by Luca Veste
Do it. Do it. Do it.
Alpha kicked the table back, raising the shotgun and standing up. He hit Gamma before she even had the chance to turn fully around. Alpha hit Tango square in the chest next. He turned and fired towards the door as Delta exited.
His heartbeat was the only sound as he took down Omega.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
God forgive them. God forgive me.
Darkness. Only darkness. No light, no escape. A hammer coming down towards him, then a wrecking ball. Pounding into him, knocking him off his feet in slow motion. Every bone cracking, every bruise, every organ shifted, all happening in turn so he could feel each one. Darkness, just darkness.
Goldie woke slowly, his eyes opening and closing like he was coming out of a deep sleep he didn’t want to wake from. Tight eyelids, as if they were crusted over. He opened one a crack, trying to work out what was happening He tried to move his hand to rub his eyes. Couldn’t move it. He tried the other hand and found the same result. Something was holding them in place, but he couldn’t feel a weight on them, no hard resistance. His mind was confusing him, acting without going over options first. Working on instinct. Move this, feel that.
His legs wouldn’t move.
Goldie’s mind was cloudy, like walking through mist or fog. Trying to find his way along an unfamiliar street when he couldn’t see more than a few inches in front of him.
His legs wouldn’t move.
The pain was there, in the background, waiting for its moment to hit him full force. For now, it was just throbbing away in the distance, his head doubling in size with every pulse.
Goldie blinked. Once. Twice. Opened his eyes fully and came to know where he was.
On the rack.
His breathing became faster, rhythmic. In, out, in, out. The pulsing pain grew in his head, becoming heavier with each breath.
Two fingers entered his vision from above him. Clicking. Together.
‘You with me?’
The voice came from behind him. Fragments of the events which had preceded the darkness began to crowd his mind. The noises from outside. The screaming.
Visions of blood, cascading in front of him.
‘Wakey wakey.’
Goldie tried to form words, but his tongue felt like it had been removed. Just a gargle of noise escaping his mouth. It was still there, numb pain when he moved his teeth over the swollen form inside.
‘You’ve taken quite a nasty knock to the head. Several, in fact. Probably best you don’t try and talk for a while. Stay awake though. I’ve heard that’s important.’
The noises. Banging around his skull, echoing and subsiding.
‘You know … it wasn’t my idea, this rack thing. Remember the old man? The one you and your shitty little mates tried to intimidate and scare? He was the one who began this whole thing. He suggested this as a punishment. For your crimes. Against him. Against us. Against our whole society. I remember the others didn’t like the sound of it, but they just got swept along on the wave of actually doing something for a change.’
He remembered the other boys, lads, men. Falling where they were hit.
‘It’s a shame he didn’t live long enough to see what he created here.’
It wasn’t like in films, but Goldie already knew that. He’d seen real violence before. Inflicted it.
Not like this. Never like this.
‘You … you kimmed em …’
‘Please, if you’re going to talk, try to enunciate. Yes, I killed them.’
‘Aye …?’
The form around him changed, moved. No longer behind him, now at his side.
‘Because it was time. It wasn’t working. Trying to help you boys was pointless. It was never going to work, was it?’
Goldie tried to speak, but the pain in his head was growing by the second. He could feel something dripping next to his ear.
‘You would have left here and gone back to the way things were before within days. You’re all the same. Nothing we did here would have changed that.’
Goldie shook his head but regretted it instantly. The pain which had been just below the surface now broke through. Exploding around him, filling his ears. He heard himself screaming but didn’t remember telling himself to do so.
‘Shhh … shhh …’
The pain didn’t subside, but Goldie soon realised the screaming was making things worse. Tears formed and then snuck out the corner of his eyes.
‘It’s not my fault. You all have choices. You decide to go this way and end up here. It’s your own decision to go down this path. I just can’t take it any more. It’s not right, what you all do. You make people scared to leave their houses. You frighten innocent people, you know that. All of you.’
The voice came closer.
Alpha. The man in charge. The only one Goldie had feared from the start.
Leaning over him as his eyes misted over with moisture, no amount of blinking clearing his vision, so that everything became blurred.
‘You know what the worst thing is? You don’t care. You don’t care who you hurt as long as you’re all having fun. Getting your kicks out of everyone else’s misery.’
A breath, and then the man who called himself Alpha stood up. Goldie blinked some more, trying to clear his sight and failing.
‘Well … no more. I’m going to make all of you sit up and take notice. Make you feel fear. Every single little scrote and scally in this city will be afraid. It’s our turn now. The good people of this city. The ones who do everything right and get no reward for it. Who have sat back while you all take over. These are our streets and I’m taking them back. For us all. For me, for them. For everyone.’
Goldie tried to speak, but his throat hitched up on him. This was it. Every day in that hole of a room, the darkness, the only sounds coming from the others in the same position, every damn day, he had known. Known he wouldn’t be leaving while still breathing. He’d lied to himself. Of course he had. Tried to think of a plan.
Then he’d come up with one on the spur of the moment. And Alpha had killed them all, sparing Goldie’s life by not shooting him as well. He remembered throwing his hands up and the stock of the rifle striking him in the face. And again. His head being beaten before unconsciousness had taken him.
No. A bullet to his chest, to his head, to his heart hadn’t been the end.
There had been something else in mind for him.
His head was lifted up, the rest of his body still weighed down. Strapped down.
‘This is the best I could do, but it’ll work.’
Goldie looked to where Alpha had put something next to him on the rack. A large bowl, full of water. He started shaking his head, but it was no use.
It wasn’t bad. Not at first. His head being forced underwater until he couldn’t hold his breath any longer. Ripped back out, where he could suck in glorious air, before he was forced under again. Coughing and spluttering.
Each time underneath getting longer. Unable to breathe, in and out of consciousness. Drowning. He now knew what it felt like to drown. His mind playing tricks on him.
‘Once more.’
The voice was ethereal. Not connected to what was playing out in his head. A different life, better than the one he had led.
Goldie opened his mouth, trying to breathe under the water, only succeeding in filling his lungs with liquid.
There was no return to the surface. No gasping, no air, no oxygen. Just darkness, seeping into him until it took over.
Goldie could feel nothing other than the pain in his body and his hope for release. An end.
The finality to sweep over him.
His last thoughts were just images. No sounds, no voices. Just his family. What was left of them. Blurred and out of focus as his struggle stopped and his vision went black.
Gone.
Delta ran. For his life, for his future. Knowing there wasn’t anything left back at that farm.
Alpha was going to kill everyone.
So he ran. Kept running, scared that he was going to be next. He had nowhere to go, having sold up his house to live at the farm full-time. No money, as he hadn’t worked in months. All his savings being poured into this project.
All gone.
His old lungs couldn’t hack it any more, so he stopped for a while. It was only then that he felt the pain. Put a hand to his shoulder, flinching as he looked at the blood which remained there when he took it back. He must have been hit when Alpha fired at him as he ran out the back door. He didn’t know why he’d even gone back to the main house. He should have ran as soon as the boys had been killed. The upper hand they’d always had had now been ripped away, tearing a hole into the top of his arm in the process.
It was dark, the day’s spring warmth now disappearing. Delta tried to stay away from the roads, scared that Alpha wouldn’t stop at those left at the farm.
That he wouldn’t stop until all of them had gone.
20
Murphy didn’t bother with speed limits on the way back to the station. He picked his way through what traffic was on the roads, keeping all his focus on what was ahead of him.
He was there in less than fifteen minutes, but it felt like much longer.
Murphy’s grip on the wheel tightened as he arrived on St Anne Street, the brown-bricked building appearing on the crest of the small hill halfway down. He shouldn’t have taken off like that, not in the middle of the day. Not in the middle of a murder enquiry.
What had he missed?
It was like the months after his parents had been murdered all over again. Allowing his personal life to take over. It was supposed to be a fresh start, and the last year had given him the false sense of security that he could have it all. Be the husband, be the friend, be the man who could do it all.
Rossi’s voice had sounded mixed. Fear and excitement. Breathless. As if she’d single-handedly solved everything whilst Murphy was off counselling some kid he wasn’t even related to.
He kind of hoped that wasn’t the case. Murphy wanted to be there for the conclusion of this one.
He parked up and was just about to leave the car when he glanced up at the rear exit and saw them. Two or three at first, then more. A mix of uniforms and detectives who had been working the Dean Hughes inquiry.
Rossi came out soon after, still trying to put her jacket on as she shouted orders across to stragglers who hadn’t moved as fast as the first lot. She looked up as Murphy beeped his horn and changed direction, trotting across the car park towards him.
Murphy turned the engine over as she opened the passenger side door and sat down in the seat.
‘Tell me on the way …’
‘You don’t know where we’re going yet.’
Murphy followed out behind a yellow police van, the barrier to the car park already raised. ‘You can tell me that as well.’ He took one hand off the steering wheel to scratch at his beard. ‘So, this “Ian” just answered one of the phonecalls?’
‘Yeah,’ Rossi said, the same breathless excitement making her voice catch. ‘You should have seen the face on Harris. Scared the shit out of him.’
‘What did he say?’ Murphy replied, not sharing the joke.
‘Who, Harris?’
Murphy turned his head and gave her a look.
‘Oh, right, yeah. He was scared. You could tell from his voice. I played on that a bit and got him to tell me what had happened.’
‘Go on …’
Rossi blew out a breath and tapped a rhythm on her knee. ‘The lead guy goes crazy, that we know. Shoots up the place apparently and our man Ian gets away.’
‘We knew that.’
‘Yeah. But now he wants to come in and help. Turns out he was hurt during his “escape”. A graze by the sounds of it, but he’s been holed up and losing blood. Didn’t want to go to a hospital. Anyway, it looks like his conscience got the better of him.’
Murphy banged a hand against the wheel. ‘So we’re going to get him? Excellent work, Laura.’
‘Grazie.’
‘Prego.’
Rossi made a noise in the back of her throat. ‘I knew you’d pick some words up eventually.’
‘Just be glad it wasn’t your usual bile.’
Rossi laughed, the sound cutting off as they began to slow behind the procession of cars and vans which were in front of them.
‘Looks like we’re here,’ Murphy said after ten minutes or so of driving, lifting his foot off the accelerator.
They pulled in behind an unmarked car from the pool, a long line of cars in front and behind them.
They were going into the woods.
Childwall Woods was only around fifteen minutes from the city centre, but it felt like an entirely different place. Dense treelines on short roads, with immaculately presented, large semi-detached houses facing the outskirts of the woods themselves. Another example of the disparate versions of the city. The housing estates only a few miles away from middle-class suburbs.
There were a few entrances into the woods itself, with Rossi informing Murphy they had chosen the Childwall Abbey Road end to convene. Murphy looked up to the sky as the noise which the residents of Merseyside were now used to hovered above. Helicopters had become second nature to those in the city – deployed at a minute’s notice and seemingly without thought. Murphy had little sympathy for those who constantly complained about the noise. He’d once lived on the flight path for Speke Airport … they had no idea. Murphy spoke in a low voice to Rossi as they reached the large group of uniforms and detectives near the short path which led into the woods.
‘You take the lead. This is your shot.’
Rossi drew herself up, her black jacket tight against the open-necked white blouse underneath. ‘No problem.’
Murphy watched the helicopter above as Rossi gave quick instructions. She had her phone open, giving details of the woods from a quick Google search she’d made on the way over. Murphy heard the words thirty-nine acres and nature reserve and chose to just follow Rossi and see where that took them.
They trudged off in groups of twos and threes. All on their guard. All a second away from calling for back-up, those trained in taser use going first. Everyone’s hands on their belts.
The ground was soft but not muddy as they reached the woods, the relatively good weather they’d had the last month or so on their sides. The lack of rain hadn’t dispersed the clouds overhead however, the light becoming progressively less bright as they entered the dense paths within the woods.
Murphy walked alongside Rossi, eyes shifting left to right as they moved slowly along the tracks, peering into the trees if they thought something looked out of place. Every now and again, they’d disturb someone walking a dog, or someone with binoculars around their neck. Bird watchers and nature lovers.
Somewhere, there was a man with a gunshot wound and a guilty conscience.
‘Did he give any indication as to where he might be in here?’
Rossi shook her head to Murphy’s question. ‘Just that he was in the woods and to hurry.’
Murphy skirted around a suspicious-looking brown mark against the grey paving. ‘He could have at least come out and met us on the main road.’
‘He said he was too scared to do that. He thinks the lead guy is after him. And I wasn’t about to argue.’
Murphy sniffed and went back to looking into the trees once more.
A shout from ahead drew them to a stop. A raised arm in the air, then silence assailing them through the trees.
Then the silence was broken. At first it was just voices, then hard shoes against the concrete paths as officers moved around them, moving forwards towards the commotion.
Murphy reacted slower than Rossi, who took off at a sprint, a pen clattering to the ground in front of him as it flew out of her jacket pocket. Murphy moved then, catching up to her quickly. They reached the point where the noise had begun, the treeline a blur of yellow as the flak jackets of the uniforms converged on one spot, eventuall
y dispersing as the noise dissipated, just a few exchanges between breathless men and women.
The relative silence was ended by a single cry.
‘Paramedic.’
Murphy pushed his way through a few bodies, aware of Rossi behind doing the same, coming to a small clearing past a few thin-trunked trees which had lined the path. Two uniforms blocked the view, but Murphy could see past them to what was slumped against the base of a tree. A man in his fifties at least, he guessed. Dressed in a T-shirt which was hanging off him and blue jeans which were already losing their original colour. The T-shirt he wore was once a faded green but was beginning to turn completely red.
Blood red. More brown than red, but unmistakeable all the same. As were the rips near the man’s right shoulder, the T-shirt almost torn free on one side. The man’s left hand was draped over the wound Murphy knew lay beneath. Seeping through onto his dirty hands. Three-day stubble and dark rings underneath his eyes.
Ian.
Or as Murphy knew him … George Stanley.
Murphy paced the path as four paramedics brought George past him on the stretcher. One of them was carrying an IV bag above her head, and they were making a show of holding the weight of what was now an emaciated man who had clearly gone at least a day or so without food or water.
George Stanley had said two words before finally accepting unconsciousness.
I’m scared.
Murphy wasn’t sure of what.
‘How do you know him?’ Rossi said, standing close to him so as not to allow others to overhear their conversation.
‘It was probably before your time. Ten years ago, his seventeen-year-old son was killed. I was still a uniform then, about six months before becoming a DC. It was pretty big news.’
‘I’m trying to place it …’
Murphy waved a hand. ‘Not important really. I was one of the first uniforms who spoke to him and his wife. Didn’t take it serious, I suppose. Just some teenager who had gone missing. You know the score. When they found his body a couple of days later, it went a bit nuts. The local papers tried to insinuate we – the police – had done something wrong. Like we should have taken things more seriously. Things were a bit shaky, but thankfully upstairs didn’t take much notice.’