by R T Green
The man in the light-brown uniform shook his head, took another sip of the coffee Tami had made for him. ‘You say she met someone... a girl?’
‘Yes, at Joe’s bar. I think they were becoming... friends.’
‘So it is distinctly probably they are somewhere together.’
‘With all due respect Commissioner, she came home alone last night.’
‘Are you sure she was alone? She has an outside door, yes?’
‘Yes, but...’
‘So the girl could have been with her. The juice glass was outside, was it not?’
‘She would have let us know if she was going somewhere. Not just disappear without a word.’
‘Forgive me, Mr. deWinter, but is it not the case your daughter has been a little... wayward since she has been here? Three incidents of drunken behaviour on file, I believe.’
David nodded his head sarcastically, realising they were going to get nowhere. ‘So you are not prepared to help us, commissioner?’
‘I am not saying that. The circumstances do seem a little unusual. But so is your daughter’s behaviour.’ He stood up to go, put his hat back onto his head. ‘Please do get in touch, if you have not heard from her in forty-eight hours.’
‘Two days?’
‘I am sorry, Mr. deWinter. Our resources are stretched as it is, with the Christmas frivolities. I am sure she will return to the fold, but if not, we will take action.’
As they watched the commissioner drive away, David threw a desperate glance to the sky. ‘Guess you were right, Tami. What do we do now?’
She took his hand. ‘Everything we can to find her ourselves, David. Perhaps first we make some posters, let people know she is missing?’
He nodded sadly, allowed her to lead him back into the house.
Chapter 88
A faint light was trying to force its way through my eyelids. Dead black, turning to dark grey.
No feeling. Nothing. Just grey.
Open your eyes.
Can’t.
Can’t feel eyes. Can’t feel anything.
Am I dead? Can you ask yourself if you’re dead?
Panic, welling up over me. Me? Nothing of me to feel. No body. But something must be there, otherwise I wouldn’t be so shit scared.
Am I just a spirit, floating around in a strange world of nothing?
Think.
And stop talking crap.
Light grey now, zig-zaggy fireworks flashing across my brain.
Must have a brain then. But still no eyes. Want to see. Can’t.
Ouch. Stabbing pain, somewhere in my thoughts. Hurt, something bad.
Where am I?
Hell, think woman. You already know you’ve got a brain, so use it. Try and put two coherent thoughts together, one in front of the other.
Not happening.
Dark grey again. No, please, don’t be black.
Whatever it was controlling the light, it wasn’t listening.
Zig-zags again, forcing me awake. How long was I asleep?
Funny.
Don’t have arms, so sure as hell won’t be wearing a watch.
Light grey... lighter than before. Feeling something. I have a body, I think. Nothing will move though, maybe my mind playing tricks.
Sand. I can see sand, moonlight. Oh, bad feelings. Blurry shapes, grabbing me... taking me somewhere.
Please, I need to remember...
No more to recall, just the here and now.
Blackness, coming again. Go away, I don’t want to sleep.
No... I remember.
Lisa.
Bitch.
Blackness.
Am me. All of me... maybe. Arms and legs, fingers and toes. I can feel. Still can’t see though.
Warm. I am warm. No moving air, no sun soaking into my skin. Must be inside somewhere. Listen. No sounds, nothing at all. ‘Hello..?’
Did I just say that, or think it? Didn’t hear my voice. No voice. Maybe better to keep quiet anyway, if I’ve been kidnapped.
Kidnapped? Come on, who the hell would want to kidnap me?
Oh shit.
I told Coop my dad lived here. He wouldn’t betray me... would he? He must have. Lisa, MI6. Makes sense.
No it doesn’t. Tobago, part of the British Commonwealth, UK law enforcement every right to be here. So why the electronic drug, people knocking me out? Bit like overkill, when they could just arrest me and cart me back on a plane.
Nothing makes sensible sense. I’m not on a plane, otherwise I would hear some kind of noise, feel movement.
Wherever I am, it’s silent and still.
Have to see. All the bits of me seem to be here, I should be able to open the eyes I know I’ve got...
Foggy shapes. A room, not so big. Really foggy. I blink my eyes, several times, it makes no difference. What the hell did you slip me, Lisa? I can move my head, glance around, but everything is a blur. Then a shape, blocking out the light. A dark face, staring at me.
I try to cry out. No voice still. The dark face has gone, out of the room I think. Damn you, eyes. Why won’t you work properly? I blink again, furiously. A little better then, but still like the worse kind of London fog.
Movement in the room. Someone is here. My useless eyes can see a figure, walking towards me. A long white dress, or robe of some kind, I can’t tell.
‘Hello Madeline.’
No... why is this happening? She is leaning over me, dusky pink skin with red dapples; beautiful eyes shaped like a perfect leaf...
‘Zana..?’
Chapter 89
‘It is revealing, you calling me by that name.’
Why did she say that? My vision was clearing, I could focus better. She stood by some kind of built-in dressing table, facing away from me. A long white robe covered her body, reaching almost to the floor. I could see her reflection in the mirror, her head bowed as she concentrated on something in her hands.
It’s just a dream. A cruel mirage, brought on by whatever it was Lisa slipped me.
Bitch.
Dream or not, I couldn’t tear my eyes from Zana. ‘Please...’ My voice was hoarse, just one word too much, making me cough, gasp for breath. That forced me to lift my head. My vision was still cloudy but I could see my body, stretched out on some kind of couch, still in the green dress.
This isn’t right. Isn’t real.
She heard my cry, turned and walked over to me. ‘Lie still, close your eyes. Let me check you over.’
I did as she asked, my eyes hurt anyway. A headache like a month’s-worth of hangovers was pounding my brain to pulp. It wasn’t helping my state of mind. Or my sanity. Fucking dreams that seem so real, people coming back from the dead... this I can do without. Give me a break, subconscious. I can be evil enough to myself without your cruel intervention.
Zana was passing something over me, I think. I could hear the beeping, right in my ears at first, then getting further away. Then she spoke.
‘You can open them now. You are none the worse.’
She sounded different. Huskier, deeper... colder.
I opened my eyes, blinked furiously. I could see better. She was standing next to the couch, a slight smile on her face as she gazed down on me. Her skin was a deeper shade of smoky-pink than before, the red dapples on her face darker. She looked a little older, her eyes still beautiful but clouded, the fire and intensity that I loved so much gone away.
No... oh, please no.
It wasn’t Zana.
The tears came. Pathetic, angry tears I didn’t want but couldn’t stop.
I tried to reach my face, brush the tears away, disgusted with myself for allowing yet another illusion to play with my emotions. Something was restraining me. Bands of blue light, around my wrists and ankles; like shackles, binding me to the four corners of the couch.
‘Get out of my head...’ I whispered, all I could manage to do. ‘Fucking bad dreams I could do without.’
She saw me struggling to reach my face, pressed a button
on the device in her hand. ‘I apologise, Madeline. A necessary precaution.’ Whatever controlled the bands of light relaxed them, and finally I could reach my face, wrench the tears away with the back of my hand.
‘I want to wake up now.’
She smiled again, reached out a hand. Warm, gentle fingers caressed the bare flesh on my thigh, and then pulled slowly away.
‘Do you feel that, Madeline?’
I did feel it. ‘Who are you?’
She turned away, walked back to the dresser and put down the device. ‘I have relaxed the restraints. You have movement now, but they will not allow you to leave this room.’ She pointed to a door in the silver metal wall. ‘That is a washroom; please feel free to use it, and anything else you may find here.’
I sat up, tried to ignore the all-too-familiar jackhammer trying to vibrate my brain into tiny pieces. It wasn’t making my mood any better.
‘I said... who the fuck are you?’
She walked towards the door, unfazed by my ingratitude. ‘Later, Madeline. For the moment you have enough to come to terms with.’
The door hissed aside. In the doorway she turned, and her eyes narrowed as she looked straight at me. ‘But you should be aware, I am neither a dream nor an illusion. As you will soon discover, I am very, very real indeed.’
Chapter 90
I lay flat again, closed my eyes. It seemed to help, the road-menders and their jackhammer moving further down the street. It didn’t do much for sound reasoning though, the mess of wobbling jelly I used to call a brain still unable to keep a coherent thought in one place.
This couldn’t be real. Her words bounced around my mind, echoing in the void. Do people in dreams tell you it’s not a dream? Hell only knows.
Hell. Is that it... where I am?
A sudden shudder seemed to shake my whole body. I couldn’t really tell for sure, my inner and outer self didn’t want to cooperate with each other. The room was warm, but in a second I was frozen to the core. If this isn’t hell right here and now, something was telling me it might soon be.
Think, you pathetic excuse for a woman. Try moving... maybe that’ll knock some sense into you. I sat up, stuck my feet hesitantly on the floor. I touched the blue glowing bangle on my left wrist; my fingers went right through it.
Just light. Light that seemed to dislike my fingers, judging by the angry buzz and faintly-electrical shock that said in no uncertain terms, ‘Don’t touch me, or else...’
Ok, get the message. My legs worked, but standing up brought the nausea. I made the washroom, threw up disgustingly. And then again, even more grossly. I hurled until all I was doing was heaving nothing but foul-smelling air.
Then I hit the basin, manic hands smacking water into my face, almost drowning me, like I’d not seen the wet stuff for weeks. But my vaguely-insane aqua-therapy calmed the jitters, and looking at my strained, hollow face in the mirror, the shock of my reflection finally jolted me back to reality.
Maybe this was a dream. More likely it isn’t. But one thing I knew for certain was that Madeline deWinter didn’t get fazed by a tiny little issue like getting kidnapped.
So pull the inner and outer yous together, and start acting like a grown-up.
I explored the room. The latest bracelets from Claire’s Accessories didn’t seem to mind me nosing. My personalised couch was set in a small alcove adjoining the main room, which consisted of a very nicely furnished living area, and an equally sumptuous sleeping area with the biggest bed I’d ever seen.
Whoever my new best friend was, she liked a good standard of living.
In a tall closet I found a white gown, like... whoever-the-hell she is was wearing. My dress was a mess, so I changed into the gown. The pounding in my head was gone, my hands steady as I held them out in front of me. It was time to see if my brain had finished its extended lunch break.
Much of what surrounded me was recognisable, but not familiar. Everything had a touch of the alien about it. Just like the woman who had kindly checked me over and restrained my ankles and wrists.
She was all alien. All Calanduran.
Who were all dead, so I thought.
My mind flashed back, and it brought another round of the shudders. And another brief session of self-flagellation. All my training, all my experience in the field... and I didn’t see the obvious.
For a moment I tried a little self-consolation; told myself that back then an awful lot of epic and explosive action happened in a very short time, culminating in Zana’s death.
It didn’t help. In my six years as an MI6 assassin, I’d never left loose ends.
I guess there’s a first time for everything.
A year ago, Zana and her six colleagues arrived on Earth, blending into London life while they learned how they could control us for when the battle troops turned up. She didn’t just magic herself here; they must have used some kind of shuttle.
And on the awful day that changed everything, just after she’d revealed her true form to me in her apartment, our peace was literally shattered when four other aliens smashed through the balcony doors, intent on eliminating Zana for her treachery.
Then another bad guy, a short while later, in my apartment. And a sixth, driving a van that tried to force us off Westminster Bridge into the Thames.
All of them had to have got there somehow.
Another shuttle.
Why did it never occur to me? Six bad-guy aliens, arriving on a second shuttle, all killed. I buried my face in my hands, let out a groan to no one but myself. How could I not have seen the blatantly obvious?
There were more than six people on that second shuttle.
And they survived.
I stood up, paced around the room in aimless circles, fitting together the pieces of my new jigsaw puzzle. And then the last tiny piece slotted into place. The blood froze solid in my veins.
Hell? Oh yes.
Zana’s original six, all assassinated by me. The four uninvited guests in her apartment, mostly killed by me. The one in my place, who met his end at my hands. And white-van man, forced off the bridge to a watery grave. By me.
Not to mention the thirty-thousand battle-troops, who I helped incinerate to death.
And now the last remaining shuttle, containing what must be the handful of Calanduran survivors left on Earth, has suddenly turned up on my tiny Caribbean island?
I wonder why they came all the way here?
The hell I do.
Chapter 91
The door hissed open. I’d not had enough time to come to terms with my new life in the luxury suite at the Hotel California, so the sight of the girl standing hesitantly in the doorway was the reddest of rags to the proverbial bull.
She was someone I knew.
I flew off the couch, raised my fist to thump her as hard as I could, but my sudden aggressive movement must have flagged up a red light to my new bangles.
They wouldn’t let me get anywhere near her.
‘Consider yourself a lucky bitch…’ I hissed at her.
Lisa walked slowly into the room, her eyes never leaving mine, and placed a tray of food on the low table. My eyes never left her either, my useless fists clenching and unclenching as I fought the pointless urge to rearrange her beautiful face, hardly noticing the angry buzzing emanating from my new fashion accessories.
‘I see you’re still morphed into human form then.’
‘Please... please don’t be angry with me, Madeline. I had no choice. I was just following orders.’
‘You think that makes it any better?’ I glared at her, but despite the rage I couldn’t help noticing how awful she looked. Her eyes gave away a confusing mess of emotions... fear, hate, sadness, desire; I couldn’t tell what was breaking her in two. It looked like she didn’t even want to live right then.
I fought to stay angry, knew I was losing the battle. Damn you Zana... two months ago, before you forced me to discover my heart, I would have whipped out the cheese-cutter and garrotted her neck in t
wo without a second thought.
Now, I was starting to feel sorry for the pathetic-looking girl who drugged me. She was following orders, like I did when they told me to assassinate the seven.
I didn’t have a choice then either.
‘Look, Lisa... ok, I understand. Just tell me where I am please?’
She hesitated for a moment. ‘You are on our shuttle.’
‘Yeah, I figured as much.’
She indicated the tray. ‘LaTiri asked me to make some food. Please try and eat it. I have made it nice, for you.’
‘LaTiri? I assume that’s the vision in white I met earlier?’
She nodded. ‘Please, you must obey her. She is all-powerful.’
I rebooted the calculations I’d made earlier. ‘Hmm... all-powerful. So where is the shuttle now, Lisa? Flying off into space to rendezvous with another mother-ship?’
She glanced around the room, nervous to even be talking with me, but whispered an answer. ‘We are on the ground.’
‘In Tobago?’
She nodded, swallowed hard. ‘I must go. I am not supposed to talk to you.’ She began to head for the door.
‘So how many of you are there? How many Calandurans left?’
She reached the doorway, glanced back. ‘Just... just a few.’
‘Lisa... what’s wrong? Are you ok?’
The door slid to a close behind her. But before it did she shook her head, whispered, ‘I have been better.’
I ate like I hadn’t seen food for a week. Maybe I hadn’t, there was no way to tell how long I’d been out from the drugs Lisa had been forced to administer. I had no idea what I was eating, but it was delicious. Halfway through it occurred to me the food might be drugged too, but I dismissed that.
My little blue friends would take care of any crazy ideas I might have had.
As I ate, I analysed the situation. The few words Lisa spoke had told me a lot. I was still grounded, on the island. My captors were few in number, and clearly the all-powerful LaTiri was the boss. Lisa was unhappy... were any of the others? Could I use that to help me?