Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Five

I didn’t keep my promise to Lisa, and to myself. I knew I wasn’t going to, I understood the danger and Lisa’s story haunted me, but there was a selfish voice in my head telling me that this was different, that she loved me too. She could’ve attacked me, and I hung onto the fact that she didn’t as proof that she cared for me.

As soon as I had a moment to myself I slipped over to see her, the room adjoining hers was always empty, there was a chair in front of the glass always waiting for me. She watched me with a faint smile and I looked into her pale eyes, I didn’t speak, didn’t move, I hardly breathed. I could feel a connection as though there were a thread between us.

‘Elizabeth,’ I whispered every now and then, it seemed a sacred word.

It wasn’t easy to slip away, Lisa was dogging my every step, because she knew where I was going. She was still waiting for a decision from Alex, he had agreed to speak to her, but he was keeping her waiting. Every time I walked past his room the look of purest loathing had gone, replaced with a smug grin.

I knew the wait was draining on Lisa, and those moments she tried to keep me from seeing Elizabeth she said very little and just walked around the place without a sense of purpose.

It was easier to get away from her in the day time, when I was supposed to be sleeping, I would watch Elizabeth, curled up tightly on her small bed. My hand always twitched towards the door knob, but I knew now it was futile, I would never touch her. At the moment I was content just to watch, but sometimes something stirred in me that I tried to ignore, a longing like cramps in my stomach.

Lisa suspected me, but she never mentioned my red eyes, never asked why I was always tired. More often than not I fell asleep against the glass watching Elizabeth, and Lisa never asked why I had to sneak back into our sleeping quarters. I could see her eyes were slightly narrowed though, I almost wished she would accuse me, I couldn’t bare the guilt and the shame.

One night, I had managed to leave Lisa arguing with an exasperated Doctor Stewart and I slipped away to see Elizabeth. Once inside my room I sank into the chair and she smiled deeply at me, a wider smile than I had ever seen on her face. My heart leapt, it was a beautiful smile, more beautiful than she had ever looked before. In the same way that Teresa had been exotic and sexy, Elizabeth seemed innocent as a child.

I placed my hand on the glass, she pulled her chair closer to me, another massive surge of my heart beat. She placed her hand on mine. Just that piece of old sand lay between us. It was as close as I could hope to touching her, but it wasn’t enough. My eyes were fixed on her silky hair, the urge to run my fingers through it hurt me, a real physical pain.

Elizabeth turned her eyes to the door, very subtly. She wanted me in the room with her, the pain almost crippled me and I tried to hide it from her with a slow smile. ‘I can’t,’ I whispered. She simply turned her eyes to the door again, more carefully this time. Her hand left the glass and she mimed opening a door.

‘I can’t.’

She shook her head. Was the door really open? My whole body was shaking as I left my chair, a surge of adrenaline ran through me. I placed my hand on the knob and my shaking fingers turned, the door clicked open.

Lisa burst into the room just as I was about to push the door away. She was flustered and breathing harshly, as if she had run here. Her eyes darted from my face, to my hand, to Elizabeth. She seemed frozen to the spot for a moment.

‘Lisa, I-’

‘I don’t care,’ she hissed, ‘Alex has agreed to speak to us, I need you there.’

I hastily closed the door and tried with all my strength not to look as Elizabeth, our eyes met briefly and I felt an electric current stir through me. Lisa grabbed my arm and dragged me away.

‘I wasn’t-’

‘Later,’ she shot back, and she marched me down the corridor. I felt the shame burning hot within me, but every time I tried to explain she cut me off. Letting her down was almost worse than knowing I had come so close to touching Elizabeth, almost.

*

Alex was sitting smugly in his room, unlike Mark’s room, it was spotlessly clean and smelled vaguely of lemon polish. Alex was chained to the floor, heavy iron bolts around his wrists and ankles held him down, padlocks attached to iron rings on a solid stone block. An open blood bag lay on a metal tray in front of him, its contents were leaking out, he didn’t look interested in them at all. Instead his greenish brown eyes were fixed on Lisa, they followed her every movement.

Two chairs had been placed in front of him. It reminded me of the meeting with Jarl, what seemed like several lifetimes ago.

‘Are you not hungry?’ Lisa asked conversationally, pointing at the blood bag, I eyed her suspiciously, this was a different tactic to what I had seen in the past.

‘I know where it comes from,’ he smiled cruelly, ‘there’s always more.’ Me and Lisa remained silent. ‘The P.V.R,’ he went on, still smiling, ‘I find it fascinating, they’re so ready to give up their blood for us.’

‘But you don’t want that?’ Lisa asked, still calm.

He looked at me, ‘you look like you’ve read Douglas Adams,’ he sized me up.

For one incredible moment I warmed to him, ‘I’m a twenty-five year old man who lives alone,’ I said, ‘of course I’ve read Douglas Adams.’

He smiled again, sincerely, I felt my head spinning, I had become so unguarded. ‘You wouldn’t want to eat the pig that wants you to eat it, that’s just weird.’ He laughed and shook out his long brown hair.

Lisa raised her eyebrow and he looked at her closely. ‘You’re Angelica’s sister,’ he said, it wasn’t a question, he already knew.

Lisa gripped the side of her chair a little tighter. ‘What do you know about Angelica?’

‘I know why she died,’ he shrugged, ‘if it will bring you any closure? You know who killed her?’

Lisa nodded, tight lipped.

‘So why aren’t you in Cuba?’ Alex asked, he leaned forward, the chains scraping on the floor? ‘Why are you here?’

‘Because of you,’ I said, my anger returning, ‘because of what you did to Maria and to Robert Thompson, because Project Forty-Five caught up with us just as they caught up with you.’ I looked at him from across the table, I couldn’t imagine this skinny boy could’ve done those things.

‘This is just a minor set back,’ he waved airily, ‘I’ll be out of here soon,’ his smile turned dark, ‘and you two are on my list.’ He laughed lightly again, as if he wanted to buy us a drink. I couldn’t find it in me to be scared.

‘Jarl,’ Lisa whispered.

‘I imagine he was very pleased to meet you,’ Alex nodded, ‘means his plan worked.’

‘And this plan is?’ I could see Lisa’s knuckles had gone white gripping the chair.’

‘What we all want,’ Alex said, ‘to expose this place, to make them realise that we can’t be trained like animals.’

‘Please,’ Lisa asked softly, though her eyes had darkened, ‘tell us what we want to know.’

‘I liked keeping you waiting,’ he smiled deeply again, ‘I was very surprised about how much you wanted to speak to me.’

‘I just want to understand,’ she exposed a flash of anger accidentally.

‘A long time ago,’ Alex began theatrically, clearly enjoying every moment. ‘My new father worked for this place, this Project Forty-Five.’ He paused again for dramatic effect, the deep smile turning dark just for a moment, as if he couldn’t hold on to normal conversation for much longer.

‘Jarl was made a Vampire as Hitler was dying in the bunker, on the exact day. By a Nazi officer actually, but that’s a another story for another day,’ he smiled once again, the images of Robert Thompson’s body swan in my mind steadier with every smile.

He continued, ‘there are very few Vampires, always have been.’

‘Why is that?’ Lisa asked, she sounded genuinely inquisitive and interested.

‘It’s hard to hide,’ Alex smiled, ‘when you have a tendency to tear a body apart like a wild dog, it’s hard to live undetected, and you can’t live off animals, it has to be humans. History is littered with stories of Vampires being driven out into the sun, or starving to death. We’re strong individually, but we have many weaknesses.’ He sighed and studied his fingernails. ‘Despite what the doctors here think, there are a lot of cases like my dear brother Mark, refusing to eat and slowly dying.

‘In this place, they had seen so many cases of Vampires being detected and captured that they believed it was impossible to live as a Vampire without attracting pitchforks and fire, and then they met Jarl.’ Another annoying dramatic pause.

‘He had been living as a Vampire for sixty years without anyone noticing, with no one around him even suspecting. The key to his success was that he hardly ever killed, he was ruthless with himself, carefully took enough blood just to survive for a few days, then carefully cleaning the wound and dazzling the victim to make them forget. No harm done.’

‘Then why-’

‘I’m getting to it!’ He snapped back angrily after Lisa’s comment, obviously he didn’t want anyone to disturb his story. ‘He was Project Forty-Five’s wet dream, they had never in thirty years of being in operation seen anything like Jarl and what he did. They got him to help instruct them, help teach the others to follow his example. But two years something went terribly wrong.’

It seemed like he wouldn’t go on until Lisa asked, ‘what happened?’

‘He made me,’ Alex smiled again as though this were the most exciting thing he could’ve said. ‘He was tired of living so clean, tired of working or humans, so he found me, a known drug dealer and petty criminal.’ He was clearly still proud of his human roots. ‘Essentially he lived through me, told me to kill those I found attractive, kill children, rip apart without caring of the consequences.’ He looked fondly into the distance, ‘good days, until I was captured and bought here.’

‘Jarl always knew it was inevitable, they found out who I was and they were angry. Jarl was proud of me though, I turned out exactly how he wanted, they wanted to kill me and he didn’t.’

‘So he stopped working for them,’ Lisa breathed, she looked flushed and angry, angrier than she had been the whole time we had been talking to Alex. Some of the things he had done formed crystal sharp images in my head.

‘Not only that,’ Alex went on, ‘he saw how they were being treated like prisoners, and he hated it. Started to realise he had been right to create me, that we can’t be controlled, that we are wild animals and the way he had been living went against his nature.’

‘But he wasn’t killing anyone, surely that was better than-’

‘You don’t understand, you stupid girl,’ Alex lowered his head onto the table, shaking it as if in disbelief. ‘We don’t care about killing, we never have, it was all so he wouldn’t be found. It was all so he wouldn’t be chased into the sun like so many others. Jarl realised we didn’t need to be scared of them, we’re stronger than them in every way.’

I had to stifle a laugh, ‘this is about world domination,’ it was all so stupidly simple.

‘No,’ Alex seemed annoyed again, ‘it was a warning, a warning of what we could do. We left a pattern, hoping someone would follow it. Mark was created to help, but, as you know, he wasn’t very good at the killing thing. Jarl had to get me to kill that French bitch who was meant for Mark.’

‘That’s what Jarl meant when he said he needed help,’ Lisa realised, ‘he needed us to discover Project Forty-Five, he said he wanted it stopped.’ She was silent for a moment, ‘so Angelica was killed just so you could prove a point, send a warning?’

‘More or less,’ Alex shrugged. Lisa kicked her chair away, she struck him on her cheek, the silver ring she wore made contact with his bare skin. Alex let out a wild snarl.

‘You bitch,’ he growled, as she took her hand away a tiny red burn shimmered on his face.

‘I’ve been reading up,’ she snarled back, equally ferocious, it was hard to tell who was the Vampire. ‘I know how to hurt you, and don’t think I won’t.’

‘Then don’t think when I get out of here I won’t squeeze your brain like a sponge, cerebrospinal fluid is delicious.’

‘It’s good to know we’re on the same wavelength.’

I stared at both of them carefully, their eyes never left each other’s faces, at least for several minutes. The air seemed so still around them, I knew Lisa would live out her promise, if she wanted to kill him, she would find a way, I didn’t doubt that about Lisa now, nothing was impossible to her.

‘Please tell me something,’ Alex broke the tension between them, he sounded almost desperate, ‘did Jarl say anything about me? About joining him? Helping him again?’

‘No,’ Lisa lied, because she knew it would hurt. She, like me, had already worked out that Jarl was the only person Alex cared about. ‘He didn’t mention you.’ And with that we were escorted out of the room, Alex looking strangely dismayed.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Four

I stayed with her until five in the morning when she lay down upon her small narrow bed. An alarmingly loud horn signalled the sun rising, and made me jump. I heard in the distance the sounds of doors locking and vampires howling. I paid no attention to this though, only to her. I placed my palm up against the glass as she seemed to drift off into a deep sleep, her body curled up tightly.

I was overcome with a sudden urge to touch her, just to feel her silky white skin, just to place one finger upon her. I tried the door, it was locked, so I pulled at the knob harder. It wouldn’t budge, no matter how hard I pulled. It drove me crazy that she still slept through this, I were to enter the room she wouldn’t notice. I placed my foot against the glass and pushed with my whole body, it still wouldn’t move. I didn’t make any movement to the wood, to the lock which looked so feeble to me. In my amazement I felt my eyes sting with tears. I just wanted to touch her so badly.

I threw myself at the door, I crashed my whole body against it, I beat my fists against it, and she still slept.

I fell to the floor in a heap, still feeble punching the door, but I realised there was no way I was getting through again. Not after the first time, that glorious moment when I breathed the same air as her, in the same room as her.

I got to my feet shakily and backed away, trying not to look at her, trying not to feel anything for her and trying to calm my heart. I remembered what I had wanted so many hours ago, the fresh air and the outside world. I make a decision to never seek her again, the way I felt about her scared me.

As I closed the door behind me the normality returned, a pleasant, sweeping sensation that spread all through me, right the way to my fingertips. I felt the craving for the outside world once more and I made my way to the huge main doors of the facility.

One of the grey dressed workers obliged by opening the heavy doors, he suppressed a yawn as I was admitted through but he nodded smartly to me, a business nod. The light hit me like a slap, I had to squint as I walked blinded into a sundrenched car park. A light breeze made me shiver, but also felt so good, soothing and healing as I walked into the world I had missed so much, away from myth and legend.

My eyes eventually got used to what they had needed so badly and I saw the building was an old, beautifully restored manor house, painted immaculately white. In the car park several pristine, new cars waited, clearly there was money in pretending you didn’t work here. I couldn’t read the golden plaque on the building’s entrance, but I was sure it would say something boring and official sounding.

Beyond Project Forty-Five was a small town, I saw a bakery and a tobacconist, set around cobbled streets, a large, old church was the centre of everything. The church, made of pale stone, looking medieval, gothic and imposing. It reminded me of a time when religion was the same as law. I walked through the village, hoping my red eyes and crumpled clothing didn’t attract suspicion.

There were few people out this early, but the ones I saw were far from suspicious, they smiled at me and waved enthusiastically, all trapping me in the beautiful picturesque wonder that had come over me, as I felt the sun warm my face and that sweet breeze carry the luscious sents of fresh bread and garden flowers, I realised I had a huge stupid grin spreading across my face.

It was like walking out of a nightmare, everything was clear and peaceful, the headache that had been building up over days started to melt. The only thing which slightly disturbed the experience was that Elizabeth’s softly smiling face kept threatening to cut through my thoughts. I shook her image aside and breathed in more of the sweet air.

Without realising it, I had ended up in the church yard. I stood directly in front of the impressive wooden doors that led into the enormous church. I took a deep intake of breath and walked inside, it seemed natural and calming,, to enter here, I felt as if this had been my destination all along.

Inside, the place had that earthy, slightly damp smell of all churches, despite how early it was, there were already candles burning at the altar, but I was alone here. The silence echoed out, no screams, so shrill demands from Lisa. I sat in one of the pews and gazed up at the scene depicted by the beautiful painted glass window behind the altar.

It was Jesus carrying the cross, the sun shone deeply golden behind him to illuminate his figure, the blue sky parted for him. All around the faces were dark and solemn, yet still angelic. I concentrated on the image, almost breathing in the colours. I wished for a moment that I had believed in something, that in my whole life I had thought of the possibility of God. Maybe, if I had, I would’ve been able to deal with this situation better.

Just because I was in a church and I had nothing better to do, I put my hands together and closed my eyes. I felt foolish as I cobbled a prayer together, I asked God, if there was a God, if he could forgive me for not believing in him all my life, and I asked him to be reassured that I would believe in him from now on, if he showed me a way out this mess. No matter how tightly I shut my eyes however, it didn’t work, I didn’t feel anything, it was quite tough in that moment to realise that I would never believe in a higher power, and I would just have to figure out my own problems. I sighed deeply as I stood up to leave.

Lisa was watching me. I scowled when I saw her, she couldn’t let me have one moment on my own. She was leaning against the heavy arched entrance of the church and watching me sceptically.

‘What are you doing here?’ She asked.

I shrugged, trying to covey as much annoyance as I could with one shrug. ‘I just ended up here.’

‘Are you particularly religious?’

Again, she annoyed me so easily, why did she even care? I just wanted to enjoy one private moment. ‘No.’ I answered simply.

‘I knew that,’ she said, rubbing her chin in thought, ‘yet I knew you would be here.’

‘Why’s that?’

Lisa stepped towards me, whatever power the church had held for me, she seemed to be immune to it. ‘She’s got you,’ Lisa settled onto a pew.

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Think for a moment,’ now she sounded frustrated with me, my heart sped up in anger. ‘Angelica, Heimlaug Gunderson, all the others, they all spent a whole lot of time finding religion before they were killed. Surely you remember that?’

I did, but it was one of the details that had been lost as soon as I discovered that vampires were real. ‘What does it have to do with anything?’ I snorted, it seemed so petty.

‘I thought it was important,’ Lisa went on, ‘so I asked Doctor Stewart. You have no idea how old the vampire myth is, ancient, but not as old as religion. As soon as we came down from the trees humans were trying to explain why the sun shone.’

‘What do the two have to do with each other?’

‘They’re so old they’ve blended,’ Lisa smiled triumphantly. ‘Vampire’s have no reason to fear crosses, but they do, because of how old religious symbols are, it’s ingrained in them.’

‘This is stupid,’ I snorted again, ‘where’s the evidence?’

‘Every culture has its monsters, what if those monsters have always been the same thing?’

‘What does that have to do with me going to church?’

‘This is the really mind-blowing bit,’ Lisa smirked. ‘We’ve evolved alongside religion, the church is our defence from monsters, we do it sub-consciously, that’s how buried in our culture it is.’

‘That’s nonsense,’ I said, though a creeping sense of wonder was overtaking me.

‘When was the last time you were in church?’

‘My cousin’s christening, three years ago.’ She smirked even more, I had never seen such a smug face. ‘But if that’s true why aren’t you going to church? You’ve been around them too.’

‘Not like you have,’ Lisa sighed, ‘you know what I mean.’

‘She’s attractive,’ I felt defensive, ‘that’s all.’

‘Where were you last night?’ Lisa asked sensitively.

‘It doesn’t matter, I just didn’t want to be around you anymore, sometimes you can be so intense, it’s a nightmare.’ I hoped that stung just a little. I settled back down in the pew with my arms crossed.

‘Has it always been this way for you?’ Her voice was still soft, as if she were talking to a dying person. ‘You always go for the unattainable girls? That’s what she saw in you, that’s how she hooked you.’

‘Can’t I have feelings for someone?’ I half shouted, ‘she could’ve attacked me and she didn’t, doesn’t that mean something?’

Lisa shook her head. ‘This isn’t some fantasy Disney Princess world,’ she said, ‘you don’t have ‘feelings’ for someone after one glance at them.’

‘Oh what would you know,’ I raged, ‘she’s not like the rest of them, not even Mark, she’s rational, and I knew she was happy to see me last night, I could feel it.’

‘So you spent all night with her?’ Lisa frowned. ‘And I know more about it than you think.’

I leapt out of my seat so fast the wood creaked on the stone floor. ‘But what do you know?’ I rounded on her, ‘everyone keeps telling me there’s more to you than there seems, but what is it? What are you hiding?’

She stared at her hands. ‘Okay, I’m sorry.’

‘Why are you sorry?’ I noticed the touch of triumph in my voice.

‘I never told you any of this before,’ she almost looked scared, still staring at her fingers, following them opening and closing. ‘I wasn’t in the Army Cadets,’ she sighed, ‘well I was, a long time ago, but I was also in Iraq.’

I gaped at her.

‘I didn’t serve very long,’ she went on, ‘not after what happened. I fell in love with my commanding officer.’ She said the word ‘love’ as if it were a horrible expletive. ‘Philips was, well, in the conventional sense he was gorgeous, in that stupid girly movie star way, but it was an instant thing for me, butterflies and all that bollocks.’ Her face was bright red.

‘He had this wonderful mystery about him,’ she continued, ‘he had worked his way up through the ranks really quickly, he was only a few years older than me. He was so well respected he only worked at night, it was his speciality, he had brilliant eyesight and the natural instincts needed for night watches, apparently. No one really questioned it, he was good at night, he was better than any of us at spotting unusual movements, even in the pitch black it seemed he could still see.’

‘You don’t mean what I think you mean?’ My breath was held.

‘I didn’t know,’ Lisa stared determinedly at her feet, ‘how was I supposed to? Someone only works at nights your first reaction is not Vampire. Rational minds don’t think that way, and I loved him, Lawrence,’ she sounded almost tragic, ‘I only met the bastard twice but somehow I loved him, I took as many night patrols as I could just to be around him.

‘One night a woman just came running towards the camp, we couldn’t stop her and she wasn’t afraid of the guns at all. Nobody wanted to hurt her, she had a small child with her, I remember his massive staring eyes out of a tiny face. He must’ve been two years old, too young to understand that his country was at war, just hungry and scared.

‘We housed them in a tent, just to keep them safe, had a medic look over them. The woman was so scared, but we didn’t know what of, even the translator couldn’t distinguish proper sentences through the babble.

‘I knew he was busy, but I ran to get Philips, of course I volunteered to find him. When he got there, well, the situation just got a whole lot worse, she grabbed her child, screamed, tried to tear at the canvas just to get away. The little boy just stared at us with those huge eyes, he didn’t say a word, he barely even blinked.

‘The obvious thing was that she couldn’t leave, it was too dangerous, and the way she was behaving, we thought if she could calm down we could get some useful information from her, she was so scared of something and we wanted to know what. To be honest we were excited, we figured it was a bomb, that she was scared for her child’s life. If the bomb was going to hit, we would be warned so far in advance we could move the whole camp.

‘Then, later on in the night I heard gunshots. They came from the tent which housed the woman and her son.’

Lisa put her head in her hands and started to shake. She didn’t cry, but she was shivering as if she were frozen solid. She looked like she wanted to push herself into the ground, make herself disappear. She shrank away as her head reached her knees.

‘They were dead?’ I whispered.

Lisa’s head snapped up so harshly I jumped back a step. ‘I never saw the bodies,’ she said in a dry raked voice, ‘but I saw him, I saw his mouth was red. We all woke alert after the gunshots but I was the first there, and I know he saw me, he looked right into my eyes, a smile on his face like a challenge, a challenge for me to tell anyone what I had seen. I saw the blood dripping from his-’

She collapsed into tears.

‘The little boy too?’ I slid further down in my seat.

‘They gave me a lot of money to cover up what I had seen,’ even her voice was shivering, ‘I tried to spread the word, but they told me Philips had had a lot of problems, that he was moved to-’

‘A rehab facility in France?’ I finished for her.

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Is he still-’

‘No,’ she said without emotion. ‘He died. He killed a nurse and they had to, well, I’m told it hurts, at least.’ She attempted a smile but gave up half way through. ‘I saw him though, after all the officers and those mysterious people from France had finished with me, he looked disappointed. I know now, he had picked me out, he was disappointed he never got to finish with me, that I walked out alive.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’

‘I didn’t know what I saw,’ she answered, her voice still quivering. ‘I thought he was crazy, a murderer, but a Vampire?’

‘But once things became clear,’ I tried again, ‘when you saw it was happening again?’

‘I couldn’t tell you!’ she almost wailed, I had never heard her like this. ‘They made it clear that no one would believe me if I did, that it would be an international scandal and they would blame me for everything!’

‘Just what we were told,’ I realised. ‘It must be a huge conspiracy, to keep this all quiet, the government, the military.’

‘Part of me wonders if that’s why they let him rise so quickly,’ she half whispered, ‘they knew he would be ruthless.’

A well placed gust of wind made us both jump, a few worshipers made their way into the church.

‘I always wondered how you know the things you do,’ I was speaking wistfully, as though of simpler times. ‘The tracking people, the way you climbed that school fence.’

‘None of that matters now,’ she whispered, frowning. She was obviously ashamed, she was still blushing, still blinking back tears.

I reached out and touched her hand, she snapped it back, ‘Lisa-’

‘I’m worried about you,’ she said, the frown deepening, ‘I see it all again, when I… I loved him, I prayed every day. I hadn’t been to church since I was a child, I made my decision not to follow my parent’s beliefs, but I was there, wearing a cross and remembering all those old hyms.’

‘That’s not like me,’ I said with guilt bubbling in my stomach. I thought of the way I had ferociously tried to get through the door. She might be right, but it didn’t feel like I was being had, it just felt wonderful. I had the sweet feeling of excitement bubbling in my stomach when I remembered she was just a few hundred metres away. My resolve not to see her again melted away.

‘Please,’ Lisa took my hand this time, and she had an annoying motherly look on her face, ‘please don’t see her again.’

With that guilt building up like acid I nodded slowly.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Three

Days past. Lisa stamped her feet and demanded to see Alex for several hours until she was removed from the corridor and we were locked up again. Kept in one room we weren’t allowed to leave. The nights acted as days and the days became nights. As there was no natural light, I couldn’t tell the difference.

I began to feel ill without sunlight, by stomach gave horrible painful lurches hourly, especially after the meagre meals they gave us, mostly bread and soup. It took Lisa to say it out loud, that we were prisoners. She said this after the first day we spent in the small white room, and I nodded grimly.

Doctor Stewart came to visit us several times in this imprisonment. At first, I asked why, if we had caused so much trouble, he didn’t just let us leave? He pressed upon us the seriousness of what we had done, said he just wanted us to understand how they operated in Project Forty-Five. He said he admired Lisa’s spirit and wanted her to join the team, he said nothing to me. Once again I felt a twinge of unease about Lisa, what exactly did she know?

However, every time the doctor visited, Lisa would start demanding to see Alex, she paid little attention to what he said, when he started talking about her responsibility and begged her not to raise her voice. I sat with my head in my hands shaking, almost laughing with the stupidity of it all. When Doctor Stewart had slammed the door behind him, I spent my time frowning at her, and she spent her time pacing.

On the third night (or morning) of our imprisonment I dreamt about the time I had woken up to Lisa ringing my doorbell, the moment she stepped into my life. Except this time she was knocking on the door, banging in fact, with a chair.

I sat bolt upright in my sleeping bag, she was in fact ramming a plastic chair against the door. She was also screaming for release, it took me a while to notice that as the hammering rang out over everything. The walls seemed to be shaking with the sound of it.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ I asked groggily.

‘Getting the fuck out of here,’ she answered back wildly. She looked like she had been pacing all day, her hair was sticking up where she had been running her hands through it and her clothes were crumpled and stretched. The banging resumed as she turned away from me.

I stepped towards her I attempted to pull her arm away from the chair. I’m embarrassed to say she resisted me very easily and my effort made very little difference to her determination.

‘You just don’t understand!’ I shouted over the crashing, ‘they’ll only let us out once we play nice and do what they say, this is getting you nowhere.’

‘They can’t keep us locked up in here forever!’ she yelled back.

‘Yes they can, no one knows about this facility,’ I reminded her. She shrugged and continued to bang, my head started to throb.

Massaging my forehead I tried a different angle. ‘Please consider what Doctor Stewart said, work for them, keep calm and eventually you’ll get the answers you want.’

‘I’ll never work for them,’ she sniffed back.

I shook my head in hopelessness. I wondered how this had happened, how Lisa’s recklessness had landed us in this place. Not for the first time, I wished I had ignored the buzzer that morning and gone back to sleep.

‘It’s the only way to get out,’ I said angrily, ‘is to behave.’

At that moment the door clicked open, Lisa stopped in mid swing of her chair and I removed my hands from my face to look up.

A prim looking woman I had never seen before stood there. She was wearing a crisp white suit which she smoothed down.

‘I want to talk to Alex,’ Lisa shot out as her head snapped up to view the stranger.

‘I was told ‘ou would say that,’ the woman had a strong French accent. She smiled broadly and her whole demeanour became instantly Romantic and exotic, it took years from her softly lined face.

‘Where is Doctor Steward?’ I asked in the politest tones I could muster.

‘E is indisposed,’ she bit her lip slightly.

‘You mean he doesn’t want to deal with us anymore?’ Lisa sniffed. She folded her arms.

‘Exactly,’ the woman smiled again. ‘We have one condition.’

‘Before we can-’

‘Leave this room, yes,’ the woman said impatiently, She smoothed her dress again. She took me by surprise by shaking my hand firmly. ‘I am Jacqueline Beauclerc, I am in charge of secrecy here at Project Forty-Five. It is my job to insure that this facility and its inhabitants stay hidden from the general public.’

She glanced at both of us sternly. ‘Occasionally there are those who slip through the net.’

‘You want us to keep quiet,’ Lisa snorted, ‘Doctor Steward already told us this, and besides, he made it clear that no one would believe us.’

‘We would take great steps to discredit you,’ Jacqueline nodded curtly. Lisa looked outraged but I wasn’t too concerned, the woman was honest at least.

‘It’s not that no one would believe us then,’ Lisa started angrily, ‘you would make sure they wouldn’t.’

‘You still don’t understand,’ Jacqueline said, equal anger rising in the voice that had been so calm until now. ‘You are so determined in your quest. First there would be disbelief, then panic, world wide panic.’ She pursed her lips. ‘Imagine if you found out the monsters under your bed were really there all along?’

‘But people have a right to know.’

I signed deeply. ‘She’s right,’ I said from my behind my hands that rubbed my tired eyes. ‘Tony Callister’s parents have a right to know, Lisa had a right to know what happened to her sister.’

‘If you tell a few, you should tell them all,’ Jacqueline continued calmly, ‘and people have a tendency to overreact. We made our decision long ago.’

‘What about the P.V.R?’ I asked.

‘We keep them away with promises of their fantasy world, and I’m sure Doctor Stewart has told you how we are able to use them.’ She explained matter of factly. I remembered that first unpleasant chat with the Doctor.

‘If you expect us to donate blood to these animals you’ve got another thing-’

‘Alex has agreed to speak with ‘ou.’ She sounded a little desperate, desperate to cut Lisa’s shrill whining off. I looked up from rubbing my face in my hands.

It definitely make Lisa shut up, she stood with her mouth open like a fish, just for a few moments until the sneer returned. ‘Doctor Stewart finally given in?’

Jacqueline frowned, ‘it is not a case of Doctor Stewart’s approval,’ she said, ‘the meeting will take place on Alex’s terms.’

‘So when is that?’ Lisa looked ready to storm the door.

‘He has only agreed to speak with ‘ou,’ Jacqueline’s frown deepened, ‘you will ave to be patient until he lets he meeting take place.’

‘But he’s a murderer,’ Lisa spat, ‘he shouldn’t get a say.’

‘Yes, he’s a murderer, and your track record with our patients hasn’t been good so far. You wait until he says, and you follow our rules. Okay?’

We both nodded, Lisa grudgingly.

‘I had to push Doctor Steward through a lot of hoops to get this deal, so if I let you out of this room you’ll behave yourselves.’

Even I was a little angry at being spoken to like a five year old, I expected Lisa to kick off again, but she didn’t. She shrugged non-comitally, and after Jacqueline raised her eyebrows she nodded with a rigid jaw.

I wish I could’ve walked out of our stuffy prison into bright sunshine, but of course it was the middle of the night, because the place was a hive of activity, with the workers patrolling the corridors and the shouts and snarls of various inmates ringing out. All I needed was some fresh air, just one gasp of what was outside this hole.

‘Any chance I could leave for just a moment?’ I asked Jacqueline.

She shook her head sternly, ‘not at night,’ she said, ‘in the morning you can.’

I looked at my watch, it was half past two, ages before daylight.

Lisa took my elbow, ‘lets go and put some pressure on Doctor Stewart,’ she said.

‘I think I’ll just spend a while on my own,’ I responded immediately, ‘don’t worry, I’ll keep out of trouble.’

As I turned the corner, I knew exactly where I was going, to another empty room, at least I hoped it was empty. For some reason I knew the way, or my feet did, in this massive place I was drawn back to that room as if I was floating there.

Mercifully, the room was empty and pitch black. My heart started to thump so loudly I knew she could hear it, the thought that she could hear the blood running through me was exciting and dangerous. I pulled the release on the blind and I saw her once again, the feeling flooded from me.

‘Elizabeth,’ I tested the word, it sounded beautiful and it tasted beautiful in my mouth. Because the room was still dark behind me, she sparkled out even more. Her soft hair, her pale eyes, and the innocent smile that played on her lips, I didn’t care that she wasn’t Teresa, I didn’t care who she was, I just wanted to be near her.

I pulled up a plastic chair and watched her. I looked into her eyes until I was sure the sun was rising outside.