The Refugee

by S A Tameez

  As they walked on, Ahmed’s heart began to race as he noticed a police officer walking toward them. Ahmed noticed Stelios’ head turn. “Don’t even think about it.” Ahmed said from behind him, as if he had just intercepted his thoughts. “I’ll blow your brains all over these shop windows.” The man let the police officer walk pass.

  They walked around the back of the main street to a small car park. The man stopped at a dark blue BMW and pressed the open button on his key fob. The car was flash to say the least. It was an M5 with the limited-edition body-kit and customised metallic paint job. It was gleaming like it had just gone through the car wash.

  “Get in,” Ahmed said, pointing at the driver’s side. Ahmed jumped into the back, sitting directly behind him.

  “Now drive.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “Just drive — now!” The man revved the engine and it roared as he began driving.

  As Stelios drove, Ahmed looked about him and he noticed a street that looked to be part of an industrial estate. He directed the man to turn down it. He was right; it was filled with factories and warehouses.

  A lot of the buildings looked run down and out of use. He instructed Stelios to stop outside an isolated building that had broken windows and looked as if it was derelict.

  “Get out.”

  The man looked at the building in horror and shook his head. “Are you serious?”

  “Dead serious,” Ahmed replied with the gun now pressed on the back of the man’s head. The man reluctantly got out of the car, taking as long as he possibly could. Ahmed got out and gave him a shove towards the building.

  The locks on the door had already been broken. And the rusted hinges screamed as Ahmed flung the door open. The cobwebs and plentiful dust indicated that it had been vacant for a while. It appeared to be an old furniture making factory judging by the wooden chairs and tables scattered around. There was an old rickety-looking staircase to Ahmed’s left and he pushed the man towards it. Half way up, his captive stopped. “Are you going to kill me?”

  “Well, that really depends on you!”

  The man paused briefly before getting the hint and then continued walking up the laborious set of stairs. The angle of the staircase was at almost ninety degrees, which was painful for even the strongest thighs. A surge of burning pain rushed up Ahmed’s leg muscles.

  There was more furniture on this floor. The well-crafted, wooden chairs and solid tables made Ahmed wonder why the furniture wasn’t used or sold, and remained there to rot.

  Ahmed kicked a chair towards the man.

  “Sit down,” Ahmed ordered, then looked around the room. He noticed some electrical cables dangling down from the ceiling. He yanked them as hard as he could, ripping them out of whatever they were in. A cloud of dust came down and floated around the room like mist.

  Ahmed used two electrical wires to tie up the man’s arms to the arms of the chair. He then used another to tie his legs together and then around the legs of the chair. The remaining wire was used to tie the man’s body to the chair.

  Ahmed felt like he was watching someone else tie up this man. How could he do such a thing? When he looked at the man, who was mumbling a prayer, it really began to sink in. He’d kidnapped a man at gun point, brought him to an abandoned factory and had just tied him up. It was a disturbing scene and made Ahmed feel sick.

  “What are you going to do with me?” the man asked, with sweat pouring down his forehead. “Please don’t kill me… I have a family.”

  Ahmed felt like he had been kicked in the stomach. This was a man that had a family, one that probably relied on him. What if those kids in the picture-frame were waiting for him… maybe he was supposed to pick them up from school? What have I done?

  “I had a family too.” Ahmed said. What was coming out of his mouth was nothing like what was going on in his head. Somewhere inside his inner workings, there was a compassionate Ahmed, but he knew he had to be tough, ruthless even, or he would lose any chance of finding Malik. “My wife, she died not so long ago, and my ten-year-old son was abducted from a refugee camp.” What Ahmed had been thinking and feeling for this man, was clouded by pain and anger. How could he have compassion for anyone else when no one had any for him. His wife was dead and no one even knew her name. And who knows or cares about his son? Malik was a nobody. That’s why it was easy for him to be taken and like so many others, it was as if he never existed.

  “I am sorry to hear about that.”

  “I don’t want your pity!” Ahmed shouted. “I want my son back!” Ahmed grabbed the man’s face and squeezed, “Now, I am going to ask you again… where is my son?”

  “I…I don’t know where your son is, I swear I—” The words came out garbled, but recognisable, as Ahmed’s grip on Stelios’ face tightened.

  “The men that took my son had your name and address written down.”

  “What men?” the man said, again with difficulty.

  Ahmed let go of the man’s face, allowing him to get his breath back.

  “So what if they had my name and address?” the man added, “I’m a respectable solicitor... I’m sure plenty of people have my name and address.” He had a point, Ahmed thought. But he wasn’t convinced. There’s no way an operation like organised kidnapping could work without a sleazy solicitor and crooked coppers.

  Ahmed took off his blazer and waistcoat and threw them on the floor. He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and pulled another chair towards himself. He sat directly opposite the man and stared deep into his eyes. “Maybe I haven’t made myself clear enough... I really do not want to hurt you, but I will do whatever it takes to get my son back! Whatever—it—takes.”

  The man shook his head. “Look, I am sorry about you son, I really am, but I have nothing to do with this. If you let me go, I promise I won’t go to the authorities; you have my word.” There was short pause. “I have money... just tell me how much you need — and the car, you can take the car. I won’t even report it stolen.”

  “I will ask you one more time, where—is—my—son? Where are they keeping the boys they have abducted? Who oversees the operation?”

  “I don’t know. I swear!”

  Ahmed was positive that the man sitting before him was a bare-faced liar. Every time he answered, his eyes shifted from side to side, a typical mannerism for a liar.

  Ahmed clenched his jaw, which was, by now, throbbing painfully. He had given the man enough chances to tell the truth. There’s a time for a pen and a time for a sword. Ahmed swung his arm with his fist clenched, striking the man on the side of the face. The man let out a loud scream, his cheek beginning to swell. The blow left Ahmed’s knuckles red with the force of the blow. They hurt; it was the first time he had ever punched anyone.

  “Where is my son?” Ahmed growled; he felt no remorse or compassion.

  He struck the man again, this time on the other side of his face, catching his nose. A trickle of blood appeared from one of his nostrils. Ahmed had hurt someone, and yet still he felt nothing. He struck the man again. This time his victim’s lip exploded and bled down his chin.

  He felt emotionless. It was probably just as well. He did not want to feel anything at all. He had a job to do and didn’t want emotions to get in the way of that.

  “Now that you know I am serious and what I am capable of, I suggest you tell me exactly what I want to know!” There could be no doubt that Ahmed was serious, as he pointed the gun close to his hostage’s face, yet the man still said nothing.

  I can’t believe he is making me do this! Why won’t he just tell me where my son is?

  Ahmed looked around him, noticing some abandoned tools, one of which was a claw hammer. It was covered in dust and its once shinning metal, was now a golden with rust. Ahmed grabbed it, holding it tightly from its black rubber grip.

  “What... what are you doing?” the man asked. There was no mistaking the fear in the man’s eyes as blood still oozed from his nose and lip. “Please... please
don’t do this... please I beg you.” The man pleaded. But Ahmed’s eyes were like the headlights of train, running at full steam. Ahmed took a moment to untie one of the man’s hands from the other, and secured it by his wrist to the arm of the chair with a piece of the cable. The other hand he made sure was still tied to the back of the chair.

  Ahmed spread the man’s digits and without hesitation, he launched the hammer onto one of his fingers. The sound of the bone breaking and the man’s agonising cry, was nerve-racking. The nail was shattered and blood seeped out of his finger. The man looked as though he were about to pass out.

  “Tell me where my son is now!” Ahmed screamed into the man’s face. “You’ve got nine more...”

  Ahmed pulled back his arm ready to strike again, “Are you going to tell me what I want to know or am I going to have to continue?”

  The man was barely able to speak, “I won’t tell you.”

  Ahmed paused, won’t tell, surely if he didn’t know he would have said: can’t tell...

  “What do you mean, won’t tell?” Ahmed grabbed a handful of the man’s hair and pulled, exposing his receding hairline.

  “I will not say anything... there is nothing that you can do that will be worse than what will happen to me and my family if I say anything. So, you will have to kill me.”

  Ahmed held the hammer up as if he were in a film and someone had pressed the pause button. He felt his eyes returning to their normal size and begin to refocus without the red blur that had taken them over. His shoulders slumped, and the hammer fell out of his hand as he fell back into the chair.

  “You are in way over your head,” the man muttered, sweating like a pig, and breathing heavily, his face etched with pain. “I’m not going to tell you anything, nothing at all. So, you may as well kill me.”

  Ahmed’s head pounded. He knew that no matter how much he tortured this man, he wouldn’t speak. He was protecting his family — ready to die for them. Ahmed could relate to that.

  He stood up. Looking at the man, tied up, bleeding, and bruised, he wanted to throw up. The dingy abandoned factory, the blood-stained hammer on the floor — it was the kind of gruesome scene that you would read about in a Steven King novel. Ahmed took his surroundings in as if he had just woken into a nightmare. It didn’t feel real, any of it.

  He grabbed his suitcase, the keys to the man’s car, then hurried down the steep stairs and out of the factory. He jumped into the man’s car, drove as fast as he could. He wasn’t sure what to do next but he knew that he had try to help the man that he had just viciously assaulted. He stopped at a pharmacy close by, grabbed the strongest painkillers he could find, a few bottles of mineral water, a box of bandages, and a pack of antiseptic wipes. A shopping list filled with guilt. He felt paranoid, feeling that the woman behind the counter could see into his mind and knew exactly what he had done — what he had become. The evil creature he had become.

  He drove back to the factory as fast he could. He was hoping that when he got back he would find the man unharmed and that it had been just his mind playing tricks on him.

  He froze when he saw the man slumped in the chair, unconscious. Ahmed walked forward, slowly. He had finally broken out of crazy mode. The kind and compassionate Ahmed, the one with the conscience, had now regained control of the ship, and had immediately removed the Ahmed who had become a devil from the crew. The sight of the bruised and bloodied man made him want to melt into the ground.

  He waved the back of his hand in front of the man’s mouth. He felt the man’s warm breath on the back of his fingers. Thank God, he’s still breathing. The man coughed and groaned in pain as he came back round. His eyes grew and he began to panic when he saw Ahmed in front of him.

  He quickly opened the foiled wrapping of the pain killer and removed two tablets. “It’s ok, this will take the edge off the pain.” He put the tablets into the man’s mouth and then poured some mineral water into him to help him wash them down. The man’s eyes were locked onto Ahmed’s as though he were petrified that this was a sadistic joke.

  Ahmed had no intentions of hurting him any further. He removed an antiseptic wipe and began to clean the man’s wounds. As he worked, the man had a perplexed look on his face as if he could not believe that Ahmed was the same man who’d only moments ago battered him.

  ****

  The black vehicle pulled up outside the police station and Agent Stavros stepped out, putting on his sunglasses and smoothed his smart black suit down. He bent down to check himself in the car wing mirror and ran a hand over his jet-black, slicked back hair. He licked a finger and smoothed it along the designer stubble that ran along his jaw, and when satisfied, he placed an unlit cigarette in between his lips. He looked at his colleague, a shorter, chubby man with similar attire. Except this man didn’t have stubble, nor a cigarette.

  “Let’s go,” Stavros said to his overweight colleague who was breathing heavily like most fat men do, and the pair of them approached the entrance of the police station and Stavros pressed the buzzer. Whilst waiting for someone to answer, a police officer standing close by in the designated smoking area asked, “Hey, you need a light?” when he noticed the unlit cigarette in Stavros’ mouth.

  “No thank you,” Stavros smiled and put the cigarette back into the tin, “I don’t smoke.” The police officer gave a him bewildered stare and then shrugged his shoulders.

  Stavros found the combined smell of strong coffee and cigarettes to be unpleasant to say the least. The thought of it sinking into his suit and leaving him stinking all day made him press the intercom button again, holding it for a few seconds longer than the previous time.

  “Yes?” a voice emerged from the intercom speaker.

  “Special Agent Stavros and Special Agent Harris.” There was a short pause and then the magnetic locks on the door made a loud clunking noise as they released.

  Inside, the police station was full of people preparing for their day. Some getting briefed on assignments, some sitting at their desks sipping coffee, and some preparing for a long day of patrols. Phones were constantly ringing, like an irritating song playing in the background.

  Within a few moments, a short, plump man, wearing a white shirt and a pair of black trousers that looked as though they were about to slip off him, waddled towards them.

  “I am Inspector Lambros, welcome to Chios police station... Now, I know you guys, you special agents...” he then mumbled under his breath, “whatever the hell that is,” and then continued, “think you’re above the law, but let me tell you this, around here, I—” but before the Inspector finished, Agent Stavros walked to the office and casually sat down in a large brown, leather-chair. Agent Harris removed a piece of paper from the inside of his jacket pocket and flashed it in the inspector’s face who snatched it and then followed him to the office.

  “I need somewhere to work and I like this office. I will be working from here until our investigation is over.”

  “But... this is my office.” The inspector said.

  “And a mighty nice office it is,” Agent Stavros remarked. “Now, why don’t you do me a favour and get us two cups of that lovely smelling coffee... it’s been a long a journey.”

  “Hey, you’re not allowed to smoke in here.”

  “I know. I don’t smoke.”

  Agent Harris ushered the inspector out and shut the door. “Can we do that?”

  “We just did!” Stavros replied. He and his colleague chuckled quietly.

  “So, where do we start?” Agent Harris asked.

  “From the beginning,” Stavros said, whilst looking around at the cluttered room. The room contained a desk full of scattered paper, boxes of various sizes sitting on the floor and two unusually large filing cabinets that looked like skyscrapers. The filing cabinets had a ladder leaning against them, presumably to use to get to the top drawer. But the real mystery lay in how on earth they managed to get them through the door. Stavros arched his back and stretched out his arms as far as he could. It
was the sort of stretch that became mandatory after a long drive. The problem, however, was it normally resulted in him wanting to go to sleep, the heating on and the comfortable office chair wasn’t helping either.

  After a few minutes, there was a knock at the office door. “Come in,” Stavros said. The inspector walked back in with two cups of fresh coffee. His demeanour was different. It was like cool water had been poured all over him and he had calmed down as a result.

  “Excellent. Thank you,” Stavros said, his nostrils flared as he inhaled the smell of the coffee.

  “Now my good fellows... maybe we got off on the wrong foot. I have just got off the phone with my boss and it appears you men are here on some really important business. And being in charge of the police station here, I am going to need the details, especially if you want my help.”

  “Of course,” Stavros said, taking a large sip of coffee, “we wouldn’t have it any other way.” He closed his eyes as the warm coffee went down his throat and into his stomach, successfully warming his insides.

  He put the cigarette that he’d been carrying around in the metal case since he quit, four-years-ago, back in its tin and then back in his pocket.

  “Please, Inspector… sit down,” he gestured, “we are here in search for someone... someone we believe to be highly skilled and extremely dangerous.” He looked over at Harris and nodded. Harris opened the briefcase and removed a large, brown envelope and handed it to Stavros. Stavros took out a photo and put it on the desk for the inspector to see. “This is Mohammed Ahmed, Professor Mohammed Ahmed, from Syria. Our intelligence team have informed us that he managed to get here by pretending that he is a refugee seeking asylum. He escaped from the camp and killed a volunteer, whose body was found stuffed in a cupboard.” Stavros then removed photos of the body and put them on the table as well.

  “Nice!” The inspector said, raising his eyebrows. “So, this psycho is loose and roaming around Chios right now. And what’s his motive?”

  “We’re not a-hundred-percent sure. Our sources say that he is linked with ISIS. He has been linked to the recent attack in Greece and is now here to initiate another attack.”