by Andrea Hicks
I drag myself across the floor of the van and lean against the side, my breath coming in short spurts. Cain is driving like a maniac and I have to brace myself against the side of the van as he floors the accelerator, skidding around corners like a bat out of hell. As we round the next corner I bang my face against the side of the van.
‘Cain! For Chris’sake’s, Cain, slow down.’
At that moment, the van skids to a halt and Cain jumps out of the cab and slides the side door open.
‘We’re here.’
I stare up at him, embarrassed at the position I’ve been thrown into, a jumbled heap on the floor of the van. ‘Didn’t you hear me calling you? What were you thinking?’ I wait for an answer. ‘And where’s here?’
‘A cottage. My cottage...’
‘Where?’
‘Shere.’
I frown and Cain looks annoyed. ‘Shere. It’s in Surrey.’ I untangle my clothes...and my legs and slide out of the van. The street is in darkness with very little social lighting, but it’s eons away from what I saw outside Plan Bee.
Following Cain into the cottage I can’t help but look around to see if anyone’s watching. I seem to have got into the mind-set pretty quickly that I’ve done something I shouldn’t, but then I rethink it. The people who held me were in the wrong, not me. I’ve escaped because I had to. I don’t think I had a choice, but even if I hadn’t wanted to leave the facility I think Cain would have forced me out. I’ve put an awful lot of trust in him and I need to speak with him real fast and find out why he provided me with an escape route. Where I come from people don’t do things unless there’s something in it for them, so what’s Cain’s angle?
I follow Cain into the living room where he draws the curtains and switches on the TV, the only light flickering into the room. He leaves the lamps switched off.
‘Take off your jacket and make yourself comfortable. You’re going to be here for a few days. I’ve made a bed up for you in the spare room.’ I do as he tells me but I’m anxious to talk to him. I need to know why he’s doing this, sprung me from the facility and now hiding me in his own house, effectively put his job on the line. What he’s done is probably against some law or other, so why would he do it unless he was going to gain in some way? Before I can instigate conversation he goes into the hall and I hear him run up the stairs. A few moments later a toilet flushes and he runs back down the stairs. Cain seems to do everything at break-neck speed.
‘Cain, we need to talk.’
He nods. ‘Yeah, hang on.’ He goes into the kitchen and comes back with two mugs of black coffee. ‘Switched the machine on before I left.’
I take the steaming mug from him. ‘Milk?’
‘Nah. Bad for you,’ and kind of laughs, a chuckle I suppose. ‘Well, maybe not for you.’
‘You think this is funny?’
‘His expression changes and his face settles into seriousness. ‘No, no of course not. You must be very scared.’
I take a sip of the too hot coffee and burn my top lip. ‘That’s an understatement.’ Now’s the time for me to get to the bottom of all this. ‘I need to know what’s going on, Cain. You work at Plan Bee; you must know what they were planning to do with me and why. And why have you got me out of there? What’s in it for you?’
He raises his eyebrows and leans back in his chair, a retro club chair that fits in perfectly with the old/modern décor. ‘Why does there have to be something in it for me? What will I gain out of it?’
I glance around the room at the industrial style accessories, the fur throws, the huge enamel motorcycle posters on the wall. ‘This place must have cost you, so you’re doing okay. Why did you allow me to escape? You went to an awful lot of trouble to get me out of there. If they discover it was you, that’ll be it for you, won’t it?’
‘Pretty much.’ I widen my eyes and give him a look that says. “Well, why then?’ He leans forward and rests his elbows on his knees, turning the mug around in his hands. ‘I’ve lost my vocation, Nina. When I got a job at the facility I was blown away. Their project and raison d’être has always been about saving lives by ensuring the food chain can sustain the global population, and it was what I wanted to part of, why I went to university and trained for years.’
‘What happened? Did something change?’
He nods. ‘Yeah, something changed. We got a new boss.’
‘And...?’
‘She lobbied for a program of “set-aside” with the pharmacological companies. The newer drugs they come up with, the more stable the global population. The population is at seven billion and rising, the only major country not increasing is Japan, and they’ve got a government plan in place to ensure their population increases. The lack of increase has affected their economy negatively, but this goes against what other governments want. The problem is lack of food, Nina. The world is in crisis, the bee population is in crisis. People have just never understood how important bees are.’
‘So why can’t they be, I dunno, bred...or something?’
‘It doesn’t work like that. We could breed millions of bees but if the food chain isn’t intact it’s a pointless exercise.’
‘Are you saying...it’s easier for them to let people die of illnesses, to not search for or develop the drugs or treatments to help them?’
‘Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying.’
‘So instead of finding a way to support the food chain, she’s found a way to decrease the population.’
He nods with one quick nod. ‘Yep.’
‘Can she do that?’
‘She’s doing it.’
No one speaks, Cain is staring into his coffee, and I think about all the items I’ve seen on TV about the right medicines not getting to the right people because of where they live. Perhaps that was a lie too. ‘So, where does that leave me?’
Cain blows out a long breath. ‘In trouble. The woman is something else. We’re all wary of her, even those scientists who’ve worked at the facility for the duration and know more about what’s happening globally regarding the food chain and the population than she’ll ever know...they’re wondering where it will all end, scared how far she’s willing to go to get what she wants.’
I sip at my now lukewarm coffee. ‘Is she going to kill me?’ Cain leaves his chair and paces up and down the room rubbing his hands together. ‘So, you do it too.’
‘What?’
‘Pace...like a caged animal.’
‘You’re in big trouble, Nina. She said you’re the biggest threat to the survival of the world than anything else, even more than the destruction of bees and the breakdown of the food chain. We tried to persuade her to allow you to live. We said we would take responsibility for making sure you couldn’t be exploited by unscrupulous pharma companies looking to make a fast buck, for keeping you away from the media so that stories didn’t appear in the press that would panic the population. She was having none of it.
She’s the hunter, Nina.
And you’re the hunted.’
I lean back in my chair and think about what Cain has said. Something uncurled inside me, anger I think, yes, utter anger that someone thinks they have the right to make decisions for me, someone who doesn’t even know me, who has never laid eyes on me apart from, I suspect, via a monitor. Fuck her.
‘Fuck her.’
‘What?’ Cain frowns, incredulous.
‘Fuck her?’
‘No thanks. Anyway, what d’you mean, fuck her.’ He shakes his head and chuckles. ‘That won’t cut it with her. She’s...something else.’
‘I don’t care what she is.’ My anger goes up a gear. ‘Listen, Cain, this is me, my body, my life. Why would I let an unknown person, unknown to me in any way, run my life? She doesn’t know me; I don’t know her.’
‘You don’t want to know her.’
I pull an, ‘Oh come on,’ face. ‘Who is she anyway?’
‘Cecily Cunningham, or CC as she like to be called, not by the likes of me, I haste
n to add. Only by those she feels are on the same level.’
‘And who’s that?’
‘Oh, only the PM, deputy PM, Home Secretary, Police Commander Deveraux, y’know, people like that.’
‘Deveraux’s a bitch.’
‘She’s a bitch with power. Like our Cecily.’
‘Is she MI5?’
‘Not officially, but yes, with...other responsibilities.’
‘Which are?’
‘MI5 is Domestic Intelligence and Security, constructed to keep the country safe from terrorism and outside threats.’
‘I’m no threat, Cain.’
Cain closes his eyes and breathes in, and just for a moment as I watch him I realise this man, this person who I’ve just met is the only person between me and death. That’s if I can trust him, because right now I don’t know who to trust. He could be playing me. Maybe Cecily Cunningham gave him the job of making sure nothing happens to me so she can make something happen to me. She’s in charge and she wants the job of ending me, to make absolutely sure I am ended.
Is he my minder?
‘Are you my minder?’
He opens his eyes and stares at me. His blue eyes have taken on a dark tone and his gaze doesn’t waver. ‘No, Nina. I’m not your minder.’
‘So why, Cain? And how?
‘How what?’
‘How are you going to get me out of here? Where will I go? Do you have a plan?’
‘Not really.’ I roll my eyes and suddenly I ache all over. The rotten diet I’ve lived on, the constant exploration of my body, and being cooped up in a cell for months has taken its toll and frankly I feel unwell. ‘Look, I just wanted to get you out of there before they did anything else to you. Tomorrow I must go back to the facility as though nothing has happened. Look as shocked as everyone else that you’ve escaped from Plan Bee.’
‘What about CC TV, and I don’t mean her?’
‘Disabled.’
‘By you?’
‘Yeah. It was surprisingly easy, but then the guards are numpties.’
I feel nausea rising up from my stomach and I just know I’m going to puke.
‘I need the bathroom.’
‘Upstairs. Facing you.’ I run for it and make it just before I hurl into the toilet. Again and again. In between vomiting I hear Cain’s come up the stairs ‘Nina?’
‘I’m sick.’
‘Yeah, I heard. I’ll get some water.’
The next couple of days are hell. I’ve caught something gross, probably because I was kept inside for so long, and then going outside made me a target for crappy germs. So much for being the person with all the answers in my body. I’m not believing that right now. I feel like shit.
Cain goes into the facility and acts like he’s as clueless as everyone else about how I got out. It’s being mooted as an inside job by his colleagues because of everything being disabled, but according to Cain, Cecily Cunningham isn’t buying it. She’s determined it’s an outside department who have got their hands on me, and that’s fine by me. And Cain. It gets him off the hook and gives me time to get back to full fitness. I need to be fit because I think I might be doing a lot of running, at least that’s what I’m doing in my dreams, running, running, running, like the song. I know it’s delirium because of whatever it is I’ve caught. I’m sweating like a proverbial pig, and then shivering so hard my teeth chatter. Cain has been heaping loads of quilts on me only for me to kick them off to go vomit again. He offered a bowl but I even I need my dignity. Can you imagine? I’m lying in bed looking like hell, and there’s bowl of sick next to me. No, no, no. So embarrassing. See, I’m still a human being with some pride, even if Cecily What’s ‘Er Face has tried to strip it away from me.
Today I feel better. Something has changed. I’ve stopped vomiting and I’m drinking loads. Water is my greatest companion right now, but I can feel a small curl of hunger in my stomach which I feel is a positive. Turning onto my side I start to think about what has happened to me over the last few months.
The last thing I remember is being wheeled along the corridors in the hospital, but before that I was in the café where I work, feeling like shit. Before that on the bus on the way in, but between then and when I argued with Dylan, nothing. Dylan, my sometime boyfriend. Because we’d split up. We’d decided to be...just friends, because he was sleeping around, and I wasn’t having that. It was what we’d argued about, and I remember telling him I’d had enough, that just because I wasn’t in the best place it wasn’t okay for him to go behind my back, particularly with the person he’d gone with., the one who was always sniffing around him. And he’d felt bad, so he’d left me a fix, Dylan’s version of a bouquet or a box of chocolates. I think he was trying to say sorry, but according to female dork, the fix had been modified...which means, what? Did he modify it, or was it just some bad stuff?
I turn back onto my back. Did Dylan wonder what had happened to me? Was he worried sick like I would have been about him? Where is he now? Has he been looking for me? It occurs to me that if he has been searching for me, maybe going to the police to report me missing, he’s in danger if what Cain says is true.
I suddenly realise that lying in bed makes me vulnerable, a sitting target. I throw off the duvet and swing my legs out of bed. When my feet hit the carpet I wobble. The stomach flu has left me very weak, but I can’t let it stop me. There’s nothing worse than feeling vulnerable and I’ve got to get over it and move on. And I’m not sure about Cain. Why would he risk his job to protect me? What’s in it for him? In my experience when someone puts themselves on the line there’s always something in it for them...always a payoff. What’s his?
I inhale a deep breath and steady myself against the night-table, then swig from a glass of water Cain has left by the bedside. I search the top for my mobile, then remember they took it from me at Plan Bee. Where is it now? It has my life on it. Everything I do, everywhere I go and everywhere I know is documented on it. Will they use it to try and find me? It’s what I would do. I miss it. On the outside I became reliant on it. When I was kept at Plan Bee there seemed to be no need for it, apart from trying to let someone know where I was. Dylan? I hope he’s been trying to find me. I’ll kill him if he hasn’t.
My clothes are clean and folded and left on a chair in the bedroom. Cain’s first mistake. He doesn’t know me. There’s no way I’m allowing someone else to control me. I’ve had enough and the need to get out into the air and find Dylan is almost overwhelming. I shower off the puke and sweat and illness, dress quickly and go downstairs. I chuckle to myself when I see my scruffy trainers placed neatly by the front door next to Cain’s. His Gucci and my well-worn street style don’t go together. I slip my feet into his beautiful and expensive trainers and wonder if it would be worth wearing them. I could sell them on the street and buy a cheaper pair. At least I’ll have some money in my pocket, and I could get a cheap mobile with what’s left.
In the kitchen I grab a hunk of bread from the cupboard and slather it with butter from the fridge. I eat while opening and closing the drawers looking for money. Nothing. I frown because I’m sure someone like Cain would have a stash hidden somewhere. I look in the living room and the kitchen. The thing about Cain is that his style is typically masculine simplicity, no fancy boxes or bureaus to look in, but I’m also aware that someone with no outward appearance of wealth, apart from his trainers that is, would maybe have a safe. If this is the case with Cain I’ve had it because I can do lots of things, but safe cracking isn’t one of them. I also know that in hotels the safe is stashed away in the bottom of the wardrobe. I look towards the stairs. Cain’s bedroom is the one place in the house I haven’t explored.
I push the last piece of bread into my mouth and think about it. If I’m to get away I need money. Without it I won’t get far. If he has a safe, or at least one that’s locked, and what would be the point of having one if it isn’t, I might as well go back to bed and let Cecily come for me. I don’t want to go into his bedroom.
I really, really don’t, but it’s the last place I can look. I take the stairs two at a time. His bedroom door is shut. I put my hand on the brass knob and twist. I’m in.
Facing me, on the wall above Cain’s bed is a huge black and white canvas, a kind of magazine shot of a girl’s face. She’s beautiful, stunning with long blonde hair which sweeps wispily across her face as though the breeze has taken it. She’s facing the camera, looking out of the shot with a look that must have been purely for the photographer. It’s personal, intimate, and it’s on Cain’s bedroom wall, so I’m guessing she must mean something to him. The room is the same as downstairs, wooden floors, neutral walls apart from the wall where there are two long windows which look out over the street. This wall has been left brick. On the floor are a couple of sheepskin rugs and the bedding is pristine white with a mocha coloured throw across it. It’s pristine, sharp, almost unlived in, but Cain is a scientist. It might have been slightly worrying if his room was messy. Like mine was in the flat. I shake my head to fling away the images of my flat. I need to go back there, if only to see if what the dorks said about it being torched is true. I feel really sick again. Why the hell is this happening to me? I’m a nothing, a no one. I’ve drifted through life so far, simply trying to survive, and now all of this. It’s like a bad dream, and since it started I’ve had no time to think properly. I need to prioritise. Money first.
I open all the draws in Cain’s dresser looking for where he kept it; all the guys I’ve ever known have kept a hidden stash, if only to stop me from getting my hands on it. There’s nothing under the bed, not even dust. This guy is uber clean, and the dresser comes up with nada. At the other end of the room there’s a closet, made to look like part of the wall. I press it and the door swings open. Inside there are boxes stacked up on the shelf. I put one on the bed and take off the lid. Inside there are files stacked as if in a filing cabinet. I pull one out and open it, a medical file, but there are also passports in different names with a photograph of the same guy although the photos are all slightly different, some with dark hair, some blond, some with glasses, some with a beard, and drivers licenses, again the same guy but with different names, and even some utility bills to an address in Chelsea. After trying to take this in I look in the file again and my heart leaps. Inside the file are wads of money in different currencies. I take out the English money and look in the other files, all the same but with different people, men and women, and each file contains money. By the time I’ve retrieved all the English money, I’ve got a couple of thousand. I quickly slide the box back into the closet, eyeing the other boxes. If I need more cash I know where to come, that’s if I dare come back here, but I don’t want to be greedy. Right now I have enough to find a hotel, to feed myself and to get transport if I need it. Then a thought occurs to me. There are passports here and driving licences. All I need to do is find one that looks like me, a mixed-race girl with dark brown eyes and long, unruly curly hair. I pull the other boxes down and scrabble through them aware that Cain could return at any moment. I want to be out of here by the time he gets back, because it’s a meeting and a conversation I really don’t want to have.
