Strangeways

by Matthew Samm

  “There are calls for me to hand you over to the law, so that you can face justice like the common criminal you are. What do you think about that? I should hand you over, shouldn’t I?”

  Isaac looked uncomfortable. He didn’t want to be tried like a criminal, but deep down he knew that’s where he should be.

  “You’re finished Isaac. I told you this was the last straw. You’ve brought nothing but shame on this family and lord knows I’ve tried to help you. Today has shown me one thing. You are beyond help.” Their father sipped his soup. “We need to rectify the shame you’ve brought on this family. This is your last night here. Tomorrow, I will tell the media that you have been removed from our house. You will be given an apartment outside the city, where you will gaze at New Manchester’s beauty but never be able to set foot on her hallowed streets. You will live your life without your family. I don’t want anything to do with you.” Lucien paused and glanced at his daughter.

  Alix met his eyes and immediately looked away. She didn’t want any part in her father’s declaration. She had no choice.

  “Your sister doesn’t want anything to do with you.”

  Isaac’s eyes flashed to his sister’s, silently pleading with her to intervene. She looked back but didn’t speak out, lest she feel her father’s wrath as well.

  “I will have to take the shame of knowing you were once a part of this family. We’re all shamed by you in the eyes of the people and I want you to know that. You’re a disgrace!” Without waiting for a reply, their father pushed his chair back, the soup left half-finished and strode away to his private study.

  When he’d gone, Isaac turned to his sister. “Well, at least he won’t get on my back about going into his study.”

  Alix formed a wry smile and they returned to their soup. Neither of them could eat. Their appetite had deserted them. After a moment, she spoke again. “Did you hear what Brooks said before the Reaper carried out the sentence?”

  Isaac nodded, soup dripping from the spoon balancing and steaming in front of his mouth; the same place it had been since their father stormed away.

  “You’re not worried?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “I suppose I should be. As of tomorrow, I’m on my own, nothing but a shame to him. Remember?”

  “You’re not a shame to me, Isaac.”

  “Thanks for saying so while he was here, Alix.”

  “I know, sorry.”

  “It’s OK,” he said. “I know why you can’t. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be OK. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  Alix looked away, biting her inner cheek with uncertainty before smiling again and absently stirring her soup.

  Alix pushed open the door to her bedroom, the blue low light emitters making the room hazy. Outside, the city still lived and breathed although not as fervently as during the day. She glanced over at the bedside table towards the clock. 2:37 am. Her body felt heavy with exhaustion and yet the nerves still nibbled at her gut. She didn’t want to lower her guard, but fatigue had finally caught up with her and she began losing the battle to stay alert. Despite her best efforts, a thick yawn escaped.

  She brushed her teeth and shrugged off her gown. Underneath was a cosy t-shirt bearing the emblem of New Manchester United, and baggy pajama bottoms. It was the only time she allowed herself to look like a vulnerable young girl. Normally, in everyday life, she was dressed for form and function; something elegant and deadly, yet also comfortable. In her job, you didn’t wear anything you’d beg to take off at the end of the day.

  Her bed lay in front of her, the duvet pulled back and the crisp, cool sheets inviting her in. A wave of tiredness overwhelmed her and for a second, she wondered whether she’d even make it to the bed before her eyes closed. The threats from the evening’s bout started to lose their power. She’d shifted to justifying why she needed to sleep. ‘Isaac’s not in any danger tonight,’ she thought. ‘Mad Jack would need at least a night to mobilize his revenge.’ She’d lost. Sleep won.

  She slid under the duvet and pulled it up to her neck. Her eyes began to get heavy and she felt sleep beginning to climb her body.

  That’s when she heard the click of the front door. It was subtle and for a moment she lay there, unmoving, unsure as to whether it was her senses playing tricks on her, or simply her overactive imagination brought on by a heart pounding evening.

  A creak of the floor boards and a soft tinkle as something small dropped to the floor. She thought she heard a cursed whisper, before silence grew again.

  She waited, not daring to move. Although sleep had retreated, her mind was fuzzy as she scrambled back to functional thought.

  In the hallway, behind her closed door, she saw the border of light in the door frame. They were caused by the low emitting night lights, which were blue, like her bedroom.

  A shadow split the blue and slowly moved from right to left. The border was whole again for a second, before another shadow cut across. And again, for a third time.

  Someone was in their house.

  All the threats from the day streamed back through her consciousness. People were here; people with a mission. Her thoughts immediately flew to her brother.

  Isaac’s room was in the other corner of the apartment, off the kitchen. There was no doubt. That was the way they were heading.

  Alix gained a moment of clarity, brought on by the sudden knowledge of what they wanted. She knew it. The threat to her brother by Brooks and now the existence of at least three people in their house was too much to be a coincidence. They had to be connected.

  Alix leaned out of bed and pushed the panic button. They had one in each room. Her father was a man of standing and power and it was not out of the question that he’d be a target for someone at some time in the future.

  Alix knew what should happen. The button would be dark until pushed. She had to hold it for two seconds. After two seconds, there would be a quick burst of red flashes above and then darkness again. The red flashes would tell whoever had pushed it that the message was received, and help was on the way.

  She pushed the button, holding her finger down for at least five seconds. Nothing. She took her finger off and tried again. Nothing again. It didn’t make sense. The panic buttons were disabled. No help was coming.

  Then her training kicked in. She was a Warden. She’d punished people in the cells. Why should this be any different? This thought got her out of bed but was rapidly replaced with reality. There’s at least three of them and she didn’t know if they were armed or not. This is not the same as in the cells.

  She moved to her door, anyway, opening it a crack and risking a glance outside. In the low light, she saw a dark figure in the kitchen. It was clearly male, and he stood with his back to her next to the kitchen table, the same table at which they’d eaten dinner less than two hours ago. She didn’t know where the other two were.

  She crouched down and made her way along the hallway towards where the kitchen and diner expanded into an enormous open plan living area. She saw the man by the table, but now she could see another man at the door to her brother’s room. Beyond him, a third shadow was looming over her brother’s bed.

  It was coming true. The threat was coming true, and it was coming true on the same night it had been made. In a way, it made sense. Who would be ready for an attack so soon? This way, whoever it was would get their revenge before her father could even prepare for it.

  The revenge popped into her mind. They’d killed Robert Brooks. If it was vengeance they wanted, then it stood to reason they’d respond in kind. He was going to kill her brother, right there and then, while she watched!

  She refused to allow that to happen. She’d already helped bury her mother and sister this year, there was no way she was going to bury her brother as well.

  Alix came over all ice and fire. Her training kicked in and she jolted across the room in seconds and without making the slightest sound. The man next to the table was first. She leapt on to his back and wrapped
her forearm bone around his throat. She’d need six seconds. She started counting and clung on as he helplessly struggled against the fleshy noose around his neck. So far there had been no noise from this man. As she applied the choke, she’d twisted him so that she was braced against the dining room wall. He wasn’t going to bang into anything.

  Just a few more seconds.

  Finally, the man’s eyes closed, and he went limp. She tried to guide him to the floor, but his arm fell from his neck, into one of the kitchen chairs. Alix watched in horror, as the chair teetered on one leg. She willed it back to all fours, but it was futile. In slow motion, it toppled, cracking off the hard wood floor and bouncing a few inches away. It was enough of a sound to alert the other two.

  She heard them come out of the bedroom searching around for the noise. Their faces turned towards the dead weight of their colleague and the furious figure scrambling from under him. They stared Alix dead in the face.

  The first man was skinny and bare armed. Each limb was covered in tattoos, crude marks denoting his belonging to some criminal gang, probably Mad Jack Brooks’.

  The other man was wearing a bobble winter hat and all black outdoor clothes. They were more suitable for hiking the hills than city robbery. Underneath the hat jutted a skull tattoo of a wickedly curved blade.

  Both men eyed her for a second. It was two against one and they sensed the upper hand. Alix knew that she only had a few moments before the third one started to come around again. In the pause before the storm, Alix stared at each of them, her gaze flicking between the two. “Do you boys really want to do this?” she said to them before screaming for her father.

  They looked at each other and then attacked. She vaulted over the table so that one was in front of the other. They had the numbers, but she had the training and the athleticism.

  The first punch came, and she parried it and jabbed back, cutting his lip. The man’s hands came up to his face and he was shoved out of the way by the one behind.

  Bobble cap man threw a flurry of blows at her and tried to wrap her up in his arms. She was faster. She dodged each blow and every time she did, she made sure to take her tax on the man’s body.

  He winced in pain as her strikes landed. Both the men retreated and looked less sure of themselves.

  Alix circled again, moving around the room so that her back was to the table. Maybe she could goad them into attacking her and then use the table as a weapon somehow. If she could clatter their head off there, they’d be down for good.

  She was beginning to enjoy herself. She felt like she had the besting of these two and she suddenly felt like she did in the cells. A being of pure power, skill and fear. These men would fear her, just like the criminal scum they were.

  Why weren’t they attacking?

  That was when she found herself on the floor, the room spinning and her head throbbing. It’s always the blows you don’t see that hurt you.

  The third man, the one she’d choked unconscious. With hazy eyes, Alix looked up. It was him. The third man loomed over her, his eyes all business. He mumbled something to the other two and jerked a thumb towards Isaac’s room. Alix struggled to focus. The room still span, but she forced her legs to move under her. They would not take Isaac.

  She was briefly aware of the boot landing on her chin and she collapsed back to the floor.

  She saw the three men disappear into her brother’s room. Where was her father? Why hadn’t Isaac fought back? Had they drugged him? Had they killed him? The questions started to dim and as she blacked out, the only thought that resonated around her head was how she’d failed. She couldn’t save him.

  3

  Alix perched on the side of the couch holding an ice pack to the swelling lump on the back of her head. It had started to throb, which was something she desperately wanted to disappear as soon as humanly possible.

  She was in pain, that was for certain, but it paled in comparison to the humiliation. She knew she’d been stupid, forgetting where her adversaries were. She’d let enjoyment cloud her judgement. It stopped being business and started being pleasure. Whenever those two mixed, careless mistakes happened. In this case, she’d been cracked around the head, but truthfully, she could have been shot, stabbed or worse. Alix didn’t even want to comprehend what could have happened to her.

  As it was, only she would ever know what really happened in her own kitchen. Her reputation was safe, for now, but her brother certainly wasn’t.

  She’d thought they were there to kill him, to exact revenge on the same day revenge had been promised, but there was no blood, nor any sign that he’d come to injury.

  They’d taken him, and as fuzzy memories sprouted in her mind, she remembered it was the last thing she’d seen; three men scampering from the apartment with the limp form of her brother strung over one of their shoulders. Isaac wasn’t fighting back. He must have been given something; something that made him compliant.

  The stinging behind her eyes brought her back to the present, she hoped it wasn’t a migraine stirring. She felt some relief when her father strode across the living room, talking a mile a minute with security agents, police officers and his backroom team. As always, her father was in charge and managing the crisis.

  Firstly, and most obviously, he was coordinating the search for her brother; questioning police officers and trying to decipher who might have taken him and where.

  Secondly was the apartment security. Alix, her father and her brother lived in the penthouse apartment of Beetwhistle Tower, in the heart of downtown New Manchester.

  The men who invaded the apartment had been in the belly of the beast and if they could do it once, they could do it again. Brooks had said ‘a son for a son’, which is exactly what had happened, but it was not certain whether they’d return and try to take the daughter as well. Security had to be beefed up and the apartment completely locked down.

  Finally, Alix’s father was controlling the story. Media would find out about this. It would be all over the news in the morning, no doubt and he wanted to govern the story. He was discussing, with his team, what information would be released and to whom.

  Through the throbbing ache, Alix heard him say ‘not to Bly’, referring to the journalist who had asked him uncomfortable questions at the press conference. It was her father’s own little revenge. It said, ‘question me on live video and I’ll make sure you’re a step behind everyone else’. Alix took a second to consider the power her father had. He could decide who got access and who didn’t. In a city where he played such an integral role, to have control over the narrative, was powerful indeed. Many careers had been destroyed by her father’s press rulings. If he liked their coverage, their career blossomed. If he didn’t, it tanked.

  The commotion and discussions carried on for what seemed like hours before the police peeled off and began searching the apartment for forensic clues. She became dreamily aware of the bustle and allowed it to wash over her, dulling her aching head by not thinking about anything. Her eyes lost focus and she entered a daydream. It was a replay of the night’s events. The emotions were running wild through her. The fear, the adrenaline, the pleasure. Each one cycled through her system and made the real world bleary as if she were viewing it from inside a glass box filled with cotton wool.

  Then her father was kneeling in front of her, disturbing her reverie and forcing her to focus. Immediately, the throbbing started again, and she felt herself audibly groan.

  Her father took that as a sign of her pain and held her hand with one of his whilst gently stroking her hair with the other. “You OK, Alix?” he said, his voice softer than it had been all night.

  She nodded. “I’m OK. Just worried about Isaac. Do they know anything?” she asked, gesturing towards the police officers scouring the room for evidence.

  “Nothing definitive, but they don’t need to. I know exactly who it was.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “It’s obvious, isn’t it? You were there when Br
ooks threatened Isaac. I never thought it would be tonight, but you heard it.”

  Alix remained silent for a moment, allowing what her father said to become clear. Her mind just about agreed with her father. It was obvious, but she was having trouble concentrating. She cursed her pounding head to herself.

  “I’m also certain I know where he is,” her father continued.

  Alix’s ears pricked up to hear him say this. “How can you know where they are, Dad? It’s only just happened. Have you told the police?”

  “Of course, I have, Alix, but our hands are tied.” He used the term ‘our’ suggesting that he and the police were one and the same. They weren’t. The Wardens were his brainchild and he’d found the money and political muscle to birth them into a central role in society, but the police were separate and independent. Another stab of pain and Alix’s thoughts moved on.

  “What do you mean your hands are tied? Just tell them where he is and let the police do their job.” She made sure to emphasize the word ‘their’ to remind her father that they didn’t work for him.

  “I’m certain they’ve gone to Strangeways. They won’t be there yet, but they’re on the way. I’ve sent cars and hovercraft out to try and spot them on the road, but I don’t think they’ll be caught. I’m certain they’re heading to Strangeways and I don’t know what they’re going to do to him when they get there.” Her father went quiet, his own eyes defocusing as unseen thoughts played out in his mind’s eye. “I can’t believe the last things I said to him were…” he trailed off and brought a hand up over his eyes. He was still on his knees and was obviously trying to keep his tears hidden from the other professionals in the room. Never apologize. Never show weakness. That was what her father believed.

  Alix put a hand on his shoulders wincing as her aching head protested the movement. “What better way to put things right with Isaac by bringing him home in one piece.”

  In front of her, his eyes covered, her father gently nodded his head, although it was clear the emotions still roiled just below the surface.