Part 5
The house was cold.
My fingers seemed covered with some invisible, intangible veneer of ice, and I fancied my nails were turning the cobalt blue of a late afternoon sky, or maybe the purplish blue of one of those corpses in the morgue. Either way, it wasn't particularly reassuring. Neither was the Colt revolver I was holding on to in my gun-hand with a death grip, like someone drowning holding on to a rescuer. Not for the first time I quietly cursed the gun laws in the country – a weighty submachine gun would do wonders to my self-esteem. Usually when I'm in my nice, warm apartment in my nice, safe armchair I'm anti-guns, which shows you a lot about me, doesn't it?
The skin of my hands seemed pale, nearly lucent next to the dark gleam of the revolver grip, and I felt a small treacherous surge of confusion, as if that wasn't right somehow. No time to analyse the feelings, so I moved on. With the mincing, amusingly unsteady gait of a girl wearing nine-inch heels for the first time, I attempted (note attempted) to sneak quietly. Playing James Bond, what fun. Now I was in some room that looked like a damned medieval library. Dusty books. Nearly sneezed, what with all the damned dust whirling in slow motion like billions of drunken ballroom dancers, and wondered where the hell Cady was. Stupid idea of mine to separate. First time doing a potential hostage situation as a non-cop, and I was edgy.
Had he found the kid?
Couldn't seem to hear anything much. There was a lack of noise that made the air seem to hum in one's ears, like the quiet purring of an air conditioner. I caught unnecessary sounds that now seemed obscenely loud, when they would normally not even be noticed - my boot sinking into the scruffy carpet of a weary shade of red, my forced, steady breathing, the scrape of trouser fabric.
I was pretty sure she was here, as sure as several hours of surveillance (coupled with an irritating need to use the gents each time a perceived development took place), inelegant bugging, snooping around the trash and interviewing neighbours, all the while scattering fake personas and reasons like confetti over a bride would be. Nice. Fun. Now, what was it that convinced me the life of a gumshoe was all car chases and exciting espionage-related activities?
Nothing to see in this room. No cooperative dust cover on the ground with equally cooperative footprints, fingerprints, personal effects. All that I could deduce, playing Sherlock bloody Holmes, was that some time ago a cat ruled this rambling house like my tabby Tam ruled mine - all those defiant scratch marks on the heavy, depressed curtains and the drooping sofa. Even the mahogany, glass-surface table looked limp. Cupboards were empty except for a few offended spiders. I wished this were an apartment in the mainland, where if I got killed I probably would be found. Morbid. Now, where had that come from?
Too much stress and playing hero? I really should have taken Cady's advice and called the cops and the family when we came to this conclusion, but the cops, even when well meaning, don't usually come fast enough for my tastes. Bureaucracy, that evil venomous, untrustworthy beast, moves like a slug when the speed of a cheetah is most called for. And since the Doctor just got out of the house, presumably to go to what passed as downtown on this place, hey, nice time to break in, rescue seven-year-old Drew Doarcia, and run away heroically. I think I'd get nightmares where Cady's disbelieving, sardonic expression would loom out of the darkness and go "I don't need to say 'told you so'..." in sepulchral tones. If I ever manage to get out to have nightmares in the first place.
Why am I so nervous? The only creep in this house is the Doctor, and he's gone. Must be the surfeit of movies I've been gorging myself on during spare time. Or maybe the fact that I'd never get used to not having close backup a call away. Turning private detective, after all the privileges of being a cop, still came as a mild shock, especially when I needed said privileges. Probably like a drug addict waking up one day to find that the world's drugs had mysteriously decomposed to nothing.
Can't hear Cady.
What sunlight the murky glass window let in spilled weakly onto the carpet and the torn sofa. Oddly, I automatically stepped around it, but I didn't want to go into an in-depth, soul-searching review of my probably stress-caused actions now, so I let it pass. Maybe there's schizophrenia in it somewhere. Leaned against the pocked, off-white wall next to the door out of this room. Carefully opened the door and nudged it open with my foot, half-expecting a violent reaction.
Feeling disappointed at the reception – one reproachful spider that scuttled away and up to the doorframe – I turned into the corridor. I wondered what would happen if I were caught and the kid wasn't here. Not much evidence, the Doctor's righteous indignation, all those bright flashing red sirens…breaking into a house, trespassing, you have the right to remain silent, that poor Tim, all the work finally got to him, etc, etc.
I wondered what drugs the architect for this mansion had been on. The corridor was the same one I'd started out in when I'd entered the library, which either meant this wing of the house was larger than I'd thought, or I was somehow going in circles. Couldn't see the first door to the library, so it was quite possible that the corridor curved away to my right.
Maybe LSD.
Was it the same one? Looked like it. The sad, peeling wallpaper and the obligatory sickly salmon-pink carpet. Different corridors in this mansion seemed to have different-themed carpets. I meditated on my drugged-architect theory as I neared the next door.
Same opening-door routine, which made me feel melodramatic and idiotic. Maybe this was what actors felt like when shooting a movie. Glanced inside – small room, French windows, dusty glass cabinet. Fine porcelain winked at me through the dust-fogged glass, some of which looked rare, even to my untutored and uncaring eye. I wondered how the Doctor could afford them on his salary – he wasn't any sort of honcho in Birs Hospital.
Baby grand piano next to the windows, sunlight falling on the seat and the keys. Nothing here either – I was going to leave quietly when a black blur leaped up onto the keyboard. The sharp discordant notes made me jump, and I nearly dropped the gun. A black cat gave me a reproachful look from flat yellow eyes, then padded to me and rubbed against my legs. Poor thing must have been locked in here, but from the smell and the looks of the mouse-bitten piano cover, red velvet pushed into lazy folds on the ground, it may not have been left wanting of food.
Being the antisocial sod I was, I aimed a kick at it, but it dodged skilfully, treated me to a mew that was full of wide-eyed hurt, and seeing that my heart didn't melt, it stalked off huffily, tail high.
Reached a staircase. The structure of this house was insane. Why a staircase in the middle of nowhere? I climbed up, keeping to the railing, so as not to make too much creaking sounds. I wondered how the Doctor had acquired this house. Must have inherited, somehow, but research on him hadn't shown any hints of a privileged family background. This house positively stank of old money.
Still not a peep from Cady. Knowing him, he hadn't left his mobile phone on, if he'd even brought it, so I couldn't call him. Tried anyway – nope, no response.
Came up onto yet another corridor. How big was this house anyway? It didn't seem this big from the outside…I could feel the presence of a headache. Goddamnit. Just what I needed.
Carpet was a particularly dead shade of red. I think I'm becoming manic-depressive. Stupid house…stupid case…sometimes I believe I cultivate the wrong friendships. Drew's family only got referred to the Seek Sickers Investigation Agency (Cady's contribution to the brainstorming for names) because his brother was part of a gang that received 'support' from a bigger gang that I somehow got involved with. I call it gang, but Jared calls it 'organisation'. The Organisation. How did an ex-cop detective who adores a low profile get involved with the Organisation? To use a cliché, long, involved story that I can't remember much of, and some of which I still don't find believable.
Doors. Concentrate on doors. Maybe it was the cold, maybe the atmosphere. My brain shouldn't be drifting off this often…
Three doors. One at the right end, two opposite ones to the left end. Short corridor, which meant that, by the logic in this house, one of the rooms would be a default corridor to the next bit of this house, after which I would find that this 'short' corridor actually led to the rest of the wing anyway. I decided to try the door at the right end first.
Opened to another cold, small room. Shouldn't call it small actually – this was the size of my own bedroom. But compared to the other rooms in this nightmare, small. I saw with rising hope a small bed, some depressed stuffed toys in a neat pile on it, a relatively new rug with a garish bright green border. Pasted pictures on the walls, a child's drawings, all pictures of open space, all recent. Crayons on the ground, small kiddie table against the wall, of a shade of yellow only mass-manufactured plastic could be. Little kiddie chairs. Two neatly at the table…the other facing the corner to my far left. Away from the furniture and the small window. A tiny, definitely human figure sat in it.
Bingo, Jeopardy, millionaire!
Then the triumph turned stale, because the boy didn't turn to even look at me. Dark hair, right, dark chocolate skin as suits soccer fanatics, right…I walked a little noisily towards him. "Drew?"
The boy flinched slightly, but didn't move. I felt an overwhelming sense of relief. He wasn't dead. "Drew, baby? My name's Tim, I'm a detective your family got. You okay?"
Drew's fingers, clutching the edges of the chair, clenched. What was wrong with the kid? I couldn't see any restraints…so I walked up to him and knelt down. "You okay?"
The boy turned wide brown eyes to me, let out a sigh or a gasp, and leaped off the chair into my arms. "The Doctor told me not to leave the chair but you're not the Doctor can I go home now?" He paused for breath. "Please?"
"Calm down, baby. Everything's going to be okay. The Doctor's not here. We're going home." I spoke soothing, inane words over and over again, softly, but they did the job. Drew began breathing steadily. Trust shone in his eyes, and he looked as me as a priest would look at his Saviour. Tried to be helpful. "The House changes, you know."
"Changes?"
"Rooms don't stay where they are. You start walking in one place and you end up back at the same place it's scary please let us go home…" Breathing too fast again. I put this talk down to childish superstition. Lord knew it was easy enough to get lost in this damned place.
"I'd get you out, I promise. Now have you watched James Bond before?"
The kid nodded, mildly surprised at this sudden reference to the British spy.
"We've got to pretend we're both James Bond, okay? Move silently, pay attention for the bad guy. You can do that?" For some victims, it usually helped if one gave them an active role in their escape, or a perceived active role. May help in their therapy later, but I'm no shrink.
"Sure." Drew's eyes were wide again, this time from excitement.
"Stay close now." I edged towards the door, Drew copying my movements. At least he wasn't suffering from emotional/whatever shock…I didn't know how to deal with kids, period, let alone hysterical ones. Christ, of all the crimes, kidnapping kids had to be one of the worst. All those scarred families, the fear, and the sad success rate of finding them alive…and finally when the trail's cold and the cops have more or less given up, then they turn to the private detective and hope for a miracle. In this case, they got one. The only ones who were surprised were Cady and I. Obstinate hard work, luck, the Organisation's aid, somehow managed to get together all at once.
From what we'd found, there was some suggestion that the Doctor had, through his paediatric practice and 'volunteer work' in certain places, led to the 'disappearance' of at least two kids over the past few years. Drew was very lucky.
Now where in damnation was Cady?
We sneaked out to the corridor, then toward the staircase.
Or rather, where it had been.
The staircase was gone.
I stared at the now-blank wall in astonishment, then walked down the corridor, Drew dutifully following me. Even under my accusing stare, the missing structure refused to turn up. I wondered if I was going mad. I went back and knocked on the section of wall where the staircase had been. Nope, it was solid.
"Drew, baby, have you ever been out of your room?"
"Sometimes." Drew looked around him constantly, nervously. Very quick little eyes.
"Was there a staircase here?"
"Sometimes. An' sometimes there's two doors at the end of this corridors."
I looked. There were now three. I rubbed my eyes. Still three.
"And what happens when there's two?"
"There's two and a staircase when he wants me to go downstairs with him."
"And three?"
"Only three when I wanna escape. Then I can't go downstairs." The boy was trembling now. "We'd go home won't we?"
"Don't worry, baby. Now tell me what happens when there're three."
"I can't go back into my room and only one of those three doors open."
I turned back. His room's door was closed, even though I hadn't shut it and I hadn't heard it closing. I tried the knob. Locked. Jesus Christ, this began to look like a bad horror movie.
"What's behind the door that can open?"
The boy shook again. Tiny fists clenched. "Him."
Well, I had a gun. Time to give it a shot, pun intended. "Come on then."
As the kid predicted, two doors were locked, one wasn't. I wondered how many times he'd tried escaping, and got the feeling he didn't want to tell me what happened when he got caught. Something must have caused the rigid obedience with which he stared at the corner of the wall even when a stranger spoke behind him and entered the room.
I kicked open the door as noiselessly as I could (a paradox there), and did a classic gun stance, both hands on the grip, finger ready and already putting pressure on the trigger.
Nothing…we were on a sort of balcony that looked out over a floor below us. Staircase, a gracefully curving one to the floor below. Strange, I hadn't seen it before, and the kid probably hadn't either – he looked surprised.
Carefully we went down the staircase, with him at my heels. There was a grimy chandelier above, teeny crystals catching the faded light, and small windows with big curtains and those ugly tassels some people think look tasteful. The windows were too small for me to get through, but I looked closer anyway – we were three stories off the ground…too high up to try and get Drew to climb down by himself. A Persian carpet at the end of the staircase, on which was a carved mahogany table with a Greek vase of dead flowers that once were probably roses. Half-naked carvings of nymphs and satyrs pranced as the vase's decoration. Charming.
The room was semicircular, with the flat portion of the semicircle bearing the windows, and three doors on the smooth curve. Wood-panelled wall that managed to look both expensive and like a certain cheap restaurant a few blocks from my apartment.
Hmm…time to ask the kid again. "Have you seen this place before?"
"Nope."
So much for helpful contributions. "Randomly pick a door, baby. I'd think your luck has got to be better than mine at the moment."
Drew giggled nervously, then pointed to the door on my extreme left. Carefully I minced over to it, and opened it the spy way. I didn't know what to expect, and I certainly didn't expect a brick wall. In disbelief, I touched the rough surface. Solid. When rubbing it I nearly abraded my knuckles.
"You pick one." Drew was turning this into a sort of adventure. I tried to look more like a knight in shining armour for his sake.
The middle door, for variety, was a metal wall. Half-heartedly I scrutinised it. Maybe there was some sort of lever or mechanism or something. Nope, no such luck, and the wall was solid too.
The last door opened into a large kitchen that looked as though it had been used many hours ago. Dirty dishes steeped in murky sink water. There was a door at the far end, next to the 'fridge, and the kitchen was done in oak and white tiles which would have looked cheerful in less sinister surroundings. It looked homey – the stove, the kitchen table and chairs in the centre, the cabinets…but we crept to the door, opened it. No one outside, so we went through.
Was there any need to describe the next area? You'd never believe it, but we were back upstairs, outside Drew's room. I stared, mouth slightly open in shock. Wait, maybe this was only another damned copy. The stupid fuck of an architect. When I got out I'd go over to his place and pummel him, or something.
I turned back – the door was closed, and locked, even though I hadn't closed it. At the end of the corridor, three rooms. Two wouldn't open, one had already been opened, out to the balcony, the staircase, the chandelier, the small windows, the semicircular room. Jesus Christ.
"Mister Tim?" I heard Drew's timid voice through the fog of stunned amazement.
"Yes baby?"
"Are…are we going home?"
"Of course we are, I promised." The words sounded hollow even to me, but Drew seemed satisfied. Went downstairs – two doors that opened to brick and metal walls, one into an extremely familiar kitchen with extremely familiar dishes. God, maybe this was a nightmare, please let it be a nightmare.
I stopped in the kitchen and took a deep breath. "Let's try again, okay?"
"Okay."
Two more loops, back in the kitchen. On the last one, I'd taken a dish out and put it on the table, with a cup on it. The next loop brought me back. Same cup, same dish, same position. Even the same damned water droplets from me messily lifting the cup out of the sink. Jesus Christ.
When in deep shit, call for help. I took the mobile phone from its pouch in my belt, and debated on calling the police, decided against it – they'd never believe me anyway. Poor old Tim, thinks he's walking into the same room again and again, must be going a bit bonkers up there, you know? Tried calling Cady. No answer. Even the dial tone managed to sound accusatory.
I took a deep breath, and called the last number for emergencies. Waited impatiently as the monotonous ring-tone picked up, then to my relief a familiar feminine voice replaced it.
"What do you want, Tim? Do you have Drew?"
"Yep, got the kid, and I need some serious help."
"What's wrong?" Bianca could seem as concerned as a paid psychiatrist could. Wasn't her real name, of course – the real name was Witney, and she hated it. She tolerated the inevitable shortening of Bianca to Bi. Ironical, that voice, considering what she did for a living.
"We can't get out, and I can't find Cady." Briefly I told her what was wrong, and half-expected her to burst into derisive laughter.
When she didn't, I felt mildly annoyed. What, she didn't believe me? Luckily I managed to see how idiotic this reaction was, and quashed it before she answered.
"I'd be right there."
"Are you sure about this?" Sheer relief. She could handle anything.
"I said I'd be there. Where are you?"
I told her, and then something occurred to me. "Bi, are you sure Jared would allow you to…"
Amusement. "Strange as this may seem to you, I don't belong to Jared, Tim. This sounds serious, and while it may come as a shock to you, I like you and Cady…and some excitement after a week of pushing paper could be cathartic. See you. Stay where you are, from what I hear the kitchen's the best defensive position."
She hung up; I pulled out a chair and sat down, feet flat on the ground, resting the gun on the table. Drew pulled up a chair. "Help's coming?"
"Yeah. Your brother's friends. Now we just have to wait and watch the doors carefully." I still felt numb, from what was happening, and from Bianca's ready acceptance of the situation and her decision to come and help. I tried to think of what she would have to say to Jared, and cheered up.
"Okay."
**
After a few hours – it was somewhat reassuring to find that time passed in this place – Drew fell asleep. I couldn't blame the kid – my eyelids felt like drifting down, but a few years of surveillance had been of use. Never thought I'd use it to try and defend myself, though. I wondered if there was coffee in the cabinet, and decided I didn't really want to look. My foot was beginning to cramp, and during this lull in all that activity, my body was reminding me of the cold again. I'd given Drew my jacket to use as a blanket, so I was less advantaged in the warmth department.
To pass the time I thought of the Organisation and marvelled on how it survived in U.S.A, supposedly the most developed country in the world. And one of the more crime-ridden, but for some reason that always refused to sink in. I'd lost count of the members of the core group, and it had many branches – Drew's brother's Latino-only teenage gang, for one. Jared liked to cultivate loyalty, so he usually arranged help and such for members of such affiliates – Drew, for one. Kidnapped in his school playground, wasn't found out until lesson-time. It was remarkably easy to kidnap children in playgrounds that weren't fenced in, and with Drew this trusting…from what I'd heard, he liked to sit alone in a quiet corner as well. Perfect victim potential.
The Organisation seemed to be made up that way – outer circles of affiliates, the core group of the directly 'employed' – the more sophisticated hitmen, and miscellaneous higher-up criminals – then the inner circle – a few lieutenants. Then Jared's bodyguard, or whatever she called herself, confidant, consultant, whatever, Bianca, who did half of his work, and occasionally seemed to be just as much the head of the Organisation as he was. And Jared himself, of course, the modern-day Godfather, every manipulative inch of the spider that he was, sitting in his web of organised crime, extremely intelligent. Ph.D. at twenty something, I think it was for psychology, and I had no idea how he got involved in what was popularly termed the Underworld. I didn't know much about Bianca – she was more reticent about her past and her life in front of me, but I got the feeling they were equals.
Wonder why Drew was picked – was he just convenient, or was it on purpose? From what we'd seen of the Doctor – mild mannered paediatrician in the day, child-kidnapper whenever it suited him – evidence leant towards 'convenient', but you'd never know in these sick cases. Police were still checking him out, but it was a bit late to regret the decision to come here alone with Cady instead of bringing official aid. Since we weren't sure whether Drew was really here anyway.
I looked down at my hands – hands of a white man, and somehow I got that feeling that something was out of place. I stared at them – the callused palm, the blue veins at the wrist, slightly dirty fingernails…what? I was absorbed in turning my hand over and over, staring at the groove of the lifeline, the bones under the skin, more veins, so I didn't notice Bianca at the door.
"Something wrong with your hand?"
I jumped, half-starting from the chair, which scraped back noisily and woke up Drew. She grinned, flashing perfect white teeth.
Bianca looked gypsy, but I couldn't really tell. Raven black hair that streamed down, a gleaming waterfall, past slender shoulders right out of a Baywatch poster. Heart-shaped face framed by the tresses, soft black eyes, long eyelashes, sharp, inquisitive nose, rose-red inviting lips. You could see the muscles under the mocha skin up close, but from here she just looked like a model, maybe for some perfume company with confusing commercials. Very easy to imagine those wide, vapid smiles wreathing her face, flipping hair, painted fingernails…tall, beautiful, the works. People could easily class her into a certain category of humanity, unless they happened, like me, to see how she fought. How she thought.
Clinging deep red cotton blouse, jeans of some velvety material, dark brown. Looked expensive, branded goods, compared with Cady's scruffy blue plain shirt and pants that had seen better days until they took up a relationship with my greying partner. Black Doc Martens, with concealed knives. She held a chrome-plated gun that definitely did not look like a toy, and I was sure there were other 'surprises' in the light pack that fit easily on her back and shoulders. The quintessential 21st century James Bond girl, just what we needed.
I wondered idly how Jared managed to attract these sorts of people, as my heart attempted to return to its original position where it'd jumped when she decided to appear at the door. Behind her was a familiar thin, pale figure – Cady, rubbing a lump on his head and muttering darkly to himself.
"Cady! Are you okay?"
"Does it look like I'm okay?" He gave me a morose once-over, then slouched over and pooled in a chair.
"What happened?"
"Hey kid. At least we found ya. What happened to me? I don't know shit. Walked into a room looking for the kid, looked like a living room or something, next thing I know someone or something hit me on the head, and I'm out like a light." Cady returned to gingerly probing the lump.
"And I find him there, wake him up, we walk around, and end up upstairs…"
"At the corridor with three doors at one end?" I had a sinking feeling in my gut.
"Yeah." Bianca looked rather unsurprised. "Just like you described on the 'phone. Went downstairs, found you. End of story."
"How'd you get here so fast? Last I heard you were in L.A."
"I was in one of Jared's homes – a yacht, Eighth Circle. Since you said this was an island, I simply commandeered it. It's at the dock now, waiting for us." Eighth Circle of Dante's Inferno…Sins of Fraud. Ahaha.
"And Jared didn't say anything?" Cady surfaced from his mire of self-pity for a moment.
"He wasn't there to say anything." Bianca positively smirked. "Hey Drew. How's things?"
Drew smiled happily. "Better."
"Nice to hear, love." She affectionately ruffled his hair.
"Why don't you ever call me love?" I bantered.
She looked at me owlishly. "Because you're not cute enough, gumshoe."
"You wound me," I told her.
"Good." She glanced at Cady. "Ready to start moving now, antique?"
Cady shook a finger at her in mock rage. "Young lady…"
"Spare me the senile diatribes until we get out of here, old man," she laughed at his venomous glare. Cady hated being called 'old' – once he'd told me that if someone ever attempted to give up his or her seat to him in a bus, the charitable soul would be beaten up on the spot. "Okay, so this is the repeating door?"
I nodded. Drew nodded. Marionettes.
"Let's try it then. Cady, do you think you're up to carrying Drew?"
The predictable thing happened, and we ended up in the kitchen. Bianca sucked her cheek thoughtfully.
"Ya don't seem much surprised." Cady was back in the chair, seating Drew on his lap.
"If you quote me in front of Jared I'd call you a liar, but if you want my real opinion on this…"
"It's supernatural, right?"
"Seems paranormal to me, unless we're on some sort of induced drug trip." Bianca sniffed the air. "And I doubt that we'd still be able to go around in circles when hallucinating. Everything seems clear, there aren't any other wildly mysterious appearances…"
"So what do we do?" Cady was always the one who was to-the-point.
Bianca pulled out a chair and sat down. "Nothing much we can do. Is there food in the 'fridge?"
"You can think of food now?" I didn't conceal how incredulous I felt.
"If we have to sit out a siege…"
I took a look. Didn't know what to expect, maybe bottled heads and eyeballs, too many psychotic movies. It was a 'normal' 'fridge – yoghurt, milk, orange juice, chocolate sauce, suspicious vegetables, the obligatory paper-wrapped cuboids of butter, a lurking jar of vomit-green hotdog relish, innocent-looking cheddar cheese, frozen bread. The freezer had meat that I didn't feel like identifying at the moment, but since it looked supermarket wrapped it should be…conventional, some sausages, and a box of fish fingers. There was some ice-cream. Who put ice-cream with meat?
"We can sit out a siege." Cady observed, unnecessarily.
Bianca was still holding on to her gun – but so was I. She didn't say anything. A 'let's hope it won't come to that' would just have sounded needlessly plaintive. Drew had fallen asleep again – in the silence the three of us seemed to be calmed by his breathing.
"Wonder if he'd come check on us." Cady continued.
I glanced at Bianca. She now wore an unpleasant smile. "I hope so."
The gun hand rested on the table, and the metal finish glinted in the cheap fluorescent whiteness of the kitchen lights.
**
Time seemed to pass slowly. We took turns complaining, playing with Drew, reminiscing, playing with Drew, complaining, reminiscing some more, sleeping, watching the doors, and occasionally cooking. I began to try and think of a place where Jared wouldn't be able to find me and get his hands on me for separating his precious Bianca from his property for this length of time.
We had begun speculating what the Doctor was doing in town, or whether he had come back. If he had, did he know we were here, and was prolonging whatever he wanted to prolong, or was he oblivious?
What made it weirder was that when Bianca called Eighth Circle, and some of the Organisation's minions came to look for us, they couldn't seem to find the house. We took turns trying to give instructions, then gave up. Currently they were still scouring the large island the best they could for what was apparently now a non-existent mansion.
This pretty turn of affairs reached Jared's ear remarkably quickly, and he shouted at Bianca over her 'phone for a while (Cady and I wished she'd turn the volume down by half, at least). Bianca placidly listened to him, then finally asked if he had anything constructive to add, which nearly set him off again, I could tell.
When she philosophically put the 'phone back in her pack, Cady voiced our thoughts. "He's coming?"
"Damn him." Bianca replied obliquely.
"Maybe he'd bring some more people."
"I brought some – left them in the garden to keep watch, thinking this would be less of a mess if I went in myself. Called them some time ago, several times. No answer. Probably…non-vital now." She gave Drew a sidelong glance, unwilling to say dead in front of a kid. Very maternal.
"He also had several choice things to say about you," Bianca winked at me.
"Oh good, entertainment at last." Cady brightened up.
I sank into my chair. Maybe if I ran off to some remote monastery in Tibet…
"Tried smashing those windows?" Bianca glanced out of the kitchen. "Maybe Drew can get out, if anything…"
Drew began to look excited, but the three of us silently weighed his chances outside, alone, and came to the same decision.
"No harm doing it anyway," Cady rubbed his eyes. "Maybe your lackeys would be able to find broken glass."
Bianca shrugged, producing one of those double-edged, triangular ninja throwing knives. Very theatrical, and very brutal-looking. She took aim, and her wrist flicked forward.
The knife embedded itself into the glass, but it only cracked – and the house keened.
I swear it – a cry of agony both high-pitched and in a bass growl seemed to emanate from the walls, and at the same time there was a sharp jolt of pain in my head. I must have groaned, because the three of them glanced sharply at me.
"Tim?" Concern camped from Cady's thin mouth to his greying fringe.
"Sudden headache," I gingerly probed my head. It had receded into a dull throbbing. "Probably stress."
Bianca snorted. "Let's try it again, then." Yet another throwing knife, but this time thrown such that it quivered in the doorframe like a hooked fish. Another unearthly howl of pain, and yet another stab in my head.
"I don't understand," Cady said bluntly, as wide-eyed as the kid.
"Are we inside Tim's head?" Drew advanced a timid suggestion.
Bianca's stare was intense – her eyes sparkled with energy. "Nice way of putting it, love."
"Ya mean he's right?"
She shrugged again. "It's as good a reason as any. Any other ideas?"
I rubbed my nose. "No. But if it's my brain, then I should be able to get us out." The words sounded unreal, and seemed to hang in the air.
"Try."
"Right. Let's say I want that door to open outside." I pointed at the door that led upstairs. "So I just make it open outside? Hah."
"Jee-sus, you're taking this seriously?" Cady leant forward.
"Do you have better contributions to make?" Bianca nodded at the disgruntled shake of the grizzly grey head. "There you go."
"But why is this…" I began.
"Let's ask that big question when we get out." Always the pragmatist.
I took a deep breath, and
attempted to focus on a picture of the badly kept, weed-choked ground outside
the mansion, then attempted to pin it to the door. Maybe I was going mad. I
heard a chair scrape, and saw Bianca, through my haze of concentration, walk
catlike to the door and open it.
Tidal wave of relief – the door led outside. The scent of rotting lawn washed in, and smelt sweet – the scent of freedom. Then I realised that someone who looked remarkably like myself was blocking the way out.
"Surprise," he said softly, and his hand darted forward, like those little hummingbirds, a comparison enhanced by the shimmer of the steel knife in his hand. Bianca flinched violently to the side, and so it missed her heart, getting embedded in the joint between left shoulder and arm instead. She hissed in pain, but the gun went up, pumping.
The…person was already diving and rolling, towards me, so I started from my chair and got punched in the solar plexus for my efforts. Didn't let go of the gun, but as I aimed it at him he somehow sprang back to his feet, and one hand caught my gun hand wrist in a grip like a vise. I kneed him in the stomach, and he pulled me down with him. The next moments were confused – Cady's shouting at Bianca not to shoot, not to shoot, Bianca growling back some answer as we rolled on the ground like those gangster fights in movies, me trying to shoot him, him trying to wrest the gun from me.
The gun went off, bullet hole in the ceiling and the sharp sting of gunpowder on my cheek. He yelled in pain, but I hadn't hit him – at the same time I felt the daggers of agony in my brain, but I'd been expecting them. I took advantage of the temporary slack to grab him under the chin and slam his head against the ground. A loud crack and he was still, but not dead – breathing, chest lifting up and down in a grotesque parody of peace. Myself, I was breathing hard as I staggered to my feet, gun trained on him. It was a mercy he didn't wear the same clothes, or even Cady might have had difficulty telling him from me...I felt like I was looking into a mirror, and wondered, not for the first time, what in hell was going on.
Pale shirt and black jeans that also looked expensive. Who was this guy?
"Weirder and weirder." Bianca appeared unruffled as she knelt down and checked his pulse, then stood up. "Good job, actually." The knife was still in her shoulder, and she made no move to pull it out – would cause more bleeding, and there was no medical aid here. The stains didn't seem to show much through her red blouse, but blood began to trickle in tiny rivulets down her arm in vein-like patterns. I looked away quickly.
"Do you want to call the cops?" Cady asked. Drew was silent, staring at Bianca's wound.
"I'm a felon myself, remember?" Bianca winked at Drew. "It's all right, love." Back to Cady. "The best I can do is get my 'lackeys', as you call them, to put this twin of Tim in a certain place, and get some answers from him." She said it very matter-of-factly, without any inflection at all, but I knew how they were going to 'get some answers', and I shivered.
"Fine idea, except how are we going to drag him there?" Cady stretched, holding Drew.
Bianca made a show of looking outside. With a sinking heart, I saw what looked like one of Jared's cars prowl up what was left of the driveway, and idly wondered how he'd managed to get it onto an island even as I attempted to move behind Bianca.
She managed a chuckle, even though her pain. "Don't worry, he probably won't hurt you."
"It's the 'probably' that's getting to me."
**
Drew was returned to his happy family, we got thanked, more importantly, paid, and were now sitting in the luxurious meeting room on the Eighth Circle. My 'evil twin', as Cady put it, was now languishing somewhere in the mainland under the 'care' of the Organisation.
I tried to sink into the black leather love seat like my feet had in the lush rosewood-hued carpet. The wood panelling of the room reminded me of another chamber, elsewhere, but the vibrant, polished oak in the soft light lent warmth and comfort. Cady was asleep in the yielding embrace of the brown velvet-covered sofa, probably from the medications for the bump on his head. I contemplated the large wooden model of a ship in a glass bottle with a small neck on the table facing me, with the metal-and-cushion swivel-chair behind it, the back to the window (porthole, whatever) that gave a glimpse of the sea. Not very comforting – if I were to run out to the deck and dive off, I'd be quite a distance from the land.
I wondered who was the tasteless one who put a mosaic on the ceiling that depicted sections of the Eighth circle of Hell. Needless to say, tiles of different shades of red dominated the piece. Perversely the framed paintings on the wall were of peaceful landscapes – one that looked suspiciously like a Monet of a garden, for example. Two doors, both dark wood, with polished silver doorknobs. I wondered how much money Jared made in a day.
The door that led to the common rooms opened, and Bianca let herself in, closing it behind her. She wore a long wheat-coloured silk dress, embroidered on the bosom with thread of a darker hue, very elegant, oddly formal, if you ignored the seemingly mismatching black Doc Martens. She wore those boots nearly everywhere. The outfit managed to cover most of the bandages, such that only a thin sliver of white peeked out from the silk, like sunlight does, sometimes, from behind a cloud. The sapphire on her black lace choker seemed to blink myopically in the light.
"Where's Jared?" My voice woke up Cady, who sheepishly sat up and rubbed his eyes.
Bianca smiled without showing her teeth. "Settling something." It didn't invite further questions as to what he was settling. The three of us, now in such surroundings, exchanged meaningless courtesies and compliments for ten minutes, such that I forgot to ask anyway. Bianca probably doubled up as a hostess for certain functions of the Organisation on occasion.
"How's the arm?" Cady and I wore a plain shirt and trousers, and felt underdressed. As it was he self-consciously glanced down at his battered shoes, and surreptitiously tried to check if they were leaving marks on the carpets.
Bianca sat on the desk next to the ship-in-the-bottle, and still managed to make the position look lady-like, crossing long legs. "Damage to the radial nerve, but superficial trauma to the long bone, considering the situation. Missed the artery. Can't move my arm much and I may not be able to wear those shoulder-baring dresses any longer, but it'd probably heal, after all that surgery. Jared threatened a few specialists. No infection, at least."
"Sorry," I felt guilty.
She tried to shrug, and winced, then tried to cover that up by pushing her long hair over the injured shoulder. "I chose to go. Pretty exciting."
"Exciting?" Cady choked on the scotch that he had poured for himself from the drink cabinet.
"Exciting?" Jared echoed. I hadn't heard the door open. He advanced menacingly on Bianca, who merely smiled demurely.
Jared wore that black velvet cowboy hat of his even indoors, and I speculated once that it was to cover the baldness, until I noticed how he flaunted that aspect of his appearance as well, especially in front of people who felt uncomfortable when they see him stroking his scalp. More expensive, tailored clothes – I seemed to be surrounded by wealthy people lately – maroon Armani shirt, tight trousers of a deep electric blue, cream yellow tie. Jared liked wearing outrageous clothes, and I gathered this was a common topic of debate with Bianca. Her gaze was disapproving. But she had managed to wean him away from the purple cowboy hat…at least, in her presence.
He grinned at it, then kissed her passionately. It went on for a while, and got embarrassing. Cady and I exchanged glances. Feeling like an interloper, I cleared my throat noisily. Bianca pushed him away, cheeks flushed, but smiled again.
Jared touched the brim of the hat, one of his ambiguous gestures that could mean anything from a greeting to a prelude to excessive violence. Smooth, tan-coloured skin was stretched tightly over muscles and sharp, thin features – the jutting nose, well-defined cheekbones, the dark hollows beneath them, and the high forehead. Thin lips curved into a humourless upward arc, and the deep forest green eyes were distinctly cold. Then he seemed to reach some sort of decision, and straightened. This time his eyes twinkled like pinpoints of light caught in crystal. "Welcome to the Eighth Circle, gumshoes. If you're interested, drugs are on the fourth deck, gambling on the third…"
Bianca chuckled, her laugh rich and low. "Jared…"
He gave her a can't fault a guy for trying grin, and sidled next to her, slipping his arm around her waist. Handsome couple. "Bianca convinced me not to mutilate, dismember, incapacitate, decapitate or disable any part of you, so we'd just get on to explaining the house itself. Now I'd like to know what happened." It wasn't a request, but it sounded like one. Jared could make 'go to hell' sound courteous.
I told him, he listened, and Cady added what had happened to him. Bianca was silent – I assumed she'd already informed him of her part in the matter. When I got to the end of the fight with my doppelganger, Jared twitched.
"He got away."
I didn't register that at first, then I did, slowly. "What?"
Jared looked both annoyed and uncomfortable, one of his volatile moods. "I said he got away. Somehow, when he was conscious, he managed to get out of his handcuffs, overpower five good men, truss them up, and get away in the 'prisoner' car. No, I have no idea how he did it."
"Still on the loose?" Cady inspected the rim of the crystal goblet.
"Operatives have been on the lookout…"
"Still on the loose," I agreed.
Jared scowled down at his well-made, bull's blood-hued shoes. Bianca skilfully changed the subject, and soon we were chatting on taxes, the new government, golf, property, everything but what I wanted to hear, but I knew better than to press the subject.
Cady did it – in part. "How's the kid?"
"Recovering very well," Bianca rubbed the hollow between Jared's left hand's thumb and forefinger absently. "He'd never trust strangers again, but perhaps that's for the better."
"What about the Doctor?" I remembered.
"Never showed up. Haven't heard from him since. He hasn't been to the hospital where he works in, nor the other properties," Jared seemed to have an answer to almost everything.
It seemed to conclude the entire affair. Bianca and Jared stared at us until we got the message and exchanged meaningless good-bye pleasantries. Cady and I got out of the room, feeling as though we were schoolboys escaping from the principal's office after a dressing-down, and decided to go and take another nap. By the sound of things behind the door that we had thankfully closed, Jared wasn't wasting time scolding Bianca…
**
I woke up when water splashed on my face, icy cold. Sneezing, I sat up immediately and rubbed my eyes, identified the culprit, and immediately felt for my gun.
Needless to say it wasn't there. My doppelganger dangled it out of my reach, like a cruel child holding a doggy treat just out of reach of a puppy, and conscientiously put a glass that still had pearls of water in it on the small table next to the bed. The wetness on my face grew oppressive, as if a heavy veil was suffocating me. I tried not to make sudden movements as I stared at him.
My mirror image wore the exact same clothes with which he had been in when he 'surprised' Bianca, not a rip, not a smear on them. He smiled that lopsided smile I used on people whom I wanted to think I was intellectually challenged. I found myself looking down the muzzle of the gun, and wondered what it felt like to die.
"How'd you get past all the security?" I asked, at the same time he said, "I suppose you're wondering how I got on the yacht."
"And that."
"And that."
"You wouldn't believe me at this point of time." He replied.
I glared briefly at him. "Who are you?"
"Yourself, of course." He seemed unconcerned.
"So you're going to commit suicide?" My eyes were drawn back to the gun, the gleaming, murderous metal tube.
"I wasn't going to shoot you."
"Really." If I were to throw the sheets at him, duck and roll…
"A way of getting your full attention."
Was he psychotic, or was he psychotic. "You have it."
"Good. Listen to me. Do you remember that house?"
"Unfortunately." I decided not to try anything.
"Do you know what it is?"
"Bianca said it was my mind." I wished someone would come in. Preferably, either Jared or Bianca…
"Correct. Can you tell between reality and the imagination?"
Just my luck, a philosophical psychopath that looked exactly like me. "I believe so."
"You believe," he repeated mockingly. My voice…my line… "Would you believe me if I told you this world isn't real?"
"Sometimes it seems so," I said cautiously.
"Have you watched the Matrix?"
"This world is really a computer?"
He snorted. "No. It's hard to explain, and I won't. It's a pyramid, actually." With his free hand he drew out something that he wore around his neck – it looked like some sort of good luck charm. The chain was continuous, with no clasp. The pendant was a crystal pyramid, the inside of which burned with a tongue of dancing, dark green fire.
"That's the world?"
"The real one."
"Oh." I attempted to humour him. "I see."
He smiled pityingly. "You don't at all, but not to worry – none of the masks ever did before they go in."
"Masks?"
"Yes. Are you ready?"
"Ready for?" I considered throwing a pillow at him. Maybe if it hit the gun out of the way…
"Taking over. The mind."
"I don't have a mind now?"
"No. You're merely a part of one; one persona put in a make-believe world in a pool of other personas. I'm real."
"Make-believe?" I echoed, deciding not to argue the point that anyone who could get onto Jared's yacht unnoticed and unchallenged was probably unreal. And life seems pretty 'real' to me. Sensations washed my senses as if in silent denial – the soft cotton sheets, the embracing mattress, the coolness of the air-conditioning, and the light in my eyes.
He smiled as if he knew. "Realistic, isn't it? Amazing what magic and really good inbuilt illusion can achieve, this semblance of life itself. It even borrows from real life – Jared, Cady…the first two letters of their real names, crossing time itself, with those not even born yet, or are in their childhood – respectively, Drew and Bianca, or should I say, Witney. Well then, are you ready?"
"To go into the real world?" I thought of the Matrix. "Do I get red pills and blue pills?"
"No, you get to say yes or no."
"If I say no?"
"Then I shoot you, since you'd be of no further use to me. They'd come and find you and give you a nice funeral, and I'd just find someone else. This world will exist as long as I play masquerades."
"Such a difficult choice."
He laughed, and the room seemed to be blurring, dimming – the sharp outlines of wall corners and tables turning fuzzy, like a badly frozen movie frame. Everything seemed to be turning greyer, then abruptly the bed I was sitting on became insubstantial and I fell painfully onto my rump. As I scrambled hastily to my feet I noticed that the bed wasn't there anymore. Neither was the room.
We were in some infinitely large void, illuminated with a dull grey-blue light. Or rather – I was – he was gone, just like that. I looked down at myself as if expecting to see a bullet hole – maybe this was the Afterlife – and noticed something weirder – my skin was darkening, as if being charred by some invisible fire, and finally stopped at pitch black. Fingers became slender, hairless, and the hair that intruded into my field of vision was an unusual shade of white. Wha?
The clothes changed too, warping like special effects into some white robe and pants that vaguely resembled Obi-wan's clothing in Star Wars: Episode One. And the memories…
The memories…
Memories…
What in the Nine Hells? These dreams of voids were getting really strange, or maybe this was what happened when you have concussion. What's so interesting about an expanse of nothing? Wish fulfilment? Maybe that fractured skull didn't heal as much as the Matron said it had. I wondered if I should try and wake up – last I remembered was that vithin snake.
The irritating buzz in the silence identified itself as voices, somewhere to the north. They sounded familiar, and it took me a short while to place them – Jarlaxle and a female. A child's voice, then Caomh. I walked quickly in that direction, and they came into view suddenly, like reality after a hangover.
Jarlaxle was speaking earnestly to an extremely pretty drow female, and Caomh was watching with amusement, his single arm cradling a sleeping kid. The kid and the female were blurred, like smudged paintings. Very strange – as if they didn't really exist. Looked like it, anyway – the female wasn't wearing priestess robes, or at least not most of the time – her clothes shifted from light blue to clerical dark purple. It made my eyes water when I tried to concentrate on it. Maybe this was what that famous illusion in the Baenre chapel would be like.
Caomh noticed me first, and grinned. "Vendui, Qu'el'velguk."
"Vendui, Caomh…what are all of you doing in my dream?"
Jarlaxle broke off talking with the female and smiled at me. "Ah, Ti'erlfein."
I inclined my head. "Jarlaxle. Lloth, I think this is a bad dream after all…"
The female chuckled, but made no move to correct me, if that was her intention.
"This is Lady…" the mercenary raised his eyebrows at her.
"Not a chance, Jarlaxle. I've told you why I can't tell you my name. Several times."
"But…"
"No. There's no use anyway, since none of us will remember when we wake up."
"So why don't you tell me, since I will forget?" Jarlaxle put on a charming smile.
"Because he told me there was a 'high chance' we would not remember. Not an absolute chance."
"Why did he tell you all this and not us, then?" Caomh looked down at the kid. "Cute. Looks like Zak…the nose and the shape of the face…"
"Well he should, considering he's Zak's son," the female said dryly.
"Really." Caomh rocked the child, and something that looked like affection flickered across his face.
"Who's this 'he' that seems to know everything?" I managed to ask.
"Someone who talked to her but forgot about the rest of us." Jarlaxle touched the female's cheek as if to make sure she was solid. She rolled her eyes.
"Since I'm the farthest away from all of you in the 'real world', with the possible exception of Drizzt there, but a child may not be able to explain this as well as an adult. So there is less of a chance, if we happened to remember, for me to meet one of you in the near future and 'discover' this common experience and quote, 'blow his cover'. As it is I was not allowed to tell you lot everything…"
"You're a child now." Jarlaxle pointed out. "You said so yourself."
"Do I look like one here?" She turned around slowly, gracefully, showing off her curves. I realised I was staring quite unashamedly, and hoped Jarlaxle didn't notice. He seemed possessive of her, whoever this female was.
The female turned away and gave me a once-over. "I wonder how he thinks you'd be more stable this time…but no matter."
"Who?" I must have looked very blank, because she laughed.
"If he didn't tell you, or if you forgot, it's none of my business. He doesn't seem to exist in a place ruled by time, anyway…just look at us. Now wake up."
"How?"
"Can he delay this? I want to talk with you a little more." Jarlaxle was still admiring the female.
"We'd meet somewhere in the future, that's all he told me." Her eyes were deep pools of an icy blue. "Wake up, Ti'erlfein."
And I did.
