‘Oh, Mrs. Diana, you would be surprised by how mean the world can be,’ Apollo said with a chilling tone coloring his calm, slow voice. ‘You live in a bubble if you believe people won’t vote for greedy, rich, privileged people to die. Especially in these unbearable times.’
Clio let out a scream as all the lights were switched off, and once again found herself jumping closer to her brothers. As triplets, she always felt she was dealt a shitty card. Both her womb companions were tall, athletically built with strong features. She, on the other hand, stood a few feet below them and even with a healthy appetite, weight never gathered on her skinny bones.
The lights only remained closed for a split second. An attention warning as the robotic voice came back.
‘One hour. Keep voting. Twenty thousand votes already cast and no word from the Minister of Health.’
‘Twenty thousand! My God,’ Salome said and raised her eyes towards the heavens. ‘Virgin Mary, I pray to you. Bring an end to this insanity!’
Valentina turned to Alex. ‘Is it just me or did the voice sound different?’
‘Probably just excitement. The previous recording might have been made before our arrival.’
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have fallen for the whole free...’
‘Shh, stop talking nonsense. We both wanted to come. It could easily have been me who came home first and found it under our door.’
Valentina pushed her blonde hair back and licked her dry lips. ‘Why was it under our door? I don’t get it. They do have a point. Why were we not blamed for something?’
‘I have a theory.’
‘Shoot.’
‘Well,’ he said and crossed his arms across his chest. His signature posture of let me explain this and then gloat. ‘It wasn’t meant for us. It was for number six. Our number was, as on most days, unscrewed and upside down.’
Valentina’s eyes opened wide. ‘Number six is owned by that businessman who meets there with his mistress...’
‘Exactly! He’s the bastard who should be standing here. Not us.’
Valentina took a step back; her eyes fixed on the fly buzzing around the light. ‘If you’d only fixed it...’ she mumbled.
‘Hey, come on, that’s not fair...’
‘No, no. I’m sorry, I... forget it,’ she apologized, placing her open palms upon his chest. ‘Besides, we are safe, right? We aren’t being blamed,’ she whispered in his ear. ‘However, we can’t just stand here and watch these people die.’
Chapter 15
I drove in silence, my eyes focused on the red spot on my mobile phone. As a driver in the hectic and chaotic jungle of the metropolis of Athens, I often wondered what life would be like without Google maps. You entered your destination, your starting point and the route and details appeared. This was normally the time that Ioli would roll her eyes and inform me that the police GPS talks to you and is much easier. A matter of opinions, a matter of age, or a matter of sex? Did my male ego refuse to listen to the annoying lady warning me every minute of what I would need to do in fifty meters? Maybe. Then again, aren’t we as stubborn to decline the use of a map? Cliches...
No comment came from Ioli. She seemed lost in thought. She had taken out her hair band and let down her hair. I guessed she could not lay her head back into the car seat with her trademark ponytail. A few stray droplets decorated her window. Her finger ran along the glass, casually strolling from one drop to another. I could see her lips slightly moving, yet no sound was produced.
‘Okay, I can’t take it. What’s bothering you?’ I asked.
‘You could say what’s on your mind, boss. Bothering, bothers me,’ she said, and a straight-line smile came and went. ‘It’s such a guy’s question, you know? As if all women are bothered...’
‘The feminist raises!’
‘Sounds like a lame movie title. You’re lucky; I know you’re not like that and you have Tracy as a queen.’
I kept my eyes on the dark road ahead. ‘You still haven’t answered my question.’
‘The address of the mobile location. It sounds familiar.’
I turned and looked at the phone that permanently lived in her hand or pocket. ‘My partner, this strong-willed Cretan, tells me Google it. And she says it so sarcastically as to imply I am old.’
She twisted in her seat; her eyes and finger abandoning the wet window. Her whole body faced me. ‘Already have, smarty pants. Nothing came up.’
‘Maybe seeing it will refresh your memory,’ I said and turned right at the over-hanging traffic lights. The streets were nearly deserted. Most Greeks remained in front of their blank screens. Others, one by one, gave up on waiting for Hotel Murder’s return and headed for their beds. We decided to head back to HQ and found out more about Alexandro and Valentina. As Ioli put it, though, ‘No one knew shit.’
Due to having discovered the billionaire’s body, and maybe because Ioli had trained Alexandro as a rookie, we were not assigned to the Hotel Murder case. Ioli exited the building disappointed. ‘I’m too frustrated to go home. Shall we go now and investigate the house? I need some fresh air.’
And that’s how we ended up driving the quiet, rainy, badly-lit streets of the old town. ‘We’re here. Filellinon Street. Let’s find number 8A,’ I commented as I turned left and looked up at the rusty street sign, nailed to the crumbling wall featuring artistic graffiti.
‘That’s where Themi’s system pinpointed the location. Though, it could be any of the houses next to it. None look big enough for us to be sure. He did mumble something about up to twenty meters from the spot.’
She was right. The houses were stuck together like unwilling sardines. Most with basement apartments below them. The lines separating their bricks were hard to distinguish. Many were uninhabited or such was the impression they gave me. No lights, overflowing mail-boxes, broken windows, and weed-infested front yards painted the picture of the neighborhood. Every few houses, a closed shop broke the monotony.
In the row of worn-in houses, the crown for the worst belonged to 8A. Its roof sagged - having caved in like hot bread taken out the oven too soon. Smashed windows were the rule and local hooligans had used their spray cans upon its walls, to express their love. Either for a girl or their football team.
I parked by the sidewalk, and we both stepped out into the chilly night. The light above us flicked as we walked under it. Funny how that always happens. As a kid, I liked to imagine myself a mutant and thought that my electromagnetic energy distorted the energy force field. Yes, I was that kind of boy.
‘Let me take a wild guess. No one is home?’ Ioli said as we both stood before the broken door that swayed in the night breeze, squeaking along the way, whining and reminiscing of better days.
‘Better safe than sorry,’ I replied, and my gun came to my side.
The next hour had us exploring dirty rooms and avoiding spider webs in not just 8A, but an additional three abandoned houses and a shop.
‘No one seems awake in the houses around. I was hoping for some snoopy neighbor. I will get a team of rookies down here, first thing in the morning, to collect intel’.’
Our tired bodies returned to the car, craving to return home to hot showers, a good midnight snack and a compassionate hug. Yet, our minds remained on Alexandro and Valentina. The idea of them being in danger, somewhere unknown to us, ate at us from the inside.
Chapter 16
Deep blue, wild, proud waves ran through the bay and headed towards Thessaloniki’s coast. Soon, their short-lived journey came to an end, dying before the beauty of Greece’s second largest city.
The seafront road hosted many packed cafes. Packed with heated discussions and eyes glued to over-hanging TV sets. A group of teenagers sat on the corner couch of their favorite coffee house, each with their smart phone cemented in their hand.
‘I voted for the priest. Screw them. All that money and they give nothing back,’ a girl with green highlights said.
‘My dad says bankers are the ones to blame,’ a boy
sitting with his legs folded on the sofa commented.
The red-haired girl with her eyes lowered to her phone chuckled.
‘Why are you laughing, baby?’ her boyfriend, the handsome teen with ripped jeans, asked.
‘Done,’ she said.
His eyes and hands asked, ‘with what?’
‘I just voted for all of them,’ she declared and smiled widely.
It was his turn to laugh. ‘Babe, that means you didn’t vote at all.’
‘Huh? What do you mean? I just said, I voted...’
‘...For them all,’ he cut her off. ‘That means if all had ten votes, they all have eleven. You made no difference.’
‘You sound like our math teacher. If you have so many apples and a train is travelling so fast, why the heck am I so bored?’
‘Shh, weirdos,’ her sister said. ‘The voice is back. I voted for the triplets, by the way. Spoiled vermin, the lot of them!’
The serene, distorted voice came once again through TVs around the country, interrupting the news surrounding the story. Survivor was obviously cancelled. Many were surprised at the ease of the interruption, and some figured that the TV station was in on the sick game.
Little did they know that police squad teams had located the base of the transmission, just hundreds of meters away from the station. Herculean men, dressed in black, escorted by their rifles, helmets and Kevlar vests surrounded the seemingly deserted bungalow.
The uninhabited, run-down home had stood empty for nearly a decade, and wild weeds had become the masters of its front garden. One by one, the task force members rushed past its faded blue gate that hung tilted at an angle and screeched with every push of the night wind.
Miles away, at Athen’s Metropolitan police station, the Minister of Health paced up and down behind the Police Chief. The similarly built men, with silver hair and deep wrinkles upon their worried faces, were the only ones talking; they were surrounded by silent advisors. All eyes were on the eight screens before them, watching as the squad teams approached the shabby cottage with the moth-eaten curtains.
‘We’re late. Time’s up,’ the Minister of Health said, and for the first time since his divorce, he bit his nails. ‘When we, the cabinet, decided not to negotiate, I expected quicker results.’
‘Relax,’ the chief said, though his voice shook, betraying the worry roaming free inside him. ‘We will arrest whoever is sending out the images and find out where the hostages are being kept.’
‘The two hours are over! They are going to kill someone any minute now. We won’t make it on time, even if they admit to the hotel’s location.’
The chief turned to the minister’s direction, his hands massaging his lower back. ‘If there is no signal being transmitted, they will have no audience to show the murder and make more demands, right? By shutting down the transmission, we stop this madness.’
The minister let out a gorilla-like yell and sat down on an uncomfortable-looking chair in the corner of the control room. He mumbled, ‘I hope you’re right,’ and closed his eyes as his feet tap-danced upon the hardwood floor.
The sound of the wooden, chipped door being kicked in echoed in the control room, leading their conversation to its death. Lights swirled around the bungalow as the police officers stormed in, forcing rodents and bugs to flee in terror. In the middle of the living room was the only piece of furniture not buried in dust. A brand-new round table stood, hosting a laptop connected to an antenna, less than two feet high. Multiple wires ran out of it, down to a sizable black box under the cheap, beige table.
‘Clear.’
‘Kitchen, clear.’
‘Bedroom, clear.’
Deep voices came through crackling receivers. The house was empty.
Suddenly, the laptop screen came to life. It transmitted the image from inside Hotel Murder.
The sinister voice began. ‘Fellow Greeks, welcome to tonight’s execution. The cabinet of ministers did not obey and did not take the required actions to better our health system...’
The police technicians studied the laptop. ‘This is just to distract us. Its strength is weak. It was placed here so it could reach the station’s headquarters, but this is not the system that has hijacked their transmission,’ one tech said.
‘There’s nothing we can do from here,’ the woman next to him said, yet still unplugged the entire system. Everything was to be bagged and sent back to their labs for further examination.
Meanwhile, back at Hotel Murder, few were left in a group. As each person entered a room alone, the door shut closed behind him. A trip to the bathroom turned out to be their last. Gas blew into the locked lavatory and eyes awoke alone in dark rooms. One by one, the house ate up the group and the plan of the mastermind behind it all was set in motion.
Bishop Arsenios had entered a dark room by the Grand Hall. ‘Let’s check if there are any unsealed windows in here,’ he said and flicked open the lights. The room was completely empty, its walls bare and without windows. The small room had only one other door. Also, closed. ‘Let me take a look,’ he said and smiled at his wife. Salome bit her trembling bottom lip and exited the room. She stepped out into the hallway to check on the rest of the group. That was the last she ever saw of Arsenios.
The hefty door slammed behind her, causing her to jump. ‘Arsenios?’ she yelled as her cracked hands with arched, chewed nails banged against the door. ‘Help me!’ she cried, hoping to grab attention from anyone nearby. She kept on hitting the door until she heard the voice. ‘The two hours are up,’ she whispered as she wiped the few droplets of blood from her knuckles. It was a first for Salome - to clench her fists and punch a door. Calm and quiet were the most common adjectives used to describe her by family and friends.
Tears escaped her still eyes as the voice announced that, with 6,136 votes, Bishop Arsenios had been chosen as next to die. Her body slid down the flowery wallpaper and she sat upon the carpeted floor. ‘Lord, have mercy,’ she said and closed her eyes in prayer.
Just moments before, Arsenios had felt the blow of sleeping gas hit him as he entered the second room. Dizzy and disoriented, he awoke lying on the ground. It took him a minute or two to place his sweaty palms upon the cold ground and put weight on his hairy hands. He pushed himself up and took a step forward, his forehead hitting hard at the glass frame. He rubbed his sore, blood-red eyes and struggled to focus.
He stood surrounded by glass. Locked away in a see-through cage. A cage in the middle of the empty room. Four cameras were pointing at him from the room’s corners. The ponderous bishop tried throwing his weight against the glass, but it did not budge. It did not even shake.
Arsenios stood still, thinking of his five adolescent children. If –as the voice spoke to the Greek people- his kids would see his end, he wished to go with his head held high. He wrapped his fingers around the gold cross hanging from his neck, closed his eyes and began to pray.
‘A bit too late for that, Bishop,’ the voice taunted him.
‘And who are you to judge, sir? A coward behind a mic...’
‘My peers and I fight for a better Greece. A Greece, where the church, the billion-euro worth church is taxed just like everyone else. You preach the word of God, yet poverty and misery are on the rise. Greece has voted. Any last words?’
‘May God have mercy on your soul.’
‘I hope the Devil shows none on yours.’
A screeching noise from above caught his attention. A buzzing sound could be heard, and it was getting louder by the second. Within a minute, a plague of locusts filled the glass-built cage. Arsenios fell to his knees, his hands covering his mouth. He could fell tiny, filthy legs all over his bare skin.
People gasped in front of their TV sets. Remorse from his voters?
‘No time for ten plagues, Bishop. Just the two,’ the distorted voice announced and red water fell from above, pushing locusts to a watery grave. Arsenios stood up and waited for the water to reach his bearded chin before he started to swim.
I doubt, I will fit into the opening, but it’s worth a shot.
And with that thought, he pushed himself up, his hands frantically trying to grab on to safety. The screeching noise from above left him with no hope. He was sealed in.
‘Salome, I love you. See you on the other side!’ he yelled, and serenity indulged him. His body fell down into the red pool and bubbles of air caught in his lungs rushed to the top.
TV screens turned black.
‘One down, but still more to go. Keep voting, Greece. Our demands will be met. We await the cabinet of ministers to announce the taxation of the church and the Archbishop to announce the donation of one hundred million euros to Save The Children foundation. The money will be used to fund school meals. No child will ever starve again. If in an hour, these demands are not met, the next in line will be sentenced to death.’
Chapter 17
It was a heated discussion between ministers if there ever was one.
The prime minister placed his head between his hands as he heard them shout out their opinions.
‘If we give in now, he will just keep making demands and people will expect us to oblige. This is no different than negotiating with terrorists.’
‘Deep down, we all want to tax the church, yet fear the retaliation. This is a golden opportunity.’
‘Even if we announce our agreement, it will be a long road before it becomes law. We would be buying time.’
Miles away, the Archbishop also sat before his council of sleepy bishops. The difference being their agreement. With fifteen votes for and none against, the council calmly voted to announce that the church, despite popular belief, did not have such a cash flow in their possession. Also, that they did not accept anyone to undermine their efforts for Greece’s well-being. The church funded hundreds of charities, and its doors were always open for anyone who needed a warm meal or a place to eat.
The council did not remain so calm when the spokesman for the government announced the intention to take all necessary steps for the taxation of church property to become law.
Hotel Murder: The most gripping, page-turning mystery of the year (Greek Island Mysteries Book 5) Page 8
