They got to work, knowing the drill by now. It took less than a minute for Monty to find something. “This padlock has a code on the back.”
They walked over to join him, and Leo examined the padlock for himself. On the back was a series of numbers and letters — all 26 members of the alphabet listed in order, starting with 1 for A and 26 for Z. “What makes you think this is the right cell?” Leo asked.
Monty pointed inside. On the back wall was a glowing red sign made from LEDS and transparent tubing. It read: ATONEMENT.
Leo nodded. “Yeah, fair enough. So what’s the riddle? What’s the game?”
“We have to spell something out using the code,” said Monty. “Agreed?”
Cheryl thought he was onto the right track, but she was determined to contribute something herself. There were already numbers dialled into the padlocks — 19, 9, 14, 19 — and she wondered what they translated too. She didn’t expect they were random. “Hey, Leo, can you use your numbers-brain to check what word this combination spells?”
Leo took the padlock from Monty and held it in his hand, turning it back and forth so he could see both the combination and the code. Slowly he deciphered the word on the padlock. “S-I-N-S.”
“Okay,” said Cheryl. “Give me a sec. Sins, sins, sins… Make good your sins. That’s it! Change the combination so that it spells ‘good.’
Leo thumbed the rollers, working out the right numbers by using the code on the back — 6, 15, 15, 4. The padlock popped right open.
Cheryl pushed the gate, opening up the cell. “Looks like we’re still in the game.”
Like the other cells, this one lit up as soon as they entered. The small space was packed with video cameras, all pointed at a bizarre structure in the centre of the room.
Monty moved protectively to the front of the group. “What is that? It looks like a coffin.”
It did resemble a coffin, wide at the top and tapering towards the bottom, but it was made out of metal — dimpled brass, by the looks of it. It was also too short to be a coffin. There was a wide hole at the top at about shoulder height. The structure’s purpose was unclear, but then she saw an envelope stapled to its side. She hurried inside the cell and opened the envelope. She read aloud the letter inside. “Alfie, your sins are buried. Unearth them and be set free.”
Alfie backed away from them and started hyperventilating. “I-I ain’t doing it, man. Whatever it is, I ain’t doing it.”
Monty stalked him. “You have to, bruh. What choice do we have?”
“I ain’t doing it! No way, I’m not ending up like Happy.”
Leo went after him too. “I know you’re scared, dude, but we’ll be right here. You can do this.”
“We’re never getting out of here, you idiots!” Alfie suddenly seemed so young, just a boy. “We’re going to die down here, don’t you see?”
“Then what do you have to lose, bruh? Get it over with, yeah?”
“No!”
Leo tried to put an arm around Alfie but missed and stumbled. “Come on, dude. We all have to take our turn.”
“So you go in there then, Leo. Let’s see how brave you are.”
“The letter had your name on it. It has to be you, Alfie.”
Alfie stopped backing up and raised his good hand as if to fight them. “Cheryl could have been making it up for all I know. It might not even be my name.”
Cheryl marched over to Alfie and shoved the letter against his chest. She waited for him to read it.
He shrugged. “Yeah, well, so what? I still ain’t going in there.”
“You either go in voluntarily,” said Monty, “or I’ll drag your pussy-arse in there myself.”
Cheryl voiced her disapproval. “Monty, there’s no need for that.”
He glanced back at her. “If he doesn’t get in that cell, we’ll all starve down here. You’re the one saying we need to play the game if we have any chance of getting out.”
Leo looked at her apologetically. “I’m with Monty. Alfie needs to get in that cell one way or another.”
“Touch me and I’ll knock you the fuck out.” Alfie raised his fist higher. “Just try me.”
This is getting bad, thought Cheryl. In closed confines like this, a fight breaking out could be deadly. There was no one to break it up and no one to get help. She had to stop things from escalating. Stepping into the middle of the posturing men, she attempted to reason with Alfie. “If you do this, Alfie, you can relax. This is your turn, but once it’s over it will be somebody else’s. You already know things are bad, but this is your chance to do the right thing and help us. It’s not going to go away, so just face it and get it over with.”
Monty allowed his posture to soften. “Look, bruh, don’t be a pussy like me. John is dying because I didn’t take my turn. If you don’t take yours, something bad is guaranteed to happen, but if you play the game and manage to win then maybe we have a chance of getting out of here.”
A tear spilled down Alfie’s cheek. “I’m scared, man. Please don’t make me go in there.”
Monty pulled him into an embrace and patted him on the back. “You can do this, Alfie. You’re my mate, and I know you can do it.”
To Cheryl’s surprise, Alfie started nodding. She’d been sure things would devolve into violence, but they now seemed to be heading away from that direction.
Alfie sobbed quietly as he moved over to the cell. He hesitated before going inside, but not for long, and it seemed he had made up his mind to go through with whatever came next.
“So what do I do?” he asked, looking back at them. “Do I mess with this metal thing?”
No one answered because no one knew the answer. Also, they were afraid — perhaps not as much as Alfie, but enough to take the words from their mouths.
Deciding to just go ahead and try something, Alfie moved around to the back of the brass coffin and started fiddling with it. He soon managed to open a rear compartment, and it became clear what he was supposed to do.
“I’m supposed to climb inside.”
“We’re here,” said Cheryl. “We’re right with you, Alfie.”
He gave them an anxious glance, then climbed into the coffin’s interior. His neck slotted into the hole at the top, leaving his head exposed and his body enclosed. The back casing snapped shut, trapping Alfie inside. Tears and snot covered his face. He looked like a sad Russian doll.
“It’s okay,” said Cheryl. “We’re right here.”
As if to mock her words, the cell door swung shut, locking them out. Alfie was on his own.
“What now?” Alfie tried to keep his voice from descending into sobs. “Nothing’s happening.”
The light in the cell went out and so did the red tubular sign. Alfie screamed in the darkness. They could no longer see him.
“Something is happening, all right,” said Monty. “Just stay calm, Alfie. We’ll get you through this. It’s just a game.”
A spotlight sliced through the darkness, casting a yellow cone over a terrified Alfie. Then the cone shifted, moving away from Alfie and settling on the back wall.
It wasn’t a spotlight. It was a projection.
The man without eyes stared back at them and began to talk. “Alfie Maguire, you are guilty of a grievous crime, and through its undertaking a family has been denied closure. Yet your crime was in service to another, a transgression intended to obscure one even more heinous. Confess your sin, Alfie, and seek atonement. Only then shall you be free.”
The projection shifted back down, once again illuminating Alfie and the brass coffin.
Alfie struggled, his neck bulging against the metal edges of his cramped prison. “What sin? I haven’t done anything. Let me out of here.”
Cheryl grabbed the bars and poked her face through the gaps. “Alfie, don’t mess around. We know this is real, so just confess whatever crime you can think of.”
“There’s nothing,” he protested. “What do you want from me? I wank off in the bath. I don’t always wash my hands after a pi
ss. I don’t deserve to die.”
“You must know something, Alfie. The psycho who trapped us down here wants to hear something in particular. What sin does he know about? Why would he want revenge on you?”
“I don’t know who the fuck he is?”
Leo shushed them. “Quiet! I hear something.”
A hissing sound filled the silence.
“Oh God,” said Alfie. “What is that? Snakes?”
“No,” said Cheryl. “It’s gas.”
Suddenly a spark ignited and a flame whooshed to life. It rose underneath the coffin, licking at the bottom.
Alfie’s face quivered in terror. “What’s happening?”
“There’s a fire,” said Leo. “Underneath you.”
“Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck.”
Cheryl told him to stay calm. It didn’t work.
Hanging from the ceiling, half-a-dozen video cameras lit up and began whirring, filming Alfie’s predicament.
“You need to give a confession,” she shouted through the bars. “That’s what he wants.”
“I have nothing to confess!”
“Alfie, you must have something.”
“I don’t!”
Cheryl turned aside to look at Monty and Leo. “Do you know what he did? Do you know what he needs to confess to? Now is the time to stop covering for him.”
Leo shook his head. So did Monty, but she was less inclined to believe him. He and Alfie were both in sales, thick as thieves. Mates. Buddies. Brethren.
“Monty,” she said, staring him in the eye and trying her best to sound stern. “You saw what happened to Happy. We have to follow the rules. Help Alfie. What does he need to confess?”
“I swear I don’t know.”
“Damn it, Monty, I don’t believe you. He’s your friend.”
His face twisted in anger, but he fought it off and gave her a pleading look. “I promise you, Cher. I don’t know what he did.”
“Get me out of here!” Alfie was yelling now. “I can feel it getting hot. I’m going to burn to death in here. Come on!”
The brass coffin started to glow at the bottom. It was heating up like an old-fashioned kettle. And Alfie was stuck inside it. He began to sweat, beads on his forehead catching the light like jewels. His slick black hair whipped back and forth in front of him as he thrashed.
“Confess!” Cheryl shouted. “Don’t die in there, Alfie.”
The cameras overhead continued to whir, and Alfie seemed to notice them for the first time. Instead of confessing, he swore and cursed at their lenses, calling out the man who had put him there. Was he watching this? Or would the footage be retrieved later?
Monty rattled the bars. “Alfie! I need my sales sidekick, innit? Do what you have to do to get out of there.”
Alfie whipped his focus to Monty and glared. “I ain’t your fucking sidekick, Monty. Half the sales you get are stolen. You use John’s login details to steal everyone else’s leads. You think I’m stupid?”
Monty’s mouth fell open. “W-What…?” He took a moment to breathe. “Yeah, okay, you’re right, Alfie, you got me, hands up, I’ve been doing it for years. Monty Rizwan is a piece of shit who looks out for number one. A thief too. Oh, and I hacked off my boss’s hand. All in all, I’d say my future is pretty much over, yeah? This ain’t about me though, bruh. This is about whatever shit you’re guilty of.
“I ain’t guilty of— Shit! It’s getting hot. Help me, man, please!”
“Help yourself, bruh!”
Leo tried pulling at the gate, just like he had when Happy had been getting buried alive. It didn’t do any good this time either. The brass coffin started to glow red. Alfie’s eyebrows dripped sweat.
Cheryl yelled again. “Alfie, time is running out. You have to confess to something.”
He didn’t seem to hear her. He thrashed wildly, like he hoped to squeeze his body out through the head hole. “It’s burning me. It hurts. Get me out of here. Get me out of here. Get me out of here.”
“Just confess,” begged Cheryl. “What’s the worst thing you ever did?”
Alfie went bright red in the face. The glowing heat at the bottom of the coffin climbed upwards, inch by inch. He was going to burn alive.
Alfie screamed.
Then he confessed.
“I buried a dead girl,” he shouted at the cameras. “I-I buried a body so that nobody would ever find it. I helped cover up an accident.” He screamed in pain. “N-N-No, a murder. I helped cover up a murder.”
The flames continued burning. The heat continued rising. Alfie’s eyes rolled about in his head. Why wasn’t it over? Why wasn’t he free? He had just confessed to covering up a murder.
“Who was it?” Cheryl yelled through the bars. “Who was the dead girl?”
“Wh-what?”
“Who’s body did you bury?”
“Polly,” said Alfie, screaming between the words. “P-Polly McIntyre.”
The flame disappeared. The back panel of the brass coffin sprung open. Alfie collapsed, dropping backwards out of sight. Cheryl rattled the bars of the gate and stumbled in surprise when it swung open.
Monty and Leo raced into the cell and retrieved Alfie. They grabbed him by the arms and dragged him into the centre of the tunnel. His trainers, and the ankles of his skinny jeans, were smoking and the smell of bacon wafted though the air. Cheryl patted Alfie down. He moaned in pain.
The skin on his shins had melted into the denim of his jeans. His feet were bubbling in his shoes.
“I don’t think you have enough Vaseline for this,” said Leo, looking at Cheryl with a queasy look on his face.
“No,” she said. “I don’t.”
7
Cheryl was dying to question Alfie about his confession, to ask about Polly McIntyre — was it the same Polly who disappeared? Happy’s niece? — but she couldn’t. Alfie was hurt badly. The pain was too much for him to focus. Tears leaked all over his face as he writhed on his back, and every time someone spoke to him he replied only with moans.
“I feel like we’re dropping one by one,” said Leo, and he nodded at where John and Maggie were still lying, close to death. They were positioned side by side, holding hands as if they knew their time was coming. They didn’t speak, they didn’t move, they only stared into space, blinking every now and then. Cheryl expected both of them to die and it horrified her. She had never expected anyone to die before. Death had always been a nasty surprise. Something that happened out of nowhere. Something that happened without warning.
Her dad had just been making bacon sandwiches. An ordinary afternoon. His final afternoon.
I’m sorry, sweetheart. The doctors said it was instant. There was nothing anyone could have done.
He’s gone.
Death had always been a surprise for Cheryl.
Until today. Today she saw it coming, approaching down a narrow alleyway with no hope of escaping it.
Monty shuffled onto the ground between her and Leo and passed around some crackers. There was a bottle of water too that they had used to douse Alfie’s legs, and she reached for it now, sipping a few mouthfuls greedily. Then she crunched on a cracker, the best cracker she had ever tasted.
“You okay?” Monty asked.
She nodded, but told him, “Not really.”
“I hear that.”
Leo chuckled through a mouthful of cracker, his angular chin pistoning back and forth. “It’s down to us three. Think we’ll win a prize?”
“Just show me daylight,” said Cheryl. “That’s good enough for me.”
Monty looked at his watch. “You’ll have a wait on your hands. It’s passed seven.”
Cheryl gasped. “Is it really that late? No wonder I’m so exhausted.”
“Wanna take a nap?” Leo winked and patted his lap.
“Seriously? You just watched one of your coworkers almost get burned to death.”
“Almost to death.”
Monty chuckled. “I suppose, if nothing else, it shows w
e can survive this by following the rules. Maybe we really can get out of here if we play along with this psycho’s games.”
Cheryl had considered the same thing. If the games were fair then perhaps they really would be released if they managed to survive them. After all she’d seen, it seemed unlikely. It would be crazy to let someone go after torturing them. Even if Maggie’s husband was just a pawn in whatever was going on, he at the very least would go to jail. Happy was dead, even if the rest of them got away.
And that’s a big even.
“Alfie’s alive because he admitted to murder,” she said. “Was Polly McIntyre Happy’s niece?”
Leo nodded. “Yeah. I can’t believe Alfie killed her. I always thought it was you, Monty.”
“What? Shut your mouth, bruh. I ought to mash you up.”
Cheryl looked at Monty. “Why would Leo suspect you?”
“Because I had a barny with Polly the night she disappeared.”
“What about?”
He shrugged. “No clue. I don’t remember anything about that night, but I know I didn’t hurt Polly. I wouldn’t. The police had me in their sights for a while because my car had been wrecked the same time she had vanished, but even they eventually decided I had nothing to do with it.”
Leo nodded. “Yeah, well, the mystery has been cleared up now. Alfie killed her.”
“No,” said Monty. “He said he was involved, but didn’t admit to killing her, only that he buried her body.”
Leo shrugged. “So what? He must’ve killed her in order to bury her.”
Monty shook his head. “Nah, bruh. That’s not what he said. I reckon someone else killed her and Alfie helped cover it up.”
Cheryl asked a question that needed asking. “Who then? Who killed Polly?”
“John probably,” said Leo, “or maybe it was Happy.”
“What? But Polly was his niece.”
“Exactly. Aren’t most murders committed by someone the victim knows? Family or friends?”
Cheryl frowned. “Happy’s dead. Why continue with this torture if the murderer has been punished?”
No one answered for a second, but then Monty provided a theory. “The game has kept on going because everyone is guilty of something. I’m guilty of thieving from Alscon,” he glanced at Alfie lying on the ground nearby, “and my coworkers. Alfie is guilty of hiding Polly’s body. I suppose John and Maggie are guilty of adultery. That leaves Happy and Leo.”
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