Hard Return

by Rosie Claverton

  The bag search was brief and perfunctory. Amy’s toys were well-concealed, and Stoker didn’t come near them. His toiletries were removed and set to one side, as were his cigarettes. Just like prison, there was a tax on the lower orders to appease the higher-ups. He was going to need to get the hang of the rules if he wanted to survive here.

  ‘Kitchen it is then. Follow me.’

  As they walked out of the door, the noise picked up behind him, as if they’d been waiting for a chance to gossip about him. Stoker turned right down the corridor and Jason tried to pay attention to the layout. Three doors on the left, two on the right – but then the mess room was easily the biggest room in the place.

  At the end of the corridor on the right, Stoker introduced him to the kitchen. He closed the door behind him and the sounds from the mess hall faded to nothing, leaving them alone with a utilitarian metal surfaces and piles of dirty plates. A nice place for a bit of murder, very quiet. Where he was currently standing with a stranger who was one of his suspects.

  Stoker smiled at him. It was at such odds with the direction of his thoughts that it took Jason a moment or two to smile back, slightly awkward, keeping a tight grip on his bag just in case. Not that a few pairs of boxers would do him much good.

  ‘Lewis says you’re an idiot, but he’s glad you’re here.’

  His heart rate sped up, but he felt something in him loosen and unwind. Lewis was pleased to see him. He’d already made friends here, people he could trust. That was going to make this thing a whole lot easier and get them all out of here faster.

  ‘Tell him he’s the idiot.’

  Stoker nodded, the smile fading to a smirk.

  ‘Oh, I know. I’ll leave you to it then. The bunkroom’s down the end of the corridor, last door on the right. Take care in the dark.’

  He opened and closed the door before Jason could respond. To thank him? To shake his hand? All his instincts were gone, but he was glad he had allies here. Dropping his bag on the floor, he started scouting out his domain.

  The kitchen hadn’t been taken care of for a good long while, possibly since Mole’s death. There had been some effort to clean plates, but nothing had been put away, the surfaces cluttered. Peering into the industrial-size fridge, Jason saw mainly vegetables and open cartons of UHT milk and orange juice. A further nose in the cupboards turned up tin after tin of meat, beans, and tomatoes. Pasta, rice, cereals, and potatoes came in generic bags, probably supplied by whoever was running the place. The only fresh food outside of the veg was bags of bread, poorly sealed and already growing an impressive amount of mould. Jason was disappointed not to find peanut butter – maybe someone was allergic?

  He stopped himself. This wasn’t the task he had been sent here to do. Alby hadn’t said anything about how this man was supposed to have died, just said he’d been found in the garden. The only name he’d produced from his addled brain was ‘Mole’. It hadn’t been enough for Bryn to get a definite match, especially as his criminal record had likely gone the way of the others’.

  If no one had been picking up the chores and this was the place Mole had died, Jason might still find some evidence here. Though what the hell he was to do with it, he had no idea. A splash of blood was perfect for the forensics lab, but pretty useless out in the middle of nowhere. He didn’t even really know what he was looking for, this kind of thing more suited to the medical examiners.

  He wished he had some kind of recording equipment on him, but Cerys had ruled it too suspicious and Amy had wished aloud for more time to run wires and camera leads through his hoodie to somehow make it work.

  They hadn’t had time and Cerys had been right. He was carrying only one piece of tech, which was a miniature mobile phone, beloved of criminals and prisoners, and something that wouldn’t be out of place if it was discovered though he very much hoped it wasn’t. He needed at least one connection to Amy. He hoped Cerys was taking good care of her out there in the dark.

  He shook his head to clear it. He wasn’t used to late nights anymore, to maintaining his focus. He had to get on and get down to the bunk, before anyone noticed he was taking a stupidly long time to wash some dishes.

  He found a dustpan and brush under the sink and went round every inch of the floor, making a half-hearted effort to sweep while sniffing to pick up the scent of bleach and watching out for signs of blood between the old tiles. Nothing.

  Which meant that Mole probably didn’t bleed here. How did he die then? Poison? Bang to the head? There were 101 ways to kill a man and Jason was becoming grimly familiar with all of them. He could always ask around to find out how Mole died, if anyone knew, but that would raise suspicion, especially as he wasn’t supposed to know about it at all.

  He opened the sink cupboard to replace the dustpan and brush, when he noticed a thick strip of water damage on the edge of the cupboard floor. The wood was discoloured and warped, as if it had sat under water for days. The wood between the pipes and the damage was unmarked, so there hadn’t been a leak there. He looked at the back of the cupboard door and spied an array of thick lines, the course of water running down, but very faint.

  Peering closer at the cupboard floor, he saw little patches of white dotted along the warped wood, no one bigger than his littlest fingernail. It looked like the beginnings of mould, which meant this damage was very recent. As recent as last week?

  Jason shut the cupboard door and filled the sink with water, checking the overflow and bringing the water level up to just below it. He sunk his arms in up to the wrist, and then the elbow. The water benignly trickled out of the overflow, not coming close to breaching the sides.

  He glanced back at the door. It was behind him to the right, enough of a distance that it could open without disturbing whoever was at the sink. A person could take one or two steps, and—

  Jason plunged his head beneath the water.

  He felt it rise up, soaking his hoodie and slopping down the front of his chest, down the cabinet. Suddenly, a hand was yanking him back, pulling him away from the sink and shaking him at the same time.

  ‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’

  It was the black guard with dreadlocks, an expression of anger and disbelief on his face. He got it together when he saw Jason’s shocked expression and let go of him, awkwardly patting him on the back.

  ‘It’s, uh…it’s not that bad here, mate. Better than the inside. You’ll be all right.’

  Jason spluttered, took a breath. ‘I wasn’t…that wasn’t…’

  What other explanation did he have? ‘I was just trying to recreate a murder’ wasn’t the impression he wanted to give either.

  ‘We’ll keep an eye on you,’ the man said, still patting. ‘I’m Dreadlock, by the way. Everyone calls me that. Who are you then?’

  ‘Jay—Jay Bird.’

  ‘Jay, right. I’ll take you down to the bunkroom to find a friend. Keep you close, right?’

  Shit. His stupid experiment meant he was getting a nanny, rather than freedom to explore in his own time.

  ‘What about the dishes?’ he mumbled.

  ‘Your new mate can help you out in the morning,’ he said. ‘Come on now.’

  Reluctantly, Jason grabbed a teatowel, scrubbed the water from his skin and dabbed at his soaked hoodie, before taking his bag and his pride down the long corridor to the bunkroom, Dreadlock watching him all the way.

  Chapter 13: Nanny State

  Amy’s ‘bunk’ was a folding bed in the locker room.

  ‘Sorry. We’re kinda short on space down here.’

  ‘IN3’ did look apologetic, but also anxious to get back to her station. She was young, maybe only Cerys’ age, with long dark hair plaited away from her face. Amy thought she might be Japanese American, from her features and her accent. She wore the same white top, black bottoms as the others, like waiters at a restaurant. Her modicum of choice
had been used on a white blouse and a black pencil skirt, with thick black tights.

  ‘How many people are sleeping here?’

  The agent glanced at the door again.

  ‘Six agents, six guards. The other shift is in the Eye Room or in the Security Hide. Agent Jenkins has his own quarters, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ Amy echoed flatly.

  ‘I really need to—’

  ‘Do you have a name?’

  The agent blinked at her for a moment.

  ‘We, uh, tend to go by our designations. I am IN3.’

  ‘IN3?’

  Amy could tell the agent was beginning to get suspicious. She needed information, allies – not enemies and informers. Her brain was struggling to remember details of the types of work she had provided support for, but they had all been solo or duo missions, never anything requiring this amount of infrastructure.

  ‘I provide a remote supporting role to agents in the field,’ Amy expanded. ‘This is my first time in this kind of…setup.’

  ‘Oh, you’re NCA, aren’t you? Yeah, all the NCA newbies struggle with this part. I is really Eye, as in ‘I spy with my little’ one. N for the night shift, and then I’m the third worker from the left. If I get transferred out or move position, then the designation shifts to the new person who occupies that spot. Little bit clearer?’

  It wasn’t clear at all. Did ‘NCA newbies’ mean that they put fresh recruits here, or did the emphasis on ‘NCA’ mean this was a joint operation with the military? International agencies? How big was this thing?

  ‘That makes sense, yes,’ she said.

  ‘Only Agent Jenkins uses his name here. You’ll probably get a designation too.’

  ‘Are there other technicians here?’

  ‘Nope, no technicians here.’

  ‘That makes me TD1.’

  IN3 beamed at her, as if grateful they were back in familiar territory.

  ‘I guess it does. You’d better get some rest though. The day shift starts at eight.’

  IN3 left her alone in the locker room with her folding bed and a head full of questions. The reason she couldn’t recall NCA information about this kind of work is that, until now, she hadn’t known this kind of work existed. Sure, her agents thought of themselves as Bond boys or Mata Haris, but they were mostly just liaising with police forces, trying some low-level infiltration, or bluffing their way into privileged circles. What the hell were they doing involved in this?

  The questions threatened to overwhelm her, the lack of certainty pressing in on her from all sides. She took a breath, then another. She just had to focus on getting through tonight. One night at a time. One task at a time.

  Amy found some instructions for the folding bed inside its canvas cover and, after a few false starts, managed to get it the right way up and with all the legs locked in place. She cast a quick glance over the laptop, but it asked for her NCA password on startup, so she closed it again. No need to alert Frieda right away that she had slipped her lead. She couldn’t think about Frieda right now, her hands already moving on to the next mundane thing.

  She laid out the sleeping bag on top of the folding bed, before checking her backpack. Cerys’ laptop hadn’t survived the fall down the shaft, the screen completely shattered. It wouldn’t be much good down here anyway, not with an NCA network. Amy wrapped it in a plastic bag and shoved it in the bottom of her locker. She’d get her a new one if they got out of here. When.

  Security hadn’t troubled the secret compartments, which was good news. She partially withdrew her cheap mobile phone, but there was no signal. Of course – she was underground. She had to hope Cerys wouldn’t do something stupid like try to mount a rescue, like her brother would under similar circumstances.

  It had been hard to see Jason on the screen and walk away. To know that she could have access to his every moment, and yet be denied. It was going to be an exercise in self-control to not be in that room every moment she was awake. Which was probably going to be a lot of moments if she was stuck in this freezing-cold locker room on a flimsy bed.

  She found the bathroom next door and brushed her teeth before returning to the locker room to change. She had a wind-up torch in her bag, which she set going before venturing to turn out the lights. Making her way back towards the light, she tripped over her shoes and her backpack before wrestling the sleeping bag over her body. She only just about fitted on the folding bed, so she had no idea how Owain managed it.

  She couldn’t believe Owain was here. They had waited a whole year for time away from him, and then here he was. He must be the only reason she hadn’t been arrested or…worse. If the NCA was capable of running a place like this, then it was more than capable of disappearing people. Amy had underestimated both the Agency’s power and their lack of moral code.

  The door suddenly opened and the lights were flipped on.

  ‘I know you’re not asleep.’

  Amy resisted the urge to snap back at him and sat up in her sleeping bag. Owain let the door close behind him and looked tiredly at her for a moment or two, before letting himself fall back against the wall.

  ‘I thought I left you behind at my old job.’

  ‘I didn’t realise your new job was experimenting on prisoners in a murder box.’

  ‘Neither did I,’ he said.

  She heard the bitterness, recognised how it had been growing in him, twisting him. She had sounded like that once, after Lizzie had left, before Jason. She recognised the poison, but she didn’t know who was going to be the person who might untwist him. All those who had once cared about him had run far away. She couldn’t blame them.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ she asked.

  Owain sighed and scrubbed a hand through his short, cropped hair. It made him look even older, wearier. Amy almost felt sorry for him.

  ‘I don’t know everything,’ he began. ‘Its origins go way above me, above Frieda. I’m not even sure who’s involved, or—’

  ‘Skip to the end.’

  He looked up, but didn’t comment on her abrupt tone and lack of patience. He'd seen enough of her to know when not to push. Amy knew she hadn’t learned the same.

  ‘There are twelve prisoners in one ex-military compound. Every week, one leaves and one arrives. How they choose them, I don’t know, but there are lots of different skills in there. Violent men, clever men, liars, thieves, gangsters. Every stripe of criminal you can imagine.’

  ‘I heard the prisoners vote out the rejects.’

  Owain nodded. ‘You heard right. Frieda wanted them to have as much control over the mix as possible. The idea was that the group would keep only the most useful people and get rid of the wasters. That way we would learn something about how criminal groups form, how they bond, how they go on to commit terrible acts together.’

  Amy felt a chill go down her spine. ‘This isn’t about any ordinary criminal act though, is it? This is about…’

  ‘Mass murder. Or terrorism, if you like.’

  He was so calm, so matter-of-fact, that Amy thought she must’ve misheard him.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because we don’t understand it. This way, we can observe how gangs and cells form, what keeps them ticking, what gets the job done. At least, that’s the theory. In practice…’

  ‘It’s not working out so well.’

  ‘This is the last centre still operating. The other two collapsed within the first six months – the inmates lost interest, or started a riot. Frieda is determined that our experiment will work.’

  At her name, the fear returned full-strength. ‘Are you going to tell Frieda I’m here?’

  ‘Of course I am,’ he said, as if it was obvious. ‘She’ll find out soon enough.’

  ‘You can’t—’

  ‘I’ll tell her I brought you in, you and Jason. To clean up the mess lef
t by my predecessor. She won’t like it, but she needs me here. I’m the only one she trusts now.’

  ‘Does that make you feel special?’ Amy said, unable to let that lie.

  ‘It means I’m doing my job,’ he said, face inscrutable. ‘You never understood why I left.’

  ‘I never wanted to, and I don’t want to now. I want to get Jason and Lewis out of here as quickly as possible. That’s all.’

  ‘Who’s Lewis?’

  ‘Lewis is Jason’s best friend. He visits him every other week, or hadn’t you noticed?’

  ‘I haven’t had a chance to catch up with the files,’ Owain said, rubbing a hand over his face. ‘Of course it would be one of Jason’s friends in here. Of course.’

  ‘One of two,’ Amy said, unable to resist scoring another point. ‘Alby Collins just left, but history isn’t important, right? We don’t count former friends.’

  She watched him take the hit, his jaw tightening. She watched and hated herself a little bit for scoring points when he was hurting. But he had hurt them too. She couldn’t let herself forget that. There had been times, in their year together, when she had felt herself falling back into the old rhythms of their friendship. Then, she’d catch herself, see the look on Jason’s face, and withdraw again. She would never let herself go back. Never.

  ‘Amy, I’m having a shit weekend and it’s about to get worse. I am doing you a fucking favour, so can you just knock it off for five minutes?’

  She nodded, feeling the guilt grow inside her, before she shoved it back down.

  ‘Yes. I can.’

  ‘Your designation is TD1. You start at eight o’clock tomorrow morning. Your job is to find new ways of obtaining surveillance from the subjects. Under no circumstances are you to contact Jason. He is fine just where he is.’

  ‘How is he fine when he’s locked in that place with a murderer?’

  Owain’s eyes looked at her, dark and blank.

  ‘It wouldn’t be the first time, would it?’