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by Rachel Martin

  Well, she didn’t love the compound, not anymore. Not now she was filled with such shame for hiding away inside them, hiding away from the misery of the world.

  She pushed all the over-coats and long boring gowns hanging up in her Mother’s wardrobe aside, and grabbed the box. She pulled it out into the light and ripped open the worn cardboard edges. She looked into the box. Just as she remembered - colour. She whisked the box into her bedroom and started hunting for something to wear tonight. She ignored all the short skirts, dresses, and men’s clothes, and pulled out some jeans, tops, and a leather jacket. She lifted the jacket out and pressed it against her nose, she breathed it in: deep, musty, perfect. Leather was banned in the compounds, like all other animal products. She also pulled out an old make-up case and found some make-up still inside, and some of it looked quite new. Her Father must have found it outside the walls recently, for when they play dress-up. He obviously liked her Mother wearing it. Sadie imagined them now, in the bedroom, wearing these clothes before… before… gross, she shuddered at the thought. She pulled on a pair of blue jeans and one of the most colourful tops she could find, a bright red figure-hugging T-shirt. Who was that person in the mirror? she thought as she admired herself. Luckily she was a very close fit to her Mother. She had grown up so fast. It was one of the things that kids in the compound did, they said. They said so much, she thought. They can all fuck off, she thought. She shoved the stuff she didn’t want back in the box and hid it again in her Mother’s wardrobe. She listened at the top of the stairs. They were all talking, laughing, and having fun in the safety of the living room, in the safety of the compound. In those moments, she didn’t exist to her parents; she was nothing more than a passing thought. She scowled. The anger was rising again. She balled her fists. Calm down Sadie, she told herself.

  She sat down in front of the mirror in her bedroom. Her face was red from tears. Her hair was wild and uncouth. Her eye was bruised. She went to the bathroom had a wash, brushed her hair and applied the make-up. It didn’t take much preening to look better, ready, older. She shoved the make-up into her bag. It was hers now, she grinned to herself.

  For a long time, she sat staring at her new reflection in the mirror. She was judging herself, and her abilities, and she was happy with her analysis. She liked the new her in the mirror. It was a far cry from the child she used to be. That Daddy’s girl, who lapped up everything her parents said and did as if it were Gospel. There is no Gospel. She had taught herself to question everything and everyone. No one was above suspicion. No one at all, not even herself. She couldn’t always trust her own thoughts she realised, what with all the brain-washing. Well, at least, she was aware of that, she reasoned.

  There was nothing left to do now. She was ready. She had to go out there and do this task. This plan. This reason to go on. This was something she absolutely had to do. She had to teach them a lesson. She had to save everyone she could. She thought of the people in the compounds, the people that knew the truth, and still, they did nothing. The loathing oozed out of her, she could almost taste it. Never in her whole life had she been so sure about anything. She felt that this was her burden, her trial, her reason.

  The time came, slowly, edging closer and closer as if it were a slow train bound south, travelling deeper and deeper into Hell forever. She stood up and hid some pillows under the duvet covers. She switched off the lights, opened the door, and listened. They were watching a movie now. A comedy. A crap comedy. She could hear their laughter like claws on a chalk-board. She switched on the bedside lamp, pulled on her huge overcoat, lifted the hood, and put on her over-laden rucksack. She stood at the front door.

  She looked down the hallway towards the living room and whispered “bye,” sarcastically.

  She opened and closed the front door silently, save for a little click. On the doorstep, she stood for a moment shaking with excitement, with nerves. She leaned against the door and breathed. Come on Sade’s Go. The hot nighttime air was infiltrating her and making her fizz with exhilaration. The next thing she knew she was in full flight down the street. Calm down, calm down, she told herself. She slowed to a walk.

  Getting down to the tube was easy. After her first trip, with the guards and the gates, she realised she needed to find another way. She had done a lot of research and discovered an old, disused service tunnel. It appeared on the original blueprints but had been conveniently erased from the new, publicly assessable ones. So much for their transparency. When she entered the main entrance, instead of following the main route, she veered off to the left. She passed by all the derelict offices and shops. Behind one of the shops towards the end of the tunnel was a very narrow corridor and at the end of this corridor was a tiny door, less than a metre tall. It had been bolted and coded, but she broke in, quickly enough. Through the door were the old maintenance routes. It was like a labyrinth, one tunnel branching into three, sometimes four, but by now she knew the way by heart. Eventually, she stood over a grate and looked down through it. It was directly over one of the female toilet cubicles. These toilets that had been ‘out of order’ since the compound opened. Sadie imagined that some perve probably used to spy on the women from up here. Where did her lousy impression of men come from? No one in the compounds ever dared to utter something subversive like that. She wondered momentarily. But, whatever the reason for the grate, she was glad it was here for now until the whole thing was gone forevermore buried under cement and sand, whenever that would be, very soon probably. This was going to be how she bought them in. Teach her parents a lesson. Teach everyone a lesson. She already had the confrontation scripted in her mind. How can you let them all die… she would say. Then she would pull out the trump card. They wouldn’t know what hit them. She dropped down into the cubicle, hung her overcoat up on the back of the door. She listened at the toilet door. Only dim and distant sounds, the unwanted rarely burrowed this deep into the labyrinth under the compound. She unpicked the lock and furrowed through to the platform. The beggars noticed her more without the overcoat. She wished she was still wearing it. She thought about going back for it. But didn’t.

  The train seemed to take forever to get to the Estate. All the time she was imagining how she was going to bring the subject up. How she was going to explain it. Tonight was the night. It had to be. She had no idea how much time would be left until she was trapped inside the compound with no way out, and no way in. The sands were literally giving her a deadline. She had to tell. She had to, she had to. No backing out now, no squirming, and saying nothing, no wheedling out of it. She had to be strong, strong Sadie. She finally arrived.

  She stood on the platform edge. It was still packed. It was always packed. She climbed up the steps to the exit. There was that fetid smell in the air, it filled her nose. It seemed to be getting worse and worse as she climbed to the exit. She shook involuntarily. Still, it got worse. Something was wrong. Someone grabbed her from behind. They pushed her hard, she stumbled and almost fell. They pushed her up against the dirty stained wall, her face was touching it.

  “Do it,” said a foul smelling old woman with red scabby sores all over her face.

  A man ripped Sadie’s backpack off of her and turned her around. He pushed her back against the wall. He leaned closer and closer to Sadie’s face. A puss-filled boil came so close, it almost touched her. She couldn’t recoil any further. His greasy hair hung down to his chin and crawled towards her on the thick air. Vomit started rising from her stomach. The skinny, toothless tramp got ever closer. He had her trapped. She couldn’t believe how strong he was. He obviously wasn’t as old as he looked.

  “Open it,” he shouted at the woman.

  The woman ripped opened Sadie’s backpack and stuck her bony, dirty skin draped arm inside. She pulled out the cigarette cartons with a glint in her eye and a wicked smile on her grotesque face.

  “My, my! How’d you get your hands on things like this Missy? You’re a long way from home, aren’t ya,” the man cackled.

&nbs
p; Where was Elise? She had promised. Sadie screamed, “Elise.”

  The old man pushed his bony yellow hand against her mouth. The putrid stench of dead rat and old nicotine was radiating off of it. It was so rank, her eyes started watering. Where was Elise?

  “There’s no point in crying, sweetie,” the women said while stroking Sadie’s face. “No one cares. No one's gonna help you.”

  Sadie tried to bite the old man’s hand. He slapped her to the floor, and then dragged her back up to her feet.

  “What else you got on ya?” he said, as he began frisking her, running his hand up between her legs.

  Eighteen

  Ashley stood leaning over the balcony outside the flat, his mouth was hanging open. The coffee and moonshine concoction, accompanied by the sudden change in air was making him feel sick. It was muggy out here, so very muggy, and it was still getting hotter. It was becoming hard to breathe in the thick oxygen-deprived air of the city. Insects were attracted to the salty sweat that was seeping out of him. He flapped them away. He was staring down into the darkness, it was taking his eyes a long time to adjust. His gaze naturally fell on the only two working street lamps, and the fires. There were figures captured in their glow. Hordes of people trying to sleep in tattered sleeping bags, trying to inject their arms with God knows what. He shivered as he remembered that mainlining crushed up paracetamols and each other’s blood was popular at the moment. Ashley almost puked at the thought, then forced himself to stop thinking. He listened. He could hear the gang’s stupid voices from here. They were drinking, smoking, laughing, abusing those around them. He could smell the ganja too. If he only listened, he could almost convince himself that they were the only people outside. He had to fight the urge to run down and fire two rounds into Marc’s skull. He imagined the back of Marc’s head exploding outwards and flying away from his body, spraying the rest of the gang, and the tramps, and the rats in brain matter. Marc’s body would stand for a few wobbly moments before it fell, like The Shard. Ashley laughed at the thought. Not now though, he told himself. Not now.

  What was that? He felt something drawing closer. He turned quickly and stared intently into the darkness down the balcony, at the other flat doors. All was silent. Was it one of the gang playing a trick on him? Was it one of the soldiers? No, they wouldn’t stop. Whatever it was it seemed to be tugging on his consciousness, telling him to wait. He held his breath. He shuddered. ‘You’re being paranoid’, he told himself. He chose to ignore it. He allowed himself one last glance down at the fires, at the orange light disappearing into black, and he was ready. He looked up to the Heavens, or rather the perpetual smog cloud, then jogged off in the opposite direction of the noise, away from Marc and away from that version himself that they all thought they knew. They knew nothing. All of them were so completely and utterly pointless, and they didn’t even know it. After tonight he’d never have to see any of their stupid faces ever again. He picked up his pace, despite the sauna-like air.

  He watched the train grind and squeal away. He blocked his ears. Trust him to miss the train by seconds. Now he had to wait an undetermined amount of time. The trains came when they wanted these days, and no one complained. Complaining meant you’d get taken for sure. He sat down and leaned his back against a pillar. He put his hand in the bag and felt over the guns, the masks, the gloves. He had no choice but to take all the extra gear, if his Mother or sisters found it, he’d never see any of it again. He slapped his forehead. The plan has to work, it has to. I have to be free from those idiots. There was a rising pressure building within him, it was bubbling away, pushing behind his eyes. He bit his tongue, hard, and told himself, you can do it, you can do it. It was all that mattered. There was nothing else he needed. He could do this. He stood up and leaned his shoulder against the pillar. This was the make or break moment. He started tapping his foot against the pillar. If he could do this, he could do anything. He walked around in a circle, pacing the platform. Everyone moved out of his way. They were frightened of him. No, they were frightened of Marc, not him, who would be frightened of him? They would be after tonight though, he thought. He paced. He sat back down. He scratched his head. Where was the fucking train? The buzz from the drink was still going strong, but he needed a booster. Anything to keep his nerve up. He sipped from the bottle. He retched. The taste didn’t get any better. That was another fallacy. He got his phone out and listened to the most recently left messages. That idiot still had no idea, he grinned. All of them had gone, just as they said they would. The day was today, and the time to do it was now. It really was now or never. He closed his eyes and imagined the scene to play out in a few hours’ time. This had never happened before, not so close to them.

  The train squealed in front of him. He jumped up and breathed in a few lungfuls of humid and rotten air. He shook himself down like a dog drying itself, trying to instil more courage. He picked up the bag.

  He sat down opposite two normal looking couples, as far away from the tramps as he could get. He dropped his bag with a loud clang. He froze; thank God the guns didn’t go off. He pulled his hood down and sipped from his bottle. He closed his eyes and visualised pulling the gun, shouting, ordering, he had the air of surprise. He could do it alone, he could, he could, couldn’t he? He sipped more moonshine. Why did everything have to be so difficult? Why did Marc have to be such a dick? Why did Preston have to be such a pussy all the time? Stop it, stop it, stop it, he told himself. Focus. He rubbed his face with his hands. The car was in place, check. He knew the code, check. He had the weapons, check. The door? What about the door? He glanced in front of him. How he wished he was as huge as Marc or that guy opposite. He would be perfect. Stop it. Focus. Stop letting the doubt in. Another sip to stay normal. Another sip for courage. He could shoot the door handle off. But what about the noise? He had another sip.

  The whisperings over the other side of the train were growing louder, he heard: Yeah, we, really, really, really want to get out of here, like yesterday, so anything that seems viable we’ll be up for… Ashley glanced up at the woman saying these things. There was something familiar about her. He knew her somehow. They had met before. He looked away. You’re being stupid, you’re desperate, and you’re looking for help, searching for it. It’s the moonshine, making you crazy. But no, the feeling got stronger, much more intense, it became an ache, then a pain. He realised, she was saying this because it was meant to be. He kept listening as she said I’m deadly seriously you know… Completely and utterly… The man with her was ready to do something too. He just knew it. It was an overwhelming flooding sensation: this was meant to be: it was his fate. It was why he missed the other train. She looked serious. They were here to help him. He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand, it came away soaked. He glanced up again. He did know her, and somewhere in the recesses of his mind, he knew she was his ticket out of here. This was his chance. Do it, do it, do it, he told himself. Just bloody do it damn it, what’s the worst that can happen? After tonight things will be different, he’d be dead, or rich. He preferred rich. But he was prepared either way. They were the key. They were sent here to help him. He looked up at them again, they seemed trustworthy. No, they were trustworthy. They understand like he does, that there’s only one real choice for people like them. He opened the moonshine and swigged some more down. It heated him, gave him the courage he needed. Why wouldn’t they? What have they got to lose, they outnumber him anyway. Do it, do it, do it… He stood up and sat down next to them.

  Nineteen

  “You old git,” snarled the woman. “Stop touching her like that.” She slapped him around the back of the head.

  “You dirty skank,” he spat back, clutching Sadie by the upper arm. “You check her then.”

  The women pushed in front of the man and started feeling about inside Sadie’s pockets. She pulled out the nail file and shoved it in her own pocket. Her greasy head was just below Sadie’s nose, there was a foul smell coming off it. Sadie thought she saw white
lice moving about in her hair.

  “Elise,” Sadie tried to scream, but the man stifled her by pressing his hand over her mouth again.

  His rough, callused hand was scraping across her face and lips. She could hardly breathe. Desperately she looked about. The place was filled with dead-eyed zombie-like people watching and ignoring, all of them unable and unwilling to do a thing. She tried to catch one of them by the eye, trying to force them into action. But, it was useless, no one cared, no one even seemed remotely aware of what was happening to her. This had happened many times before. She knew it. This was an average evening event, the entertainment. Everyone kept milling about, rolling around, dying, staying out of everyone else’s way, like this was normal. The old hag was right. Sadie tried to move her head away from the woman, but the man had her held tight. The sickness was rising from her gut. A rope was lassoing around her stomach, wrapping tighter and tighter. ‘I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die,’ she thought to herself, ‘no one cares, and I’m gonna die’. Maybe her parents were right all along, maybe there really was nothing for her out here. How she wished she’d never broken into that stupid drawer in the first place. Maybe curiosity really does kill the cat. Why couldn’t things have been different? She tried to move, but every time she did, the old man gripped her even tighter. This was her punishment. He pushed his knee into her leg, she winced in pain. She would have buckled forwards if she hadn’t been stuck fast into place by this wretched being before her. Please Elise, where are you? Please, please come. She promised her, she promised her. She will be here. Where is she? Sadie burst into tears.

  “No need to cry, missy. We ain’t gonna hurt you,” the woman said, scavenging through Sadie’s pockets. “Not if you be a good gal now.”

  The women gripped Sadie by the chin with her index finger and thumb, and lightly tapped her cheek with the other palm.