haven’t any elders. Once we reach eighteen, we’re taken to the house and put down and then the tribe throws our bodies into the marshes.” The boy called Josh shrugged. “There’s nothing we can do because the men have guns and there’s no way off the land.”

  “Perhaps there is,” Adam said. “But first I must eat. I need to regain my strength.”

  “Why should we feed you?” Josh asked aggressively.

  Adam untied the bundle from around his waist and handed it to the boy. “I took them from the bodies of Doctor Maylor and the others who were also thrown down the shaft.”

  “You really were down one of the pit shafts?”

  “I am Adam and I’ve been trapped down a mine shaft for a long time and I really do need to eat. I’m not your enemy and I intend to help you to escape.”

  A murmur of excitement went through the group and one of the women stepped forward. “Leave him alone, Josh! We’ve plenty of food and he can tell us about himself and how he plans to help us escape.”

  “Alright. I suppose I should let him fuck you, Sara, in case he’s a spy and has been sent here to test us. How about it, Adam, do you fancy shagging her?”

  The girl smiled at him and he tried not to stare at her breasts, pressing against the confines of her shirt.

  “Yes,” he said. “Josh, we’ll talk later, but I really do need to eat and have something to drink.”

  “You do if you’re going to fuck Sara,” someone laughed. “You’ll need plenty of stamina to satisfy her.”

  “Well, you could never manage it,” Sara shot back, provoking more laughter. “Come on, Adam. Let’s go to my hut.”

  Nodding in agreement, Josh stooped and untied Adam’s bundle. He snatched something out of it in excitement. “It’s a mobile phone—no it’s some kind of walkie-talkie. Shit, the battery will be dead that’s for sure.” He switched it on and held it to his ear. “It’s dead!”

  Adam saw the disappointment on their faces as their hopes fell. “It does not matter because we will be leaving by crossing the marshes. I know how it can be done,” he said. Sara took Adam’s hand in hers and he allowed her to lead him to her hut. While he ate some bread and soup, Sara told him that she was fifteen and was expecting a baby.

  “I’m only two months gone,” she said, “so our shagging won’t affect the baby.”

  As she began to undress, Adam felt a sudden and almost overwhelming sorrow as he remembered Ben and Eve and their baby. “No, Sara,” he said. “I cannot mate with you. Let us be friends instead.”

  Sara looked at him strangely and then, shrugging, she dressed. “What about the other tribes? Are you going to help them escape too?”

  “Other tribes?”

  “Yes, the Blonde and Red Hair villages are about two hours walk away. Callum, the red headed boy, is always fighting Josh and Oliver, who’s the leader of the Blondes. Callum wants to be the leader of all the tribes, but I don’t like him much. He’s mean.”

  They left the hut and Sara showed him the pen where chickens were kept and a smaller one containing rabbits. “This is where we get our meat. Vegetables are grown by the latrine and our water is taken from that tank over there.”

  The tank was the one he remembered, eight feet square, six feet high, made of thick plastic and mounted on a steel platform five feet above the ground. Once a week, a large tanker driven by one of

  Dr. Maylor’s men had drawn up alongside it and pumped fresh water into it. It used to be his job to refit the tank’s plastic lid.

  “Have the other tribes got this type of water tank?” he asked.

  Sara nodded. “Yes, I think so, why?”

  “Because that’s how we’re going to get across the swamps,” he said. Josh came towards them and nodded. “I’ve sent a couple of runners to tell the other tribes to meet us here but it will be lunch time before they arrive. Sara, get the other girls to help you prepare some extra food. I’ve told Matthew and Jacob to kill a few chickens. Adam, I think we’d better talk before the others arrive.”

  Adam followed Josh away from the huts and could see by the expression on the boy’s face that he was worried. “What’s wrong, Josh?” he asked.

  “I’m not sure how Callum will react when we tell him we’re planning to escape. He might try to stop us because it’s against the rules to even talk about life outside of here.” His grey eyes regarded Adam thoughtfully. “You do realise that if we’re caught, the Lord Lands will have us killed and thrown into the swamp?”

  “Then why are you and the others risking it?”

  “Sara and I love each other, and everyone in this tribe is terrified of being taken to the house and losing an eye, liver, kidney, or being killed. I’m eighteen next year. I will be killed anyway. I was going to try and hide in the woods, but no-one has survived in there. They send the dogs after you and if they don’t get you the open mine shafts will.”

  “We’ll escape and get help, and I won’t allow Callum, or anyone else, to stop us. That’s a promise!” Adam meant it. He had to find the Eve’s daughter, Jay, for she was the girl who’d screamed and was now the only other of his kind.

  * * * *

  Wheatstone City, South Hudson, USA

  South Hudson State Senator, Henry Matheson, acknowledged the applause of his supporters, making no attempt to hide his smile of satisfaction as his main rival for the Republican nomination came towards him and shook hands. Russell, too, was smiling, because now that Henry had been nominated as the Party’s official Vice-Presidential candidate for the forthcoming Presidential election, Henry could afford to accept his opponent’s gesture of defeat graciously. After all, Russell thought, I was the one who’d found out about Senator Wilsthorpe’s twenty-three year old mistress and sent the videotape to the Wheatstone City Post.

  He scanned the crowd and located his men who were anxiously monitoring faces, looking for any sign of potential trouble. They were armed and would shoot to kill. You didn’t take chances with a Vice-Presidential candidate. He would be relieved when Henry was safely back inside the conference hall, where the FBI, who had insisted on taking charge of his security, would take over. Russell’s deputy could supervise the bodyguards, while he checked out the surveillance on Mary Slymond and Scott Williams. The other girl, the freak, may have escaped from him in England, but she was flying into the New Hudson State Airport today and into his territory. Like a moth in a spider’s web, she would be his for the taking.

  He would have liked to be there to knock her off as she left the terminal building, but there was no way he could have left Henry’s side today. He could have put a contract out on her but he wanted to take her out himself.

  For the past thirty years, Russell had found a perfect way to dispose of those who could possibly pose a danger, either to himself or to Henry. After drugging them, he would hide them in the storage box under the bed of his camper, and take them to his isolated cabin near the Bitterfoot forests in Montana. In the security of the basement, he and Nathan, a psychotic retard who looked after the cabin while Russell was away, would have some fun devising ways of torturing their victims to death. Russell’s favourite opener for a good looking woman was to let Nathan have his way with her before he amputated one of her legs below the knee. Russell would then cook the limb and force her to watch as he and Nathan ate some of it, and forced her to eat a little of herself, too. They had once succeeded

  in keeping a woman alive after amputating her legs and both arms. She’d bled to death as they tried to remove the upper stump of one of her arms.

  When the victims eventually died, Nathan got
rid of the body by cutting it up and feeding it to his dogs, before crushing the bones and throwing them into the river. He had found Nathan living in a tumbledown shack a few miles in the woods from Russell’s own cabin. It had been easy to persuade Nathan to move into the cabin as a caretaker and look after the prisoners in the basement. Strong as a grizzly bear and just as vicious, he liked to watch Russell working on his victim. Sometimes Russell allowed Nathan to lop off a few fingers or toes as a treat. The freak’s friend, Mary, would be the next one to experience the delights of the cabin’s basement after the funeral on Friday. Russell found himself almost drooling as he speculated on how she’d taste.

  * * * *

  Greensburgh, South Hudson

  Mary drove the car off the black top and followed the dirt road that led to the house. Jay thought that, despite her grief, her friend had grown even more beautiful. Her raven black hair cascaded around her shoulders and even at the airport men had stopped in their tracks to admire her. Jay wondered what it would be like to have that effect upon men.

  They had spent their previous night at the airport’s hotel and Mary had, in between bouts of crying, told Jay the awful details of Scott’s parent’s murders.

  Scott was waiting outside the house when they arrived and, as soon as she was out of the car, hugged her and then Mary. Putting one arm around each of their shoulders, he led them into the house.

  “We’ll have something to eat and we’ll get your bags in later. I guess you guys must be starving,” he said. Scott had a quiet air of maturity that reminded Jay of his father and she realised that she had never thought of him as a man before. He had always been Peter’s son, her adopted cousin. They breakfasted out on the terrace and as they were having coffee afterwards Scott turned to her. “There’s a car coming in an hour to collect me and take me to the funeral home to view Mom and Dad. I have to go but you two can stay here if you don’t feel up to it?”